Minola

“ Minola said earnestly, "don't do that."
"Don't do what?"
He had hardly been thinking of his own words, and he seemed a little surprised at the earnestness of her tone.
"Don't lose heart. Don't give way. Don't fall into the track of the commonplace, and become like every one else. Keep to your purpose, Mr. Heron, and don't be beaten out of it."
"No; I haven't the least idea of that, I can assure you. Quite the contrary. But it is so hard to get a chance, or to do anything all at once. Everything moves so slowly in England. But I have a plan—we are doing something." ”

“ There was one consolation—the dedication did not set forth her name, and nobody could know who the lady patroness of the poet might be. Minola felt inclined to be offended that she should be in any way brought into this folly, but she was not certain whether remonstrance or complaint might not be more ridiculous than utter silence. After all nobody knew anything about her or cared, she said. If she were to complain in any way, it would only grieve poor Mary, whom the thought that her brother could have offended her friend and leader would drive well-nigh distracted. ”

“ Heron could not endure walking alone just then. He hailed a hansom and disappeared.
"How vain men are!" Minola thought as she went her way. "How egotistical they all are!" Of course she assumed herself to have obtained a complete knowledge of all the characters of men. "How egotistic he is! Of course he tells his whole story to every woman he meets. Lucy Money no doubt has it by heart." ”

“ Minola, filled as she was with a peculiarly independent spirit, and driven by circumstances to consider its indulgence a right and even a duty, could not keep from the occasional torment of a doubt whether there must not be something wrong in the conduct of any woman who, under any circumstances, leaves voluntarily, and while she is yet under age, the home of her childhood, and takes up her abode among strangers, without guardians, mistress of herself, and in lodgings. ”

“ Minola gave a sort of shudder.
"When the time comes. That seems so dreadful; as if we were only waiting for the poor woman to be dead to snatch at whatever she left behind her. Mr. Money, is there really no other way? must I have this property?"
"If she dies before you, yes—it will come to you. Of course you know that it isn't great wealth in the London sense. It won't constitute you an heiress in the Berkeley Square sense, but it will give you a good deal of miscellaneous property for a young woman. ”

“ You know that anybody who likes can find out everything about people's wills, and all that. Do you know anything about your father's will?"
"No," Minola said, with a start, and feeling the tears coming to her eyes. "I don't, Mr. Money. At least, not much. I know that he left me some money—so much every year; not much—it would not be much for Lucy—but enough for me and Mary Blanchet. Mary Blanchet manages it for me, and makes it go twice as far as I could. We never spend it all—I mean, we haven't spent it all this year. I should never be able to manage or to get on at all only for her." ”

“ She's very pretty, and sweet, and obliging; and he is simple and manly, and would be drawn by her pure, winning ways; and men like him are fond of women who don't profess to be strong. Well, if I can help her, I will do so—it will be something to see her completely happy, and him too."
Whereupon, for no apparent reason, the tears sprang into Minola's eyes, and she found a vain wish arising in her heart that she had never renewed her acquaintance with Lucy Money, never been persuaded by Mary Blanchet to visit her, never stood upon her threshold and met Victor Heron there. ”

“ Minola asked with a smile and a little of heightened color. "I shall feel myself of great importance."
"Well, yes, into council. First about yourself. I have been looking into your affairs a little, Miss Grey—don't be angry; we are all fond of you in this house, and you don't seem to have any one in particular to look after your interests."
"It was very kind and good of you. I have not many friends, Mr. Money; but I am afraid the word 'interests' is rather too large for any affairs of mine. Have I any interests? Mary Blanchet understands all my affairs much better than I do." ”

“ You don't want to lead an idle life lounging about London. Mr. Blanchet has his poems; Mr. Money has—well, he has his business, whatever it is, and he is in Parliament."
At this moment the servant entered and handed a card to Minola. A gentleman, she said, particularly wished to see Miss Grey, but he would call any time she pleased to name if she could not see him at present. Minola's cheek grew red as she glanced at the card, for it bore the name of Mr. Augustus Sheppard, and it had the words pencilled on it, "Wishes particularly to see you—has important business." ”

“ The pair of friends in Regent's Park were drawn together by exactly opposite impulses: each believed the other poor and unfriended. Minola was under the impression that she was giving her sympathy to a ruined and unhappy young man, who had failed in life almost at the very beginning, and was now friendless in stony-hearted London. ”

“ Minola spoke out with perfect frankness, believing that that was the best thing she could do, and not showing the least sign of embarrassment.
Mr. St. Paul laughed.
"You don't like the other fellow so well?" he said.
"I am sure he is a very good man——"
"That's enough; you need not say another word. We all can tell what a critic means when he speaks of some actor as a careful and painstaking performer. It's just the same when a woman says a man is very good. Then you pronounce for Heron?" ”

“ Minola thought; "a little money seems much more likely to part good company in my case."
Yet that there are advantages in a command of money was soon made very clear to Minola. When she returned from a walk a day or two after she found a specimen copy of Herbert Blanchet's poems awaiting her, with a note from Victor Heron. The letter was somewhat awkward and rueful. Mr. Heron explained that, by her express instructions, he had allowed Blanchet to have it all his own way in the arrangement of the style of his appearance in paper and print ”

“ She has come to London to live alone, and I am sure she must have some strange and romantic story."
Meanwhile Mr. Money, who prefaced his inquiries by telling Miss Grey that he was always asking information about something, began to put several questions to her concerning the local magnates, politics, and parties of Keeton. Minola was rather pleased to be talked to by a man as if she were a rational creature. ”

“ A jury of Keeton folk would have assumed a promise of marriage and proceeded to award damages for its breach if it were proved that a young man had walked openly for any three evenings in the park with a girl whom he afterward declined to make his wife. Minola did not care to meet any of the joyous couples or their friends, and even already the twitter of voices and the titter of feminine laughter were beginning to make themselves heard among the darkling paths and across the broad green lanes of the park. ”

