A Fair Mystery: The Story of a Coquette

Already an adept in coquetry, she sighed at once for a victim for her charms. Alas! she found him near.

"Are there any new people?" she asked of Mattie.

"Only Earle Moray."

"Eh? A decent sounding name. Who is he?"

"A poet and a gentleman," cried Mattie, enthusiastically.

"A poet? Poets live, I understand, in garrets."

"But Earle has some money," said Mattie, simply.

"Earle? So? You seem to know him rather well."

Poor Mattie blushed crimson.

CHAPTER VIII.
THE YOUNG COQUETTE.

Before returning to Brackenside, Doris had demanded a room for herself, and for this room certain furnishings. She did not know that Mark and Patty would say to each other:

"It is only fair, since we have for her a hundred pounds a year;" but she did know that her will would be law to them.

She brought with her, when she came back to the farm, many little adornments, purchases of her own, or gifts from her school friends; and these Mattie dutifully arranged for her, just as she had polished the windows and nailed down the carpet, and ironed the curtains before Doris came. Doris never thought of helping her. She perched herself, Turk fashion, on the foot of the bed, and issued her orders as a good-natured little mistress to her maid. There were knickknacks for the toilet-table, pictures for the wall, a little book-case of hanging shelves.

"Your room will be fit for a princess, Doris," said Mattie.

"For a princess!" said Doris, with scorn. "If I were half a princess, or only rich, I would clear out the rubbishy things at once. You might have them, Mattie, since you like them. I would have gold-mounted furnishings for my dressing-table, silk hangings, velvet carpets, upholstery in plush and satin, gold, white, pale-blue. I would have exquisite marbles, and pictures that cost a fortune each."

"But you never saw such things," said Mattie.

"No; only I have read of them, and find in myself a fitness for them. I would give anything for such luxury."

"Do not pine, dear, for what you can never have."

"I may have it some day," said Doris, defiantly.

"But how would you get it?"

"By my beauty. The world belongs to beauty."

Mattie was shocked. She was putting the books on the shelves, and her honest face clouded. She said to Doris:

"I fear your books are worse than none. How did you come to get such books? I have heard Monsieur D'Anvers say some of these were vile trash; and I notice sentences in the others that are not fit reading for a young maid."

"They are French," said Doris.

"That does not make them better. There are good books to be had in French; and you have Byron for your only poet. I have heard our rector say Byron is unfit reading for girls."

"You ridiculous, strait-laced creature!"

"And I don't quite like your pictures, dear. The subjects are not pleasant to me. These French beauties were famous for vice. La Pompadour, and Diana, and the rest. This Cleopatra is too scantily attired to suit my taste, and this Trojan Helen is not a nice picture. I would have chosen Joan of Arc, and tender Margaret More, and sad Hecuba, and martyr Margaret. Pictures should elevate our souls."

"My goodness, Mattie! have you been taking lessons of that gentleman poet you mentioned? Where does he live!"

"At Lindenholm—his mother owns it, and came there two years ago, when she was left a widow. Her husband was a curate."

"Then I don't believe your Earle Moray is very rich. He is just a farmer, if he has only Lindenholm. I remember the place, half villa, half farm-house, with great linden trees around it. Does he write books?"

"He has written one small one—'Songs of the Country-side.' I have it here. You can read it; it is like music."

"Ta, ta! I hate poetry. What does the man look like?"

"Why, he looks as he is, a gentleman, a good man."

"I foresee I shall have a surfeit of goodness here. If the man is neither rich nor handsome, he will hardly pay to flirt with, unless one is desperate."

"To flirt with!" cried Mattie, aghast. "You would not flirt, Doris?"

"And why wouldn't I?"

"Why, it is wicked. It is cruel, it is deceitful."

"Hear the girl talk!" cried Doris, flinging herself back on the bed with peals of musical laughter. "Why, goosey, I flirted with every male creature I set eyes on at school."

"But I thought they did not allow such things."

"Allow? You will undoubtedly be the death of me, with your simplicity," said Doris, sitting up, her golden hair distractingly rumpled, her eyes shining with glee, her dimples dancing like tricky sprites among the deepened roses on her cheeks. "Don't you understand that it was our chief aim to do what we were not allowed? Men, I admit, were scarce. The writing-master was engaged to one of the teachers; but I flirted with him until she nearly cried her eyes out; and after he withstood me three months he surrendered at discretion, and I laughed at him. The French master vowed he would kill himself on my behalf; the music-master fell so conspicuously into my power that the preceptress dismissed him, and got a gorgon of a woman in green spectacles in his place. As for the dancing-master, he played the fool and erred exceedingly whenever I was in sight; so the girls said it was better than any theater."

"Doris, I am ashamed of you."

"What odds does that make, so long as I am not ashamed of myself?"

"But you will not act in that way with Earle?"

"Why won't I? Are you afraid of losing him?"

"He doesn't belong to me," said Mattie, blushing.

"How soon am I likely to see him?" demanded Doris.

"To-morrow. Every day. His mother wants him to be a farmer. She manages Lindenholm now, and sends him to take farming lessons of father. Father thinks everything of Earle, and so does mother."

"A farmer! The game is not worth the candle. I wouldn't be a farmer's wife for anything. I loathe being a farmer's daughter."

"I don't," said Mattie, with spirit. "I'm proud of my home, my honest race, my good, sweet mother, my dear father."

"How queer!" said Doris, meditatively. "Now, I couldn't see anything to be proud of in all that. I should be proud of a coach and grays, and men in livery—of suits of jewels, of a French maid, of velvet, satin, lace, brocade dresses."

"Doris," said Mattie, anxiously, "have you any soul?"

"Soul? If we cannot live without one, and soul makes the heart go, I suppose I have; otherwise, I don't feel aware of the property you mention."

"I believe you are only jesting, to tease me. You were always brighter than I am, and a real rogue. You have higher ideas and better intentions and wishes than you say."

"No, really I haven't—not one bit."

