A Little Girl of Long Ago - Amanda Minnie Douglas (top 100 novels of all time txt) 📗

you know what is in store, and no one need trouble about the future. You are not engaged, you are quite free; and, like Ben, I will wait seven years or twenty years for you. But I think you never can belong to any one else."

Ah, what delightful security!

"Dear, dear Doctor Joe. Oh, it would be too much happiness! No, I ought not; mamma thinks I ought not to marry. And," raising her head and showing a face full of scarlet flushes and tears, and eyes shining with love's own light, "it looks just as if I had come in here and really asked you to marry me. We have forgotten all about poor Jim. You will think me a coquette, and you ought to despise me."

His clasp tightened a little.

"I am sorry that Jim should have been so heedless. Perhaps it will be better to let him learn how much in earnest you are with your refusal. It may not be flattering to a young girl to think a man will forget her."

"But I want him to forget that part," she interrupted eagerly.

"I think he will. And if he comes to me for comfort, I will try to be a wise father-confessor. And yet I can't help pitying the man a little who will lose you. Only in this case it would be like having an exotic without a conservatory, and not quite knowing how to build one."

"Joseph!" his mother called from upstairs.

Daisy sprang up and smoothed her ruffled plumes, Joe gave her one long, dear kiss, and she flashed out of the little room.

She held her head very high. It was the most splendid thing that could happen to a girl; but she was not going to spoil her dear Doctor Joe's life.

Are there days that the Lord of all the earth has created for love? Some days seem made especially for sorrow. But this had such an exquisite serenity brooding in the air. It was not late enough to have any regrets for the passing of summer, and oh, what a summer it had been!

"Do you really want to go up to the fair?" Herman Andersen had asked, when they reached the corner.

"Why,--" Hanny hesitated,--"we have seen it a good many times," and she gave her soft, rippling laugh.

"Let us go over to Tompkin's Square." He had something to say to her that would be easier said in those deserted walks. You could always find them except on Saturday or Sunday.

"Very well," with her graceful assent.

The birds, done with their summer housekeeping and child-rearing, had time to sing again. But it was all low, plaintive songs, as if they said: "We must go away from the place in which we have been so happy. Will we be sure to come another spring?" Now and then a branch stirred. The grass had been cut for the last time, and there were sweet little winrows that filled the air with fragrance. He was quiet, for he liked to hear her enchanting talk. It had turned upon when she was a little girl, and how queer things were! It didn't seem as if everything could change so. And what a great gay time they had at the Beekmans' when Stephen was married! So they walked around, and were at an entrance. A cabman put down a woman and some children just as Mr. Andersen had said, "We were going up there some day, you know; we ought to go before everything has faded."

"Yes," she made answer.

"See here, we might get this cab and go up now"--looking up with eager inquiry.

Dickens had not created Mr. Wemmick with his delightful off-hand premeditated happenings; but other people had them even then.

She made no demur, but assented with her innocent eyes full of exquisite sweetness.

He helped her in and sat along side of her. He had all kinds of young lover-like thoughts, and really he so seldom had her alone. He wanted to snatch up the hand and kiss it. It made such a tempting background for the lace mitt. No one but old ladies wore gloves, except on very fine occasions. And her slim little fingers, with their pink nails, were so pretty! If he could even hold her hand!

But they jolted over rough streets, through little clumps of Irish villages, and laughed over the pigs, and geese, and children. Then wastes again, with long, straight lines where streets were to be.

"That is the house over there," she said.

"I wonder if you could walk back? Or shall I keep the cab?"

"Oh, no. It is so delightful to walk!"

Ah, how the hand of improvement had disfigured everything! leaving ugly, square, naked blocks, with here and there a house, then a space where the trees were still standing; but the children despoiled the lilacs and dogwood in the spring, and thrashed the lindens and black walnuts all the later summer, until the poor things had a weary, drooping aspect. Over here was the great garden, and a street ran through it. The old house was shabby, and needed painting; and most of the vines had been cut away. The steps were broken. Several families inhabited it now. The cousin had thrown it up in disgust.

But the young man saw it through her eyes, glorified with the glamour of childhood. Slim young Dolly, Aunt Gitty netting, the ladies in rocking-chairs with their sewing under the trees, Mr. Beckman and Katschina, and the tea on little tables; and the boys she was afraid of.

"They were such pudgy little boys," she says, with a laugh in which there is only a remembered mirth. "They were like some of Irving's descriptions. You wouldn't expect them to grow up into such fine-looking men, now, would you? I think Peter is almost handsome."

