Susan Warner

“ Fleda said, with a terrified look. "You are not worse?"
"I don't expect ever to be better," said Mrs. Plumfield, with a smile. "Nay, my love," she said, as Fleda's head went down on her bosom again "not so! I do not wish it either, Fleda. I do not expect to leave you soon, but I would not prolong the time by a day. I would not have spoken of it now if I had recollected myself; but I am so accustomed to think and speak of it, that it came out before I knew it. My darling child, it is nothing to cry for."
"I know it, aunt Miriam." ”

“ Oh, Fleda, you should see Mr. Carleton's greenhouses!"
"Should I?" said Fleda.
"Dear me! I hope mamma will come!" said Constance, with a comical, fidgety shake of herself; "when I think of those greenhouses I lose my self-command. And the park! Fleda, it's the loveliest thing you ever saw in your life; and it's all that delightful man's doing; only he wont have a geometric flower-garden, as I did everything I could think of to persuade him. I pity the woman that will be his wife she wont have her own way in a single thing ”

“ Thou mayest lose friend after friend, and gain more than thou losest in that one."
"I know it," said Fleda; "but dear aunt Miriam, don't you think human nature longs for some human sympathy and help too?"
"My sweet blossom! yes," said Mrs. Plumfield, caressingly, stroking her bowed head; "but let Him do what he will; he hath said, 'I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.' "
"I know that too," said Fleda, weeping. "How do people bear life that do not know it?"
"Or that cannot take the comfort of it. Thou art not poor nor alone while thou hast him to go to, little Fleda. ”

“ The screen of trees was very thin on the border of this opening so thin that the light from beyond came through. On a slight rocky elevation, which formed the further side of it, sat an exquisite little Gothic chapel, about which, and the face of the rock below, some noisette and multiflora climbers were vying with each other, and just at the entrance of the further path a white dog-rose had thrown itself over the way, covering the lower branches of the trees with its blossoms.
Fleda stood spell-bound a good while, with a breath oppressed with pleasure. ”

“ Carleton, to come and spend a whole day in social converse with you!"
"Carleton!" said Fleda.
"Yes? Oh, you don't know who he is! he's a new attraction; there's been nothing like him this great while, and all New York is topsy-turvy about him; the mothers are dying with anxiety, and the daughters with admiration; and it's too delightful to see the cool superiority with which he takes it all; like a new star that all the people are pointing their telescopes at, as Thorn said, spitefully, the other day. Oh, he has turned my head! I have looked till I cannot look at anything else. ”

“ I may seem selfish I am selfish but, dear Miss Ringgan, you do not see all you, who make me so, can make me anything else with a touch of your hand it is selfishness that would be bound to your happiness, if you did but entrust it to me."
Fleda neither spoke nor looked at him, and rose up from her chair.
"Is this your generosity?" he said, pointedly, though gently.
"That is not the question now, Sir," said Fleda, who was trembling painfully. "I cannot do evil that good may come."
"But evil?" said he, detaining her "what evil do I ask of you? to remove evil, I do." ”

“ No sound of stirring and active humanity. Nothing to touch the perfect repose. But every lesson of the place could be heard more distinctly amid that silence of all other voices. Except, indeed, Nature's voice; that was not silent: and neither did it jar with the other. The very light of the evening fell more tenderly upon the old grey stones and the thick grass in that place.
Fleda and Mrs. Rossitur went softly to one spot where the grass was not grown, and where the bright white marble caught the eye and spoke of grief, fresh too. ”

“ Hugh, laughing.
"The wind is always that to me," said Fleda; "not always in such a cheerful mood as to-day, though. It talks to me often of a thousand old-time things, and sighs over them with me, a most sympathizing friend! but to-day he invites me to a waltz Come!"
And pulling Hugh after her, away she went down the rocky path, with a step too light to care for the stones; the little feet capering down the mountain with a disdain of the ground that made Hugh smile to see her; and eyes dancing for company, till they reached the lower woodland. ”

“ Mrs. Rossitur was lying on the bed; but her first mood had changed, for at Fleda's soft word and touch she half rose up, and, putting both arms round her waist, laid her face against her. There were no tears still, only a succession of low moans, so inexpressibly weak and plaintive, that Fleda's nature could hardly bear them without giving way. A more fragile support was never clung to. Yet her trembling fingers, in their agony, moved caressingly among her aunt's hair and over her brow, as she begged her when she could, she was not able at first to let her know the cause that was grieving her. ”