"Why, then," said poor Mattie, deeply distressed, "it must be your moral nature that is lacking."

"Moral nature? That's just it," said Doris, with infinite satisfaction. "Moral nature—I haven't any. I think all the nature I have must be immoral; I always side with the sinners in all stories."

Mattie had finished arranging the pretty little room. Doris jumped from her place on the bed.

"Really you have made it look very well, considering what you have to do it with. A sort of household fairy, you, Mattie; your name should be Brownie. Now we will play you are my maid. I am going to bed, and I like to have my hair brushed a long time. It is good for my nerves, and good for my hair. Will you be my maid?"

"With great pleasure," said Mattie, letting down the golden flood of Doris' silken hair. "How beautiful it is!"

"I think I am beautiful every way," said Doris, calmly.

"You are, indeed," said Mattie, without the least envy.

"Your hair will not brush straight! It is all in wavy clusters."

"You will brush it every night, and then I shall like you."

"Surely I will brush it, when you wish. But I like you in all cases," said Mattie. "And I want you to be good, dear."

"And not flirt with Earle Moray? Or other men? I'll not promise that. Flirting is my nature. I will flirt with this Earle until he puts his heart in my hands, and I will crush it up so—as I do this rosebud—and drop it—so! You watch and see how it is done, Mattie."

Tears rushed to Mattie's eyes. She hurriedly left the room.

"In love with him! Jealous! Oh, delightful! Here is something to amuse me. I thought I must surely die of dullness here, but I can flirt with the 'gentleman and poet,' and drive this preaching little puritan mad with envy, and that may fill up a year for me. Then, if the prince has not come along to woo, I shall go out somewhere to seek my fortune. Anything but stagnation. I will go where no one of the name of Brace shall follow me."

Meanwhile, Mattie, in her own neat, snug room, sat in the moonlight, mourning over the perverseness of this beautiful beloved sister, and trembling for Earle Moray, whom she called her friend, and held far dearer, without knowing it. How could any man help loving such a dazzling creature as this Doris? And his manly, noble heart must then be crushed and flung away like that ruined rose? She looked up to the moon-lit sky. There was her helper and her friend. She prayed:

"God keep poor Earle."

Then, comforted, she sought her bed and slept the sleep of faith. Doris slept the sleep of youth and abounding health, until Mrs. Brace awoke her.

"It is almost seven, dear. I let you sleep late this morning."

"This late? Now, mother, you might as well know I made my own hours for rising, and I will never rise at seven!"

Patty sighed, and left her; she knew Doris would always have her own way.

CHAPTER IX.
POET AND GENTLEMAN.

Rose the sun over an idyllic day; the white clouds floated softly over the summer blue; the poppies blazed in scarlet splendor through the grass; the bearded barley stood in sheaves, and through the meadows of Brackenside, that prosperous farmer, Mark Brace, led his men to their work.

Earle Moray, whose mother looked on poesy as the macadamizing of the road to ruin, and desired nothing better for her son than the safe estate and healthful, honest life of a farmer, had come to take a lesson in stacking corn.

It is true that farm work was not especially attractive to Earle the poet, but pleasing his mother was attractive to Earle the son; the friendship of honest Mark was attractive to Earle the man; and Earle had common sense to know that every man is better off for knowing how to win his bread from the field. Therefore, came Earle to his lesson.

"My sister has come!" said Mattie, meeting him with a boding heart. "She has grown more lovely than ever in these four years. You will write poems about her when you see her. Her face is a poem, her voice and laugh are poems!"

"And where is the phœnix of girls?" demanded Earle.

"Down there under the great elm, watching the reapers. I will introduce you to her," said Mattie, who thought this fatal introduction should be well over with, the sooner the better.

Perhaps Doris was in a less impish mood to-day. Frank Mattie did not dream how Doris had meditated all the morning on the new situation, and had dressed for conquest. In rustic surroundings she would play the rural queen. Her dress was a simple print, a white ground with little green sprays of maiden-hair traced on it. At her neck a knot of pale green, through which was carelessly drawn a flower; in her gleaming hair a cluster of hop blossoms; her wide straw hat at her feet was trimmed with a wreath of hop-vine; over her shoulders fell her wonderful hair. She held a book in her lap; one white hand rested on the page, the other brushed back a truant curl; and she lifted her lovely eyes in innocent, pleased expectation, as Mattie and Earle drew near.

The heart of Earle Moray stood still with surprise, then it leaped as if it would break its bounds, and a flood of passionate admiration fired his whole being. Oh, how divine a thing she was, this naiad in the meadow-land; all poetry should wait as handmaid at her feet. Why was one born to sing, unless to sing. Those shining eyes, those dimpling smiles, that flush of dawn upon her cheeks, well becoming the young morning of her maiden life. Oh, daughter of the gods of Hellas! Oh, "being fit to startle and surprise," looking at her, this boy-poet, whose soul had until now only stirred in its sleep, and murmured in its dreams, awoke to full and perfect life.

Mattie looked into his flushing face, his kindling eyes, and saw that words, if she had dared to utter them, would now be fruitless to warn him of Doris. She could only in her secret soul hope that Doris was less cruel than she had said, and so send up in silence to the ear of Heaven, that prayer:

"God save Earle Moray!"

Earle looked at her.

"Mattie! What is on your mind? Do you want to say something to me?"

"No—yes—only—that you must remember that my sister is only a child, and takes nothing seriously. You will not mind any nonsense that she says."

"Surely she will speak as she looks, like an angel."

They drew near the elm. With what consummate art were the violet eyes drawn down from contemplation of their native skies to comprehension of earth's lower things! With what a sudden start at the abandon of her own position on the grass did Doris greet Mattie and the "gentleman-poet!" She saw the flush on his cheek, the ardent flame lighting his dark eyes. She said to herself:

"I shall have no trouble here; he is at my feet already. Thank fortune the man is handsome; and what an air he has! I shall not waste time on him, as it would be wasted on a clod-hopper. He will be good practice for better times."

