"What is the matter, child?" asked the other.
"Nothing, except that I was thinking about how these thoughts were brought up."
"How do you mean?"
"Apropos of my woodland walk with poor Arthur. Auntie, I do believe you"re afraid I"m going to fall in love with the dear fellow."
"No," said Aunt Polly; "it is not exactly that, for I"d never be able to sleep at night if I thought you capable of anything quite so ghastly. But we must have some care of what people will think, my dear Helen."
As a matter of fact, Aunt Polly did have some very serious fears about the matter, as has been hinted before; it was, perhaps, a kind of tribute to the divine fire which even society"s leaders pay. If it had been a question of a person of her own sense and experience, the word "genius" would have suggested no danger to Mrs. Roberts, but it was different with a young and probably sentimental person like Helen, with her inflaming beauty.
"As a matter of fact, Aunt Polly," said Helen, "everybody understands my intimacy with Arthur."
"Tell me, Helen dear," said the other, turning her keen glance upon her; "tell me the honest truth."
"About what?"
"You are not in love with Arthur?"
And Helen answered her with her eyes very wide open: "No, I certainly am not in the least."
And the other drew secretly a great breath of relief. "Is he in love with you, Helen?" she asked.
As Helen thought of Arthur"s departure, the question could not but bring a smile. "I--I"m afraid he is," she said.--"a very little."
"What a ridiculous impertinence!" exclaimed the other, indignantly.
"Oh, that"s all right, Auntie," said Helen; "he really can"t help it, you know." She paused for a moment, and then she went on: "Such things used to puzzle me when I was very young, and I used to think them quite exciting; but I"m getting used to them now. All the men seem to fall in love with me,--they do, honestly, and I don"t know how in the world to help it. They all will make themselves wretched, and I"m sure it isn"t my fault. I haven"t told you anything about my German lovers, have I, Auntie?"
"Gracious, no!" said the other; "were there any?"
"Any?" laughed the girl. "I might have robbed the Emperor of a whole colonel"s staff, and the colonel at the head of it. But I"ll tell you about Johann, the funniest one of all; I think he really loved me more than all the rest."
"Pray, who was Johann?" asked Aunt Polly, thinking how fortunate it was that she learned of these things only after the danger was over.
"I never will forget the first time I met him," laughed the girl, "the first day I went to the school. Johann was a little boy who opened the door for me, and he stared at me as if he were in a trance; he had the most wonderful round eyes, and puffy red cheeks that made me always think I"d happened to ring the bell while he was eating; and every time after that he saw me for three years he used to gaze at me in the same helpless wonder, with all lingers of his fat little hands wide apart."
"What a disagreeable wretch!" said the other.
"Not in the least," laughed Helen; "I liked him. But the funniest part came afterwards, for when I came away Johann had grown a whole foot, and was quite a man. I sent for him to put the straps on my trunks, and guess what he did! He stared at me for a minute, just the same as ever, and then he ran out of the room, blubbering like a baby; and that"s the last I ever saw of him."
Helen was laughing as she told the story, but then she stopped and looked a little conscience-stricken. "Do you know, Aunt Polly," she said, "it is really a dreadful thing to make people unhappy like that; I suppose poor Johann had spent three whole years dreaming about the enchanted castle in which I was to be fairy princess."
"It was a good chance for a romantic marriage," said the other.
"Yes," said the girl, laughing again; "I tried to fancy it. He"d have kept a Wirthshaus, I suppose, and I"d have served the guests; and Arthur might have come, and I"d have cut b.u.t.terbrod for him and he could have been my Werther! Wouldn"t Arthur have made a fine Werther, though, Aunt Polly?"
"And blown his brains out afterwards," added the other.
"No," said Helen, "brains are too scarce; I"d rather have him follow Goethe"s example and write a book about it instead. You know I don"t believe half the things these poets tell you, for I think they put themselves through their dreadful experiences just to tell about them and make themselves famous. Don"t you believe that, Auntie?"
"I don"t know," said the other (a statement which she seldom made).
