The heiress of Greenhurst

On the third day, Lady Catherine sent for me to come up to the Hurst. It seems she was resolved to carry out her plan of giving me such accomplishments as I could pick up, without expense, from her son’s tutor, and her own waiting-maid.

I went, not without a pang of wounded pride, but too happy in the hope of seeing him again, for thought of much else. Lady Catherine was in her dressing-room, and several ladies, whom I afterward learned were guests from London, had joined her, it seems, curious to see the wild wood-nymph who had made a sensation at the hunt.

Lady Catherine half rose from her silken lounge as I entered, and motioned me to sit down on an embroidered ottoman, first lifting from it a little tan-colored spaniel, which she settled beside her on the couch. I sat down, with a burning forehead, for it was easy to see that she placed me and the dog on an equal level, if indeed the animal did not meet with higher estimation than the human pet.

“Isn’t she a spirited, wild little beauty?” she said, addressing a young girl some two years older than myself, perhaps, who was busy working seed-pearls into a bit of embroidery.

The young lady looked coldly up, and, after scanning me from head to foot, dropped her eyes again, murmuring something about my being older than she had supposed. Lady Catherine drew her hand down the folds of my hair, exclaiming at its thickness and lustre, just as she had handled the silky ears of her King Charles a moment before.

“Did you ever see anything so long and so raven black,” she said, uncoiling a heavy braid from around my head, and holding it up at full length.

“That sort of hair is often seen in persons of mixed blood,” answered the young lady, without lifting her eyes, “long, but of a coarser texture. I must confess black is not my favorite color.”

“You must take an interest in this poor child—indeed you must, Estelle; I have quite depended on it—she will be quick to learn: won’t you, child? Let her look over some of your drawings, Estelle. I dare say she never saw anything like them in her life!”

The young lady kept at her work, not seeming to relish the idea of amusing a creature so disagreeable as she evidently found me. Lady Catherine arose; she spoke to the young girl in a subdued voice, but not a syllable escaped me.

“Nay, love, you must. It will please George more than anything; besides, I promised as much to her father in order to induce him to abandon that horrid way of life. It is quite a moral duty to civilize the child, now that the parents are married; George looks upon it in this light, I assure you.”

“I would do anything to please him, you know,” said the girl, half sullenly, “but he never sees my efforts; never cares for them.”

“Who should know, dearest, but the mother who is his confidant?” was the caressing reply. “How can you doubt what I tell you?”

“Well,” replied the girl, rising, “let the child come to my dressing-room!”

“No, love,” interposed Lady Catherine; “bring them here—I never weary of them myself.”

The young lady withdrew, and returned with a richly embroidered portfolio crowded full of drawings. She spread them out upon a table, and haughtily motioned me to approach.

The drawings were evidently copies highly finished, but variable as if more than one pencil had performed its part there. My quick intuition told me this at a glance, and I looked into the girl’s face with a feeling of scorn which doubtless spoke in my features. She probably held me in so much contempt that my look was unnoticed, for she continued to turn over the drawings with haughty self-possession, as if quite careless of any opinion I might form.

At last we came to a head sketched with care, and evidently an attempt at some likeness.

“Do you know that?” said Estelle, “probably you have never seen Mr. Irving.”

“I have seen Mr. Irving,” was my answer, “but this is not in the least like him.”

“Perhaps you could draw a better one!” she said, casting a sneering smile toward Lady Catherine, but with rising color, as if she were a good deal vexed.

“Perhaps,” I answered very quietly.

“Try,” said the haughty girl, taking a pencil and some paper from a pocket of the portfolio.

I took the pencil, dropped on one knee by the table, and, excited by her sneers into an attempt that I should have held almost sacrilegious at another time, transferred a shadow of the image that filled my soul to the paper. I felt the look of haughty astonishment with which the young patrician bent over me as I worked out the quick inspiration.

“What is she doing?” inquired Lady Catherine, gliding toward the table. “Why, Estelle, you seem entranced.”

Estelle drew proudly back, and pointed toward me with a sneering lift of the upper lip, absolutely hateful.

