The Three Brides, Love in a Cottage, and Other Tales Part 9

"And how may you be named, young man, if not De Grandville?"

"Henri de Montmorenci," replied the young soldier.

"De Montmorenci!" cried the baron. "That is a n.o.ble and historic name.

The house of Montmorenci has been well represented in the field."

"_And on the scaffold_!" added Henri, with deep emotion.

"The scaffold!" exclaimed the baron. "Yes, yes; I remember now a dreadful tragedy. But _he_ suffered unjustly."

"No matter," answered Henri. "The ignominious punishment remains a stain upon our escutcheon. Men will point to me as the son of a condemned and executed traitor. Could I forget for a moment the tragedy which has rendered my poor mother an animated image of death, the finger of the world would recall my wandering thoughts to the horrors of the fact. The scaffold, with all its b.l.o.o.d.y paraphernalia, would rise up before me."

"Henri, you are too sensitive," said the baron. "The best and bravest of France (alas for our history!) have closed their lives upon the scaffold. I believe your father innocent. If it were otherwise, you have redeemed the honor of your race. You deserve my daughter's hand--take her and be happy."

"Make her the companion of my agony! Never."

"Come with me," said the baron; "her smiles shall dispel these gloomy fantasies."

"No, no! urge me not," said the young guardsman. "Let me return to my poor mother. She has need of all my consolation. I renounce forever my ill-fated attachment. Heaven, for its own wise purposes, has chosen to afflict me. Farewell, baron; I thank you for your kindness--your generous friends.h.i.+p. You and Heloise will soon learn that Henri de Montmorenci is no more. After the next battle, if you seek me out, you will find me where the French dead lie thickest on the field."

"n.o.ble-hearted fellow!" cried the baron, when Henri had left him. "He ought to be a field marshal."

"Marshal Saxe requests your immediate presence, baron," said an aide-de-camp, presenting himself with a salute.

"Monsieur de Baron," said the commander-in-chief, when De Clairville had obeyed the summons, "I have chosen you to carry my despatches to the king; you will find yourself honorably mentioned therein, and I think the favor of royalty will reward your merit."

The baron bowed low as he received the despatches from the hand of the marshal, and was soon ready for the journey, first taking a hasty farewell of his daughter, whom he commended to the care of Madame de Grandville, (or rather Montmorenci,) during his absence.

In five days thereafter, he reported himself to the marshal, and was then at liberty to attend to his private concerns. He found Heloise in the company of Henri and his mother, and the gloom depicted on their countenances presented a singular contrast to the radiant joy that sparkled in the eyes and smiled on the lips of the genial and warm-hearted old soldier. He kissed his daughter, saluted Madame de Grandville, and then, shaking the young guardsman warmly by the hand, exclaimed,--

"Good news, Henri; I bring you a budget of them. The king has heard of your gallantry, and inquired into your story."

"Heaven bless him!" exclaimed the mother.

"The memory of your father," continued the baron, "has been vindicated by a parliamentry decree affirming his innocence. His forfeited estates are restored to his family; and I bring you, under the king's seal, your commission as full colonel in the French Guards, and letters patent of n.o.bility, _Count_ Henri de Montmorenci!"

Henri and his mother were nearly overwhelmed by this good news; while Heloise clung to her father's arm for support.

"No fainting, girl," said the happy baron. "That will never do for a soldier's wife. Here, take her, count, make her happy--and let us hear no more of your volunteering on Forlorn Hopes--at least, during the honeymoon."

We need not add that the baron's injunctions were implicitly obeyed.

PERSONAL SATISFACTION.

Mrs. Tubbs had been a very fine woman--she was still good looking at the period of which we write, but then--

"f.a.n.n.y was younger once than she is now, And prettier of course."

She had been married some years. Tubbs was a gentleman farmer, and lived out in Roxbury, when land was cheaper there than it is now, and a man of moderate means could own a few acres within three miles of Boston State House. On retiring from the wholesale West India goods business, he had purchased a little estate in the vicinity of the Norfolk House, and raised vegetables and other "notions" with the usual success attendant upon the agricultural experiments of gentlemen amateurs; that is, his potatoes cost him about half a dollar a peck, and his quinces ninepence apiece. He had a greenhouse one quarter of a mile long, and kept a fire in it all the year round, at the suggestion of a rascally gardener, whose brother kept a wood and coal yard. We could tell some droll stories about Tubbs's gardening, if they were to the purpose. We will mention, however, that when he went into the vegetable business he was innocent as a lamb, and verdant as one of his own green peapods, and of course he made some curious mistakes. He was not aware that the infant bean, like the pious aeneas, was "in the habit of carrying its father on its back," and so thinking that nature had made a mistake, he reversed the order of the young sprouts, and reinterred the aged beans. This was one of his many blunders. However, we have nothing to do with his gardening. We have said he was innocent as a lamb, but he was by no means so pacific; on the contrary, his temper was as inflammable as gun cotton--the slightest spark would set it in a blaze.

To return to Mrs. Tubbs, whom we have most ungallantly left in the lurch since the first paragraph. She had been into Boston one day, shopping, and returned home in the omnibus. She sat between two young men. The one on her right was modest and well-behaved, while the other was entirely the reverse. He might have been drinking--he might have been partially insane--these are charitable suppositions; but at all events, he had the impertinence to address Mrs. Tubbs in a low tone, audible only to herself. He muttered some compliment to her appearance--talked a little nonsense--inoffensive in itself, but intolerable as coming from a stranger. Mrs. Tubbs made no reply, but she was glad to spring from the conveyance when the driver pulled up at the Norfolk House. To her great joy she espied the faithful Tubbs, attired in a _blouse_, and wheeling a barrow full of gravel down Bartlett Street, with all the dignity of a gentleman farmer, conscious of being a useful, if not an ornamental, member of society. She accosted him with,--

"Tubbs, love, I've got something to tell you."

Tubbs relinquished the handles of the barrow, and sat down in the gravel.

"Mr. Tubbs!" screamed the lady, "you've got your best pantaloons on."

"Never mind, my dear; out with your story, for I'm busy."

"Mr. Tubbs! I've been insulted!"

Mr. Tubbs's head instantly became as red as one of his own blood beets.

"Who is the miscreant?" he yelled, jumping up.

"A young man who sat next to me in the omnibus."

"Describe him!"

"Dark hair and eyes, with a black stock, light waistcoat, dark-colored coat and pantaloons--"

"Which way did he go?" interrupted Mr. Tubbs.

"Into the hourly office."

"'Tis well! Mrs. T., I'll have his heart's blood!"

"Now, T., be calm!" interposed his better half.

"Mrs. T., I will be calm," was the dignified reply, "calm as the surface of Mount aetna, on the eve of an eruption. Farewell, love, for a moment. Have an eye to the wheelbarrow while I have a settlement with this scoundrel!"

With these words, Tubbs marched up the hill. He entered the hourly office, and looked round him. His first glance lighted on a young man who answered the description given by Mrs. Tubbs; but he wished to make a.s.surance doubly sure, and so he accosted him politely,--

"Fine growing weather, sir."

"Yes, sir," replied the stranger.

"Peas are doing finely," said Mr. Tubbs.

"Indeed!"

"If the weather holds, we can plant corn next week."

"Indeed!"