“ Fleda was silent with filling eyes.
"We do not seek our happiness in these things," he said, tenderly. "I never found it in them. For years, whatever others may have judged, I have felt myself a poor man; because I had not in the world a friend in whom I could have entire sympathy. And if I am rich now, it is not in any treasure that I look to enjoy in this world alone."
"Oh, do not, Mr. Carleton!" exclaimed Fleda, bowing her head in distress, and giving his hand an earnest entreaty. ”

“ Stackpole, smiling at her, however; "women have nothing to do with books."
"What do you say to that, Miss Fleda?" said Thorn.
"Nothing, Sir; it is one of those positions that are unanswerable."
"But, Mr. Stackpole," said Mrs. Evelyn, "I don't like that doctrine, Sir. I do not believe in it at all."
"That is unfortunate for my doctrine," said the gentleman.
"But I do not believe it is yours. Why must women have nothing to do with books? what harm do they do, Mr. Stackpole?"
"Not needed, Ma'am; a woman, as somebody says, knows intuitively all that is really worth knowing." ”

“ My dear Fleda!" said Constance, clasping her hands, and elevating her eyes in mock ecstasy, "if you had ever seen Mr. Carleton!"
"I dare say I have seen somebody as good," said Fleda, quietly.
"My dear Fleda!" said Constance, a little scornfully this time; "you haven't the least idea what you are talking about! I tell you, he is an Englishman; he's of one of the best families in England: not such as you ever see here but once in an age; he's rich enough to count Mr. Thorn over, I don't know how many times."
"I don't like anybody the better for being an Englishman," said Fleda ”

“ You are no more fit to go to Queechy to-morrow than you were to be out till seven o'clock this evening; and if you saw yourself, you wouldn't want me to say any more. There is not the least morsel of colour in your face, and you look as if you had a mind to get rid of your body altogether as fast as you can! You want to be in bed for two days running, now this minute."
"Thank you, dear Mrs. Pritchard," said Fleda, smiling "you are very careful of me, but I must go home to-morrow, and go to bed afterwards." ”

“ Rossitur's obliged, grateful, and faithful servant,
LEWIS THORN." Fleda felt, as she read, as if icicles were gathering about her heart. The whirlwind of fear and distress of a little while ago, which could take no definite direction, seemed to have died away and given place to a dead frost the steady bearing down of disgrace and misery, inevitable, unmitigable, unchangeable; no lessening, no softening of that blasting power, no, nor ever any rising up from under it; the landscape could never be made to smile again. ”

“ But she looked and caught her breath as she looked, while the road led along the very edge of a dingle, and then was lost in a kind of enchanted open woodland it seemed so and then passing through a thicket came out upon a broad sweep of green turf that wiled the eye by its smooth facility to the distant screen of oaks and beeches and firs on its far border. It was all new. Fleda's memory had retained only an indistinct vision of beauty, like the face of an angel in a cloud as painters have drawn it ”

“ Fleda.
"But you are looking charmingly for all that," Constance went on; "so charmingly, that I feel a morbid sensation creeping all over me while I sit regarding you. Really, when you come to us next winter, if you persist in being by way of showing your superiority to ordinary human nature a rose without a thorn, the rest of the flowers may all shut up at once. And the rose reddens in my very face, to spite me!"
"Is 'ordinary human nature' typified by a thorn? You give it rather a poor character."
"I never heard of a thorn that didn't bear an excellent character," said Constance, gravely. ”

“ Marion's face was hid on the foot of the bed. Mrs. Rossitur did not move. Leaving Mr. Carleton on the near side of the bed, Fleda went round to the place she seemed to have occupied before at Hugh's right hand; and they were all still, for he was in a little doze, lying with his eyes closed, and the face as gently and placidly sweet as it had been in his boyhood. Perhaps Mr. Rossitur looked at it: but no other did just then, except Mr. Carleton. His eye rested nowhere else. The breathing of an infant could not be more gentle; the face of an angel not more peacefully at rest. ”

“ The wind rose soon after they reached Bridgeport, and swept furiously over the boat, rattling the tiller chains, and making Fleda so nervously alive to possibilities that she got up two or three times to see if the boat were fast to her moorings. It was very dark, and only by a fortunately-placed lantern, she could see a bit of the dark wharf and one of the posts belonging to it, from which the lantern never budged; so, at last quieted, or tired-out, nature had her rights, and she slept. ”

“ She checked her tears and raised her head; she ventured no more; she dared not turn her face towards her companion. He looked at her once or twice, as if in doubt whether to speak or not.
"Are you not going beyond your strength?" he said at length, gently.
Fleda said, "No," although in a tone that half confessed his suspicion. He was silent again, however, and she cast about in vain for something to speak of; it seemed to her that all subjects of conversation in general had been packed up for exportation; neither eye nor memory could light upon a single one. ”

