A Romance of the Republic Part 10

"O, what's the use of talking, Tulee!" exclaimed she, impatiently. "I have no friends to go to, and I _must_ stay here." But, reproaching herself for rejecting the sympathy so tenderly offered, she rose and kissed the black cheek as she added, "Good Tulee! kind Tulee! I _am_ a little homesick; but I shall feel better in the morning."

The next afternoon Gerald and Rosa invited her to join them in a drive round the island. She declined, saying the box that was soon to be sent to Madame was not quite full, and she wanted to finish some more articles to put in it. But she felt a longing for the fresh air, and the intense blue glory of the sky made the house seem prison-like. As soon as they were gone, she took down her straw hat and pa.s.sed out, swinging it by the strings. She stopped on the lawn to gather some flame-colored buds from a Pyrus j.a.ponica, and, fastening them in the ribbons as she went, she walked toward her old familiar haunts in the woods.

It was early in February, but the warm suns.h.i.+ne brought out a delicious aroma from the firs, and golden garlands of the wild jasmine, fragrant as heliotrope, were winding round the evergreen thickets, and swinging in flowery festoons from the trees. Melancholy as she felt when she started from the cottage, her elastic nature was incapable of resisting the glory of the sky, the beauty of the earth, the music of the birds, and the invigorating breath of the ocean, intensified as they all were by a joyful sense of security and freedom, growing out of the constraint that had lately been put upon her movements. She tripped along faster, carolling as she went an old-fas.h.i.+oned song that her father used to be often humming:--

"Begone, dull care!

I prithee begone from me!

Begone, dull care!

Thou and I shall never agree!"

The walk changed to hopping and dancing, as she warbled various s.n.a.t.c.hes from ballets and operas, settling at last upon the quaint little melody, "Once on a time there was a king," and running it through successive variations.

A very gentle and refined voice, from behind a clump of evergreens, said, "Is this Cinderella coming from the ball?"

She looked up with quick surprise, and recognized a lady she had several times seen in Na.s.sau.

"And it is really you, Senorita Gonsalez!" said the lady. "I thought I knew your voice. But I little dreamed of meeting you here. I have thought of you many times since I parted from you at Madame Conquilla's store of sh.e.l.l-work. I am delighted to see you again."

"And I am glad to see you again, Mrs. Delano," replied Flora; "and I am very much pleased that you remember me."

"How could I help remembering you?" asked the lady. "You were a favorite with me from the first time I saw you, and I should like very much to renew our acquaintance. Where do you live, my dear?"

Covered with crimson confusion, Flora stammered out: "I don't live anywhere, I'm only staying here. Perhaps I shall meet you again in the woods or on the beach. I hope I shall."

"Excuse me," said the lady. "I have no wish to intrude upon your privacy. But if you would like to call upon me at Mr. Welby's plantation, where I shall be for three or four weeks, I shall always be glad to receive you."

"Thank you," replied Flora, still struggling with embarra.s.sment. "I should like to come very much, but I don't have a great deal of time for visiting."

"It's not common to have such a pressure of cares and duties at your age," responded the lady, smiling. "My carriage is waiting on the beach. Trusting you will find a few minutes to spare for me, I will not say adieu, but _au revoir_."

As she turned away, she thought to herself: "What a fascinating child!

What a charmingly unsophisticated way she took to tell me she would rather not have me call on her! I observed there seemed to be some mystery about her when she was in Na.s.sau. What can it be? Nothing wrong, I hope."

Floracita descended to the beach and gazed after the carriage as long as she could see it. Her thoughts were so occupied with this unexpected interview, that she took no notice of the golden drops which the declining sun was showering on an endless procession of pearl-crested waves; nor did she cast one of her customary loving glances at the western sky, where ma.s.ses of violet clouds, with edges of resplendent gold, enclosed lakes of translucent beryl, in which little rose-colored islands were floating. She retraced her steps to the woods, almost crying. "How strange my answers must appear to her!"

murmured she. "How I do wish I could go about openly, like other people! I am so tired of all this concealment!" She neither jumped, nor danced, nor sung, on her way homeward. She seemed to be revolving something in her mind very busily.

After tea, as she and Rosa were sitting alone in the twilight, her sister, observing that she was unusually silent, said, "What are you thinking of, Mignonne?"

"I am thinking of the time we pa.s.sed in Na.s.sau," replied she, "and of that Yankee lady who seemed to take such a fancy to me when she came to Madame Conquilla's to look at the sh.e.l.l-work.

