"You seem to be fond of animals, which is your favorite?"
An answer rushed to my lips and I was conscious of a mischievous expression creeping over my face. Had I reflected for a moment I might never have uttered it, but before I had time to weigh my words, they had been pointedly p.r.o.nounced.
"Man--of course," I said; "Which is yours?"
He did not answer as quickly as I had, and yet I did not dare look at him or speak again. After a moment"s pause, however, I ventured to raise my eyes towards the cabinet, and as I did so, how my heart thumped, how my cheeks reddened. He had stretched one hand out to reach some object that stood on one of the ebony brackets above me, and the reflection in the little square mirror before us was, to say the least, rather suggestive. The bracket being higher than the mirror was not visible in it. The effect produced therefore was that of a broadcloth sleeve, carefully brought around two slender shoulders, and a handsome manly countenance leaning a little towards a blushing maiden"s face. Worse than all, he too happened to look into the gla.s.s at the same moment, and our eyes in shrinking from one another"s glance met under an awkward circ.u.mstance. He looked steadily at Amey Hampden in mirrorland, and then said in a very conventional tone, turning his eyes towards the bracket:
"Pardon me, I want to show you something."
It was a beautiful white dove which, though lifeless, had retained much of its grace and softness. In its beak was a dainty little card upon which was inscribed in large characters: "Love one another."
"Do you like it?" he asked after we had examined it silently for a moment.
"The idea is certainly original," I answered evasively.
"Yes, but do you like it?" he repeated
"Which?" I asked, "the bird, or the idea altogether?"
"The idea altogether."
"Oh! ye-e-s," I drawled as indifferently as I possibly could. "It is a very chaste conception on the whole--but--"
"But what?"
"Oh! there is not much in it after all."
"Miss Hampden! you astonish me! Not much in loving one another, especially with such an exalted, enduring love as that which the dove symbolises."
"You mistake me, Dr Campbell," I interrupted suddenly, looking up at him, but I did not finish, for some one just vanished out of the doorway as I turned my head. The curtain was still swaying when I stopped my remark abruptly, and Arthur Campbell following my glance, strode towards the entrance and looked indignantly out. The pa.s.sage was clear, and he returned, laughing, saying the eavesdropper was no one more formidable than the draught. I was not so easily convinced, however, and asked to go back in to the drawing-room where the merriment was still unabating. He did not seem quite pleased, but nevertheless offered me his arm unhesitatingly, and we pa.s.sed in among the noisy crowd just in time for the summons to supper.
CHAPTER VII.
When I awoke the morning after the Merivales" Musical, the forenoon was already pretty well advanced and a light, warm fire was burning in my room. Outside, the winter wind was shrieking plaintively, and over every pane of the window were dense layers of frosty ferns and gra.s.ses. It wanted a few minutes for the half hour after ten by the prattling little time-piece on the mantel. I arose and dressed languidly, feeling dull and oppressed and rang for a cup of strong coffee. I felt no appet.i.te for breakfast, and drawing my warm, heavy wrapper around me I wheeled a low easy chair toward the fire and sank wearily into it.
It may be a wise policy for the votaries of gaslight pleasures to maintain that there is no baneful result arising from a constant pursuit of such distractions, but, however wise this att.i.tude may be, I hardly think it can rely upon the sanction of our conscience. It is certainly not sound truth. For the abnormal life which society prescribes for her followers is fruitful of most injurious consequences. Evil effects do not always thrust themselves upon our notice in any directly p.r.o.nounced way. Very often those which are most pernicious have a stealthy and un.o.btrusive progress, and it is only when their destructive mission is well accomplished that we become aware of their existence. There are physical, moral, and mental wrecks, the playthings of every varying circ.u.mstance that agitates the sea of life, who are living examples of the truth I uphold: men and women who have made an oblation of their greatest energies and capacities to lay upon the altars of a profitless materialism. This is of course the extreme limit of worldliness, but in many cases it had a tame and semi-respectable beginning, originating from circ.u.mstances as seemingly safe as those which make up our own individual lives. Who can tell whether danger will allow us to tempt and tease her with impunity. The fortifications around our personal lots are not so stable as we imagine, and they require our constant and vigilant supervision. While we are feasting and rioting the scouts of the enemy are conspiring strongly against us.
For myself I say, that every indulgence of this kind invariably brings me an uncomfortable re-action, and I have never been able to satisfy myself with the explanation which is popularly received regarding it.
It is not merely the result of physical disorder, of that I am sure.
There is not a morbid tendency, ever so latent within me, that is not brought forcibly to the surface during this re-action, and I never realize so fully that the pleasures of the senses are empty and fleeting as when I have given myself up to an unbridled indulgence of any of them. I have rested my eyes upon every conceivable form and phase of animate and inanimate beauty in my life-time, and to-day my poor eyes are tired and dissatisfied. My ear, that has been inclined to every sort of sweet and sad melody, is still waiting and hoping for a soul-stirring refrain that will never reach it; and my heart, that has quickened at glad surprises and fluttered during hours of the world"s happiness, is still asking, still searching for a joy that will minister in full to its demands. No wonder then that so many of us pause in the midst of our gay confusion, and ask ourselves wearily: "What is the use?"