“You have found a prodigy here, madam, nothing less,” she said; “what a memory the creature must have to draw like that with only one sight of your son’s face!”

Lady Catherine bent over me, and I felt that she breathed unequally, like one conquering an unpleasant surprise.

“What an impression that one interview must have made,” persisted the young lady.

“I have seen Mr. Irving more than once or twice,” I answered, without pausing in the rapid touches of my pencil, though my heart beat loud and fast as I spoke.

“Indeed,” sneered the girl with a glance at Lady Catherine.

“Indeed!” repeated that lady, with forced unconcern; “the child wanders among the trees like a bird, Estelle, you have no idea what a wild gipsy it is; we must civilize her between us.”

“Is Mr. Irving to help? It looks like that,” answered Estelle, spitefully.

“Is there anything in which I can be of service?” said a voice that made the heart leap in my bosom; but so perfect was my self-control that I finished the shadow upon which I was at work mechanically, as if every nerve in my system were not thrilling like the strings of an instrument.

“We were speaking about humanizing this strange child a little,” said Lady Catherine; “she really has a good deal of originality, as we were saying, and Estelle is quite charmed with the idea of bringing it out.”

My soul was full of scornful ridicule. I felt it breaking up through my eyes, and curving my lip as I looked from Estelle to George Irving. His own face caught the spirit, and he met my glance with a bright smile of intelligence, that others read as well as myself.

“Did you ever try to teach music to a woodlark, dear mother?” he said, stooping down to look at the head I had sketched.

My heart stood still, but I would not permit myself to blush; on the contrary, there was a dry, cold feeling about my lips as if the blood were leaving them; but my gaze was fascinated. I could not turn it from his face, and when the warm crimson rushed up over his brow and temples, as the likeness struck him, my breath was absolutely stopped. I would have given the universe for the power of obliterating my own work from the paper and from his brain. There was anger, reproach, and a dash of scorn in the glance which he turned from the likeness to my face. I trembled from head to foot. The lids drooped like lead over the shame that burned in my eyes; a feeling that he thought my act indelicate scorched me like a fire.

“The likeness does not seem to please you, Mr. Irving,” said Estelle, and her face brightened. “In my humility I had supposed it better than my poor attempt.”

“Oh, it was only a copy, then!” he cried, laughing, and the cloud left his face; “this is your first lesson, and my poor features the subject. You honor them too much; pray whose selection was it?”

“I believe my sketch gave rise to the other,” answered Estelle, casting down her fine eyes, and certainly mistaking the feelings she had excited.

“I am glad of it,” answered Irving, and the glow of his countenance bore proof of his sincerity.

“Now,” said Lady Catherine, in her usual way, which with all its softness had authority in it, “let us settle things for the morning. We visit Marston Court; Estelle has never been thoroughly over the house; of course you go, George.”

He did not seem embarrassed, but thoughtful, and, after a moment’s consideration, replied, “Yes, I will escort you on horseback. Who are going?”

The guests were enumerated. Most of the names I had never heard before. My own was not in the list.

“And Zana!” said Irving, with a slight rise of color when his mother paused.

“Oh, Zana, she will find amusement for herself. She has never seen the house yet—besides, as your tutor remains behind, he can take the opportunity to give her a lesson or two.”

Lady Catherine looked furtively at her son as she made the proposition. His brow clouded, and his lips were set together very resolutely; but his voice was low and respectful as he replied,

“Not so, madam! Unless in your presence, that gentleman is not a proper person to teach a girl like Zana!”

“Hear me, you are really making the thing a burden. How can you expect all these formalities, George, in a case like this—and me with nerves worn down to a thread?”

“I will teach her myself,” was the firm reply, though rays of crimson shot across his forehead as he spoke.

“You, George?—preposterous!”

“Why preposterous, madam?”

“Your youth!”

“Is my tutor old?”

“Your position—your prospects!”

He laughed in a gay, light fashion.

“Well, should my Uncle Clare marry again, a thing not unlikely, exercise of this kind will be a useful experience, for then I shall have little but my brains to depend on.”

