AT HER SIDE.
The arrangement of the guests at the dinner-table that evening suited all concerned. Phil sat at the right of the host, with Lucia directly opposite, where her face was before him all the while. Marge sat at the right of the hostess, where he could closely observe the young man from the country, and, not less important, Tramlay’s manner toward the younger guest. He could also note the effect of the young man and his ways upon Mrs. Tramlay; for did he not know how to translate every expression of her face? It was his own fault if he did not, for he had been one of her suitors nearly a quarter of a century before, and the lady had never ceased to be mildly grateful for this compliment, and to repose as much confidence in him as a loyal wife might without harm grant an acquaintance who never had been offensive.
That Mrs. Tramlay wanted Lucia to become Mrs. Marge was one of these confidences,—not spoken, but none the less distinctly understood,—and it had taken all of Marge’s adroitness to maintain his position with the family, since Lucia’s “coming out,” to avoid being brought to propose. Several years earlier he had fully intended to make{63} Lucia his own when she should reach marriageable age, and many and acceptable had been the attentions by which he had endeavored to secure the first place in the girl’s regard. But somehow as his prospects gradually yet distinctly brightened, the profits of the iron trade as gradually and distinctly waned; Marge was not in the iron trade himself, but Lucia’s father was, and bachelors at forty-five generally expect something with a bride besides a father’s blessing. What the girl’s father thought of him Marge had never taken time to wonder; for if he was satisfactory to his fastidious self, how could he be otherwise to a plodding family man? His social position was good; his name had never been part of a scandal; he had no debts; he never borrowed money; and, although a club man, no one had ever seen him drunk, or heard of his being fond of actresses. If all this did not make a man not merely irreproachable, but highly desirable as a son-in-law, what did parents expect?
The arrangement of seats at the table suited Lucia also. She knew her mother’s matrimonial intentions regarding her. She was not in love with Marge, but girls in her set did not think it good form to be very fond of men whom they probably would have to marry. If, however, Marge meant business, she wished he would be more attentive to it. She felt that she was missing a great deal of pleasure for lack of proper escort. Twice in the course of the last season Marge had taken her and her mother to the opera; Lucia adored opera,—that is, she liked to look about the house, and see who was with who, and how the prima donna dressed, and to have gentlemen{64} call at her box between acts,—but two operas were merely sips at a cup she longed to drain, and only once had she been able to persuade her father to mitigate the privation. If apparent interest in Phil at table could have any effect upon Marge’s languid purpose, the provoking fellow should not lack stimulus. To have to devote herself for a whole hour to one young man, in the long hair and country garb which regained their awkwardness in her mind’s eye when her father announced that Phil was coming to dinner, seemed a hard task; but when the young man made his appearance Lucia was so agreeably surprised that what had seemed a task at once became by anticipation a positive pleasure.
The evening soon opened promisingly for Marge, for Phil took soup a second time,—a proceeding which inflicted upon Mrs. Tramlay several moments of uncontrolled annoyance and caused profound silence around the table. But Lucia rapidly recovered; desperate cases required desperate remedies; so she said,—
“Phil, do you remember that dinner you once made us in the grove by the beach?”
“Indeed I do,” said Phil. “I never shall forget it.” And he told the truth; for Lucia’s look of horror when he brought from the fire a piece of board piled high with roasted clams had been one of the few great mental dampers of his life.
“You made us forks from dried twigs,” said Lucia. “I kept mine as a memento; it is hanging over my mantel now, with a bow of blue ribbon around it.”{65}
Marge frowned perceptibly; Mrs. Tramlay looked horrified; but Phil’s face lightened so quickly that Lucia’s little heart gave a gay bound.
“Why didn’t you ever give a clam-bake on Sunday,—the only day I could be there?” asked Tramlay. “I’d give more for such a meal out of doors than for the best dinner that Delmonico could spread.”