“ Ringgan."
"For me!" exclaimed Fleda, her cheeks forming instantly the most exquisite commentary on the gift that the giver could have desired. She took in her hand the superb bunch of flowers from which the fingers of Florence unclosed as if it had been an icicle.
"Why didn't you say so before?" she inquired sharply; but the "fowling-piece" had wisely disappeared.
"I am very glad!" exclaimed Edith. "They have had plenty all winter, and you haven't had one. I am very glad it is yours, Fleda." ”

“ Renney," said Fleda, smiling. "I believe I am not very strong yet."
The housekeeper and Hannah both looked at her with strangely touched faces, and again begged her to try the refreshment of tea. But Fleda would not go down, so they served her up there, with great zeal and tenderness. And then she waited patiently and watched the people in the cabin, as they sat gossiping in groups, or stupefying in solitude; and thought how miserable a thing is existence where religion and refinement have not taught the mind to live in somewhat beyond and above its every-day concerns. ”

“ Carleton?"
"So far as to know a rose when I see it," he answered, smiling, and with an imperturbable coolness that it quieted Fleda to hear.
"Ay, but the thing is," said Constance, "do you know twenty roses when you see them?"
"Miss Ringgan, Mr. Carleton," said Mrs. Evelyn, "has received a most beautiful supply this morning; but, like a true woman, she is not satisfied to enjoy unless she can enjoy intelligently they are strangers to us all, and she would like to know what name to give them; Mr. Thorn suggested that perhaps you might help us out of our difficulty." ”

“ Carleton, gently.
"Will you take good care of her?"
Mr. Carleton hesitated, and then said, so low that it could reach but one other person's ear
"What hand and life can."
"I know it," said Hugh. "I am very glad you will have her. You will not let her tire herself any more."
Whatever became of Fleda's tears, she had driven them away, and leaning forward, she touched her cheek to his, saying, with a clearness and sweetness of voice that only intensity of feeling could have given her at the moment
"I am not tired, dear Hugh." ”

“ Fleda dared not look at him.
"It is not impossible unless this lady forbid me. I am not a fixture."
"But what brought you here, man, to offer your services?" said Charlton; "most ungallantly leaving so many pairs of bright eyes to shine upon your absence."
"Mr. Thorn will not find himself in darkness here, Captain
Rossitur," said Mrs. Decatur.
"It's my opinion he ought, Ma'am," said Charlton.
"It is my opinion every man ought, who makes his dependance on gleams of sunshine," said Mr. Thorn, rather cynically. "I cannot say I was thinking of brightness, before or behind me." ”

“ Carleton, how do you bear that, Sir?" said Mrs. Evelyn.
"Will you let such an assertion pass unchecked?"
"I would not, if I could help it, Mrs. Evelyn."
"That isn't saying much for yourself," said Constance; "but Fleda, my dear, where did you get such an experience of waste and desolation?"
"Oh, 'man is a microcosm,' you know," said Fleda, lightly.
"But you make it out that only one-half of mankind can appropriate that axiom," said Mr. Stackpole. "How can a woman know men's hearts so well?" ”

“ He looked at Fleda, but the flush was gone again, and nothing could seem less conscious of his presence. Pain and patience were in every line of her face, but he could read nothing more, except a calmness as unmistakably written. Thorn gave that face repeated glances as he walked, then stood still and read it at leisure. Then he came to her side again, and spoke in a different voice.
"You are so unlike anybody else," he said, "that you shall make me unlike myself. I will do freely what I hoped to do with the light of your smile before me. ”

“ I wish they would send for you to New York again."
"I don't know that I should want to go, if they did," said Fleda. "They don't raise my spirits, Hugh. I am amused sometimes I can't help that but such excessive gaiety rather makes me shrink within myself; I am, too, out of tone with it. I never feel more absolutely quiet than sometimes when I am laughing at Constance Evelyn's mad sallies and sometimes I cannot laugh at them. I do not know what they must think of me; it is what they can have no means of understanding." ”

“ Roses were here too the air was full of the sweetness of damask and Bourbon varieties and a few beautiful banksias, happily placed, contrasted without interfering with them. It was very still it was very perfect the distant country was fresh-coloured with the yet early light which streamed between the trees, and laid lines of enchantment upon the green turf; and the air came up from the sea-board, and bore the breath of the roses to Fleda every now and then with a gentle puff of sweetness. Such light she had seen none such light since she was a child. ”