“Oh, yes, sir, before this century goes out.”
The judge smiled. He liked the young man’s enthusiasm, and he answered: “So be it. You shall help to survey the ground. I will speak to De Witt to-morrow.”
At this point of the discussion there was a knock at the front door, followed by a little stir of entrance, and the sound of speech and light laughter. Both men were suddenly all ear. There was no more conversation, and after a few moments of silent expectation Mrs. Bloommaert and Sappha entered the room together. They were in happy mood, and Sappha was so lovely with the bloom of the frosty air on her smiling face that Leonard forgot everything and every one but her, and before either were aware he had taken her hands and kissed her.
The next moment they both realised their position, and Leonard, still holding Sappha’s hand, led her to the astonished father. “Sir,” he said, “we have loved each other since we were children. Will you now sanction our love, and permit our betrothal?”
The judge looked helplessly at his wife. She was watching the young couple with smiles on her face, and evident sympathy in her heart for their cause. If he wished to be adverse and disagreeable, he foresaw he would have no help from Mrs. Bloommaert. Yet to give up in a moment all the wavering feelings of dislike he had entertained for Leonard, and all his own settled purpose of no recognised engagement for his daughter until peace was accomplished, was a hard struggle. Perhaps it was well he had to decide in a moment. At that precise hour he was in a mood of liking Leonard, and he had no time to reason himself into another mood. Slowly, and with a little asperity, he answered:
“Mr. Murray, it seems to me you have not waited either for my sanction or my permission.”
“Ah, sir, consider the temptation.”
Involuntarily he looked into the face of “the temptation.” With clear, shining eyes she held his eyes a moment, and then her voice uttered the undeniable entreaty: “I love Leonard so dearly, father. And he loves me.”
“I see! I see!”
“We only wish to please you, father; that is best of all.”
“Indeed, sir, that is best of all!” said Leonard eagerly.
“Well, well! In this country the majority rules. What can a man do if there are three against him, especially when one of the three is his wife?” and he shook his head, and looked somewhat reproachfully at his wife.
Then Sappha slipped her arms around his neck, and laid her cheek against his, and he embraced his daughter and stretched out his hand to Leonard.
Thus Fortune often brings in the boats we do not steer, and by what we call a happy accident guides our dearest and most difficult hopes to a sudden fruition. It is then a good thing to leave the door wide open for our unknown angels. They often accomplish for us what we hardly dare to attempt.
After this settlement Sappha and Leonard felt that they might revel in the joy of life and take their pleasure where-ever they found it. And they found it both in public and private affairs. Annette’s marriage was to take place in June, and there were preparations without end going on for that event. Her grandfather De Vries had given her, as a wedding gift, the Semple place, a beautiful old home set in a fine garden which had once sloped down to the river bank.
“It is not exactly what I should have chosen,” said the bride-elect; “but it is valuable property, and grandfather would not have given it to me if I had not promised to live there.”
“It is no hardship to live in the Semple house,” said Sappha. “The rooms are so large, the woodwork so richly carved, and the garden is the sweetest, shadiest place in New York, I think.”
“Grandmother is going to furnish it, and she lets me choose exactly what I want. I declare, dear Achille and I have no time for love-making, we are so worried about chairs and tables and wedding garments.”
“I never should have thought Achille would worry about anything. He is always so deliberate, and so calm.”
“Oh, but a man in love is a different creature, and I can tell you that Achille is distractingly in love. I am not quite ignorant about the queer ways of men in a fever of infatuation. Why, he scarcely ever goes to see the pastry cook now.”
“Oh, but De Singeron was a gallant officer of King Louis! He is in exile and misfortune, that is all. The pastry business is but an emergency--and he manages it splendidly----”
“Certainly. I have always liked his good things. And he is going to make us the most wonderful wedding cake. However, when Achille and I are married Achille will have to give up many things, and Monsieur Auguste Louis de Singeron will be one of them. At present I have too many things to worry about to interfere.”
“You have nearly half a year in which to do your worrying. Why not take things more easily?”
“Oh, the fun is in the fuss! Did you hear that General Moreau is going back to Europe to join the allies? The emperor of Russia has sent for him, and now he will have the chance to pay Napoleon back for his nine years’ exile. But I shall never pass 119 Pearl Street without a sigh. No one ever gave such princely entertainments as the Moreaus. The general is to have a great appointment, but what he likes best is the chance of fighting the world’s big tyrant. Achille is going to see him embark--and many others. But this is not my affair. There is my wedding gown, for instance.”
“Have you decided on it?”
“It must be white--everything about me must be white. Achille says so. I think grandmother will send to Boston for the silk or satin; there is none here of a quality fit for the most important gown a woman can ever wear. You would think it was grandmother’s wedding, she is so interested in every little thing about it.”
Indeed, Annette did not much overstate madame’s interest in her granddaughter’s marriage preparations. She lifted the additional work, and even the additional expense, with a light-hearted alacrity that was wonderful. And in many ways her cheerfulness brought her a rich and ready reward. She had been almost a recluse for some years, she was now seen constantly on the streets and in the stores, and not infrequently in this way she became a delighted spectator of public parades and military drills and movements. Achille usually accompanied her, and his respectful attentions were a source of wonder and speculation to those who forgot to consider that Frenchmen are specially trained to give honour, and even reverence, to old age. So it was not remarkable that madame put on a kind of second youth; how could she be in constant, affectionate accord with four loving young hearts and not do so?
For the next half-year, then, Annette was the centre of interest in her own little world. The judge and Mrs. Bloommaert, Sappha, and Leonard gladly entered into the spirit of this generous service for, and sympathy with, the exultant little bride. And at this period of her life, even her foibles and selfishness were pleasantly excused. It was her last draught of the careless joy of girlhood; no one wished to spill, or spoil, one drop of it.
Leonard and Sappha were much of their time at the Bloommaert House in Nassau Street; although Leonard, in the City Commissioner’s office, was making some pretence of mapping out streets and lots of ground in the wilderness round Harlem Flat. But this business hardly interfered with his attentions to Sappha and Annette; nor yet with the military spirit which took him very regularly to the guard-room of some of the volunteer companies. He was also a recognised dependence when the city wished to entertain some hero whom it delighted to honour; for then both his purse and his natural genius for method and arrangement made him an invaluable surety for success.
During this half-year there were not many warlike events to influence New York, and her citizens had become quite used to the guns at the different forts signalling “the British fleet off Sandy Hook.” Many false alarms also contributed to this sense of security. They were well aware, too, that the already numerous forts were being steadily increased and strengthened, and in April the Battery parade was fortified. This park was then a strip of greensward about three hundred feet wide, between State Street and the water’s edge. It had no sea wall, only a low wooden fence on the edge of a bluff two or three feet high; then loose sand and pebbles to the water’s edge. There was a dock at the foot of Whitehall Street, and at Marketfield Street the water came nearly to the middle of the block between Washington and Greenwich streets. About the centre of the southeastern part of this park there was a public garden and a charming little hall, where coffee, cakes, ice cream, and other delicacies were served; and on summer evenings some of the military bands made excellent music there for the visitors.
Of course, the erection of a breastwork around this water line of the park was an interesting event to all the dwellers on the Bowling Green, and Sappha and Leonard, during the lovely days of April and May, took their walks about the Battery fortifications, and thus thrilled their love through and through with the passion of patriotism and the glow and excitement of its warlike preparations.