"Ah," she said, as Earle asked permission to sit on the grass at her feet, "I don't know that you belong there. Are you a worker or an idler? Mattie is a worker; if you are industrious and good, you must go with her or my father. I am an idler; if you are naughty and idle, you belong with me."

"I am of still a third class—I am a dreamer. Here let me sit and dream of heaven."

Mattie turned away, fearful and sick of heart; the mischief was done.

"Dreaming is even better than idling," said Doris. "And here is a real land of dreams. See how the poppies bend, sleepy with sunshine; the sunshine is a flood of refined gold; the bees fly slowly, drunk with perfume; the butterflies drift up and down like beautiful, happy, aimless thoughts. Let us dream, and live to be happy."

"One could not do better," cried Earle. "Here shall be our lotus-land, and you are a fit genius for the place, Miss Brace."

"Now, at the very beginning, I must make a treaty with you. Are you coming here often?"

"I hope so."

"Then, unless I am to hate you on the spot, you must not call me Miss Brace. I detest the name! If there is one name above another that I hate, it is that name Brace! It is so common, so mean—a wretched monosyllable!"

"But you would grace any name!" cried Earle.

"I don't mean to grace that very long!" exclaimed Doris.

Earle opened his eyes in uncontrollable amazement.

"You don't know what it is to suffer from a wretched, short, commonplace name. Look at me, and consider that I am called, above all things, Doris Brace! Horrors! Now, your name is fairly good. Earle Moray. There is a savor of gentility, of blood, of breeding, about that. You can venture to rise with such a name. I can only rise by dropping mine, and that I mean to do."

Earle laughed. This was, after all, the pretty, captious nonsense of a little child.

"But Doris is a sweet name. It fits this sweet, home-like landscape. Doris, the lovely shepherdess, has been sung and painted for centuries."

"But I have no genius for woods or fields, and I am afraid of sheep. However, Miss Doris is better than—Miss Brace."

She reached for a poppy growing in the grass, and the book fell from her knee. Earle picked it up, and saw what it was.

"This!" he exclaimed, in genuine consternation.

Now, Doris absolutely lacked the moral sense that would make her ashamed of the book, or revolt at anything she found therein. But she had native wit, and she saw that she was on the point of instantly losing caste with Earle Moray on account of this literature.

"Eh? What kind is it?" she said, with enchanting simplicity. "I bought it on the train late yesterday, and since I came out here I have been too happy to read it. Isn't it a nice book?"

"I should say not," said Earle.

"How do you know, unless you have read it?"

"I know the author's reputation; and then, the title!"

"Dear me! And so I must not read it?—and my one-and-six-pence gone! Whenever I try to do particularly right, I do wrong. Unlucky, isn't it? Now the last word my French teacher said to me was, 'By all means keep up your French; you have such a beautiful accent.'"

Earle looked relieved. Here was an explanation of exquisite simplicity. There was no spot on this sweet, stainless lily.

Mattie came back.

"Doris, mother thinks you had better unpack your trunk. Your dresses will be rumpled lying in it so long."

"You unpack it, like a dear! I shall ruin my things taking them out; and then, I can't go in, it is so lovely out-of-doors."

"Did you not put the things in, to begin with?" asked Mattie.

"No, dear; one of the girls did. The girls loved to wait on me, Mattie!" This with sweet reproach.

"But mother thinks you are keeping Earle from work."

"Go away, Earle!" said Doris, giving him a dainty little push. "If you stay idle here, I am to be called in and set to work. After that stuffy old school this four years, I cannot stay indoors. Go, Mattie, and tell mother if she insists on my coming in, I shall appeal at once to my fairy godmother to turn me into a butterfly."

Mattie walked slowly away.

"That's all right," said Doris, with satisfaction. "They all end by letting me have my own way."

"And how does that work?"

"Well. Don't you suppose it is always a very nice way?"

"It must be, indeed," said Earle, heartily.

He thought to himself that so charming a form must shrine only the tenderest of hearts, the sweetest of souls, and her way must always be a good way.

The girl was infinitely more lovely than one could look for in the child of Mark and Patty Brace, the sister of gentle Mattie; but being the child of Mark and Patty, and sister of Mattie, she must be a sharer in their goodness, that sterling honesty, that generous unselfishness, that made these three everywhere beloved and respected, patterns of domestic and neighborly virtues.

Thus thinking, Earle sunned himself in the radiance of her smiles.

CHAPTER X.
A WASTED WARNING.

While Earle Moray watched Doris, and lost himself in delicious fancies of a soul fair as the body that shrined it, Doris, on her part, gazed on him with awakening interest. She had expected to see a young countryman, a rhymster who believed himself a poet, one with whom she could "flirt to pass away the time," and "to keep in practice"—not this gentleman in air and dress, with the cultivated musical voice, the noble face, the truthful, earnest eye.

Said Doris in her heart, "I did not know that little dairy-maid Mattie had such good taste;" and in proportion as the value of Mattie's love increased before her, so increased her joy in winning it away. Not that Doris had any malice toward Mattie personally; but she had a freakish love of triumphing in the discomfiture of others. Slowly she yielded to the fascination of Earle's presence. She told herself that "the detestable country" could be endurable with him to play lover at her feet. To her, mentally arraigning "the detestable country," spoke Earle:

"I love this scene; fairer is hardly found in any book of nature. What is more lovely, more suggestive, than a wheat field with golden sheaves?"

"I am a true child of the cities," said Doris, "despite my country birth and rural name. I was just thinking how superior are the attractions of paved streets, filled with men and women, and lined with glittering windows. But if you will tell me some of the suggestions of the wheat field, no doubt I shall learn from you to think differently."

How charming was this docile frankness!

"It suggests earth's millions filled daily with bread. It suggests that gracious Providence, by long and lovely processes, forestalling man's needs. It brings to mind the old-time stories of Joseph's dream of bowing sheaves, of Ruth gleaning in the field of Boaz."