“Edgar!” gasped Mrs. Tramlay. It did not reach him, though the look that accompanied it passed in its full force from the foot of the table to the head.
“Why, Sunday,” said Phil, with some hesitation,—“Sunday is—Sunday.”
“Quite true,” said the host. “It is in the country, at least; I wish ’twas so here.”
“Edgar,” said Mrs. Tramlay, “don’t make Mr. Hayn think we are heathens. You know we never fail to go to service on Sunday.”
“Yes,” said Tramlay; “we’re as good Pharisees as any other family in New York.”
“And after that dinner in the woods,” continued Lucia, “we went for pond-lilies: don’t you remember? I do believe I should have been drowned in that awful pond if you hadn’t caught me.”
Again Marge’s brows gathered perceptibly.
“He merely drew her aside from a muddy place,” whispered Mrs. Tramlay.
“Well, this is interesting,” said Tramlay, at the other end of the table. “Hayn, are there many places out your way where silly girls are likely to be drowned if they are allowed to roam about without a keeper?”
“Quite a number,” said Phil, as seriously as if his{66} host expected a list of the Haynton ponds and their relative depths. “For instance, Boddybanks Pond is about——”
“Oh, that was the pond where we went canoeing,—that pond with the funny name! My! I wish I was in that very canoe, on that very pond, this very minute.”
“Lucia!” exclaimed Mrs. Tramlay.
“I know ’twas dreadfully impolite to say before company,” said Lucia, with a pretty affectation of penitence, “but everybody knows I can’t be there, and that ’twould be too cold for comfort; so it doesn’t do any harm to wish it. And I should like that canoe-trip over again: shouldn’t you, Phil?”
“I certainly should,” said Phil. “That pond is very pretty in summer, when everything around it is green. There are a great many shades of green there, on account of there being a great variety of trees and bushes. But you wouldn’t know the place at this season; and I think it’s a great deal prettier. The ground—the water, too—is covered with leaves of bright colors; there are a lot of blazing red swamp maples around it, in spots, and three or four cedar-trees, with poison-ivy vines——”
“Ugh!” ejaculated Mrs. Tramlay.
“Poison-ivy leaves, you know, are the clearest crimson in the fall,” Phil continued, “and they’re so large and grow so close together that they make a bit of woods look like a splendid sunset.”
“Oh, papa!” exclaimed Lucia, clapping her hands, “let’s go out to Haynton to-morrow, just for two or three days.”{67}
“Lucia,” said her mother, severely, “you forget all your engagements for the next few days.”
“Her father’s own child,” said Tramlay. “She forgets everything but the subject before her. She would make a good business-man—if she weren’t a girl.”
“I saw some couples out canoeing at Mount Desert, last season,” drawled Marge. “It seemed to me dreadfully dangerous, as well as very uncomfortable for the lady.”
“Oh, our canoe wasn’t one of those wretched little things; was it, Phil? ’Twas a great long pond-boat, made of beech bark——”
“Birch,” suggested Phil.
“Birch bark, and so heavy that I couldn’t upset it, though I tried my hardest.”
“Lucia!” The voice was Mrs. Tramlay’s, of course.
“Why, mamma, the water wasn’t knee-deep; I measured it with the paddle.”
Mrs. Tramlay sank back in her chair, and whispered that if the family ever went to the country again she would not dare leave that child out of her sight for a single instant, but she had hoped that a girl twenty years of age would have enough sense not to imperil her own life. As for that farmer fellow, she had supposed he was sensible enough to——
“You wouldn’t have tried that trick if I had been in the canoe, Miss Tramlay,” said Phil.
“Why not?” asked Lucia: she knew how to look defiant without ceasing to be pretty.
“Well, I would have been responsible for you, you know,—your instructor in navigation, so to speak;{68} and it’s one of the first principles of that art not to take any risk unless something’s to be gained by it.”
“Good!” exclaimed Tramlay.
“Not bad,” assented Marge.