What is the use of all these vain efforts of ours to feed our inner appet.i.tes with a diet that can never nourish or sustain? What is the use of all these monotonous beginnings that never have any tangible end? What is the use of playing so burdensome a part upon the social stage? What is the use of deceiving ourselves and our fellow-men, when there is such a glorious cause of truth to fight for? Ah! it is the way of the world, and that is a power which we fear to defy. The way of the world! These little words have justified sin and crime over and over again. They have masked the vilest cunning with a surface of unquestionable propriety; they have quietly sanctioned one fashionable folly after another, until vice and virtue are brought to one level, ay, and if needs be, the former triumphs, and the latter is shoved aside to make headway for its counterfeit. It is the way of the world that poverty be sneered at and denounced, that humility be ridiculed, that modesty be mocked, not openly not daringly, but by covert and cutting insinuation, the ever are weapon of the moral coward. It is the way of the world that sorrow be held pent up in hearts that are dying for care and sympathy, the way of the world that selfish motives be the best, that might is right, and indeed who can say our dazzling, splendid, cruel world has not its way? And we, its victims, its votaries, what recompense have we?
Such reflections as these trooped in solemn order before my mental vision as I sat staring into the coals, that frosty morning after the Merivales" entertainment. Every circ.u.mstance of the preceding night rehea.r.s.ed itself in my memory. I repeated Arthur Campbell"s every word. I had not forgotten one. I recalled Mr. Dalton"s steady look, even Miss Nibbs" funny little personality rode upon the embers, and brought a faint smile to my pensive countenance. I teazed myself with interrogative conjectures of every kind, now leaning towards one, and now towards another. Somehow the vagaries of our hope or of our fancy, like ourselves, look their best by gas-light, and show a very disappointing complexion in the open daylight. While I sat thus weaving and tangling the webs of my aimless thought, the door opened and my step-mother glided in with a dainty little note between her fingers.
"Lazy girl," she muttered in a half yawn, throwing the note into my lap. "Rouse yourself, and read this. An answer is wanted."
It was from Alice Merivale, to my surprise, and appeared to have been scratched off in a hurry:
"If you have nothing on hand for the afternoon, dear Amey, I wish you would come over at about one o"clock and take luncheon with me. It is so stupid. A. M."
I folded it up and smiled, as I went in search of my writing materials.
In half an hour after I was waiting to be admitted into their house. I was shown into Alice"s apartment according to her direction. She was lying on a lounge by the fire, with her delicate hands clasped over her shapely head. Her long, yellow hair fell in soft braids on each slender shoulder. She wore a _negligee_ of white, with delicate tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs of swan"s down and looked, on the whole, the living impersonation of luxury and beauty. When I was shown in she greeted me with a languid smile, but did not alter her comfortable position.
"I am so glad you"ve come, Amey," she said looking up at me where I stood beside her. "Just throw your becoming wearables anywhere there and come and sit down for a chat."
I did as she told me, and a moment later we were both settled luxuriously before the glowing embers ready for mutual entertainment.
"Did you think I was crazy, Amey, when you received my note this morning?" Alice asked, drawing the vagrant folds of her soft wrapper about her.
"Well, no, Alice," I answered slowly, "but I found it a little queer, that was all."
"Queer world, is"nt it Amey?"
I smiled, and still looking into the fire said, as if in soliloquy.
"How much alike we girls are. I came to that very conclusion an hour ago before my own embers."
"What reason have _you_ to think that?" she said, with a wondering look in her beautiful blue eyes.
"Every reason in the world."
"And I have so often envied you, Amey Hampden, and thought you a fortunate and happy girl beside a wretch like me."
"Alice!" I broke in, in consternation "how can you talk like this?
You, the spoilt darling of Fortune herself, you, the cynosure of so many eyes, the possessor of untold worldly comfort and happiness."
"Go on, go on, I like that," she interrupted ironically.
"Well, you know you are," I added emphatically.
"A wretch! yes, without a doubt" she answered firmly. "I am rich in that which can buy everything but peace of mind and contentment of heart. I am fortunate enough to escape that experience which gives a flavor and a charm to existence. I am the cynosure of eyes that are content with surface glitter only, and the possessor of comforts and happiness that have made my life the empty, blighted thing it is."
She paused while the sound of her altered voice vibrated in the room, then laughed a merry, artful little laugh and rising languidly to her feet, added:
"Oh, dear! oh dear! what funny people we are!"
Before any more was said upon this tender subject we went down to lunch, laughing and chatting as gaily as though we were the freest-hearted creatures in existence.
We spent an hour in discussing the good things below, and then went back arm-in-arm to the cosy apartments we had vacated above. The fire had been renewed and our seats still in the same suggestive places attracted us towards them again. Alice threw herself upon her lounge and hummed a s.n.a.t.c.h of her last night"s selection, which she suddenly interrupted with a fully-indulged yawn out of which again emerged a taunting
"Come now Amelia, _a quoi penses-tu_?"