The stories of Ruth, Rebecca and Esther were the three Bible stories that Doris knew; the face of Doris lighted as she answered:

"Oh, I like that! I have imagined Boaz—tall, grave, stately, dark; and Ruth—young, and fair, and tender. I cannot quite fancy how Naomi looked—like other old women with a sad history, I suppose—but the words are lovely."

"'Whither thou goest I will go; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.'"

His voice took a deep, passionate tone, and his eyes filled with the light of love.

"Mattie says you are a poet!" cried Doris. "Are you?"

"I wish I could say 'I am.' Time will prove me. I have the poet's longing. Shall I ever reach the poet's utterance?"

"Why, I think you have it now," said Doris, sweetly.

"It is because you inspire me, perhaps. As I came toward you, I wondered whether you were Tennyson's 'Dora' or 'The Gardener's Daughter.'"

"Oh, neither! I am very different! They were content with trees and flowers, and humble ways. Was it not Dora who 'dwelt unmarried till her death?' I shall not do that. I shall marry and fly from the country-side. I can live among people in the city."

"What! cannot you live the truest life where wind, and rain, and water-fall, and birds make music? the flowers mark the sweet procession of seasons—all is calm, and security, and innocence."

"Tell me," said Doris, bending forward, glee in her sapphire eyes, her small hand thrilling him as she touched his arm; "tell me, poet, are you content? Do you not long for fame? To sway your fellows, to be rich, to make money?"

"Oh, money is the lowest of all objects. What is money to love?" demanded Earle.

"Money, just as metal, may be a low object, but money as money, as getting what we want most, is a high object. Think of what it can buy. Think of gorgeous pictures lighting your walls with beauty, of flashing jewels and gleaming marbles, of many-fountained gardens, of homes fit to live in, not stuffy little farm-houses, with windows under the eaves. Tell me, are you content? Will you live and die a farmer? Is not this money a thing worth winning to lay at the feet of love? Will you not spread the wings of your soul for a wider life? Have you not ambition?"

"Yes!" cried Earle; "I have ambition."

The dimpling smile showed the shining pearly line of little teeth; the soft fingers of the little hand touched his hand as she withdrew them; and, leaning back against her oak tree, she laughed joyously:

"I have found a fellow-sinner."

"Ambition can be noble, rather than evil, and to aspire is not to sin. Who could help being ambitious, with you as the apostle of ambition? You enforce with your beauty each word that you utter!"

"You think me beautiful?" said Circe, in sweetest wonderment, as if she had not studied dress, look, pose, gesture, minutely to enhance her wonderful and rich endowments of nature.

"Words cannot tell how fair. A verse keeps singing through my brain; it is this:

Ah, this was something like, thought Doris, to be wooed and flattered in poetry. She dropped her dainty lids, the rose pink deepened in her cheeks, and she gave a slow, sweet sigh.

"Did you make that poetry?"

"No: but would I could make immortal verses, for your sake," said Earle. "The world should hear of you."

The world! Oh, rare delight! Had she not dreamed of driving men mad for love, of making poets sing, and artists paint her charms? And these conquests were begun.

She looked up archly. She knew when to check the tides of enthusiasm and adoration, that they might grow stronger for the repression.

"Away with poetry, my singer, here comes prose."

Over the field toward them strode honest Mark Brace, looking for his neophyte in rural toils. Mark's round face was crimson with heat and exertion, but a broad smile responded to the pretty picture these two young lovers made under the tree. He cried, heartily:

"A deal you are learning this morning, Master Earle. Will you put off your lessons in wheat-stacking till next year? Lindenholm farm, at this rate, will be a model farm to the county when the madam turns it over to you."

"I was not in working humor," said Earle.

"Work won't wait for humors," quoth Mark. "And for you, my pretty miss, I don't doubt your sister is making butter and your mother cooking dinner, while you are playing shepherdess under a tree."

"Do I look as if I could work?" laughed Doris, springing to her feet and extending a wee rose-leaf hand. "I am only for ornament, not use. But I will leave Mr. Moray, for 'evil communications corrupt good manners,' and I have made him lazy. Good-bye, poet. 'Blessings brighten as they take their flight;' so I expect to look more and more charming as I depart homeward."

The minx knew that she had done enough that day to turn Earle Moray's head, and it would be well to let the effect deepen in absence. She danced off homeward, and Earle whispered under his breath:

Mark Brace looked after his Fairy Changeling in dire perplexity. To him work, honest labor—winning bread from the soil, was noble and happy; in all the words of Doris rang some delicate undertone of irony and scorn, of what he most esteemed. Fair, fair, indeed, but was it not selfish of her to let those whom she deemed her blood, work, and she stay idle? Yes, there was the hundred pounds, and she was not really their blood, but of some idle never-toiling strain.

More and more his hands were bound concerning the beauty, as she grew up in his care. He wished he could explain her to Moray, but he could not. Honor held him to silence. He could warn. He spoke suddenly, laying a hand on the lad's arm.

"Earle, I like you vastly. You are honest, good, a gentleman. I should be sorry indeed to see you giving your time, and mind, and setting your heart on that pretty, idle lass of mine."

"Sorry, Mark? Why sorry? She is sweet and lovely!"

"If it were Mattie, now," said honest Mark, speaking, not as a father or match-maker, but as a man. "Well and good. I'd not say a word. A man's heart may rest in Mattie—Heaven bless her! But Doris is of quite a different strain. In her there is no rest. One could never find rest in her. Never—never."

Earle tried to smile, but the words struck home, and were fixed in his heart beside the thought of Doris.

Meanwhile Doris danced off home, and framed her lovely countenance in the vines about the kitchen window.

"And what have you been doing?" asked Patty, reprovingly.

"Turning Earle Moray's head," responded Doris, promptly.

Mattie started and paled a little.

"He thinks I'm lovely!" cried Doris, with a laugh.

"So you may be, but no thanks to you," said Patty, "and if you set yourself to head-turning, mark my words, child, there will some terrible evil overtake you both."

CHAPTER XI.
THE FOSTER-SISTERS.

