An Original Belle Part 19

CHAPTER XIV.

OMINOUS.

SUBORDINATE only to her father and two chief friends, in Marian's thoughts, was her enemy, for as such she now regarded Willard Merwyn.

She had felt his attentions to be humiliating from the first. They had presented her former life, in which her own amus.e.m.e.nt and pleasure had been her chief thought, in another and a very disagreeable light. These facts alone would have been sufficient to awaken a vindictive feeling, for she was no saint. In addition, she bitterly resented his indifference to a cause made so dear by her father's devotion and her friends' brave self-sacrifice. Whatever his motive might be, she felt that he was cold-blooded, cowardly, or disloyal, and such courtesy as she showed him was due to little else than the hope of inflicting upon him some degree of humiliation.

She had seen too many manifestations of honest interest and ardent love to credit him with any such emotion, and she had no scruples in wounding his pride to the utmost.

Meanwhile events in the b.l.o.o.d.y drama of the war were culminating.

The Union officers were thought to have neither the wisdom to fight at the right time nor the discretion to retreat when fighting was worse than useless. In consequence thousands of brave men were believed by many to have died in vain once more on the ill-fated field of Bull Run.

One morning, the last of August, Strahan galloped to the Vosburgh cottage and said to Marian, who met him at the door: "Orders have come. I have but a few minutes in which to say good-by. Things have gone wrong in Virginia, and every available man is wanted in Was.h.i.+ngton."

His flushed face was almost as fair as her own, and gave him a boyish aspect in spite of his military dress, but unhesitating resolution and courage beamed from his eyes.

"Oh, that I were a man!" Marian cried, "and you would have company.

All those who are most to me will soon be perilling their lives."

"Guess who has decided to go with me almost at the last moment."

"Mr. Blauvelt?"

"Yes; I told him that he was too high-toned to carry a musket, but he said he would rather go as a private than as an officer. He wishes no responsibility, he says, and, beyond mere routine duty, intends to give all his time and thoughts to art. I am satisfied that I have you to thank for this recruit."

"Indeed, I have never asked him to take part in the war."

"No need of your asking any one in set terms. A man would have to be either a coward, or else a rebel at heart, like Merwyn, to resist your influence. Indeed, I think it is all the stronger because you do not use it openly and carelessly. Every one who comes here knows that your heart is in the cause, and that you would have been almost a veteran by this time were you of our s.e.x. Others, besides Blauvelt, obtained the impulse in your presence which decided them.

Indeed, your drawing-room has been greatly thinned, and it almost looks as if few would be left to haunt it except Merwyn."

"I do not think he will haunt it much longer, and I should prefer solitude to his society."

"Well," laughed Strahan, "I think you will have a chance to put one rebel to rout before I do. I don't blame you, remembering your feeling, but Merwyn probably saved my life, and I gave him my hand in a final truce. Friends we cannot be while he maintains his present cold reserve. As you told me, he said he would have done as much for any one, and his manner since has chilled any grateful regard on my part. Yet I am under deep obligations, and hereafter will never do or say anything to his injury."

"Don't trouble yourself about Mr. Merwyn, Arthur. I have my own personal score to settle with him. He has made a good foil for you and my other friends, and I have learned to appreciate you the more. YOU have won my entire esteem and respect, and have taught me how quickly a n.o.ble, self-sacrificing purpose can develop manhood.

O Arthur, Heaven grant that we may all meet again! How proud I shall then be of my veteran friends! and of you most of all. You are triumphing over yourself, and you have won the respect of every one in this community."

"If I ever become anything, or do anything, just enter half the credit in your little note-book," he said, flus.h.i.+ng with pleasure.

"I shall not need a note-book to keep in mind anything that relates to you. Your courage has made me a braver, truer girl. Arthur, please, you won't get reckless in camp? I want to think of you always as I think of you now. When time hangs heavy on your hands, would it give you any satisfaction to write to me?"

"Indeed it will," cried the young officer. "Let me make a suggestion.

I will keep a rough journal of what occurs and of the scenes we pa.s.s through, and Blauvelt will ill.u.s.trate it. How should you like that? It will do us both good, and will be the next best thing to running in of an evening as we have done here."

