CHAPTER X

SURPRISE

The spell, The mightiest upon earth—the spell of love, Familiar, mutual, requited love— Shall be upon thee; and its charmed power Shall at each moment, at a wish, call up More wealth than ever crossed the desert sands, Gems, purer, costlier far than Araby’s; Unsunned treasures from that richest mine, The human heart. POCAHONTAS.

“OH!” echoed the old man, while the young people looked at him aghast. “Eh? What? It seems I’ve been nodding and you’ve caught me! Very rude of me to fall asleep while you were reading, my dear! You might have won a pair of gloves, eh?”

It was evident from the commodore’s words that he had not heard a word of Donald Bruce’s reckless talk, but had indeed but just at that instant waked up.

“I hope you had a refreshing nap, sir,” said Em., who was the first to recover her self-possession.

“Yes—yes—yes—yes! I had a very refreshing nap! Brief, but very refreshing. ‘Forty winks,’ as the saying is, you know, my dear; just lost myself, that is all!” said the old man, apparently unconscious that he had been sound asleep for two hours.

“I hope you feel revived, sir,” said Ronald, now plucking up heart.

“Yes—yes, quite so! But how the deuce did you come here, Ronald? What do you want?” demanded the commodore, bethinking himself now of the unexpected presence of his nephew.

“I want to go to Greyrock this afternoon. Will you let me have Warlock?” inquired the young man with quick invention.

“Now, Ronald!” testily exclaimed the elder, “why will you reiterate a request that you know, for your own sake, I must deny? No! You cannot have that four-legged fiend! No! I will not have your neck broken during _my_ lifetime by any concession of mine. No! Once for all, you can not, and you never _can_ have Warlock! You may ride any other horse in the stable—in fact, you may ride any other four-footed creature on the estate, and you know it. But you sha’n’t risk your life on Warlock,” emphatically declared the commodore, bringing down his doubled fist with force upon the table as a finality.

“Very well, sir; of course you must be obeyed,” said Ronald with a slight shrug of his handsome shoulders. “I shall not, however, take any of the other horses. If I cannot have Warlock I do not care to take a ride to-day.”

“No! I thought you only wished to go to Greyrock for the sake of risking your precious neck on Warlock’s vicious back. But you shall not do it. I shall sell that horse the first chance I get. Now, then, go about your business, Ronald, and send my man here. It is time to dress for dinner. You may go, also, my dear; but don’t go back to my sister-in-law and sit down to sewing, I command you. And, mind, my commands are paramount on this ship! You have been sitting enough to-day for a young one. Go now and take a turn in the fresh air of the grounds. There! Be off with you both. ’SCAT!!”

The conscience-stricken young pair hurried from the library by different doors—Ronald going out into the hall, and Em. descending the steps through a French window that opened upon the front yard.

That yard so widely different from all the other houseyards she had ever seen in her life; that yard so savage in rocky desolation, so sublime in magnificent prospect.

The house, as I said, stood upon a natural plateau about half way up the front of the precipice, directly overhanging the river. The yard extended some thirty feet to the extreme edge of the precipice, which was defended by a stone wall about breast high. There was no gate or outlet from this front wall. The approach to the house, as I told you, was from behind, and the entrance to the yard was at the side.

Em. walked to the wall, leaned over it, and looked down the sheer descent of a wooded steep a thousand feet to the river that flowed at its foot. What abysms of darkness and mystery were in the depths of the shadowy foliage so far below! There, in those deep caverns, doubtless, the wildcat made her lair and reared her young; there, among those gray crags, the eagle built her nest and brooded over her eggs. No gentler creatures of the earth or air could surely find their homes among such savage desolation, though Em. as she stood there leaning over the wall and gazing down the dreadful descent.

At length she raised her eyes and looked around, and beheld a prospect magnificent beyond all words to portray. Spread out before her was the beautiful valley, with the river flowing in the midst, and the undulating, wooded hills rising beyond, all now royally arrayed in the gorgeous hues of autumn, and refulgently lighted up by the glorious rays of the setting sun.