Summer day glided silently after summer day, and at Brackenside Farm Earle Moray was re-telling for himself the story of Eden—the love of one man for one woman, to him the only woman in the world. Alas, that his had not been a more guileless Eve! The love-making was patent to every one, and the family at the farm wondered where it would end. Mark Brace was truly sorry that Earle had set his heart on the lovely, fantastic Doris; and yet, honest man, he did not wonder that any young fellow should be beguiled by so fair a face, and he could not but be heartily amused at the queenly airs with which the farm foundling, believing herself a tenant-farmer's child, received the homage of Earle Moray, poet and gentleman, owner of the little estate of Lindenholm.

Good Patty Brace was, on her part, greatly perplexed. With woman's keen intuition in love, she perceived the intense sincerity of Earle's passion for Doris, and saw as well that Doris was entirely without heart for him. The girl admired him, loved his flattery, desired to be some one's chief object, but would have tossed him aside as easily as an old glove if a more dashing adorer had made his appearance. Besides, if Doris gave consent to Earle's wooing, would Mrs. Moray be well pleased with her son's choice? Mrs. Moray of Lindenholm was a thoroughly practical woman, and would see at a glance that the idle young beauty would be a very unreliable wife for any man, especially for one of moderate means.

"What fools men are in love matters," quoth Patty to herself—"at least most men!" with a thought backward to Mark's sensible choosing. "This dreamer and verse-writer would have done well to choose our Mattie, who would help him on and make him happy his life-long. But Doris is only fit to marry a lord, as no doubt she sprung from a lord; but where a lord is to come from as a suitor goodness knows, not I."

And, of all who saw the summer wooing, Mattie was the most deeply touched, but gave no sign. When she felt the sharpness of the pain when Doris asserted empire over Earle, then Mattie first guessed that she had set her love upon him; and she gave herself the task of rooting out lover's love, and planting sisterly affection in its stead. Her gentle face grew graver, her soft brown eyes had a more wistful light, but not a thought of jealousy, or anger, or envy. God was good to Mattie in that no ill weeds throve in her maiden soul. Doris did not find the sweetness she had expected in tormenting her, for Mattie gave no signs of torment—rather for Earle than for herself she was sad, and that with reason.

It is sad to see a young man love absorbingly, madly, giving up all for love. Doris became his one idea. Even his mother, while she knew he was attracted by a pretty daughter of Mark Brace, did not guess his infatuation. Scarcely an hour in the day were the young pair parted.

Earle had told Doris of the poet's old recipe for a lovely complexion, washing in morning dew; and Doris, to preserve the most exquisite complexion in the world, went out, when the sun rose, to bathe her cheeks and brow with the other lilies and roses in the dews of the dawning. Earle met her and rambled with her through flowery lanes. When his supposed studies in farming began, he was rather lounging at the feet of Doris than learning of Mark Brace; yet so eagerly did he hurry off to the farm, that his mother blessed his unwonted attention to his duty.

He dined at home, not to leave his mother lonely, then off again, and his farm studies consisted in reading poetry or tales to Doris, under trees, or wandering far into the gloaming with her in Brackenside garden. His heart poured itself out in Herrick's grand old song "To Anthea:"

His rich young voice rolled forth these words with deep feeling.

Doris laughed at the song at first, but his earnestness in singing it touched her a very little.

"I shall always think of you when I hear that song," she said.

"Think of me! Yes, but if it means that we are to be parted, and you think—just to remember—Doris, I should die!"

He was fervid, handsome, romantic, brilliant in love's first golden glow, hard to resist.

She smiled at him.

"Let us fancy we will not be parted," she said sweetly.

Earle came hurrying up one day after dinner.

"Now for a long evening in the garden!" he cried. "I have brought a new drama; the poetry is exquisite. We will sit in the arbor under the honeysuckle, and while the summer wind is full of the breath of flowers, I will read you the sweeter breathing of a poet's soul. Come, Doris—come, Mattie—let us off to the garden."

Mattie's face flushed with joy; it was so sweet to find some pleasure she could share with him.

Earle read; his voice was full of fire and music. Mattie listened entranced. Doris half forgot her favorite dreams of herself in gorgeous crowds, the center of admiration. The gloaming fell as he read the last lines.

"It is beautiful, in its poetry," said Mattie, "but not in its idea. I cannot love the heroine, though her face is fair. Beauty should be united to goodness, and goodness has not this cruel pride. To think of a woman who would let a brave man die, or risk death, to win a smile! I always hated the lady who threw the glove, and I think the knight served her well, to leave her when he returned the glove, for she had no idea of true love."

"Beauty has a right to all triumphs," cried Doris, "and men have always been ready to die for beauty's smile."

"A good man's life is worth more than any woman's smile," said Mattie. "The man's life, the woman's life, are Heaven's gifts, to be spent in doing good. We have no right to throw them idly away, or demand their sacrifice. I never liked these stories of wasted affection. They are too pitiful. To give all and get nothing is a cruel fate."

"Oh, you little silly country girl," laughed Doris, "you do not think that beautiful women are queens, and hearts are their rightful kingdom, and they can get as many as they like, and do what they please with them."

"You talk to amuse yourself," said Earle, "that sweet smile and voice fit your cruel words as little as they would suit an executioner's sword."

"What is slaying by treachery in love better than murder?" asked Mattie, eagerly.

"It is a very exciting, piquant, interesting form of murder," retorted her wicked little sister.

"How can any one enjoy giving pain," cried Mattie. "I have read of such women, but to me they seem true demons, however fair. Think of destroying hope, life, genius, morals—for what? For amusement, and yet these sons all had mothers."

"You are in earnest, Mattie," said Earle, admiringly.

"I feel in earnest," said Mattie, passionately.

"Pshaw, there is much spider and fly in men and women," laughed Doris. "Women weave silvery nets in the sun, and the silly men walk straight in. Who's to blame?"

"You talk like a worn-out French cynic," cried Mattie.

"Well, who is to blame?" persisted Doris; "pretty women for just amusing themselves according to their natures? or silly men for walking into danger, being warned?"

