Say and Seal, Volume 2 — II

CHAPTER II.

In the dressing-room Faith was seized upon in the warmest manner by Mrs. Stoutenburgh, who looked very pretty in her dress of bright crimson silk.

"I'm so glad you've come back, dear.

And how well you're looking!

--a little thin, though.

But you'll soon make up for that.

You're just as lovely as you can be, Faith--do you know it?"

"No, ma'am."

--Her _flowers_, she knew, were as lovely as they could be.

"Jerry brought us, Mrs. Stoutenburgh, after all, and pretty fast too."

"O he can go fast enough.

You needn't look so sober, child--of course no one thinks so but me, and nobody ever minds what I say.

_That's_ pretty, I suppose you'll allow," she said laughing, and bending down closer to Faith's holly leaves,--"what is it, Faith?

basswood?"

"Don't you know holly, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?

And the berries are winterberries."

"Yes my dear--I perceive.

You mustn't get angry with me, child--I tell you nobody does, not even your grave escort.

At least not for anything I do to _him_.

Well I'll go down and electrify people with the news that you're coming."

And the crimson dress floated off to the tune of a light step and a merry voice.

And more slowly and more doubtfully the black dress and winterberries followed her.

Perhaps in very truth Faith would have been willing that Mr. Stoutenburgh should have taken her under his broad wing for that going down stairs.

At least she was as absolutely grave and quiet as anybody ever saw her, and a little more inclined to be shrinking.

But Mr. Linden was alone in the hall at that minute, so there was no one else to shrink from; and if Faith wanted to shrink from him, she hardly could,--there was such an absence of anything to alarm her, both in his look and manner.

Therefore, though she had to go down stairs upon his arm, and pass sundry people on their way up, Faith felt that he was a shield between her and the glances and words which he so little regarded.

Eyes and tongues indeed ventured hut little in his presence; but that protection of course extended only to the centre of the drawing-room, and the welcome which Faith received from Mrs. Somers,--then she must shield herself.

Then truly, for a while, she was taken possession of by Squire Stoutenburgh, who walked with her up and down, and said all manner of kind things.

Faith had no particular skill to shield herself from anything, and indeed gave herself no thought about it.

She took what came, in a simple and quiet spirit, which was very apt to strike like a bee the right part of every flower; or that perhaps carried its own honey along.

So she walked up and down with Mr. Stoutenburgh; and so she afterwards entered into the demands of a posse of her old and young friends who had not seen her for a good while.

Amidst a little group of these people, collected benignly around Faith, Dr. Harrison presently intruded himself.

Now Dr. Harrison was a lion, and the smaller animals naturally fell off from him, which was precisely what he expected them to do.

The doctor had the field soon clear.

"What have you been doing to yourself?"

he said to Faith with the kindly, familiar manner which had grown up between them.

"Taking good care,"--she said, in smiling answer to his question.

"Who took the care?

yourself?"

"Yes."

"I thought so."

"Why, Dr. Harrison?"

"Excuse me," said he.

"Anybody else would have done it better."

"No," said she shaking her head,--"you are wrong."

"You have been--" said he, looking at her,--"you have been 'doing your duty' too hard."

"Can one do that, Dr. Harrison?"

"Certainly!"

"I haven't been doing it this time."

"Do you remember," he said sitting down by her and lowering his voice,--"what you said once about the flowers of the wilderness?"

"Yes."

"Would you like to see some of them?"

"In the wilderness?"

"No," said he smiling.

"I can shew you one family of them, by their portraits, here--to-night."

"I would like to see them in the wilderness or anywhere!"

said Faith.

"Then if you'll come with me"-- And the next thing was Dr. Harrison's walking off the black silk and winterberries before all the eyes of the people and through one room after another, till a little one-side room was reached which was not a thoroughfare to anything.

In this little room was a table and a lamp upon it, and also several very large thin books.

There was also, which was singular, a very comfortable easy chair.

In this Dr. Harrison installed his charge close by the table, and drew up one of the volumes.

"I am going to introduce to you," he said, "the whole family of the Rhododendrons."

"Rhododendron?"

--said Faith.

"I never saw them."

"It is their loss," said the doctor; "but here they are."

It was as he said;--the whole family of the plant, in the most superb style of portraiture and presentation.

Full size and full colour; one of the most magnificent of such works.

Faith had never seen a Rhododendron, and even in her dreams had never visited a wilderness where such flowers grew.

Her exquisite delight fully satisfied Dr. Harrison, and quite kept her attention from herself and the fact of her being shut off from the rest of the company.

Now and then one and another would drop in and look at what they were about, with curiosity if not with sympathy; but Rhododendrons were not alluring to most of the people, nor to say truth was Dr. Harrison.

