8ERTRAND 
 AC.RES 01- BOOKS 
 
 140 PACIFIC AVENUB 
 UON BEACH CALIF.
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 A NOVEL. 
 
 BY 
 
 FERRIS JEROME. 
 
 " The great moral combat between human life 
 And each human soul must be single." 
 
 OWEN MEREDITH. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO. 
 1879.
 
 Copyright, 1879, b y J- B - LlPPlNCOTT & Co.
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 FIRST BOOK. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 "DULL, dull, dull!" 
 
 Burr Courtenay (an accomplished representative of a 
 learned profession), tipped back in a revolving office-chair, 
 with his feet elevated upon a round, rusty stove, in which 
 an uncheerful fire smouldered, removed a cigar from his 
 lips and made this return, in an indolent tone, to the 
 above observation : 
 
 "Well, Mr. Burns, I expected something rather more 
 original after such protracted meditation." 
 
 The first speaker wheeled around and came and stood 
 with his back to the stove. 
 
 "Is it likely," said he, with some asperity, "that adaily 
 prospect from that point of observation," indicating the 
 murky window which looked out on the bleak main street 
 of a very bleak prairie village, " is calculated to develop 
 originality?" 
 
 "Genius, Charles," said his companion, mildly, "is 
 not dependent upon outward circumstances, it takes fire 
 from within." 
 
 "It has got to have something to feed on after it has 
 taken fire, has it not?" said Mr. Burns. " I am not sure 
 but it needs a little extraneous influence to kindle it. 
 Though I pray you not to suppose," he added, "that I 
 lay any claim to genius. I am at a loss to know why you 
 mention the word in this connection." 
 
 " I mention it," said Mr. Courtenay, " because of your 
 
 3 
 
 2046129
 
 4 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. 
 
 having intimated to me some days ago that you intended 
 to write a poem ; and it was in my mind, as you stood 
 there, that the poem might be in process of fermentation. 
 But your remark dispelled the thought. By the way, 
 Charley," he continued, "what do you suppose kindled 
 the flame of the Scottish bard who bore your own illus- 
 trious name? Was it the Highlands, those poetic hills 
 breathing the rhythmic name of Albion ? Or was it the 
 Highland lassies, adding their quaint beauty to the pictur- 
 esque scenery, that inspired his pen? Or was it the 
 ploughshare?" 
 
 "Perhaps it was all of those," said Mr. Burns, with a 
 faint smile, again throwing his melancholy glance from 
 the window across the bare, brown, deserted street. 
 
 "There is a tradition in our family," he added, irrele- 
 vantly, " or was, before our family was reduced to its 
 present insignificance, that Robert Burns belonged to our 
 ancestry. But I repudiate it; I don't want to hang to 
 any man's coat-tails." 
 
 The homely and trite figure suggested a literal fact to 
 Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Charley," said he, with indolent apprehension, "you 
 are in a fair way to ruin your own coat-tails; why don't 
 you tuck your broadcloth under your arms when you 
 stand with your back to the stove?" 
 
 "I wouldn't assume that boorish attitude for all the 
 broadcloth in High-Water-Mark," said Mr. Burns, mag- 
 nificently, moving away and seating himself on a high 
 stool by the desk. 
 
 "I wonder," said Mr. Courtenay, whose mind was in 
 that unoccupied state which catches at, and is willing to 
 give a kind of inactive attention to, any trivial thought 
 that floats by, as a feather or a butterfly is borne idly on 
 the air, "what originated such a name for this village?" 
 
 "Spring rains, I fancy," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "Ah, maybe so, I had not thought of that. I have 
 heard that sometimes in the breaking-up of the ice and 
 snow the river greatly overflows its banks. It may be that 
 when they laid the town-plot they extended it just as far 
 as the high-water mark, and hence the name." 
 
 "The river has never exceeded its banks much since
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 5 
 
 we have been here," said Mr. Burns; adding, gloomily, 
 "and we have been here three years." 
 
 " Two years and a half, Charley," corrected his friend, 
 deprecatingly. 
 
 "Well, we shall be here three years. I feel as if it 
 would be all the same if we could project ourselves into 
 the future ten, twenty, forty years, and look back upon 
 them as already past. We shall probably go on and on, 
 like Tennyson's brook, and the story will have, from year 
 to year, a remarkable sameness. A feeling comes upon 
 me that we are simply waiting for the years to tide over 
 us and leave us, at last, stranded and dead on the beach. 
 Noble souls ! Burr, candidly, do you think it will pay, 
 our sticking here all these years?" 
 
 Mr. Burns fixed his deep-set blue eyes, with the brows 
 just now almost meeting above them, upon his companion 
 with such earnestness and energy of expression as to make 
 them appear, for the moment, intensely and brilliantly 
 black. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, quite unmoved, returned, " Pay? Why, 
 of course it will pay ! Won't there be a railroad through 
 here one of these days? Isn't that what we have been 
 waiting for?" 
 
 "It is what we have been waiting for, certainly; but 
 the prospects for a road were just as ' immediate' three 
 years ago as they are now. And in the mean time we are 
 getting rusty. We are tinctured with Western habits and 
 dialect. And then we don't have any practice, and when 
 the railroad does come, Heaven speed the day ! won't 
 it bring troops of new lawyers, fresh from Eastern cities, 
 and won't they have the preference?" 
 
 "God forbid !" said Burr, fervently. "I don't think 
 they will, Charley; I have more faith in the people of 
 this community than that. We are making heavy claims 
 upon them by our long and patient residence among 
 them." 
 
 "If they could only appreciate that !" said Mr. Burns. 
 " My fear is that they may repudiate our ' claims' before 
 the railroad comes. Two such accomplished barristers as 
 ourselves is a considerable investment in legal talent for a 
 village like this." 
 
 i*
 
 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "I am certain of one thing," said Mr. Courtenay, get- 
 ting up and dropping the stump of his cigar in the ashes, 
 and then taking a turn around the room with his hands in 
 his trousers' pockets, "that if five hundred law-graduates 
 were to immigrate to this town to-morrow, no two in all 
 that number would be so well read, Charley, as you and 
 I. I speak with modesty." 
 
 "No; we have done little else but read," said Mr. 
 Burns. "But where is the good of it?" 
 
 "It will not be thrown away, Charley. You know 
 that in the grand economy of Nature (and, too, of Reve- 
 lation, I suppose, under which head I conclude Blackstone 
 is classified) nothing is lost. You can follow the drop of 
 dew through all its changing history and know that it 
 cannot perish. Are not the gems of intellect as un- 
 quenchable? There is no death to the soul, or to any- 
 thing born of the soul. If there were not a single Bible 
 extant, or the vaguest scriptural tradition, I should still 
 hold to the theory of immortality, basing it upon the in- 
 destructibility of things." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, adroit diplomatist that he was, had hit 
 upon a thought which he knew would divert his com- 
 panion's mind from the gloomy prospect of remaining in 
 a town destitute of railroads. 
 
 After a little silence he took it up and remarked, "The 
 only immortality that I have any conception of as regards 
 man or rather, the only theory that my knowledge and 
 reason accepts without a doubt is the throwing out of 
 influence that will last until its force is spent, like a ball 
 pitched into the air. And there is a correspondence be- 
 tween that and your dew-drop ; whatever form it takes it 
 still adheres to the earth. There are a few men that lived 
 centuries ago whose balls are spinning through the world 
 yet." 
 
 "My dear Charley," said his friend (but I am bound 
 to explain to the reader, who might otherwise, in the 
 perusal of Mr. Courtenay's history, look upon him as 
 singularly inconsistent, that he argued partly for the sake 
 of argument, and partly because he loved to hold up a 
 question like a prism, and catch as many rays of light as 
 it was capable of reflecting), "if that is all the immor-
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 7 
 
 tality we can count upon, it is hardly worth spending a 
 lifetime for. What is fame, or anything, to a man if he 
 dies and is oblivious?" 
 
 He paused in his walk, and repeated, in a voice deep 
 and melodious, and whose modulation was perfect, 
 
 " ' When the grass is green above me, 
 
 And those who bless me now and love me 
 
 Are sleeping by my side, 
 Will it avail me aught that men 
 Tell to the world with lip and pen 
 
 That once I lived and died ? 
 
 " ' No ; if a garland for my brow 
 Is growing, let me have it now, 
 While I'm alive to wear it.' 
 
 Or else let me have a conscious immortality after death. 
 If fame which is a mere breath blown over our graves 
 is the price to be paid for our grandest achievements, life, 
 as I remarked, is not worth the living." 
 " Bah !" said Mr. Burns, with a shrug, 
 
 " ' What is our life worth except in the giving 
 
 Of life to some aim ? What's the good of mere living !' 
 
 You always go in for the individual, Burr. You never 
 can identify yourself with a mighty movement, or merge 
 your energies in a great cause and lose sight of self. Burr 
 Courtenay is the grand object you have always in view. 
 What is the difference which particular ' I' it is that accom- 
 plishes something for the good of the world, so that the 
 something is accomplished ? What matter who wrote the 
 Iliad since it is written, or what do you or I or any man 
 care for Homer, the Homer who walked about, and ate, 
 and drank, and slept ? His personality died centuries ago ; 
 it is nothing to us or to the world. And because an in- 
 spiration was breathed through him upon the world, was 
 he better than another ? I have no particular reverence for 
 the instrument on which a fine piece of music is played. 
 I hate this detaching of oneself from the body of human- 
 ity, as though one particle were better than another." 
 
 "Perhaps one particle is no better than another," said 
 Mr. Courtenay, "viewed by a disinterested party, say 
 a cherub or an archangel some leagues removed from us
 
 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 as regards both space and interest, but you must allow 
 me to discriminate between myself and the other particles. 
 I have but one office to perform in life, I take it ; and 
 when I perform it perfectly, admitting even that I do it 
 without reference to anything outside of myself, do I not 
 chime in with the grand harmony of the universe ? Is 
 there any law in my being that clashes with my fellow- 
 beings?" 
 
 "You lose sight of the question," said Mr. Burns, im- 
 patiently, "or, rather, you evade it. You are not think- 
 ing of the universe or of mankind, and of being true to 
 them as the stars are true, or as Moses was true : you are 
 thinking of yourself." 
 
 "Well, suppose I admit that," said Mr. Courtenay, 
 good-naturedly. "The atom which I call ' I 1 is of vital 
 importance to me, though perhaps to no one else. It is 
 of moment to me whether I or another occupy such or 
 such a position, or enjoy such or such an existence, just 
 as it is of moment to me whether I or somebody else eat 
 my dinner. Mind, I say it is of importance to me, not 
 that the universe will suffer in the case. I and my neigh- 
 bor are balancing like the two sides of an equation ; it is 
 of no consequence which of us takes from the other, the 
 world remains the same. The Almighty has planted this 
 dominant ' I' in every breast ; and it is right. It is right 
 that every man shall feel himself a king, and not be for- 
 ever giving up his place in the meek spirit of self-sacrifice. 
 Will you please reach me that document in the upper 
 right-hand pigeon-hole?" he asked, turning away from 
 the window at which he had been standing. " It is old 
 man Jenkins's will. I see him crossing the street and 
 heading this way. I presume he wishes to add another 
 codicil. If he keeps on I shall have to pin a fresh legal- 
 cap sheet to this instrument." 
 
 Mr. Burns handed down the paper, and Mr. Courtenay 
 reseated himself grandly in the revolving office-chair. 
 He was exceedingly handsome and majestic in appearance ; 
 rather massive about the head and shoulders, with a lion's 
 mane of black, glossy hair curling about his coat-collar, 
 a trifle longer than the fashion, perhaps, but strikingly 
 becoming.
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 9 
 
 Nature had turned him out as complete a specimen of 
 his kind as one will see in a lifetime; and art had fin- 
 ished him off with an exquisite polish in which there were 
 many ingredients of good and evil. Some years ago 
 when he first dawned upon Mr. Burns, his remarkable 
 beauty of face and physique was even more dazzling and 
 resplendent ; being fed by the enthusiasm of youth, which 
 alone can tinge the cheeks and fire the eyes and animate 
 the whole being with a marvellous grace and glory. More- 
 over, he was finely educated, cultured, distinguished in 
 appearance, and, though somewhat reserved and haughty 
 in bearing, he was gentle and courteous in manner. 
 
 Long association had brushed off some of the outer 
 splendor and revealed to the confident and appreciative 
 friend more of the inner worth. Whatever seemed cold, 
 or selfish, or biased in him (and it is true there was a 
 good deal of such seeming) Mr. Burns thrust aside, or 
 chafed at, as affectation, or, at the worst, as the fungous 
 growth of circumstances. He had penetrated to the core 
 of Burr's grand nature, and believed in him as he believed 
 in all absolute good, and truth, and nobility. As for his 
 vanity, which showed itself in his fine manners and grace- 
 ful courtesy, especially to women, Mr. Burns cared 
 nothing for that now ; was a little contemptuous of it in 
 fact (though it had helped to dazzle him once) ; being 
 himself very free from mere outside polish. Whatever 
 was pleasing and beautiful to others in him radiated from 
 the centre of his being. 
 
 There was one thing, however, about his friend that 
 was exceedingly unsatisfactory and sometimes absolutely 
 painful to him. It was, that Burr never took him into his 
 inmost heart to show him its hopes, its fears, its motives, 
 its secret workings, nor ever revealed to him a glimpse 
 of his past life except incidentally. Never purposely dis- 
 closed his tenderer and better nature, but continually 
 baffled his affectionate sympathy, and, indeed, seemed to 
 ward off, by a shield of triviality which he perpetually 
 carried, any grave confidences which Mr. Burns himself 
 might have liked to make to him. There was no getting 
 at him somehow, or at the reality in him. In discussion, 
 he took up any side of a question that presented itself to 
 A*
 
 I o HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 him without regard to any previous opinion he might 
 have expressed concerning it; declaring all things to be 
 so many-sided that it was impossible always to take the 
 same view. 
 
 "I look upon every subject as a landscape," said he, 
 "which may be studied from many different stand-points 
 and in many changing lights and shadows. One view may 
 be as good and as true as another ; why limit myself to 
 this or that ?" Which broad philosophy, though unobjec- 
 tionable in itself, was sometimes very exasperating to his 
 mercurial companion. 
 
 Personal elegance was a strong habit with Mr. Courte- 
 nay. He was a splendid creature and well worth being 
 well kept. But he would have sat there with the office 
 festooned with dust and cobwebs from one year's end to 
 another if Mr. Burns had not flourished a broom over 
 the walls and ceiling once a month or so. 
 
 Mr. Burns was fastidious as to his surroundings, and 
 cared more for his own comfort than for the impressions 
 he made on the minds of others. There was a principle 
 running through his life that he endeavored to control 
 his actions by, paying little heed to results. 
 
 Mr. Jenkins opened the door and let himself in with a 
 modest air, as though he deprecated the liberty he was 
 taking. Mr. Burns's utter indifference as he made his 
 appearance, and Mr. Courtenay's imposing manner, justi- 
 fied the feeling that he was taking a liberty. 
 
 "Good-evening, Mr. Jenkins," said Mr. Courtenay, 
 in a deep voice, a trifle reassuringly. 
 
 To which Mr. Jenkins responded, rubbing his hands 
 over each other as if they were cold, and advancing 
 into the room, " Good-evenin'. GW^-evenin', Mr. 
 Burns." 
 
 The deprecating air extended in particular to Mr. 
 Burns, who was really the more formidable of the two, 
 because of a certain fineness of nature and keenness of 
 perception, which, linked with uncompromising princi- 
 ples, impressed upon the designer or the impostor the 
 feeling that he was unmasked. There was no wavering 
 in the direct glance of his steel-blue eyes. 
 
 He nodded distantly and pushed the visitor a chair
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. II 
 
 with his foot, after which act of scant courtesy he with- 
 drew himself from Mr. Jenkins's spiritual atmosphere. 
 He still maintained his position on the high stool by the 
 desk ; his hat, which he had a habit of wearing in the 
 office, was pushed back from his forehead, and his mouth 
 had a slight curve, which gave to his fine, classical face a 
 half-contemptuous expression that was somewhat habitual. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay and Mr. Jenkins began conversation by 
 speaking of the weather, perhaps the only common ground 
 between them outside of the latter's business, which, of 
 course, could not be entered upon without some such 
 preliminary. Said Mr. Jenkins, " I've jist about made 
 up my min' to leave this 'ere blasted cole country an 
 go to a warmer climate. A man freezes the very marrer 
 out o' his bones on these big prairies. I'd pull up stakes 
 an' go in a minit if I could sell out." 
 
 "Go where?" asked Mr. Courtenay, with a slight 
 widening of his long eyelids. 
 
 " Why, down into Arkansaw. I've got a brother-in- 
 law down there, been a wantin' me to come this three 
 year. But ye see, what little I've got 's a' most all tied 
 up in Ian'. Not so very little either, he ! he!" with a 
 glance at Mr. Burns. " Wouldn't be a very easy matter 
 to cut loose these hard times." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay discouraged emigration ; what the coun- 
 try needed was more men, women, and children. Though 
 of course there would come a time, when the population 
 began to thicken, for Mr. Jenkins and others to float 
 off naturally, like the scum from a boiling kettle. But 
 the time was not yet ripe. 
 
 " Do you not think," said he, in his smooth, polished 
 manner, " that our cold, frozen winters are more con- 
 ducive to health than those warmer latitudes?" 
 
 "Well, I dunno but they be," admitted Mr. Jenkins, 
 readily. " Me nor none o* my fam'ly hev been sick a 
 week, put it all together, sence we've been here, an' that's 
 ten year. But then it's too cole fur a farm in' country. 
 Why, they begin seedin* down there in Arkansaw while 
 we're a settin' by the fire waitin' fur the groun'-hog to 
 come out an' see his shadder." 
 
 "How many crops do they raise there in a year?"
 
 12 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 asked Mr. Burns, severely, fixing Mr. Jenkins with his 
 penetrating gaze. 
 
 " Eh ! how many crops?" he returned, struck, seem- 
 ingly, by the newness of the suggestion conveyed in the 
 inquiry. "Why, one, I 'spose, the same as they raise 
 anywheres." 
 
 " I thought perhaps they raised more than one, seeing 
 they begin so early in the season," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, who was far more gifted in the way of 
 sarcasm than his friend, had a velvet suavity that was 
 careful, usually, to veil it from the object at which it was 
 directed. He came to his client's aid and said, in a con- 
 ciliatory accent, that he presumed Mr. Burns thought if 
 only one crop could be raised in a year it did not matter 
 greatly what particular time of year. 
 
 "Well, but," said Mr. Jenkins, who had a stubborn 
 set of opinions, "ye see, the thing is to git yer crop in 
 airly; there's a mighty sight o' difference in bein" airly 
 an' in bein' late." 
 
 "It seems to me," said Mr. Burns, "about like the 
 difference, longitudinally, between New York and High- 
 Water-Mark ; the sun wakes them up a little earlier there, 
 but their day'is no longer than ours, and the morning is 
 just as fresh when it reaches us as when it broke upon the 
 Atlantic." 
 
 Leaving Mr. Jenkins to ponder feebly over this bit of 
 mathematical geography, Mr. Burns again retired in a 
 spiritual sense. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay sat intently scanning the will with its 
 several codicils annexed, smoothing his glossy beard with 
 one white hand and waiting for the old man to mention 
 his errand; whereupon he replied, promptly, "I happen 
 to have the document in my hand at this moment ; what 
 is it you wish?" 
 
 " Well, as I tole ye afore," said Mr. Jenkins, "I didn't 
 mean to will any o' the Ian' to my dotter Sary Ann, bein' 
 as she was engaged to Jim Sites that has a' most as much 
 Ian' as I hev myself. But, ye see, Jim an' her's fell out, 
 an' she says she'll never hev him now, no how. She's 
 purty high-strung, Sary Ann is, when she gits her dander 
 up."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 3 
 
 Mr. Jenkins leaned back in his chair and again glanced 
 at Mr. Burns, who sat as deaf as a post. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay elevated his eyebrows without raising 
 his eyes, and repeated, mechanically, "Fell out." 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Jenkins, screwing his little, old, 
 wrinkled face up into what was intended to be a face- 
 tious expression, and pointing with his thumb. " Ye 
 see, the way of it was, Jim he got jealous o' Mr. Burns 
 here." 
 
 Mr. Burns again fixed his eyes coldly on the visitor's 
 face. 
 
 "'Twa'n't nuthin' o' no account," said Mr. Jenkins, 
 fidgeting a little, "only, ye see, away las' summer when 
 Sary Ann was a pickin' berries inside the garden fence, 
 Mr. Burns, he comes along an' stops an' leans agin the 
 fence to chat a spell, an' Sary Ann she gives him a han'- 
 ful o' berries. An' same time Jim he comes a ridin' up 
 the lane an" sees 'em there. Well, he's been a fussin' 
 about it, off an' on, ever sence. 'Specially ef he sees 
 Sary Ann a talkin' to or recognizin' them as she says is 
 his betters." 
 
 By a peculiar chuckle and wink Mr. Jenkins made the 
 latter- part of his speech a personal compliment, including 
 both gentlemen. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay made as if he would rather not be in- 
 cluded. 
 
 "I hope you don't take no offence for the mentionin' 
 o' your name, Mr. Burns?" said Mr. Jenkins, humbly. 
 
 " None whatever. I cannot see that the affair concerns 
 me in the least," said Mr. Burns, with exaggerated indif- 
 ference. 
 
 "Of course," the old man continued, hopefully, "Jim's 
 good enough in his way, got a better start 'n most o' the 
 young men has aroun' here ; but fur all that, he's hardly 
 the sort for Sary Ann. I've tole her so time an' ag'in. 
 I've tole her to hold her head a leetle higher 'n that. 
 She's twice as well-edicated as him ; she's got a certifiket 
 an' 's a goin' to teach school this winter." 
 
 Mr. Burns, feeling a strong aversion to 'being loaded 
 with any responsibility about the young lady, and strong 
 indignation at the likelihood of such responsibility being
 
 ! 4 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 thrust upon him, spoke out in reply to the old man's 
 insinuations with as Mr. Courtenay subsequently de- 
 scribed it great force and clearness. 
 
 "Mr. Jenkins, you may give my compliments to Mr. 
 Sites, and tell him he has no cause for jealousy so far as 
 I am concerned. You may say to him that I am not a 
 marrying man. And it is my advice to you, gratis, and 
 it is not often a lawyer proffers his opinion so cheap, that 
 you had better get your daughter to make up with the 
 young man. As you say, he has a better start than most 
 fellows have, and I doubt if she can do better." 
 
 Mr. Jenkins was awed into silence by this unequivocal 
 logic. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, who had sat a silent listener, with an 
 unreadable expression of countenance, hastened to bring 
 forward the subject of the will. "You wish to transfer 
 some of the property herein mentioned to your daughter, 
 I conclude?" 
 
 "Well, yes," said Mr. Jenkins, somewhat relieved, 
 hitching his chair a little nearer. "Ye see, bein' onset- 
 tied like, an' havin' no def'nite prospects afore her, as 
 one may say, an' knowin' my liability to drop off enny 
 minute" (Mr. Jenkins had a cheerful habit of predicting 
 a sudden terminus to his career), "I feel 's if it's my 
 duty to make some pervision fur her 's well 's the rest of 
 'em, ag'inst my demise." 
 
 "Certainly," acquiesced Mr. Courtenay, holding his 
 pen suspended over the paper. 
 
 "Well, ye may jist change that last quarter-section we 
 was disposin' of the other day, an' set it down to Sary 
 Ann's credit ; then they'll all fare purty much alike, gals 
 an' boys." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay made the required alteration with de- 
 spatch. 
 
 Mr. Jenkins got up and crossed over to give his admir- 
 ing attention to the lawyer's dexterity of pen. 
 
 " Now, I couldn't make a scratch holdin' my pen 
 atween my fingers like that," said he, with his head on 
 one side and his hands in his pockets. 
 
 When the new addition or correction was properly 
 approved, Mr. Courtenay asked, diplomatically,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 1 5 
 
 "Is there anything further, Mr. Jenkins? lam par- 
 ticularly engaged this evening, and if there is nothing 
 more " 
 
 " Well, I don't think of nuthin' more at present, I 
 believe," said Mr. Jenkins, reflectively. "I guess Sary 
 Ann's all right now, Jim Sites or no Jim Sites, he ! he ! 
 That's what you might call a purty good dowry fur a 
 young woman, ain't it?" 
 
 "Very good, indeed," said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 " There's not many gals a gittin' married nowadays 
 that's as well pervided fur, I'll bet a 'tater ! A little 
 money on the wife's side comes handy to a young feller 
 jist startin' in life. My ole woman had a thousan' dol- 
 lars, an' it gev me a mighty good lift. Ye see, when ye 
 once git the ball a rollin' it doubles up pretty fast." 
 
 "I suppose so," said Mr. Courtenay, cautiously, re- 
 flecting that he had very little experimental knowledge on 
 that head. 
 
 "Well," said Mr. Jenkins, finally, "I guess I'll hev 
 to be goin' ; it's about supper-time 't our house. Why 
 don't you gentlemen call round some time an' git better 
 acquainted? We ain't got much of a place, but it's not 
 the house, I al'ays tell my ole woman, it's the people a 
 body goes to see an' the victuals, he! he! We've 
 gen'ally got a little sumpin' t' eat. I sh'd think ye'd git 
 awful lonesome stickin' here, year in an 1 year out, the way 
 you do." 
 
 " It is a little lonely, sometimes," said Mr. Courtenay. 
 And the visitor crossed over to the door and bowed him- 
 self out, just as he had bowed himself in, with, 
 
 " Good-evenin', Mr. Courtenay. Gflfldf-evenin', Mr. 
 Burns." 
 
 The last named returned the courtesy briefly, as before. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay remarked, glancing around, " Charley, 
 you remind me very much of Poe's ' Raven.' ' 
 
 " Wouldn't the likeness be more striking if I had a 
 Roman nose and darker eyes?" said Mr. Burns, signifi- 
 cantly. 
 
 " You misapprehend me, Charley," said his friend. " I 
 meant, simply, that you brought the idea of the poem to 
 my mind. I had reference to your expression only, which,
 
 !6 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 had I spoken literally even, overcame entirely the color 
 of your hair and eyes, and suggested that ominous bird. 
 I hardly think," he added, deprecatingly, "that you 
 could classify my nose as a Roman nose ; to go back to 
 the classics, it is more properly a Grecian nose." 
 
 " Possibly. I am not very well up in classical lore," 
 said Mr. Burns. 
 
 After a little silence, Mr. Courtenay said, " By the way, 
 Charley, can we not do something this evening? It is 
 miserably dull, as you observed. Suppose we go up to the 
 deacon's and spend the evening?" 
 
 Mr. Burns objected. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Burr, you and I don't intend to marry those young 
 ladies." 
 
 "Admitted." 
 
 "Then we must let them alone. They put more stress 
 on our trifling attentions than our motives justify. You 
 know how it is, people expect us to marry ; they keep 
 looking out for it, and our little civilities, no matter in 
 what direction, pass for much more than they are worth. 
 The ultra-democracy of a newly-settled country puts us on 
 an exact level with everybody. A little politeness to our 
 wash-woman is mistaken for gallantry. We may as well 
 put aside false modesty and face the question as it is. 
 We are peculiarly situated." 
 
 " We are, indeed," said Mr. Courtenay. " But I don't 
 see anything very disagreeable in the peculiar situation," 
 he added. 
 
 " It is a fact," continued Mr. Burns, " that we seem to 
 be preferred by the ladies of all classes here to any other 
 two young men. I say it humbly, for it shows the re- 
 markably poor status of society in this village." 
 
 "I suppose you mean the young ladies," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. "I don't know of a single mater familias 
 who looks upon us with favor." 
 
 "It is because we're so poor." 
 
 "No; I think they are in doubt respecting our inten- 
 tions. Unlike you, I do not believe anybody expects us 
 to marry. Did I understand you to say our popularity 
 indicates a low state of society here ?"
 
 HIGH WA TER-MARK. 1 7 
 
 " I mean there is a poverty of society here; there is no- 
 body for the young ladies to aspire to but us, if ' aspire' 
 is the word, we get so ridiculously puffed up by being 
 the lions of a small country village." 
 
 "Yes; you should have put it differently," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. "Though, of course, it would have come to 
 the same thing, however delicately worded." 
 
 "As to the deacon's young ladies," continued Mr. 
 Burns, coming back to the point they had started from, 
 " God grant they may bestow their affections more worthily 
 than upon us !" 
 
 "You mean, I suppose," said Mr. Courtenay, " that it 
 would be better for them to make an investment that 
 would bring them some returns." 
 
 " Burr, for heaven's sake," exclaimed Mr. Burns, 
 flashing round upon him, "don't treat the matter so 
 lightly ! You do possess the sense of right and wrong. 
 Why assume such careless indifference?" 
 
 Burr shrugged his shoulders. "What shall we do?" 
 said he. " Hermitize ourselves for fear of damaging some 
 young lady's affections?" 
 
 Mr. Burns, curbing his temper, returned, " Did it 
 ever occur to you, Burr, that you have a manner toward 
 women especially toward pretty women which might 
 lead almost any one of them to suspect you admired 
 her?" 
 
 "No," said Burr, the least bit ruffled; "I am not 
 aware of having such a manner and of employing it so 
 promiscuously." 
 
 "Don't take offence, Burr; it is possible you may not 
 know. But your experience must prove to you how irre- 
 sistible you are to women, God knows, I don't mean to 
 flatter you ! and I should think you had tasted enough 
 of the bitter fruits of indiscretion." 
 
 Mr. Burns's words seemed to ring up some memory of 
 the past that was annoying to his friend. 
 
 " Oh, damn it ! Charley, don't preach. What would 
 life be without its sweet and bitter spices? A most in- 
 sipid dose to me. Did not the bell ring? It must be 
 supper-time." 
 
 He took up his hat and stepped out. Mr. Burns fol- 
 2*
 
 1 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 lowed him, and they walked down-street to the one hotel 
 in the village, a long, two-storied frame building, com- 
 modious, but entirely without ornamentation. 
 
 As they ascended the steps up into the long porch that 
 extended from one end to the other of the building in 
 front, the two male employes of the establishment, 
 Dick Gibson and "Nigger" Fred, came up to the pump 
 to water a pair of tired stage-horses, the driver of which 
 sprang down from his perch with a familiar nod and 
 joke, and went around to hand out a rather lean mail- 
 bag, with which he whipped across the street to the post- 
 office. 
 
 High-Water-Mark was off the main stage-line, and got 
 its mail only twice a week. 
 
 The landlord came out and rang the last supper-bell 
 vigorously, and forthwith there came pouring in from 
 every direction clerks, shoemakers, editors, apprentices, 
 and various nondescript individuals, all depending on 
 this one eating and drinking institution for the where- 
 withal to sustain life. 
 
 Mr. Burns, in his gloomy mood, looked about him, 
 and felt it a sort of degradation to be herding with all 
 those people, and ate no supper. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, though fully as fastidious, had the 
 happy faculty of standing aloof anfl ignoring what was 
 repulsive. He carried his own spiritual atmosphere with 
 him. Physically he was much more susceptible to dis- 
 agreeable things than Mr. Burns.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK, 1 9 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 " BURR, what do you say to changing our boarding- 
 place?" 
 
