"Mr. Richmond, I"m obliged to you, and you, too, Georgey, but I sha"n"t leave the old homestead while I live. My father and mother, and all our folks, since the time of the revolution long ago, hev lived and died here, and I don"t want to be the first to leave it. I can see you every day as long as you"re in Burnfield; and whether I went to live with you or not I wouldn"t go with you to the city--a noisy, nasty place! So, I reckon I shall keep on living here; very much obliged to you both at the same time, as I said afore."
And from this resolution nothing could move her--no amount of coaxing could induce her to depart from it. The laws of the Medes and Persians might be changed, but Miss Jerusha Skamp"s determination never!
It was late when they returned to Richmond House, where they found Mr.
Curtis solacing himself with a cigar; his chair tipped back and his heels reposing on the low marble mantel, and yawning disconsolately as he glanced drearily over the _Burnfield Recorder_.
"Got back, have you?" he said, looking up as our party entered; "and time, I should say. What precious soft seats your excellency and the rest of you must have found in Miss Jerusha"s. Quarter to twelve, as I am a sinner! I wonder Miss Skamp didn"t turn you out. How is that ancient vestal?"
"In excellent health," replied Richmond, throwing himself on a lounge, "and perfectly unchanged since you saw her last. By the way, there was a young friend of yours there, d.i.c.k."
"Ah, was there?" said Mr. Curtis, twisting round suddenly in his chair, and turning very red. "Aw--Bob Thompson, I daresay."
"Yes, if Bob Thompson is five feet three inches high, and has blue eyes, pink cheeks, yellow curls, and white forehead, ditto a dress, and is in the habit of wearing gold bracelets, and answering to the pretty name of Emily."
"Ah--Miss Murray," said Mr. Curtis, thrusting his hands abruptly into his pockets, and beginning, without the smallest provocation, to whistle violently. "Nice little girl! How is _she_?"
"Ask Randall," said Richmond, with a slight laugh and a malicious glance toward the gentleman in question. "He had Emily pretty much to himself all the evening--took summary possession of the young lady, and the moment he was introduced began to be as fascinating as he knew how.
Irresistible people are poets. Ask _him_."
Instead of asking him, however, Mr. Curtis favored the handsome poet with a ferocious scowl, and then, flinging away his Havana, stalked out of the room with tragic strides that would have made his fortune on the stage.
Mr. Wildair laughed, and Mr. Randall looked after him with a slight smile, but said nothing.
One week later Georgia learned his opinion. Emily had been spending the evening at the hall, and had just gone home.
"What a dear little angel she is!" exclaimed Georgia; "so sweet, so good, so gentle and loving. Her presence brightens the room the moment she enters, like a ray of sunshine. Darling little Emily! how I love her! I wish she were my sister."
Warren smiled, and placing a hand lightly on either shoulder, looked down in her flushed, enthusiastic face.
"Belle Georgia," he said, meaningly, "_so do I_."
And now let the curtain rise once more ere it falls again forever.
Five years have elapsed, but Burnfield and Richmond House are still the same; a little larger, a little more noisy, a little more populous, but nothing to speak of. The march of improvement does not get ahead very fast there.
There is a little brown cottage standing by the sea-sh.o.r.e, and sitting in the "best room" is an elderly lady knitting away as if the fate of kingdoms depended on it. Such a spotless best room as it is; not a speck of dust to be seen anywhere, the very covers of the "Pilgrim"s Progress"
and "Robinson Crusoe" fairly glitter with cleanliness, and it"s absolutely dangerous for a person of weak eyes to look at the chairs and painted floor, so perfectly dazzling are they. The old lady herself, albeit a little stiff and prim in her dress, is as bright as a new penny, and although the said dress would at the present day be called somewhat skimpy, it is a calico, like Joseph"s coat of many colors, and she is fairly gorgeous in it.
A demure, well-mannered, polite animal of the feline species reposes on a rug at her feet, and blinks a pair of intensely green eyes in the sunshine with a look of calm, philosophical happiness beautiful to see.
Betsey Periwinkle, our early friend, has departed this life, deeply regretted by a large and respectable circle of acquaintances, and was buried in state at the bottom of the garden, and the one now introduced is a descendant of that amiable animal, and as such no doubt will be cordially welcomed.
Out in the kitchen is a "cullud pusson" of the female persuasion, whose black face glistens with happiness and a recent application of yellow soap, who sits chewing gum and sewing at a new turban with a look of contentment.
But there is one other inmate of that best room--a stranger to you, reader, whom I now hasten to introduce. It is a young lady of some three years old, who goes skipping along, alternately tumbling down, and after emitting one or two shrill yells, which she considers necessary to draw attention to the clever way in which the fall was managed, crawls up again and resumes her journey round the room, until she thinks proper to undergo another upset.
