Evenings At Donaldson Manor Part 17

Mrs. Grahame saw the growth of these feelings with delight. She loved Lilian, and gave the highest proof of her esteem for her, in believing her worthy of her son. Mr. Grahame was less satisfied. He, too, loved Lilian, and would have welcomed her to his heart as a daughter, but her lately acquired fortune, and her connection with the Trevanion family, gave her a right to higher expectations in marriage, than to become the wife of a mechanic of very moderate fortunes, howsoever great was his ability, or howsoever distinguished his personal qualities. No--Mr.

Grahame was not satisfied, and nothing but his confidence in Michael kept him silent. The confidence was not misplaced.

The news of Lilian's fortune, and of Mr. and Mrs. Trevanion's offer to receive her into their family, had sent a sharp pang through the heart of Michael Grahame, which had taught him the true character of his attachment to her.

"She is removed from my world--she can be nothing to me now," was the first stern whisper of his heart, which was modified after two or three interviews into--"She can only be a dear friend and sister. I must never think of her in any other light." And, devoted as he had been to her through the winter, no word, no look had told of love less calm or more exacting than this. But there came a time when the quick blush on Lilian's cheek at his approach, the tremor of her little hand as he clasped it, told that she shared his feeling, without his power of self-control. Then came the hour of trial to Michael Grahame's nature.

Self-immolation were easy in comparison with the infliction of one pang on her. And wherefore should either suffer? Was it not a false sentiment that denied to her the right to decide for herself, between those shows and fas.h.i.+ons which the world most prizes, and the indulgence of the purest and sweetest affections of our nature? Was he not in truth sacrificing her happiness to his own pride? It was a question which he dared not answer for himself, and he applied to his father, in whose high principles and clear judgment he placed implicit confidence. Mr.

Grahame was too shrewd, and in this case too interested an observer to be unprepared for his son's avowal of his past feelings and present perplexities.

"You are right, my son," he replied to his appeal; "It is Lilian's right to decide for herself on that which will const.i.tute her own happiness."

"Then I may speak to her--I may tell her--"

"All you desire that she should know," said Mr. Grahame, gently, "when Lilian has had an opportunity of knowing what she must sacrifice in accepting you."

"True--true--I will ask no promise from her--nay--I will accept none--I will only a.s.sure her that should the world fail to fill her heart, the truest and most devoted love awaits her here."

"And in listening to that a.s.surance, without rebuking it, a delicate woman would feel that she had pledged herself."

Michael Grahame's brow contracted, and his voice faltered slightly as, after a moment's thoughtful pause, he asked, "What then would you have me do?"

"Nothing at present--Lilian will soon leave us, and at Mr. Trevanion's she will see quite another kind of life--a life which, with her fortune and their friends.h.i.+p, may be hers, but which she must give up should she become the wife of a mechanic and the daughter-in-law of a gardener. Let her see this life, my boy, and then let her choose between you and it."

"And how can I hope that she will continue to regard me with kindness if I suffer her to depart without any expression of interest in her?"

"Any expression of interest! I do not wish you to be colder to her than you have hitherto been, and I am much mistaken if Lilian would exchange your _brotherly_ affection for all the gewgaws in life."

"I will endeavor to take your advice, but I hope I shall not be tried too long," were the concluding words of Michael Grahame, as he turned from his father to seek composure in a solitary walk. When he had returned, he found that his father had gone to the city--an unusual circ.u.mstance at that season, and one which he could not afterwards avoid connecting with a letter which Lilian received the next day from Anna Trevanion, before she had risen from the breakfast table.

"Papa," wrote Miss Trevanion, "has made me perfectly happy, dear Lilian, by declaring that he cannot consent to leave you longer in the country.

I hope you will not find it very difficult to obey his commands in the present instance, which are, that you shall be ready at noon to-morrow to accompany him to the city, where you will find Mamma and your Anna, waiting to receive you with open arms."

"What is the matter, Lilian? Does your letter bring you bad news?" asked Mrs. Grahame, as she saw the dejected countenance with which Lilian sat gazing on these few lines.

Michael said nothing, but, as Lilian looked up to answer Mrs. Grahame, she saw that his eyes were fixed upon her, and the blood rushed to her temples, while she said, "It is only a note from Anna Trevanion, to say that her father is coming for me to-day at noon,--and--and--" Lilian could go no farther--her voice faltered, and she burst into tears.

Michael Grahame started from his chair, but a movement of his father's arm prevented his approaching Lilian, and unable to endure the scene, he rushed from the room, while his mother, folding the weeping girl in her arms, exclaimed, "Don't cry, Lilian, Mr. Trevanion will not certainly make you go with him, if you do not wish it."

"Hush, hush, good wife," said the kind but firm voice of Mr. Grahame; "Lilian must not be so ungracious to such friends as Mr. and Mrs.

Trevanion, as to refuse to go to them when they wish her. Go, my dear child," he continued, laying his hand on her bent head; "and remember that no day will be so happy for us as that in which you come back--if indeed," he added, more gayly, "you can come back to such an humble home, after living among great folks."

There was another voice for which Lilian listened, but she listened in vain. Her first feeling on perceiving that Michael Grahame had left the room while she lay weeping in his mother's arms was very bitter, but Mrs. Grahame soothed her by saying, "Michael couldn't bear to see you crying, dear, so when his father wouldn't let him speak to you, he jumped up and ran off. Poor Michael! sadly enough he'll miss you."

In about an hour, Michael again sought Lilian, bringing with him three bouquets of hot-house flowers. Two of these had been arranged by his father for Mrs. and Miss Trevanion, and the other was of flowers which he had himself selected for Lilian. She stood beside him while he first wrapped the stems of the flowers in a wet sponge, and then put them into a box, to defend them from the cold. This was done, and the box handed to Lilian without a word. As she took it, she asked in a low tone, and turning away to hide her embarra.s.sment as she spoke, "When shall I see you in New-York?"

"I shall be in New-York very soon," he replied; "perhaps to-morrow--but we move there in such different spheres, Lilian, that I do not know when we shall meet."

"Perhaps never," said Lilian, endeavoring, not very successfully, to steady her voice and speak with _nonchalance_, "unless you are willing to leave what you call your sphere and seek me in mine."

"I only need your permission to do so with delight,"--and so charming had her evident emotion made her in his eyes, that Michael could not refrain from pressing her hand to his lips. There was no anger in the flush which this action brought to Lilian's cheek.

Mr. Trevanion was punctual to the hour of his appointment, and descended from his carriage only to hand Lilian into it.

"You will call sometimes to see how your ward does," he said good-humoredly to the elder Mr. Grahame, but to Michael not a word. He had determined to discourage, and, if possible, completely to overthrow any intimacy which Mr. Grahame had acknowledged to him was not unattended with danger. Mr. Trevanion was a man of liberal mind, yet he was not wholly free from the prejudices of his cla.s.s, which made the highest happiness the result of the highest social position. There is in the mind of man so unconquerable a desire for the unattainable, that it is not wonderful perhaps that this opinion should be entertained by those who do not occupy that position; but to those who do, we should suppose its fallacy would stand out too glaringly to be doubted or denied. We are far from denying the advantages of rank and wealth: but we view them not as an end, but as a means for the attainment of an end, and that end, not happiness, except as happiness is indissolubly connected with the perfection of our own powers, and with the extension of our usefulness to others. He who, like Michael Grahame, can command the means of intellectual cultivation and refinement, and a fair arena for the exercise of his powers, when thus cultivated, need not envy the possessor of larger fortune and higher station with his weightier responsibilities and greater temptations.

Michael Grahame understood Mr. Trevanion's coolness, but he was not one to retreat from an unfought field. Three days had scarcely given to Lilian the feeling of ease in her new home, when he called on her. He had chosen morning, as the hour when others would be the least likely to dispute her attention with him. She was at home--Mrs. and Miss Trevanion were out--and a long _tete-a-tete_ almost reconciled him to her new abode. He had not forgotten his father's advice, nor taken the seal from his lips. He might not speak to her of love, but the nicest honor did not forbid him to show her the true sympathy and affection of a friend. In a few days he called again, and at the same hour; Miss Devoe was not at home, she had gone out with Mrs. and Miss Trevanion. Again the next day he came at the same hour, and the answer was the same. He called in the afternoon at five o'clock, and she was at dinner; at seven o'clock, she was preparing for an evening party, and begged he would excuse her. "I will seek no more," said Michael Grahame at length, with proud determination, "to enter the charmed circle which shuts her from me in the city. They cannot keep her to themselves always, and if Lilian's heart be what I deem it, it will take more than a few months of absence to efface from it the memories of years."

A few days only after this determination, Lilian was called down at nine o'clock in the morning, to see Mr. Grahame. Early as it was, the furtive glance towards her mirror and the hasty adjustment of her ringlets, might have suggested to an observer, that she hoped to receive in her visitor one who had an eye for beauty; and the sudden change that pa.s.sed over her countenance as she entered the parlor in which her two guardians sat in earnest talk, would have awakened strong suspicions that she did not see _the Mr. Grahame_ whom she had expected. Mr.

Trevanion rose as she entered, and shaking hands with Mr. Grahame, said kindly, "I leave you with Lilian, Mr. Grahame, but I hope to see you again at dinner--we dine at five."

"Thank you, sir, but I hope to be taking tea with my good woman at home at that hour."

"Well, I shall hope to see you again soon--you must call often and see your friend Lilian."

"Why, I've been thinking, sir, that that would hardly be best for any of us--and to tell the truth, I came to-day to talk with Lilian about that very thing, and if you please, I have no objection that you should hear what I have to say."

Mr. Trevanion seated himself again, and Lilian placing herself on the sofa beside him, Mr. Grahame resumed:--"It seems to me, sir, that Lilian has to choose between two kinds of life, which, should she try to put them together will only spoil one another, and I want her to have a fair chance to judge between them. Now, you know, sir, I speak the truth when I say that there are many among the fine gay people whom Lilian will meet at your house, who would look down upon her for having such friends as I and my wife, or even my son, though President B---- says he will be a distinguished man yet."

"I do not care for such people, or for what they think," exclaimed Lilian indignantly.

"I dare say not, my dear child, and yet they are people who are thought a great deal of, and whom, if you are to live amongst them, it would be worth your while to please--but that isn't my main point, Lilian. What I want to say, though I seem to be long coming at it, is, that I want you to see this gay life that fine folks in the city lead, at its best--without any such drawbacks as it would have for you, if you were suspected of having ungenteel acquaintances, and so we shall none of us come to see you--barring you should be sick, or something else happen to make you want us--until you make a fair trial, for six months at least, of this life--then should the beautiful, rich Miss Devoe like the old gardener and his family well enough to come and see them, she will learn how fondly and truly they love their Lilian."

"I had hoped you loved her too well to give her up so needlessly for six months, or even for one month," said Lilian, tears rus.h.i.+ng to her eyes.

"Ask Mr. Trevanion if I am not right in what I have said, my dear child," said Mr. Grahame tenderly.

"I will not dispute the correctness of your principles in the main, Mr.

Grahame, but I hope you do not think that all Lilian's _fine_ acquaintances as you call them, would be so unjust in their judgment as to think the less of her for her love of you, or to undervalue you on account of your position in life."

"No sir--no sir--I don't think so of all--but I want Lilian to see this life without even one little cloud upon it--such a cloud as the being looked down upon, though it were by people she didn't greatly admire, would make. We have our pride too, sir, and we want Lilian to try for herself whether our friends.h.i.+p, with all its good and its bad, be worth keeping. She is too good and affectionate, we know, to shake off old friends that love her, even if they become troublesome--but we will draw ourselves off, and then she will be free to come back to us or not, as she pleases. Now, sir, tell me frankly, if you think me wrong."

"Not wrong in principle, as I said before, Mr. Grahame, but--excuse me--you required me to be frank--would it not have been better to have made this withdrawal gradually and quietly, in such a manner that Lilian would not have noticed it, instead of giving her the pain of this abrupt severance of the ties between you?"

"A great deal better, sir," said Mr. Grahame, coloring with wonderful feeling, and fixing his clear, keen eye full on Mr. Trevanion,--"a great deal better if I wished to sever those ties--a great deal better if I would have Lilian believe that we had grown cold and indifferent to her.

But, my dear child," and he turned to her, and taking both her hands, spoke very earnestly--"believe me, when I tell you, that you will find few among those who see you every day, that love you so warmly as the friends who have loved you from your birth, and who now stand away from you only because they will not be in the way of what the world considers higher fortunes for you if you desire them. To leave you free to choose for yourself, is the strongest proof of love we could give you, and I repeat, when you have tried all that this new life has to give you--tried it for six months--if your heart still turns with its old love to those early friends, you will give them joy indeed."

Mr. Grahame paused, but neither Mr. Trevanion nor Lilian attempted to reply to him for some minutes--at length she raised her eyes, and said,

"You did not think of this when I left you--what has changed your mind--I will not say your _heart_--towards me?"

"You are right not to say our hearts, Lilian; but, indeed, even my mind has not been changed--I thought then as I think now--but I could not persuade others of our family to think with me. Now, however, they all feel that they cannot keep up their old friendly intercourse with you without mortification to themselves, and pain to you. And, as I said before, we were none of us willing to withdraw from that intercourse without giving you our reasons for it, lest you should think we had grown indifferent to you."

Mr. Grahame soon departed, leaving Lilian saddened and Mr. Trevanion perplexed by his visit. "Singular old man!" this gentleman exclaimed to himself more than once, in reflecting on all that Mr. Grahame had said; so difficult is it for those whose minds have been forced into the strait forms of conventionalism to comprehend the dictates of untrammelled common sense, on points which that conventionalism undertakes to control. One thing at least Mr. Trevanion did comprehend--that on the succeeding six months depended Lilian's choice of her position and a.s.sociates for life.

"So far Mr. Grahame is right Lilian," he said to her, "you cannot have a place at once in two such different spheres as his and ours. I always knew that to be impossible."

"You called my father friend," said Lilian, with unusual boldness.

"Your father was a gentleman by birth and breeding."

"And he has told me," persisted Lilian, "that he has never known more true refinement and even n.o.bility of mind than in Mr. Grahame."