Ah! how brief are the moments of such splendid effects!

Even as Em. gazed the sun sank down behind the mountains at her back, and all the valley faded into twilight.

Em. turned away and walked around the side of the house and passed to the rear.

There the precipice presented a different aspect. Instead of descending to the river it ascended to the clouds, and from a fissure in the rock, to the left of the stables, sprang a fountain that grew in volume as it fell from rock to rock, and rushed roaring into the river below.

Em. knew—because she had heard, in the conversation between Ronald Bruce and her father on that evening when the former had stayed all night in the old manor-house—that the cultivated farms belonging to The Breezes estate were all in the valley below, and that these mountain ranges were only valuable for their quarries of blue limestone; but she wondered exceedingly at the eccentricity of the first proprietor, who had built his dwelling-house on this mere shelf of rock half way up the mountain side, with an ascending precipice behind it, and a descending precipice before it.

She remained out until the twilight faded into darkness, and then she went into the house and ran up to her attic chamber, where the care of the little colored girl Liza had already lighted two wax candles and set them on the toilet-table, and had mended the wood fire which burned brightly on the hearth.

Em. brushed her hair and ran a narrow blue ribbon through its brown ringlets, then put a blue bow to the meeting of her linen collar; and so, having made the best toilet she could for dinner with well-dressed ladies she put out her candles and left the room to go downstairs.

The upper halls were dimly lighted, each by a little lamp at the back end.

Em. had just reached the landing on the second story and was hurrying down the hall when a door on the left opened and a tall, dark, handsome woman, richly dressed, but looking older than either Mrs. Bruce or Mrs. Templeton, came out and carelessly approached Em.

They stood face to face. The lady lifted her eyes haughtily to those of the girl that for the moment stood in her way. But when their gaze met the lady’s great black eyes dilated wide with terror, with horror! Her face blanched to the pallor of death, her frame shook as with an ague.

“BEGONE!” she shrieked. “Why do you come to haunt me?”

And with these words she fell to the floor.

Em., paralyzed by amazement, stood speechless and motionless over the woman whom she had so involuntarily appalled and overwhelmed.

But the shriek and the fall had startled others. Four opposite doors flew open and four women rushed out of their rooms to see what was the matter and to behold Em. standing like a statue of Fear over the prostrate form of Malvina Warde.

“In the name of Heaven, what does all this mean, Miss Palmer!” demanded Mrs. Bruce, stooping to examine the condition of her guest, while Mrs. Templeton, Hermia, and Belinda gathered around them.

“She has fainted,” said Mrs. Templeton.

The four women raised the unconscious form and laid it on the hall lounge.

“How did this happen, Miss Palmer?” inquired Mrs. Bruce while they all began to use the common methods of reviving a swooning woman—bathing her head, beating her hands, and applying sal volatile to her nose.

“Why don’t you answer, Miss Palmer?” demanded Mrs. Bruce without pausing in her efforts.

“I—I don’t know,” stammered the frightened girl. “I had just run downstairs and turned around when I met this lady coming out of that door. We came on each other suddenly, and she stared and screamed and fell. I think she took me for a ghost.”

“It is very strange,” said Mrs. Templeton; “but, then, Malvina has had heart disease for some years, and a little thing startles her.”

“Do not be alarmed. Mamma is subject to these fainting fits,” said Belinda Warde; “lay her head quite low and she will soon recover.”

They followed the daughter’s advice, and the mother gave signs of returning consciousness.

“You had better go down, my dear. Since it was the sight of you that first startled her you had better not be one of the first objects that her eyes meet on opening,” said Mrs. Templeton.

Gladly enough Em. left the circle and went downstairs. A feeling of repulsion had come over her at the sight of that woman for which she could in no way account.

