Miss Vincent

“ Miss Vincent smiled when Alice told of Eva's odd simplicity of application; but as Alice went on and presented Eva's perplexity and her plea for girls of her age,—their lack of time and all that, and her own assurance to Eva that Miss Vincent did not mean what Eva fancied that she did,—Miss Vincent, in a quick, decided, almost eager way, started forward and cried,—
"Oh, but I did! I did mean it. Girls of your age can do—oh, so much! You are thinking of only one way of doing,—helping the poor, visiting people in need. ”

“ Quite true, no doubt, Miss Vincent; but there are some young ladies less strong-minded than yourself, who may be easily bewitched by the delicate outline of a classical profile, or the light of a pair of handsome dark eyes. Eleanor Vincent, do you remember what I said to you when I brought you down to Hazlewood?”
Mr. Monckton was in the habit of addressing both the girls by their Christian names when he spoke seriously. ”

“ Margaret answered, fervently.
"Perhaps he didn't want you. We've only his word for it there is this brother in Australia—and what is that worth, I should like to know?"
Mrs. Vincent looked up quickly from her seat in the porch. "I'll have you speak with respect of the man who is my husband," she said, gently.
"And shame to you, mother, that he is. He has undermined your faith, and made you forget your first husband's child."
"Hannah, you will be silent," Mrs. Vincent answered, with some of her old dignity. "We have each kept to our own way of thinking, and neither has meddled with the other. ”

“ The best roses were cut for his writing-table, the ripest fruit for his dessert and breakfast, and once when she lingered in the best parlor, dusting it before he was down, she lifted a half-written slip and kissed it, knowing that his hand must have rested on it; for youth does not monopolize romance, and even eight-and-thirty can know its agitations. After a time Mr. Vincent became aware of her feeling for him ”

“ But Vincent could win hearts as well as fame: ah, do you think I don't know?—trust a woman to know! There is a strange kind of charm and fascination about him: I would put the most accomplished lady-killer in England in a drawing-room, and I know where the girls' eyes would go the moment my Vin made his appearance: perhaps it is because he is so honestly indifferent to them all. And it isn't women only; it isn't merely his good looks; every one, young and old, man and woman, is taken with him ”

“ Vincent would only die and be done with it! If he was not mixed up with all these family affairs,—but they will be settled by midwinter. He is not thinking of marriage for himself, that she can plainly see, and it makes her cause all the more secure. She feels, sitting beside him in the palace car, quite as if she had the sole claim, and she really loves him, needs him. It is different from any feeling of mere admiration, though he is a man of whom any woman might be justly proud. ”

“ Their life was hard. They rose at four, their food was of the plainest description, they spent their days in an unhealthy atmosphere and were habitually overworked. The life of a true Sister of Charity needed to be rooted and nourished in the love of God, and no one realized it more completely than Vincent himself. In his weekly conferences, when they met together at St. Lazare, he would set before them the ideals of their vocation, bidding them above all things to be humble and simple. ”

“ Politics are rather low down, you know, Miss Vincent, so they'll suit me. What did you think of Miss Hunstan? I saw her last night; she had fallen in love with you."
[Pg 91]
"Had she?" Margaret exclaimed, joyfully. "I'm so glad. I love her, though I only saw her for a moment."
"I'll tell her so. Every one does. My mother was devoted to her; that's one reason why I am. She's great fun, too, though, of course, she's getting on a bit," he added, with the splendid insolence of youth. "There's something more at the back of this visit," and he looked at Mr. Vincent. ”

“ And they reveal all Vincent's theories and ideals, his goodness, his moods, variable as the mercury in a thermometer, his personality as a man and an artist, young, gay, unsuspecting, indefatigable: untiring, too, in spite of his lack of physical strength. At early as 1882, he wrote:
"My hands have become rather too white for my taste. People like myself have no right to be ill." ”

“ Whereupon Vincent said to himself, 'You're a very impertinent woman—although you've got pretty eyes.' And again he said, 'But after all you are a woman; and perhaps from you I may learn something more about Maisrie.' So he said aloud—
"The deck of a steamer is hardly the place for secrets." ”

