Lucy Westenra

“ To be caught in Ellen Webster’s toils and own himself beaten would, Lucy well understood, be to his mind a humiliating fate.
Only a compelling, unreasoning love that swept over him like some mighty tidal wave, wrenching from its foundations every impeding barrier, could move him to surrender; and who was she to arouse such passion in any lover? She was only a woman human and faulty. ”

“ Lionel laughed in the joy of his heart. "I am glad also, Lucy. The place is mine by right, and it is just that I should have it."
"I have thought it very unfair, all along, that Verner's Pride should belong to her husband, and not to you, after—after what she did to you," continued Lucy, dropping her voice to a whisper.
"Things don't go by fairness, Lucy, in this world," said he, as he went through the gate. "Stay," he said, turning back from it, a thought crossing his mind. "Lucy, oblige me by not mentioning this to my mother or Decima. ”

“ She looked round at Lady Verner and said, in a gentle tone, that she would be ready at any hour named.
“We will go at once,” replied Lady Verner. “I have ordered the carriage. The sooner we make it—as we have to make it—the better.”
There was no mistake about it. Lucy had grown to love Lionel Verner. How she loved him, esteemed him, venerated him; none, save her own heart, could tell. Her days had been as one long dream of Eden. ”

“ Lucy was thinking of nothing but himself, and perhaps a little of the "great work" at Wharfside, which her father's illness and death had interrupted; but Mr Wentworth, who was only a man, remembered that Tom Wodehouse would be his brother-in-law with a distinct sensation of disgust, even in the moment of his triumph—which is one instance of the perennial inequality between the two halves of mankind. He had to brace himself up to the encounter of all his people, while she had to meet nothing less delightful than her own dreams. ”

“ And she began to tremble and to catch her breath and laugh.
“Now, Mrs. Ames!” said the doctor sternly. And the white-faced man let go of his companion's arm and put out his hand.
“Lucy!” he said, in a queer, weak voice. “Lucy—my wife——”
But Lucy was clinging to John Alden and fighting for breath and words.
“Oh, I'm not—he's not—” she gasped. And John Alden's hand closed on her wrist like a vice.
“Be quiet!” he said roughly. “Lucy, stop—stop, I say! Pull yourself together! No! you can if you try—no—stop at once—at once!” ”

“ Isn’t it hard to describe someone you know? The chief thing about Lucy is that she’s a nice person, and it shows.”
“Does she miss her mother very much?” Vicki asked. “And her father?”
“Yes, terribly. Lucy’s such a loyal and warmhearted person. She always befriends lost dogs, and hungry cats, and people who need her.”
It was out of lonesomeness and a need to be with people, the neighbor said, that after her father died in an auto accident two years ago Lucy moved into downtown San Francisco to live with another girl and the girl’s mother. Also, Lucy wanted to be nearer her job. ”

“ Miss Entwhistle declined them. She had missed her chance, she thought, when the cab was beneath her window and all she had to do was to lean out and say, 'Wait a minute.' But then Lucy,—ah yes, Lucy. The minute she thought of Lucy she felt she absolutely must be friends with Everard. Incredible as it seemed to her, and always had seemed from the first, that Lucy should love him, there it was,—she did. It couldn't be possible to love him without any reason. ”

“ The first year of Lucy's arrival—the year of Lionel's illness, Lord Garle had been away from the neighbourhood; but somewhere about the time of Sibylla's return, he had come back to it. Seeing a great deal of Lucy, as he necessarily did, being so much at Lady Verner's, he grew to esteem and love her. Not with the same love he had borne for Decima—a love, such as that, never comes twice in a lifetime—but with a love sufficiently warm, notwithstanding. And he asked her to become his wife. ”

“ While Miss Entwhistle was thinking like this and observing Wemyss, who never observed her at all after a first moment of surprise that she should look and behave so differently from the liquid lady of the cottage in Cornwall, that she should sit so straight and move so briskly, he and Lucy were, though present in the body, absent in love. Round them was drawn that magic circle through which nobody and nothing can penetrate, and within it they sat hand in hand and safe. Lucy's whole heart was his. He only had to come into the room for her to feel content. ”

