第44章 Contrasts.(1)

Genuine and genial were the words of sympathy that were expressed on every side for the young lady who had been transforming the dull day into one of exceptional jollity.A deputation of ladies called upon her,but from within her locked door she confirmed the impression that it was a nervous shock,and that a few hours of perfect quiet would restore her.

And it would seem that she was right,for she came down to supper apparently as genial and smiling as ever.Beyond a slight pallor and a little fulness about her eyes,Van Berg could detect no trace of her sudden indisposition.

The remainder of the day was passed more quietly by the guests of the Lake House,but the force of Miss Burton's example did not spend itself at once,and on the part of some there was developed quite a marked disposition to make kindly efforts to promote the enjoyment of others.The unwonted exhilaration with which she had inspired her fellow guests was something they could scarcely account for,and yet the means employed had been so simple and were so plainly within the reach of all,as to suggest that a genial manner and an unselfish regard for others were the only conditions required to enable each one to do something to brighten every cloudy day.

After Miss Burton's departure,the young people had the dance to themselves,their elders resuming the avocations and soberer pleasures from which they had been swept by an impulse evoked from their half-forgotten youth.

When Van Berg joined Miss Mayhew again,he found her mother and Stanton trying to explain how it all came about.

"There is no use of multiplying words,"concluded Stanton;"Miss Burton is gifted with a mind,and she uses it for the benefit of others instead of tasking it solely on her own account,which is the general rule."At this moment a letter was handed to Mrs.Mayhew,which she read with a slight frown and passed to her daughter.It was from Mr.

Mayhew,and contained but a brief sentence to the effect that his absence would probably be a relief,and therefore he would not spend the coming Sabbath with them.

Ida did not show the superficial vexation that her mother manifested,and which was more assumed than real.Her cheek paled a little,and she instinctively glanced at Van Berg as if her sudden sense of guilt were apparent to his keen eyes.He was looking at he searchingly,and she turned away with a quick flush,nor did she give him a chance to speak with her again that day;but his words--"what a millstone about a man's neck a woman can be!"--haunted her continually.Still oftener rose before her Miss Burton's flushed and kindled face,and the artist's emphatic assertion of the power of mind and character to add to native beauty.Had she not been a millstone about her father's neck?Was there not a fatal flaw in the beauty of which she was so proud,that spoiled it for eyes that were critical and unblinded?

Oppressed by these thoughts and being in no mood for her cousin's banter,or the artist's society which always seemed to render her more uncomfortable,she was glad to escape to the solitude of her own room.

Another "revelation"was slowly dawning upon her mind,namely--just what she,Ida Mayhew,was.A woman is an "inspiration"or a "millstone according to what she is,"this stranger,this disturber of her peace,from whom it seemed she could not escape,had not only asserted but proved by showing her a lady she would have passed as plain and insignificant,but who nevertheless possessed some sweet potency that won and cheered all hearts,and who,she was compelled to admit,was positively beautiful as she sat at the piano,radiant with her purpose to cause gladness in others.Miss Burton had created sunshine enough to enliven the dismal day,and had quickened a hundred pulses with pleasure.She had been a burden even to herself.

Everything,from the artist's first disturbing frown to the present hour,had been preparing the way for the sharp and painful contrast that circumstances had forced upon her attention to-day.

But the thought that troubled her most,was that he saw this contrast more plainly than it was possible for her to see it.

Vaguely,and yet with some approach to the truth,her intuition began to reveal to her the attitude of his mind towards her.She believed that he was attracted,but also saw that he was not blinded by her beauty.She was already beginning to revise her first impression that he was shutting his eyes to every other consideration,as she had seen so many do in their brief infatuation.His manner was not that of one who is taking counsel of passion only.Those ominous words--"according to what she is"--indicated that he was looking into her mind,her character.With a sense of dismay,she was awakening to a knowledge of the dwarfed ugliness her beauty but partially concealed,and she felt that he,from the first,had been discovering those defects of which she had been scarcely conscious herself.She began to fear that her cousin's words would prove true,and that he would not fall helplessly in love with her.Therefore the opportunity to retaliate and to punish him for all the mortifications that he had occasioned her,would never come.On the contrary,he might inflict upon her,any day,the crowning humiliation of declaring,be indifference of manner,that he had found her out so thoroughly,as to entertain for her only feelings of disgust and repugnance.