Vassall Morton Part 2

"Digs day and night."

"A little ambitious, I suppose."

"A little."

"But very prudent."

"Uncommonly so."

"An excellent young man," exclaimed Leslie; "I think very highly of Horace Vinal."

Morton cast a sidelong glance at him, and there was a covert smile in his eye. He began to see a weak spot in his companion.

"He will certainly make his way in the world," pursued Leslie.

"No doubt of it."

"He is not so fond of out-door exercises as you seem to be."

"He is good at one kind of exercise."

"What's that?"

"He can draw the long bow."

Leslie did not see Morton's meaning, and took the words literally, as the latter intended he should.

"What, have you an archery club at college?"

"No; but there are one or two among us who use the long bow, now and then, and Vinal beats them by all odds. But he is very modest on the subject, and never alludes to it. In fact, there are very few who know his skill in that way."

"It is all the better for his health to have some amus.e.m.e.nt of the kind."

"Yes, it would be a pity if his health should suffer."

"I have often thought that his mind was too active for his const.i.tution."

Morton cast another sidelong look at Leslie. Though he admired the daughter, he refrained with difficulty from quizzing the father.

"You seem to know Vinal very well."

"Yes, thoroughly; I have known him from childhood; he is the son of my wife's sister, and I am his guardian. I watch his progress with great interest."

"You will see him, I dare say, reach the top of the ladder. At least, it will be no fault of his if he does not."

"I am very glad to hear my good opinion of him confirmed by one who has seen so much of him."

And, rising, he left the room.

"A very good young man, this seems to be," he thought to himself, as he did so.

"Amiable, good natured, and all that; but very soft, for a man who has seen hard service," thought Morton, on his part.

The party rea.s.sembled in the inn parlor. Masters William and Marlborough, having gained a reprieve from their banishment, busied themselves at the table, the one in poring over Brewster on Natural Magic, the other in solving a problem of Euclid. Leslie viewed these infant diversions by no means with an eye of favor, and soon banished the students to a retirement more suited to their tender years. The sentence overcame all their philosophy, and they were carried off howling.

Morton, meanwhile, was breathing a charmed air; and though diffident in the presence of ladies, and not liberally endowed by nature with the gift of tongues, his zeal to commend himself to the good opinion of Miss Edith Leslie availed somewhat to supply the defect. He had never mixed with the world, conventionally so called, and knew as much of ladies as of mermaids. But having an ardent temperament and a Quixotic imagination; being addicted, moreover, to Froissart and kindred writers; and, indeed, visited with a glimmering of that antique light which modern folly despises, he would have been ready, with the eye of a handsome woman upon him, for any rash and ridiculous exploit. This extravagance did him no manner of harm. On the contrary, it went far to keep him out of mischief; for in the breast of this youngster a chivalresque instinct battled against the urgency of vigorous blood, and taught his nervous energies to seek escape rather in ceaseless bodily exercises, rowing, riding, and the like, than in any less commendable recreations.

The close of the evening found him with an imagination much excited.

In short, decisive symptoms declared themselves of that wide-spread malady, of which he had read much and pondered not a little, but which had not, as yet, numbered him among its victims. Among the various emotions, novel, strange, and pleasurable, which began to possess him, came, however, the dismal consciousness that, with the morning sun, the enchantress of his fancy was to vanish like a dream of the night.

CHAPTER IV.

What pleasure, sir, find we in life, to lock it From action and adventure?--_Cymbeline_.

Morning came, and the Leslies departed. Morton watched the lumbering carriage till it disappeared down the rugged gorge of the Notch, then drew a deep breath, and ruefully betook himself to his day's sport. He explored, rod in hand, the black pools and plunging cascades of the Saco; but for once that he thought of the trout, he thought ten times of Edith Leslie.

Towards night, however, he returned with a basket reasonably well filled; and, as he drew near the inn, he saw a young man, of his own age, or thereabouts, sitting under the porch. He had a cast of features which, in a feudal country, would have been taken as the sign of n.o.ble birth; and though he wore a slouched felt hat and a rough tweed frock, though his att.i.tude was careless, though he held between his teeth a common clay pipe, at which he puffed with much relish, and though he was conversing on easy terms with two attenuated old Vermont farmers, with faces like a pair of baked apples,--yet none but the most unpractised eye would have taken him for other than a gentleman.

As soon as Morton saw him, he shouted a joyful greeting, to which Mr.

Edward Meredith, rising and going to meet his friend, replied with no less emphasis.

"I thought," said Morton, "that you meant to do the dutiful this time, and stay with your father and family at the sea sh.o.r.e."

"Couldn't stand the sea sh.o.r.e," said Meredith, seating himself again; "so I came up to the mountains to see what you were doing."

"You couldn't have done better; but come this way, out of earshot."

"Colonel," said Meredith, in a tone of melancholy remonstrance, "this seat is a good seat, an easy seat, a pleasant seat. Why do you want to root me up?"

"Come on, man," replied Morton.

"Show the way, then, Jack-a-lantern. But where do you want to lead me?

I won't sit on the rail fence, and I won't sit on the gra.s.s."

"There's a bench here for you."

"Has it a back?"

"Yes, it has a back. There it is."

Meredith carefully removed a few twigs and shavings which lay upon the bench, seated himself, rested his arm along the back, and began puffing at his pipe again. But scarcely had he thus composed himself when the tea bell rang from the house.

"Do you hear that, now? Another move to make! Didn't I tell you so?"