“But I’d have got something if I’d succeeded in upsetting the boat,” said Lucia: “I’d have got a ducking.”
Then everybody laughed,—everybody but Mrs. Tramlay, who intimated to Marge that Lucia was simply being ruined by her father’s indulgence.
The dinner ended, the host and Marge retired to the library to smoke. Phil was invited to accompany them, but Lucia exclaimed,—
“Phil has been too well brought up to have such bad habits. He is going to keep me from feeling stupid, as ladies always do while gentlemen smoke after dinner.”
She took Phil’s arm and led him to the drawing-room, where the young man soon showed signs of being more interested in the pictures on the wall than in the girl by his side.
“These are very different from the pictures you used to see in our little parlor in Haynton,” said Phil. “Different from any in our town, in fact.”
“Are they?” said Lucia. “But you might be loyal to home, and insist that yours were unlike any in New York; because they were, you know.”
“I didn’t suppose they were anything unusual,” said Phil, quite innocently.
“Oh, they were, though,” insisted Lucia, with much earnestness. “I’m sure you couldn’t find one of them in any parlor in New York. Let me see: I{69} do believe I could name them all, if I were to close my eyes a moment. There was ‘General Taylor at the Battle of Buena Vista,’ ‘The Destruction of Jerusalem,’ the ‘Declaration of Independence,’ ‘Napoleon’s Tomb at St. Helena,’ ‘Rock of Ages,’ ‘George Washington,’ Peale’s ‘Court of Death,’ ‘Abraham Lincoln and his Family,’ and ‘Rum’s Deadly Upas-Tree.’ There!”
“Your memory is remarkable,” said Phil. “I didn’t suppose any one had even noticed our pictures at all; for I’m sure they are old-fashioned.”
“Old-fashioned things,—why, they’re all the fashion now, don’t you know?” said Lucia, with a pretty laugh.
Phil did not reply, for he was quite overpowered by what seemed to him the elegance of the Tramlay pictures. He could easily see that the engravings were superior in quality to those to which he was accustomed; he was most profoundly impressed by the paintings,—real oil paintings, signed by artists some of whose names he had seen in art-reviews in New York papers. He studied them closely, one after another, with the earnestness of the person whose tastes are in advance of his opportunities: in his interest he was almost forgetful of Lucia’s presence. But the young woman did not intend to be forgotten, so she found something to say about each picture over which Phil lingered.
Among the paintings was one which had been seen, in the original or replicas, in almost all the picture-auctions which were frequently held in the New York business-district for the purpose of fleecing men{70} who have more money than taste. Sometimes the artist’s name is German, oftener French, and occasionally Italian; the figures and background also differ from time to time as to the nationality, and the picture is variably named “The Parting,” “Good-By,” “Auf Wiedersehen,” “Good-Night,” or “Adieu,” but the canvases all resemble one another in displaying a young man respectfully kissing the hand of a young woman. The Tramlays’ copy of this auctioneer’s stand-by was called “Adieu,” the name being lettered in black on the margin of the frame.
“Why,” exclaimed Phil, with the air of a man in the act of making a discovery, “I am sure I have seen a wood engraving of that painting in one of the illustrated papers.”
“I don’t see why they should do it,” said Lucia; “it’s dreadfully old-fashioned. People don’t say ‘adieu’ in that way nowadays, except on the stage.”
“I thought you said a moment ago that old-fashioned things were all the fashion.”
Lucia shrugged her shoulders, and said, “Kissing hands may come in again.” Then she raised one of her own little hands slightly and looked at it; Phil’s eyes followed hers, and then the young man became conscious of a wish that the old form of salutation might be revived, on special occasions, at least. The thought succeeded that such a wish was not entirely proper, and while he reasoned about it Lucia caught his eye and compelled him to blush,—an act which the young woman perhaps thought pretty, for she immediately imitated it, the imitation being much more graceful and effective than the original. The{71} situation was awkward, and Phil instantly lost his self-possession; but not so Lucia.