“ Vincent said (he is a man of rather a sardonic humor) , "but in shying at the sticks he is quite unequalled: he has quite a genius for it. He ought to have the sticks painted on his carriage, as the French marshals have their bâtons. Hasn't he brought you a pincushion or a jack-in-the-box, Lady Raikes? and has he begun to neglect you so soon? Every father with a little boy at home" (and he congratulated her ladyship on the birth of that son and heir) "ought surely to think of him, and bring him a soldier, or a monkey, or a toy or two." ”

“ Vincent to address me. You cannot imagine that I am so base as to treat him with duplicity, or that I consider him only as a pis-aller; no—I have treated, I will treat him honourably. He knows exactly the state of my mind. He shall have a fair trial whether he can win my love; the moment I am convinced that he cannot succeed, I will tell him so decidedly: but if ever I should feel for him that affection which is necessary for my happiness and his, I hope I shall without fear, even of Lady Delacour’s ridicule or displeasure, avow my sentiments, and abide by my choice. ”

“ I don't believe Hannah's heaven will be half so good as this world is in summer-time, when everything is green and a dear mother loves you."
"It will be your heaven, too, Margey, dear," Mrs. Vincent said. "I don't like you to talk so—"
"Then I won't," Margaret answered, impulsively. "I won't do anything you don't like. Here is father."
"He has come to tell us something," Mrs. Vincent said. She started from her chair and looked at him, and then for a moment at the green world beyond the porch, as if she felt that it would give her strength. ”

“ Lena was enjoying herself immensely. "I have made you angry again," she said; "but you look splendid, just as you did in London. Isn't she beautiful, Miss Barton?"
Hannah could hardly bear it. "I have never been able to see it," she said, as her mother and Mrs. Lakeman entered.
Dawson Farley was standing by the porch. "Are you likely to come to London again, Miss Vincent?" he asked.
"I hope I shall, and soon," Margaret answered; and then she went on eagerly, "I heard that you saw Miss Hunstan first when she walked on the stage holding up a princess's train?" ”

“ Vincent is a lover and a hero. You know it is a ruled case, in all romances, that when a lover and his mistress go out riding together, some adventure must befal them. The horse must run away with the lady, and the gentleman must catch her in his arms just as her neck is about to be broken. If the horse has been too well trained for the heroine’s purpose, ‘some footpad, bandit fierce, or mountaineer,’ some jealous rival must make his appearance quite unexpectedly at the turn of a road, and the lady must be carried off—robes flying—hair streaming—like Bürger’s Leonora. ”

“ Vincent ventured to say, in rather a low voice.
"And thus so far we have come through the world together," the old man continued, in the same meditative mood. "What I have done I have done for the best. Perhaps I may have erred: what could I tell about the uprearing of a young girl? And it may be that what she is now she is in spite of what I have done for her and with her—who knows such mysteries? As for the future, perhaps it is better not to look to it. She is alone; she is sensitive; the world is hard." ”

“ But she could have it again; with a grown woman's strength and depth of feeling, she could have the inheritance of youth. She had spent it, but now she could have it again. That was what Vincent meant.
He seemed to lean over her now, his burning, quivering hand on hers. She felt a deep hot flush rise to her face, all over her body. She was like a crimson rose, offering the splendor of its maturity to be plucked. Let her have the courage to know that its end and aim and fulfilment lay in being plucked and gloriously worn before the coming of the inevitable end! ”

“ The Maquis took advantage of the silence which followed Vincent's criticism to rise from table. We all (except Vincent, who took leave) adjourned to the salon. "Qui est cet homme la?" said one, "comme il est epris de lui-meme." "How silly he is," cried another—"how ugly," said a third. What a taste in literature—such a talker—such shallowness, and such assurance—not worth the answering—could not slip in a word— disagreeable, revolting, awkward, slovenly, were the most complimentary opinions bestowed upon the unfortunate Vincent. ”

“ If she possesses one quality higher than intellect, it is her kindness of heart: no wonder indeed, that she is so really clever—those trees which are the soundest at the core produce the finest fruits, and the most beautiful blossoms."
"Lord Vincent grows poetical," thought I—"how very different he really is to that which he affects to be in the world; but so it is with every one—we are all like the ancient actors: let our faces be ever so beautiful, we must still wear a mask." ”