"It should not be a woman's nature to set traps for hearts or souls. You know better, Doris," urged Mattie.

"If I could be rich and great, and go to London, and live in society, you'd see if I would do better," retorted Doris.

"You two remind me of verses of a poem on two sisters," said Earle. "Their lives lay far apart.

"Yes, that means me," said Doris, tranquilly.

"That, then, is Mattie."

Mattie looked up in gratified surprise.

"If you are complimenting Mattie, I won't stay and hear it; I reign alone!" cried Doris, half laughing, half petulant, and darting away she sought her own room, and refused to return that night.

It was often so. When she had sunned Earle with her smiles she withdrew her presence, or changed smiles to frowns; so he was never cloyed with too much sweetness. When Doris withdrew, in vain he sang under the window, or sent her love-full notes. The summer sun of his love had its settings, its shadows, its thunder-clouds, yet Earle loved and was happy.

CHAPTER XII.
BEAUTY BECOMES IMMORTAL.

It was the good custom of Mark Brace to close the day with prayer; and sometimes a word or two of the psalms for the day penetrated the sedulously deaf ears of Doris.

Such happened to be the case one August night, and set the beauty thinking. She was perched on the sill of the dairy window, next morning, watching Mattie make butter, but her brow wore a perplexed frown, and a look of curiosity not provoked by butter-making was in her blue eyes.

"What is the matter? What are you thinking of, Doris?"

"I am thinking that I am an example of Scripture truth."

"In what particular?" asked Mattie.

"In the particular of tumbling into the pit, or catching in the net, duly set forth by me for other people."

"I don't quite understand you."

"Then you are even duller than usual, and, as I may no more speak in parables, I will expound myself clearly. I deliberately endeavored to entrap and entangle Earle Moray into loving me, for my summer pastime. I did not duly consider that I might fall in love with him myself."

"Why not, if you desired him to love you?"

"That was merely part of beauty's dues, child. Why not? He is not rich enough, or great enough; he cannot take me to London, and make me a society queen."

"Certainly not. You did not expect that."

"True. And I did not expect to fall in love with him."

"But you have? Surely you have, he loves you so much."

"Eh? Do you want me to love him? I thought you wanted him."

"I only want him to be happy," said Mattie, turning away, with a blush.

"Perhaps I love him a little. I am not capable of loving much," said Doris, with exceeding frankness. "My chief affections are set upon the pomps and vanities of this life, which I presume were renounced for me in my baptism."

"Don't be so wicked," cried the scandalized Mattie.

"And yet I don't know that I could say 'yes,' if Earle asked me to marry him. I might, and then repent, and take it back. I suppose, if he asked father and mother, they would say 'yes,' and be fearfully awkward about it."

"You shall not talk so about them!" said Mattie, indignantly.

"I don't feel to them as you do—why is it? I don't feel a part of the Brace family. I like you, Mattie; father amuses me with his outspoken, homely ways; I don't consider mother much. She is good, but commonplace, like brown bread. In fact, you are all too rustic, and homely, and pious, and common-sensical for wicked me. Are you done with that butter? Why don't it grow made? I am sick of life. Earle is off to Brakebury for his mother. It is only half-past eight, and I feel as if I had been up a century. Come with me to get blackberries."

"I cannot. I have much dairy work to do yet," said Mattie.

"I wish you would go for blackberries for supper," said Patty Brace, coming in. "You don't seem disposed to do anything useful, Doris—suppose you try that."

"I take care of my room, and my clothes," pouted Doris, "and that nearly kills me. I wish I had a maid!"

Patty laughed.

"Well, child, the woods are cool and beautiful, and you are tired of doing nothing. Take this basket, and try and fill it with blackberries."

Fearful of being asked to do some more practical duty if she rejected this, Doris picked up the basket, put on a pair of gloves, tied her sun-hat down under her distracting little chin, and set forth toward the knoll, a place famous for blackberries. The grass was long and thick, the aftermath of clover loaded the air with fragrance, scarlet creepers ran along the hedges, and at the knoll, with purple stems and green and orange leaves, grew the blackberries in globules of polished jet. An inspiration of industry seized Doris, and she filled her basket; the soft little tips of her fingers were dyed crimson with the fruit. She lingered over her task. Earle might return, and it would be pleasant under the trees, birds singing and grass rustling about them, while Earle talked poetry to her.

But Earle did not come, and something in the silence of nature set this thoughtless creature to thinking.

It was one of those solemn hours of life when our fate hangs in the balance. What of her future? What should she do with herself? Should she give up her frantic ambition, her intense desire after excitement, riches, and splendor, and, accepting an honest man, settle in a simple, comfortable home, and grace it as a good wife and mother all her days? Could she do that?

Should she refuse Earle Moray, on whose lips an offer of himself and his all was trembling? Should she send him away? She scarcely felt ready for that. She had grown to love him a little—just a little—but more than any one—except herself. Should she fly this homely, quiet life, these good, uncongenial people, fly to the great city, and set out under a feigned name to make her own way in the world, as singer, actress—any wild, adventurous path that might find her at least a lord for a husband? Should she?

"Can I give him up? Can I leave him to Mattie? Will he ever be famous and rich enough to make it worth while to nourish my little bit of love for him into real love, if I can ever love? Oh, for some good fairy to rise up and tell me what to do!"

She started in sudden fear, for surely a step was coming close to her, some one from the other side of the coppice, who had watched her unseen. Not a fairy. A gentleman. A very presentable gentleman, who said:

"I beg pardon. Do not let me alarm you."

Then the two looked at each other.

Doris saw a handsome, middle-aged man, palette on his thumb, box of paints under his arm, portable easel in his hand; wide-awake hat, velveteen suit. She promptly summed him up—"artist."

He saw—Doris; Doris, mold of beauty; naiad in grace; innocence in her startled eyes; face of an angel; mien of a wood nymph. He began to believe in the gods of old. He said to himself, "Maid or spirit? Mortal or vision?"

