Doubly false

Joshua Hurd went down to the hotel where Seymour was staying to get the gold for his horses, and chanced to pass up the hall just as Cora and her cousin were standing within the parlor door. The beauty of these girls would have been striking anywhere, but, in deep mourning and saddened by misfortune, the effect of their appearance was calculated to excite something deeper and purer than admiration. Joshua was not much given to emotions of taste or feeling, but he stopped short in his quick, plunging walk, and stared at them with doubt and astonishment in his face.

“By goram, if grown folks ever looked like children, them gals belong to the family somehow. Sich hair as that doesn’t crop out on any other heads that I know on. What if it was them? All her bread ’ed be dough mighty quick.”

While he stood muttering these words to himself, Virginia Lander came out of the parlor and passed him. Her long black dress swept across his heavy shoes, and her side face was turned toward him.

“Marm, marm—I say is—is—it you, or ain’t it nobody as I cares about? My name is Joshua Hurd.”

“Joshua Hurd!” exclaimed Virginia, turning back. “Oh, I am so glad you are here!”

“And it’s you, and t’other one tu; I saw you a standing together, and my heart riz right up inter my mouth. But the old gentleman, is he on hand? Thought you was all gone to smash at once.”

Virginia turned her face away, not in anger at the stolid creature, but the pain at her young heart was terrible.

“We come back alone,” she said, with tears in her voice. “Do not let us talk of it. My cousin and I are all that you will ever see!”

“That’s tough,” answered Joshua, really disappointed. “Good gracious! who’d a thought of finding you here arter we’d all gone into mourning for you, and got kind’er pacified about so many going down at once. I only hope she’ll take it mild.”

“We have just been speaking of that—my cousin and I. No one must be taken by surprise.”

“I reckon I’d better go right hum my own self and kind’er break the news to her easy. She’s got sort a used to the property, you know.”

Virginia smiled faintly at this and said, in her innocence, “Oh, she will never think of that. It will make no difference to her.”

“Who is this?” exclaimed Cora, joining them. “What, Josh! dear old Josh!”

“Yes mam, it’s me, sure enough. But you—by jingo, I can’t tell which is which. How you have grown, both on you.”

“Then you cannot tell us apart, Joshua?” said Cora, smiling. “Try! try!”

“Couldn’t du it to save my life,” was the puzzled answer. “Defy her tu tell which is her own darter and which isn’t.”

“What nonsense, Joshua! Why I have ridden on your shoulder a hundred times.”

“And so has both on ye, that’s nothing.”

Virginia, who was falling back into the sadness which had become habitual to her, seemed distressed by the light tone of this conversation, and asked Joshua if he could go up the river by the first train and carry the news of their arrival to the home which they would be sure to reach in the morning.

“Yes,” Joshua said, “he was on hand for anything, and would make a straight line for the depot the minute he’d secured a bag of gold a young chap in the hotel owed him.”

“I will write a line and have it ready,” said Cora, exhibiting a good deal of nervous excitement. “Are you going up stairs, cousin?”

“Yes,” answered Virginia, sadly. “Even this meeting troubles me more than I expected.”

A strange light came into Cora’s eyes; she was evidently glad to be alone.

For ten minutes after she entered the parlor, Cora Lander walked up and down the room, at first rapidly, like one whose thoughts were in a tumult; then with measured paces, as she collected those thoughts out of chaos and planted them in her mind. She took up a pen to write at last, but flung it down again, having formed a quick resolution.

“Let him go,” she said, beginning to pace the floor again. “It is better not. I will neither send note nor message, but let me be certain.”

She rang the bell, and when the servant answered it inquired what was the latest train up the river. The man answered that one would leave a little before eleven. She dismissed him and gave herself up to anxious thought again.

When Joshua came down for his instructions, Cora was sitting in the parlor alone, grave and apparently composed.

“She had changed her mind about writing. Indeed the effort was too much, but Joshua could tell all that was necessary. Her cousin and herself had escaped and were in New York. A vessel had picked them up at sea when almost starved, and in her they had gone back to England, but these things would all be explained in due time without burdening his memory with them. Tell the people at home that he had seen them, that would be enough.”

This she said very quietly, looking in his face all the time, as if to challenge close observation. As he was going out she called him back and said, with a smile:

“So you cannot make out which of us belongs to the lady up yonder, or which is the orphan and heiress?”

“No, I’ll be hung and choked to death if I can.”

“Oh, you are dull, Joshua; but there will be plenty of the people who can tell us apart, I dare say.”

“Not a critter, without it’s our Eunice. She might.”

“Oh, Aunt Eunice, as we used to call her. How cross she was,” said Cora, holding up her hands in mock terror.

“Cross! Wall I reckon she is.”

“But she was always devoted to—to Mrs. Lander.”

“And is yit; but natur is natur, and Eunice’s is awful sometimes. Now Mr. Lander was a good man, but she e’enamost hated him.”

“But his daughter, she was a favorite with Eunice.”