“ Nona Vincent, in face and form, the living heroine of his play, rose before him in his little silent room, sat down with him at his dingy fireside. She was not Violet Grey, she was not Mrs. Alsager, she was not any woman he had seen upon earth, nor was it any masquerade of friendship or of penitence. Yet she was more familiar to him than the women he had known best, and she was ineffably beautiful and consoling. ”

“ For how can I tell you clearly without seeming cruel and ungrateful to one who has through my whole life been kindness and goodness to me?—no!—no!"
She withdrew her hand; she turned away from him altogether.
"Maisrie," said he, "I don't want you to say anything, except that you love me, and will be my wife."
"Your wife, Vincent—your wife!" she exclaimed, in a piteous sort of way. "How can you ask any one to be your wife who has led the life that I have led? Can you not guess—Vincent—without my having to speak?" ”

“ Love is not always blind; and if he is, Vincent is the man to cure him.
In those days he prescribed for us all round, and punched and stethoscoped us, and looked at our tongues for love, and told us what to eat, drink, and avoid, and even where to go for it.
For instance: late one night Little Billee woke up in a cold sweat, and thought himself a dying man—he had felt seedy all day and taken no food; so he dressed and dragged himself to Vincent's hotel, and woke him up, and said, "Oh, Vincent, Vincent! I'm a dying man!" ”

“ DARLING ROSA: You've often said that you would disown Vincent if he were not true to the South. Think of Vincent in my place—dawdling in Acredale or Washington while battles were going on. You would not hold him less contemptible that he was in love; that he let his love, or his life, for you are both to me, stand as a barrier to his duty. You can't love where you can't honor, and you can't hate where you know conscience rules. ”

“ When all the house was still Lord Vincent stole to the apartments of
Mrs. Dugald.
"Oh! I have been waiting for you so long and so impatiently," she said, as she placed him a chair at her dressing-room fireside.
"I came as soon as all was quiet. Oh, Faustina, how I am sinking my soul in sin and infamy for your sake!" exclaimed Lord Vincent, as a momentary qualm of shame sickened his heart.
"Do you repent it, then?" she inquired, with a glance that brought him to her feet, a slave once more, "do you repent it?"
"No, my angel, no! though we go to perdition, we go together! ”

“ She lifted her mother's hands and kissed her fingers. "I cannot, darling!"
"But where would you go in London?" Mrs. Vincent asked, for she herself felt the impossibility of peace at Woodside Farm while Margaret remained and her husband was absent.
"I shall go to Miss Hunstan first. Sometimes I think I should like to be an actress, too."
"You mustn't, Margaret!" Mrs. Vincent cried in terror. "Hannah would never let you enter the house again, for she says that play-actors come from Satan and go to him again when their day is done." ”

“ Yet Vincent was justified in his experiment. Long as had been his experience of the sin and misery of men, it had not taught him, any more than it did his Divine Master, to despair of human nature. He had only employed his usual methods with Mazarin: methods that had prevailed with so many souls. He had appealed to the desire for good which he believed lay hidden in the heart of every man, no matter how deeply it might be buried under the refuse of a wasted life. ”

“ Mayfield, and which those men had come to get. And her ladyship could not help you, for Mr. Vincent has made her sell all her jewels already."
Mary fairly started. Was it possible that she was on the track of another family trouble, some new and black disgrace of which she had hitherto known nothing? It seemed hardly fair to take advantage of a weak-minded old woman in this, and yet--
"Who is this Mr. Vincent that you speak of?" Mary asked.
"Mr. Vincent--that is all I can tell you. He is young and handsome, and yet so wicked and unscrupulous. ”

“ Why can't they let the people have a row if they want one? I'd like it; give a fellow something to do in this beastly hole."
He went off to dress moodily, wishing savage wishes, so adding, perhaps, to that electricity in the air. And Vincent gave it his quota of desire also, in his reckless determination to regain Paradise, as it was lost, through a woman. And that play of Romeo and Juliet in the scented garden--Juliet, whose bounty was "as boundless as the sea"--was a bit of pure paradise to him. He had never, he thought, been in love before. He had never known what love was. ”