With most urbane politeness he dispersed any desire to remain and look over his proceedings which might have been felt by some of the intruders; or contrived that they should find nothing to detain them.

It was a long business, to turn over all those delicious portraits of floral life and give anything like a sufficient look at each one.

Such glories of vegetable beauty Faith had never imagined.

It was almost a new revelation.

There were deep brilliant crimsons; there was the loveliest rose-colour, in large heads of the close elegant flowers;

there were, larger still and almost incredible in their magnificence, enormous clusters of cream-coloured and tinted and even of buff.

There were smaller and humbler members of the family, which would have been glorious in any other companionship.

There were residents of the rich regions of the tropics; and less superb members of the temperate zones;

there were trees and shrubs; and there were little bushy, hardy denizens of the highest and barrenest elevations of rocks and snow to which inflorescence ever climbs.

Faith almost caught her breath.

"And these are in the wilderness!"

she said.

"Yes.

What then?"

said the doctor.

Faith did not say.

"You are thinking they 'waste their sweetness'?"

"O no, indeed!

I don't think that."

"You are thinking something.

Please let me be the better for it."

"One ought to be the better for it," said Faith.

"Then I hope you won't refuse it to me," said Dr. Harrison gently laughing at her.

"I was thinking, Dr Harrison, what the Bible says,--'He hath made everything beautiful in his time';--and, 'God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good.'

" The doctor turned over the leaf to a new Rhododendron.

Faith's thoughts went to Pequot, and her heart gave a bound of joy at the remembrance of the sick woman there.

Mrs. Stoutenburgh's crimson dress was so softly worn and managed, that the wearer thereof was close in Dr. Harrison's neighbourhood for a minute before he was aware of her presence; which quiet motions, it should be observed, were habitual to Mrs. Stoutenburgh, and not at all assumed for the occasion.

Therefore it was with no idea of startling anybody, that she said presently, "My dear Faith, what _are_ you looking at through those Rhododendrons?"

Faith started, and looked up with a bit of a smile.

"What do you see, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?"

said the doctor.

"O several things," said the lady, passing her hand softly over Faith's brow, and then with one of her sudden impulses putting her lips there.

"Do you like them, Faith?"

"Does not Mrs. Stoutenburgh like them?"

said the doctor, as he placed a chair for her in the best position left for seeing.

"Thank you," said she laughing.

"I came here to be seen this evening.

And so ought some other people.

How much do you pay for the monopoly, doctor?"

"I really don't know!"

said Dr. Harrison with a very slight rise of his handsome eyebrows.

"I am in Pattaquasset--which is to me a region of uncertainties.

You will know better than I, Mrs. Stoutenburgh."

"Well," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh with a wicked look at the doctor for his sole benefit,--"speaking of Rhododendrons, which you've seen often enough before,--don't you admire _this_--which you have _not_ seen before?"

and she touched Faith's holly leaves with the tip of her little glove.

"I should think it must stir what Mr. Linden calls your 'nerves of pleasant sensation'."

"I am honoured by your estimation," said the doctor laughing slightly.

"Miss Derrick's taste is matchless.

It is an act of benevolence for her to wear flowers."

Faith's very brow crimsoned, till she bent it from view as much as she could.

In all her truth she could not rise up there and confess that her skill was not the skill to be commended.

She wanted a shield then.

"Don't flatter yourself that you are an object of charity," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh turning over another leaf to give Faith employment.

"They're talking of games in the other room, dear," she added in a gentle voice,--"may I tell Mrs. Somers you will play too?"

"Yes ma'am, certainly!"

"They're not ready yet--sit still and enjoy your prints--I'll see what they are about."

And the lady left the room.

Dr. Harrison sought some particularly fine specimens and engaged Faith in talk about them and their localities and habits, till her self-possession was restored.

"Have you heard the news about Mr. Linden?"

he asked with most nonchalant carelessness.

"What news?"

said Faith, doubtful whether he meant Squire Stoutenburgh's chapter or some other.

"Then he hasn't told you himself?"

"No," said Faith.

"I thought you ought to be authority," the doctor went on in the same tone.

"It is very good news--for him--I hope it is true.

They say--I have heard,--how beautiful the droop of those petals is!

--and the shade of colour is rare--They say, that he has a very dear friend abroad; I mean in Europe, somewhere.

Do you think it is true?"

"Yes," said Faith.

She thought it was not wonderful news.

"I mean a lady friend?"

said the doctor.

"Yes," said Faith again.

She knew now what the doctor meant, but she did not feel inclined to enter into the subject or to enlighten him at all.

Then too Mr. Linden might have more friends than _one_ abroad!

