"What is it? She hasn"t declined, surely?" Mrs. Faude asked in an undertone, close at his side.
"Just that; it"s from the mother; thanks me for the invitation, but respectfully declines; not even vouchsafing a shadow of an excuse. What can it mean?"
"I don"t know, I"m sure. But if they knew you had serious intentions--it might make a difference."
"Possibly. I"ll soon bring it to the proof."
He rose and went out in search of Mr. Travilla, found him alone, and at once asked his permission to pay his addresses to Elsie.
The request was courteously, but decidedly and firmly refused.
"May I ask why?" queried the young man in anger and astonishment.
"Because, sir, it would not be agreeable to either my daughter herself, to her mother or to me."
"Then I must say, sir, that you are all three hard to please. But pray, sir, what is the objection?"
"Do you insist upon knowing?"
"I do, sir."
"Then let me answer your query with another. Would you pay your addresses to a young woman--however wealthy, beautiful or high-born--whose moral character was not better, whose life had been no purer than your own?"
"Of course not!" exclaimed Faude, coloring violently, "but who expects----"
"I do, sir; I expect the husbands of my daughters to be as pure and stainless as my sons" wives."
"I"m as good as the rest, sir. You"ll not find one young fellow in five hundred who has sowed fewer wild oats than I."
"I fear that may be true enough, but it does not alter my decision,"
returned Mr. Travilla, intimating by a bow and a slight wave of the hand, that he considered the interview at an end.
Faude withdrew in anger, but with an intensified desire to secure the coveted prize; the more difficult of acquisition, the more desirable it seemed.
He persuaded his mother to become his advocate with Mrs. Travilla.
She at first flatly refused, but at length yielded to his entreaties, and undertook the difficult, and to her haughty spirit, humiliating mission.
Requesting a private interview with Elsie, she told her of the wishes of Clarence Augustus, and plead his cause with all the eloquence of which she was mistress.
"My boy would make your daughter a good husband," she said, "and indeed, I think any woman might feel highly honored by the offer of his hand. I do not understand how it is, Mrs. Travilla, that a lady of your sense fails to see that."
"I appreciate your feelings, my dear Mrs. Faude," said Elsie gently. "I am a mother too, you know, and have sons of my own."
"Yes, and what possible objection can you have to mine? Excuse my saying it, but the one your husband advanced, seems to me simply absurd."
"Nevertheless it is the only one; except that our child"s heart is not enlisted; but either alone would be insuperable."
"She hardly knows him yet, and could not fail to learn to love him if she did. Be persuaded my dear Mrs. Travilla, to give him a chance to try. It is never well to be hasty, especially in declining a good offer, and this, let me tell you, is such an one as you will not meet with every day, lovely and attractive in every way, as your daughters are.
"Ours is an old, aristocratic family; none better to be found in our state, or in the Union; we have wealth too, and I flatter myself that Clarence Augustus is as handsome a man as you would find anywhere; amiable in disposition also, and would, as I said before, make an excellent husband. Will you not undertake his cause?"
"Believe me, it is painful to me to refuse, but I could not, in conscience."
"But why not?"
"Simply for the reason my husband gave. We both consider moral purity more essential than anything else in those we admit to even friendly intercourse with our children; especially our daughters."
"My son is not a bad man, Mrs. Travilla, very far from it!" Mrs. Faude exclaimed, in the tone of one who considers herself grossly insulted.
"Not, I am sure, as the world looks upon these things," said Elsie, "but the Bible is our standard; and guided by its teachings we desire above all things else, purity of heart and life in those who seek the friendship of our children; and very especially in those who are to become their partners for life, and the future fathers or mothers of their offspring, should it please G.o.d to give them any."
"That is certainly looking far ahead," returned Mrs. Faude, with a polite sneer.
"Not farther than is our duty, since after marriage it is too late to consider, to any profit, what kind of parent our already irrevocably chosen partner for life will probably make."
"Well, well, every one to her taste!" said Mrs. Faude, rising to go, "but had I a daughter, I should infinitely prefer for her husband, such a young man as my Clarence Augustus to such as that poor artist who is so attentive to Miss Travilla.
"Good-morning. I am sure I may trust you not to blazon this matter abroad?"
"You certainly may, Mrs. Faude," Elsie returned with sweet and gentle courtesy, "and believe me, it has been very painful to me to speak words that have given pain to you."
"What is it, little wife?" Mr. Travilla asked, coming in a moment after Mrs. Faude"s departure and finding Elsie alone and seemingly sunk in a painful reverie.
She repeated what had just pa.s.sed, adding, "I am very glad now that we decided to return to Philadelphia to-morrow. I could see that Mrs. Faude was deeply offended, and it would be unpleasant to both of us to remain longer in the same house; but as she and her son go with the boating party to-day, and we leave early in the morning, we are not likely to encounter each other again."
"Yes, it is all for the best," he said. "But I wish I could have shielded you from this trial."
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHTH.
"The brave man is not he who feels no fear, For that were stupid and irrational; But he whose soul its fear subdues, And bravely dares the danger nature shrinks from."
--BAILLIE.
The Travillas returned home to Ion in November and took up with new zest the old and loved routine of study, work and play.
Elsie was no longer a schoolgirl, but still devoted some hours of each day to the cultivation of her mind and the keeping up of her accomplishments; also pursued her art studies with renewed ardor under the tuition of Lester Leland, who, his health requiring during the winter, a warmer climate than that of his northern home, had come at the urgent request of his relatives, to spend the season at Fairview.
Elsie had a number of gentlemen friends, some of whom she highly esteemed, but Lester"s society was preferred to that of any other.
Malcom Lilburn had grown very jealous of Lester, and found it difficult indeed to refrain from telling his love, but had gone away without breathing a word of it to any one.
Not to Scotland, however; he and his father were traveling through the West, visiting the princ.i.p.al points of interest, and had partly promised to take Ion in their way as they returned; which would probably not be before spring.
Mr. and Mrs. Travilla were not exempt from the cares and trials incident to our fallen state, but no happier parents could be found; they were already reaping as they had sowed; indeed it seemed to them that they had been reaping all the way along, so sweet was the return of affection from the little clinging, helpless ones, the care of whom had been no less a pleasure than a sacred, G.o.d-given duty; but with each pa.s.sing year the harvest grew richer and more abundant; the eldest three had become very companionable and the intercourse between the two Elsies was more like that of sisters, than of mother and daughter; the young girl loved her mother"s society above that of any other of her s.e.x, and "mamma" was still, as she had ever been, her most intimate friend and confidante.