“It is strange, and unjust, and sinful,” said the girl to herself as she tripped downstairs. “That woman never did me any harm in all the days of my life! She never even knew me any more than I did her, and yet it is true that I feel such a loathing of her as I never felt for any living creature before. I must pray it away! It will not do! I will not have hatred in my heart—particularly such a wicked, unnatural, and unreasonable hatred as this. I will do that lady every kind service I possibly can, and I will try to overcome this sudden hatred of an inoffensive stranger.”

In the lower hall she found Ronald Bruce, standing and staring upward.

“What is the row upstairs? Was it a mouse, or a spider, or a candle moth that caused all that screaming and running?” he inquired.

“Oh! Ronald, it was I,” said Em. compunctiously.

“You! What did you do?”

“Oh! I suppose I came running down the attic stairs too swiftly and too silently——”

“Were you expected to creep down noisily, like an old cripple on crutches?” laughingly demanded the young man.

“Nonsense, Ronald! You must know I glided down and met Mrs. Warde in the gloom, and she screamed and fainted.”

“Was that it? Ha, ha, ha!”

“Don’t laugh, Ronald. She took me for a ghost.”

“Then she must have a bad conscience, that is all I can say about it! Em., I hate that woman!”

“Don’t, Ronald. That is wicked, even supposing she ever injured you, which perhaps she never did.”

“No, she never did. Nor did ever snakes or scorpions injure me, yet I hate them; and I hate that woman as I hate them, with an instinctive hatred.”

“We should not hate anything; we should not permit the feeling of hate to take any root in our hearts,” began Em., but before she could preach her bit of a sermon she was interrupted by the appearance of Commodore Bruce, who came out of his study to cross the hall on his way to the drawing-room.

“What was the matter just now? Which of the women was in hysterics?” he carelessly inquired.

“Mrs. Warde met Miss Palmer in the twilight, and taking her for a ghost, screamed and fainted,” replied Ronald.

“Humph! I don’t wonder, seeing that she persecuted to death one who was as much like Miss Palmer as though they had been twin sisters. Ah, well!” said the old man to himself as he passed on his way, “I am only a little less culpable than herself, seeing that I should have looked after the orphan girl whom my poor lad loved and committed to my charge with his parting words. I have often wondered what he meant when he said that he would have something to tell me which would surprise and please me, but that his lips were sealed by honor until he should return from his three years’ voyage—that voyage, ah, Heaven! from which he never came back! I often suspected that that unfortunate child was——But what is the use of speculating? The poor boy is gone, the girl is lost, and the child is dead. The past is beyond recall, and therefore beyond regret,” concluded the commodore as he passed to his arm-chair in the drawing-room.

Em. had followed him, and naturally Ronald had followed Em., and while she busied her nimble fingers by arranging the books and bijouterie on the center-table Ronald stood by her side.

The dinner-bell rang.

“Now, where are all these women? Unpunctual as usual. I wish I had them all on board a man-o’-war in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean! I’d train ’em into punctuality! Where are they, I wonder?”

“They are attending to Mrs. Warde, I think, sir,” said Em. soothingly.

“Attending to Mrs. Warde? Does it take four able-bodied women to attend to a single hysterical one? Let ’em throw a pitcher of cold water over her head—that will fetch her to,” growled the old man as he arose from his seat and took his cane and crept towards the dining-room, followed by Em., who was pursued by Ronald.

“You always run after uncle! You never stay behind a moment to let me have a word alone with you,” complained the young man.

“No, because it is not right far me to do so,” replied Em.

“What! Not when we are engaged to be married?” he whispered.

“We are not engaged. We cannot be engaged without the consent of parents and friends,” said Em.

“Eh! Why, did I not swear to marry you, whether or no?” he hurriedly whispered, for the ladies of the household were hastening downstairs, and before Em. could reply they were close behind the lovers.

They all entered the lighted dining-room together and seated themselves at the table.

“Well! How is Malvina? Got over her fainting fit?” inquired the commodore as he seated himself at the foot of the table.

“No, not entirely; but she is lying down in her room carefully watched over by Liza. She will not be able to join us this evening,” replied Mrs. Bruce.

“Humph!” exclaimed the commodore, neither very sympathetically nor credulously.

