Oliver Evans

“ Give up, for a season, this projected tour of Europe; wait till I can go with you—till I can take you; go back to W—— with me. You can continue your art studies, if you wish it; you can prosecute them there as well as here. You are ambitious, Electra; so am I; let us work together."
She raised her head and looked up at the powerful, nobly-proportioned form, the grand, kingly face, calm and colourless, the large, searching black eyes, within whose baffling depths lay all the mysteries of mesmerism, and a spasm of pain seized her own features. She shaded her brow, and answered—
"No, Russell ”

“ No one makes bread; they dry the venison into chips, and getting the meals at all seems a work of toil and difficulty, instead of the pleasure it used to be to us. Evans, since tea, has told me all his troubles and worries. He is a kind, generous, whole-hearted, unsuspicious man, a worse enemy to himself, I believe, than to any other; but I feel sadly that the future of a man who has not stronger principles than he has must be at the best very insecure. ”

“ Wishing to perfect his art by the study of nature alone, and to free himself from the influence of schools or individuals, Evans made himself a home for many years in the centre of a grand gorge of mountain scenery in North Wales, at a farm called Tyn-y-Car, in a large park at the junction of the Deddr with the Conway. ”

“ His chivalry to women is so well known, that Evans said I could be safer and better cared for with no one. He added, "His heart is good and kind, as kind a heart as ever beat. He's a great enemy of his own, but he's been living pretty quietly for the last four years." At the door of his den I took leave of Birdie, who had been my faithful companion for more than 700 miles of travelling, and of Evans, who had been uniformly kind to me and just in all his dealings, even to paying to me at that moment the very last dollar he owed me. ”

“ He was smiling a faint, gravely gentle smile that barely lifted the corners of his lips when she turned in his arms and lifted her face once more to him.
“We don’t mind very much,” she repeated in a half whisper. “Do we––either of us––now?”
Slowly he shook his head. With effortless ease he stooped and swung her up on one arm, seating her upon the bare table before the window. Another match flared between his fingers and the whole room sprang into brightness as he touched the point of flame 56 to the wick of the lamp bracketed to the wall beside him. ”

“ Selecting the cloth and accomplishing her errand, she returned by way of the orphan asylum, whose brick walls were rapidly rising under her supervision. One of the workmen took her horse, and she went over the building, talking to the principal mechanic about some additional closets which she desired to have [Pg 189] inserted. Dr. Arnold chanced to be passing, but saw Erebus at the gate, stopped, and came in.
"I was just going up the Hill to see you, Queen—glad I am saved the trouble. Here, sit down a minute; I will clear the shavings away. When did you hear from Leonard?" ”

“ Evans is a good fellow, but provokingly incomplete.
"Yes," said I. "What happened to the old man?"
"Oh, he rushed on deck at the first shock, it seems, and was promptly bowled over the side by a breaker. But there's no killing him. He just sat on the reef, thinking his ketch sunk and Thorpe dead, until someone came and took him off. Shook him up, though. He's never been quite the same since—which is all to the good, most of us think." ”

“ Mr. Aubrey, remember me as I was, not as I am. Good-bye, my friend. May God bless you in coming years, and crown your life with the happiness you merit, is the earnest prayer of my heart."
The rare blue cord on her brow told how fiercely the lava-flood surged under its icy bands, and the blanched lip matched her cheek in colourlessness; save these tokens of anguish, no other was visible.
Russell drew down the hand from his shoulder, and folded it in both his own.
"Irene, are we to walk different paths henceforth—utter strangers? Is such your will?" ”

“ Terran time and calendar were adapted as a matter of course.
"But why should we be?" Stella demanded. "I've been eating everything in sight, just for fun. But now I'm actually hungry enough to eat a horse and wagon and chase the driver!"
"Swimming makes everybody hungry," Beverly said, "and I'm awfully glad that hasn't changed. Why, I wouldn't feel human if I didn't!"
Hilton and Temple went home, and had a long-drawn-out and very wonderful supper. Prince waited on Temple, Dark Lady on Hilton; Larry and Moty ran the synthesizers in the kitchen. All four Omans radiated happiness. ”

