They walked homeward together, under the starlit canopy, and Clemence thought that, whatever might come to her, there was one whose pure affection was wholly her own.

"Here, child, is another letter for you!" said Mrs. Hardyng, coming in from the village the following day. "You are getting to be a personage of some importance, I perceive."

"Why, who can it be from?" queried Clemence. "I have no correspondents."

"Perhaps another anonymous communication," said her friend. "Open it and see, for I am dying of curiosity."

"It is from dear Mrs. Linden," said Clemence. "Here is what she writes:"

"MY ABSENT DARLING: Why have you not written or come to me? By your long silence I have been led to infer that you may not have anything pleasant to communicate, and, therefore, fear to disturb me with the narration of your misfortunes. I have looked for your return for shelter from the home from which you went forth, like some weary bird with drooping wing and plaintive song. That home is always open to you, with its fond welcome. Can you have found new friends who have grown dearer than her who bade you good-bye with a prayer in her heart for your future? If you are happy, which G.o.d grant, then I am content. But I have a strong presentiment of evil; and I fear, I know not what, when my thoughts turn to you. There was a promise about coming back when tired of your experiment. I mean to hold my wayward one by that promise. Do you recollect being accused of too much independence? If I remember correctly, Mrs. Bailey thought that one of your greatest faults, that needed speedy correction. I don't want you to exercise it towards your old friend. Some of these days, if I do not hear from or see her, I shall come and claim my daughter.

"It can't be possible that you have found anybody in that out-of-the-way locality to feel particularly interested in--eh, Clemence? I have sometimes thought that some other more famed mortal engrossed the affection that belongs, by prior claim, to me.

Don't encourage any of those rustics, for I have somebody here so infinitely superior to any one whom I ever met before that I have decided that there is only one girl in the world worthy of him.

Now, if I have aroused your curiosity sufficiently to have you call for 'more,' I will change the subject, and give you a little of the gossip that I know will interest you.

"The last sensation is nothing else than the elopement of Melinda Brown with a curly-haired hotel waiter. Imagine the scene when the fact became known to the disconsolate Brown _mere_. The girl has found her level at last, my dear. It was all time and trouble thrown away trying to make anything of her. Melinda could not be a lady, because, as I always contended, it wasn't in her. She is now in her proper sphere. I hear that her husband has set up in the same business in which his worthy papa-in-law began life. Melinda lives in apartments over the grocery, and enjoys life hugely, as she never did in the elegant mansion she has left forever.

"I've still another wedding to chronicle. You surely have not forgotten our fair Cynthia, the former confidante of Mrs. P.

Crandall Crane, but now, alas! her friend no longer, but that lady's deadliest foe. But to 'begin at the beginning:'

"Some months ago Mrs. Crane made the acquaintance of some new people, whom she hastened to describe and present to her dearest friend. One of them was a young gentleman, of fair, effeminate beauty and manners, and extreme youth. In fact, he had but just been emanc.i.p.ated from the strictest discipline of stern tutors.

This fortunate youth was the sole heir of a wealthy and indulgent step-father, who had followed the remains of a second 'dear departed' to the grave, and was said to be inconsolable, living but to secure the happiness of this only son of his cherished and lost Amelia. The gentleman, whose name was Townsend, purchased an elegant villa at a convenient distance from the city, and installed therein a faraway cousin as housekeeper. This worthy person was immediately surrounded by the Crane clique, who made her long and oft-repeated visits, until, no doubt, she wondered greatly at the cause of her popularity. Of course, being only a poor dependent on the bounty of her relative, she was naturally pleased and flattered at being the object of so much friendly regard, and she took every pains to make herself agreeable to her new-found friends. Another fact proved the grat.i.tude of her disposition, and that was the praises which were continually lavished upon the gentleman over whose mansion she presided. In this poor woman's estimation, Mr.

Townsend was a model man. It had been her valued privilege to visit him occasionally during the lifetime of the second Mrs. T., and nothing from her description could have been more beautiful than his devotion to the lady during her long and lingering illness.