 They had got back to the office. The mail not much 
 to speak of, with the exception of the newspapers had 
 been duly examined, and Mr. Courtenay, ensconced in 
 his favorite seat, was going over the latter. 
 
 "With a view to economize?" he asked, looking up. 
 
 "No," said Mr. Burns; "it occurred to me that it 
 would be better for us, morally and socially, to obtain 
 board in some nice, respectable family, where we could 
 enjoy, in a degree, the pleasures and refinements of a 
 home. Do you not think it would be an improvement on 
 our present way of living?" 
 
 "It would, indeed," said Mr. Courtenay. "Have 
 you thought which of the nice, respectable families in 
 the place you would patronize?" 
 
 "No; I can't think of anybody that could take us," 
 Mr. Burns returned, with a despairing accent. "I have 
 been clairvoyantly so to speak prying into every- 
 body's domesticity in the village, but the houses are all 
 so small." 
 
 "And as densely populated as foundling hospitals," 
 added Burr. 
 
 " Yes ; I am afraid we'll have to give it up." 
 
 " I am afraid so. Unless the deacon's folks could be 
 prevailed upon to take us in ; there is plenty of room up 
 there." 
 
 There was a levity in the proposition that grated upon 
 Mr. Burns after the serious conversation of an hour be- 
 fore. He got up and thrust his letters business letters 
 in big, buff envelopes into a drawer and walked to the 
 window. 
 
 Uninteresting as was the view from there, the window 
 yet had a sort of fascination for him, as though it were a 
 connecting link between himself and the great, outside 
 world beyond and the heavens above.
 
 20 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 By and by, Mr. Courtenay threw the papers aside. 
 "Well, Charley, what about your poem? Is it to be a 
 little sonnet for the local periodical?" 
 
 "No; it is to be of considerable length. I'm glad 
 you spoke of it. I think I'll begin it to-night," said Mr. 
 Burns, turning away from the window. 
 
 " Have you got an inspiration?" 
 
 "No. I have got a volcano in my head. I am con- 
 suming in inactivity. Something must be done or there 
 will be an explosion." 
 
 "So bad as that?" said Burr. "Well, you have hit 
 upon an excellent safety-valve and a very harmless one. 
 Have you the 'gift' of poesy? I don't think I ever saw 
 anything from your pen that would argue your being en- 
 dowed with the divine afflatus." 
 
 "I had a faculty for rhyming when I was a boy. I 
 haven't exercised it since," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " Charley, excuse me if the question is impertinent, 
 were you ever disappointed in love?" 
 
 "No; not in the way you mean." 
 
 " Pray how many ways are there for a man to be dis- 
 appointed in love?" Mr. Courtenay asked. 
 
 " There is such a thing, Burr, as striving for a prize and 
 finding out after you have got it that it is not the thing 
 you wanted after all. It seems to me the sort of disap- 
 pointment you had in your mind when you asked me that 
 question would be nothing to this." 
 
 " That is hardly like you, Charley ; it is more in accord- 
 ance with your friend's fickle temperament to experience 
 the flavor of dead-sea apples," said Mr. Courtenay. " By 
 the way," he added, with a candor that was customary 
 between them, "it seems to me you ought to have got 
 through with all this sort of thing long ago, Charley. 
 Twenty-eight I believe you tell me you are twenty-eight 
 is rather an advanced age to be still dabbling in poetry. 
 Of course you will not understand me to imply that poetry 
 should be left to school-boys ; a genius who gives his life 
 to it is the most glorious of men. He leads the van in the 
 world's progress; he pushes forward the boundaries of 
 thought and emotion and gives us what we most thirst for, 
 and what seems to us a foretaste of the boundlessness of
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 2 1 
 
 eternity, freedom. And.freedom, in all its significations, 
 is the grandest word in the language of men." 
 
 "Freedom!" reiterated Mr. Burns. "Good heavens! 
 we hardly comprehend it in any of its significations. If 
 our limbs are unbound we glory in our liberty, though 
 our souls are fettered with superstition, our intellect with 
 ignorance. Society may rule us, poverty hamper us, cir- 
 cumstances control us, friends constrain us, enemies cut 
 us off, and still we prate of freedom. There is no such 
 state ; it is only a word. I agree with you a grand word, 
 which may have its definition, by the grace of God, in 
 the great hereafter, but never here." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay seldom replied to any of his friend's 
 outbursts, but held on serenely to his own line of thinking. 
 He remarked, after a little silence, " How much we 
 admire the man of superior skill who hits off a thought 
 hanging like a ripe apple within our sight, but just out of 
 our reach, and shares it with us ! The poet gives expres- 
 sion not to his own idea alone but to ours. A test of 
 your genius would be to waken thoughts and emotions 
 that lie dormant in me ; to strike a chord in my nature 
 that I myself could have evolved no music from. We 
 know little about our tone and melody until a master- 
 hand plays upon us. Mind, I don't limit your genius to 
 my capacity, or for that matter to the capacity of any 
 age or people. Write your music and there will come, some 
 time, an instrument to give expression to it. Human 
 nature is wonderfully responsive when it is awakened. 
 The past has shown that there have been poets who shot 
 ahead of their time whole centuries ; we have not come 
 up to some of them yet, their light is still ahead, and 
 shines back on our approaching footsteps. Genius is 
 immortal. It can wait." 
 
 " But it is a drudge and has got to work for its immor- 
 tality," said Mr. Burns. " I remember reading some- 
 where that if Shakspeare had never written a line he 
 would still have been the immortal Shakspeare ; he 
 would have felt and lived in himself all that he wrote. 
 What an absurdity !" 
 
 " It agrees with Byron," said Mr. Courtenay, and 
 quoted,
 
 2 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " ' Many are poets who have never penned 
 
 Their inspirations, and, perchance, the best. 
 They felt, and loved, and died, but would not lend 
 
 Their thoughts to meaner things ; they compressed 
 The God within them, and rejoined the stars 
 
 Unlaurel'd upon earth, but far more bless'd 
 Than those who are degraded by the jars 
 
 Of passion, and their frailties linked to fame, 
 Conquerors of high renown, but full of scars.' " 
 
 " I don't suppose Byron believed that when he wrote 
 it," said Mr. Burns. "It is effort that makes men great. 
 It is labor that makes their greatness effective. It is fine 
 to talk about inspiration, and to fancy that the beautiful 
 thoughts, exquisitely enfolded, that rain down upon us 
 from the heaven of great minds, burst spontaneously from 
 inspired lips. But I suspect Byron himself perspired 
 over the very lines you just now quoted. Talk of soaring 
 like the lark ; that is pure sentimentalism. You have got 
 to work like a slave." 
 
 "Why, then, do you wish to task yourself so heavily ?" 
 asked Mr. Courtenay, with mild irony. 
 
 "To drain off a little native and accumulated bitter- 
 ness in my composition," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " It seems to me your profession might serve as an outlet 
 for that ; there is something in vilifying your antagonist 
 and browbeating witnesses, though, perhaps, it is not so 
 safe especially with reference to the antagonist as the 
 other valve, the poetry." 
 
 "Not when my antagonist is Burr Courtenay," Mr. 
 Burns retorted. 
 
 It had been twilight in the office for some time. The 
 fire burning up a little threw quivering spots of light on 
 the walls and on the floor. But it was too dark for the 
 young men to see each other's faces except in dim out- 
 line. A silence settled between them, and the air seemed 
 to vibrate with unspoken thoughts. They were Mr. 
 Burns's thoughts. Burr was only smoking and dreaming ; 
 perhaps feeling vaguely the pressure of the charged at- 
 mosphere. Mr. Burns broke the silence: 
 
 "Burr, you asked me if I were ever disappointed in 
 love. As perhaps you inferred, I have been in love, I 
 suppose I was. I was once engaged to be married."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 23 
 
 "With your principles," returned Mr. Courtenay, 
 " the one would of course precede the other. Your being 
 engaged would argue your having been in love." 
 
 "Not necessarily; one might deceive himself," said 
 Mr. Burns. 
 
 "How?" 
 
 "Fancy himself in love when he was not, really." 
 
 " Or fancy himself not in love when he was really," 
 said Burr, smiling. "You are so cautious, so fearful of 
 making a mistake, that you would be quite as liable to 
 fancy the one as the other. You started out with great 
 expectations; you wanted to get a great deal out of life, 
 and were not easily satisfied. You would spoil the most 
 beatific state with a doubt as to whether it were real and 
 would last." 
 
 Mr. Burns groaned inwardly. 
 
 "You looked for something better than this world can 
 give, perfection. Let me give you a piece of advice. 
 If you want to believe in anything, do not investigate, 
 do not tear the veil from before it. Your mind is too 
 analytical ; you are always trying to get at the reality of 
 things; you must grasp the rainbow. For me, I like to 
 keep the down on my peach and the dew on my rose. I 
 like to throw the halo of poetry around the beautiful, and 
 stand at a distance from the sublime to admire its tremen- 
 dous effects. Examine all things for enjoyment, as you 
 do a picture. Put them in the best light, and don't come 
 too near." 
 
 " But suppose you have something beside enjoyment in 
 view?" said Mr. Burns. " Suppose you want to get hold 
 of a principle?" 
 
 "Why, then," said Mr. Courtenay, "philosophers 
 would tell you to dig deeply. There is a motive-power 
 in the very centre of things corresponding to the outward 
 aspect and action. A great man is a sublime mystery to 
 us until we come face to face with him. That is the point 
 of disenchantment. But if we stop there we are in dan- 
 ger of a warning from the illustrious Pope, 
 
 'A little learning is a dangerous thing.' 
 
 If you are bound to investigate, for heaven's sake don't
 
 2 4 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 stop until you have bored clear through to the centre. 
 Anything short of that leads to skepticism and bitterness. 
 You you did not refer to Maggie, did you?" 
 
 "No," said Mr. Burns. "It was years ago. I don't 
 know why, Burr, in all the years we have been together, 
 I never told you." 
 
 A curious smile crossed Burr's face, unseen in the dark- 
 ness. He was almost as cognizant of Mr. Burns's past 
 history as of his own ; though neither, in all their long 
 intercourse, had unfolded himself to the other. 
 
 " How did the engagement come to be broken off?" 
 he asked, after a short pause. 
 
 " It was not really broken off, it was dropped. I can't 
 tell how, or when, or why the love I had or thought I 
 had for that woman died out. As I regarded her then, 
 and as I remember her now, she was incomparable among 
 women, sweet, amiable, talented. I don't understand 
 how she went out from me. It all seems vague, misty. 
 It was like the slow, unconscious fading of a day into 
 night. It was like my youth : they both went together." 
 
 Impossible to tell the effect of this remarkable confi- 
 dence upon Mr. Courtenay. After another little silence 
 he asked, in a subdued tone, 
 
 " And what of her, the lady?" 
 
 " Heaven knows ! She dropped completely out of the 
 current we had both been sailing on so long together. 
 I have never, for one moment, ceased to wonder, and 
 to speculate, and torture myself about her. I have 
 even tried to find her, to satisfy myself, but she left no 
 trace." 
 
 " I can't see that you are to blame, Charley," said Mr. 
 Courtenay, gently. 
 
 "To blame or not to blame, it is not a pleasant thing 
 to reflect that you may have destroyed the happiness of a 
 life, of the very life you had intended and pledged your- 
 self to bless." 
 
 Down in the bottom of his trunk, carefully wrapped up 
 and preserved, Mr. Burns had a portrait and a bundle of 
 yellow letters whose delicate tracery of penmanship had 
 no tenderer meaning for him now than a parchment roll 
 of Egyptian hieroglyphics would have had ; albeit, he
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 35 
 
 had once been thrilled to his heart's centre at sight of 
 them. But that was long ago, when his youth was still 
 fresh upon him and his cheek was tinged with an almost 
 girlish blush as he unfolded the dainty sheets breathing 
 the atmosphere of a tenderly loved presence. 
 
 He made a movement to get them for Burr to see, but 
 restrained himself. What right had he to hold up the 
 trusting heart that throbbed in them to Burr's criticising 
 gaze ? For even now he was not sure of his friend's 
 sympathetic interest. Still, after an interval of silence, 
 perhaps fancying he had paved the way in some small 
 degree to Burr's heart, or for he was far enough above 
 prying curiosity from whatever motive, possibly without 
 any particular motive, he asked, "Burr, were you ever 
 really in love?" 
 
 If he had thought to get a sympathetic answer the illu- 
 sion was dispelled. 
 
 " A great many times," said Burr, with a movement as 
 if to throw off a pressure and let himself up into his usual 
 light atmosphere. " At the unripe age of fifteen I was 
 desperately bent on marrying my preceptress, a lady of 
 perhaps twice my years ; but she discreetly rejected me. 
 I am not sure but the romantic ardor of that attachment 
 surpassed, in purity and intensity, anything I have ever 
 experienced since. But the refusal was bad for me ; I 
 became a bitter skeptic while yet in my teens, and in- 
 volved myself in no end of reckless flirtations." 
 
 " The habit has scarcely left you yet !" said Mr. Burns, 
 ironically. 
 
 " Do you know, a few years ago, I had an opportunity 
 to see that first love of mine," Burr continued, " by step- 
 ping a little out of my way ; but I should have closed my 
 eyes if she had passed directly before me. Not that any 
 remnant of my boyish ardor remained, but she had grown 
 old, they told me, and I could not bear to see the ravages 
 of time on a face I had once idolized, or idealized, 
 whichever it was. As it stands to-day, I am not committed 
 to any lady." 
 
 "Not committed! How vastly people's ideas differ 
 about certain things 1" Mr. Burns exclaimed. 
 
 " Do you mean yours and mine?"
 
 26 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " Yes ; yours and mine. If I beguiled any young lady 
 into loving me, and believing I loved her, I should feel 
 myself 'wholly committed,' as you say." 
 
 "Should you? And what would then be your course 
 of procedure ? For I fancy that is about the state of Miss 
 Jenkins's mind with reference to yourself," said Burr. 
 
 The firelight shone up into his face, revealing an ex- 
 asperating glimmer in his eyes. He took his cigar from 
 his lips and held it, smoking, between his fingers. 
 
 Mr. Burns made a gesture of impatience. 
 
 Though in some respects the most tender-hearted of 
 men, and easily moved to compassion by physical suffer- 
 ing of man, brute, or insect, there were certain kinds of 
 worms Burr Courtenay loved to see wriggling on a hook. 
 He not unfrequently impaled his companion. 
 
 "I at first had the impression," said he, "that the 
 young lady only presumed on her intimacy with you as a 
 means of coquetting with her lover; but it seems she 
 has serious designs upon you, and her father appears 
 anxious to further her claims. It looked like it, his 
 coming in and laying the matter open and putting a pre- 
 mium upon her, so to speak, besides treating you with 
 marked affability." 
 
 "Burr, you know as well as I," said Mr. Burns, flash- 
 ing up, " that the old man has got upon the wrong track. 
 It is you who have turned Sarah Jenkins's foolish, senti- 
 mental little head, not I. To speak with unvarnished 
 frankness, I must say I cannot imagine the quality of your 
 pride when you stoop to rivalry with such fellows as poor, 
 uncouth Jim Sites !" 
 
 His severe way of putting the case was a little embar- 
 rassing to his friend. 
 
 " I think you are laboring under a misapprehension, 
 Charley," said he. " I do not conceive that I have ever 
 put myself into rivalry with Jim Sites." 
 
 Mr. Burns, unheeding the denial, resumed: "The 
 Jenkinses have high aspirations, and they probably think 
 it would be a fine thing to marry their daughter to an 
 attorney-at-law ! If it comes in my way again I shall 
 take pains to effectually disabuse their minds of that im- 
 pression."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 2 7 
 
 "Don't be hard upon us, Charley," said his friend, 
 good-humoredly. 
 
 " I will lay our poverty and general worthlessness be- 
 fore the old man in a way that will astonish him," re- 
 turned Mr. Burns, as he went over to the desk, struck a 
 match, and lighted a lamp with a very murky chimney 
 and began taking out writing materials. 
 
 "Are you going to begin your poem immediately?" 
 Burr asked. 
 
 "Yes; perhaps, by and by, you will aid me a little in 
 the way of comment and criticism ?" 
 
 "Gladly," said Burr, with a willingness that argued 
 confidence in his ability for the office ; but added, after 
 deliberating a moment, "It occurs to me, Charley, upon 
 reflection, that the position of critic and commentator is 
 a rather difficult one, seeing that my criticisms and com- 
 ments are to be made to you and not behind your back 
 to the world. By the way, it strikes me this is hardly the 
 age of poetry ; every subject I can think of has been ex- 
 hausted. Of poetical themes, take ' Morning,' for in- 
 stance ; it has been so abundantly bedecked with 'rosiness' 
 and various gilding and coloring, from time to time, that 
 if it should put on all its glories at one sitting it would 
 rival the very shekinah. 'Evening,' too, with its gor- 
 geous sunsets and its tinkling bells, than which nothing 
 is more melancholy to my mind, as presaging the coming 
 night; suggesting 'The curfew tolls the knell,' and so 
 forth. ' Twilight' with its pensive hour, everything, in 
 fact. Not a school-boy but what has written an ode to 
 Spring ! Poetical description is exhausted." 
 
 " Hum ! what a materialist you are !" said Mr. Burns. 
 " Can you see nothing but what is suggested to your 
 senses?" 
 
 "Well, take the graces and the virtues, haven't they been 
 satiated with rhythmic laudation. As for Patriotism, does 
 not every nation under the sun' swell the music of its own 
 anthems ? And as for our warriors and our statesmen, is 
 there a single illustrious name unsung? I contend that it 
 is an exceedingly difficult matter to be a poet in this 
 common-sense, matter-of-fact age. The same spirit of 
 incredulity and investigation that has unmasked many sa-
 
 28 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 cred and scientific mysteries, raises its unhallowed hands 
 and plucks off the ivy-wreaths and delicate frescoes with 
 which poetry is accustomed to bedeck itself, leaving the 
 naked skeleton of a fact, a tale, or a moral. No matter 
 how beautiful or exquisite the shell, crack it, get at the 
 kernel. No man has time to loiter among ancient ruins, 
 or beside pearly streams looking for stray gems. Every 
 sentence that is spoken on the rostrum, in the pulpit, has 
 got to be pithy, no mere flowers of rhetoric ; indeed, 
 rhetoric has little place with us, the plainest, most con- 
 cise dress a thought can wear is the best. A dash of wit, 
 a spark of brilliancy, a glare of humor may flash along 
 the page, or the sermon, or the oration, but it must be of 
 the keenest, and brightest, and, I might add, briefest. 
 We must wait until the great geniuses of the past have 
 been sifted like sand upon the public mind and earth is 
 mellowed with their ashes." 
 
 " Let me ask," said Mr. Burns, " if you consider that 
 Homer, Pope, Dryden, and all those ancients had been 
 so disseminated before say Shakspeare's era, or Byron's 
 and Tom Moore's?" 
 
 "Certainly; and the latter were born of their ashes; 
 they were woven into the every-day lives of millions, just 
 as their contemporary philosophers and sages were woven 
 into the scientific life. Why, let any one who has never 
 studied the classics turn to those old bards, and he will be 
 astonished to find himself almost as familiar with them as 
 with his own thoughts. He might in ignorance of their 
 antiquity even accuse them of plagiarizing some of our 
 modern writers. Every sentence (at least every sentiment) 
 has been made a text of, disguised, diluted, clothed in a 
 thousand different forms to mingle with our common lit- 
 erature. There is but little originality afloat nowadays, 
 Charley ; the most that we get comes to us with the familiar 
 odor of well-known flowers, hidden out of sight, it may 
 be, in a gorgeous bouquet of words, but still perceptible 
 to a cultivated mind. Strange that the fragrance of an 
 inspiration should be everlasting ! There is a species of 
 immortality sweeter than that attained by the celebrated 
 Count* Frangipanni." 
 
 " How is it to be attained by us poor mortals of the
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 2 9 
 
 present century," said Mr. Burns, " if we are to fold our 
 hands and wait until the world has absorbed Shakspeare 
 and nothing is left of Milton but a scented zephyr? I do 
 not believe we are merely to wait for the uprising of the 
 Phoenix, we are to work for it. We must help on toward 
 the new era. No man lives for himself; in one sense no 
 man is an individual, an integer, but a fraction of one 
 stupendous whole." 
 
 " You are right," said Mr. Courtenay. " Take our oft- 
 quoted Shakspeare. Ah ! Shakspeare is a part of the 
 universe, the voice of it. My faith in him is pantheistic. 
 If I were a spiritualist I would deny that William of Strat- 
 ford was a mere man, and affirm that he was the writing- 
 medium of all humanity." 
 
 "Spare him your eulogies," said Mr. Burns, turning 
 again to his desk; "he doesn't need them. There he 
 stands, as Webster said of Massachusetts, he speaks for 
 himself." 
 
 " If you are going to write," Mr. Courtenay remarked, 
 " perhaps I had better take a stroll and leave you to your 
 inspiration." 
 
 "You will not be any constraint upon me," rejoined 
 Mr. Burns. 
 
 "Nevertheless I think I'll step out," Mr. Courtenay 
 persisted, and got up and lighted another lamp with a 
 murky chimney, and went into a back-room. When he 
 reappeared, gloved and equipped, Mr. Burns sat at the 
 desk with a sheet of legal-cap spread out before him, 
 poising his pen above it and contracting his eyebrows. 
 His hair, light and curling, was brushed carelessly back 
 from his forehead. His eyes were exceedingly bright, 
 unsatisfied, and melancholy. It seemed as if the fire in 
 them had consumed his youth and drunk up his youthful 
 blood. His high, straight nose, slightly-curved lips, and 
 pale complexion were responsible for a certain aristo- 
 cratic air he had. In build he was nearly as tall and 
 quite as symmetrical, but slighter, than his friend. The 
 two contrasted strikingly in many ways. Mr. Courtenay 
 showed a fulness of health and strength and physical 
 beauty ; Mr. Burns not a lack, but an absence of it, as 
 though it had been, as though it might be again. He
 
 3 o HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 was young ; he was not broken, or wrecked, or decayed ; 
 only empty of the zest of living. His life might be re- 
 filled like a goblet whose wine has been spilled. Burr, 
 though some years his senior (he did not know just how 
 many), was still in the enjoyment of his champagne, and 
 still believed in its sparkling bubbles ; he suffered no cloud 
 to hang over his spirit. "Well, good-night, Charley; 
 may the muse inspire you !" he said, with a just percept- 
 ible elation of spirits, as he strode across the office to the 
 door. 
 
 Mr. Burns responded moodily and without raising his 
 eyes. Burr went out. When the door closed upon him, 
 Mr. Burns got up, threw a picturesque blue cloak around 
 him, took his hat and also went out. The night was 
 dark, full of clouds and chilliness. Mr. Burns stopped 
 and listened. He could hear Burr's footfalls on the 
 frozen ground a short distance up the street, and he fol- 
 lowed him. 
 
 "It's a mean, sneaking thing to do," he muttered, 
 " track him as if he were a thief, but I want to make 
 sure whether he goes there. That will be a bad piece of 
 business yet." 
 
 On they went, the one behind the other, until they 
 reached the summit of the hill upon which stood the 
 proudest mansion in the village. It was Deacon Clyde's. 
 Mr. Courtenay opened the gate, walked up to the front 
 door, and rang the bell. 
 
 Mr. Burns, in the shadow of the fence and some 
 shrubbery, observed through the low, lace-curtained win- 
 dows of the parlor two young ladies sitting, one on 
 either side of a small, oblong table, with a lamp upon it 
 dangling with prismatic pendants. No other house in 
 High-Water-Mark afforded so many luxuries and elegan- 
 cies as Deacon Clyde's. The young ladies, Mr. Burns 
 observed, were busy with some sort oif fancy-work. 
 
 On the opposite side of the hall-door was a window 
 half uncovered, revealing a scene similar to the parlor 
 scene, except that it was an elderly couple Deacon Clyde 
 and his wife who occupied respective seats at a small 
 table with a lamp upon it. 
 
 The deacon had a newspaper in his hands, and appeared
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 3 1 
 
 to be reading aloud ; for now and then he raised his eyes, 
 and his wife glanced up from her knitting, and they smiled 
 and nodded at each other over their spectacles. When 
 the door-bell rang the deacon dropped his paper upon his 
 knees, Mrs. Clyde suspended her knitting, and they both 
 listened, then smiled and nodded, and resumed their quiet 
 occupations. 
 
 The young ladies, meantime, exchanged glances, and 
 then the taller one arose, and went out and opened the 
 door. The light of the hall-lamp flashed in her face, re- 
 vealing a pink flush blended with an ill-disguised, glad 
 recognition, though she preserved a marked and quite 
 charming dignity of manner. 
 
 The face in the parlor had an eager, expectant look, 
 which Mr. Burns fancied changed to disappointment when 
 Miss Clyde re-entered with Burr and closed the door, 
 showing that he came alone. 
 
 " Poor little Maggie !" he said, with a sigh, and turned 
 and went back to the office, resumed his seat and his pen, 
 and began his poem. 
 
 CHAPTER III, 
 
 " BURR, are you awake?" 
 
 It was past midnight, and Mr. Courtenay had come in 
 and gone to bed. But he instantly reported himself awake, 
 and Mr. Burns took up the lamp and his manuscript and 
 stepped into the back-room. He put the lamp down upon 
 the wash-stand splashed with soapsuds and loaded with 
 toilet-utensils and seated himself at the foot of the bed. 
 His hair was rumpled, and had a pen thrust into it above 
 his ear. His face was pale from excessive mental effort, 
 
 Mr. Courtenay's eyes had the appearance of being 
 forcibly kept open. He professed deep interest in the 
 poem, however, and Mr, Burns, began, with an easy, swing- 
 ing rhythm,-^
 
 3 2 JJIGff- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " Anon, at th' portal of life's pearly gate, 
 Youths and maidens in expectancy wait ; 
 And a rosy curtain is drawn aside. 
 And they catch a glimpse of a silver tide, 
 (That is brighter than any stream that flows !) 
 Upon its banks in luxuriance grows 
 The floweret that lovers love so well ! 
 It has such a tender legend to tell." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay interrupted to ask, " You don't wish me 
 to 'scan* it, d,o you? The mechanical part is all right, 
 I suppose " 
 
 "I care very little about the mechanical part," said 
 Burns; " leave that to school-boys." 
 
 "Aha! I like your independence," said Burr, "but 
 they tell us that the highest freedom is in keeping the 
 law. You must put your own will into harmony with the 
 Superior Will." 
 
 " What has the Superior Will to do with my rhymes?" 
 Mr. Burns exclaimed. 
 
 "Everything. The smallest thing you do is measured 
 by a fixed and immutable principle. You are imperfect, 
 inasmuch as you fall short of the measure. There are a 
 good many principles even in rhyming; there is. meter, 
 for instance." 
 
 "I shall not be at very great pains to oblige meter," 
 said Mr. Burns. " I am after the soul of poetry, not the 
 body." 
 
 "Then you limit me in my office of critic and com- 
 mentator," said Burr, patiently. "But no matter, so 
 that we understand each other." 
 
 1 And when lovers part, as they sometimes do, 
 Believing each other divinely true, 
 It is meet to exchange a token then, 
 A souvenir until they meet again ; 
 She gives him a lock of her silken hair, 
 Which he puts near his heart and keeps it there ; 
 And he though assured of his happy lot 
 He clasps in her hand a forget-me-not. 
 
 ' Now the impulse to leave a voice behind 
 To keep his mem'ry in the loved one's mind, 
 (And perhaps, too, to keep intruders out), 
 Shows distrust ; or, at least, implies a doubt.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 33 
 
 She loves and believes, and has ne'er a thought 
 
 That the beautiful dream may come to naught ; 
 
 She recks not the months, nor the years, I ween, 
 
 All the changeful years that may intervene. 
 
 For if change should come, why, confident elf! 
 
 The change, of course, could but be in herself. 
 
 And here is a text that's true to the letter: 
 
 A change in oneself is a change for the better." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay made a gesture of dissent. " My ex- 
 perience goes to show that woman is constant," said he. 
 " If anything, too constant." 
 
 " Your experience differs from that of most men," said 
 Mr. Burns, dryly. 
 
 " Not from your own, I think," said Burr. 
 
 Mr. Burns read on, 
 
 " If harm ever comes to the sweet love-plan, 
 The fault, you must know, is not in the man ; 
 It is she, it is she, the fickle and fair, 
 Who gave him a lock of her beautiful hair ; 
 And who has in a casket, unforgot, 
 A faded and scentless forget-me-not. 
 
 "The life of that flower is frail and brief, 
 
 But so long as a crumpled, withered leaf 
 Remains, still to chant its sad, sweet refrain, 
 Its tender plea is not made in vain. 
 
 She may break her vow, and may prove untrue, 
 
 It is what the world expects her to do ! 
 
 'Tis her privilege, too, you cannot ignore it, 
 
 And society gives her license for it." 
 
 Mr. Burns paused to take up another sheet, and Mr. 
 Courtenay started as though he had forgotten himself and 
 what was required of him. 
 
 "It's a a pastoral, isn't it, Charley?" he asked. 
 
 "A pastoral !" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, as critic and commentator, was a little 
 crestfallen at having made the mistake. 
 
 "Ah! I thought it might be a pastoral, from the 
 forget-me-nots, or a a lyric?" 
 
 Unheeding the last venture, Mr. Burns read on. At the 
 next pause Mr. Courtenay said, in somewhat languid tones, 
 "It has a very dulcet rhythm, Charley, glides along like 
 a a like a midsummer night's dream." 
 
 The comparison was so soothingly suggestive that the 
 
 B*
 
 34 
 
 HIGH- IV A TER-MARK. 
 
 lids drooped over his eyes, and he felt an exquisite temp- 
 tation to drift off into the land of sleep and visions. 
 
 "Are you getting sleepy?" Mr. Burns asked, a little 
 suspiciously. 
 
 "Oh, no," said Burr, opening his eyes and staring 
 resolutely. But he was drowsy to his finger-tips. "The 
 light shines in my eyes," he explained, winking them 
 pretty fast. "I believe my eyes are a little weak of 
 late." 
 
 "I'll drop the shade over the lamp," said Mr. Burns. 
 He did so, and then resumed the poem. A gentle snore 
 arrested him, and he stopped and leaned over and peered 
 into Burr's face, and a look of profound disgust curled his 
 lip. He gathered up his papers, and took the lamp and 
 went back into the office, looked at his watch, crammed 
 the manuscript into the desk, and went to bed himself. 
 As he crawled in behind Burr, that excellent commentator 
 muttered, "Verysoo soothing, Charley; seems like a 
 a seems like a d-r-e-a-m." 
 
 Mr. Burns turned his face to the wall, with the feel- 
 ing that one need never expect perfect sympathy in this 
 world. In a little while he had gathered up his internal 
 forces and resolved upon a philosophical self-dependence. 
 
 Meantime, the young ladies in the house on the hill, 
 neither of whom was the deacon's daughter, the elder, 
 Evelyn Clyde, being his orphan niece, and the younger, 
 Maggie Atherton, being his wife's orphan niece, after 
 bidding Mr. Courtenay "good-evening," an hour or so 
 after that witching period of time is supposed by the 
 vulgar world to merge into night, blew out the parlor- and 
 hall-lamps (for the rest of the household had long been 
 asleep), and tiptoed up-stairs, lighted by the moon. For 
 the wind had swept the clouds aside, and the moon and 
 stars were throwing their soft light in at the windows. 
 