It gives him a little twinge. He was jealous of Peter awhile ago; but he admits bravely that Peter is very good-looking.

And here are some poor willows. Oh, the lovely shrubbery that is neglected and dying!

"After all, it _is_ the people who give the charm to places,--the loving care, the home delight. But no one could keep it up. Property gets too valuable, and taxation is too high; and there are so many poorer people who must have homes."

These sententious bits of wisdom he considers utterly charming. She has caught them from John.

Then they sit down on a great stone and rest, though she protests she is not tired. She can walk for hours.

Now he ought to tell her all that is in his heart. If the world stands thousands of years there will never be such a golden opportunity again. She breaks off a bit of yarrow and sticks it in her belt. How beautifully the lashes droop over her eyes, deepening and softening the tint, until it looks like a glint of heaven!

"Oh, we ought to go on," she says presently; and with a dainty smile and motion, she rises. Ah, if she knew what he is wild to utter!

They turn their steps homeward. A wood-robin in a thicket sings, "Sweet, sweet, I love you, I l-o-v-e you," with a maddening, lingering cadence.

Why is he not as brave as the bird? Are there any choicer, more exquisite words in which to say it?

They come to a little stream. "Oh, just down here is Kissing Bridge," she says, with a kind of girlish gleefulness.

She had made her father tell the old Dutch story one evening, when they were all sitting on the stoop. And as they go on, she, with a sort of eager, heedless step, as if she was not walking on his heart, tells about Stephen, and how he jumped out of the carriage and gathered a great bunch of roses for her. They have reached the spot. The stream has shrunken. You could step over it.

"They were just there." She indicates the spot with a pretty gesture of her head. "But there are no wild-roses now;" and a soft sigh escapes her, as she turns to him, and their eyes meet.

"Are there none?" he asks, his eyes drinking in the sudden radiance. For if ever dainty, delicate, ethereal wild-roses bloomed, they are in her cheeks; and oh, what are her scarlet lips that have meant to answer, and are mysteriously tranfixed with the rarest sweetness!

He kisses her--once, a dozen times. There is no one near. They own the city,--the whole world, for love is Lord of all.

He slips her hand in his arm. Its tremble thrills every nerve in his body. He experiences the overwhelming joy of possessorship, for she _is_ his.

"My darling little Nan;" and his voice is unsteady with emotion.

He has rechristened Baby Stevie's pet name; but it has never sounded so enchanting before.

Then they walk on in delicious silence. Another bird sings in a drowsy afternoon tone,--

"Sweet, sweet, I love you, I l-o-v-e you."

They glance at each other, and both translate it. Her cheeks are redder than wild-roses now; and her dimple holds the sweetness of a great mystery. They both smile, and he kisses her again. Why not? There is no one about.

"My darling, can you guess when I first began to love you?" He wants her to know all the story. It seems as if his whole life will not be long enough to get it told and he must begin at once.

"When?" There is a startled sound in her voice, as if she was amazed that love had a beginning.

"That night in the dance,--the Spanish dance. We will go somewhere this winter and dance it over again; and the music beats will say--'I love you.'"

"Oh, so long ago?" she exclaims.

"Yes; and I have a visiting-card of yours." He hunts in his card-case. "Here it is--'Miss Nan Underhill.' I've kissed it thousands of times. I have almost worn it out. And when I went home I told my father about the little girl in New York that I must come back and win."

"Oh, did you!" She is touched by the revelation.

"He is a delightful father. Some time I must take you over to see him, or he may come here. But he had promised that I should go to Ebberfeld; and so I did. The aunt had proposed the match."

"And your poor cousin!" Her voice is full of such infinite pity that he gives the little hand a tender pressure for thanks.

"I couldn't have loved her anyhow. She seems older than I; and I am a very boy in heart. Then she was too large. I like little women."

"I am so glad," she cries, with unaffected joy, "for I am small; and I never can grow any larger. But I don't mind now."

"So when my father found how much in earnest I was, he planned the business change. It was my own mother's money, you know. But he has been a good father to me, and I am glad he has some other children. I was to go to Paris."

That seems so magnificent she is almost conscience smitten.

Ah, how much there is to say!

"But you will get tired with all this long walk," he exclaims anxiously. Oh, blessed thought! he will have the right to keep her rested and happy, and in a realm of joy.

"Oh, no," she returns. "Why, the walk has not seemed long."