Marian was more than pleased with the idea. When at last Strahan said farewell, he went away with every manly impulse strengthened, and his heart warmed by the evidences of her genuine regard.

In the afternoon Blauvelt called, and, with Marian and her mother, drove to the station to take part in an ovation to Captain Strahan and his company. The artist had affairs to arrange in the city before enlisting, and proposed to enter the service at Was.h.i.+ngton.

The young officer bore up bravely, but when he left his mother and sisters in tears, his face was stern with effort. Marian observed, however, that his last glance from the platform of the cars rested upon herself. She returned home depressed and nervously excited, and there found additional cause for solicitude in a letter from her father informing her of the great disaster to Union arms which poor generals.h.i.+p had invited. This, as she then felt, would have been bad enough, but in a few tender, closing words, he told her that they might not hear from him in some time, as he had been ordered on a service that required secrecy and involved some danger. Mrs.

Vosburgh was profuse in her lamentations and protests against her husband's course, but Marian went to her room and sobbed until almost exhausted.

Her nature, however, was too strong, positive, and unchastened to find relief in tears, or to submit resignedly. Her heart was full of bitterness and revolt, and her partisans.h.i.+p was becoming almost as intense as that of Mrs. Merwyn.

The afternoon closed with a dismal rain-storm, which added to her depression, while relieving her from the fear of callers. "O dear!"

she exclaimed, as she rose from the mere form of supper, "I have both head-ache and heart-ache. I am going to try to get through the rest of this dismal day in sleep."

"Marian, do, at least, sit an hour or two with me. Some one may come and divert your thoughts."

"No one can divert me to-night. It seems as if an age had pa.s.sed since we came here in June."

"Your father knows how alone we are in the world, with no near relatives to call upon. I think he owes his first duty to us."

"The men of the North, who are right, should be as ready to sacrifice everything as the men of the South, who are wrong; and so also should Northern women. I am proud of the fact that my father is employed and trusted by his government. The wrong rests with those who caused the war."

"Every man can't go and should not go. The business of the country must be carried on just the same, and rich business men are as important as soldiers. I only wish that, in our loneliness and with the future so full of uncertainty, you would give sensible encouragement to one abundantly able to give you wealth and the highest position."

"Mr. Merwyn?"

"Yes, Mr. Merwyn," continued her mother, with an emphasis somewhat irritable. "He is not an old, worn-out millionnaire, like Mr.

Lanniere. He is young, exceedingly handsome, so high-born that he is received as an equal in the houses of the t.i.tled abroad. He has come to me like an honorable man, and asked for the privilege of paying his addresses. He would have asked your father had he been in town. He was frank about his affairs, and has just received, in his own name, a very large property, which he proposes to double by entering upon business in New York."

"What does his mother think of his intentions toward me?" the young girl asked, so quietly, that Mrs. Vosburgh was really encouraged.

"He says that he and his mother differ on many points, and will differ on this one, and that is all he seemed inclined to say, except to remark significantly that he had attained his majority."

"It was he whom you meant, when you said that some one might come who would divert my thoughts?"

"I think he would have come, had it not been for the storm."

"Mamma, you have not given him any encouragement? You have not compromised yourself, or me?"

Mrs. Vosburgh bridled with the beginnings of resentment, and said, "Marian, you should know me too well--"

"There, there, mamma, I was wrong to think of such a thing; I ask your pardon."

"I may have my sensible wishes and preferences," resumed the lady, complacently, "but I have never yet acted the role of the anxious, angling mamma. I cannot help wis.h.i.+ng, however, that you would consider favorably an offer like this one, and I certainly could not treat Mr. Merwyn otherwise than with courtesy."

"That was right and natural of you, mamma. You have no controversy with Mr. Merwyn; I have. I hate and detest him. Well, since he may come, I shall dress and be prepared."

"O Marian! you are so quixotic!"

"Dear mamma, you are mistaken. Do not think me inconsiderate of you. Some day I will prove I am not by my marriage, if I marry;"

and she went to her mother and kissed her tenderly.