CHAPTER XXXI.

The Thorn rankles.

We left the quiet town of Sudbury snow-clad and sparkling in all the glory of a frosty moonlight night; we now return to it, and discover it decked out in its bravest summer garniture. A short distance above the hill upon which it is built, the water of the river that glides along its base may be seen springing over the low dam that obstructs its passage, sparkling, glistening, dancing in the sunlight, as it falls splashing on the stones below; and then, as though subdued by the fall and crash, it comes murmuring on, stopping now and then to whirl and eddy round some rock or protruding stump, and at last glides gently under the arch of the bridge, seemingly to pause beneath its shadow and ponder upon its recent tumble from the heights above. Seated here and there upon the bridge are groups of boys, rod in hand, endeavouring, with the most delicious-looking and persuasive of baits, to inveigle finny innocents from the cool depths below.

The windows of the mills are all thrown open, and now and then the voices of some operatives, singing at their work, steal forth in company with the whir and hum of the spindles, and mingle with the splash of the waterfall; and the united voices of nature, industry, and man, harmonize their swelling tones, or go floating upward on the soft July air. The houses upon the hill-side seem to be endeavouring to extricate themselves from bowers of full-leafed trees; and with their white fronts, relieved by the light green blinds, look cool and inviting in the distance. High above them all, as though looking down in pride upon the rest, stands the Academy, ennobled in the course of years by the addition of extensive wings and a row of stately pillars. On the whole, the town looked charmingly peaceful and attractive, and appeared just the quiet nook that a weary worker in cities would select as a place of retirement after a busy round of toils or pleasure.

There were little knots of idlers gathered about the railroad station, as there always is in quiet towns—not that they expect any one; but that the arrival and departure of the train is one of the events of the day, and those who have nothing else particular to accomplish feel constrained to be on hand to witness it. Every now and then one of them would look down the line and wonder why the cars were not in sight.

Amongst those seemingly the most impatient was Miss Ada Bell, who looked but little older than when she won the heart of the orphan Clarence, years before, by that kind kiss upon his childish brow. It was hers still—she bound it to her by long years of affectionate care, almost equalling in its sacrificing tenderness that which a mother would have bestowed upon her only child. Clarence, her adopted son, had written to her, that he was wretched, heart-sore, and ill, and longed to come to her, his almost mother, for sympathy, advice, and comfort: so she, with yearning heart, was there to meet him.

At last the faint scream of the steam-whistle was heard, and soon the lumbering locomotive came puffing and snorting on its iron path, dashing on as though it could never stop, and making the surrounding hills echo with the unearthly scream of its startling whistle, and arousing to desperation every dog in the quiet little town. At last it stopped, and stood giving short and impatient snorts and hisses, whilst the passengers were alighting.

Clarence stepped languidly out, and was soon in the embrace of Miss Ada.

"My dear boy, how thin and pale you look!" she exclaimed; "come, get into the carriage; never mind your baggage, George will look after that; your hands are hot—very hot, you must be feverish."

"Yes, Aunt Ada," for so he had insisted on his calling her "I am ill—sick in heart, mind, and everything. Cut up the horses," said he, with slight impatience of manner; "let us get home quickly. When I get in the old parlour, and let you bathe my head as you used to, I am sure I shall feel better. I am almost exhausted from fatigue and heat."

"Very well then, dear, don't talk now," she replied, not in the least noticing his impatience of manner; "when you are rested, and have had your tea, will be time enough."

They were soon in the old house, and Clarence looked round with a smile of pleasure on the room where he had spent so many happy hours. Good Aunt Ada would not let him talk, but compelled him to remain quiet until he had rested himself, and eaten his evening meal.

He had altered considerably in the lapse of years, there was but little left to remind one of the slight, melancholy-looking boy, that once stood a heavy-hearted little stranger in the same room, in days gone by. His face was without a particle of red to relieve its uniform paleness; his eyes, large, dark, and languishing, were half hidden by unusually long lashes; his forehead broad, and surmounted with clustering raven hair; a glossy moustache covered his lip, and softened down its fulness; on the whole, he was strikingly handsome, and none would pass him without a second look.