“No, she wasn’t. If you’re her, you must have found that out. She took to the other gal mostly, and so did I.”

“Indeed! Well, well, you will think better of it when we get home. Go now, Joshua, or you will be too late for the train. By the way, had you not better go early in the morning? It will give you plenty of time. We shall not start before ten.”

Joshua gathered up the end of a shot bag, which he had brought from the stable to carry his gold in, and resting it on his knee, tightened the string with both hands.

“Jest as you think best,” he said. “Shouldn’t wonder if the madam ’ell be disappointed when she finds out that this isn’t all hern,” he muttered. “It’ll come awful tough for her to give up. Jest as you think best.”

Cora arose, and, in order to hurry the man off, tied up the bag with her own hands.

“Go now; go, my good fellow, or you will get but little rest,” she said, taking his cap from the marble console and putting it on his head. “Be sure and start very early in the morning.”

Joshua lifted himself heavily from the damask chair on which he had been seated, and moved away with the bag of gold grasped tightly in his hand, muttering to himself:

“I’ll make sure of that by going up to-night.”

The moment he was gone, Cora went up to her cousin’s chamber, and flinging herself on a couch complained bitterly of a headache, which she said was torturing her. But she declined Virginia’s offered help, and lay with her face to the wall, apparently asleep, but buried in deep thought. At dark some tea and a light supper was sent up, of which they both partook with considerable appetite, Cora observing that a headache like that was sure to make her hungry, while her cousin suggested that they had eaten nothing since morning—an unwise thing when they had both so much need of strength. After a little, Cora arose and proposed going to bed at once.

“We have had a weary day,” she said, “and you look very pale, dear; besides I am so depressed.”

“Yes; it is a sad return home. I do not feel as if I should ever sleep sweetly again.”

“But you must. I will not go to my own room till you are safe in bed; you would sit up crying half the night if I left you alone.”

“No, my heart is too mournful for tears.”

“Still you must try for rest, or no sleep will come to me.”

“For your sake, then, I will go.”

Virginia arose with a weary look and prepared herself for bed. Cora helped her to undress, and with a gentle hand brushed out the masses of chestnut brown hair which glowed with a ruddy tinge in the light as she braided it loosely in one massive cable. These pleasant feminine attentions were rather unusual to her, and Virginia received them gratefully.

“Ah! what a mournful day we shall have to-morrow,” she sighed, wearily taking off her dress. “You have something to look forward to, Cora, but I—”

The unhappy girl turned away her head, and lying down half undressed, with her cheek to the pillow, began to cry.

“Don’t, don’t give way so,” said Cora, bending over her. “Remember, to-morrow we shall be home.”

Virginia sobbed still more piteously.

“At home, without him! Rich, helpless, oppressed with cares. How shall I ever fill his place?”

A strange look swept Cora’s features. She almost smiled, yet a hateful expression mingled with the smile.

“Do not think about that now, but put on your night dress; you will take cold.”

Virginia arose and invested herself in the full white garment which gave her a nun-like purity of look. She dropped on her knees, and with her face buried in both hands, prayed meekly for several minutes. Then she arose with a heavy sigh, and kissing her cousin good-night, lay down, turning her face to the wall.

“Good-night, dear; rest well,” said Cora, smoothing the counterpane with her hand. “Now I can go content. Good-night.”

With these words, Cora stole softly out of the room, murmuring good-night as she went.

Instead of going to her own chamber, the girl turned toward the staircase and swept down to the broad hall on which their parlor opened. At the lower end of this passage she saw Seymour walking up and down, on the watch. The moment her dark garments fluttered into sight he came forward and followed her into the parlor. She closed the door and drew a bolt, so gently that he did not detect the action.

“Now, now tell me everything,” she said, seating herself on a couch and motioning him to a place by her side. “I am anxious, eager to know what brought you here.”

“Why ask that?” cried the young man, bending his radiant eyes upon her, while her hand was pressed between both his so ardently that her fingers unconsciously returned the clasp. “Why ask? You brought me here. I could not live with the Atlantic between us—death seemed better than that.”

“And you love me so?”

“Love you! Don’t ask me how much, or I might tell you what I have done.”

“What you have done? But I do ask.”

“Ask what, dear one? There is nothing to tell. I have moved Heaven and earth to reach this place—to obtain the means without which you would not be yourself. I have money now, brightest and dearest—ready gold and plenty of it, at least for the present; enough in fact, to give us a fair start in life. Only say that you love me dearly as I love you, and a glorious future is before us.”

“I have said it a hundred times, Seymour,” she answered, bending fondly toward him, but remarking, even in this rush and glow of affection, that he looked wild and spoke hurriedly, with his eyes bent downward.

“But again, and again I want to see love-light in your eyes and passion on your lips every moment of my life. It is my food, my drink, the air I breathe. Oh, girl! girl! how I love you!”

He threw his arms around her and strained her to his bosom with a vehemence that frightened her. She was ardent and given up to her own wild will like himself, but there was something beside love in all this, and she felt it with a thrill of terror.