 "What a lovely evening!" Evelyn exclaimed, still 
 laboring under the delusion that the hour was not far 
 advanced. She knelt by the window and drew aside the 
 white curtain, not to admire the night, that was an in- 
 nocent little deception, but to watch the tall form glid- 
 ing away through the still, white light, and to listen to 
 his firm foot-falls on the frozen ground. Oh, beautiful
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 35 
 
 moon, beautiful stars! can they make hearts so happy? 
 or does the happy heart make night so beautiful? 
 
 He is gone. Out of sight, Out of sound. And the 
 night, and the light, and the stillness are left alone ; ex- 
 cept the soughing of the wind in the tall poplars stuck, at 
 intervals, all around the deacon's premises. 
 
 Maggie has nothing for which to thank the night and 
 the moon, and so she lights the lamp on the dressing-table 
 and tucks her brown curls into a night-cap, and proceeds, 
 sadly and in a quiet, matter-of-fact way, to get ready for 
 bed. She kneels at the bedside and breathes an habitual 
 prayer; and still Evelyn kneels at the window and breathes 
 a different prayer, with more heart in it. 
 
 "Evelyn," Maggie calls from the white pillow on 
 which she has lain her pink, sorrowful cheek. 
 
 "What, dear?" Evelyn springs up, and comes and 
 stoops down and kisses her, rather in the exuberance of 
 her own happiness and triumph than of affection for 
 Maggie. Though she is fond of Maggie in her way, 
 which is rather a proud and imperious way. 
 
 " Did you want anything?" 
 
 "No; but it's late," said Maggie, and shut her eyes, 
 for there were tears in them, which she did not care to 
 have Evelyn see. 
 
 So Evelyn turns away and goes to the dressing-table, 
 and takes down and brushes her long, beautiful hair, feel- 
 ing a vague thankfulness for her own beauty mirrored in 
 the glass before her. Her heart beats, and her cheeks 
 burn, and her eyes are more blue and intense in their 
 brightness than the sapphire drops depending from her 
 delicate ears. 
 
 She is beautiful, and very queenly in figure and bear- 
 ing ; wonderfully so to-night, Maggie thinks, watching 
 her furtively and half envying her. 
 
 Though Maggie's faith in Mr. Courtenay was not so 
 great as Evelyn's. She doubted the sincerity of his pol- 
 ished and courteous attentions. Sometimes she wanted 
 to say as much, but Evelyn was too proud, and cold, and 
 unapproachable on such subjects for her to venture. 
 
 Mr. Burns she knew to be the soul of truth. She 
 could believe in every word and act of his. But, alas !
 
 36 HIGH- WA TER- MA RK. 
 
 his words and acts in the direction of love-making to 
 herself had been so few. She had weighed them all, and 
 they were hardly sufficient to balance the smallest hope 
 that he might care for her. 
 
 To-night she made a resolution founded on the con- 
 viction that he certainly did not care for her, and 
 clinched her plump hands in token of its fixedness, that 
 she would never, never think of him again 1 And went 
 to sleep with two bright tears tracking a pathway down 
 her round, rosy cheeks. 
 
 The deacon and his wife had sat up a little later than 
 usual, hoping the parlor visitor would depart, and leave 
 the young ladies at liberty to come out and attend to the 
 evening devotions, a ceremony in which the young la- 
 dies took no very active interest. At last the deacon 
 arose, and put away his newspaper, and Mrs. Clyde 
 wound up her yarn and stuck the needles in the ball and 
 put it away, and then pushed the lamp-stand a little 
 nearer the deacon's arm-chair and laid thereon the 
 family Bible. The deacon crossed over to poke the fire, 
 and wondered if the girls wouldn't soon be out. 
 
 "Better not wait for 'em, father," said Mrs. Clyde. 
 They called each other "father" and "mother" still, 
 though there were none left of five children who had 
 called them so, and who were all lying asleep in various 
 places in the green earth, with white slabs above them. 
 Two in a peaceful cemetery, hundreds of miles away, and 
 three on a battle-field, where the grass grew rank above 
 them, being fed with blood. " They do sit up so late 
 when them young men come up from town," Mrs. Clyde 
 continued, in a not displeased tone, being secretly proud 
 of the distinction conferred on her girls by the attentions 
 of the talented young men, but never compromising her 
 matronly dignity by appearing to consider it a distinction. 
 She was far too proud and too discreet for that. 
 
 "Yes, &leetle too late," the deacon responded, readily. 
 
 " Oh, well, young folks is young folks, they must have 
 their day," said Mrs. Clyde, defensively. She might 
 have added that they must also have their way, some- 
 times. Maggie was very docile and obedient, but was 
 inclined to follow Evelyn's example. And Evelyn brooked
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 37 
 
 little constraint. Though she never did anything more 
 flagrant than staying home from church and absenting 
 herself from prayers when she chose (some unguarded ex- 
 pressions of Mr. Courtenay's having led her to regard 
 religion as old-fogyish, and in which Mr. Courtenay 
 was culpable, inasmuch as he took away from her a faith 
 which she had leaned upon in an unquestioning, child's 
 way, and gave her nothing in return, a kind of swin- 
 dling somewhat extensively practised in this land, though 
 perhaps the perpetrators vindicate themselves by declar- 
 ing their victims incapable of receiving what they would 
 give). Miss Clyde also reserved to herself the right of 
 going where she pleased, doing what she liked, and ac- 
 cepting attentions from gentlemen at her own discretion. 
 In point of propriety there is no doubt Miss Clyde was 
 perfectly competent to guide herself aright, owing to an 
 inherent dignity of character that underlay all her motives 
 and actions. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE Sunday following Mr. Courtenay's visit at the 
 deacon's he proposed to Mr. Burns that they should at- 
 tend church in the evening, adding that it was quarterly 
 meeting, and the presiding elder would preach. 
 
 " Do you hold that out as an inducement?" Mr. Burns 
 asked. 
 
 " I thought it might have some weight," said Burr. 
 
 "Well, you are mistaken ; it has none whatever. The 
 one item of Methodism I object to is the presiding elder. 
 That is, I am passive in regard to the other items, but I 
 am actively opposed to that. It has always seemed to me 
 that that high dignitary was chosen with as much reference 
 to his physical endowments as to his spiritual and intel- 
 lectual." 
 
 "Well," said Mr. Courtenay, "it is true there are 
 some fine-looking men in that body of divines; but why 
 
 4
 
 38 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 a man should be objected to, even for a sacred office, on 
 account of a good corporeal development, is not plain to 
 me." 
 
 " His corporeal development is not a thing to be con- 
 sidered in the question of a man's fitness for a sacred 
 office," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " Do you know, Charles, that the kings of Israel were 
 chosen on that same ground to which you object?" 
 
 "The kings of Israel are swept off the boards; the 
 world is done with them. They symbolized the highest 
 idea of the people, no doubt, in their day ; but now we 
 don't care for the outside of a man, we are after what is 
 in him." 
 
 " Waiving that," said Burr, " shall we go? It is time 
 to be thinking of it, if we do." 
 
 After a moment's deliberation, Mr. Burns arose and 
 went into the back-room and got himself ready. When 
 they were about stepping out, Mr. Courtenay remarked, 
 carelessly, "I thought perhaps we had better escort the 
 young ladies to church this evening." 
 
 "If that is your intention you must excuse me," said 
 Mr. Burns, and turned and threw his gloves upon the 
 table and flung himself into a chair. 
 
 " Charley, what is the matter? What has come over 
 you of late?" said Burr. 
 
 " Old memories." 
 
 "Damn old memories!" Burr exclaimed with sudden 
 fierceness, as though he had them under his heel. 
 
 Mr. Burns looked up sharply, as though it might be 
 possible to get a glimpse of his friend's inner conscious- 
 ness at this moment through the crevice made by his sud- 
 den outburst. 
 
 But the flash of Burr's temper was like a flash of light- 
 ning in pitch darkness. 
 
 He bit his lip, and then said, a little sadly, "There is 
 comfort to me in this, Charley; whatever we get, in this 
 life, is probably the right thing. Or whether it is or not, 
 we don't seem to have the sole ordering of our affairs. If 
 we did, very few of us would be just where we are. How- 
 ever different our life might have been from what it has 
 been, we should doubtless have old memories and regrets
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 39 
 
 and remorse all the same. Then why not make the best 
 of what is, and ' Let the dead past bury its dead' ?" 
 
 "If one could !" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "But even then I don't know as one should. There 
 are some errors and mistakes we ought to suffer for." 
 
 " Deliberate errors and mistakes," said Burr; "I admit 
 one ought to be punished for intentional wrong-doing." 
 
 " There wouldn't be much wrong-doing if all the wrong 
 done were deliberately planned beforehand," said Mr. 
 Burns. " Not half the evil in the world results from cold- 
 blooded intention." 
 
 "Well, however that may be," said Burr, "take up 
 your gloves and come on. I will vouch for it that Miss 
 Maggie is not going to break her stout little heart for you. 
 Don't flatter yourself so much. You are getting morbid 
 on this subject." 
 
 Mr. Burns got up. " Maybe you are right," said he. 
 
 A few minutes later, passing up the street on their way 
 to the deacon's, they observed the resident clergyman of 
 the Methodist order striding across to the place of wor- 
 ship to make sure that the lights and the fires were in 
 proper trim ; fearing possibly from some previous negli- 
 gence that the employe in the light and fire line was 
 not to be implicitly relied upon. 
 
 "Poor fellow!" said Mr. Burns, with a sympathetic 
 shrug, " he looks blue and chilly in his threadbare broad- 
 cloth." 
 
 " Not to speak of his ungloved hands," said Burr, who 
 had a horror of numb fingers. " By the way," he asked, 
 " is black broadcloth a church ordinance ?" 
 
 "I believe it has always been the canonical costume 
 for orthodox clergymen," said Mr. Burns; "but perhaps 
 modern civilization will justify its being grown out of 
 shortly." 
 
 The minister bowed clerically, that is to say, gravely, 
 for it was Sabbath evening ; and besides, the young attor- 
 neys were of doubtful piety according to his reckoning, 
 and it behooves a minister of the gospel to preserve the 
 church dignity in his own person in presence of the 
 worldly-minded. 
 
 They, on their part, gave the graceful military salute
 
 40 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 habitual with them, though perhaps with an accent of 
 mock deference, and passed on with their rapid, even 
 strides. 
 
 " Who would be a fanatic !" exclaimed Mr. Burns. " I 
 would rather be bereft of one of my five senses than have 
 any part of my brain overcast or any faculty of my mind 
 shackled." 
 
 " I venture to say that the fanatics have done more to 
 push things forward in this world than the philosophers," 
 said Burr. " Give one of them an idea, they are essen- 
 tially one-idea men, and see how he will drive ahead 
 with it. They are the working-men. If not exactly at 
 the head of affairs, they are the tools that cooler and wiser 
 men use in adjusting them. Fanaticism has been one of 
 the boldest, most persistent, indefatigable, devoted, self- 
 sacrificing powers ever set in motion upon the earth. It 
 is like steam : all you have got to do is to get a steady- 
 handed, clear-headed engineer to keep it going in the 
 right direction. The philosopher sees all sides, his mind 
 is a world of light ; the fanatic's is but fractionally illu- 
 minated, but the darkened half is an added power pro- 
 pelling the one bright idea. Philosophy brings out all 
 things ; fanaticism throws out its head-light and shows us 
 but one. In other words, it is concentration." 
 
 " I would rather not concentrate," said Mr. Burns, with 
 a shrug. 
 
 "Fanaticism is apparently more consistent than philos- 
 ophy," Burr continued. 
 
 " Consistent ! I used to order my life by that word," 
 Mr. Burns interrupted. "But I have repudiated it; it is 
 treacherous and tyrannical. If you lay yourself out to be 
 consistent, every step you take is a stake set up marking 
 your boundaries; you will soon be completely hedged in. 
 You make to-day the governor of to-morrow, and so on 
 until you have narrowed your life down to the smallest 
 compass. Of all things in the world I hate constraint, 
 self-imposed or imposed by others." 
 
 " You are controlled by it more than any other man I 
 know," said Burr, coolly. 
 
 " No ; you mistake. Conscientiousness is not con- 
 straint. I hate a rule, but I believe in the law. No
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 41 
 
 man shall handcuff me with his opinions ; ' I'll not endure 
 it.'" 
 
 " Regarding this idea of consistency," said Burr. " It 
 is not necessary to carry it up into psychology ; we are 
 not governed by precedent in ethics as we are in logic." 
 
 They had arrived at the deacon's door and rung the 
 bell. Bridget appeared, smiling all over her comely, 
 Irish face, and ushered them into the parlor, which was 
 vacant. The young ladies, she said, were up-stairs getting 
 ready for church. 
 
 " Will you please say to the young ladies that Mr. 
 Courtenay and myself wish to accompany them to 
 church?" said Mr. Burns, with an assurance that Burr 
 chided him for when the girl's back was turned. 
 
 "What's the use mincing the thing? -they won't re- 
 fuse," said he, moving about and examining the pictures 
 on the walls. 
 
 "You might have put it more courteously," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. 
 
 The prismatic lamp was burning on the marble-topped 
 centre-table, and a comfortable fire glowed in the pol- 
 ished wood-stove. The room was very pretty, and had a 
 cosy, delightful air that young ladies of taste can give to 
 a pretty room. And these were young ladies of taste, 
 though perhaps not much beside. They were very well 
 bred and moderately educated, having spent a few terms 
 at an academy before coming West. They had accom- 
 plished but little in music. Miss Clyde played a few set 
 pieces, but never descended to jigs and hornpipes. And 
 Maggie, being of a housewifely turn, was given to chir- 
 ruping little snatches of old-fashioned song while going 
 about her work in dining-room and kitchen, and seldom 
 touched the piano, so that that beautiful instrument was 
 rather an uninteresting piece of furniture in the deacon's 
 parlor, being held in about the same respect as the tables 
 and chairs. The young ladies were unacquainted with 
 its wonderful resources, and the poor, cumbersome thing 
 passed unappreciated, like many another poor thing that 
 is pulsing with unheard music. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay seated himself luxuriously in a stuffed 
 rocking-chair, and Mr. Burns, who had a sort of in-
 
 42 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 stinctive, tender sympathy with all musical instruments, 
 though he had never cultivated their acquaintance much, 
 sat down to the piano and began playing softly, " Those 
 Evening Bells." 
 
 He was still drawing forth his little melody with a 
 delicate and dreamy touch, when the" young ladies' steps 
 came lightly down the stairs. The door opened, and 
 there was a rustling of silk, and the room was flooded 
 with a faint perfume and a presence. The latter be- 
 longed to Miss Clyde. Burr felt its magnetism, and 
 towered up grandly from the rocking-chair. 
 
 There was, of course, a general recognition all round, 
 but these two instantly absorbed each other. 
 
 Maggie, a little pale and tremulous, followed in Miss 
 Clyde's wake, and Mr. Burns's eyes, as he turned around 
 upon the piano-stool and stood up, sought her face. 
 
 Some eyes always have an earnest look whether they 
 mean it or not, and whether from depth of soul or depth 
 of color. Mr. Burns had such eyes, deep-set, glowing, 
 intense. 
 
 Maggie blushed under them, and thought, "Oh, surely 
 he does care for me!" and straightway suspended her 
 fixed resolution never to think of him again. 
 
 How could she help it? He was magnetic to her, he 
 thrilled her with an ecstatic delight in the very sound of 
 his voice and touch of his hand; even in the outlines of 
 his face and figure. He had once lent her a book from 
 the office, saturated with cigar-smoke, and Evelyn had 
 said, " Bah, how odious !" But to Maggie it was sweeter 
 than patchouly. It was a breath from the atmosphere in 
 which they lived. 
 
 "Is it time for church?" Mr. Courtenay asked. 
 
 "Nearly, I think," said Miss Clyde, seating herself, 
 and drawing on her gloves. 
 
 Mr. Burns resumed the piano-stool. 
 
 "You were playing?" said Miss Clyde. 
 
 No one would ever think her at a loss for words to carry 
 on a conversation. One rather suspected her of a good 
 deal of reserved force. She was quiet and stately, and 
 those qualities added to the idea of statuesqueness which 
 Burr admired in her.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 43 
 
 " I was drumming a little," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "Won't you sing us something before we go?" 
 
 " We have hardly time, have we?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, please !" said Maggie, with eloquent eyes. 
 
 Mr. Burns could not often be induced to make an ex- 
 hibition of himself; as he phrased it, but now he turned 
 around and touched the keys and sang with thrilling 
 pathos, " Come ye Disconsolate." 
 
 His voice had a rare, penetrating power, like his eyes. 
 When he had finished he arose abruptly, and took up his 
 hat. Maggie's eyelashes glistened with tears. 
 
 There was a general movement, and they started. Out- 
 side the gate Mr. Burns offered Maggie his arm, and walked 
 fast to avoid anything like sentiment. Burr and Miss 
 Clyde came on slowly, for the opposite reason. Not that 
 Miss Clyde was sentimental, she was rather matter-of- 
 fact, and not at all subject to fine emotion, except the 
 fine emotion of love. 
 
 The moon was shining, and hosts of glittering stars 
 were pointing earthward. 
 
 Mr. Burns descanted on the most unpoetical of sub- 
 jects : the bleakness of the prairies in winter, the fierce- 
 ness of the winds, and the probabilities of a milder season 
 than usual ; all of which topics were of general interest, 
 and could hardly fail of entertaining any young woman 
 who had the good of the country at heart ; and Maggie 
 answered, yes, the prairies were bleak, and the winds and 
 the winter storms were dreadful ; but the Indian summer 
 was beautiful, and sometimes it stretched to almost Christ- 
 mas (Maggie was an older resident than Mr. Burns), and 
 it was splendid to go nutting. 
 
 But, now and then, a little unconscious sigh fluttered 
 up, and Mr. Burns, glancing down, felt an impulse to 
 tuck the small gloved hand more snugly and warmly under 
 his arm. 
 
 It occurred to him that Maggie was a little paler than 
 usual, her cheeks seemed less rounded and rosy, and he 
 ventured to remark upon it, and asked if she were not 
 feeling well. 
 
 "I, not feeling well?" 
 
 The surprised brown eyes flashed up at him, brimming
 
 44 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 with shy tenderness in the moonlight, and a pink flush 
 spread itself over her face. There was a great deal of 
 prettiness about Maggie, the freshness and bloom of 
 youth. 
 
 "Oh, yes. I don't know what it is to be sick," she 
 said, and the long lashes drooped again on the peachy 
 cheeks. 
 
 Mr. Burns strode on a little faster. They were nearing 
 the place of worship. 
 
 High-Water-Mark had not yet advanced sufficiently in 
 religious and financial importance to erect church build- 
 ings, and so devout services were conducted every Sab- 
 bath morning and evening in the village school-house, 
 the only available place. 
 
 Two ministers of different and it might be added, in- 
 compatible denominations (though the ministers them- 
 selves were upon excellent terms with each other) preached, 
 on alternate Sundays, to about the same congregation. 
 
 A village school-house is apt to be an untidy and some- 
 what unhallowed place. This one was. But a janitor 
 had been employed by the several boards of trustees of 
 church matters to make a business of sweeping and dust- 
 ing, and arranging the humble furniture every Saturday 
 afternoon, with reference to the day following, thereby 
 sanctifying the profane edifice for religious exercises. The 
 seats were rude, notched, pencil-marked, and otherwise 
 marred and defaced. Notwithstanding, there were a few 
 aristocratic ladies including the ladies at Deacon Clyde's 
 who spread their elegant folds of silk and cashmere 
 upon them, and exhibited lovely bonnets in remarkable 
 bass-relief to the background of disreputable black-board 
 and dirty, whitewashed walls. 
 
 "I think we had better not wait for those two," said 
 Mr. Burns, glancing back as they reached the school- 
 house, and laying his hand on the door-knob. By chance 
 he seated Maggie and himself on the same bench with 
 Sarah Jenkins and her lover, who, it appeared, had come 
 to an amicable understanding. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay and Miss Clyde entered and took a back 
 seat. The back seats were usually left for the aristocracy, 
 but sometimes a number of ungodly boys got into them.
 
 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. 45 
 
 It was so upon this occasion, but they scuttled away, 
 speedily and with little noise, at the approach of "Lawyer 
 Courtenay." 
 
 Soon the minister and the elder entered, and marched 
 down the aisle, hats in hand and hands kid-gloved. The 
 minister, "poor fellow," as Mr. Burns had irreverently 
 called him, had assumed clerical dignity in the shape of 
 a long buttoned-up overcoat. 
 
 Mr. Burns speculated on the difference between running 
 over, in thin clothes, to poke the fires and trim the lights, 
 and marching in stately order and full equipment of heavy 
 garments to perform the solemn duties of the sanctuary. 
 
 The presiding elder was a man of fine appearance, with 
 a military suggestiveness in his clothes and bearing. He 
 was learned and eloquent, and was much praised and 
 admired ; though, perhaps, not well understood in his 
 finest passages and best declamation by the greater part of 
 his audience, but commanded all the more reverence for 
 that ; for it is true of our superstitious nature that what- 
 ever is a little mysterious to us commands our high regard. 
 That which comes down to a level with our understanding, 
 fails, in a measure, of our respect. Is this egotism or 
 modesty? I am inclined to the latter on behalf of this 
 congregation, for, surely, if they could go straight through 
 the elder's sermon, from beginning to end, it wouldn't be 
 much of a sermon ! I don't know but the Roman Catho- 
 lics are right with their Latin, after all ; there is policy in 
 it as regards poor, ignorant humanity. 
 
 The elder had selected for his text the remarkable dec- 
 laration, " Ye must be born again," and treated it in much 
 the usual manner. The discourse was not referred to on 
 the way back to the deacon's, but when the door had 
 closed upon the young ladies, Mr. Burns remarked, " It 
 struck me, to-night, what an extraordinary injunction that 
 is." 
 
 "The text?" asked Burr, who had the same thought in 
 his mind. 
 
 "Yes. What a subject if he could but have handled 
 it ! But what a subject to preach to that congregation I 
 One of the profoundest declarations in all Scripture." 
 
 "He simplified it, however," said Burr, smiling.
 
 46 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Yes, he simplified it as some of our hard words are 
 simplified by their no less hard definitions. Do you know, 
 Burr, I have heard but a very few sermons in my life that 
 did not outrage my feelings. Take this: The sins of the 
 fathers shall be visited upon the children. I have felt my 
 blood boil with indignation over sermons preached from 
 that text ; and yet, how just and perfect is the law when 
 we understand it ! If ministers could get behind this 
 literalism and bring to light the soul-life of these texts I 
 Every one of them is a rock which needs to be struck 
 with an Aaron-rod to make the living waters gush. They 
 preach ' Christ, and him crucified,' and every time they 
 do it they crucify us. Mankind will never imbibe real, 
 Christian principles merely through pity for Him who 
 suffered. We do not accept the fact that the earth is 
 round because Galileo was punished for declaring it. I 
 hold that I am a Christian myself, and that Christ is the 
 Saviour of mankind. His philosophy will stand the test 
 of all ages and remain the foundation of all goodness, 
 because it is truth. But I can never allow myself to be 
 classified with those who are technically called Christians. 
 They persist in offering sacrifice to Christ the Individual, 
 and I wish to found myself upon Christ the Principle. 
 The highest devotion is in observing and following the 
 teachings of those whom we would honor." 
 
 When they got back home, the fire had burned low and 
 the lamps were glimmering faintly. The law-office was 
 not a room or suite of rooms in a brick " block," or other 
 mammoth building, as is usual in more pretentious cities, 
 but was a little independent structure, with a bedroom 
 in the rear. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MR. BURNS was an early riser. That is, he was much 
 in advance of Mr. Courtenay in point of getting up. 
 
 The following morning being a sharp, bright November 
 morning, shortly after Jack Wilds, a lad employed about 
 the premises to make fires and bring in fuel, and feed and
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 47 
 
 curry the horse in the stable back of the office, had per- 
 formed these several duties and retired, he arose and un- 
 derwent his usual copious ablutions at the wash-stand ; 
 after which he applied an energetic brush to his hair, 
 which, it suddenly occurred to him, was getting rather 
 long, and, being of a curly nature, rather troublesome. 
 Then he went out into the office, took up his hat, flung 
 the before-mentioned blue cloak around him, and, with 
 his hand on the door-knob, called to Burr to get up and 
 come on, he was going to breakfast. It appeared to be a 
 mere matter of form, for, without waiting for a response, 
 he stepped out and proceeded down-street to the hotel, 
 and Burr slumbered on. 
 
 Breakfast over, he went into the barber-shop and got 
 his hair cut, and returned to the office and entered upon 
 his poem again with that vigor of thought and freshness 
 of spirit that come with a bracing air and a fair appetite 
 to the tolerably young. 
 
 Mr. Burns did not feel himself young ; it seemed to 
 him that he had been through everything, and was a good 
 deal bruised and cut up. But he still possessed the power 
 of throwing off his burdens now and then, and letting 
 himself up into a freer air. 
 
 He was still scratching away with zeal when Burr ap- 
 peared at the door of the little back-room, good-natured 
 and handsome as an Apollo, with his black hair brushed 
 back. 
 
 "Why didn't you call me, Charley?" he asked; and 
 that being his standing morning inquiry, Mr. Burns gave 
 it the customary answer without looking up. 
 
 "I did call you." 
 
 Burr returned, half skeptically, "I didn't hear you," 
 and went back to complete his toilet. 
 
 He presently came out with his great-coat buttoned up 
 to the chin, he took excellent care of himself, put on 
 his hat (not a silk hat, silk hats were at variance with 
 High-Water-Mark etiquette, except for the minister), and 
 then he went down to breakfast. 
 
 Upon his return, finding Mr. Burns still busily writing, 
 he inquired with sudden, renewed interest after the poem. 
 Since that night they had not mentioned it; Mr. Burns
 
 48 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 had felt a little indignant and Burr conscience-smitten. 
 That, however, was wearing off. 
 
 Mr. Burns held up an extended legal-cap sheet closely 
 written. 
 
 "What! have you written all that?" exclaimed Burr. 
 "Really, Charley, you are developing a surprising fac- 
 ulty." 
 
 "No; not developing, only exercising," said Mr. 
 Burns. " My faculties all came to light years ago. I am 
 not conscious of anything latent. Think I made as good 
 rhymes at fifteen as I do now." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay lit a cigar and took up a newspaper. 
 
 Mr. Burns, turning again to the desk, wrote on until 
 his poetic impulse was exhausted, and then came around 
 to the stove, disposed to talk. 
 
 "I wonder if the 'Comet' will be out to-day?" said 
 he. He referred to the local periodical. 
 
 Burr laid down his paper. " It is difficult to say ; the 
 ' Comet' is a luminary not to be depended on like the 
 fixed planets. It is, as its name implies, of a meteoric 
 character, appearing and disappearing at uncertain in- 
 tervals." 
 
 " Given its appearances I can calculate to a degree of 
 accuracy its disappearances," said Mr. Burns, with a laugh. 
 He used the "Comet" to rub the windows and lamp- 
 chimneys, it being printed on soft, pulpy paper, almost 
 as pliable as a rag, and rags were scarce. 
 
 Just while they were speaking the printer's boy came in 
 with a damp number of the " Comet" neatly folded. It 
 was a courtesy the editor always showed the attorneys, 
 sending their paper per express, instead of leaving it in 
 the post-office. 
 
 Mr. Burns signified the customary "thank you," and 
 the boy went out. 
 
 " Run over the locals," said Burr, "and see what has 
 been going on in the neighborhood." 
 
 Mr. Burns read a few items about the weather, Row 
 in the Lim'rick Settlement, Elopement in Winchester, 
 "man of fifty runs off with hired girl, leaving wife and 
 children." 
 
 "A striking commentary on the human affections,"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 49 
 
 said Burr ; " proves the truth of the poetic sentiment that 
 the heart never grows old." 
 
 "Here is a railroad item," said Mr. Burns. '"Re- 
 liable information.' Humph ! I have built too many 
 delusive hopes on reliable information respecting rail- 
 roads. ' ' 
 
 " Let's hear it," said Burr. 
 
 " ' P. and Q. R. R. Company intend, as soon as spring 
 opens, to begin work, and push through rapidly, on the 
 North-Western line.' " 
 
 " Which route, I wonder?" said Burr ; " though I sup- 
 pose they will .wait to determine that until they have 
 ascertained who will pay the greater bonus. Is that all 
 it says about it?" 
 
 " That is the gist of it ; the editor appends some re- 
 marks." 
 
 " Never mind the editor's remarks ; I hold them to 
 be worthless upon any subject," said Burr. 
 
 " What is the good of continually imposing upon the 
 people's credulity ?" exclaimed Mr. Burns, throwing the 
 paper aside. "The prospects for a railroad have been 
 just as brilliant ever since we came here as they are now." 
 
 "Good heavens, Charley ! have a little patience," said 
 Burr. "Everything can't be done in a day." 
 
 "Something might be accomplished in a lifetime," 
 Mr. Burns returned ; " if a man had a dozen lives it 
 would be different. But only one ! and that slipping out 
 of our grasp and we looking on quietly and letting it go." 
 
 Burr, apprehensive that his friend was bent on working 
 himself up into one of his gloomy states, bethought him 
 of the poem as a diversion, and requested to hear a few 
 more stanzas read. 
 
 Mr. Burns presently went to the desk and took out 
 his manuscript, and, ignoring the fact that his critic had 
 probably slept through the last dozen lines or so, began 
 where he had left off: 
 
 " Ev'n Shakspeare, woman's most gallant defender, 
 Who praised the sex as so gentle and tender, 
 And otherwise lovable, even he 
 Thought best with th' world on this point to agree ; 
 Lamenting th' frailty of woman, that she 
 Is th' definition of ' Inconstancy.' 
 c 5
 
 5 o HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " And how unjust that a person should be 
 Adjudged, alone, by what others may see, 
 Who see but the surface ! And then connect 
 As mathematicians cause and effect." 
 
 "Are you sure that last is an entirely original simile?" 
 asked Mr. Courtenay, interrupting. 
 
 "I could not swear to it," Mr. Burns admitted. "And 
 just here let me state, once for all, that very frequently a 
 thought glides off my pen that appears strangely familiar 
 to me, though I have no recollection of any previous 
 knowledge of it." 
 
 " Your position disarms criticism on the score of 
 plagiarism," said Burr, feeling that his office as critic 
 was becoming somewhat circumscribed. "However, it 
 only proves the truth of what I said some time back : 
 all paths are so trodden, and thought is so universal 
 upon all subjects that are thought about at all, that there 
 is no new thing to be said." 
 
 "Another thing that I have observed," said Mr. Burns, 
 " is, that when I take up a subject and think hard upon 
 it, and elicit as I flatter myself a new idea from it, I 
 immediately begin to see it floating about in current liter- 
 ature, showing that other minds have been busy with the 
 same thought." 
 
 "That is the result, Charley, of the uniform cultiva- 
 tion of mental soil. Each era in the public mind is 
 marked with some general cast of thought. And when 
 the people of any period bring their intellectual energies 
 to bear upon a given question (which the people of all 
 periods do), the natural deduction is that many of them 
 will develop the same ideas. Every man's thought is a 
 part of the capital stock of the age." 
 