“ The quizzical smile only widened before the chilly threat of his beady eyes and ruffled forehead. And then, all in one breath, her little pouted chin went up and she burst into a low gurgle of utter enjoyment of the tableau.
“Well,” she demanded, “aren’t you ever going to say anything? Here I am! I––I decided to move today––there really wasn’t any use of waiting. Aren’t you surprised––just a little?”
The meekness of her voice, so wholly belied by her eyes and lips and swaying boy-like body, only tightened the old man’s mouth. ”

“ Delighted with this intelligence, Evans awakened the whole house, especially two strapping fellows, whom he called his bull-dogs, sometimes employing them as husbandry servants, at others, on account of their large size, and muscular power, as constables. Both these fellows were first sent to saddle his horse, in case he should have to take Twm to Cardigan gaol,—and then to attend him to Watt’s cottage, where the trio soon went.
Peeping through the casement, Evans discovered a tall figure wrapped in a cloak, as described. “There he is sure enough,” quoth he in a whisper ”

“ Yes, and I could beat you over the head with my gun—oh, sure I've got one!—just like he beat that roan horse, and strip your pockets and be clean away before one of those"—he nodded over his shoulder at the train—"could think to call for help. And thinking to call for help would come quicker to them than thinking to help without calling. And Girl o' Mine would carry me clear in five minutes."
He paused remorselessly, as if to let this sink in, but out of the silence, "I don't scare easily," the huge man said.
"Pshaw! I'm not telling you to try to scare you," Blue Jeans scoffed. ”

“ This is what he said:
“Filthier you are than a cow.”
“Evan, indeed to goodness,” Hannah replied, “iobish you talk. Sober dear, do I not work to the bone?” With a knife she scraped through the refuse on her arm and displayed to him the thinness to which she referred. Then in her anger she spoke: “Slack you are, Evan Rhiw. Your little land you drink in the tavern of Mistress Shames. Are not the people mouthing your foolish ways on the tramping road and in Shop Rhys?”
Matilda entered the kitchen, and threw these words at him: “Dull and whorish you are, son of the Bad Spirit. ”

“ He closed the door, hung up his hat, and looked into the studio; no fire in the grate, no light in the gas-globes—everything cold and dark save the reflection on that front window.
"Electra!"
"I am here."
"No letter."
She stood motionless a moment; but the brick walls opposite, the trees, the lamp-posts spun around, like maple leaves in an autumn gale.
"My owlet! why don't you have a light and some fire?"
He stumbled toward her, and put his hand on her shoulder; but she shrank away, and, lighting the gas, rang for coal.
"There is something terrible the matter; Russell is either ill or dead. ”

“ I am not sorrowful, but my path in life is not quite so flowery as yours."
"I wish you would not call me 'Miss Huntingdon' in that stiff, far-off way, as if we were not friends. Or maybe it is a hint that you desire me to address you as Mr. Aubrey. It sounds strange, unnatural, to say anything but Russell."
She gathered up her books, took the gloves, and went slowly homeward, and Russell returned to his desk with a light in his eyes which, for the remainder of the day, nothing could quench. As Irene ascended the long hill on which Mr. ”

“ Edwards, his partner, is his exact opposite, tall, thin, and condemnatory-looking, keen, industrious, saving, grave, a teetotaler, grieved for all reasons at Evans's follies, and rather grudging; as naturally unpopular as Evans is popular; a "decent man," who, with his industrious wife, will certainly make money as fast as Evans loses it.
I pay eight dollars a week, which includes the unlimited use of a horse, when one can be found and caught. ”

“ Aren't you afraid that I will work you more unmercifully than a Yankee factory-child, or a Cornwall miner? See here, Queen; what do you suppose brought Electra to Richmond?"
"A desire to render some service to the sick and suffering, and also to be comparatively near her cousin."
"Precisely; only the last should be first, and the first last. Russell is a perverse, ungrateful dog."
As he expected, she glanced up at him, but refrained from comment.
"Yes, Irene—he is a soulless scamp. ”