“ Had some rude person jostled against or otherwise insulted the poet as they passed along, Victor would have felt it his duty to interpose and resent the affront as promptly as if Minola Grey or Lucy Money were the object of the insult. To his unsophisticated colonial mind the poet was the sweet feminine voice of the literary grammar.
Heron occupied two or three rooms on the drawing-room floor of one of the streets running out of Piccadilly. He paid, perhaps, more for his accommodation than a prudent young man beginning the world all over again would have thought necessary ”

“ I am very fond of my Lucelet. She isn't strong; she hasn't great intelligence. I know my little goose is not a swan, but she is very sweet, and sensitive, and loving: the most affectionate little creature that ever was made happy or unhappy by a man. I am morbidly anxious about her happiness. Now, you are her friend, and a thousand times cleverer and stronger than she, and she looks up to you. She would tell you anything. Has she told you anything lately?"
Minola hesitated. ”

“ Augustus Sheppard the other day, mamma, in our drawing-room."
"He couldn't have known this, I think," Miss Blanchet said.
"Oh, no, I suppose not; but he knows him, and he'll tell us all about him. Why wouldn't Nola have him, Miss Blanchet?"
"He is rather a formal sort of person, and heavy, and not the least in the world poetic or romantic; and Minola does not like him at all. She doesn't think his feelings are very deep; but there I am sure she is wrong," the poetess added emphatically. "She has never had occasion to make a study of human feelings as others have." ”

“ When, however, it was found that Minola was to have her father's property after all, a certain change took place in the opinion of most persons who concerned themselves about the matter. It was assumed generally that Mr. Grey was far too good and Christian a man to have left his property to a girl who could be capable of acting in an opera bouffe. ”

“ Minola did not very clearly follow all that he had been saying; partly because she was beginning to be afraid that to put herself into the position of adviser and confidante to this young man was a scarcely becoming performance on her part. Her mind was a little perturbed, and she was not a very good listener then. Some people say that women seldom are good listeners; that while they are playing the part of audience they are still thinking how they look as performers. Anyhow, Minola was now growing anxious to escape from her position. ”

“ An affable and courteous Gentleman,
Her name is Katherina Minola,
Renown'd in Padua for her scolding tongue
Petr. ”

“ In truth, Minola had in her mind a little plot to do a service to Mary Blanchet and her brother in the matter of the poems, and she had thought of Mr. Heron as the kindliest and likeliest person she knew to give her a helping hand in the carrying out of her project. Mary, not thinking anything of this, was yet made more happy than before by the prospect of having a handsome young man for one of the audience. As has been said already, she had the kindliest feelings to handsome young men. Then the presence of another listener would make the thing quite an assembly ”

“ I met him in Egypt, and I knew him in England too; and so he came to see me, and he found a sort of old acquaintance in Heron. That's all. He's a clever fellow, and not a bad fellow in his way. I dare say he would have made a very decent follower of Drake or Raleigh if he had been born at the right time."
Minola's attention was drawn away somewhat from the character, adventures, and philosophical interest of Mr. St. Paul to observe some peculiarity in the manner of Lucy Money. Although Lucy had set out by declaring herself wildly eager to know something about St. ”

“ Minona's eyes were full of tears, the sister of car-borne Morar. She retired from the song of Ullin, like the moon in the west, when she foresees the shower, and hides her fair head in a cloud. I touched the harp with Ullin: the song of morning rose!
"Ryno. The wind and the rain are past, calm is the noon of day. The clouds are divided in heaven. Over the green hills flies the inconstant sun. Red through the stony vale comes down the stream of the hill. Sweet are thy murmurs, O stream! but more sweet is the voice I hear. It is the voice of Alpin, the son of song, mourning for the dead! ”

“ Minerva looked at me seriously.
“That’s it, Minerva,” said Ethel eagerly. “They scrape their wings in some way and that makes the sound. You don’t know how many things there are to learn about the country and, Minerva, it isn’t half as dangerous as the city. To-morrow if it is pleasant, we’ll go out and try to catch a grasshopper playing his little fiddle. You may go, now, Minerva.”
Minerva went out and closed the kitchen door and the next minute the house shook. ”

“ She came in to where I was finishing my second cup of coffee and said,
“Minerva is a jewel. She’s going up. Do you know, in some ways it’s better than if we had Mamie Logan because Minerva is a much better cook and she won’t have any beaux from the village to make a noise in the kitchen in the evening—”
“No, but you may have to import beaux from Thompson Street to solace her loneliness,” said I. “If I know the kind at all, Minerva will die one day away from New York.”
“Nonsense,” said Ethel. “She can’t help falling in love with the view from the kitchen windows. ”

“ Meanwhile the nymphs, winding their arms about the goat-men's loins, fell to biting and caressing and provoking their hairy lovers, and body intertwined with body, they enfolded and bathed them in their tender flesh that was sweeter and softer and more living than the water of the brook which ran by them under the sallows.
At the sight, Fra Mino fell, in mind and intention, into deadly sin. He desired to be one of these demons, half men and half beasts, and hold to his bosom, after their carnal fashion, the fair lady of Florence he had loved in the flower of his years, and who was now dead. ”

“ Minerva is not bad looking and she has a happy disposition in the main,” said I, as Ethel passed me my coffee.
“My, yes, she’s a different creature from what she was when she first saw these hills. This morning she actually told me that the sunsets up here had more colors in them than they had in New York, and that they were bigger. She’s beginning to take notice. I must give her a nature lesson. Something has always happened to prevent it.”
“I don’t think the need for it exists now that she has James. He’s all the study she needs.” ”