 Mr. Burns fell into a speculative silence, which Burr 
 filled up with smoking. By and by he remarked, "What 
 we were speaking of a moment ago, Burr, our familiarity 
 with a new thought, as if we had known it before, in our 
 present consciousness, or in some pre-existent state " 
 
 " Pray don't found yourself on a pre-existent state, 
 Charley," Burr interrupted. "A future state is more 
 than many of us dare aspire to in this day of skepticism. 
 Though I have a theory," he added, speculatively, re-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 5 1 
 
 moving his cigar and blowing a slender column of smoke 
 upward and watching its ascent, "that this essence 
 which we call soul is simply the breath of the Infinite, 
 blown now upon this instrument, and now upon that. It 
 may be that this spirit within me has lived in a thousand 
 others before me, and will still go on living after me." 
 
 "Do you suppose," said Mr. Burns, "that there can 
 be a proper continuation of this life of ours if our per- 
 sonality is destroyed and our consciousness cut off? 
 Why, there is nothing of us but our consciousness ! If 
 a dew-drop loses its identity when it is sucked up by the 
 atmosphere and resolved into vapor, then I contend that 
 the dew-drop is absolutely destroyed. So with us. If a 
 man is to go through some change in which he loses his 
 former self, it seems to me that this immortality which 
 we so long for is no object to him, but merely to the 
 Power that wishes to perpetuate existence in these chang- 
 ing forms. What puppets we are ! Man's struggles are 
 vain. God rules over all ; it is his concern, not ours." 
 
 " Man's struggles, I suspect, are a part of God's plan," 
 said Burr. " I should like to be enlightened as to what 
 purpose they serve. Probably they belong to the refining 
 process. ' ' 
 
 "I wonder if it would be any satisfaction to us," said 
 Mr. Burns, "to account for all our grievances by believ- 
 ing that we thus help on toward some Higher Life which 
 though it might even be a sort of continuation and 
 refinement of our own we should yet have no actual 
 consciousness of." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay laughed. "All the way up from the 
 lowest insect," said he, " the animal creation are devour- 
 ing one another. The poor beasts that suffer death to feed 
 the lives of men have no realization of the importance of 
 their office, and I doubt its being any comfort to them 
 if they had. So, perhaps (though in a far higher and 
 finer sense), out of our miserable existence is extracted 
 some purified form of being that we have no more con- 
 ception of than the brute has of ours." 
 
 "That is what I am afraid of," said Mr. Burns. "If 
 I could but believe that throughout the eternal ages I 
 should still be I. Good God ! it seems to me a soul
 
 5 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 a living, absorbing, conscious soul is too precious a thing 
 to be dropped into oblivion ! That you, Burr (for in- 
 stance), with all your splendid accomplishments, with 
 your grand intellect, comprehending in its small but won- 
 derful space the wisdom of centuries, should drop into 
 the ground and become nothing !" 
 
 Burr shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "Don't be personal, Charley," said he; "it isn't 
 pleasant. By the way, I did not suppose you thought 
 this ' I' of so much consequence. I remember when we 
 were discussing a similar question the other evening, you 
 took the opposite side." 
 
 "It was not a similar question," said Mr. Burns; "I 
 meant then that I did not care for marked distinction 
 among my fellow-beings, that it was of little importance 
 where I was placed .in the body of humanity. In my re- 
 lation, as a human being, with the universe, I want to be 
 /. I don't want to be smothered out of sight." 
 
 After a little silence he took up the poem again. 
 
 " Let him who has never yet missed a bird 
 That he aimed at, give his honor's word, 
 If ev'ry result in life that he sees, 
 With th' motive beneath it exactly agrees ; 
 If the outer garb is as nicely refined 
 As th' beautiful warp and woof of th' mind. 
 
 " The artist paints, and his soul is on fire ; 
 And th' world stands by to applaud and admire. 
 Yet e'en in his triumph, for some hidd'n cause, 
 His soul is unsated with th' world's applause. 
 Still his hand and his brain are never at rest ; 
 Ah ! he knows that th' world has not seen his best. 
 There are finer gems in his artist-heart 
 Than any picture in the Halls of Art." 
 
 "That is quite true," interrupted Mr. Courtenay; ad- 
 ding, frankly, " and as trite as it is true, if you will allow 
 me to say so. Of course you express it very felicitously ; 
 but there has existed this vexatious fact in the mind of 
 genius ever since a human soul was born, that an ideal 
 can never be fully realized. A painting bears, of course, 
 about the same relation to the artist's conception as a por- 
 trait does to the original. And to him the artist it is 
 about as satisfactory as would be to you the photograph of
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 S3 
 
 the woman you love. The thousand varying shades of 
 the great conception like the emotions of the soul are 
 not portrayed. Only those who know the original can 
 see the likeness; also, only those who by inspiration, as 
 it were, or by kinship of soul, can make of the painting 
 a gate through which to enter the artist's realm of fancy, 
 can know the picture. The artist and none the less the 
 poet at best, but gives the world a photograph. Genu- 
 ine poetry is that which is lived ; that which is written is 
 but a description of it ; and those who write it most often 
 lack it in their lives ! A soul must give out life to some- 
 thing, or in something, as a tree gives out leaves and blos- 
 soms, and fruit, and germs for other trees. It is oftenest 
 seen in the social and domestic circles, of course; but 
 lacking this, or soaring beyond it, the inspiration of liv- 
 ing bursts through other channels, and we have poems, 
 and paintings, and sculpture, and music, that are neither 
 more nor less than souls photographed. And they are the 
 mirrors in which we may behold ourselves, the farthest 
 stretch of the possible in us,- so that we sometimes ex- 
 claim, I, too, am a poet, or a painter, or a sculptor. 
 Genius is not so rare a thing as we are inclined to think ; 
 the most of us have a spark of it hid away somewhere in 
 our nature. Many of us obscure mortals bound up re- 
 sponsive, as soon as the magnet is held over us, showing 
 that we have the faculty, if not the power, of genius. I 
 sit here in my dingy office, little and unknown, and read 
 Charles Sumner's speeches in the 'Tribune' and fancy my- 
 self as big a statesman as he. I may not be able to speak 
 as well as Sumner, or write as well as Emerson, and yet, 
 what these men, and other great minds, set forth, I may 
 feel to be the measure of myself. And what would these 
 men do without me to appreciate them ? The world will 
 advance through me as well as through them. We may 
 not all be able to keep up with our leaders, but the next 
 best thing is to follow close after them. It seems to me 
 that the worst thing in the world to contend with is stu- 
 pidity. It tears my heart, even at this day, to remember 
 Socrates." 
 
 "Allow me to ask," said Mr. Burns, who had been for 
 some time trying to sandwich a question between Burr's 
 
 5*
 
 54 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 rapid sentences, " if, laying aside his attempts, mis- 
 takes, and achievements, a man is as great as his best 
 thoughts?" 
 
 " You might as well ask if one would measure a river 
 when it is swollen with spring rains ! However, when you 
 come to bridging it, you have got to bridge above high- 
 water mark. You must judge an individual by his life 
 and character, the even flow of days and years. Still, 
 when you attempt to measure his capacity you must allow 
 for high tides ; for a man, as well as a river, may go out 
 of and beyond himself. Inspirational moments do not 
 materially affect the even tenor of our lives, but they 
 leave an impression always. Every soul that ebbs and 
 flows will mark high-tide on the borders of its life. But 
 go on with the reading, we have diverged." 
 
 Mr. Burns did not look upon himself as an inspired 
 writer; his poem was not a spontaneous effusion such as 
 Burr's aesthetic taste demanded, but a laborious under- 
 taking. 
 
 There was a time when he had felt a good deal of poetic 
 enthusiasm, but it proved itself to have been but the effer- 
 vescence of youthful hope, ardor, and ambition. Thou- 
 sands have experienced it, and drained it off like the 
 froth from champagne before life has fairly begun. 
 
 He continued : 
 
 " This conscious, mighty power of soul to feel, 
 Beyond man's utmost power to reveal, 
 Shows all the weakness and the strength of earth, 
 And proves the soul is of immortal birth. 
 
 " That point we reach where we cannot impart 
 What we feel, to another human heart, 
 Where the highest earthly intelligence 
 Stops, and no cunning trick of mortal sense 
 Can reveal to man what we might convey 
 To spirit, uncumbered with mortal clay, 
 Is the limit of earthly capacity, 
 The beginning of immortality. 
 
 " Here is the germ of everlasting life. 
 With which e'en savage, pagan hearts are rife ; 
 This longing after closer sympathy 
 Than friend can give, however dear he be. 
 
 " 'Twixt spirits there is (at least there must be) 
 A perfect and exquisite sympathy.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 5 5 
 
 Ev'n souls clay-embodied, and thus far concealed, 
 Are oftentimes to each other revealed, 
 In a measure. Oh, what rapture to feel 
 The power to know what sense cannot reveal ! 
 
 " It is this divine power through which we see 
 Something of love's most strange, sweet mystery. 
 And love, oh, love is a beautiful thing! 
 Perhaps it belongs but to Life's Young Spring ; 
 For so many hearts are withered and old, 
 And devoid of love, sear, desolate, cold. 
 
 " If once the sweet buds of promise sprung 
 About these cold hearts when they were young, 
 And were snatched, and ruined, and trampled on, 
 And the sad heart left with its pain alone, 
 Could it take up the ' burden of life' again, 
 And still live on, and outlive the pain? 
 Can one who has lost all the beauty of life 
 Still join in the world's hard battle and strife, 
 And grasp a pittance, "mid the noise and din, 
 Instead of the crown he had hoped to win? 
 Does life still go on when its zest is fled, 
 Or the soul still pulse when all hope is dead?" 
 
 " Do you propound these questions seriously, my dear 
 Charles?" Mr. Courtenay inquired. "Because it is not 
 right to look upon life in that desponding way. There 
 is no occasion for hope to die or life to lose its zest. I 
 maintain that every man is the arbiter of his own des- 
 tiny." 
 
 " Not flattering to either of us," said Mr. Burns, with 
 a bitter smile. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay continued: "If somebody knocks you 
 down, get up again ; the matter lies only between you and 
 him, and the world moves on. If circumstances go 
 against you, fight your way through them. Life is not 
 made very easy for any of us, I notice. I will tell you 
 where a thousand people fail ; they get themselves into a 
 groove too narrow for the contingencies of life, and when 
 disaster comes and cuts off their one resource, the one 
 little channel they have crowded their life into, they are 
 undone. I have known a score of men who, being 
 'Christians,' have quarrelled with their particular sect, 
 and gone out and straightway renounced their Christi- 
 anity, simply because their whole idea of religion was 
 embodied in a set of dogmatic principles laid down by a
 
 5 6 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 single church organization. The current of life within 
 us should be so broad and deep that the cutting off of 
 one or more of our little tributaries would never turn 
 the tide out of its course." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay ceased speaking, and when it appeared, 
 by his lighting a fresh cigar and beginning to smoke, that 
 he had no further remarks to offer, Mr. Burns resumed : 
 
 " Oh, the world has many a fatal dart 
 That but the world ignores a broken heart ! 
 Well, a broken purpose is all the same, 
 Or a life that has missed a noble aim ; 
 Or a ruined life that one can't reclaim. 
 A life or a limb may be broken and lame. 
 
 " Yet every dead hope will mem'ry outlast, 
 And th' heart remain true to youth's beautiful past. 
 Love lies far beneath all the outer strife, 
 Has chiefly to do with one's inner life. 
 I mean that rare, delicate sentiment 
 That fills the soul with a sweet discontent ; 
 And not that regard of a coarser cast, 
 That is knocked about in every blast 
 Of temper that one's dearest friends may show ; 
 'Tis a different kind of love, you know, 
 ' A sensitive plant, a floweret rare, 
 
 To be petted and nurtured with tender care. 
 Oh, exquisite love ! But its fatal sting 
 Can wither a soul to a lifeless thing." 
 
 " I don't know that I quite follow you," Mr. Courtenay 
 interrupted. "The poetry is very nice, but I can with 
 difficulty distinguish between your true sentiments and 
 your irony." 
 
 " I can with difficulty distinguish between them my- 
 self," said Mr. Burns. "I am a mystery to myself, I am 
 full of contradictions." 
 
 " Perhaps we may set you down, then, as a philosopher 
 who sees all sides," said Mr. Courtenay, facetiously. 
 
 Mr. Burns went on : 
 
 " But the picture of life has two sides, of course ; 
 We look to the sensible world t' endorse 
 The plainer side, the more practical view, 
 Seen from a point not romantic, but true. 
 
 " To judge from this practical side 'twould seem 
 That love, after all, is only a dream !
 
 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. 57 
 
 Yet th' world will agree that the dream is sweet. 
 And that earth is heaven when lovers meet ; 
 Ay, that love is life, complete and whole, 
 The divinest dream of a poet's soul. 
 That a woman's life down that pearly stream 
 Would be sweeter still than a poet's dream. 
 Ay, sweeter far, and her heart is leal, 
 And true to the dream, but 
 
 ' Life is real.' 
 
 Some other considerations, you know, 
 Must be taken into account ; and so, 
 Tho' th' heart be faithful, and loyal, and true, 
 Why, perhaps, after all, it wouldn't do 
 To be rash in the matter, or as it would seem 
 Sacrifice everything else to a dream. 
 Don't rashly declare her love has decreased, 
 Or that she's inconstant, ' to say the least;' 
 Or drink to woman's ' frailty' a toast, 
 She is only prudent, to say the most. 
 
 " Twixt love and the world there's many a strife, 
 The world having all the substantials of life; 
 And love, though the very charmingest elf, 
 Too often has naught to bestow but himself." 
 
 "Quite true," said Burr; "sentiment is frequently at 
 variance with the practical concerns of life." 
 
 " Who would venture to sea with no visible boat 
 Launched on the tide to keep him afloat ? 
 Yet thousands embark on this stream of love, 
 Nor ask if th' voyage may a safe one prove. 
 All alike with hope's joyous wreaths bedecked, 
 And happy, but, ah ! some one may be wrecked, 
 And thrown back upon the deserted strand, 
 Not drowned, but powerless ever to land 
 Again. What a terrible risk to run, 
 The risking of life when life's just begun ! 
 
 " The uncertain future no seer can foretell ; 
 The maiden but ponders the question well. 
 She takes in her hand the withered flower 
 In the last fluttering, changeful hour, 
 And its sweet voice pleads and her eyes grow dim, 
 And her heart turns wistfully back to him. 
 To him the loved one, the loved and lost, 
 For she has already counted the cost, 
 And given him up. 
 
 But a sigh of regret 
 
 Breathes th' heart's allegiance, she cannot forget. 
 ' I loved him,' she says ; ' but, ah ! it would seem 
 That after all it was but Love's Young Dream.' 
 C*
 
 5 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Yet love's young dream, strangely blended with truth 
 In the very uncertain woof of youth, 
 Is, even in one's advancing life, 
 When one is a tranquil, contented wife, 
 Serene in life's placid, calm September, 
 A very beautiful dream to remember." 
 
 " It is so," said Mr. Courtenay, through his little cloud 
 of smoke, with half-unconscious emphasis. " What ! have 
 you finished?" 
 
 Mr. Burns had collected his sheets together and laid 
 them on the desk. 
 
 " Yes," said he ; "I have run aground. I shall have to 
 wait for a fresh impetus and a stiff breeze to fill my sails." 
 
 "I hope they will be forthcoming," Mr. Courtenay 
 returned. "I was becoming deeply interested. I am 
 anxious to know how it terminated with the youth. I 
 suspect, however, the aroma of ' love's young dream' 
 hardly lingered about the silken curl so long as about the 
 forget-me-not." 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 MR. BURNS had been employed by Deacon Clyde to 
 negotiate for some town lots he wished to purchase of a 
 non-resident. He got the matter arranged, and said to 
 Mr. Courtenay one evening, 
 
 " I think I will walk up to the deacon's and settle this 
 business," having the papers in his hand. "Will you go 
 with me?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay declined. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "I thought, Charley," said he, looking up quizzically 
 from a German paper he was perusing, " that you had cut 
 yourself off and wished to cut me off from going to the 
 deacon's for fear of injury to the young ladies' affections?" 
 
 "The young ladies," returned Mr. Burns, "are out of 
 the question in this instance ; our business is with the 
 deacon."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 59 
 
 "You are very transparent, Charley," said Mr. Cour- 
 tenay. " I see you are not averse to meeting the young 
 ladies; all you wish to avoid is the responsibility of ap- 
 pearing to seek them. So you smooth away the difficulty 
 with those town lots." 
 
 "Of course," returned Mr. Burns, warmly, "I am not 
 such an egotistic fool as to suppose our bare presence and 
 social contact will tell very heavily upon the young ladies. 
 There is no harm in meeting them, the harm is in giving 
 them to think we care for them in a particular way." 
 
 "Well, go on," said Burr, resuming his paper; "you 
 have got a fair excuse, make use of it." 
 
 There happened to be company at the deacon's. Mr. 
 Burns, armed with his deeds and titles, was ushered into 
 the parlor and introduced to the Rev. Mr. Kirkwood 
 (the Calvinistic minister), his wife, and his wife's nephew, 
 a young Dr. Webster just arrived from the East and newly 
 fledged from a medical college. A worthy young fellow 
 he subsequently proved himself to be, though just now a 
 little offensive to Mr. Burns because of a certain perfume 
 of " Eastern" style and fashion that hung about him, and 
 that is always more or less disagreeable to Western nostrils. 
 
 " He'll soon get that taken out of him !" was our cyn- 
 ical attorney's mental reflection. 
 
 The doctor had come West to establish himself in his 
 profession. Mr. Burns's first momentary sensation was 
 chagrin at finding himself in such presence, and he was 
 tempted to beat a retreat. But, being very cordially re- 
 ceived (the minister and the deacon both standing up to 
 shake hands with him), he gradually expanded. He was 
 extremely susceptible to the influence of a warm social 
 atmosphere. 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood, by whom he found himself seated after 
 the greetings and introductions, turned to him a refined, 
 intelligent face, and launched at once into conversation, 
 which turned finally upon the contrasts of East and West. 
 
 Mr. Burns took up warmly for the West, and quoted a 
 little poetry upon it, which he said his friend Courtenay 
 had composed once in an inspired moment, standing 
 upright in a carriage and sweeping his eyes over a vast 
 sea of tall, undulating grass. The only rhythm, he ex-
 
 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 .plained, apologetically, that he ever knew Mr. Courtenay 
 to perpetrate : 
 
 " There are many who can boast of a land of milder air, 
 Where bright birds sing more sweetly, and where flowers bloom more 
 
 fair; 
 
 Of green hills and snow-capped mountains, but, oh ! I love the best 
 The pebbly streams, wood-bordered, and the prairies of the West." 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood smiled constrainedly, having a deep- 
 seated prejudice against the unchristian author of the 
 rhyme. 
 
 Both the attorneys, in fact, had a general reputation 
 for skepticism in religious matters that precluded friendly 
 advances on the part of conscientious church people, 
 though Mr. Burns, it was believed, was the less dangerous 
 of the two. 
 
 "Yes," Mrs. Kirkwood said, "one wouldn't forget to 
 mention the prairies ; one's whole idea of the West is that 
 it is a great, vague expanse, with little more to be seen than 
 is seen from the deck of a vessel in mid-ocean." 
 
 " Well," returned Mr. Burns (it was noticeable that Mr. 
 Burns defended the land of his adoption to everybody 
 except his friend Courtenay), " I like to be impressed 
 with the vastness of things. I like the idea of expansion, 
 it agrees with my theology. So much is said about 
 mounting up, I want to widen out. I want to get where 
 nothing, not even a church-spire, obstructs my view." 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood glanced up suspiciously, and met his 
 frank, straightforward blue eyes smiling at her. She 
 replied literally and a little stiffly that she preferred the 
 picturesque and cultivated to the bleak and barren. 
 
 "Oh, certainly, as a matter of taste," said Mr. Burns, 
 " a prairie landscape would be nothing to speak of in the 
 way of beauty. But after I had been here long enough 
 to become accustomed to the prairies I went back East to 
 the place where I was born. I had no personal recollec- 
 tion of it, my parents having come westward when I was 
 but a few years old. I had the excuse of a little business 
 for going, and I naturally wanted to see the skies my eyes 
 first opened on. Well, it seemed to me that the whole 
 valley of the Shenandoah wasn't big enough to hold me.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 6 1 
 
 It cramped me, made me near-sighted ; I had to hurry back 
 to get a long breath and a clear sweep of vision. I tell 
 you, madam, we Westerners are cosmopolitans ; there is 
 nothing local or small about us. We don't cling forever 
 to old prejudices, we advance." 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood looked up with a flash of her intelligent 
 eyes, and a sudden determination to explore the danger- 
 ous ground of his "opinions" and perhaps air her own 
 in the broad scope his mind seemed to present. She had 
 always regarded him, as well as Mr. Courtenay, with a 
 good deal of distrust. But his face, now that she had 
 for the first time got near enough to him to see something 
 of what was in it, disarmed her. She felt that between 
 herself and him existed a bond of congeniality, and that, 
 though they belonged to the separate ranks of two op- 
 posing forces, they might set up a flag of truce and 
 become personal friends. 
 
 " If you do not cling to old prejudices you have adopted 
 some strong modern ones," said she. Mr. Burns raised 
 his eyebrows, smiling, and glad to have her defend her 
 side. " Your ' broad views,' " she went on. 
 
 " What ! you think my broad views are only prejudice ?" 
 
 "I think every man has a set of opinions," she re- 
 turned ; " and if they are prejudice in one instance, why 
 not in another? Your idea of expansion is opposed to 
 some other person's idea of contraction ; then, are you 
 any more liberal than your neighbor? He cannot take 
 in what you see ; you cannot take in what he sees. Where 
 is the difference between you?" 
 
 "Why, the difference is here," said Mr. Burns: "I 
 try to examine all things ; he is too proud, or too preju- 
 diced, or too cautious- even to take them up and look at 
 them." 
 
 " If one takes them up it is not easy to drop them 
 again," said Mrs. Kirkwood, quickly. "Have you not 
 found that true," she asked, " of many persons you have 
 interested yourself in, as well as of many ideas you have 
 examined ?" 
 
 "Yes," said he; " but what of that ? Shall we draw 
 ourselves up like a turtle in its shell for fear of touching 
 something unpleasant and that will stick to our fingers ? 
 
 6
 
 6 2 HIGH WA TER-MARK. 
 
 I want to get out of my shell and look about me. You 
 orthodox Christians, it seems to me, madam, labor too 
 much under the superstition that the world is full of snares 
 and pitfalls and enemies. You .collect together in your 
 strong castles, your creeds and churches, and peer out 
 through your little loop-holes on a world of sin and de- 
 pravity round about. You are tender-hearted and gen- 
 erous, full of kindness and compassion, eager to succor 
 and to save. You stand at all the portals, in all the dan- 
 gerous places, hooking in poor, perishing sinners, and 
 gathering them into the shelter of your strong walls. 
 Why not level them down, and stand out boldly, fear- 
 lessly, upon this green, beautiful earth God Himself has 
 made! You don't get near enough to humanity; you 
 don't let humanity get near enough to you. My dear 
 madam, it is your walls, in a thousand instances, that 
 divide God's people from each other ! We mortals are 
 only divided by walls of one kind or another anyhow 
 of our own building. We are all His children." 
 
 Mr. Burns's blue eyes were eloquently lighted up. It 
 was a favorite theme of his, this thought that God was 
 the tender Father of all, ungiven to favoritism. 
 
 "You accuse me of having my one point of view, like 
 the others," he continued, but Mrs. Kirkwood interrupted 
 him, -with a smile and a blush, 
 
 " Pray don't take the accusation personally ; I am driven 
 to making that broad assertion. I should be skeptical 
 of humanity if I disbelieved it, it would prove men to be 
 so dishonest. As it is, when I see people opposing one 
 another it is my comforting argument that they all have 
 different stand-points and are true to their convictions." 
 
 "You are very liberal, then," said Mr. Burns, looking 
 at her with his expansive smile, and thinking he under- 
 stood her better than she understood herself, harnessed as 
 she was to her creed and dogmas. 
 
 " No, not liberal according to your definition of the 
 word," she returned; "all I dare profess is a little 
 charity." 
 
 "You only keep the old word, that is all the differ- 
 ence," said he. 
 
 "I sometimes think those people are the happiest,"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 63 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood said, "who really and honestly see but 
 one side." 
 
 "And you are not one of those?" said he, a little quiz- 
 zically. " Well, why should you try to be? You said a 
 moment ago, one could not easily drop an idea he had 
 taken up to examine; an idea is only hard to drop when 
 we find a truth in it. Why not live up to our discoveries ? 
 Our lives are perfect in as far as they agree with the light 
 we have." 
 
 Turning his eyes at this moment, Mr. Burns took in 
 what was going on elsewhere in the room. Dr. Webster 
 was giving the young ladies a graphic account of his trip 
 westward. He was a vivacious talker, and they at least 
 Maggie seemed highly entertained. 
 
 There was a hungry, restless look in Evelyn's eyes which 
 he had often observed when Burr was not present. That, 
 more than her manner toward Mr. Courtenay, proved how 
 much she cared for him. 
 
 In Maggie's simple nature there was a vein of coquetry, 
 and the situation was highly agreeable to her. She liked 
 Dr. Webster's evident admiration of herself even while 
 her heart was beating high at the proximity of Mr. Burns. 
 And the innocent little double-dealer scarcely lost a word 
 either of them said ! 
 
 Mr. Burns thought he had never seen her looking so 
 well ; so white, and red, and bright-eyed. 
 
 Mrs. Kirkwood perceiving his divided attention, allowed 
 the conversation to drop, and glanced around with deli- 
 cacy, to see if there were not some opening she could 
 glide into and so leave him to join the young people. 
 
 But Mrs. Clyde had stepped out of the room for a mo- 
 ment, and the deacon and the minister were afloat upon 
 politics, that wonderfully seductive stream to the masculine 
 heart. So she remained where she was, and Mr. Burns, 
 being a little disgusted with the doctor's animation, pres- 
 ently turned toward her again. 
 
 " How do you like Western society?" he asked, having 
 it in his mind that Weste/n society was a rather loose in- 
 stitution when a young fellow with a glib tongue and a 
 handsome face could step right into the best of it upon a 
 mere introduction, through relatives who probably knew
 
 64 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 nothing of his private character, as this Dr. Webster was 
 doing. 
 
 "We can hardly be said to have any, can we?" said 
 Mrs. Kirkwood, smiling. "We have hardly organized 
 ourselves yet." 
 
 "Well, who is responsible?" said he. "It seems to 
 me we all have a duty in this respect, the elements of so- 
 ciety are in us if they are anywhere ; why don't we go 
 to work? Of course," he added, a little sadly, having 
 reference to his own and Mr. Courtenay's solitary lives 
 and not to the young doctor, " we fellows who have no 
 anchorage in home or family can't do anything. Don't 
 you think, madam, we are the natural proteges of society, 
 and ought to be taken better care of?" 
 
 Mr. Burns had a winsomeness that went straight to the 
 feminine and especially the matronly heart. 
 
 "Indeed I do," said Mrs. Kirkwood. "You make 
 me ashamed that we have been so remiss." 
 
 She inwardly resolved upon a different course of action 
 in the future. 
 
 Mrs. Clyde came in presently, and sat down and began 
 saying something which did not particularly interest or 
 concern Mr. Burns, and he got up and crossed over to the 
 centre-table, took up a late magazine (the deacon's young 
 ladies affected first-class literature), and, seating himself 
 on the sofa, began turning the leaves. 
 
 Maggie, mindful of a hostess's duties, excused herself 
 from the doctor and Evelyn, and went over and placed 
 herself beside him with a half-shy, half-coquettish air. 
 He was looking at a poem by Whittier. 
 
 "Have you read this?" said he, and without raising 
 his eyes for an answer, he had long ago taken the meas- 
 ure of Maggie's literary capacity, and found her not much 
 above milk-and-water novels, began and read the poem 
 through. 
 
 When he had finished, Maggie looked up brightly. 
 
 " I have heard that before !" she exclaimed. 
 
 "Indeed?" 
 
 "Yes; Eva and I were visiting at N City last 
 
 week, I suppose you did not know?" 
 
 "Yes; I heard you were away."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 65 
 
 " Well, we heard a dramatic reader there, a Miss 
 Stuvysant. Oh, you ought to have heard her read this 
 poem !" 
 
 Mr. Burns shoved the work back to its place on the 
 table. 
 
 "What else did she read, Poe's 'Raven' ? " said he, 
 with a slight curve of his lip. 
 
 "No, she didn't read that, but she read 'Hiawatha.' 
 I never could see anything in that before, but a queer 
 jingle, jingle." 
 
 " And what did she make of it?" 
 
 "A gentleman who was with us said she made/^/ry 
 of it." 
 
 " Indeed? Longfellow would be glad of that. What 
 is this Miss Stuvysant like, strong and masculine?" 
 
 " Oh, no ! rather small and delicate. Everybody said 
 her voice had wonderful ' depth' and ' compass' for so 
 slight a creature. Her face looked like creamy-white 
 lilies, and her eyes were large and dark, and seemed 
 sometimes to have a far-off look, like like Evan- 
 geline's." 
 
 A steel-engraving of that pathetic heroine, hanging in 
 a small oval frame above the piano, had caught Maggie's 
 eye and suggested the comparison. 
 
 "I heard some one say," she continued, "that she 
 must have had a world of experience to be able to enter 
 so passionately into the grand things she read ; and 
 somebody else answered, ' Humph ! that is the power 
 of genius, not experience." ' 
 
 So she prattled on, parrot-like; and Mr. Burns, with 
 his elbow on the arm of the sofa, and his hand shading 
 his eyes, looking at her, fell to thinking : " Of all poems, 
 and pictures, and dreams, is not this the sweetest ? This 
 fresh, beautiful life in its dewy morning ; the bright 
 cheeks, the sparkling eyes, the radiant brow with its 
 shining, waving hair?" 
 
 There is a charm in youth and bloom and innocent 
 unworldliness that touches a tender chord in a man's 
 nature. Mr. Burns felt the exquisitely sweet vibration, 
 and knew that if he put out his hand this beautiful thing, 
 with all its life and loveliness, might be his. 
 
 6*
 
 66 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Maggie looked up presently, and threw a bomb-shell 
 into the dreamy current of his thoughts. " There's going 
 to be a dance next week !" 
 
 Mr. Burns started and, looking into the bright eyes 
 she flashed up at him, repeated, mechanically, "A dance 
 next week?" But his thought arrested, asked, "What 
 sort of a poem is it, the ' Morning' with its ' rosy 
 fingers' and ' pearly dews' ? What will be left of those 
 bright eyes and glowing cheeks, the fair brow and shining 
 hair, but husks after they have faded !" 
 
 To Maggie the most delightful break in the monotony 
 of life was a ball. She prattled on about it, and Mr. 
 Burns only half listened. He glanced at his watch pres- 
 ently and said he must go. 
 
 " Oh, don't hurry !" said Maggie. " It is not late." 
 
 Mrs. Clyde came forward, and said they were just going 
 to have some refreshments, and he must stay. 
 