When dinner was over the family adjourned to the drawing-room. The old man settled himself in his arm-chair and went to sleep. Belinda Warde placed herself beside Ronald Bruce, and with something like her mother’s powers of fascination held him bound for hours. The three other ladies drew around the center-table with their fancy work of embroidery or crochet. And Em. spent the very dullest evening she had ever passed in all her life.

At ten o’clock precisely Commodore Bruce rang up all the servants, sent for the old family Bible and conducted the evening prayers.

Then he peremptorily sent every one off to bed.

Em. was glad to reach her attic, which had already begun to seem like home in its privacy.

It remained just as she had left it four hours before, except that the fire was burning so low that it scarcely half lighted the large room with its lurid glow.

There was a box of wood in one corner near the fireplace, and Em. took a few sticks and laid them on the smoldering logs, and soon had a cheerful blaze.

Then she took down one of the candles from the mantelpiece, and was about to light it when she started to hear a voice behind her exclaiming:

“Dere now! I jes’ dis minute got ’lieved offen duty to Miss Melwiny Warde, which I had to set by her and watch her until Miss Belindy came up to bed and let me go, and den I ran right up here fas’ ever I could to fix your fire and light your candles, and you gone and done it all yourself ’dout de slightest ’sideration for my feelings.”

“I didn’t know that you were coming, Liza,” said Em. in a gentle tone.

“Now, see dere, now! Didn’t know I was coming; didn’t have no conf’ence in me. Course I was coming, on’y I was ’tained so long dere tending to Miss Malwiny Warde. Takes all de house to ’tend to she?” grumbled Liza as she went about her duties, mending the fire, lighting the candles on the dressing-table, turning down the bed and so on.

When she had completed her work she stopped and said:

“Now, Miss Em., ef you’s afeard to sleep by yourself I’ll fetch a little mattriss from t’other room and sleep down here ’fore the fire to keep you company.”

“Oh, no, thank you. You are very kind to think of it, Liza, but I am not at all afraid.”

“You know dere ain’t nobody sleeps up here in dis garret ’sides you.”

“Is there not? But it is of no consequence.”

“Now, you better let me stay up here long o’ you, Miss Em. ’Deed you had.”

“Oh, thank you, but it is not necessary that you should. Besides, what would Mrs. Bruce say to your changing your sleeping place?”

“Oh, she! Lor’ bless you, Miss Em., ole Marse Commodo’ _he’s_ marster and mist’ess, too, in dis house, and he ax me to-day, he say, ‘Lizer, where dey put dat young girl to sleep?’ I say, ‘Up in the garret.’ He say, ‘I thought so. Now you sleep on a pallet in her room if she is afraid to stay by herself, you hear?’ I say, ‘Yas, marster.’ And so, Miss Em., I come up faithful to offer my services.”

“You are very kind. And so is your dear old master. He shows very great consideration for me. But, as I said before, I do not need you, Liza. By the way, where do you generally sleep?”

“Oh! out’n de house in a room ober de stables, which dere are six rooms dere, where de servants sleep, ’cept de cook and de two kitchen-maids. Dey sleep in a room ober de kitchen.”

“Very well, then, Liza, perhaps as it is late, you had better go now. Shall I come downstairs and lock the door after you?”

“Oh, lor’, no, Miss! I locks de door and takes de key ebery night myself, so as to let myself in in de morning to wait on de ladies! But it ain’t so awful late, after all, Miss Em. It ain’t no more an’ a quarter arter ten o’clock, so wouldn’t you like to go through de other rooms in this garret and look at ’em? ’Sides which, it would be good to ’xamine, and be sure as dere ain’t no robbers nor nuffin’ hid away in dese rooms, and you up here by yourself,” persisted Liza.

“Why, what a wise little woman you are! I’m not afraid of ‘robbers nor nuffin’,’” said Em., smiling; “but I have ‘a cat-like love of garrets,’ and so we will look at these other rooms, Liza. You take one candle ond I will take another, so we will have light enough.”