"I remember your talking about her," rejoined Rosa. "You thought her beautiful."

"Yes," said Floracita, "and it was a peculiar sort of beauty. She wasn't the least like you or Mamita. Everything about her was violet.

Her large gray eyes sometimes had a violet light in them. Her hair was not exactly flaxen, it looked like ashes of violets. She always wore fragrant violets. Her ribbons and dresses were of some shade of violet; and her breastpin was an amethyst set with pearls. Something in her ways, too, made me think of a violet. I think she knew it, and that was the reason she always wore that color. How delicate she was!

She must have been very beautiful when she was young."

"You used to call her the Java sparrow," said Rosa.

"Yes, she made me think of my little Java sparrow, with pale fawn-colored feathers, and little gleams of violet on the neck,"

responded Flora.

"That lady seems to have made a great impression on your imagination,"

said Rosa; and Floracita explained that it was because she had never seen anything like her. She did not mention that she had seen that lady on the island. The open-hearted child was learning to be reticent.

A few minutes afterward, Rosa exclaimed, "There's Gerald coming!"

Her sister watched her as she ran out to meet him, and sighed, "Poor Rosa!"

CHAPTER VIII.

A week later, when Gerald had gone to Savannah and Rosa was taking her daily siesta, Floracita filled Thistle's panniers with several little pasteboard boxes, and, without saying anything to Tulee, mounted and rode off in a direction she had never taken, except in the barouche.

She was in search of the Welby plantation.

Mrs. Delano, who was busy with her crochet-needle near the open window, was surprised to see a light little figure seated on a donkey riding up the avenue. As soon as Floracita dismounted, she recognized her, and descended the steps of the piazza to welcome her.

"So you have found the Welby plantation," said she. "I thought you wouldn't have much difficulty, for there are only two plantations on the island, this and Mr. Fitzgerald's. I don't know that there are any other _dwellings_ except the huts of the negroes." She spoke the last rather in a tone of inquiry; but Flora merely answered that she had once pa.s.sed the Welby plantation in a barouche.

As the lady led the way into the parlor, she said, "What is that you have in your hand, my dear?"

"You used to admire Madame Conquilla's sh.e.l.l-work," replied Flora,"

and I have brought you some of mine, to see whether you think I succeed tolerably in my imitations." As she spoke, she took out a small basket and poised it on her finger.

"Why, that is perfectly beautiful!" said Mrs. Delano. "I don't know how you could contrive to give it such an air of lightness and grace.

I used to think sh.e.l.l-work heavy, and rather vulgar, till I saw those beautiful productions at Na.s.sau. But you excel your teacher, my dear Miss Gonsalez. I should think the sea-fairies made this."

Four or five other articles were brought forth from the boxes and examined with similar commendation. Then they fell into a pleasant chat about their reminiscences of Na.s.sau; and diverged from that to speak of the loveliness of their lonely little island, and the increasing beauty of the season. After a while, Flora looked at her watch, and said, "I must not stay long, for I didn't tell anybody I was going away."

Mrs. Delano, who caught a glimpse of the medallion inserted in the back, said: "That is a peculiar little watch. Have you the hair of some friend set in it?"

"No," replied Flora. "It is the likeness of my father." She slipped the slight chain from her neck, and placed the watch in the lady's hand. Her face flushed as she looked at it, but the habitual paleness soon returned.

"You were introduced to me as a Spanish young lady," said she, "but this face is not Spanish. What was your father's name?"

"Mr. Alfred Royal of New Orleans," answered Flora.

"But _your_ name is Gonsalez," said she.

Flora blushed crimson with the consciousness of having betrayed the incognito a.s.sumed at Na.s.sau. "Gonsalez was my mother's name," she replied, gazing on the floor while she spoke.

Mrs. Delano looked at her for an instant, then, drawing her gently toward her, she pressed her to her side, and said with a sigh, "Ah, Flora, I wish you were my daughter."

"O, how I wish I was!" exclaimed the young girl, looking up with a sudden glow; but a shadow immediately clouded her expressive face, as she added, "But you wouldn't want me for a daughter, if you knew everything about me."

The lady was obviously troubled. "You seem to be surrounded by mysteries, my little friend," responded she. "I will not ask you for any confidence you are unwilling to bestow. But I am a good deal older than you, and I know the world better than you do. If anything troubles you, or if you are doing anything wrong, perhaps if you were to tell me, I could help you out of it."