 " Pray, excuse me," said he, in the formal manner he 
 and Mr. Courtenay were both in the habit of assuming, 
 and which was the result, probably, of their mingling so 
 little in general society. "I have an engagement which 
 cannot very well be neglected. I merely came in to see 
 Mr. Clyde on a matter of business. Perhaps you will 
 step into the office in the course of a day or two?" 
 turning to the deacon, who assented, but began a strong 
 protest against his early leave-taking, so that he had to 
 make his excuses over again. When he had finally got 
 clear of them all and bowed himself out, and the door 
 closed behind him, he directed his steps rapidly toward 
 the river and away from the village. 
 
 " It is true, as Mrs. Kirkwood said !" he ejaculated. 
 " We have no society here, and I doubt whether we even 
 have the elements. What could convert Deacon Clyde's 
 young ladies into grand and interesting women, such as 
 I know there are somewhere in the world ? Education ? 
 They have a little of that, but I don't see that it goes any 
 deeper than the surface, etiquette, polite language, and 
 a rather refined style of dress and manner. Evelyn 
 Clyde is a fine piece of statuary, with just soul enough 
 to worship a brilliant man, without in the least compre- 
 hending the talents, education, and accomplishments
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 6 7 
 
 that make him so. But, after all, it seems to me, Burr 
 sees no farther than she does ; neither goes below the 
 other's dazzling surface. He no more perceives her shal- 
 lowness than she sounds his depths. If they marry, they 
 will marry on the basis of a dream, that will flee away, 
 and leave them strangers and aliens to each other. I 
 remember" (and Mr. Burns's thoughts went back a great 
 way) " how I, a man, was first captivated by the per- 
 sonal splendor, brilliancy, and eloquence of brave Cap- 
 tain Courtenay. And to-day I do not prize him for a 
 single one of the qualities that charmed me then, though 
 he still possesses them, and is still admired on account 
 of them. I have taken hold of him by a stronger grasp 
 than admiration, I have founded a friendship and a belief 
 in him that his very faults cannot shake ; albeit I do not 
 like his faults. And it seems to me that the ' love of man 
 and woman' is not so different from ordinary warm affec- 
 tion and esteem, but that a woman would have to find 
 some of the same sterling qualities in Burr that I have 
 found to be able to love him as well. I can think of no 
 more damning misfortune than to marry a woman to be 
 taken into one's very innermost life who can't compre- 
 hend, after she has entered it, the holy of holies. Heavens, 
 what a desecration ! I want my whole nature to expand 
 and blossom in the light and love of the soul I unite with 
 mine. Miss Clyde would undoubtedly pierce through 
 Burr's dazzling surface, for a small needle has a sharp 
 point ; but I doubt if she could ever go much deeper 
 than his faults." 
 
 All this of Burr and Miss Clyde ; then his thoughts 
 turned to Maggie. And what was Maggie but a school- 
 girl, who, being a woman grown, was considered a woman 
 finished. Her education had stopped, except as years and 
 experience would teach her to be dextrous and econom- 
 ical in household affairs, perhaps patient and matronly 
 and full of neighborly kindness ; for Maggie was amiable 
 and industrious, and had strong natural feelings and affec- 
 tions, even if she had not the power of growth in other 
 directions. As far as she went, certainly she was all he 
 could ask. But he felt the need of a subtler companion- 
 ship, intellectual, moral, spiritual. If he could not find
 
 68 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 a being who embodied his whole idea of wife, why, then, 
 he would not marry. Love, so often said to be incidental 
 in a man's life, he felt to be essential if he married in 
 his, as food for a part of his nature, like knowledge for 
 the mind and religion for the soul, the supreme thing, 
 permeating all the rest. " Love is not simply a snare to 
 entrap us into matrimony," he thought; "its chimes 
 should ring down the whole journey of life, and strike 
 as sweetly more powerfully upon the ears of seventy 
 than of seventeen." 
 
 Gradually his mind went back over a sweep of years, 
 and he wondered what sort of woman had developed out 
 of the little girl he had once believed that he loved. His 
 memory, at least, was loyal to her virtues and her intel- 
 ligence. He knew that she possessed a soul above the 
 grovelling things of earth. Perhaps she was a grand 
 woman now, nobly rounded and perfected. He won- 
 dered, vaguely, if she might not have power to charm 
 him again if they should happen to meet in some of the 
 crooked by-paths of life. The thought thrilled him. He 
 would be glad if she could ; it was very sweet to love 
 and to be loved. Then Maggie Atherton's pretty face 
 came up again, as faces will come in dreams, with its 
 shy, bright eyes. 
 
 After all, people are strikingly affected by sense. It 
 is the actual presence, contact, personal magnetism, that 
 creates (and in most cases holds) the subtle, sweet emo- 
 tion we call love. The absent for long years can have 
 but little influence, however admired, esteemed, revered, 
 compared with one who is present and can wield some 
 personal attraction. Could she charm him again ? Alas, 
 how ? since time and separation have swept away all the 
 sweet influences of her presence and personality, and 
 made her no longer the object of an active affection, 
 which needs the daily bread of daily sight and touch and 
 companionship to keep it aflame. Loved still, perhaps, 
 with a softened tenderness like that we feel for those 
 long dead and at intervals forgotten. 
 
 It was starlight and clear when he began his brisk walk 
 and meditations. The road which he travelled led him 
 into a strip of woodland skirting the river.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 69 
 
 He was presently aware of a lulling sound in the tree- 
 tops, and looking up, saw detached, ragged-edged clouds 
 scudding across the sky and gathering darkly in the 
 west. 
 
 He turned about to retrace his steps. Near the edge 
 of the village stood a rude, dismantled fort, which the 
 early pioneers had erected as a sort of protection against 
 marauding bands of Indians in the neighborhood. 
 
 Coming near to this old fort, Mr. Burns espied, in the 
 shadow of the wall, the figure of a man walking before 
 him slowly in the same direction. 
 
 It was unmistakably the figure of Burr Courtenay; 
 there could not be another form like that, with such 
 graceful, gliding motion. Clinging to his arm the arm 
 next the wall was a woman. 
 
 Mr. Burns stopped, confounded. 
 
 What woman, not Miss Clyde, surely? 
 
 Miss Clyde ! preposterous ! This woman was short ; 
 Burr bent his head to talk to her. 
 
 She was enveloped in a large waterproof cloak ; he 
 could see its heavy folds flapping in the wind, and the 
 huge frill of the uncomely hood gathered about her face 
 as she turned it toward her companion. 
 
 Suddenly, out from a break in the wall, sprang another 
 figure in front of these two, the figure of a man with a 
 gun upon his shoulder. 
 
 " Drop that girl's arm this instant, sir ! or I'll blow the 
 villain's heart out o' ye !" he exclaimed, and levelled the 
 gun at Burr's breast. 
 
 Unlike most women in similar circumstances, this woman 
 stood mute and motionless. 
 
 Burr also stopped, but did not drop the arm as com- 
 manded. 
 
 " I was not aware you had any claims upon this young 
 lady, sir ; if so, I beg your pardon ; but presume it is 
 optional with her to remain under my protection or go 
 with you. The latter, it seems, would be the safer, see- 
 ing you go armed in this dreary neighborhood." 
 
 He glanced around and shrugged his shoulders with 
 inimitable, good-natured contempt. 
 
 One thing Mr. Burns observed, that, though he was
 
 70 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 not in the least moved by the man's angry threat, he gave 
 the woman no encouragement to cling to him. 
 
 " Your protection !" exclaimed the man, half suffocated 
 with anger, and took off his hat and wiped his forehead 
 with the cuff of his coat-sleeve. After a short and hard 
 struggle with himself he added, in a changed voice, that 
 was both dogged and pathetic, "You're right; I haven't 
 no claim on her; but neither have you." 
 
 "Then, as I remarked, the matter is at the lady's op- 
 tion," said Burr. "We are not far from the spot where 
 I accidentally met her, and I should have proposed seeing 
 her home if you had not so opportunely appeared. I 
 presume, notwithstanding your incivility to me, you would 
 be a safe enough escort for her." 
 
 The man, again clinching his hands with anger, hissed 
 out, " A safe escort ! You to call me a safe escort !" 
 
 He turned to the girl. "Are you going with him or 
 are you coming with me?" he demanded, with both de- 
 fiance and pleading in his voice. 
 
 The girl raised her eyes imploringly Mr. Burns thought 
 to her companion's face, and then with a quick gesture 
 of despair, or anger, or what not, dropped his arm, and 
 Mr. Courtenay, with an inclination of his handsome per- 
 son that had the finest touch of mockery in it, walked on 
 and left the two standing face to face. 
 
 One instant the man turned and looked after him, 
 the splendid military figure moving off through the silence 
 and dim light, grasped his weapon and muttered some- 
 thing between his shut teeth, then threw it across his 
 shoulder and offered the girl his arm. 
 
 She ignored it disdainfully ; but they turned together 
 and came in the direction of Mr. Burns, and were careless 
 about keeping in the shadow of the wall ; the faint star- 
 light shone in their faces. 
 
 Mr. Burns crouched back farther into the darkness as 
 they passed on. 
 
 The girl was Sarah Jenkins, the old man's " Sary Ann" ; 
 her companion, Jim Sites. 
 
 No need to keep in the shadow of the wall now ! She 
 might walk with that man half the night and nothing 
 come of it but a village jest.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 7 i 
 
 How different to be found walking with Burr Cour- 
 tenay ! 
 
 Mr. Burns could not help hearing the conversation, 
 which, for a time, was a monologue carried on by the 
 man. 
 
 "So you've forgot your promise a'ready, Sally." 
 There was wonderful pathos in the rough voice. " You 
 said you wouldn't have nothing more to do with 'em, 
 after we'd made up. As to Mr. Burns, it's proved to my 
 mind that he's purty much of a gentleman. But this one, 
 Sally, this one's a grand rascal. Maybe I've got you rid 
 of him now; he wouldn't like to have a bullet put into 
 him, if he ain't no coward. They say he was a good 
 soldier and a good officer, and served all through the war, 
 and fur that I wouldn't like to harm him. I just wanted 
 to put him out o' your way, Sally. 'Twa'n't on my own 
 account, neither, for I mean this to be the end of it. 
 Since you don't care for me, Sally, I won't trouble you 
 no more. But you keep clear o' Lawyer Courtenay, Sally, 
 keep clear o' him. He ain't your kind. Not that you 
 ain't good enough fur enny of 'em, and smart enough, 
 too. But all sich fellows as them cares fur is to amuse 
 themselves making love to every pretty girl as comes in 
 their way." 
 
 His words penetrated to the girl's womanhood. " Did 
 he not tell you himself that we met here simply by acci- 
 dent?" she demanded, compelled to put away the rigid 
 pride she had assumed and defend herself. 
 
 "And what does that signify, Sally?" returned her 
 lover, glad to have touched her. " Couldn't he have let 
 you go your way an' him go his'n? What does he give 
 you his arm fur, an' go promenadin' up an' down this old 
 wall as sentimental like as if you was engaged ?" 
 
 " What business is it of yours, anyhow, if I choose to 
 walk with a gentleman?" the girl exclaimed, angrily, a 
 round red spot coming into each white cheek. 
 
 She was ambitious, poor thing ! and vain. She saw no 
 reason why she should not aspire to win for a husband one 
 of the dazzling attorneys if others did. She consciously 
 felt herself to be superior in intellect, at least, to the 
 young ladies on the hill, whose manner toward her was
 
 7 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 marked by a gracious condescension that was exceedingly 
 exasperating. Why was she not as good as Evelyn Clyde, 
 or that doll-faced Maggie? Why was it, my discriminat- 
 ing reader ? She had a broader and deeper nature than 
 either of those damsels. She had a sharper intelligence, 
 a bette.r education, and even a richer beauty. But she 
 lacked some subtle quality, or was it a quality? Per- 
 haps it was simply the toning-down of all the qualities, a 
 something which in music is the "touch," in painting 
 the " tints" and "shading," the fineness of expression. 
 
 "You began with being jealous of Mr. Burns," she 
 continued, rapidly. "Because he gave me a bunch of 
 wild-flowers once that he had gathered in the woods, and 
 because he took me up in his buggy one day when I had 
 walked out to Aunt Jane's and the wind was blowing a 
 hurricane. And now, because you saw Mr. Courtenay 
 walking with me here " 
 
 " I wouldn't mind, Sally," interrupted her lover, depre- 
 catingly, " if he meant fair and honorable, but you know 
 yourself he goes up to Deacon Clyde's, bold an' above 
 board, an' pays attention to Miss Clyde, takes her to 
 meetin' an' places, an 1 acts as if he wasn't ashamed o' her. 
 If he likes you the best, what's to hinder him from coming 
 to your house an' talking to you at your own hearth-stone, 
 or walking with you in daylight?" 
 
 He was silent, and the girl was silent too, with white, 
 compressed lips. By and by they went off around the 
 corner of the fort and disappeared. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 MR. BURNS turned his steps slowly homeward ; he had 
 a dread of meeting his companion. His companion, 
 however, appeared to have no dread of meeting him ; he 
 sat comfortably by the fire, feet elevated, taking a political 
 view of the country through a late Eastern paper.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 73 
 
 " I think the affairs of the nation are swinging around 
 into something like order and settlement again, Charley," 
 said he, throwing the paper aside and reaching to the table 
 for a cigar. 
 
 " Do you think so?" 
 
 Mr. Burns stood warming his hands at the stove, look- 
 ing down at the red coals in the grate. He felt little 
 enthusiasm over the affairs of the nation just then. 
 
 "Yes," said Burr. "My interest in politics is reviv- 
 ing. In my youth I aspired to statesmanship, thought 
 the acme of American ambition was reached in the Co- 
 lumbian Capitol. I limited my aspirations to Congress 
 in those days." 
 
 "You were modest," said Mr. Burns, unsmilingly. 
 
 " But the war coming on destroyed all that," continued 
 Burr. 
 
 " Or rather, the statesman was merged in the soldier," 
 returned Mr. Burns, a recollection of his friend's past 
 sweeping over him and relaxing the severity of his face a 
 little. There was much in that past to call for admira- 
 tion, and for the tender, chivalric love he had for Burr. 
 
 "I have been thinking, Charley, that you and I ought 
 not to have come West," Burr said. "We should have 
 stood our ground among the men we were educated with, 
 locked horns with our equals, and fought an even contest 
 with the world." 
 
 "Have I not said so a thousand times?" exclaimed 
 Mr. Burns, aroused out of himself. It was so exactly 
 what he had always maintained and Burr had always re- 
 futed, that he felt exasperated. Besides, if Burr gave up 
 it .was all over with them. He had accustomed himself 
 to depend so much upon Burr, even against his own 
 judgment. He continued, excitedly, " We came out 
 here ahead of immigration almost; seized the one self- 
 ish right of possession, and are obliged to fold our hands 
 and wait for everything else to come to us. There is 
 something almost magnificent," he added, with a bitter 
 laugh, " in this reckless throwing away of our youth and 
 best energies ! I feel that our vitality is dead, we are los- 
 ing the best things we have got, our youth, our strength, 
 our ambition."
 
 74 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 "I fancied we were saving up those things for the good 
 time coming," said Burr, with his usual gentleness, that 
 was hard for his friend to bear sometimes. 
 
 "And which never comes," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " Except our youth," continued Burr, a little sadly ; " I 
 begin to feel that that is slipping away. See here ! I am 
 getting gray hairs, Charley." 
 
 He swept back the black waves from his temples, re- 
 vealing fine streaks of gray. 
 
 "So am I," said Mr. Burns ; " they are the laurels we 
 won in the army. But I am not concerned about my 
 gray hairs, except as they rebuke me for the wasting years, 
 and show me that while the husk is withering the kernel 
 also is shrinking into nothingness, whereas it ought to be 
 bursting forth in the fulness and ripeness of manhood. 
 I begrudged the four years we spent in the war, the waste 
 of time, and brain, and opportunity; but a thousand 
 times more I regret the three years since the war." 
 
 " Charley," said Burr, arousing himself to what he felt 
 to be the necessity of the moment, " you have grown as 
 much in these three years, I venture to say, as in any 
 other three years of your life. When I first knew you 
 you were a hot-headed, ambitious youth ; confident, im- 
 patient, and egotistic (excuse me). You were eager to 
 revolutionize the world and set it upon your own broad 
 basis of free thought, liberal education, and general en- 
 lightenment. If you had gone on with such tremendous 
 momentum as you began, you would have had a mere 
 mushroom growth. You would have expended yourself 
 in the froth of enthusiasm and had no good wine left in 
 the bottom of your goblet. As it is, the froth has had 
 time to settle." 
 
 "And stagnate," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "A candle has just so much life to burn away," con- 
 tinued Mr. Courtenay ; " so has a man. You were spend- 
 ing yourself too fast. Providence as Shakspeare calls the 
 overruling power that shapes our destinies sa\v that, and 
 so these quiet years were thrust upon you. The war itself 
 was timely, with respect to you." 
 
 "You reason," said Mr. Burns, "like many other people 
 I have known, who think the universe revolves around
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 75 
 
 them, and that the Omnipotent Ruler occupies Himself 
 with their smallest concerns; bringing about storms and 
 sunshine, war and death, and pestilence and prosperity, 
 all with direct reference to them ! The sublimest picture 
 of egotism the world can show." 
 
 "It seems so," said Burr, "and perhaps is in most 
 cases. But, though I do not presume to suppose that the 
 Supreme Ruler and Director of all things has a personal 
 supervision over even the stars in the heavens, yet it 
 pleases my geometrical mind to believe that every law 
 and regulation and combination which He has established 
 regarding the minutest things in creation is perfect in all 
 its relations and bearings. This, of course, proves to us 
 my comfortable doctrine that everything works together 
 for our good, and we work for the good of all. The 
 stars may have a particular reason of their own for 
 shining, but they also perform the minor office of shining 
 for us. The rain may come only because the clouds are 
 full of it and are obliged to pour it out; but it blesses 
 the earth and us. Can you not see the perfect law run- 
 ning through it all ? I am filled with profound admira- 
 tion ; religion, in my mind, takes the form of perpetual 
 praise to the Creator and Sustainer of this wonderful 
 and sublime piece of machinery, the universe. But I am 
 diverging. I was about to apply the weight of this stu- 
 pendous argument to yourself. You know that an atom 
 embodies in itself the whole principle which the bulk of 
 atoms embodies. The bulk is simply the aggregate ; what 
 is true of one is true of all the others, and vice versa. 
 What is true of the grand harmony of the universe is 
 true of your life, unless you lay violent hands upon your 
 own destiny. What a striking thought, that man is the 
 only atom in all the harmonious creation who is capable 
 of making a discord ! It is the result I suppose of the 
 gift of free-will to him." 
 
 Eloquent as Mr. Courtenay was when occasion de- 
 manded, he soon tired of a subject like this, involving so 
 much effort of thought. 
 
 "Has anything especial happened to you, Charley? 
 You seem depressed," said he, with a sudden change of 
 topic.
 
 76 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 "Not unusually, do I?" said Mr. Burns, with the feel- 
 ing that it was his habitual state in these latter years. 
 
 "I thought so. Everything pleasant at the deacon's, 
 I suppose?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Did you get your business transacted ?" 
 
 "No; they had company. The Rev. Kirkwood and 
 his wife, and that sprig of a doctor whom we have seen 
 sporting a cane and a silk tile." 
 
 " Ah ! A relative of the Kirkwoods', is he not?" 
 
 "Yes; a nephew. Burr," Mr. Burns turned a 
 
 grave face towards his friend, "I took a walk down 
 towards the river and came home by the fort after I left 
 the deacon's." 
 
 Burr took his cigar from his lips, and knocked the 
 ashes off the end of it carefully with his forefinger. 
 
 "Ah!" said he. 
 
 "I saw you walking there with Sarah Jenkins." 
 
 "And did you witness the tragic finale of the prom- 
 enade?" he asked, without change of expression, except 
 that the glimmer of a smile flashed athwart his dark, 
 half-closed eyes. 
 
 Mr. Burns felt almost as helpless against his implacable 
 coolness as poor Jim Sites. 
 
 "Why don't you let the girl alone, Burr? She might 
 marry Sites and be happy." 
 
 "She will," said Burr. "That is, she will marry him, 
 but she will not be happy with him. She is too smart for 
 him." 
 
 " Well, let her alone, let her work out her own destiny. 
 For my part, Burr, I stand appalled before the ruins men 
 make of women's lives!" 
 
 " Charley, how often must I tell you that I do not step 
 out of my way to interfere with any person's destiny? I 
 hold that the sublime laws and regulations we have just 
 been discussing will, in any case, control my course. So 
 I move along as harmoniously as I can through all the 
 complications of this wonderful world." Mr. Burns was 
 too indignant to reply. " Anyhow," said Burr, changing 
 his tactics, "the fellow is jealous and ill-bred, and needs 
 a lesson."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 77 
 
 " You cannot teach him," said Mr. Burns. " You only 
 hurt him and hurt her. You may be laying up a sorrow 
 for those two that will rankle for years." 
 
 "Nonsense, Charley!" Burr returned, with a shrug. 
 "She will explain and they will make up again, and un- 
 derstand each other all the better. I met Miss Jenkins 
 this evening by pure accident. After you went out I 
 began to feel a little lonely and proposed a walk to my- 
 self, and put on my overcoat and started down toward 
 the river. I passed by Deacon Clyde's and saw the win- 
 dows all lighted up, and would have gone in if I had not 
 discovered that there were strangers there. I spent some 
 little time walking up and down the river-bank within 
 hearing of the falls. Returning, I met Miss Jenkins 
 coming out of the little hut occupied by old Mother 
 Dexter, you remember, not far from the fort ; and the 
 evening being pleasant and I being lonely, and she being 
 rather pleased to meet me (I thought), I turned and 
 offered her my arm for a promenade under the shelter of 
 the old fort." 
 
 "Sheltered from observation, I suppose you mean?" 
 said Mr. B.urns. 
 
 "No; from the wind. But where in thunder Sites 
 could have come from is more than I am able to conjec- 
 ture!" 
 
 " Perhaps he came on purpose to meet her, knowing 
 where she had gone?" 
 
 " Perhaps ; but how did he come to be armed ?" 
 "I should think that would be a lesson to you, Burr; 
 the fellow is excitable, he might have blown your brains 
 out." 
 
 " I could easily have disarmed him," said Burr. " And 
 now, Charley, I hope I have explained this mysterious 
 circumstance to your entire satisfaction. Explanations 
 are damnable ! don't ask me for any more of them. If 
 a man's life does not carry out his principles, no explana- 
 tion of his actions will. That is Emerson's idea, by the 
 way, but before he had expressed it it was my rule and 
 guide. As you will find," he added, " if some 'spiritual 
 medium' ever takes it in hand to write my private biog- 
 raphy."
 
 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE ball which Maggie had made mention of came up 
 for discussion in the law-office on the eve of it, by Burr's 
 proposing to go and take the young ladies. 
 
 Mr. Burns, who happened to feel in a talkative humor, 
 remarked that it was strange, seeing that dancing had met 
 with so much disapproval from certain religious bodies as 
 incompatible with a healthy spiritual growth, that so many 
 people who have been church-members in the East, and 
 consistent with church rules, consider themselves relieved 
 of all restraint in the matter of dancing and the like the 
 moment they cross the Mississippi. 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Courtenay, "in that our Western 
 emigrants differ widely from the Pilgrim fathers." 
 
 "You see," continued Mr. Burns, "that finding no 
 civilizing influences in the West, it seldom occurs to us 
 to create such influences among ourselves." 
 
 "All Christian religion," said Mr. Courtenay, "is of 
 course founded upon the Bible. But how many Chris- 
 tians, do you suppose, take root in the truths of Scripture? 
 How many who are not merely the outgrowth of churches 
 and societies? People's lives are governed by circum- 
 stances; it is only here and there along the stream of 
 religion or politics, or any social concern, that we find a 
 man whose feet touch bottom. Very few act from prin- 
 ciple, they simply follow where others lead. It is true 
 that in most momentous things people have got to move 
 en masse, but even then there is a difference in merely 
 going with the tide and realizing an individual responsi- 
 bility in the movement. I think it would be only fair 
 and just to require every man to stand upon his own basis, 
 and not blindly hang upon another." 
 
 "But," said Mr. Burns, "you can't get rid of respon- 
 sibility by shaking people off. There are only a few who 
 have stamina enough to stand alone, and they have got to 
 take their weak brethren upon their backs. If you have 
 light you must let it shine ; many of us can only see a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 79 
 
 thing by having it pointed out to us. Herein lies both 
 your power and your responsibility. We all like to feel 
 that we have influence ; but influence as controlling only 
 men's actions is a weak thing. Point out a principle and 
 you have accomplished something. A live seed planted 
 in a garden is better than all the flowers plucked and 
 strewn over its paths. I agree with you, that no man has 
 a right to hang upon you blindly ; let him make your 
 principles his principles, and your motives his motives, 
 if he will, and then you are free of him. You are account- 
 able for your own life and actions, not for other men's. 
 We must each act from a point within ourself. I do not 
 doubt that it is a crime for many people to dance ; it out- 
 rages their conception of religion and their most sacred 
 feelings. If they persist, they will harden and demoralize 
 themselves, because they go against conscience. People 
 may sin against a law that exists only in themselves, 
 nevertheless they sin. For our lives are only perfect in 
 as far as they agree with our convictions of right. The 
 law I mean our learned profession deals only in the 
 broadest generalities, and touches men only in their ex- 
 tremity. The law in us is what must govern and control 
 us, and we sin whenever we break it." 
 
 "You make every man's conscience, then, his rule 
 and guide," said Burr. " How does that work when 
 some devoted fanatic gets it into his head that it is his 
 duty, and will be a benefit to society, to put a fellow- 
 being out of the world ? What did Virginia think of 
 John Brown ? What did the world think of Wilkes 
 Booth?" 
 
 "They put themselves into juxtaposition with the 
 supreme law, and were crushed by it. These things are 
 not all properly adjusted, of course, or rather, we are not 
 properly adjusted to the general law and regulations. I 
 have a fancy that it took the stars and other heavenly 
 bodies a good while to fall into their proper and harmo- 
 nious places; even yet we are sometimes warned of danger 
 to our earth by some unruly comet that has got out of its 
 way and threatens to jostle us. Mankind is a universe, 
 and every individual man, like every individual planet, has 
 his orbit, and no one has a right to crowd him out of it."
 
 8o HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 "Well, what about the dance?" said Burr. 
 
 "I don't think I shall go," Mr. Burns returned. 
 
 "Why not; have you any scruples?" 
 
 " Yes. I scruple to make myself ridiculous. You and 
 I, Burr, are getting pretty well up in years to be still 
 'tripping the light fantastic toe.' When nature has 
 added to our manhood the dignity of gray hairs, it seems 
 to me high time to give up youthful follies. And I mean 
 to do it gracefully." 
 
 "Teach me how!" said Burr, with mock humility. 
 
 " Certainly. Rise superior to them. Dismiss them 
 with a wave of your hand and say, ' I have done with 
 you.' Don't wait until the next generation sweeps you 
 off the floor ; save your dignity while you can, by step- 
 ping up higher." 
 
 " There is time enough yet for that," said Burr, a little 
 uneasily ; any reference to his years touched him in a sen- 
 sitive spot. 
 
 " I don't think, Charley, we ever did much dancing in 
 the ' light fantastic' manner !" he said. 
 
 " No ; it is too active an exercise," laughed Mr. Burns. 
 " I have walked through a few cotillons, but never essayed 
 a 'round' dance in my life. But you," he added, 
 " used to waltz, you remember, when we were in the 
 army, or rather when we were in camp." 
 
 As though the remark had touched some unhappy rem- 
 iniscence, a silence followed, and a cloud settled on 
 both the young men's spirits. 
 
 By and by, Mr. Courtenay arose and shook it off. It 
 was growing late. 
 
 "Well, what do you say? Shall we do ourselves the 
 honor of escorting the young ladies? If so, we had bet- 
 ter go up this evening and invite them." 
 
 "I shall not do myself the honor," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "In that case, I think 1 will venture to invite them 
 both, and trust to you to change your mind and take 
 Miss Maggie off my hands." 
 
 "My mind is irrevocably made up," returned Mr. 
 Burns. " It seems to me," he added, as Mr. Courtenay 
 made himself ready to step out, " that you are rather late 
 with your invitation."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 8 1 
 
 But Burr, whom much adulation had made a little vain, 
 like Napoleon Bonaparte, made his own conditions. He 
 went up to the deacon's, but did not commit himself to 
 the avowed purpose of going to invite the young ladies 
 to attend the dance, but ostensibly to spend the evening. 
 His manner was the farthest remove from Mr. Burns's 
 outspoken bluntness. He scrupled to make his attentions 
 to Miss Clyde appear pointed, even to herself. He rarely 
 escorted her to places of public entertainment, but con- 
 trived in his diplomatic way to take advantage of what- 
 ever occasion offered him the pleasure of her society, 
 and her preference. 
 
 Her preference, however, was not marked, except by a 
 proud acceptance of his attentions and equally proud in- 
 difference to the attentions of other gentlemen ; a dis- 
 tinction very gratifying to Mr. Courtenay's vanity. He 
 was an epicure in such matters, appreciating the most del- 
 icate shades of flattery, and relishing what was especially 
 rare and sweet. 
 
 As he sat in the deacon's parlor the subject of the ball 
 came up, and he remarked : 
 
 "You attend, I presume?" 
 
 "No," said Maggie, laughing and blushing, and look- 
 ing across at Evelyn ; " one might as well be frank, we 
 have nobody to take us." 
 
 "That is lamentable," said he. "If an escort is all 
 that is lacking, I might presume to offer myself." 
 
 Maggie was overwhelmed by the effect of her audacity. 
 
 " Oh, Mr. Courtenay ! I didn't mean to make you ask 
 us," she said, helplessly. "I didn't think how it would 
 sound." 
 
 Will any one doubt that Mr. Courtenay himself had 
 brought it all about, exactly as he had planned ? Having 
 made his point he swept the subject aside gracefully, help- 
 ing Maggie out of her embarrassment. 
 
 Nothing further was said about the ball until he was 
 taking leave of Evelyn at the hall-door. He had stepped 
 out and turned to say "good-night." 
 
 " Shall I come and chaperon you to-morrow evening?" 
 he asked. 
 
 " Why, yes, if you please," Evelyn returned, a delicate 
 D*
 
 82 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 flush mounting her cheek. She stood straight and slender 
 and tall in the door-way, with the moonlight streaming 
 over her and softening her beautifully cut features. It 
 was her lily-like stateliness and maidenliness that Burr 
 admired. He would no more have broken through the 
 thin fibre of delicate reserve that divided them than he 
 would " brush the down from the peach or the dew from 
 the rose." He put out his hand and took hers and held 
 it a moment lightly, and then said "good-night," and 
 walked away. 
 
 It was the nearest approach to familiarity he had ever 
 allowed himself to make toward her, and he enjoyed the 
 thought that no one save himself could presume so much, 
 even, as that. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE dancing-hall had been lighted up some hours 
 (there is always a share of the populace who like to begin 
 a thing early and get the most of it), and the 'music 
 floated across the street to where Mr. Burns sat alone in 
 his office, endeavoring to ignore it by assiduous study. 
 