“Here,” she said, turning so as to face the wall opposite that on which the mischief-making picture hung, “is papa’s favorite picture. He thinks everything of it; but I say it’s simply dreadful.”
It certainly was. The centre of the canvas, which was enormous, was filled with several columns and a portion of the entablature of a ruined Greek temple.
“It is as large as all the other pictures combined, you see; all the lines in it are straight, and there isn’t anywhere in it a dress, or a bit of furniture, or even bric-à-brac.”
Phil imagined his host must have seen other qualities than those named by Lucia, and he seated himself on a sofa to study the picture in detail. Lucia also sat down, and continued:
“There is color in it, to be sure; bits of the columns where the light is most subdued are as lovely as—as a real Turkish rug.”
Much though Phil had endeavored to keep himself in communication and sympathy with the stronger sentiments of the world outside of Haynton, he had never realized even the outer edge of the mysteries and ecstasies of adoration of old rugs. So Lucia’s comparison started him into laughter. The girl seemed surprised and offended, and Phil immediately tumbled into the extreme depths of contrition.
“I beg your pardon,” he murmured, quickly. “It was all because of my ignorance. We haven’t any Turkish rugs at Haynton, nor any other rugs, expect those we lay on floors and use very much as if{72} they were carpets. I ought to have known better, though; for I remember that in Eastern stories, where the rare possessions of Oriental kings and chiefs are spoken of, rugs are always classed with jewels and silks and other beautiful things. Please forgive me.”
Half in earnest, half pretending, Lucia continued to appear offended. Phil repeated his confession, and enlarged his explanation. In his earnestness he leaned toward her; Lucia dropped her head a little. Marge, who had finished his cigar, entered the parlor at that instant, and raised his eyebrows,—a motion more significant in a man of his temperament than a tragic start would have been to ordinary flesh and blood. Lucia started and showed signs of embarrassment when she could no longer ignore his presence; Phil merely looked up, without seeming at all discomposed.
“I think, my dear,” said Tramlay to his wife, who had been turning the backs of a magazine, “that I’ll take our friend around to the club with me for half an hour, just to show him how city men squander their time and keep away from their families. I won’t be long gone.”
“Oh, papa! right after dinner? We’ve scarcely seen Phil yet, to ask him any questions.”
“Plenty of time for that,” the merchant replied. “We’ll see him often: eh, Hayn?”
“I shall be delighted,” said Phil.
“Suppose you drop him at my club, on your way home?” suggested Marge. “I shall be there.”
“Good! thanks: very kind of you. He’ll see some{73} men nearer his own age: all our members are middle-aged and stupid.”
“I think it’s real mean of you both,” said Lucia, with a pretty pout.
Phil looked as if he thought so too. At Haynton it was the custom, when one went out to dinner,—or supper, which was the evening meal,—to spend the evening with the entertainer. But objection seemed out of place: the merchant had gone for his hat and coat, and Marge made his adieus and was donning his overcoat at the mirror in the hall.
“I’m very sorry to go,” said Phil to Lucia. His eyes wandered about the room, as if to take a distinct picture of it with him: they finally rested on the picture of “The Adieu.”
“You shall take my forgiveness with you,” said the girl, “if you will solemnly promise never, never to laugh at me again.”
“I never will,” said Phil, solemnly; then Lucia laughed and offered him her hand. Perhaps it was because Phil had just removed his eyes from “The Adieu” and was himself about to say good-by, that he raised the little hand to his lip. Fortunately for her own peace of mind, Mrs. Tramlay did not see the act, for she had stepped into the library to speak to her husband; Marge, however, was amazed at what he saw in the mirror, and, a second or two later, at Phil’s entire composure. Lucia’s manner, however, puzzled him; for she seemed somewhat disconcerted, and her complexion had suddenly become more brilliant than usual.