Tea over, Miss Ada insisted that he should lie down upon the sofa again, whilst she, sat by and bathed his head. "Have you seen your sister lately?" she asked.

"No, Aunt Ada," he answered, hesitatingly, whilst a look of annoyance darkened his face for a moment; "I have not been to visit her since last fall—almost a year."

"Oh! Clarence, how can you remain so long away?" said she, reproachfully.

"Well, I can't go there with any comfort or pleasure," he answered, apologetically; "I can't go there; each year as I visit the place, their ways seem more strange and irksome to me. Whilst enjoying her company, I must of course come in familiar contact with those by whom she is surrounded. Sustaining the position that I do—passing as I am for a white man—I am obliged to be very circumspect, and have often been compelled to give her pain by avoiding many of her dearest friends when I have encountered them in public places, because of their complexion. I feel mean and cowardly whilst I'm doing it; but it is necessary—I can't be white and coloured at the same time; the two don't mingle, and I must consequently be one or the other. My education, habits, and ideas, all unfit me for associating with the latter; and I live in constant dread that something may occur to bring me out with the former. I don't avoid coloured people, because I esteem them my inferiors in refinement, education, or intelligence; but because they are subjected to degradations that I shall be compelled to share by too freely associating with them."

"It is a pity," continued he, with a sigh, "that I was not suffered to grow up with them, then I should have learnt to bear their burthens, and in the course of time might have walked over my path of life, bearing the load almost unconsciously. Now it would crush me, I know. It was a great mistake to place me in my present false position," concluded he, bitterly; "it has cursed me. Only a day ago I had a letter from Em, reproaching me for my coldness; yet, God help me! What am I to do!"

Miss Ada looked at him sorrowfully, and continued smoothing down his hair, and inundating his temples with Cologne; at last she ventured to inquire, "How do matters progress with you and Miss Bates? Clary, you have lost your heart there!"

"Too true," he replied, hurriedly; "and what is more—little Birdie (I call her little Birdie) has lost hers too. Aunt Ada, we are engaged!"

"With her parents' consent?" she asked.

"Yes, with her parents' consent; we are to be married in the coming winter."

"Then they know all, of course—they know you are coloured?" observed she.

"They know all!" cried he, starting up. "Who said they did—who told them?—tell me that, I say! Who has dared to tell them I am a coloured man?"

"Hush, Clarence, hush!" replied she, attempting to soothe him. "I do not know that any one has informed them; I only inferred so from your saying you were engaged. I thought you had informed them yourself. Don't you remember you wrote that you should?—and I took it for granted that you had."

"Oh! yes, yes; so I did! I fully intended to, but found myself too great a coward. I dare not—I cannot risk losing her. I am fearful that if she knew it she would throw me off for ever."

"Perhaps not, Clarence—if she loves you as she should; and even if she did, would it not be better that she should know it now, than have it discovered afterwards, and you both be rendered miserable for life."

"No, no, Aunt Ada—I cannot tell her! It must remain a secret until after our marriage; then, if they find it out, it will be to their interest to smooth the matter over, and keep quiet about it."

"Clary, Clary—that is not honourable!"

"I know it—but how can I help it? Once or twice I thought of telling her, but my heart always failed me at the critical moment. It would kill me to lose her. Oh! I love her, Aunt Ada," said he, passionately—"love her with all the energy and strength of my father's race, and all the doating tenderness of my mother's. I could have told her long ago, before my love had grown to its present towering strength, but craft set a seal upon my lips, and bid me be silent until her heart was fully mine, and then nothing could part us; yet now even, when sure of her affections, the dread that her love would not stand the test, compels me to shrink more than ever from the disclosure."

"But, Clarence, you are not acting generously; I know your conscience does not approve your actions."