--It flashed upon her like a curious illumination.

"Then the story is true?"

said the doctor.

"I don't know, sir," said Faith in some distress.

"I know nothing about it."

"But you don't know that it is not true?"

said he looking at her.

"No, sir.

I don't know."

Dr. Harrison's further questions and remarks were cut short by the entrance of the very person referred to; who coming up with his usual light, alert step, held out his hand first of all to the questioner.

"Good evening, doctor!

--how do you do again?

Miss Faith, may I take you away from these beauties?"

And the released hand was offered to her.

She put hers in it very willingly but very silently; Faith dared not say a word to him about the Rhododendrons or about anything else.

"Ah, you have two hands again," said Dr. Harrison, "and you turn it against me!"

"Not that fact--" Mr. Linden said as he went off.

And then slackening his step, he talked or made Faith talk--and laugh--every inch of the way into the room where all the rest were clustered ready for blind man's buff.

It was a triumph of his skill,--or of his power,--for she had left the Rhododendrons in a mood most shy and quiet, and disposed to keep so.

Dr. Harrison had not followed them, but soon made his entrance upon the company by another door.

"What is going on?

or off, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?"

he whispered to that lady.

"Why the bandage is going on, and we're going off," said she laughing.

"Will you be blinded first, doctor?"

"Blind man's buff!"

said the doctor shrugging his shoulders comically.

"Barbarous!

I would rather 'go off' too--but anything to please you, Mrs. Stoutenburgh.

A game to see how much a man without his five senses can do against other people who have them."

But the doctor gallantly stepped up to Mrs. Somers.

"I represent the forlorn hope for the evening, aunt Ellen.

Has anybody volunteered to be the first victim?"

"You are the last person in the room that ought to volunteer," said Mrs. Somers,--"however, blindness is proverbial in some cases.

Miss Essie will bandage your eyes, Julius--and use her own for you in the meanwhile, I dare say.

Miss Essie, here is a candidate."

"Not for Miss Essie's good offices!"

said the doctor.

"I know her.

I

shall not trust her.

I will put myself in safe hands."

And with an inexpressible air of carelessness and easy pleasure-taking, Dr. Harrison carried his handsome person across the room to where Faith yet stood by the side of Mr. Linden; stood looking rather sober.

She had not brought any of the rosy Rhododendron colour away in her face;

or else it had faded.

The doctor came up and spoke in an undertone as wilfully and gracefully independent as his manner.

"If I ask you to do me the honour to put this handkerchief over my eyes, Miss Derrick, I suppose you will not know what it signifies?"

"No, sir," said Faith, with a very slight smile and extra colour.

"Where I have been," said the doctor,--"where we never play it!

--it is played in this way.

My entreating you to blind my eyes, signifies that without them I shall endeavour to find you."

"Then I wish you'd get somebody else to do it, Dr. Harrison."

"You are not in earnest?"

said the doctor.

"Very much in earnest."

"But I should observe," said he smiling, "that even the unkindness of your refusal would not change my endeavour.

I only give you, as in honour bound, the chance of doing all you can to prevent my succeeding.

Will you do it?"

He tendered the handkerchief.

Faith coloured a little more, but to put a stop to his absurdities, as they seemed to her, and to her consequent prominence before the eyes of people, she accepted the office.

Dr. Harrison kneeled at her feet, and Faith put the handkerchief round his eyes and tied it on; endeavouring, to do her justice, to perform the task thoroughly.

She was not quite sure how well it was done, after all,--for the doctor had interposed a gentle "Softly," as she was drawing the knot and had at the same time also raised his hand to ease the bandage.

But Faith had to let it go so; and simply resolved to take care of herself.

Many eyes, meanwhile, surveyed this performance with much edification, glancing too at the motionless figure who at Faith's side looked down upon it.

But when the smile in those eyes touched the lips as well, Mrs. Stoutenburgh was roused to a pitch of delight; and running into the middle of the room to meet the doctor as he came to take his stand, she clapped her hands exclaiming, "O, doctor!

doctor!

--how could you let anybody tie anything over your eyes!"

"Is there treachery, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?"

said the doctor with a comic stop.

"Where?"

--said the lady.

"Nay,--I know where," said the doctor.

And turning from her he addressed himself to the game.

But though Dr. Harrison shewed himself a keen player the game came to no sudden termination.

And Faith could not help doubting that her work had not been too effectual.

It was beyond question, even if she had not been forewarned, that the doctor was endeavouring to find--or endeavouring to catch her.

In vain Mrs. Stoutenburgh's crimson and Miss Essie's blue floated past him and rustled behind him.

In vain Mrs. Somers' purple stood in his way.