 But life must be seasoned a little, and we have got to 
 take what spices we can get. 
 
 Had Mr. Burns been living in New York City he 
 doubtless would have displayed a fastidious taste; he 
 would have flavored the evening with something fine, a 
 Booth or a Beecher. 
 
 As it was, after as I have said some hours of diffi- 
 cult study, he was moved to go up and look on at the 
 dancers. 
 
 The " hall" was up-stairs over a dry -goods store. 
 
 He flung on his cloak and, crossing the street, ascended 
 a flight of steps running up on the outside of the build- 
 ing, intending to remain among the bystanders, who 
 always clustered around the door and sat upon the steps 
 of the orchestral platform. 
 
 But he was endowed with too delicate an organization 
 for tobacco and coarse slang, and soon detached himself
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 83 
 
 from the motley throng and wended his way to the upper 
 and more exclusive end of the hall, where stood Burr 
 with Miss Clyde and Maggie, they having come in at a 
 late and fashionable hour. 
 
 Of all the things that travel in the train of emigration, 
 etiquette, perhaps, keeps nearest the van ; and fashion, 
 and style, and all those high-toned divinities, hold up 
 their sceptres on the plain and in the wilderness. 
 
 Mr. Burns approaching Burr's group, hat in hand, 
 threw back his cloak and paid the usual compliments. 
 
 Maggie bowed to him with a poor little attempt at stiff- 
 ness, which he made no effort to dispel. 
 
 Dr. Webster was there and appeared to be paying some 
 attention to Maggie. Mr. Burns inwardly determined to 
 encourage him in that. Looking at the young doctor 
 dispassionately, he could not help considering him a very 
 good match for Maggie. 
 
 However, when he offered her his arm with an easy, 
 deferential assurance, and led her away to join in the 
 Lancers just then forming on the floor, Mr. Burns gave a 
 contemptuous shrug, and went over and sat down upon a 
 long bench against the wall and watched the dancers, 
 with curved lip and the Poe's Raven expression. 
 
 Of all ridiculous dances the Lancers appeared to him, 
 at that moment, the most so. The profuse bowing was 
 burlesqued by the many ungraceful figures engaged in it, 
 and the whole scene seemed, to his disenchanted eyes, 
 the silliest farce. He thought of what De Quincey has 
 written ; that from the spectacle of certain dances he 
 derived "the very grandest form of passionate sadness 
 which can be derived from any spectacle whatsoever." 
 
 At one time in his life Mr. Burns had been grateful to 
 De Quincey for giving expression and countenance to 
 his own elevated emotions amid dancing and festal music. 
 Had the scales fallen forever from his eyes? Was he no 
 longer capable of fine elevation of feeling ? 
 
 The dance ended, they all came up and gathered 
 around him, making him a sort of nucleus for their exclu- 
 sive little party. 
 
 They praised the music, which was unusually fine, a 
 clarinet being added to the local string-band, played by
 
 84 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 a grave, handsome young man whom nobody seemed to 
 know. 
 
 Burr inquired at Miss Clyde's instigation of a dry- 
 goods clerk who approached the group, anxious to secure 
 Maggie for the next dance. 
 
 " Don't know his name, he's from Winchester. 
 Splendid player, ain't he?" said the young fellow. 
 
 " He does very well," said Burr, distantly. 
 
 " Well, sir, they say he was nothing but a blacksmith's 
 'prentice a few years ago !" 
 
 "Impossible?" said Mr. Burns. "Pray, what raised 
 him to his present elevation ?" 
 
 "Genius, I s'pose. He never had any teaching; just 
 got him a horn and went at it." 
 
 In the mean time the young man had come down from 
 the orchestra, leaving his instrument, and button-holed a 
 manager and whispered something in his ear. Where- 
 upon the manager brought him up and introduced him to 
 Maggie, whom he solicited for a waltz. 
 
 Maggie was not taken wholly unawares ; she had 
 caught the stranger's eyes several times and thought them 
 like Mr. Burns's ; which that haughty young gentleman 
 would doubtless have resented. 
 
 She took his arm, with a blush, and moved away. 
 
 The dry-goods clerk, having lost his opportunity, saun- 
 tered off, chagrined. 
 
 " Did you catch his name?" asked Miss Clyde, turning 
 to Mr. Burns. 
 
 "No," said he. "And I suppose it does not matter; 
 he is some young fellow who knows nothing but his 
 music, doubtless." 
 
 "You are mistaken," said Burr, to whom the manager 
 had been speaking. " I have just ascertained his name 
 to be Dale, of the ' Winchester Independent;' he is an 
 editor, you see, as well as a musician." 
 
 "It is all the same," said Mr. Burns; "he blows his 
 own trumpet in either case." 
 
 Dr. Webster, turning to Miss Clyde, and offering his 
 arm, said, " Shall we try this?" and led her away to join 
 the circle of waltzers. 
 
 Proud Miss Clyde, she was called far and near; the most
 
 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. 85 
 
 beautiful figure, the most graceful waltzer of all the whirl- 
 ing throng. Burr sat down beside Mr. Burns, his eyes 
 following her. The music was a full, undulating harmony 
 that seemed to sweep the light forms off their feet, and 
 bear them along with graceful, rhythmic motion. Oh, 
 power of beauty and of music ! Never before as in that 
 reeling, dizzying, graceful, enchanting motion had Miss 
 Clyde so touched the heart (or imagination) of the man 
 she so longed to win. Was it love? A thousand mar- 
 riages have been born of a waltz. Even Mr. Burns was 
 impressed. 
 
 "A very pretty exercise for young persons, ' ' he remarked, 
 sagely. " We all have to pass through the realms of 
 enchantment once in our life, I suppose. Though I must 
 say, my fairyland seldom took the shape of a ball-room. 
 I remember only one or two occasions when I was carried 
 away with a thing of this kind." 
 
 "Well," said Burr, "I don't mind confessing to you, 
 privately, that 1 never got upon the floor in my life, and 
 began to spin around like that, that I did not feel it a sort 
 of stepping down from the dignified estate of manhood." 
 
 "Do you confess so much?" laughed Mr. Burns. "I 
 never experienced that feeling until the thing was over; 
 my enthusiasm carried me through." 
 
 " I never could get up any enthusiasm," said Burr. 
 
 A few moments later Mr. Burns arose and gathered his 
 cloak around him. 
 
 "I am going home," he explained. 
 
 " No?" said Burr. " Stay, and take Miss Maggie over 
 to supper." 
 
 "I don't think my services are required," said Mr. 
 Burns, significantly. 
 
 The waltzing had ceased, and the interesting stranger 
 was slowly leading Maggie back to her place, his head 
 inclined toward her, busily talking. 
 
 Some fellow in Mr. Burns's vicinity remarked, in an 
 audible voice, "That 'ere chap from Winchester, 'at 
 plays the clar'net, 's a married man." 
 
 "Well, what ef he is?" said a companion. 
 
 "Oh, nothin' ; only he seems purty sweet on Miss 
 Atherton." 
 
 8
 
 8 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Mr. Burns glanced angrily around at the speaker, who 
 returned his look with a blank, good-natured stare. The 
 manager called out " supper," and Burr brought the young 
 ladies' wraps, having to go across the street to the hotel 
 for refreshments. The Winchester gentleman was still 
 hovering around Maggie. Mr. Burns made a sudden re- 
 solve, and went up and offered her his arm. 
 
 " Will you allow me to take you over to supper?" said 
 he, not in the gentlest tone, utterly ignoring her com- 
 panion, who immediately bowed himself away. 
 
 Maggie looked up with a glad heart-bound and as- 
 sented, her little air of stiffness vanishing in the sunshine 
 of his presence. Returning to the ball-room after supper, 
 Mr. Burns at once excused himself and went home. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MR. BURNS turned up the light in the office, and threw 
 himself into a chair, sickened and disgusted with the 
 sawing of the violins and loud "catling" of the leader of 
 the band across the way. It helped him to see this paltry 
 ball, by its miserable mockery of pleasure, or rather by its 
 cheap imitation of what many people hold to be the 
 highest pleasure the poverty and emptiness of this 
 world. 
 
 If pleasure light, fantastic enjoyment could wear a 
 covering so complete as to hide the skeleton beneath, it 
 might be endured. But this wretched make-believe was 
 unbearable. When Burr came in an hour later, he sat 
 wakefully by the fire. 
 
 "Why, how is it," Burr asked, cheerfully, glad to feel 
 the warmth of the office, " that you are not in bed?" 
 
 "Who could sleep with that damned fiddling going 
 on over yonder?" Mr. Burns returned, with unwonted 
 profanity. 
 
 Burr drew a chair up to the stove, and sat down. " The 
 fiddling wasn't bad," said he. 
 
 By and by, Mr. Burns remarked : "I have been think-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 87 
 
 ing, Burr, that it is a misfortune for a man to leave all 
 the friends of his youth behind him in the march of life. 
 The tenderest associations we ever know are those that 
 cluster round our boyhood. But as we advance we think 
 it is smart to outgrow them, to launch ourselves upon the 
 wide world and cut loose from our early loves, and say, 
 with so much wisdom (never thinking how crushing the 
 words may be to those still living in the dream we have 
 awakened from), 'Time flies, dreams vanish, and bubbles 
 burst.' As if there is anything more beautiful, or more 
 substantial, even, in this earth, than those dreams and 
 bubbles ! I would to God I had mine back again." 
 
 "A foolish wish, Charley," said Burr; "you can't 
 keep them; they are too fleeting; they go as the years 
 go." 
 
 Mr. Burns got up and went to the table, and took out 
 of his portfolio a little scrap of printed paper and read, 
 
 " ' When all the world is young, lad, 
 
 And all the trees are green ; 
 And every goose a swan, lad, 
 
 And every lass a queen ; 
 Then hey for boot and horse, lad, 
 
 And around the world away ! 
 Young blood must have its course, lad, 
 
 And every dog his day. 
 
 " ' When all the world is old, lad. 
 
 And all the trees are brown ; 
 And all the sports are stale, lad, 
 
 And all the wheels run down ; 
 Creep home and take your place there, 
 
 The spent and maimed among; 
 God grant you find one face there 
 
 You loved when all were young.' " 
 
 "Very pretty in spirit," said Burr, "though a little 
 homely in garb." 
 
 "It contains the whole poetry of life," Mr. Burns as- 
 serted, and sat musing long after Burr had gone to sleep. 
 He dropped his head in his hands, and his memory went 
 back to the little village where his boyhood had been spent, 
 alive with scenes and faces, and friends whose truth had 
 inspired him with faith in God and man. Not one was 
 left to him.
 
 SECOND BOOK. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 [It is rather bungling to break off the thread and tie a knot in the skein 
 one is winding, but take my word for it that in this case it is expedient, 
 my kind reader.] 
 
 SNUGLY cuddled out of the reach of high winds among 
 low, sandy hills covered chiefly with scrubby red-oaks 
 and hazel-brush, in a certain section of that vague, vast 
 country called the " West" in a wholesale way (but about 
 whose latitude and longitude it is not needful to be pre- 
 cise), a few hundred miles beyond where the sun sets over 
 the Blue Ridge and Catskill Mountains; and so old, and 
 so settled and populated, that " West," as applied to it, 
 was no longer synonymous with "new," so old indeed 
 that civilization had folded its hands and dropped asleep 
 as having nothing more to do, rustled the little town of 
 Hazelville, to which Mr. Burns's memory in its sad pil- 
 grimage went back. It was not distinguished in its ap- 
 pearance from many another small town in its vicinity ; it 
 had the same sleepy, general expression, the same settled, 
 satisfied, changeless air. Architecture had not touched 
 it, nor painter's brush marred the sanctity of wall, post, 
 or sign-board for a generation, except in one instance 
 where dry-goods and notions were advertised in new and 
 glaring colors upon an old building. 
 
 The school, built of hewn logs, bore upon the outside 
 at least no sign of progress ; and the squatty, old-fash- 
 ioned church commanded the same veneration it did in 
 its earlier and palmier days, and was filled to overflowing 
 of a Sunday, though its battered walls resounded to no 
 new thing in the way of preaching, any more than they
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 89 
 
 resounded to the stroke of hammer in the way of re- 
 pairing. Perhaps one would have been considered as 
 sacrilegious as the other. 
 
 A couple of peaks rise above the sandy hills surrounding 
 Hazelville, and are christened respectively and suggest- 
 ively Big and Little Twin, or, banded together, Twin 
 Points. There are some points of difference between 
 them : where one is grassy and slopes far out into sur- 
 rounding meadows, inviting to cool, shady nooks on its 
 terraces, the other is steep and rocky, and discouraging 
 to Young Ambition aspiring to its summit (except initiated 
 Young Ambition which knows a meandering path leading 
 to the topmost crag through many inspiring difficulties). 
 And where one spreads out many a broad, low oak, like 
 an umbrella in the sun, the other rears its bleak, bald 
 head against the sky, defying sun and storm. 
 
 There is a little silver stream winding in and out among 
 the hills barely affording water for a mill-race. Across 
 this small stream is a dam of brush and stones that has 
 to be crossed to reach the twins. The race is bridged by 
 a couple of logs thrown across it. 
 
 In the early autumn twilight twilight comes very early 
 down in the hollows, though the sun still gilds the hill- 
 tops we may discern two people, one a man with a boy's 
 smooth face and stripling form, the other a young girl, 
 crossing the dam hand in hand. 
 
 " Come," said the youth, grasping the girl's hand with 
 a tighter pressure and striding forward, " let us make haste 
 or the sun will be down before we reach the top of Little 
 Twin, and I don't want to miss it to-night ; it is my last 
 chance for a good many months, you know. I shall not 
 have time to-morrow night. You can come up here any 
 night," he added. "You and Fred, or Miss Barker." 
 The last with a half-humorous, half-sarcastic curl of the 
 lip. 
 
 "I shall not come here again until you come home," 
 his companion returned, decidedly. 
 
 "I should think you would, Wilma!" reproachfully. 
 "I know I should. I like to look at your picture and 
 everything that can remind me of you when I am away 
 from you." 
 
 8*
 
 go HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 " Oh, but I don't need anything to remind me, Char- 
 ley; I think of you all the time anyhow." 
 
 She clasped his arm suddenly with both her little brown 
 hands, and looked up with such a pretty mingling of shy- 
 ness and frankness, a vivid blush spreading itself over her 
 face (and besides it was such a gratifying thing to have 
 said), that the young man, with a quick, responsive glow, 
 bent his rather proud head and kissed the lips that said it. 
 
 Hitherto one might have thought him a brother, care- 
 lessly kind, helping her not very gently not so very 
 gently as a lover might over the stones. Now, however, 
 a sudden tenderness drew them together. 
 
 Charley half forgot his hurry, and they walked linger- 
 ingly and in silence, feeling that exquisite nearness to 
 each other that comes only at intervals even between 
 lovers, especially lovers of several years' standing like 
 these. 
 
 The young man felt his pulses thrill with an unusual 
 gladness. Wilma seldom gave him so frank an assurance 
 of her loyalty, thinking perhaps, with maidenly reserve and 
 it might be a dash of maidenly coquetry, that it was his 
 part to do the love-making. He had had many misgivings 
 about her depth of feeling, and believed with keen regret 
 that in the mutual interchange of affection he gave much 
 more than he received. He had strong faith in his own 
 power of discernment, and was sure that his eyes pierced 
 to the bottom of Wilma's soul;. and though it pleased 
 him that the pool was clear and pure, and that its sweet 
 waters had no outlet but in him, he regretted that it was 
 not deeper, and felt with some bitterness that the depths 
 of his own tenderness would never be fully known be- 
 cause of her incapacity. It never occurred to his loyal 
 heart that he might break his boyish contract and seek 
 for a wife one who could be more to him than she could 
 be. He would as soon have thought of replacing his 
 mother with some other woman. 
 
 As for Wilma no misgiving disturbed her. The current 
 of her days and years swept as smoothly on as a meadow 
 brook, and Charley's love was security for all her future. 
 It was the green banks hemming in the narrow, happy 
 stream of her life; the flowers growing on its edges all
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. g i 
 
 the way down to where it widened into a mystic eternity ; 
 the stars shining above and the blue sky. Charley's love 
 was all this. 
 
 But perhaps she accepted it too much as she accepted 
 the sunshine and all natural blessings, with a deep, silent 
 gratitude that she herself was scarcely conscious of. And 
 Charley did not like to give his heart's wealth and have 
 it taken as a matter of course. 
 
 Love is a costly gift, and however carelessly accepted, 
 there will come a time when the receiver will learn the 
 value of it. 
 
 Wilma was a dreamer, as perhaps most of us are, and 
 it would take a shock to waken her. And shocks will 
 inevitably come when there is anything to be unearthed. 
 Pity that they must so rack and unnerve us, leaving us 
 forever after with a stinging sense of our weakness. 
 
 It is a very ingenious saying, He tempers the wind to 
 the shorn lamb. It is so true of each of us that just such 
 storms will come as are needed to unfold us. " He tem- 
 pers the wind to the shorn lamb," but He tempers it to 
 the oak sapling as well, and it is tossed and buffetted, and 
 it grows and develops. 
 
 Perhaps a human being differs from an oak sapling in 
 this, that the former invites the storm by its own tossing. 
 Or (for we know that the tempest sweeps over the whole 
 forest) perhaps the tempering is in the heart and fibre of 
 the tree itself. And it may be that the same winds blow 
 over and search out all hearts alike, only that some have 
 deeper caverns and longer and louder echoes. 
 
 So He does not temper the wind, He tempers us. He 
 does not leave us more helpless than the vessel that ad- 
 justs its sails and has power to right itself when the 
 billows roll. 
 
 By and by Wilma said, looking down, " Charley, you 
 don't know how I dread going off to school !" 
 
 "What ! Not discouraged?" said Charley, surprised. 
 
 "Oh, no! Of course I want to go ; I have dreamed 
 about it all my life, you know. Bat to think of the great, 
 strange school ; I shall feel so awkward and out of place." 
 
 "Little goose!" said Charley, laughing and pressing 
 her closer to his side, while, with a sort of patronizing
 
 9 2 HIGH- WATER- MARK. 
 
 affectionateness, he slipped his slender, student fingers 
 under her chin, and bent his head again to kiss the 
 cherry-red lips. " My little jewel only needs polishing 
 to make it the brightest of gems," said he. And Wilma, 
 accustomed to such pretty compliments and unspoiled by 
 them, took it as a matter of course that Charley should 
 say so, without the least vain consciousness that it was so. 
 There was not any danger of her overrating herself; her 
 home-training had cultivated her in the opposite direc- 
 tion. Her mother, fearful of encouraging vanity in her 
 children, constantly depreciated instead of praising them. 
 
 Wilma had not a doubt that in the academy she was 
 about to enter she would be the least brilliant of all the 
 students. They crossed the race upon the logs, and again 
 Charley tightened his clasp of the hand, and drew it 
 within his arm with a tender impulse. 
 
 " No, no, darling, you must keep a brave spirit ! The 
 great, strange school will not seem such a formidable 
 thing after you have entered it. You have no idea how 
 the mountains dwindle away when you come close up to 
 them. I know just how it is; I had that same feeling 
 myself before I went to the university." 
 
 " And now you are one of the ' most promising young 
 men* there!" said Wilma, looking up at him proudly. 
 "I heard the minister tell mother that." 
 
 " Nonsense ! What does the minister know about it ?" 
 said Charley. " I look upon these school-days of ours, 
 Wilma, as the bridge that divides us from each other and 
 our sweet by and by." 
 
 "It is a very long bridge, Charley," said Wilma, and 
 again he felt his pulses thrill at the unusualness of her 
 emotion. Could it be there was more depth than he had 
 imagined ? Did she really care so much for him ? 
 
 He wound his arm gently about her waist. "It is a 
 long bridge, darling ; but then you know I love you al- 
 ways, and am looking forward to the happy future I am 
 trying to make for you, for us both. I am shaping my 
 life to that end. But we must ' 'bide a wee' : this long 
 separation is as hard for me as for you, my dear." 
 
 Close following the words was the pungent reflection 
 that it was perhaps harder, and he ended with a sigh.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 93 
 
 They climbed on in silence till they came to the top of 
 the hill. Charley instinctively uncovered his head, and 
 turned his face to the setting sun, his golden curls lit up 
 by the red beams, and his face aglow with light shining 
 through out of a poet soul that leaped up and soared be- 
 yond the sunset. Wonderfully buoyant things are these 
 souls that have wings ! Wilma admired the sunset, too; 
 but loved better to watch its reflection in her lover's eyes. 
 She stood looking up at him with a kind of awe, as 
 though his spirit were unveiled before her, her face as 
 rapt as his own. A spectator would have said she wor- 
 shipped him. 
 
 "Is it not grand, Wilma?" He drew her nearer to 
 him with the arm that was round her waist, but did not 
 take his eyes from the glowing west. "It doesn't seem 
 as if we are very far off from heaven standing here does 
 it, darling? If that great crimson curtain were lifted just 
 a little way we would be on a level with the golden gates 
 and could look right through." 
 
 "Oh, Charley!" said Wilma. 
 
 "And why not?" said Charley, smiling. "Do you 
 see how motionless everything is down below? There is 
 something so solemn in the hush of the wind just as the 
 sun goes down, as though a voice whispered, ' Peace, be 
 still !' And look yonder, where the sun breaks through 
 and shines upon the water, was ever anything more tran- 
 quilly beautiful ? How I love water ! I wish I had a boat, 
 though I would not dip an oar down there to-night to 
 break the charm ; it would be sacrilege. We shall have a 
 boat some day. I mean to live near some beautiful body 
 of water, and get as much poetry out of life as I can. I 
 don't see how people can be content to pass their lives in 
 barren places. This sunset is a grand poem, Wilma ; 
 and you and I are studying it together, just as we will 
 study all beautiful things in the sweet future. I shall 
 never forget it, darling." 
 
 A little while longer they stood and gazed, while the 
 red was slowly fading. Then the spell was broken, the 
 soul receded backward from Charley's eyes, and a sigh 
 fluttered on his lip, which might have meant that he felt 
 himself to have been alone on the greatest of those
 
 94 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 heights, and regretted that Wilma's perception of the 
 glories of the Invisible was not so fine or so keen as his 
 own. For Wilma had scarcely spoken ; she had felt, but 
 had kept silence ; her brown eyes widened, and were full 
 of wonder and subdued, sweet joy. The moon came up 
 with a stealthy " bo-peep" behind them, so that when they 
 turned it was looking full at them with its bland, demure 
 smile, as though secretly amused that it had stolen a 
 march upon them, seeming to have risen out of the thin, 
 broad sheet of water that lay far down among the hills, 
 like a rosy-faced boy coming out of his morning bath. 
 Charley linked Wilma's arm through his own, and they 
 began to retrace the long, downward path. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 WILMA'S family was an odd mixture in the relation of 
 its several members to one another. 
 
 It consisted of the widow Lynne, its one head ; Fred- 
 eric, her stepson ; Wilmingard, her daughter by a former 
 marriage : and Blanche, half-sister to the two last named. 
 
 There was also a Miss Amelia Barker, who boarded in 
 the family, and had had her home in it ever since 
 Blanche, whose existence measured a little more than 
 seven years, could remember ; and she was likely to con- 
 tinue in it so long as she continued in her character of 
 village schoolmistress, which would probably be until 
 some radical change took place in educational matters. 
 For the good, easy citizens of Hazelville were averse to 
 change, and had a great reverence for time-honored in- 
 stitutions. 
 
 And Miss Barker's reign was a time-honored institution. 
 The smaller children were as much accustomed to her 
 authority as to that of their natural guardians. 
 
 She was a little past the first glow and freshness of 
 youth, not confessedly so on her own part, but inferen-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 95 
 
 tially so on the part of other people, but still held on 
 to the last pretensions to bloom and beauty, with that re- 
 luctance to give them up which wo all feel more or-less, 
 according as we outgrow our frivolities, and other things 
 take the place of bloom and beauty. 
 
 Miss Barker was a power in the Lynne family ; a firm, 
 strong, decided sort of person. Which, of a woman, 
 may sound a little harsh. 
 
 There was no compromising with her ; she adhered 
 strictly to accepted facts and never indulged in specula- 
 tion. Astronomers and scientists and theologians could 
 not impose their guess-work upon her. 
 Mrs. Lynne was held to be in easy circumstances. The 
 statement, of course, requires modification according to 
 locality. The reader has an inkling of what it would 
 signify in Hazelville. The chief source of her income 
 was a small farm a mile or two out of the village. 
 
 Wilmingard, always spoken of as Wilma Lynne, had 
 inherited a small fortune and an old Knickerbocker name 
 from her father, neither of which she had come into 
 actual possession of as yet. 
 
 The fortune was fixed for a day when she should have 
 arrived at a discretionary age. The day was now not far 
 distant. 
 
 As to the name, Wilma had many times had vague 
 dreams about going to New York and hunting up her 
 family connections, who, as her mother expressed it, were 
 somewhat "high-flown," and had always looked down 
 upon poor little Mrs. Lynne, especially after her second 
 marriage (immediately after which she had quitted the 
 metropolis and emigrated to the West), which was far 
 beneath the Knickerbocker pride. 
 
 Wilmingard stood in great awe of that side of her 
 house ; even of her father's picture, a stately painting 
 hanging curtained in her mother's chamber. 
 
 Her first marriage was the romance of Mrs. Lynne's 
 life. She had been taken from a little country town to 
 a pretentious city home, and was tenderly loved by a 
 noble husband, a little too grave and too great for her, 
 it may be, though he did not live to learn it. 
 
 The romance only lasted two short years, and then she
 
 96 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 went out a widow from among her husband's coldly pat- 
 ronizing people, back to the little country town. 
 
 Wilmingard, pretty, delicate, and brown-eyed, upon 
 whom they had bestowed their pet family name, they 
 begged to be permitted to adopt and bring up ; but with- 
 out success. 
 
 When Mrs. Lynne with her husband and their two 
 children were about to emigrate Westward, a fine carriage 
 drove up one day, and two fine ladies, whose soft, dark 
 hair was mixed with gray, got out and came with rustling 
 silks into the little parlor where she was sitting, and re- 
 newed their supplications for the child, who stood by 
 with her shy, wondering eyes. 
 
 Meeting again with a distressed but firm refusal, they 
 took Wilma in their arms and kissed her, and told her 
 that when she grew up she must come and see them. 
 
 One of them gave her a little gold locket, and the 
 other a Bible with clasps ; then they touched her mother's 
 hand with the tips of their slender, gloved fingers, and 
 went away sorrowfully, as from a funeral, with tears on 
 their thin white cheeks, which they dried with their deli- 
 cate cambric handkerchiefs. 
 
 Wilma did not understand the scene, but it left a deep 
 impression on her young mind : an impression which 
 was the cue to all her after-speculations about her father's 
 family. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 WILMA' s lover (whose identity I do not doubt the reader 
 already suspects) left that young lady at her mother's gate 
 upon coming down from seeing the sunset. 
 
 A gentleman was approaching the gate from within ; 
 a gentleman who was professedly courting Miss Barker, 
 though it is to be feared without serious intentions. He 
 bowed deeply upon meeting Wilma, to which she returned 
 an inadequate little nod, showing without her intending 
 it the exact degree of respect in which she held him, 
 and passed on.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 97 
 
 Outside the gate the gentleman walked briskly to over- 
 take Wilma's lover, upon which he slackened his pace, 
 touched his hat and asked with a smile, which was all a 
 smile could be in the way of trying to make itself agree- 
 able and insinuating : 
 
 " I have the honor of addressing Mr. Burns, I believe?" 
 
 Mr. Burns looked up, and then bowed, coldly. 
 
 "We business men, you see," said the gentleman, in 
 no way disconcerted, " have a better chance of knowing 
 strangers than they have of knowing us. Though I take 
 it you hardly call yourself a stranger. He, he ! Think the 
 name would apply better to myself, doubtless. I beg your 
 pardon, sir." 
 
 "There is no apology necessary," said Mr. Burns, with 
 dignity. 
 
 "It is true," continued the gentleman, "that I have 
 not lived here a great while ; but then, while I have been 
 growing into the place, you, sir, have been growing out 
 of it. Sorry I didn't have an opportunity of making 
 your acquaintance sooner ; been East on business. Un- 
 derstand you leave us again in a day or two?" 
 
 Mr. Burns bowed again, coldly. 
 
 " I suppose you don't recollect seeing me once be- 
 fore?" The gentleman put the question as he might a 
 puzzle. 
 
 " I don't think I have ever had the honor," Mr. Burns 
 returned. 
 
 "Well, sir, you were in my store this morning. El- 
 ston's old stand, you remember; new sign, Dry Goods 
 and Notions. You came in on a little matter of trade, 
 cigars, perhaps." 
 
 " I don't smoke," said Mr. Burns, expressing as much 
 disapproval of the practice as could be crowded into so 
 brief a sentence. 
 
 "Ah ! my mistake. Beg pardon. My clerk waited 
 upon you. Well, sir, I took advantage of the occasion 
 of your coming in to make some inquiries about you, of 
 gentlemen who were sitting around ; which, permit me 
 to say, were answered in a manner highly creditable to 
 you." 
 
 Mr. Burns showed his appreciation of this compliment 
 E 9
 
 98 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 by kicking, with some vehemence, a small stone off the 
 sidewalk. 
 
 " But, sir, I beg your pardon ! I had forgotten to in- 
 troduce myself to you. He, he ! My name is Smith. 
 Popular name, isn't it? Not much danger of its being 
 soon extinguished. He! he! he!" 
 
 It was a stale joke, which he had perpetrated many 
 times before. Nevertheless, he laughed enjoyably, his 
 mirth in no way lessened by the fact that he laughed 
 alone. 
 
 "Town changed considerable since you were last 
 here?" he inquired complacently, after they had walked 
 along for some distance in silence. 
 
 Mr. Burns replied uncompromisingly that he had not 
 observed any remarkable changes, at least in the way of 
 improvement. 
 
 " O, come, now ; that's too bad ! The place seems a 
 little dull just now, because a good many have pulled up 
 stakes and gone West. Leaves an opening for a few wide- 
 awake chaps to come in and take their place. Should 
 think you'd quit college now and go into business. Splen- 
 did opportunity with your stock of learning. Might start 
 a hardware store or grocery. It doesn't pay to spend all 
 a fellow's worth getting an education, especially that sort 
 of education that can't be turned to account in trade. 
 What's the use of science and languages to fellows like 
 us who haven't got a fortune to back us? There's no 
 money in them ! I'll tell you what, there is one kind of 
 schools I like, these commercial colleges. They fit a 
 man for business. Nothing ornamental about them, it's 
 all useful. It's true, I'm something of a dabbler in lit- 
 erature myself; was educated that way, you see. Read the 
 poets now and then, and scribble a little occasionally. 
 But if I had a boy to bring up I'd send him to a com- 
 mercial college." 
 
 Mr. Burns's dignity suffered tortures; especially as it 
 was of that fine quality which disdains reply to stupidity 
 or impertinence. He took advantage of the first con- 
 venient street-crossing to step aside with a superior air 
 and very formal "I bid you good-evening, Mr. Smith." 
 