"Don't I know that?" he answered, almost fiercely; "yet I dare not tell—I must shut this secret in my bosom, where it gnaws, gnaws, gnaws, until it has almost eaten my heart away. Oh, I've thought of that, time and again; it has kept me awake night after night, it haunts me at all hours; it is breaking down my health and strength—wearing my very life out of me; no escaped galley-slave ever felt more than I do, or lived in more constant fear of detection: and yet I must nourish this tormenting secret, and keep it growing in my breast until it has crowded out every honourable and manly feeling; and then, perhaps, after all my sufferings and sacrifice of candour and truth, out it will come at last, when I least expect or think of it."

Aunt Ada could not help weeping, and exclaimed, commiseratingly, "My poor, poor boy," as he strode up and down the room.

"The whole family, except her, seem to have the deepest contempt for coloured people; they are constantly making them a subject of bitter jests; they appear to have no more feeling or regard for them than if they were brutes—and I," continued he, "I, miserable, contemptible, false-hearted knave, as I am, I—I—yes, I join them in their heartless jests, and wonder all the while my mother does not rise from her grave and curse me as I speak!"

"Oh! Clarence, Clarence, my dear child!" cried the terrified Aunt Ada, "you talk deliriously; you have brooded over this until it has almost made you crazy. Come here—sit down." And seizing him by the arm, she drew him on the sofa beside her, and began to bathe his hot head with the Cologne again.

"Let me walk, Aunt Ada," said he after a few moments,—"let me walk, I feel better whilst I am moving; I can't bear to be quiet." And forthwith he commenced striding up and down the room again with nervous and hurried steps. After a few moments he burst out again——

"It seems as if fresh annoyances and complications beset me every day. Em writes me that she is engaged. I was in hopes, that, after I had married, I could persuade her to come and live with me, and so gradually break off her connection with, coloured people; but that hope is extinguished now: she is engaged to a coloured man."

Aunt Ada could see no remedy for this new difficulty, and could only say,
"Indeed!"

"I thought something of the kind would occur when I was last at home, and spoke to her on the subject, but she evaded giving me any definite answer; I think she was afraid to tell me—she has written, asking my consent."

"And will you give it?" asked Aunt Ada.

"It will matter but little if I don't; Em has a will of her own, and I have no means of coercing her; besides, I have no reasonable objection to urge: it would be folly in me to oppose it, simply because he is a coloured man—for, what am I myself? The only difference is, that his identity with coloured people is no secret, and he is not ashamed of it; whilst I conceal my origin, and live in constant dread that some one may find it out." When Clarence had finished, he continued to walk up and down the room, looking very careworn and gloomy.

Miss Bell remained on the sofa, thoughtfully regarding him. At last, she rose up and took his hand in hers, as she used to when he was a boy, and walking beside him, said, "The more I reflect upon it, the more necessary I regard it that you should tell this girl and her parents your real position before you marry her. Throw away concealment, make a clean breast of it! you may not be rejected when they find her heart is so deeply interested. If you marry her with this secret hanging over you, it will embitter your life, make you reserved, suspicious, and consequently ill-tempered, and destroy all your domestic happiness. Let me persuade you, tell them ere it be too late. Suppose it reached them through some other source, what would they then think of you?"

"Who else would tell them? Who else knows it? You, you," said he suspiciously—"you would not betray me! I thought you loved me, Aunt Ada."

"Clarence, my dear boy," she rejoined, apparently hurt by his hasty and accusing tone, "you will mistake me—I have no such intention. If they are never to learn it except through me, your secret is perfectly safe. Yet I must tell you that I feel and think that the true way to promote her happiness and your own, is for you to disclose to them your real position, and throw yourself upon their generosity for the result."

Clarence pondered for a long time over Miss Bell's advice, which she again and again repeated, placing it each time before him in a stronger light, until, at last, she extracted from him a promise that he would do it. "I know you are right, Aunt Ada," said he; "I am convinced of that—it is a question of courage with me. I know it would be more honourable for me to tell her now. I'll try to do it—I will make an effort, and summon up the courage necessary—God be my helper!"