The skirt of that one black silk could go nowhere that some one of the doctor's senses did not inform him of it.

Closely he followed upon her flight, and keen work Faith found it, play as well as she would.

She began to get out of breath, and the amusement and fun grew uproarious.

It was when her foot was failing that the doctor's gained strength: between him and the prize there was now no barrier; no leap could avail Faith in the corner where she was at last hemmed in.

Slowly and securely the doctor advanced, first himself and then his hands, and caught--Mr Linden!

Caught him unmistakeably too,--there was no help for it; and Dr. Harrison in his astonishment forgot to pronounce him somebody else!

"Confound you!"

said the doctor slowly and comically--"how did you get here?"

"Are you fatigued?"

said Mr. Linden, taking off the bandage.

"Miss Faith, you did _this_ part of your work very ill."

"How did you get here?"

repeated the doctor, taking hold of his arm and shaking it slightly.

"I wasn't looking for _you_, man."

"What were you _looking_ for?"

said Mr. Linden, with a laughing return of the doctor's gaze.

"Shall I put that on for you?"

said the latter with a sort of complicate expression, which however never lost its grace and ease.

And then began another chase--but not of Faith this time,--perhaps Mr. Linden thought she needed rest.

And the changes ran round the company, but never (as it happened) including Faith or Dr. Harrison, until they reached the finishing round of the game.

Then it was Mr. Linden's turn again to wear the bandage, and then he gave Faith the sort of run he had given her before at Mrs. Stoutenburgh's--and with the same success.

"Haven't they played blind man's buff long enough?"

Faith whispered, when the bandage was taken off her captor.

She was flushed, a little, and sober more than a little.

"Yes--I will move a change," he answered in the same tone.

Which he did, after a short consultation.

"Dr. Harrison--you have seen the 'Butterfly,' I suppose?"

"_The_ butterfly?"

said the doctor.

"I have seen many--of all colours;

but the butterfly par excellence, I know not.

Unless it is one with white wings and black body, and spots of most brilliant red on the breast."

"The one I mean combines more colours," said Mr. Linden.

"What were you doing in France, not to see it?"

"Seeing other things, I suppose.

However, now you speak of it, I believe that butterfly has flown over me--sometime."

"Please to imagine yourself a gay rover for the nonce," said Mr. Linden, leading the doctor persuasively into the middle of the floor.

"Just suppose you are a Purple Emperor--will you doctor?

Miss Essie wants a story and forfeits,--I shall leave you to gratify her."

But he himself went to give Miss Faith a seat.

That was done with a very different manner from the gay, genial way in which he had addressed the doctor: it was genial enough, certainly, but grave.

"You do not feel well?"

he said, as he wheeled up an easy chair for her.

It was spoken too low for any one else to hear.

"Yes, I do,"--said Faith quickly.

But her face flushed deep, and her eye though it glanced towards him, failed timidly of meeting his; and her voice had lost all the spring of pleasure.

"Then cannot you keep the promise you made about a disagreeable evening?"

The tone was very low still--(he was arranging her footstool and chair) a little concerned too, a little--or Faith fancied it--but indeed she was not quite sure what the third part was; and then the doctor began his work.

For a minute or two she did not hear him, or heard without heed.

She was thinking over Mr. Linden's question and struggling with it.

For its slight tone, of remonstrance perhaps, only met and stirred into life the feeling she was trying to keep down.

Her lip took one of its sorrowful curves for an instant; but then Dr. Harrison came towards them.

"What insect on the face of the earth, Linden, will you be?

What does he resemble most, Miss Derrick?"

"I am not particular about being on the face of the earth," said Mr. Linden,--"the air will do just as well."

The doctor was waiting for Faith's answer.

Under the exigency of the moment she gave it him, glancing up first at the figure beside her, perhaps to refresh her memory--or imagination--and smiling a little as she spoke.

"I don't think of any he is like, Dr. Harrison."

"Do you think I am like a purple butterfly?"

said the doctor.

"Yes, a little,"--said Faith.

But it was with a face of such childlike soberness that the doctor looked hard at her.

"What do you think you are like yourself?"

said he; not lightly.

"I think I am a little like an ant," said Faith.

The doctor turned half round on his heel.

"'Angels and ministers of grace'!"

was his exclamation.

"Most winged, gentle, and etherial of all the dwellers in, or on, anthills,--know that thy similitude is nothing meaner than a flower.

You must take the name of one, Miss Faith--all the ladies do--what will you be?"

"What will you be?"

Mr. Linden repeated,--"Mignonette?

--that is even below the level of some of your anthills."

"If you please,"--she said.

"Or one of your Rhododendrons?"