“ Anyway, Lady Lucy, it was not much like hating you when God brought back your father from the prison and gave you such a nice home and such a nice lady to take care of you."
Lucy looked puzzled. "Did he do that? I never thought of that."
"Of course he did. He gives us all things. That is the reason we call him our Father, I suppose."
"I never thought of that," said Lucy, again. "I thought he was like a great king, who sat up in heaven and did not care what happened, only to punish people when they do wrong. I never thought of his being any thing like my father." ”

“ Chance had taken the young gentleman, Gerald Weston, to the house in which Lucy lived before, her father's return home, and having seen Lucy, something more than chance had afterwards directed his steps thither very frequently. I am afraid there had been secret meetings out of the house; girls and young men will do these things now-a-days. ”

“ Lucy was left alone. She sat down on a chair and tried to think, but felt too dazed. Suddenly she began to cry, and was somehow glad that she could cry for her husband, who had been dead for nearly two years, and dead to her for five.
When she had cried her fill she looked up, and there was the Christmas motto on the wall before her—“Peace and Good-will.” Peace for the dead, and good-will—yes, good-will to every one. It seemed to mean something to her now.
She looked at the words with swimming eyes, and then John Alden came in and took her in his arms. They did not speak—they did not kiss. ”

“ Many a fine carriage drew up before the door of the humble cottage, and bright ladies and dashing gentlemen sauntered beneath the shade, while the rosy fingers of Lucy adjusted bouquets for them, her bright lips wreathed with smiles, and her sunny eye turning to her grandmother at the placing of every stem, as though for approbation of her taste. Not a child in all the neighbourhood was so happy as Lucy. Not a child in all the neighbourhood was so beautiful, so gentle, and so good. ”

“ A cloud of images was in her brain, all bearing the beautiful but dreaded form of Helen Vaughan, and—some one touched her shoulder, and Lucy shivered and looked up.
It was Frederick Grey. What had he come out there for? He to see her in her abandonment of grief!
“Lucy!” he whispered, and the tone of his voice spoke of love if ever tone spoke it. “Lucy, are you ill?”
She would have been glad to fling his hand away, to fly from him, to meet his words with scorn; but she could not: for the heart will be true to itself, and the startled agitation unnerved her. She shook like a leaf. ”

“ Lucy was pleased to take her share of helping the time to pass; would read to him, or talk to him; or sit down on her low stool on the hearth-rug and only look at him, waiting until he should want something done. Dangerous moments, Miss Lucy! Unless your heart is cased in adamant, you can scarcely be with that attractive man—ten times more attractive now, in his sickness—and not get your wings singed.
Jan came in one day when Lionel was sitting on the sofa, having propped the cushion up at the back of his head. Decima was winding some silk, and Lucy was holding the skein for her. ”

“ Not Lucy. In losing Lionel she has lost all; and nothing remained for her but to do battle with her trouble alone. Passionately and truly as Lionel had loved Sibylla; so, in her turn, did Lucy love him.
It is not the fashion now for young ladies to die of broken hearts—as it was in the old days. A little while given to "the grief that kills," and then Lucy strove to arouse herself to better things. She would go upon her way, burying all feelings within her; she would meet him and others with a calm exterior and placid smile; none should see that she suffered ”

“ Lucy loved everybody at Bostil's Ford and everybody loved her. She loved all the horses except her father's favorite racer, that perverse devil of a horse, the great Sage King.
Lucy was glowing and rapt with love for all she beheld from her lofty perch: the green-and-pink blossoming hamlet beneath her, set between the beauty of the gray sage expanse and the ghastliness of the barren heights; the swift Colorado sullenly thundering below in the abyss; the Indians in their bright colors, riding up the river trail ”

“ Lucy Button was the last blossom on a tree which had boasted many fair ones. When the grave opened to one after another of that doomed family, till none but this bright, beautiful bud was left, she became the all in all, and with the doting affection of age was she cherished. When poverty came to Granny Button’s threshold, she drew her one priceless jewel to her heart, and laughed at poverty. When sorrows of every kind compassed her about, and the sun went down in her heaven of hope, another rose in a holier heaven of love; and Lucy Button was this fountain of love-born light. ”

“ Lucy, however, thought him good to look at; he only wanted a little smartening up, which she promised herself to impart to him when they were married. He looked what he was: a good-hearted, simple-minded, unintellectual Englishman, an Anglo-Saxon, with a hearty appetite for plain food, a love of cricket, who would with little difficulty remain in all things chaste and sober; slow to wrath, but, if really pushed against the wall, able to show berserker rage. ”