"That's a dear boy!" she exclaimed, kissing him affectionately; "I know you will feel happier when it is all over; and even if she should break her engagement, you will be infinitely better off than if it was fulfilled and your secret subsequently discovered. Come, now," she concluded, "I am going to exert my old authority, and send you to bed; tomorrow, perhaps, you may see this in a more hopeful light."

Two days after this, Clarence was again in New York, amid the heat and dust of that crowded, bustling city. Soon, after his arrival, he dressed himself, and started for the mansion of Mr. Bates, trembling as he went, for the result of the communication he was about to make.

Once on the way he paused, for the thought had occurred to him that he would write to them; then reproaching himself for his weakness and timidity, he started on again with renewed determination.

"I'll see her myself," he soliloquized. "I'll tell little Birdie all, and know my fate from her own lips. If I must give her up, I'll know the worst from her."

When Clarence was admitted, he would not permit himself to be announced, but walked tiptoe upstairs and gently opening the drawing-room door, entered the room. Standing by the piano, turning over the leaves of some music, and merrily humming an air, was a young girl of extremely petite and delicate form. Her complexion was strikingly fair; and the rich curls of dark auburn that fell in clusters on her shoulders, made it still more dazzling by the contrast presented. Her eyes were grey, inclining to black; her features small, and not over-remarkable for their symmetry, yet by no means disproportionate. There was the sweetest of dimples on her small round chin, and her throat white and clear as the finest marble. The expression of her face was extremely childlike; she seemed more like a schoolgirl than a young woman of eighteen on the eve of marriage. There was something deliriously airy and fairylike in her motions, and as she slightly moved her feet in time to the music she was humming, her thin blue dress floated about her, and undulated in harmony with her graceful motions.

After gazing at her for a few moments, Clarence called gently, "Little Birdie." She gave a timid joyous little cry of surprise and pleasure, and fluttered into his arms.

"Oh, Clary, love, how you startled me! I did not dream there was any one in the room. It was so naughty in you," said she, childishly, as he pushed back the curls from her face and kissed her. "When did you arrive?"

"Only an hour ago," he answered.

"And you came here at once? Ah, that was so lover-like and kind," she rejoined, smiling.

"You look like a sylph to-night, Anne," said he, as she danced about him. "Ah," he continued, after regarding her for a few seconds with a look of intense admiration, "you want to rivet my chains the tighter,—you look most bewitching. Why are you so much dressed to-night?—jewels, sash, and satin slippers," he continued; "are you going out?"

"No, Clary," she answered. "I was to have gone to the theatre; but just at the last moment I decided not to. A singular desire to stay at home came over me suddenly. I had an instinctive feeling that I should lose some greater enjoyment if I went; so I remained at home; and here, love, are you. But what is the matter? you look sad and weary."

"I am a little fatigued," said he, seating himself and holding her hand in his: "a little weary; but that will soon wear off; and as for the sadness," concluded he, with a forced smile, "that must depart now that I am with you, Little Birdie."

"I feel relieved that you have returned safe and well," said she, looking up into his face from her seat beside him; "for, Clary, love, I had such a frightful dream, such a singular dream about you. I have endeavoured to shake it out of my foolish little head; but it won't go, Clary,—I can't get rid of it. It occurred after you left us at Saratoga. Oh, it was nothing though," said she, laughing and shaking her curls,—"nothing; and now you are safely returned, I shall not think of it again. Tell me what you have seen since you went away; and how is that dear Aunt Ada of yours you talk so much about?"

"Oh, she is quite well," answered he; "but tell, Anne, tell me about that dream. What was it, Birdie?—come tell me."

"I don't care to," she answered, with a slight shudder,—"I don't want to, love."

"Yes, yes,—do, sweet," importuned he; "I want to hear it."

"Then if I must," said she, "I will. I dreamed that you and I were walking on a road together, and 'twas such a beautiful road, with flowers and fruit, and lovely cottages on either side. I thought you held my hand; I felt it just as plain as I clasp yours now. Presently a rough ugly man overtook us, and bid you let me go; and that you refused, and held me all the tighter. Then he gave you a diabolical look, and touched you on the face, and you broke out in loathsome black spots, and screamed in such agony and frightened me so, that I awoke all in a shiver of terror, and did not get over it all the next day."

Clarence clutched her hand tighter as she finished, so tight indeed, that she gave a little scream of pain and looked frightened at him. "What is the matter?" she inquired; "your hand is like ice, and you are paler than ever. You haven't let that trifling dream affect you so? It is nothing."

"I am superstitious in regard to dreams," said Clarence, wiping the perspiration from his forehead. "Go," he asked, faintly, "play me an air, love,—something quick and lively to dispel this. I wish you had not told me."

"But you begged me to," said she, pouting, as she took her seat at the instrument.

"How ominous," muttered he,—"became covered with black spots; that is a foreshadowing. How can I tell her," he thought. "It seems like wilfully destroying my own happiness." And he sat struggling with himself to obtain the necessary courage to fulfil the purpose of his visit, and became so deeply engrossed with his own reflections as to scarcely even hear the sound of the instrument.

"It is too bad," she cried, as she ceased playing: "here I have performed some of your favourite airs, and that too without eliciting a word of commendation. You are inexpressibly dull to-night; nothing seems to enliven you. What is the matter?"

"Oh," rejoined he, abstractedly, "am I? I was not aware of it."

"Yes, you are," said Little Birdie, pettishly; "nothing seems to engage your attention." And, skipping off to the table, she took up the newspaper, and exclaimed,—"Let me read you something very curious."

"No, no, Anne dear," interrupted he; "sit here by me. I want to say something serious to you—something of moment to us both."

"Then it's something very grave and dull, I know," she remarked; "for that is the way people always begin. Now I don't want to hear anything serious to-night; I want to be merry. You look serious enough; and if you begin to talk seriously you'll be perfectly unbearable. So you must hear what I am going to read to you first." And the little tyrant put her finger on his lip, and looked so bewitching, that he could not refuse her. And the important secret hung on his lips, but was not spoken.

"Listen," said she, spreading out the paper before her and running her tiny finger down the column. "Ah, I have it," she exclaimed at last, and began:—

"'We learn from unimpeachable authority that the Hon. —— ——, who represents a district of our city in the State legislature, was yesterday united to the Quateroon daughter of the late Gustave Almont. She is said to be possessed of a large fortune, inherited from her father; and they purpose going to France to reside,—a sensible determination; as, after such a mesalliance, the honourable gentleman can no longer expect to retain his former social position in our midst.—New Orleans Watchman.'"

"Isn't it singular," she remarked, "that a man in his position should make such a choice?"

"He loved her, no doubt," suggested Clarence; "and she was almost white."

"How could he love her?" asked she, wonderingly. "Love a coloured woman! I cannot conceive it possible," said she, with a look of disgust; "there is something strange and unnatural about it."

"No, no," he rejoined, hurriedly, "it was love, Anne,—pure love; it is not impossible. I—I—" "am coloured," he would have said; but he paused and looked full in her lovely face. He could not tell her,—the words slunk back into his coward heart unspoken.

She stared at him in wonder and perplexity, and exclaimed,—"Dear Clarence, how strangely you act! I am afraid you are not well. Your brow is hot," said she, laying her hand on his forehead; "you have been travelling too much for your strength."

"It is not that," he replied. "I feel a sense of suffocation, as if all the blood was rushing to my throat. Let me get the air." And he rose and walked to the window. Anne hastened and brought him a glass of water, of which he drank a little, and then declared himself better.

After this, he stood for a long time with her clasped in his arms; then giving her one or two passionate kisses, he strained her closer to him and abruptly left the house, leaving Little Birdie startled and alarmed by his strange behaviour.