"Forgive me for startling you," he said; "but I have been watching you as you stood under this tree——"

"I hate to be watched," interrupted Doris.

"As a man I was guilty; as an artist, guiltless, for an artist, above all things, loves and serves his art, and considers all he sees as subservient to it. I came to Downsbury in quest of studies in still life. For years I have had an ideal of a face that I wished to paint in my best mood: a face after which all should wonder. I have searched cities and country; I have wandered in my quest for that face through other lands; and when I saw you under the tree, I was all the artist—all lost in art—for yours is the face I have been seeking for my canvas."

"Why, do you mean I would make a picture—a real picture?" demanded Doris, with studied simplicity.

"Yes; ten thousand times yes! Under this greenwood tree, your basket at your feet, your hat swinging in your hand, your eyes lifted—yes, a picture to be known and praised forever. Child, I will make your beauty immortal."

This was what she had dreamed.

A poet was singing her praises, and would do so, whether she played him false or not; and here was an artist to paint her for a world to admire.

Could she who so inspired men tie herself to the narrow bounds of one humble, rustic hearth? Never!

"May I paint you?" demanded the artist. "May I set you in canvas, in immortal youth and loveliness, to live years, perhaps centuries hence, in deathless beauty?"

"The picture—the face—will live! Where, in those far off ages, shall I be?" asked Doris, earnestly.

Gregory Leslie thought the word and mood strange.

"The best part of you is immortal," he said, gently.

"And what would you call my picture?"

"'Innocence.' Yes, 'Innocence' should be its name!"

"But what in me seems to you the image of 'Innocence?'"

Stranger question still. But he answered as an artist:

"You have an ideal brow, rounded at the temples as the old masters painted their angels. Your eyes are large, bright, clear, as seeing more of heaven than earth. Your lips have the most exquisite curve. The form of your face, its coloring, your hair, are all simply perfect!"

"You shall paint my picture!" cried Doris, joyously, changing her mood. "You need ask no consent but mine!"

CHAPTER XIII.
"FAITHLESS AND DEBONAIR."

"Doris, you must not do it. I cannot bear it!"

"I don't see what difference it makes to you, Earle, and you have no right to interfere, and do it I surely shall."

Thus Doris and Earle on the theme of portrait painting.

Gregory Leslie was too astute a man, too experienced, to take his wandering naiad at her word, and paint her picture, asking no consent but her own. Never had a girl so puzzled him. Her rare beauty, found in so remote and rural a district; her delicate hands, soft, cultured tones, exquisite, high-bred grace, in contrast with her very common, simple, if tasteful, dress: and then her words, so odd—either purest innocence and simplicity, or curious art in wickedness. Who and what was the young enchantress? Then, too, her smile, the turn of her neck, her way evoked constantly some shadowy reminiscence, some picture set far back and grown dim in the gallery of his memory, but surely there. Again and again he strove to catch the fleeing likeness, but at once, with the effort, it was gone.

"If you want to paint me, begin!" said Doris, child-like.

"Pardon. It would inconvenience you to stand here; the sketch even would take time. It must be a work of care. I shall do better if I have your permission to accompany you home. Also I must ask your parents' consent."

"They don't mind!" cried Doris, petulantly, after some little hesitation. "I am only a farmer's daughter." She flushed with bitter vexation at the thought, but seeing the artist immovable in his purpose, added: "I live at Brackenside, it is not far; you can easily come there."

"If you will permit," said Gregory, with courtesy.

"You can come. I have no objection," said Doris, with the air of a princess.

She picked up her basket, and moved away with the grace, the proud bearing of "the daughter of a hundred earls."

Gregory Leslie marveled more and more. As an artist, he was enraptured; as a man, he was puzzled by this new Daphne.

Doris, seemingly forgetting her new cavalier, yet taking a rapid side look at him, considered that he was very handsome, if getting a little gray; also, that his air was that of a man of the world, a dash of the picturesque added to the culture of cities.

She wished Earle would meet them, and go into a spasm of jealousy. But Earle was spared that experience, and only Mark, Patty, and Mattie Brace were at the farm-house, to be dazzled with the beauty's conquest.

Arrived at the gate, Doris turned with proud humility to her escort.

"This is my home. I do not like it. Most people think the place pretty."

"It is a paradise!" said Leslie, enthusiastically.

"Then it must have a serpent in it," quoth Doris.

"I hope not," said Leslie.

"It has. I have felt it bite!"

Mark Brace, with natural courtesy, came from the door to meet them.

"This is an artist that I met at the knoll," said Doris, calmly. "He is looking for subjects for pictures. I think he mentioned his name was Mr. Leslie, and he wishes to paint me."

"Wants a picture of you, my darling!" said honest Mark, his face lighting with a smile. "Then he shows his good taste. Walk in, sir; walk in. Let us ask my wife."

He led the way into the cool, neat, quaint kitchen-room, hated of Doris' soul, but to the artist a study most excellent.

Then did the artist look at the Brace family in deepest wonder. Mark had called the wood-nymph "my darling," and asserted a father's right; and yet not one line or trace of Mark was in this dainty maid.

Leslie turned to study Patty, who had made her courtesy and taken the basket of berries—dark, strong, plump, tidy, intelligent, kindly, plain. Not a particle of Patty in this aristocratic young beauty, who called her "mother" in a slighting tone.

Then, in despair, he fixed his eyes on Mattie Brace—brown, earnest, honest, dark, sad eyes, good, calm—just as little like the pearl-and-gold beauty as the others.

Meanwhile Mark and Patty eyed each other.

"I want to speak to you a minute, Mark," said Patty; and the pair retired to the dairy.

Doris flushed angrily, and drummed on the window-sill.

"Behold a mystery!" said Gregory Leslie to himself.

"Mark," said Patty, in the safe retirement of the milk-pans, "this needs considering. Doris is not our own. To have her picture painted and exhibited in London to all the great folk, may be the last thing her mother would desire: and her mother is yet living, as the money comes always the same way."