"I don"t know much about such things. n.o.body reads poetry any more, you know, Helen, and it doesn"t really help one along very much."
"It doesn"t do any harm, does it?" inquired the girl, smiling to herself, "just a little, once in a while?"
"Oh, no, of course not," said the other; "I believe that a woman ought to have a broad education, for she never knows what may be the whims of the men she meets, or what turn a conversation may take.
All I"m afraid of, Helen, is that if you fill your mind with sentimental ideas you might be so silly as to fancy that you were doing something romantic in throwing your one great chance away upon some worthless n.o.body. I want you to realize what you are, Helen, and that you owe something to yourself, and to your family, too; for the Roberts have always had wealth and position until your mother chose to marry a poor man. What I warn you of now is exactly what I warned her of. Your father is a good man, but he had absolutely nothing to make your mother happy; she was cut off from everything she had been used to,--she could not even keep a carriage. And of course she could not receive her old friends, very few of them cared to have anything more to do with her, and so she simply pined away in discontentment and miserable poverty. You have had an easy life, Helen, and you have no idea of what a horrible thing it is to be poor; you have had the best of teachers, and you have lived at an expensive school, and of course you have always had me to rely upon to introduce you to the right people; but if you married a poor man you couldn"t expect to keep any of those advantages. I don"t speak of your marrying a man who had no money at all, for that would be too fearful to talk about; but suppose you were to take any one of the young men you might meet at Oakdale even, you"d have to live in a mean little house, and do with one or two servants, and worry yourself about the butcher"s bills and brush your own dresses and drive your own horse. And how long do you suppose it would be before you repented of that? Think of having to be like those poor Masons, for instance; they are nice people, and I like them, but I hate to go there, for every time I can"t help seeing that the parlor furniture is more dingy, and thinking how miserable they must be, not to be able to buy new things. And their servants" liveries are half worn too; and when you dine there you see that Mrs. Mason is eating with a plated fork, because she has not enough of her best silver to go around. All those things are trifles, Helen, but think of the worry they must give those poor people, who are pinching themselves and wearing themselves out soul and body, trying to keep in the station where they belong, or used to. Poor Mrs. Mason is pale and nervous and wrinkled at forty, and those three poor girls, who spend their time making over their old dresses, are so dowdy-looking and uneasy that no man ever glances at them twice.
It is such misery as that which I dread for you, Helen, and why I am talking to you. There is no reason why you should take upon you such sorrows; you have a clear head, and you can think for yourself and make up your mind about things if you only won"t blind yourself by foolish sentimentality. You have been brought up to a certain station in life, and no man has a right to offer himself to you unless he can maintain you in that station. There is really no scarcity of such men, Helen, and you"d have no trouble in finding one. There are hundreds of men in New York who are worth millions, and who would fling themselves and their wealth at your feet if you would have them. And you would find such a difference between the opportunities of pleasure and command that such a chance would give you and the narrow life that you lead in this little town that you would wonder how you could ever have been satisfied. It is difficult for you to realize what I mean, my dear, because you have only a schoolgirl"s knowledge of life and its pleasures, but when you are in the world, and have learned what power is, and what it means to possess such beauty as yours, you will feel your heart swelling with a new pleasure, and you will thank me for what I tell you. I have figured a wonderful triumph for you, Helen, and it is time you knew what is before you. Of what use is your beauty, if you do not carry it into a wide enough sphere, where it can bring you the admiration and homage you deserve? You need such a field, Helen, to discover your own powers in; believe me, my dear, there is really a higher ambition in the world than to be a country clergyman"s daughter."
"Is there any higher than being happy, Auntie?" asked Helen.
The importance of that observation was beyond the other"s ken, as indeed it was beyond Helen"s also; she had thrown it out as a chance remark.