“But he will never marry!—who thinks it?” cried the mother impatiently.

“Men of a little more than forty do not often consider themselves out of the matrimonial market, mother.”

“You talk wildly, George. Clare will never marry again—never, never!”

“And if he does not, am I his next heir?—or my hopes of advancement and fortune rest on you, lady mother?—you who certainly will not own yourself too old for a second marriage!”

“This is nonsense, George!”

“No, sober truth; my uncle—whom heaven preserve, for he is a good man—could aid me nothing in his death. You would inherit, not your son; the ladies of our line are a privileged race.”

“But are you not my only son and heir?”

“True again; and your favorite while I do not offend.”

“That you will never do,” answered the mother, with a glow of feeling in her voice.

“I hope not, mother,” he said, lifting her hand to his lips with an expression of earnest affection. “But do not talk to me of expectations that may be dreams; and rank that may find me, when it comes, a broken-hearted old man!”

“This is strange talk, George, and in this presence. Estelle will learn to look upon your prospects with distrust.”

“She, with all my friends, will do well to think of me only as I am, the dependent of a good uncle, certain of nothing but a firm will, good health, and an honest purpose!” he answered, glancing, not at the haughty patrician, but at me.

“And that is enough for any man,” I exclaimed, filled with enthusiasm by his proud frankness. “What inheritance does he require but that honest, firm will, which cleaves its own way in the world? Oh, how the soul must enjoy the blessings which its own strength has had the power to win. If I were a man, neither gold nor rank should detract from my native strength. I would go into the world and wrestle my way through, not for the wealth or the power that might come of it—but for the strength it would give to my own nature—the development—the refining process of exertion—the sense of personal power. In that must lie all the true relish of greatness!”

The guests had one by one glided from Lady Catherine’s room before her son came in, and no one listened to our conversation but her ladyship and the girl Estelle. When I ceased speaking, Lady Catherine sunk among the cushions of her couch, lifting the dog to her bosom as if she feared my rash words would poison the creature; while her young friend stood close by with both arms folded scornfully over her bosom, gazing at me from her open eyes, as if there had been something wicked in my expression. For myself, the moment my rash enthusiasm gave way, all courage went with it; and before the fire had left my eyes they were full of tears.

“Is the creature mad, or a sibyl?” said Lady Catherine, in a voice that went through and through me.

“Mother,” said her son, pale as death, but with a strange glory of expression in his face—“need you ask again whose blood spoke there?”

He addressed her in a whisper, but she turned white, and lifted her finger to check his further speech, glancing at Estelle.

“Strange language this for the daughter of a servant!” exclaimed Estelle, her bosom heaving with scornful astonishment.

“I am not the daughter of a servant,” was the reply that sprang to my lips; “the story is a falsehood. Turner is my benefactor, my more than father: not my father; but if he were, why should my words, if right, not spring from the lips of his child? Are all gifts reserved for the patrician? Does not the great oak and the valley lily spring from exactly the same soil? Thank heaven there is no monopoly in thought!”

“In heaven’s name, who taught you these things?” cried Lady Catherine, aghast.

“Who teaches the flowers to grow, and the fruit to ripen?” I answered, almost weeping, for my words sprang from an impulse, subtle and evanescent as the perfume of a flower; and like all sensitive persons I shrunk from the remembrance of my own mental impetuosity.

“Really, your ladyship, you must excuse me, this is getting tiresome,” said Estelle, sweeping from the room; “I fear with all your goodness the child will prove a troublesome pet.”

Lady Catherine sat among her cushions very white, and with a glitter in her eyes that I had learned to shrink from.

“Irving,” she said, speaking to him in a low but firm voice, “plead with me no more—she must and shall leave the estate.”

“Madam, she is but a child!”

“A mischievous one, full of peril to us all, and therefore, to be disposed of at once. Out of my own income I will provide for her wants, but away from this place—in another land, perhaps.”