Besides, he had taken her son to his home and heart, and had given every one to understand that this young Addison Brayton was to be the future possessor of that vast wealth. To come to the point at once, Mrs. P. Crandall Crane 'sighted them,' and mentally appropriated the young gentleman for her own Lucinda. To that end, she schemed and labored, and, just as the darling prospect seemed about to be brought to a final consummation, fate, in the person of her friend Cynthia, interfered to put a stop to the proceedings by marrying the young gentleman herself! Words are inadequate to describe the scene that followed upon this denouement. Mrs. Crane was in absolute despair for a time, until a new idea entered her fertile brain. Mr. Townsend, in the first paroxysm of rage, had disowned the recreant youth, and turned him from his doors without a farthing of the wealth that was to have been his princely inheritance. That much abused gentleman had no nearer relations than the far-removed cousin before referred to, and consequently here was a magnificent fortune, with only the enc.u.mbrance of a fine-looking, well-preserved gentleman, actually going a begging.

The thing was not to be thought of for a moment.

"'Many a heart is caught in the rebound.' 'It would be a pretty piece of revenge!' soliloquized Mrs. Crane, complacently, 'if Lucinda should yet reign mistress of that mansion, for all Mr.

Addison Brayton. How it _would_ spite Cynthia!' With renewed energy, but this time more cautiously, the sagacious lady laid her trap for the unwary footsteps of the unconscious Townsend. He was a frequent visitor at the house, feeling always sure of a warm welcome from the urbane hostess. The plan worked admirably, and at last the gentleman called to solicit a private interview with the contractor.

"'Mr. Crane is not at home,' said his smiling lady, 'but you can leave the message with me.'

"'Ah, yes!' said Mr. Townsend, with evident embarra.s.sment; 'no doubt you will do equally as well. I called, my dear madam, to--ah--solicit a great boon at your hands. You are aware how bitterly I have been betrayed by those whom I trusted.'

"'Yes,' put in Mrs. Crane, sympathetically.

"'And you have, I know, felt for my lonely and desolate situation.'

"'I have, indeed,' said the lady.

"'Since I have been intimately acquainted with your charming family, I have learned to value, and, in short, feel a deep attachment, for one whom, I believe, fate intended to fill the place of my lost loves!'

"'My own Lucinda!' interrupted the other, raising her handkerchief to conceal her satisfaction. 'Dear girl, it will be hard to part with her. You cannot realize a mother's feelings, Mr. Townsend!'

"'But,' cried the gentleman, in tones of surprise and alarm, 'I do not call upon you for so great a sacrifice. It was not Miss Lucinda that I meant, but another, to whom I have reason to think I am not altogether disagreeable. Surely you cannot be ignorant of my profound affection for your self-sacrificing sister, the widow of my late respected friend, Deane Phelps!'

"'Oh!' t.i.ttered Mrs. Crane, starting with great violence from her seat; 'you mean Jane. Well, I'm glad she's got somebody to think something of her at last. I congratulate you upon the prize you've won. I shall make all haste to impart the agreeable intelligence.'

"'You artful specimen of an underhand n.o.body!' said Mrs. P.

Crandall, bursting into the room where the little widow stood, looking really pretty with her soft flush of happy expectation in her face. 'You'll rue this day, if I live!'

"'Oh, sister, don't!' said the low, grieved voice of the other. 'I do so want your love and sympathy.'

"'Love and sympathy be d-d-darned!' sputtered Mrs. Crane, working her long fingers convulsively. 'Walk out of this room in a hurry, before I scratch your eyes out, you soft little caterpillar!'

"'Ruined! ruined! ruined!' she cried, sinking down and bursting into a pa.s.sionate flood of tears. 'Everything goes crossways. This is a doomed family. Crane can't keep up appearances a week longer, and Lucinda will be washing dishes in Jane Phelps' kitchen yet.'

Which prophecy will, in all probability, yet become literally true.

"I had these facts from Mrs. Jane Phelps Townsend, who told me that her brother-in-law had lost all of his ill-gotten gains, and, unless her husband a.s.sisted them, they would sink into the lowest depths of poverty.

"I'm just hateful enough to feel glad of it, too, Clemence. I never knew, until lately, that I could be wicked enough to rejoice over other people's calamities. But I can't help it. Last week I took a roll of fine sewing to Mrs. Addison Brayton. 'What are you crying about now, Cynthia?' I asked of the disconsolate figure that sat crouched over a sewing machine.