“ And sometimes Lucy would smile—not that calm, holy smile which usually lingers about an infant’s cradle, but a faint, sicklied play of the love-light within, as though the mother’s fond heart were ashamed of its own throbbings. But, before the autumn passed, Lucy Dutton was fearfully stricken. Death came! She laid her last comfort from her bosom into the coffin, and they were now bearing it to the grave,—she, the only mourner. It mattered but little that the grandmother’s forgiveness and blessing came now; Lucy scarce knew the difference between these words and those last spoken ”

“ Lucy Tempest and Mary Elmsley were in the drawing-room. Fair, graceful girls both of them, in their floating white bridesmaids’ robes, which they would wear for the day: Lucy always serene and quiet; Mary, merry-hearted, gay-natured. Mary was to stay with them for some days. They looked somewhat scared at the early entrance of John Massingbird. Curious tales had gone about Deerham of John’s wild habits at Verner’s Pride, and, it may be, they felt half afraid of him. Lucy whispered to the servant to find Mr. Verner and tell him. Lady Verner had gone to her room to make ready for dinner. ”

“ West sought one more genial. Ranging his eyes over the room, they fell upon Lord Garle, who was still talking with Decima and Lucy.
"Which of the two young ladies makes the viscount's attraction, Mr. Verner?"
Lionel smiled. "They do not take me into their confidence, sir; any one of the three."
"I am sure it is not Decima, papa," spoke up Sibylla. "She's as cold as a stone. I won't answer for its not being Lucy Tempest. Lord Garle comes here a good deal, and he and Lucy seem great friends. I often think he comes for Lucy." ”

“ Her former lover had been one of the first victims of the disease. But Lucy continued to live for and in her mother. Her courage only failed when she dreaded peril for her parent, or feared that death might prevent her from performing those duties to which she was unalterably devoted.
When we had quitted Windsor for London, as the previous step to our final emigration, we visited Lucy, and arranged with her the plan of her own and her mother's removal. ”

“ No Mate, no comrade Lucy knew;
She dwelt on a wild Moor,
The sweetest Thing that ever grew
Beside a human door!
You yet may spy the Fawn at play,
The Hare upon the Green;
But the sweet face of Lucy Gray
Will never more be seen.
"To-night will be a stormy night,
You to the Town must go,
And take a lantern, Child, to light
Your Mother thro' the snow."
"That, Father! will I gladly do;
'Tis scarcely afternoon—
The Minster-clock has just struck two,
And yonder is the Moon."
At this the Father rais'd his hook
And snapp'd a faggot-band;
He plied his work, and Lucy took
The lantern in her hand. ”

“ Lucy thought of a very good remark.
“You say Mr. Vyse wants me to listen to him, Mr. Emerson. Pardon me for suggesting that you have caught the habit.”
And he took the shoddy reproof and touched it into immortality. He said:
“Yes, I have,” and sank down as if suddenly weary. “I’m the same kind of brute at bottom. This desire to govern a woman—it lies very deep, and men and women must fight it together before they shall enter the garden. But I do love you surely in a better way than he does.” He thought. “Yes—really in a better way. ”

“ The next day school began in Sycamore Ridge,—for the school and the church came with the newspaper, Freedom's Banner,—and a new world opened to the boy, and he forgot the cave, and became interested in Webster's blue-backed speller. And thus another grown-up person, "Miss Lucy," came into his world. For with children, men and women generically are of another order of beings. But Miss Lucy, being John Barclay's teacher, grew into his daily life on an equality with his dog and the Hendricks boys, and took a place somewhat lower than his mother in his list of saints. ”

“ Something—was it a breath? a sigh?—made me look back into the attic where Lucy's clothes clung to the high-backed chair, like flower petals blown against a wall. The pier-glass had caught all the glory of the morning and was releasing it in quivering spears of light that dazzled me for a moment; I rubbed my eyes, and stared, and shook a little, for in the midst of all this splendour I saw Lucy! No pallid, rigid ghost, but something warm, eager with life, spreading the folds of the lilac gown like a butterfly warming its new wings in the strength of the sun. ”