 The impressiveness was lost on the pachydermatous
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 99 
 
 Smith, who, thus suddenly pulled up, responded cordially, 
 though in a tone of slight surprise, and walked on solilo- 
 quizing, " Hum, queer chap ! A leetle hard to get ac- 
 quainted with. Young, though ; hasn't seen much of the 
 world yet, I take it." 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 MEANWHILE, Wilma went into the house and sat down 
 with the family in the best room, which was a very plain 
 room, with a faded carpet, cane-seated chairs, and coarse 
 white curtains at the windows. The only thing that at- 
 tempted ornamentation was Miss Barker's little rosewood 
 melodeon with its carved legs. Before it sat that lady, 
 not performing, but looking over a little work on thorough 
 bass that was upon the rack. Blanche was seated near 
 her with her feet drawn up on her chair-rung, her short 
 dress reaching scantily below the knees, contracting a 
 pair of precocious eyebrows over a slate and an arith- 
 metic. 
 
 Mrs. Lynne looked up from her knitting when Wilma 
 entered, and asked with mild reproof, "Isn't it rather 
 chilly to be out so late, Wilmingard?" 
 
 "Oh, no," said Wilma, a little shrinkingly, the question 
 grazing the edge of her ideal world, of which Mr. Burns 
 was the centre, and of which she never made any men- 
 tion in the presence of her family. 
 
 They knew of her engagement, but of all the tender 
 hopes and plans of the two young hearts they were quite 
 ignorant. The engagement, which, notwithstanding their 
 extreme youth, was already of long standing, wore a very 
 matter-of-fact aspect to all outsiders, except, perhaps, Mr. 
 Burns's mother. 
 
 "You wouldn't mind if your fingers and toes were a 
 freezing, so long as my Lord Lofty's around, would you, 
 Will?" said Fred, who sat with his elbows on the table 
 and his chin dropped in the palms of his hands, looking
 
 I oo HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 out sleepily from under a great shock of light, frizzly 
 hair. 
 
 Mrs. Lynne glanced up reprovingly. She was fearful 
 like many a poor woman left alone to bring up a house- 
 full of children of having her authority trampled on, 
 and so continually held it up like a banner before the 
 eyes of her subjects. Resulting from which, it is not 
 strange that it was sometimes treated with a disrespect 
 like that paid to Gessler's cap by the indomitable William 
 Tell. 
 
 Fred was silent a moment, and sat winking drowsily at 
 his mother's knitting-needles. By and by, he looked 
 across at Wilma again, his tantalizing spirit unsubdued. 
 
 "Why didn't 'Squire Burns come in and spend the 
 evening, Will? Couldn't condescend, eh? There ain't 
 any of the rest of us high-toned enough, I s'pose." 
 
 Mrs. Lynne again waved her banner by flashing at. him 
 another grieved, reproving look, which he affected not to 
 notice. Blanche, with a world of indignation in her 
 black eyes, shot a glance at her brother over her slate- 
 rim. 
 
 "You think you're dreadful smart, Frederic Lynne !" 
 
 "Why, sis, who'd 'a thought you'd 'a spoke!" said 
 Fred, turning around with mock surprise. 
 
 Blanche figured away in sarcastic silence. She had 
 great respect for Mr. Burns, whose rather proud bearing 
 and dignified reserve accorded with her young ideas of a 
 gentleman. Frequent skirmishes on his behalf were car- 
 ried on between herself and Fred, all pretty much upon 
 the same plan and all ending in Fred's discomfiture. 
 
 Wilma never took any part in such combats. She was 
 too keenly sensitive where Mr. Burns was concerned even 
 to defend him, though the blood tingled in her very 
 finger-ends to hear him assailed. 
 
 Blanche presently slid down from her chair, put by her 
 book and slate, and going up to Miss Barker asked, 
 coaxingly, "Please sing something, won't you, Miss 
 Barker? Sing 'Annie Lawrie.' ' 
 
 Miss Barker complied with a smile (Blanche was a 
 favorite of hers), and touched the keys. A tender pre- 
 lude glided from under her slim fingers and prevailed
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. j o i 
 
 over the silence. Frederic's head had dropped upon his 
 folded arms on the table, Mrs. Lynne plied her needles 
 industriously, and Wilma had taken up a book, a book 
 of poems left by Mr. Smith for Miss Barker's edification. 
 Miss Barker sang with a queer, half-affected pathos, 
 which Blanche, much admiring, tried her best to imitate, 
 and the chorus, especially, was very plaintively rendered : 
 
 "And for bonnie Annie Lawrie, 
 I'd lay me down and dee." 
 
 "Oh, Lord!" groaned Fred, raising his sleepy eyes 
 toward the singers. 
 
 Blanche flashed round upon him with intense disdain. 
 
 "Frederic, what do you mean?" demanded Mrs. 
 Lynne, with much sternness. 
 
 "Oh, nothing, mother. I mean that I don't mean no 
 offence to Miss Barker; but to think of a fellow that 'ud 
 lay him down an' die for a girl !" 
 
 " Oh, we all know you wouldn't put yourself out for 
 anybody," sneered Blanche. 
 
 "Yes, I would," said Fred. "I don't mind putting 
 myself out a leefle, say to beau a girl home with an um- 
 brella of a wet evening, or trot half a mile to fetch her 
 rubbers when she's come off and forgot 'em, or some 
 such reasonable inconvenience ; but come to putting my- 
 self out altogether, blamed if there's a girl in Hazelville 
 I'd do it for." 
 
 "Nor anywhere else," said Blanche, incisively. 
 
 "I beg pardon, Blanche, and you, too, Miss Barker," 
 said Fred, humbly (though Blanche doubted the genuine- 
 ness of the humility). " Don't be offend d, go on with 
 your interlude, and let's have the rest." 
 
 But Miss Barker had emphatically ceased to play, and 
 arose from the instrument with an offended dignity which 
 she evidently believed would express itself best in silence. 
 And a very ominous silence accordingly followed. It 
 was too much for Fred ; in his own language he began to 
 feel "mean," especially when he inadvertently encoun- 
 tered his mother's sorrowful eyes fixed on him in solemn 
 reproach, as much as to say, "See what you have done." 
 
 He made a strong resolve to hold his peace, and with 
 9*
 
 102 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 that dropped his head upon the table again. His atten- 
 tion was next attracted by Mrs. Lynne saying something 
 to Wilma about her wardrobe, having reference to her 
 going off to school. 
 
 "'Most ready to go, Will?" looking up, his bright 
 eyes twinkling underneath the bushy hair. 
 
 "Yes, I am quite ready," said Wilma, "unless I hap- 
 pen to think of something else." 
 
 "I suppose you'll keep on, when you get started, till 
 you know as much as my learned and lofty brother-in-law 
 that is to be? Well, that's right, go ahead. Here's 
 poetry for it : 
 
 " A little learning is a dangerous thing ; 
 Drink deep " 
 
 "Oh, poetry, poetry !" sneered Blanche. "You're 
 always quoting poetry." 
 
 "Blanche, my small sister, you are much too sarcastic 
 for your years," said Fred. "You are developing pre- 
 maturely in that particular direction." 
 
 " I am afraid she owes that to you, Fred," said Wilma, 
 who was secretly more in sympathy with Fred than the 
 others supposed. There was a stratum of sense and good 
 nature in him which she liked, though she realized as 
 much as any of them that he must not be upheld in his 
 odd ways. She never laid up against him anything he 
 chose to say of Mr. Burns, knowing that it all came out 
 of a spirit of mischief that loved to tease her. Outside 
 the family circle Fred himself defended the young colle- 
 giate with all the boyish eloquence and confidence he 
 possessed, which was not a little. 
 
 Blanche, always industrious, got her little morocco- 
 covered Testament and began studying her Sunday-school 
 lesson. After a time she looked up with a puzzled ex- 
 pression and asked (she had a very old head for a little 
 girl), "Ma, where did the Bible come from?" 
 
 Mrs. Lynne glanced up, surprised and disconcerted. 
 
 "Huh! I sh'd think everybody 'd know that," said 
 Fred. 
 
 "Do you know? Perhaps you can tell us then!" 
 Blanche retorted.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 03 
 
 "Why, it was handed down," said Fred, lucidly. 
 
 " Dear, how smart you are ! Handed down where 
 from?" 
 
 "Well, that's what we don't know," Fred returned, 
 candidly. "There's some things we don't understand, 
 and it ain't likely we ever will ; but we're to believe 'em 
 all the same, for all that. That's faith, don't you see?" 
 
 "No, I don't see," said Blanche. "I don't under- 
 stand what faith is." 
 
 "Why, it's believing what folks tell you whether it's so 
 or not," said Fred. 
 
 "Oh, Fred !" exclaimed Wilma. 
 
 Miss Barker, horrified, felt that it was time for her to 
 speak. 
 
 "Faith," she began, addressing Blanche, to the utter 
 exclusion of Frederic, " means that you are to accept and 
 believe just what the Bible says." 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Blanche, with her baby brows 
 precociously contracted, " but there are lots of things 
 that the Bible doesn't say !" 
 
 "You are not to trouble yourself about what it does 
 not say," returned Miss Barker, severely, stopping inquiry 
 with authority instead of satisfying it with explanation, 
 which is perhaps not the most effectual way to lead young 
 minds into the right belief. "It says enough for every- 
 body's salvation if they choose to accept it." 
 
 " Or for everybody's damnation if they don't choose 
 to accept it!" said Fred, with a sudden inspiration, 
 anxious to impress Blanche with the sufficiency of the 
 Scriptures. 
 
 Miss Barker raised her hands and turned her face aside 
 to ward off the blasphemy. 
 
 " If we could clearly understand about the judgments 
 spoken of in the Bible," interposed Wilma, "as well as 
 the rewards, I suppose we should find them to mean 
 nothing more than the natural consequences of sin, or of 
 righteousness." 
 
 "That's a fact !" said Fred. "Though I suppose we 
 get it at second-hand from you, Wilma." 
 
 Wilma blushed, as she always did when betrayed intc 
 giving any of Mr. Burns's opinions.
 
 104 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "I think, Frederic, we have heard enough from you 
 this evening," said Mrs. Lynne, with unusual severity. 
 "You may go to bed." 
 
 Fred obeyed, thinking to himself as he went up-stairs, 
 " I'm sure I've heard it preached in the pulpit that the 
 most of us are to be damned, and I've given myself up 
 for lost every time. If there's only room for a few, I say 
 let the ladies go ahead as they do at Masonic funerals. I 
 know I ain't good, and I ain't so very particular where 
 they put me, either. I expect there'll be others in the 
 same boat, and I can stand what the rest can. That's a 
 pretty good idea of Will's or young Burns's that we've 
 just got to suffer the consequences. Of course it stands 
 to reason that the punishment won't be greater than the 
 offence, if we are to believe in the Almighty's justice. If 
 He ain't disposed to be fair, why, we can't help ourselves, 
 as I see, anyhow. It's my belief, though, that a fellow 
 can pull through, some way or other." With that the 
 philosophic Fred, relying more upon his own stoicism 
 and ability to "stand the consequences" than upon the 
 Supreme Father, tossed his boots into a corner and 
 turned into bed. 
 
 The other members of the family were variously affected 
 by the occurrences of the evening. All except Blanche, 
 who, forgetful of everything weighty, went and got her 
 big china-faced doll and arranged it in its white night- 
 gown, a duty she never neglected. Miss Barker felt per- 
 sonally offended with Fred. Wilma believed he would 
 come out all right, he had at bottom such a good, honest, 
 kind heart. Little Mrs. Lynne, deeply distressed, lay 
 awake half the night praying, planning, hoping, despair- 
 ing for her wayward boy, who was as much hers to guard 
 and care for and love as either of the other children. 
 Poor, tender, mother-hearts, what burdens they carry ! 
 Selfish, and yet sublimely unselfish in their great love.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE following evening was Mr. Burns's last in Hazel- 
 ville, as he was about to return to his university. It was 
 too precious to spend anywhere save with Wilmingard. 
 Notwithstanding he lingered in his mother's little sitting- 
 room and seemed reluctant to start, for the sweet-faced 
 old lady who sat by the fire with her knitting appeared 
 to watch apprehensively every movement he made. By 
 and by he got up and took his hat. 
 
 "Are you going out, Charley?" she asked. 
 
 "Only to bid Wilma good-by, mother; shall you be 
 lonely?" 
 
 He came round to the back of her chair and bent over 
 and touched her faded cheek with his lips. 
 
 " No, I am used to it, you know, my son. Put on your 
 scarf and keep your throat warm. I think it is raining a 
 little. The umbrella hangs in the kitchen." 
 
 She got up and took the lamp to get it herself. Poor 
 mother, it was his last evening. He put on his hat, but- 
 toned his coat, and half-regretfully opened the door and 
 stepped out. 
 
 " I won't be gone long, mother," he called back, with 
 his hand on the door-knob. 
 
 " Very well," said Mrs. Burns, cheerfully, but sighed 
 the moment the door closed, and listened as her son's 
 quick footsteps went ringing down the stone pavement, 
 and then drew up the stand that held the lamp and the 
 family Bible. 9he took off her spectacles and wiped them 
 on her white handkerchief, and even then could hardly 
 see for the blurring. 
 
 Human nature is so rich in resources, and yet how 
 many lives run in a single narrow channel. It seems as 
 if there ought to be more general development of human 
 faculties. Would it not be well, for instance, if parents 
 would cultivate something beside parental affection? Some 
 resources within themselves, some interests not centred 
 wholly in their offspring. Old hearts are very desolate 
 E*
 
 Io6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 in the deserted nest after the young birds have flown, as 
 fly they must and will. 
 
 A dismal little rain was spattering the pavement as 
 Mr. Burns wended his way to the Widow Lynne's. He 
 found to his extreme annoyance that Mr. Smith, of the 
 immortal family, had preceded him, and was familiarly 
 seated with the family in the best room. Miss Barker and 
 he were engaged in a discussion upon education, in which 
 the former had shown herself in favor of it upon any 
 terms, compulsory or otherwise, and in which Mr. Smith 
 had rather gone against it, giving as his objection to the 
 public school system the immense taxation to keep it up. 
 Moreover, farmers' sons, he declared, and farmers' daugh- 
 ters should not be educated above the plow and the dairy. 
 Else, what will the country do for its bread and butter, 
 by and by, when our boys are all doctors, and lawyers, 
 and preachers, and our girls all fine ladies, who read 
 novels and play on the piano. Miss Barker suggested 
 immigration as a means of recruiting the laboring ranks ; 
 but Mr. Smith was opposed to immigration also, though 
 it was evident he had not thought of a way of stopping 
 it. 
 
 Mr. Burns upon coming in had seated himself apart 
 from the debaters, and although he at first lent a polite 
 ear to the conversation he forbore participating, and soon 
 drifted into an undertone aside with Wilma. " I wonder 
 how many of us are capable of education?" said he. "So 
 many accumulate knowledge without being really edu- 
 cated. So many appear to think they have no mental 
 faculty but memory. For my part, I have no wish to 
 cram my head with a mere mass of facts, dates, events ; 
 what I want is expansion and development. I want to 
 get hold of the best there is in me and bring that out. I 
 believe there is enough of good in every human soul to 
 make a grand character, if only the best was cultivated. 
 Do you observe the mistake these people (nodding toward 
 the group at the other end of the room) have fallen into, 
 of assuming that every man who educates himself must 
 necessarily quit his farm and his quiet occupations and 
 get into public notice?" 
 
 Wilma smiled. " After all, that is natural, isn't it?"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 107 
 
 " I suppose so, but it is needless. No man who is a 
 thinker and a worker need trouble himself about his ob- 
 scurity. You know the very desert is traversed by men, 
 and a grand character in any obscure corner of the world 
 is sure to be sufficiently known and admired. I'll tell 
 you what I want, my dear. I want comprehensive rather 
 than accumulative faculties, and the power to bring my 
 mental and moral forces to bear in actual living and 
 working. I don't care to put the world's past in my 
 memory; it is enough to have it in my library for refer- 
 ence or for leisure hours. I want to make a workhouse 
 of my mind, not a storehouse. What good is a human 
 cyclopaedia? History is better more accurate and more 
 lasting in a book than in a man. Flesh and blood are 
 too costly a binding for statistical records. I could never 
 be a historian to gather up and preserve the implements, 
 the vehicles that men have used in carrying forward the 
 world's progress. I want to be one of those who go 
 forward into the unknown." 
 
 "What if everybody were like you, Charley?" said 
 Wilma, looking up, archly. 
 
 "True ! we should soon have no foothold in the past, 
 should we?" Charley returned, a sudden expansive smile 
 breaking over his rather grave face. " Somebody has got 
 to keep history going, I suppose. If all were like me the 
 world would soon get into a very chaotic state. But, 
 thank Heaven ! we are not all cut after the same pattern. 
 I want to pick out of the great bundle of work that which 
 suits me. I claim it as my right to have a choice. I want 
 knowledge, I want education, only as a lamp to use on 
 my way through life, to light me into the unseen. Do 
 you understand me, Wilma? I want all the helps I can 
 get toward living and working. And this I call education. 
 When my faculties are trained to do what I wish to ac- 
 complish, I shall be educated. We have splendid possi- 
 bilities, my dear ; but ah ! the waste of human material 
 human souls. And it is all the result of ignorance ; you 
 have no idea of the low, animal life among the mankind 
 of our large cities. Mankind ! It is a burlesque upon 
 manhood, upon womanhood. It makes me heart-sick to 
 look upon the suffering, degraded women. It is the sad-
 
 1 08 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 dest picture the world can show. And in view of it all, 
 one pair of hands are so powerless. I thank God, my 
 darling, that it will be my sweet privilege to bless one 
 woman's life, to keep the glad song of love in her heart, 
 the beautiful light of happiness in her eyes always." 
 
 Mr. Burns, reaching this climax of beautiful devotion, 
 paused a moment in contemplation. He had the most 
 tender and chivalric nature, and felt himself to be true 
 and unchangeable. Wilma's heart thrilled with infinite 
 love and trust. 
 
 " I am so glad you are going off to school, Wilma," 
 Charley continued. " You will learn so much, not merely 
 in books, but in many ways beside. Of course, I should 
 love you all the same, darling; but I think we shall be 
 better and happier and more useful by being largely and 
 uniformly developed in mind and heart." 
 
 " Oh, Charley ! I could never know as much as you if 
 I should study a thousand years," Wilma exclaimed. 
 
 "Oh, yes, you will, my dear; not the same things, 
 perhaps; I want my wife" (and here the young collegian 
 plumed himself a little) " to know just as much, or more, 
 than I. Only a little different knowledge, more delicate, 
 more refined, just as a woman's mind differs from a man's, 
 being more gentle and beautiful " 
 
 It must be allowed that Mr. Burns's tone and bearing 
 sometimes justified Fred's criticism of him, if we judge 
 him from Fred's standpoint. A few college years had 
 lifted him above ignorance, but he had not yet acquired 
 that broad, charitable wisdom that makes a man tolerant 
 of I had almost said of all things. He could hardly 
 help looking back with contempt on the grovelling lives 
 he had left behind him. The little, quiet town whose 
 pulse never quickened to the beat of the world's great 
 drum ; he had shaken its dust from his feet. However, 
 that youthful egotism that despises the lower life while 
 aiming after the higher, is not a bad thing viewed by the 
 philosopher stationed a little farther on in the way of life ; 
 by and by, when it has risen clear of the dust itself, it 
 will acquire a broader vision and expand with a softer 
 charity. 
 
 Charles Burns was very much awake upon the great life
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 109 
 
 problem, and felt a high degree of personal responsibility. 
 Well, the enthusiasts are the men that move the world. 
 They give the impetus. 
 
 By and by, Miss Barker and Mr. Smith got into a con- 
 troversy about the poets, and the latter appealed to Mr. 
 Burns. "I say, Burns, don't you think Tom Hood was 
 a great poet? Miss Barker, here, is inclined to dispute 
 his laurels." 
 
 Mr. Burns replied, a little stiffly, that it was perhaps 
 a matter of taste, education, and cultivation, whether he 
 would be considered "great." Remarking, that there is 
 a market for literature the same as for other produce, and 
 that it is changeable and fluctuating all over the world. 
 In certain localities Hood might rank above Shakspeare ; 
 in others, fall below Widow Bedott. Just as, in some 
 places, the superior article of food is rice ; in others, corn ; 
 in others, potatoes. 
 
 "Oh, of course," Mr. Smith returned, uncertain 
 whether the young collegian sided with him or not : in- 
 deed, Mr. Burns had purposely left that point obscure. 
 " Of course, everybody has his own opinion." 
 
 "On the contrary, very few have," said Mr. Burns, 
 taking him up unceremoniously. "We usually borrow 
 other people's opinions, without taking the trouble to form 
 our own. In the matter of books and authors, the critics 
 decide for us. Popish rule takes the Bible out of the hands 
 of ignorance, fearing misconstruction; none the less, we 
 have a priesthood to interpret all our books." 
 
 Mr. Smith was a persistent talker, and might have con- 
 tinued the discourse indefinitely, having succeeded in get- 
 ting Mr. Burns launched ; but he had an engagement that 
 could not well be put off, being an engagement with a 
 debtor who was coming in to " settle up," and so he was 
 obliged to take his departure, which he did with reluctance. 
 He approached Mr. Burns to bid him good-night and 
 good-by, and Mr. Burns got up and bowed, with his hands 
 behind him. Shortly afterward he himself took leave of 
 the family, and Wilma went with him down to the gate. 
 It would have been impossible for her to have kissed him 
 "good-by" in the presence of them all. 
 
 It could hardly be called a sad parting with so much 
 10
 
 1 1 o HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 love and trust on both sides, though there were tears in 
 Wilma's eyes. Charley said, tenderly, his strong arm 
 clasping her waist, and his smooth cheek pressing hers, 
 " It will not be for long, Wilma ; be brave and patient, 
 and trust the future all to me, my little one. I shall think 
 of you and love you all the time, darling. Good-by, 
 good-by !" 
 
 He turned and walked away rapidly, and Wilma leaned 
 over the low gate and looked and listened as long as his 
 footfalls echoed through the night's stillness, big slow 
 tears dropping silently and unheeded. Then she went 
 back into the house and up-stairs to her own little cham- 
 ber and closed the door, feeling that there was a sacred- 
 ness in this hour in which she had parted from her lover, 
 perhaps for a whole year, which must not be intruded on. 
 She liked being alone, though she was fond of people. 
 She liked to speculate about them, and invest them with 
 wonderful histories. The self-consciousness going on in 
 every soul was a deep, romantic mystery to her. 
 
 By some one of the many seemingly singular affinities 
 in this world (what outwardly conglomerate assemblages 
 there would be if there were no obstructions in the spir- 
 itual currents that draw people together !), Wilma had 
 contracted a strong friendship with a family consisting of 
 three elderly maiden sisters, whom Fred impiously called 
 the three Black Crows, because of their having peculiar 
 bird-shaped faces and always dressing in black. These 
 ladies were much in advance of the village in point of 
 breeding and cultivation. They were very isolated and 
 not very well liked, being considered proud, because, poor 
 ladies, they did not know how to put themselves on a 
 level with coarse minds. Mrs. Lynne, though not coarse, 
 had no key with which to unlock their different nature, 
 and so shared in the general dislike. 
 
 Wilma went to them under a sort of protest of her 
 mother and Miss Barker, and the whole village, in fact. 
 Indeed, most of the things Wilma liked to do and did 
 do, for, though she had little combativeness and would 
 have been better pleased to drift with the tide than to 
 stem it, she had a keen intuition of right, and a strong 
 disposition to follow it she did under protest. Being
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK:. 1X1 
 
 naturally amiable and obliging she would have been easily 
 led and controlled, without this innate principle which 
 made it a difficult thing for her to be pushed into a cor- 
 ner and kept there by others' prejudices. 
 
 Wilma's friends, the Shermans, had seen better days, 
 as their surroundings and belongings testified. They had 
 books, and pictures, and fine old lace-curtains, and an- 
 cient, stiff, silk dresses. They lived in a rambling, low- 
 roofed old -house, unpainted and moss-covered, shut in 
 by trees and clambered over by vines ; a curious and 
 romantic place from which almost all the villagers, envious 
 of Wilma's freedom of it, were shut out by their own 
 unkindly regard and awe of its inmates. The three sis- 
 ters, quaint and delicate and shrinking from contact with 
 their neighbors, sat among their old luxuries, and looked 
 out a little shiveringly upon the cold, unsympathetic 
 world. And Wilma was the only bit of fresh young life 
 that penetrated into their home and hearts. And it was 
 only when safe in the midst of them, with their kindly 
 and lively sympathy stirred for her, and their sweet, 
 home-like atmosphere surrounding her that Wilma freely 
 expanded. They gave her a freedom that nobody else 
 who acted upon her life even Charley allowed her. 
 
 On the walls in the Shermans' parlor, and in the folios, 
 were some fine paintings and engravings. What interested 
 Wilma most among them were the portraits of eminent 
 men and women, men and women who had thought 
 and suffered, and whose faces were books. Charley had 
 often said to her in their rambles through the woods 
 and over the hills, "I love nature, Wilma!" And once 
 she answered, laughing, "And I like folks." "Well," 
 said he, " we shall see which love is abiding, nature's 
 or man's." 
 
 Ordinarily Wilma was not brilliant in looks ; there was 
 only now and then a flaming out of the inspiration within 
 her to color her cheeks and illumine her eyes. She had 
 a soft, brown, fine-textured skin, and an abundance of 
 light hair, some of it short, and curling in little ringlets 
 about her face. Her eyes were much darker, large and 
 brown, and sometimes limpid and bright as the shaded 
 brook in the heart of the woods.
 
 112 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 The morning following Mr. Burns's last visit was very 
 hard to be got through with. Miss Barker put on her 
 bonnet and started to school at eight o'clock, so as to be 
 there betimes to sweep the room, and dust, and set the 
 children's copies before the legalized hour for beginning 
 the day's work. In half an hour Blanche followed. 
 Fred hitched up in the one-horse cart and drove out to 
 " the farm," and Mrs. Lynne and Wilma were left to do 
 up the morning work. Wilma went about with a brain 
 full of thoughts and a heart full of emotions that her busy 
 mother had no conception of, being occupied with her 
 own affairs. 
 
 At nine the stage would start from the hotel and she 
 could see it from her chamber window. She had dwelt 
 upon that anticipation all the morning with such a concen- 
 tration of longing for one more glimpse of her lover that 
 it seemed as if her mother must read it in her face. At 
 last she was at liberty and flew up-stairs, her heart throb- 
 bing as though some great crisis was at hand. Only to 
 see Charley a quarter of a mile distant. She put aside 
 the curtain and looked off eagerly in the direction of the 
 hotel. She could see the barn, and they were bringing 
 out the horses. Two or three travellers were standing on 
 the stoop in front of the hotel waiting. But no Charley. 
 Her eyes ran swiftly down the street in the direction of 
 his home, shut out of sight by the hills and trees. In a 
 moment he came leisurely around the corner, carrying 
 his travelling-bag. Wilma's heart bounded and the blood 
 rushed up into her face at sight of the splendid figure, 
 broad-shouldered and athletic, full of elasticity and 
 strength, and the perfect health and vigor of youth. 
 She longed intensely to be with him for one moment, 
 just one moment, to feel the clasp of his hand and say 
 "good-by," again. Her eyes were full of passionate 
 tears. The morning had been long enough, why had he 
 not come ? She remembered that she had not asked him 
 to come, and, for all his tenderness, he was so proud. It 
 seemed to her, as he went up into the porch and stood 
 among the other men carelessly talking, that he was leagues 
 away from her. There was nothing in his manner that 
 had any reference to her.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 1 3 
 
 Suddenly her heart thrilled ; he walked to the end of 
 the long porch, apart from the others, and looked away 
 to the top of Little Twin. Then she knew he was think- 
 ing of her, and they were again united. 
 
 The stage rattled up, and he turned and walked back 
 and threw his travelling-bag into it, and sprang up on the 
 seat with the driver. The others got inside. A sudden 
 thought occurred to Wilma; she might at least meet his 
 eyes once more; there was a turn in the street as it left 
 the village only a few rods from Mrs. Lynne's. There 
 would be a few moments' delay at the post-office, and in 
 the mean time she could walk up that street and go and 
 see her friends, the Shermans, and she would be sure to 
 meet the stage. She felt a guilty little pang at the de- 
 ception she was practising upon herself, about the Sher- 
 mans, to cover up what seemed to herself, and what she 
 knew Miss Barker and her mother would denounce as a 
 great piece of immodesty. 
 
 She flew down-stairs and got her hat and walked rapidly 
 up the quiet, unpopulous street, under the thick shade of 
 the trees that bordered the narrow, steep sidewalk. Just 
 as she reached the foot of the hill on the other side, the 
 stage came banging round the corner. At first she 
 thought, in an agony of suspense, that he would not see 
 her. He was looking straight before him, smiling and 
 talking with the driver. But the intense magnetism of 
 her eyes attracted him. He turned his head suddenly, 
 and a flush of glad surprise broke over his face. He bent 
 forward and kissed his hand to her in the quick moment 
 of passing. It was but an instant, rattlety-bang went the 
 old stage, and he was out of sight. Wilma stood still for 
 a moment, too deeply moved to give a thought to the 
 Shermans, and then turned and went slowly back home. 
 
 For many miles the picture of her walking there like a 
 brown, wood fairy under the trees, with the gorgeous 
 autumn leaves above her and under her feet, filled Mr. 
 Burns's thoughts and kept his heart throbbing. " I won- 
 der if she was not there on purpose to see me?" he 
 speculated again and again, feeling more and more tender 
 toward- her as he tried to convince himself that it was so. 
 
 The morning had seemed interminably long to him ;
 
 II 4 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 he had got up early, in time to see the sun rise, and his 
 mother had set out a dainty breakfast, and he had eaten 
 with hearty relish, partly to please her, and was in fine 
 spirits. But when he had got himself all ready for his 
 journey, even to the locking of his valise and putting the 
 key in his pocket, and looked at his watch to find that he 
 had an hour yet to wait, he began to think of Wilma and 
 to grumble because he could not see her again. Why 
 could he not see her again ? What inexplicable something 
 was it that stood in the way of his going over and bidding 
 her "good-by" again? He picked up his hat and went 
 out for a short, brisk walk up the hill back of the house. 
 When he got to its summit he looked across in the direc- 
 tion of Mrs. Lynne's. " Why didn't she tell me to come 
 back this morning?" he ejaculated. " There's plenty of 
 time. I have half a mind to go anyhow." He pondered 
 the thought a moment with knit brows, and then shrugged 
 his shoulders and turned on his heel. " No, confound 
 it ! I will not. Probably she wouldn't care to see me 
 again so soon ; it would take all the sweetness off the part- 
 ing last night. I would be a fool to go rushing back ! 
 Wilma is afraid of her folks," he supplemented a little 
 contemptuously, as he slowly retraced his steps down the 
 hill. "I have an idea they tease her about me, that 
 Fred, at any rate ; and she is such a sensitive little thing." 
 With that he came back to thinking more tenderly of her, 
 and when he picked up his travelling-bag and kissed his 
 mother good-by, he said, " Be good to my little Wil- 
 mingard, mother dear." Showing that between himself 
 and her there was no reserve on this delicate subject. 
 
 " Vou forget that I seldom see her, my son," said Mrs. 
 Burns. 
 
 "True, I don't see why she never comes here; I have 
 begged her to come so much." Knitting his brows and 
 then suddenly expanding them again. "But she will 
 some day. God speed the time !" 
 