"Mr. Roberts and I were talking about this last night," went on Aunt Polly, "and he told me that I ought to talk seriously to you about it, and get you to realize what a golden future is before you. For it is really true, Helen, as sure as you can trust what I know about the world, that you can have absolutely anything that you want. That is the long and short of the matter--anything that you want! And why should you not have the very best that life can give you? Why should you have to know that other people dwell in finer houses than yours, and are free from cares that make you ill? Why should you have the humiliation of being looked down upon and scorned by other people?
Are these other people more ent.i.tled to luxury than you, or more able to enjoy it; or could anyone do it more honor than you? You are beautiful beyond telling; you have every gift that a woman can ask to complete enjoyment of life; you are perfect, Helen, you are really perfect! You _must_ know that; you must say it to yourself when you are alone, and know that your life ought to be a queenly triumph. You have only to stretch out your arms and everything will come to you; and there is really and truly no end to the happiness you can taste."
Helen was gazing at the other with real earnestness, and the words were sinking deep into her soul, deeper than words generally sunk there. She felt her cheeks burning, and her frame stirred by a new emotion; she had seldom before thought of anything but the happiness of the hour.
"Just think of it, my love," continued Mrs. Roberts, "and know that that is what your old auntie was thinking of when you were only a little tiny girl, sitting upon her knee, and when you were so beautiful that artists used to beg to have you pose for them. I never said anything about it then, because you were too young to understand these things; but now that you are to manage yourself, I have been waiting for a chance to tell you, so that you may see what a prize is yours if you are only wise. And if you wonder why I have cared so much and thought so much of what might be yours, the only reason I can give is that you are my niece, and that I felt that any triumph you might win would be mine. I want you to win a higher place in the world than mine, Helen; I never had such a gift as yours."
Helen was silent for a minute, deeply thoughtful.
"Tell me, Auntie," she asked, "and is it really true, then, that a woman is to train herself and grow beautiful and to have so much trouble and money spent upon her--only for her marriage?"
"Why of course, Helen; what else can a woman do? Unless you have money and a husband you cannot possibly hope to accomplish anything in society. With your talents and your beauty you might go anywhere and rule anywhere, but you have to have money before you can even begin."
"But where am I to meet such a rich man, Aunt Polly?" asked Helen.
"You know perfectly well where. Do you suppose that after I have worried myself about you all this time I mean to desert you now, when you are at the very climax of your glory, when you are all that I ever dared dream of? My dear Helen, I am more interested in you just now than in anything else in the world. I feel as a card player feels when millions are at stake, and when he knows that he holds the perfect hand."
"That is very nice," said Helen, laughing nervously. "But there is always a chance of mistake."
"There is none this time, Helen, for I am an old player, and I have been picking and arranging my hand for long, long years; and you are the hand, my love, and the greatest glory of it all must be yours."
Helen"s heart was throbbing still faster with excitement, as if she were already tasting the wonderful triumph that was before her; her aunt was watching her closely, noting how the blood was mounting to her bright cheeks. The girl felt herself suddenly choking with her pent up excitement, and she stretched out her arms with a strange laugh.
"Auntie," she said, "you tell me too much at once."
The other had been marshaling her forces like a general during the last few minutes, and she felt just then as if there were nothing left but the rout. "All that I tell you, you may see for yourself,"
she said. "I don"t ask you to take anything on my word, for you have only to look in the gla.s.s and compare yourself with the women you meet. You will find that all men will turn their eyes upon you when you enter a room."
Helen did not consider it necessary to debate that question. "You have invited some rich man to meet me at your house?" she asked.
"I was going to say nothing to you about it at first," said the other, "and let you find out. But I thought afterwards that it would be better to tell you, so that you could manage for yourself. I have invited all the men whom Mr. Roberts and I thought it would be best for you to meet."
Helen gazed at her aunt silently for a moment, and then she broke into a nervous laugh. "A regular exposition!" she said; "and you"ll bring them out one by one and put them through their paces, won"t you, Auntie? And have them labeled for comparison,--so that I can tell just what stocks they own and how they stand on the "Street"!
Do you remember the suitor in Moliere?--_"J"ai quinze mille livres de rente; j"ai le corps sain; j"ai des beaux dents!_""