"'Oh, Mrs. Linden, I'm so unhappy,' she whined. 'There is a cold winter coming on, and I don't know but we shall actually starve to death before spring.'

"I remembered the insolent remarks of this lady, and the rest of her set, when a certain little bright-haired pet of mine was similarly situated, and tormented, like Martha, about 'many things.'

"It needed all my Christian charity and forbearance to keep from actually twitting her on the spot. I can't help but pity the forlorn creature, though. She's married that little spendthrift, who was brought up in idleness to rely on his expectations. They don't either of them know anything about work, now they are thrown upon their own resources. That is not the worst of it. The boy has dissipated habits, that I fear will cause Cynthia yet to bitterly regret the step she has taken against the advice of their best friends. However, they must make the best of what cannot be recalled. Then, too, she is married; and, if it be true that happiness consists in securing the objects that allure us, then should Cynthia be happy that she has at length attained the object of her life-long ambition, and can at last write _Mrs._ to her name. She is no longer an old maid, which is something gained, in her estimation.

"The youthful husband seems the most to be pitied of the two. On my way home I met him, shabby and forlorn enough, and _what_ do you suppose he was doing? Positively in the capacity of errand boy, carrying parcels to deliver. He is an under-paid drudge in a retail grocery, on starvation wages. He turned purple with mortification, and pretended not to see me. 'Oh, my countrymen, what a fall was there!'

"But I am afraid I have shocked your forgiving spirit by my hardness of heart until you are ready to deplore the depravity of human nature. My tender one! I am not like you. It comes hard for Alicia Linden to overlook injustice or forgive her enemies.

"She has always a place in her heart, though, for absent dear ones, and she often thinks regretfully of one sweet face that used to smile at her hearthstone.

"Can you not come to me, Clemence?

"Last Sabbath I went to place my offering of flowers at the graves of our buried dead. The golden glory of the autumn day poured its heavenly radiance into the far depths of my soul. How lovely looked the silent resting-place of our dear ones. I thought sadly of you, and wished you were near me, to mingle your tears with mine.

"As it is, I can only pray that G.o.d will guard you with loving care. Your affectionate ALICIA."

CHAPTER XIII.

It was Thursday afternoon. The "Ladies' Charitable Society of Waveland"

had a.s.sembled at the house of its President. The usual business of the meeting had been dispatched, and the ladies were engaged in the more congenial employment of retailing the village gossip.

"Have you observed," queried Mrs. Dr. Little, "how wretchedly ill that young Graystone woman is looking? The doctor was saying, only this morning, that he thought she was in a decline."

"I suppose its botheration, for one thing," said Mrs. Brier. "She had ought to have been more circ.u.mspect, and then she would have kept her position. I don't see how she can live without work, any more than anybody else. We can't be expected, though, to want a person with her morals contaminating our innocent children. That girl has travelled the downward road with awful rapidity since she came here. Just to think, she has been the talk of the town!"

"I have been greatly afraid," said Mrs. Little, "that the Society would be called upon to help her, if she gets worse again; She seems to be living, at present, on that widow Hardyng. How are those two to get through the winter, I should like to know? As for the child, it will have to be bound out to somebody who will make it work, and then there will be an end of all these mincing lady airs. One thing I know, it's out of our power to help them. She must have some relations somewhere, I should think. I wonder what her antecedents really are, any way. I could never quite make the girl out yet."

"Then I am a little shrewder than the rest of you, that's all," spoke up the voice of Mrs. Caroline Newcomer. "I found her out some time ago.

Listen, ladies, all of you who have any curiosity upon the subject. I learned her whole history through one of my servants, who had lived in the same city from whence this mysterious personage came. By a curious coincidence, these Graystones, mother and daughter, came and took lodgings beneath the same lowly roof to which the poverty of this Mrs.

Baily had driven her for shelter.

"Of their former life, my informant knew little, but when she first became acquainted with them, they were miserably poor, and in debt to their landlady. At length Miss Clemence Graystone succeeded, by the rarest good fortune, in obtaining a position as governess in a wealthy family. She was, however, afterwards dismissed, (as Mrs. Baily afterwards learned, through one of the employees,) in disgrace, for having designs upon a young gentleman of fortune--the uncle, I believe, of her pupils.