"I declare, Patty, I never thought of that."

"And yet, if Doris has set her heart on it, she'll have it done—you see," added Patty.

"True," said Mark. "And people will hardly think of seeking resemblances to middle-aged people in a sort of fancy picture. Better let it be done under our eye, Patty."

"I suppose so, since we cannot hinder its doing."

They returned to the kitchen.

"We have no objection, if you wish to make the picture, sir," said Mark.

"I should think not. I had settled that," said Doris.

"In return for your kindness," said the artist to Patty, "I will make a small portrait of her for your parlor."

So one sitting was given then and there, and others were arranged for.

When Earle came that evening he heard all the story, and then, being with Doris in the garden, they fell out over it, beginning as set forth in the opening of this chapter.

"I cannot and will not have another man gazing at you, studying your every look, carrying your face in his soul."

"If you are to begin by being jealous," said Doris, delighted, "I might as well know. I enjoy jealousy as a proof of love, and as amusing me, but I like admiration, and I mean to have it all my life. If ever I go to London, I expect to have London at my feet. Besides, if you mean to sing me, for all the world, why cannot Mr. Leslie paint me. You say Poetry and Art should wait at the feet of Beauty. Now they shall!"

It ended by truce, and Doris agreed that Earle should be present at every sitting. This calmed Earle, and rejoiced her. She thought it would be charming to pit poet and artist one against the other.

But the sittings did not thus fall out. Earle grew much interested, and he and Gregory took a hearty liking for each other. Gregory admired Doris as a beauty, but his experienced eye detected the lacking loveliness of her soul. Besides, he had no love but art, and his heart shrined one sacred pervading memory. Daily, as he painted, that haunting reminiscence of some long-ago-seen face, or painted portrait, grew upon him. He looked at Doris and searched the past. One day he cried out, as he painted:

"I have it!"

"What have you?" demanded Doris, curiously.

"A face, a name, that you constantly brought to mind in a shadowy way—that you resembled."

"Man or woman?" demanded Doris, eagerly.

"A man."

She was disappointed. She had hoped to hear of some reigning belle of society.

"Was he handsome?" she asked, less interested.

"Remarkably so. How else, if your face was like his?"

"But how can it be like a stranger I never heard of?"

"A coincidence—a freak of nature," said Leslie, slowly.

"And what was he like?" demanded Doris.

"Faithless and debonair! False, false and fair, like all his line. It was a fatal race; he no worse than the rest."

CHAPTER XV.
"I WILL BE TRUE—FOREVER."

Despite all the love eagerly made by Earle, and readily accepted by Doris, there was no formal engagement. A hundred times the decisive words trembled on the lips of the poet-lover, and he chided himself that they were not uttered. But then, if she said "no," what lot would be his? As for Doris not being prepared to say "yes," she deferred decision, and checked Earle on the verge of a finality, for she was not ready to dismiss her suitor. If he fled from Brackenside, what pleasure would be left in life?

She had soon ceased her efforts to flirt with Gregory Leslie; he regarded her with the eye of an artist—what of his feeling that was not artistic, was paternal.

At first, she had hoped that an opening might be made for her to city life. She had wild dreams that he could get an engagement for her as an actress or concert-singer, where wonderful beauty would make up for lack of training; she built wild castles in the air, about titled ladies who would take her for an adopted daughter, or as a companion. But Gregory Leslie was the last man to tempt a lovely, heedless young girl to the vortex of city life.

She told him one day of some of her longings and distastes. She hated the farm, the country. She wanted the glory of the city—dress, theaters, operas, promenades.

"Can't you tell me how to get what I want?"

"Child," said Gregory, "you would weary of it, and long for peace. You have a devoted young lover, who offers you a comfortable home at Lindenholm."

"To live with my mother-in-law!" sneered Doris.

"An admirable woman. I have met her."

"It would be just this dullness repeated all my life," said Doris, tearful and pouting.

"It would be love, comfort, safety, goodness. Besides, this young Moray is one of our coming men. He has native power. I am much mistaken if he does not make a name, fame, place, fortune."

"Do you suppose he will one day go to London and be great?"

"Yes, I do."

"I would like that. A poet's lovely home, where learned people, and musical wonders, and famous actors, and artists like you, Mr. Leslie, come; and we had flowers, and pictures, and song, and gayety."

"It is pleasant, well come by. You might have it all, as Mr. Moray's wife, if at first you waited patiently."

Earle took new value in this ambitious girl's eyes.

Meanwhile, warned by the experience with Leslie, which might have turned out so differently, had Leslie played lover, and offered London-life to Doris, Earle resolved to press his suit, and urge early marriage. He must have some way of holding fast the fair coquette. To him the marriage tie was invulnerable. Once his wife, he fancied she would be ever true. Yes, once betrothed, he believed that she would be true as steel. So one fine September morning, when Leslie's picture was nearly finished, Earle came up to the farm, resolved to be silent no longer. He met Mattie first. He took her hand.

"Mattie, dear sister-friend, to-day I mean to ask Doris to be my wife. Wish me success."

Mattie's heart died within her, but the true eyes did not quail, as she said:

"I hope she will consent, for I know you love her. Heaven send you all good gifts."

"If she does not take me, my life will be spoiled!" cried Earle, passionately.

"Hush," said Mattie. "No man has a right to say such a word. No one should ever throw away all good that Heaven has given him, because of one good withheld."

"Does she love me? Tell me!"

"I do not know. There is no way but to ask her."

They heard a gay voice singing through the garden. In came Doris, her arms laden with lavender flowers cut for drying. She came, and filled the room with light.

"You here, Earle!" cried Doris. "Come up to the coppice nutting with me; the hazel bushes are full."

She held out her hand, frank and natural as a child, and away they went together.

Doris was fantastic as a butterfly that day. She danced on before Earle. She lingered till he overtook her, and before he could say two words, was off again. Then she sang gay snatches of song. She noted his anxious, grave face, and setting her saucy little head on one side, trilled forth: