“What an exciting event!” she exclaimed, “and Kouba is sure that Leonard Murray was the leader of the crowd. I believe it. It was Leonard I saw with the Clark boys half an hour ago. I dare say he is staying with them. I must go and tell grandmother.”
She found madame awake, and quickly gave her Kouba’s news. And it was really a little comfort to Annette to see her grandmother’s disappointment. “So sorry am I that I came away,” she said, “for a great deal I would not have missed that scene, Annette.”
“No, indeed, grandmother! I think it will be very hard to sit here all evening and not know what is going on; shall we walk over to uncle’s now?”
“Three hours after lunch? No!”
“Kouba said the Clark boys were in the crowd; suppose I write and ask Mrs. Clark and Elsie and Sally to take tea with us. Then the men will come later, and we shall hear whatever there is to hear.”
“The Clarks may not care to come.”
“Yes they will. Let me write and ask them. We do want some one to talk to, grandmother.”
Permission being at last obtained, Annette wrote one of her nicest notes and they sent it with a slave woman across the street to the Clarks’ house. Mrs. Clark read it, laughed, and then called her daughter Sally.
“Sally,” she said, “that little minx over the way has found out that Leonard Murray is here. Answer this invitation as pleasantly as possible, but tell her we cannot leave our own home to-night, as we have company.”
“We might ask Annette here, mother.”
“That is what she expects us to do.”
“She is so pretty and cheerful.”
“We will do without her beauty and her cheerfulness to-night.”
“Joe is very fond of her.”
“That is not the question; answer as I have told you.”
But though Sally made the answer as kind as her own kind heart, nothing atoned to Annette for the fact that her little scheme--though one with a double aspect--had failed in both directions.
“They cannot come, grandmother, and they do not even ask us over there--they have company. I know who it is, for I am sure I saw Leonard Murray with the Clark boys an hour ago. But then----”
“What?”
“Sally is really ugly, and though Elsie has a pretty face, she is as dowdy as can be.”
“And so much prettier is Annette de Vries--is that what you mean?”
“Yes, that is ‘the because’ of the slight.”
“Of such a thing I would not think. ‘The because’ has nothing to do with us. And a very sweet girl is Sally Clark. Every one loves her.”
“Don’t scold me, grandmother. I have had already three disappointments. To-day is very unlucky.”
“Then sit still and let it go by. Take the days as they come to you, child.”
Annette did not immediately answer. She had gone to the window and was looking eagerly out. There was a sound of footsteps and of voices in spirited conversation. Listening and looking, she waited until voices and footsteps became faint in the distance. Then she turned to her grandmother with a shrug of satisfaction:
“I was right, as I generally am,” she said. “The Clark boys, with Leonard Murray, have just gone by. Leonard is their company. What is he there for? He never used to care for those girls. Before he went to college ‘from Sapphira to Sapphira was the limit of his way.’”
“Thou foolish one! He is none of thy affair.”
“I do not care a button for Leonard Murray, but I think my cousin Sapphira does, and--and----”
What other reasons she had were not revealed. She stood at the window with an air of mortification, which, however, soon turned to one of pride and triumph; and then she tapped the glass merrily to her thoughts.
What was the girl dreaming of? Beauty’s conquests? Social power? Love after her own heart? A marriage which would hand in her millennium? Alas, for the dreams of youth! Madame watched her in pitying silence--she knew how they would end.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER TWO
_The Spring of Life_
To the roll of the drum and the shrill call of the fife the days went in a manner that was far from being disagreeable to the youthful population of New York. They enjoyed the thrill of a fear that was mingled with much excitement; and for a short period almost a license of political and patriotic temper prevailed. But to the more responsible citizens the news of war was far from welcome; so unwelcome, indeed, that only a few days before its proclamation, two petitions had been presented to the Senate signed by three hundred and ten citizens of New York, and by nearly all of the largest mercantile houses, praying that the embargo might be continued, “because they believed it would produce all the benefits of war without its calamities.” Mr. Justice Bloommaert had been one of the signers of this petition, and when he recovered the equipoise of his usually calm nature, he was astonished and a little annoyed at the precipitancy with which he had publicly changed his opinions. It was in a measure unaccountable, and he searched all the outlying posts of his inmost soul to see where the weak point had been. It was not his wife’s sarcasms or his daughter’s more pronounced sympathy--he was used to their wordy warfare, and he was sure that no persuasive force in their armoury would have driven him to the ill-advised hastiness of his unpremeditated speech on the Bowling Green.
No, it was “the doing of that young fool, Leonard Murray.” The judge had returned to his home that momentous Saturday in a passionate temper of hatred to England and her old tyrannies. He had been irritated by the lukewarmness and doleful prophecies of the majority of his friends and associates, and by the fact that every newspaper in the city was opposed to the war. And then, while his wife and daughter were stimulating his feverish mood of disapproval, he had suddenly been called to the front to stand by the opinions of others and to declare his own. He felt that somehow he had been tricked by circumstances, and his hand forced; and that young Leonard Murray was to blame for the whole affair. He had never liked the lad’s father, and having been twice obliged to decide important cases against him, the elder Murray had shown his resentment in ways that had been both irritating and injurious. They had also been distinctly opposed in politics, and, moreover, in their youth had been rivals for the love of the pretty Carlita Duprey. Now, the son of this disagreeable man had apparently taken up his father’s power to be at least unfavourable to him. He worked himself into a still, hot passion against the youth, and determined then and there to have nothing more to do with him.
Not that he intended to recede from any word he had uttered. He told himself instantly that he had only declared the truth, and that he would stand for, and by, every letter of his speech. But he wished that he had made that speech voluntarily, in some regularly called meeting, and not in response to a request voiced by young Leonard Murray. That was the sore point of the hurt, so that he hardly touched it, even in thought, but reverted at once to his speech, which struck him now as grandiloquent, turgid, and bombastic--not the kind of speech he would have made in the City Hall or at the Common Council by any means, and a tingling sense of chagrin answered this conviction. It was thoughts similar to these which surged with passionate strength through his mind as he stood on the following Wednesday afternoon on the steps of the City Hall. There had just been a public meeting in the park, called to approve the war measure, but it had been very scantily attended; and as the noisy crowd scattered, mainly up and down Broadway, he hardly knew whether he was glad or sorry for the failure. The uproarious conduct of the youth of the city offended him, and as a general thing the men of experience, of solid wealth and political power, had not answered the call for this meeting. For it was a Democratic call, and New York at that day was the very stronghold of the Federalists.
He stood a few minutes considering which streets would likely be the quietest road to his home, and seeing Broadway full of marching companies, all more or less musical and vociferous, he turned into Nassau Street, hoping to escape the cheers and attentions which his outspoken sympathy had brought him. For some distance it was comparatively quiet, but between Garden and Beaver streets he saw approaching what appeared to be a full company. They were stepping proudly to the music of “The President’s March,” and the narrow street appeared to Bloommaert’s eyes to be full of their waving flags.
There was no outlet for his escape, and he assumed a dignity of bearing and a self-centred air that was usually both arms and armour to him. He hoped to pass unnoticed, but as the company approached it halted at command. His name was spoken. He lifted his eyes perforce and up flew every hat in respectful recognition. What could he do? Some of them were the very men he had addressed and aroused to enthusiasm on the previous Saturday. His noblest nature came to the front. He saluted them in return, wished them “God speed,” and so passed on, but not before he had noticed the happy, triumphant face of their captain, Leonard Murray.