This small individual, not to be mysterious, is Miss Georgia Wildair, eldest daughter of his excellency, Richmond Wildair, of Richmond House.
A pocket edition of our early friend Georgia she is, with the same hot, fiery temper, but never will it lead her into such trouble as her mother"s has done, for the restraining hand of religion will hold her back, and little Miss Wildair, the heiress, will be taught what our Georgia never was, to "Remember her Creator in the days of her youth;"
and this little lady is the pride and darling of Miss Jerusha"s heart, and spends, while papa and mamma rusticate in Burnfield, a great deal more of her time in the cottage than in the hall, and enjoys herself hugely with Fly and Betsey Periwinkle.
And now, reader, to that worthy cat, to the sable handmaiden, to the little heiress, and to our old friend Miss Jerusha Glory Ann Skamp, you and I must bid farewell.
A new scene rises before us. A large and elegantly furnished parlor, where pictures, and statuary, and curtains, and lounges, and last, but not least, a genial fire, make everything at once graceful and home-like. A lady, young and beautiful, but with a calm, chastened sort of beauty, and a soft, subdued smile, sits in a low nursing-chair and holds a baby, evidently quite a recent prize, who lies making frantic efforts to swallow its own little, fat fists, and hitting its invisible little nose desperate blows in the vain endeavor. This young gentleman is Master Richmond Wildair, while in "nurse"s" lap, at a little distance, his eldest brother Master Charley, a youth of some sixteen months, is jumping and crowing, and evidently having a heap of fun all to himself. These manifestations of delight at last grow so obstreperous that a handsome, stately gentleman who lies on a sofa near, reading the paper, looks up with a smile.
"What a noisy youth this boy of yours is, Georgia!" he says, looking at Master Charley; "he is evidently bent on making himself heard in this world. Come Charley, be quiet; papa can"t read."
But Charley, who had no intention of being bound over to keep the peace, no sooner hears papa"s voice than, with a crow an octave higher than any of its predecessors, he holds out his arms and lisps:
"Papa, tate Tarley! papa, tate Tarley!"
"Now do put down that stupid paper, Richmond, and take poor "Tarley,""
says Georgia, looking up with her bright smile. "Bring him over, nurse."
"Well, I suppose I must," Richmond says, resigning himself as a man always must in such cases, and holding out his arms to "Tarley," who, with an exultant crow, leaps in and immediately buries two chubby little hands in papa"s hair. "Where"s Georgia?"
"Oh, down at the cottage, of course," says the lady, laughing; "when is Georgia ever to be found anywhere else? Dear Miss Jerusha! it does make her so happy to have her there; so while we live in Burnfield we may as well let her stay there."
"Oh, certainly--certainly," replies Richmond, with tears in his eyes as Master "Tarley" gives an unusually vigorous pull to his scalp-lock. "And by the way, my dear, guess from whom I heard to-day?"
"Who--Warren?" inquires Georgia eagerly.
"No--Curtis," says his excellency, laughing. "Poor d.i.c.k"s done for at last. Miss Maggie What"s-her-name Leonard, the one with the curls and always laughing, has finished him. As the king in the play says, "I could have better spared a better man.""
"Why, you don"t mean to say he has married her?" says Georgia, in extreme surprise. "Well, I _am_ surprised. Where is he now?"
"Off in the South for a bridal tour, and then he will return and resume his duties as my secretary. There goes the tea-bell. Here, nurse, take Master "Tarley." Come, Georgia."
Look with me on another scene, reader. The beautiful moon rides high over the blue Adriatic; the bright cloudless sky of glorious Italy is overhead, that sky of which poets have sung, and artists have dreamed, and old, sweet romancers have pictured, and gazing up at its serene beauty with uncovered brow, stands a poet from a foreign land, with his blue-eyed bride. You know them both; you need no introduction; you cannot mistake them, for the lofty mien and gallant bearing of Warren, and the soft holy blue eyes and seraphic smile of Emily are unchanged.
Some day, when they are tired wandering under the storied skies of the old world, they will come back to the land of their birth, but you and I will see them no more.
On the last scene of all let the curtain rise ere it drops again forever.
In a sunny corner of a sunny church-yard, where the sweet wild roses swing in the soft west wind, where trees wave and birds sing, and a little brook near murmurs dreamily as it flows along, is a grave, with a marble cross above, bearing the name of "Charles Wildair," and underneath the inscription, "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord."
Tread lightly, reader; hold your breath as you gaze. Kneel and pray in awe, for a saint lies there.
And now that the story is finished, I see the sagacious reader putting on his spectacles to look for the moral. Good old soul! With the help of a microscope he _may_ find it; may Heaven aid him in his search; but lest he should fail, I must decamp. Reader, adieu!
THE END.