I felt myself growing pale, and saw that Irving was also greatly agitated. He looked at me reproachfully, and muttered, “imprudent—imprudent.” I went to a window, and leaning against the frame, stood patiently, and still as marble, waiting for my sentence. Again my rashness had perilled all that I loved; the thought froze me through and through; I hated myself. Irving was talking to his mother; she had forgotten dignity, her elegance, everything in her indignation against me. At last I caught some of his words. They were deep and determined.

“No, mother, I will not consent. If our suspicions are true, and I must confess every day confirms them in my estimation—the course you propose would be impolitic as cruel. You cannot keep her existence from Lord Clare; all that we guess he will soon learn. He is just, noble—think if he would forgive this persecution of—of an orphan—for she is that if nothing more!”

“But am I to be annoyed—braved, talked down by a child, and before my own guests?” said the mother. “Who knows the mischief she has already done with Estelle?”

“Mother, I beseech you, let that subject drop. It is a dream.”

“One of the best matches in England, my son; a golden dream worth turning to reality.”

“No, mother, in this I must be free.”

“Perhaps you are not free! That child!”

They were looking in each other’s eyes, the mother and son reading thoughts there that each would gladly have concealed from the other. I came forward.

“Madam, let me go home, I am not fit for this place. Let me return, and I will trouble you no more.”

“I wish to heaven it were possible for you to keep this promise, girl.”

“Let me go home; send for me no more; I will never willingly cross your path again.”

“Nor his?” said the mother, fixing her cold eyes on my face, and pointing to her son.

“Madam, I beseech you, let me go.”

“But I have promised Turner to educate you.”

“Lady, you cannot. Mr. Clarke has taken great care of me, and in some shape I have educated myself.”

“You are a strange girl.”

“I feel strange here. May I go?”

She fell into thought with her eyes on my face, as if it had been a work of marble.

“Yes,” she said, at length, “go, but I feel that we have not done with each other. Now, George, equip at once; we have kept our guests waiting!”

“No, mother, I cannot go to Marston Court; make my excuses!”

He went out, leaving no time for a rejoinder; and Lady Catherine followed. I was alone in the room.

All at once a strange sensation came over me. I looked around with a vague feeling of dread. Things that I had not before noticed were strangely familiar. It seemed as if I were in a dream, and without volition, and without object, I crossed the room toward a small antique cabinet that stood in one corner. The lids were deeply carved and set heavily with jewels. It is a solemn truth, I was unconscious of the act, but unclosing the cabinet reached forth my hand, and opened a small, secret drawer that was locked with a curious spring.

Among other trinkets, two lockets of gold lay within the drawer; one shaped like a shell, and paved thickly with pearls; the other plain, and without ornament of any kind. I took up the shell, and it sprung open in my hand, revealing two faces that seemed like something that had floated in my dreams years ago. One was that of a man in the first proud bloom of youth, with a brow full of lofty thought, but fair and of a delicate whiteness that we seldom see beyond infancy. The lips and the deep blue eyes seemed smiling upon me, and with a pang of love, for it was half pain, I kissed it. The female face I could not look upon. It seemed to me like the head of an evil spirit that was to haunt my destiny, and yet it possessed a wonderful fascination to me.

I laid the shell down, and with a sort of mysterious awe took up the other locket. It opened with difficulty, and when I wrenched the spring apart, it seemed as if my very soul had received a strain. It was a miniature also. I looked upon it and the claw of some fierce bird seemed clutched upon my bosom and throat. It appeared to me as if I struggled minutes and minutes in its gripe; then the pressure gave way, and with a burst of tears I cried out, “the face!—the face!”

A thin hand was thrust over my shoulder and snatched the locket away. I turned and saw it in the grasp of Lady Catherine. With a choking cry my hands were flung out, and I leaped madly upward striving to snatch it.

“Would you steal? Are you a thief?” she cried, grasping the locket tight, and holding it on high. “Would you steal? Are you a thief?”

The words went hissing through my ear. A hot flush of indignant shame clouded my sight, and I saw George Irving, as it were, through waves of crimson gauze, looking sternly upon me.

Then all grew black and still as death.