“ Evans eagerly, "is it true that Sile's up bachin' on Corona, in old man Beebee's cabin, an' that he's gone to work at the Mont d'Or?"
"Yes," affirmed Frances, since no one else seemed to know. "It must be. I saw him going to work this morning. He—he—doesn't look very happy."
"I hope he ain't," said Mrs. Evans emphatically. "He don't deserve to be." ”

“ When did you hear from Electra?"
They walked on to the cemetery gate, and he answered—
"I have heard nothing for some weeks. Have you any message? I am going to New York in a few days to try to persuade her to return to W—— with me."
"I doubt the success of your mission; W—— has little to tempt an artist like your cousin. Be kind enough to tender her my love, and best wishes for the realization of her artistic dreams."
They had reached the gate where Erebus waited, when Russell took off his hat.
"You have a long walk to town," said Irene, as Russell arranged her horse's reins. ”

“ In 1852 Evans was appointed a clerk in the chancery pay office, a post which he held until 1882, when his health enforced his retirement. He never married; his residence was at Hampstead, where he lived with his brother and sisters.
Evans commenced the study of geology by attending lectures delivered in 1855 by Professor Owen and Dr. Melville. In 1858 he began to collect fossils from the tertiary formations of the south of England, and formed during the next twenty-five years very complete sets illustrating the strata of the London district. ”

“ Aubrey; she——"
"What!"
The cigar fell from his fingers, he put her from his knee, and rose instantly. His swarthy cheek glowed, and she wondered at the expression of his eyes, so different from anything she had ever seen there before.
"Who gave you permission to visit that house?"
"No permission was necessary. I go there because I love her and Electra, and because I like Russell. Why shouldn't I go there, sir? Is poverty disgrace?"
"Irene, mark me. You are to visit that house no more in future; keep away from the whole family. I will have no such association. ”

“ The Burbadges say in the Sharers Papers of 1635, ‘the more to strengthen the service, the boys daily wearing out, it was considered that house would be as fit for ourselves, and so purchased the lease remaining from Evans with our money, and placed men players, which were Hemings, Condall, Shakspeare, etc.’. They also say that the players had their shares ‘of us for nothing’. Very likely they paid no fine, but they had to pay their quota towards rent. It is reasonable to infer that Thomas Evans was a relative and nominee of Henry Evans. ”

“ The huge man had his first fair view of the other's fine hard youth; and while he observed the self-possessed eyes and long nose, acquisitive and courageous, Blue Jeans devoted the interval to a counter-scrutiny. He scanned the newcomer from head to foot, silk hose and hair-line suit and expensive panama. The rings upon those pudgy fingers held longest his wandering eye, the blue-white fortune in the burnt-orange cravat. But all this seemed to kindle no approval.
"Prosperous!" he muttered bitterly. "Prosperous! And yet I don't hate you like I did that superintendent. ”

“ I thought maybe it wouldn’t be too hard for you––with you coming by at night, anyhow. There’s just the one cow and the team, and the hens to feed. And then I––I got to thinkin’ that maybe, too, you’d be able to do something else for me, if I sort of explained how things were. There––there wasn’t anyone else I could think of who’d be likely to want to do me a favor.”
He paused and licked his lips. And Old Jerry, too, 135 furtively touched his with the tip of his tongue. ”

“ EVANS, EVAN (1731–1789) , Welsh poet and antiquary, son of Jenkin Evans, was born at Cynhawdref, in the parish of Lledrod, Cardiganshire, on 20 May 1731. He received his education at the grammar school of Ystrad Meurig, under the scholar and poet, Edward Richard. Thence he removed to Oxford, and was entered at Merton College in 1751. He conveyed a small freehold in Cardiganshire to his younger brother for 100l., in order to support himself at the university. ”

“ John Owen having been thus rebuked, and being in perfect possession of the speech aside, the bachelor singled out another boy.
'Now, look at that lad, sir,' said the bachelor. 'You see that fellow? Richard Evans his name is, sir. An amazing boy to learn, blessed with a good memory, and a ready understanding, and moreover with a good voice and ear for psalm-singing, in which he is the best among us. Yet, sir, that boy will come to a bad end; he'll never die in his bed ”