“You are cold; you shrink from me, after all that I have done to win you—while my heart is struggling so madly to find yours.”

“No! no!” she protested. “I love you—I love you—ten thousand times over I love you! It may be folly, it may be madness, but I do love you.”

“My darling! my brave, bright, beautiful love! Now I am no longer afraid. I regret nothing. There is no treachery, no wrong that love like this would not sanctify. Let me look at you. Heavens, how beautiful you are! These little, warm hands, how they cling to mine! how white they are! But I will make them rosy with kisses. Oh, girl! girl! I thought you were dead, that this glorious form was weltering in the deep, torn by sharks—lost! lost! The thought was driving me mad. But you are here! you are here! I can see your heart beat and your cheeks flush, and these dear lips parted with smiles as you listen. Tell me! tell me once more, how much you love me!”

“Why ask me again?” she said. “Did I ever deny my love when you were penniless?”

“No, girl, no; but you refused to share that penniless state.”

“Because I hoped for something better. My—my relative was then alive. He was generous, and loved me. When we reached home, I intended to appeal to him. It would not have been in vain.”

“Was this your real intention?”

“I had no other—you would have heard from me. I might have asked such letters as would satisfy him of your honorable position, nothing more. But he is dead.”

“And so we must fall back on my little hoard of gold. Will that be enough for you?”

“It would be difficult to say how much would be enough,” answered Cora, with a bright smile. “Plenty of property is necessary to make love like ours perfect. I should perish, body and soul, without objects of beauty all around me. Is it because you are so handsome, so peerlessly graceful, that I can think of no one else? I often ask myself, if you were plain and insignificant, even common looking, would not my pride sweep you off among the herd of ordinary men?”

“I never thanked Heaven for good looks before,” said Seymour with genuine warmth. “In fact, I never thought of it; few men do, I fancy. Then, if I had been good and great, and all that men study and strive for, you might never have thought of me?”

“Oh, I would have everything, but I shall make you vain; your eyes flash with triumph already. See how easily a woman loses her power when she says honestly, ‘I love you.’”

“No, no; she exalts herself. Would that I had millions to lavish upon you instead of twenty paltry thousands.”

“Twenty thousand! that is not much,” she said, growing thoughtful for a moment. “But what then? We shall not be without resources; I have ideas, and courage and will enough for anything. What if I were richer than you think?”

“So that you loved me still, I should rejoice—but only for your sake.” The young man spoke honestly, and with a tone of sadness in his voice. “Could I have been sure of you, poverty would have been nothing. Oh! how much better to work for you! But all that is over, and I am brave enough to be glad.”

“We must not talk of work—I hate it,” said Cora, smiling brightly upon him. “To me the world is divided into two classes—those who work and those who enjoy. Had I been of the working classes, the very loathing of it would have driven me to struggle upwards, as both men and women can in this country.”

“Ah! if we could have had patience to wait for that!” said Seymour, with sudden passion. “To work alone even, hoping for you in the end, would have been Heaven to me; I could have served any hard task-master, like Jacob, for seven long years.”

“And in the meantime I should have grown old and ugly—you, round-shouldered, perhaps,” said Cora, laughing. “No, no; let us have all or nothing. The world is before us—Fortune has always been true to me. Like the lilies of the field, I have neither toiled nor spun, and it will go hard if fate puts me to it now.”

Seymour looked at her animated face in thoughtful admiration. Truly she was very beautiful. All the love she was capable of feeling flooded her eyes and burned on her cheek. She seemed supremely happy, and the young man believed that affection for himself alone kindled her features into superb loveliness. They sat in silence awhile. He was thoughtful and grave, though her head rested on his shoulder and the perfume of her hair swept across his face.

“I wonder if any one ever can be perfectly happy?” he said.

“I think so,” was her soft answer. “I feel so.”

“When you are mine—all mine—when fate itself cannot wrest you from me, I shall know,” he murmured. “When shall it be? There is no cause for delay.”

“I will tell you after to-morrow,” she whispered.

“But you leave the city then.”

“It is only a short ride on the railway.”

“May I come there?”

“Yes, but not directly. There may be reasons against it that I do not know of. But close by the depot is a public house, where you can be comfortable for a few hours or days. On the third day from this you will find me in the grounds. There was formerly an odd little summer-house up a ravine which opens to the river; you can almost see it from the depot. Wait for me there.”

“I shall have but one thought till then.”

“And now good-night!”

“But you will not send me away yet?”

“I must. My cousin is ill and may want me.”

“Ah, this is cruel!”

“To myself most of all. She does not know of your existence, and might find you here. There! there! you hurt my hand. We shall meet again very soon.”

“Not to part—say that, dear girl!”

“I hope so—I think so. But be prudent, and if necessary patient. Remember we have a whole life before us.”

“A Heaven, you should say.”

She smiled sweetly, gave him for the first time her lips to kiss, and went to the door with his arm around her waist. With a dexterous touch of the finger, she shot the bolt and let him out, almost delirious with mingled feelings of joy, pride, shame and regret.