 The first opportunity he had after leaving Hazelville he 
 wrote to her, and said, 
 
 t( Tell me, darling, was it accident that brought about 
 that flash of a meeting as we came around the corner, or 
 did you (tell me truly) care enough about me to come
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. I j 5 
 
 on purpose to see me ? I have tortured myself with the 
 query ever since. You can't think what a pleasure it was 
 to me, Wilma; that vivid moment photographed a pic- 
 ture of your sweet self upon my mind that can never be 
 erased." 
 
 Wilma, who had been educated in a practical, matter- 
 of-fact school that rather frowned upon the silliness of 
 love-making, answered him back jestingly and coquet- 
 tishly, and really unlike herself, 
 
 " To think you would suspect me of designing to get 
 another glimpse of you, you conceited Charley ! I had 
 started to go over to the Shermans." 
 
 Mr. Burns replied, "So my pretty fancy is exploded. 
 Better suspense sometimes, I find, than certainty. It was 
 conceited in me, wasn't it? Well, I beg your pardon for 
 the bold suspicion. I'm desperately jealous of those 
 Shermans. To think I should flatter myself all that long 
 journey with such an empty delusion !" 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 AN omnibus, coming from one of the Eastern trains, 
 backed up early in the evening against the stoop of the 
 Crawford House, in an academic town of that name ; and 
 a spruce clerk, with white cuffs and spotless shirt-front, 
 and with a pen behind his ear, came out and handed 
 down, one after another, half a dozen giggling, laughing 
 girls, who, as soon as their flounces were properly shaken 
 down, went tripping off up the street as if quite at home 
 with the place. Last came a little gray figure, which the 
 clerk carelessly assisted to alight, at the same time ex- 
 changing jesting remarks with the beflounced damsels, 
 with whom he appeared to be on easy terms. Not until 
 they had all turned their backs upon him and ran, laugh- 
 ing, away did he observe that the small figure standing 
 timidly beside him on the steps was waiting for his re- 
 turning attention. Then he looked down and asked, 
 quite kindly, if she wished to "stop." Being answered
 
 1 1 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 affirmatively, he opened the parlor-door and ushered her 
 in. Before he had quite shut it again she, Wilmingard 
 (to dispense with what may appear like a mystery), asked 
 with deference if she might send a letter to the principal 
 of the academy, and drew it from her pocket. Miss" 
 Barker had written it in the character of her former 
 teacher. The clerk took it unceremoniously and dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 Wilmingard took off her hat, and seated herself at one 
 of the front windows and looked out. Crawford was not 
 a large town, but to eyes just opening upon the world it 
 seemed very imposing. The church-spires were much 
 taller than the church-spire in Hazelville. The business 
 blocks were large and high and compact, and the dwell- 
 ings what few came within range of the window were 
 elegant beyond any she had ever seen before. Grander 
 than -all, in the distant, upper end of town, loomed up 
 the bulky brick proportions of the academy, whose shining 
 pewter dome was just now ablaze with the reflection of the 
 sun far down in the west. The streets of the little city 
 were remarkably broad and smooth, and an occasional 
 carriage full of smiling faces and gay draperies went 
 rolling along. The sidewalks were gravelled and bor- 
 dered on the outside with rows of maple-trees and little 
 square patches of thick green sod enclosed by a low 
 white railing. Everything wore a sort of holiday aspect. 
 Young girls in jaunty hats and gay jackets sauntered by 
 in groups, talking and laughing. Good-looking young 
 men struck their boot-heels sharply upon the pavement, 
 and walked briskly as if life meant something decided. 
 
 It was all new and beautiful and wonderful to Wilmin- 
 gard, the wide-awake town crowded with gay and happy- 
 seeming human life. It was always the humanity part 
 that touched her. The beautiful town itself, its fine 
 buildings, its trees and tinted autumn leaves, and its 
 boundary of low hills lighted up by a golden sunset, was 
 but the gilt and rosewood framing-in of the exquisite 
 picture of human life. Most of the young people Wil- 
 mingard made sure were students, and devoured their 
 faces eagerly as they passed along, thinking with great 
 trepidation how soon she would be among them ; but
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 117 
 
 never of them, oh, no ! She looked down at her plain 
 gray dress and sober little hat, and smiled. She could 
 never be so jaunty. Well, she did not care to be ; she 
 reassured herself by going back into her own little world 
 and remembering the dear ones that comprised it. Craw- 
 ford meant nothing to her but education. She did not 
 look for it to take hold upon her in any other way. She 
 had hardly speculated even upon what her teachers and 
 classmates might be to her or how they would affect her, 
 except that she had dreaded being plunged into a world 
 of strangers. She had no more thought of enlarging her 
 life socially, and letting a stream of new people into it, 
 than Lake Erie has of opening its arms and embracing 
 the ocean, if one may make so grand a comparison in 
 reference to so small and obscure a person. She was sat- 
 isfied with her own little sphere. 
 
 Perhaps there is little danger of shipwreck so long as 
 the heart has a safe anchor grappling it to something, a 
 mother, or a brother, or a sister, or only a memory or a 
 steady hope. Without it a human soul is in peril, unless 
 it have an inner strength of its own that enables it to 
 drop anchor in any sea and live in any storm. There 
 are brave souls rocked in mid-ocean that need no helps 
 from outside ; the God in them is stronger than all that is 
 round about them. 
 
 Watching the crowd on the street, Wilmingard singled 
 out a figure walking rapidly down the opposite sidewalk, 
 a tall, distinguished-looking man, dressed in black, 
 magnificent in form and carriage compared with all the 
 other passers-by. He bent his head downward like 
 people do who have a good deal to think about, and knit 
 his black brows. He had more than ordinary momentum 
 (in whatever way the word may be taken), and people 
 made way for him, and young men lifted their hats as 
 they passed him, which courtesy he briefly acknowledged. 
 He crossed the street, and Wilmingard lost sight of him 
 around the corner of the hotel, but in another moment the 
 parlor-door opened and he stood on the threshold. 
 
 The clerk, having hold of the door-knob, swung him- 
 self around in sight and announced, "The principal, 
 Professor Ingraham."
 
 I ! 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Wilmingard got up with palpitating heart and stood 
 trembling before so august a personage. It seemed to 
 her that Miss Barker's prim, laboriously-composed letter 
 of introduction had brought about a tremendous con- 
 sequence which she could never have foreseen. The 
 piercing eyes under the knit black brows transfixed her, 
 but in an instant a smile with which the mouth had 
 little to do, being hid by a black beard scattered the 
 sombre expression and illuminated the fine, dark face. 
 
 He crossed the room quickly and held out his hand, 
 retaining Wilmingard's in a strong, magnetic grasp, while 
 he asked a few rapid questions. Was she alone ? Had she 
 just arrived? Did she want a boarding-place? She felt 
 completely taken out of her little world and introduced 
 into a new, strange, but not disagreeable atmosphere. 
 The principal, despite the magnitude of his presence, had 
 a peculiar personal winsomeness. A sense of how his 
 students who were near to him by long association must 
 love him, pervaded her first impressions of him. He 
 seemed so protective. He was just that sort of strong, 
 broad-shouldered, great-hearted man to be loaded with 
 everybody's burdens and to bear them easily. He had a 
 wonderful faculty for smoothing other people's paths; 
 Wilmingard felt that intuitively in the grasp of his hand. 
 " My sons," and " my daughters," he called his students, 
 and held them all by their heart-strings, which is about 
 as strong a hold as you can get upon human nature. 
 
 " I will take you home with me to-night, Miss Lynne," 
 said he; " we have no boarding-house proper, as I suppose 
 you know ; our students all board with families and in 
 private boarding-houses. The preceptress will find some 
 good place for you to-morrow. You have a trunk?" 
 
 "Yes; it is outside somewhere," said Wilmingard. 
 
 He stepped to the door and gave some directions 
 about it. 
 
 " Now, come," said he. 
 
 Wilmingard put on her hat and they stepped out. 
 After they had crossed the street and got upon the other 
 side where the crowd was thicker, the principal looked 
 down and drew her hand within his arm, walking rapidly. 
 He talked very little, seeming preoccupied. Two or
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 119 
 
 three times he paused to speak a few words to persons 
 they met, relating to business matters, and it seemed to 
 Wilmingard that he quite forgot her as he strode on 
 again. Half-way up the main street he stopped and 
 opened the gate leading up to a pretty, Gothic house. 
 
 " Well, here we are," said he. 
 
 "Is this your home?" Wilmingard asked, feeling that 
 it was an unnecessary question, but possessed of a desire 
 to make herself as agreeable as her small powers would 
 permit. 
 
 " This is my home," said the principal, concisely. 
 
 A little shrub-bordered path, gravelled like the side- 
 walks, wound around to a side door facing the south, and 
 in a small portico partly protected by a mass of slightly 
 frost-bitten vines sat a pale-faced, severe-looking lady, 
 with a scarlet shawl around her, who looked up without 
 a smile. Her presence was singularly chilling. 
 
 "Why, Leah," said the principal, " is it not too cold 
 for you to be sitting here?" 
 
 He spoke in a tone both cheery and solicitous, or in 
 that venturous tone that is doubtful of the mood of the 
 person addressed and tries to be conciliatory. 
 
 "Where have you stayed so long?" she returned, 
 coldly. 
 
 "I went down to the hotel to fetch this little girl, 
 having met her messenger on the street. There ! I have 
 forgotten your medicine," striking his hand on his breast- 
 pocket. 
 
 "Oh, well, no matter, seeing you had more important 
 business to attend to," she replied, in the most cutting 
 and yet the quietest tones. 
 
 "I'll send James for it as soon as he comes in," said 
 he, ruefully; and then, seeing Wilmingard, "This is Miss 
 Lynne, from H County, Mrs. Ingraham." 
 
 Mrs. Ingraham gave the merest recognition, and then 
 the principal took her on into the house, and told her to 
 be seated and to take off her hat, and there his hospitable 
 civilities ended, men having, as. a general thing, small 
 knowledge of such matters. Then he stepped to the 
 dining-room door and told a girl, who was setting the 
 table for tea, to call Miss Belmont ; after which he placed
 
 120 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 his hat on the table and seated himself in a large arm- 
 chair, leaned back and passed his hand once or twice 
 across his forehead, as if to smooth out the deep lines 
 upon it, and ran his fingers through his hair, which was 
 very black and heavy, and slightly streaked with gray. 
 
 Wilmingard felt that she might study his face as openly 
 as she liked, so oblivious he made himself as he sat wait- 
 ing. He seemed to her much older and more care-worn 
 than at first, and she felt a sort of tender pity mingling 
 with her spontaneous affection for him. 
 
 In a few moments a quick, light step came down-stairs 
 and along the hall, the door of which was ajar. Mr. In- 
 graham got up quickly and went forward, the sombre 
 expression of his face breaking away and an eager, relieved 
 look coming into his eyes, that made the fair face of the 
 woman who entered flush a pale pink. 
 
 " Here is a new student, Miss Belmont ; Miss Lynne, 
 from H County. Miss Lynne, this is your precep- 
 tress. ' ' 
 
 He turned Wilma over to her, just as a man so often 
 turns over things to a quiet, clear-headed, strong-hearted 
 woman on whom he has the greatest reliance, and went 
 out into the portico. 
 
 Miss Belmont justified his reliance upon her; Wilma 
 unconsciously felt it the moment the blue eyes beamed 
 upon her face and the white hand closed over hers in a 
 firm, kindly clasp. She had been on the borders of 
 home-sickness the moment before, and felt, just now, 
 that it was not of half so much consequence to get an 
 education as to gain a friend, in this new world upon 
 which she was suddenly launched without, in one sense, 
 the least preparation. It was her first experience in lone- 
 liness, though she had spent a large share of her young 
 life alone ; and she was surprised into a knowledge of the 
 before unthought-of fact, that the presence of strangers 
 makes one's isolation felt. 
 
 Miss Belmont was neither very young nor very beauti- 
 ful ; but there was something about her more charming 
 than youth or beauty. It had speedily lifted the cloud 
 from Mr. Ingraham's brow, and it comforted Wilma in- 
 expressibly.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 2 1 
 
 Mr. Ingraham came in, in a moment, with his icy com- 
 panion, and they all went out to tea. The latter was 
 certainly not open to genial influences. She seated her- 
 self at the table with cold stateliness, and made such 
 serious business of table etiquette that Wilma, poor child, 
 who had a voracious appetite after her journey, felt under 
 too great constraint to eat, and left the table almost as 
 hungry as she had sat down to it. 
 
 Nowhere else did Mr. Ingraham labor under such great 
 disadvantage as in his own home in the. presence of 
 his own wife. As Wilma subsequently learned, she had 
 brought him a fortune, and he had somehow lost it ; and 
 she had no hesitancy in saying she had thrown herself 
 away upon him. She had had children ; their four smiling 
 faces looked down upon her from her bedroom walls but 
 their little pattering feet and prattling tongues were silent. 
 Altogether her life had gone wrong, and she was "soured." 
 
 One is sometimes tempted to ask, Is the leaven of 
 sweetness in us, or in circumstances? Could we be any 
 better or worse, any happier or more miserable, if fate 
 had ordered our affairs otherwise? 
 
 Mrs. Ingraham was said to be bitterly jealous of her 
 husband ; jealous even of his fatherly regard for the young 
 ladies of the academy ; and some shrewd persons hinted 
 that she had need to be. Others said, Bah ! he had a 
 genial, affectionate disposition, and the natural outlets 
 of his warm, generous heart being cut off by the death of 
 his children and the coldness of his wife, other channels 
 had to be opened, and it was a good thing he had charge 
 of young people. He was tender-hearted and exceedingly 
 sympathetic ; thought it no compromise of his manhood 
 to be deeply affected at a play, or a funeral, or anything 
 sad, or tragic, or pathetic. I have said he had unusual 
 momentum, and whichever way he turned he was sure to 
 go with a certain force, putting his whole soul into what 
 he did. He was a fine dramatic reader, and could per- 
 sonate a great variety of characters. 
 
 The day following Wilma's advent in the school, she 
 heard him read Shylock, and thought nothing could be 
 more hideous, and at the same time more, fascinating, 
 than his dark, swarthy, and rather handsome face con- 
 
 F II
 
 122 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 torted into a representation of the despised Jew. Passing 
 directly from that, he repeated, with the happiest change 
 of expression : 
 
 " When breezes are soft, and skies are fair, 
 I steal an hour from study and care, 
 And hie me away to the woodland scene, 
 Where wanders the stream with waters of green ; 
 As if the bright fringe of herbs on its brink 
 Had given their stain to the waves they drink," etc. 
 
 At home he spent a good deal of time among his books ; 
 piles of books, on the tables, on the floor, on chairs ; 
 and he was so fond of a listener some one to share the 
 things which he liked that he seized on whoever came 
 in his way. He made endless demands on Miss Belmont. 
 But Miss Belmont, though secretly in sympathy with his 
 fine literary tastes and keen intellect, had marked out a 
 line of duty, as well as of study, for herself, and it did 
 not often run parallel with Mr. Ingraham's wishes. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham was not troubled by conventionalities ; 
 the little politeness and suavity that varnish most men's 
 manners, he was quite free from. He wasted no time ; he 
 took a man by the hand, and went straight at what he 
 wished to say ; his mobile face expressing whatever feeling 
 was uppermost. 
 
 After tea, they alt went back into the sitting-room, 
 which Miss Belmont made cosy for the evening by letting 
 down the curtains, drawing out a small table, and arrang- 
 ing the lamp and the evening's mail, which James, the 
 errand boy, had just brought in, upon it, and opening the 
 grate in which there was a little fire to melt the chill of 
 an October evening. Mr. Ingraham went across the hall 
 into his study, put on his dressing-gown and slippers, 
 then came back and drew up his arm-chair, and settled 
 himself in it preparatory to looking over the papers. But 
 he was presently visited by some students, whom he car- 
 ried off into his study, because student-visitors annoyed 
 Mrs. Ingraham. So his big easy-chair, that had an air of 
 belonging exclusively to himself as though imbibing some 
 of his personality, stood empty, and made a vacancy 
 keenly felt in the small circle, at least by Wilmingard. 
 
 Mrs. Ingraham sat gloomily by the fire, with her shawl
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 123 
 
 around her in which she appeared always to wrap herself 
 up along with her troubles. Miss Belmont tried to in- 
 terest her in a magazine article, but met with so little 
 encouragement that she laid the book aside and took up 
 some needle-work, and turned her attention to Wilmin- 
 gard, whose open heart and mind were taking in a world 
 of new impressions almost unconsciously. Our conscious- 
 ness is the last thing to waken ; years after a certain set 
 of images pass before us, we wake up to the meaning of 
 them. Just as when we are children, we read a grand 
 poem for its musical rhythm, and see nothing else in it 
 until we are gray-haired, maybe. 
 
 Wilmingard took in a few disconnected ideas respect- 
 ing the various members of this singular family, Mrs. 
 Ingraham's utter disagreeableness, Miss Belmont's won- 
 derful gentleness, tinged with a faint sadness, and even 
 the principal's well-governed impatience at the unreason- 
 able constraint put upon him. But the workings of the 
 combined domestic machinery were a mystery to her that 
 remained obscure for years. 
 
 Miss Belmont was Mrs. Ingraham's step-sister, and 
 owed her education to her and lived under the weight 
 of the obligation. She was housekeeper in Mr. Ingra- 
 ham's domestic establishment as well as preceptress in 
 his academy. 
 
 At last Mrs. Ingraham got up and left the room, barely 
 having the grace to say "good-night" as she closed the 
 door Miss Belmont sighed, and presently put aside her 
 work. 
 
 " We will go up-stairs now, my dear. I presume you 
 are tired and sleepy, and would like to go to bed," she 
 said to Wilmingard, who did not object. 
 
 As they were about leaving the room Mr. Ingraham 
 came back, having dismissed his visitors, and looked sur- 
 prised to find the little circle broken up so soon. He 
 asked if Mrs. Ingraham had retired, and then added, 
 "And you two are going to desert me, also?" Knitting 
 his brows and frowning and smiling at once, his face 
 being capable of an endless variety and combination of 
 expressions, " Come back and sit down !" 
 
 The preceptress shook her head in some slight embar-
 
 124 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK, 
 
 rassment ; she had that sort of delicate, transparent com- 
 plexion that is quick to flush and pale. 
 
 "Our little friend is tired and must goto bed," she 
 explained, glancing at Wilmingard. 
 
 "But you are not," said he. "You will sit up half 
 the night poring over those dry books; bring them down 
 here by the fire." 
 
 He spoke with a mixture of imperativeness and per- 
 suasion ; but the preceptress was resolute, and leading 
 Wilma out into the hall, said, " Good-night," and closed 
 the door, leaving him standing alone on the mat in front 
 of the stove, with his hands behind him and a roof of 
 black hair, which he had been running his fingers through, 
 projecting over his forehead, adding to his look of grim 
 disappointment. He had a tyrannical will, and hated to 
 be frustrated even in little things. His remarkable gov- 
 ernment in school, that had won his academy an enviable 
 reputation, lay chiefly in his strong personal magnetism. 
 He did not instil principles so much as he infused him- 
 self. His students did not obey purely because it was 
 right to obey, but because it was he that commanded. 
 He exercised little visible control over Miss Belmont, and 
 yet there were times when he seemed to read in her 
 flushed face that his magnetic power was felt even by her, 
 and the suspicion pleased him, though he felt chagrined 
 that she set up her quiet, resolute will in opposition to 
 him. 
 
 He remained standing a moment, and then betook 
 himself to what were available : namely, his arm-chair, 
 the papers, and a foot-rest, and forthwith forgot that he 
 was alone or lonely. 
 
 Miss Belmont took Wilmingard up into a little white 
 room opening out of her own, and touched her lips with 
 a good-night kiss and went out, leaving the door ajar, 
 and set her lamp down on a table piled high with pon- 
 derous books. Not a paper or magazine; no gilt-edged 
 leaves or ornamental bindings; all grave-looking volumes 
 bound in calf. Seating herself, and opening one of them, 
 she began to study earnestly, absorbingly, as only those 
 can who have learned the art of close application. 
 
 Wilmingard, watching her through the open door, felt
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 125 
 
 that her own and Miss Belmont's consciousness, mingling 
 a moment before, and creating a little world in common 
 around them, were divided now, and each was alone. 
 She began to realize all the new sensations of being for 
 the first time in her life among strangers, surrounded by 
 strange white walls and unfamiliar objects. Not unpleas- 
 ant sensations ; the two rooms, Miss Belmont's and her 
 own, had an exquisite air of purity from being absolutely 
 clean. An air that extended to Miss Belmont herself, 
 who was daintily neat in person. 
 
 Wilmingard had a good opportunity now to study her 
 face as she had studied Mr. Ingraham's. She had a 
 broad, low, projecting forehead, and her light, silken 
 hair was parted and combed carefully above it and coiled 
 behind. Her skin was without speck or blemish, and 
 delicately fair. Her face was too short and broad for 
 beauty, though it was fine in intelligence and expression. 
 She had small, firm hands, short-fingered, not soft, but 
 white and smooth. Mr. Ingraham called her " The Little 
 Woman," and it seemed to imply that she had wrapped 
 up in her small person a great deal of the dignified, ad- 
 mirable quality which we call womanliness. A firm, 
 energetic, determined character was hers, softened by 
 the gentlest almost timid manners. 
 
 Wilmingard lay watching her sleepily until her eyes 
 involuntarily closed. Long afterward Miss Belmont sat 
 studying, and all the while the red coals glowed in the 
 sitting-room stove, and Mrs. Ingraham's cushioned chair 
 stood empty and open-armed. (Of all people in the 
 world, Mrs. Ingraham was not jealous of Miss Belmont.) 
 And Mr. Ingraham would have been glad of just her 
 silent presence. Not that he preferred Miss Belmont's 
 presence to that of any other intelligent, companionable 
 person, whose silent thoughts (even) were in harmony 
 with his own. He hated the solitary evenings and 
 wanted somebody to talk to occasionally, and to read to, 
 to take an interest in what interested him. It chafed 
 him to be left alone. Even if he were busy studying or 
 writing, so that he never looked up, or spoke, or showed 
 by any sign that he was conscious of another presence, 
 he yet liked to feel that some other was there. Mrs. 
 
 u*
 
 1 26 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Ingraham was never available, preferring the solitude of 
 her own room and the companionship of the four smiling 
 baby faces on the walls. So he looked to Miss Belmont ; 
 but Miss Belmont would not amuse him. 
 
 Under different circumstances (if Mr. Ingraham had 
 been an unmarried man), it might have been attributed 
 to womanly pique ; for he seldom took any notice of the 
 preceptress in society, or even in the academy, where 
 among all the teachers and professors she was the staunch- 
 est pillar, being the profoundest scholar, the deepest 
 thinker, and most indefatigable worker of them all. She 
 was a philosopher, a constant seeker after the abstract 
 and hidden, and delighted in tracing the analogy of all 
 things to all things, and in bringing all investigation to 
 bear on the great problem of human life and destiny. 
 Though living, in her inner consciousness, the most soli- 
 tary, isolated life, she had the warmest, tenderest, most 
 charitable love for mankind. She had the finest moral 
 and spiritual perceptions and aesthetic tastes. If people 
 had taken the trouble to know her they would have called 
 her fastidious, and stood in fear of her verdict. As it 
 was, nobody was offended by her critical judgment. The 
 merest chit of a pianist would dash off a piece of music 
 in the most soulless manner and expect her to admire it, 
 or, at most, not care whether she admired it or not. 
 
 How we shallow, conceited creatures would writhe 
 under the lash of these silent, terrible judges, did they 
 but apply it ! Our safety lies in their nobility, that will 
 not stoop to criticise us by so much as a sneer. 
 
 Miss Belmont did not assert her own individual, grand 
 nature. She was simply the preceptress. She wore that 
 garb, and it concealed her as effectually as the black dress 
 conceals the personality of the nun. She surveyed men 
 and things from a far-above, disinterested standpoint, her 
 mind spreading out like a clear intellectual and moral 
 sky above the petty contentions, egotism, and prejudices 
 of men. It is not strange she was not appreciated ; our 
 appreciation of a thing is commensurate only with our 
 understanding of it. 
 
 When Wilmingard came to know her better and to 
 study her face, she seemed to reveal much of her grand
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 2 7 
 
 nature through her eyes ; such poor eyes, too, they were, 
 in form and color, but wonderful in light and expression. 
 She was not popular in the academy, she did not shed 
 around her the sunshine that was radiated from Mr. 
 Ingraham. Hers was one of those deep, subtle natures 
 that only a few people find out and worship as they wor- 
 ship truth and honor and heroism. The influence of 
 such persons is certainly more far-reaching and wide- 
 spreading in the end than the magnetism that attracts to 
 itself simply. 
 
 Wilmingard awoke with a start the following morning 
 to find herself surrounded with so much strangeness. 
 The shutters were open, but a jasmine clambering up out- 
 side the window covered it with a thick, green shade. 
 Nevertheless, she saw that it was daylight and heard the 
 preceptress moving about in the next room. She got up, 
 her whole being quickened with that sense of expectancy 
 one feels when stepping within the borders of a new life, 
 and washed and dressed herself and then pushed open 
 the door and went out. Miss Belmont stood at the win- 
 dow and beckoned to her. Wilmingard went up to her, 
 and she put her arm around her and said, "Good-morn- 
 ing," without turning her head. The window was open 
 from the top half-way down. The sun was peeping up 
 over a long^ line of many-hued hills stretching away to 
 the east. Wilmingard was forcibly impressed by the 
 spirit of beauty breathed through the scene, and stood 
 silent. 
 
 " I always thank God for a morning like this," said 
 Miss Belmont. "I mean spontaneously, as the birds 
 sing for joy and gladness." 
 
 Wilma glanced up into her face ; it had a little differ- 
 ent expression from the night before, less sad, more 
 hopeful. She seemed lifted above the clogging circum- 
 stances around her. In solitude Miss Belmont gathered 
 up her forces daily, and braced herself for her daily work. 
 
 "Should you like to take a short walk before break- 
 fast?" she asked. "I am going out to mail some 
 letters." 
 
 Wilmingard assented, and got her hat and shawl and 
 they went down-stairs. No one was astir below except
 
 128 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 a servant or two, in the far back regions of kitchen and 
 stable. Miss Belmont turned the key in the hall-door and 
 they stepped out. The grass and the trees and shrubbery 
 and fences were all whitened by a thick frost, on which 
 the early and not very powerful sunbeams glistened. The 
 streets were silent, the village looked like a picture of still- 
 life. In a few moments doors began to open and gate- 
 latches began to click. 
 
 "Do you like getting up so early in the morning?" 
 Miss Belmont asked. 
 
 "I have always been used to getting up early," Wil- 
 mingard said ; but as to the question of liking it, her mind 
 ran back to numberless occasions when her mother's voice 
 (alas, it gave her a pang to remember it) had aroused her 
 from sweet, reluctant dreams. 
 
 Miss Belmont smiled. 
 
 " It is natural for the young to sleep," she said. " But 
 it seems to me the morning is our best time ; our thoughts 
 are freer, our intellect clearer, and life a little fresher. 
 The night and sleep throw over us a gentle influence like 
 this delicate frost-work on the trees, and when the morn- 
 ing and consciousness break upon us we come out like the 
 day, with a certain vigor and newness." 
 
 They went down street several blocks and entered the 
 outer room of the post-office, which stood. on a street 
 corner. Miss Belmont dropped her letters in the box, 
 and they turned to go out again. 
 
 " Oh, maybe there is a letter for me !" said Wilmin- 
 gard, with a sudden hope. 
 
 Miss Belmont turned back and tapped a little silver bell 
 that stood on the counter. Immediately the postmistress, 
 a woman with a broad, square chin, and mouth firmly 
 locked, as though nothing were ever to be got out of her, 
 came in through a back door and awaited orders. 
 
 " Any letters for Miss Lynne?" the preceptress inquired. 
 
 The woman turned automatically, and took down a 
 handful of letters from the box marked L, and shifted 
 them rapidly through her hands. She was near-sighted, 
 and held them close to her face. The last one, in a large 
 white envelope, with a bold superscription upon it, Wilma 
 instantly recognized as Charley's. The woman glanced
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 129 
 
 at it a second time and threw it upon the counter. Wilma 
 caught it up with a glad heart-bound that sent the dark 
 red blood into her dusky cheeks, and put it in her pocket. 
 It seemed almost as if Charley himself were beside her, 
 banishing all the newness and strangeness, and throwing 
 around her his own dear, familiar presence. He put so 
 much of himself into his letters, into the very chirogra- 
 phy of his letters. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham was out on the steps when they got back, 
 in dressing-gown and slippers, his hair uncombed and 
 projecting over his forehead, as was often the case. 
 
 "So, Miss Belmont got you out early, did she, Miss 
 Lynne?" said he, looking quizzically at Miss Belmont 
 rather than at Wilmingard. 
 
 " Miss Lynne got herself out," returned the preceptress, 
 the pink flush suffusing her white face again. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham smiled, looking at her narrowly as if 
 piercing the delicate reserve with which she hedged her- 
 self around. It was as though he said, Come, now, I 
 know you are glad to see me, I know you rather like me ; 
 why not give up and let it appear so? But the letting it 
 appear so was where Miss Belmont took a stand and set 
 up a principle. So long as she could preserve the thin 
 partition of unacknowledgment between them, she could 
 preserve her own dignity and command his respect. Per- 
 haps one strong prop to her firm principle was this, that 
 if she lost his respect she would have nothing left. 
 
 She passed him on the steps and went in. 
 
 " Come into my study," said he, following them into 
 the hall and opening a door opposite the sitting-room 
 door. "It is not breakfast time yet," taking a massive 
 gold watch from his vest pocket. " I want to read you 
 a little scrap from Dr. Holmes. Come !" 
 
 " Please bring it into the breakfast-room," said Miss 
 Belmont. " I have a little work to do there." 
 
 Mr. Ingraham frowned portentously, and obeyed. 
 
 Mrs. Ingraham did not appear at breakfast, which Wil- 
 mingard felt to be an immense relief. It seemed to her 
 things would go on much better without that severe lady. 
 The house was remarkably pleasant ; it had luxurious fur- 
 niture, deep bay-windows, pictures, shells, stones, busts, 
 F*
 
 130 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 and no end of books. Mr. Ingraham's library and study 
 were both in one, but his books were by no means con- 
 fined to it ; they had the freedom of the house and were 
 scattered about everywhere. 
 
 As soon as breakfast was over, Mr. Ingraham went into 
 his study. By and by the boy "James" drove around 
 in a one-horse topped buggy, and he came out dressed, 
 carrying an armful of books, and got into it and drove 
 away. A little later, Wilmingard, having gone up-stairs 
 and read her letter by the jasmined window in her little 
 white room, put on her hat and started to walk to the 
 academy with the preceptress, the distance being nearly 
 half a mile. 
 
 The academy enclosure was a large park set with trees 
 and covered with thick, green grass, broken by several 
 gravel walks leading from the building to the different 
 gates. Miss Belmont opened a gate at a corner of the 
 park and went up to the front entrance, Wilmingard be- 
 side her all a-tremble with excitement and anticipation. 
 A group of girls stood in the long hall on the second 
 floor, talking and laughing boisterously. They drew aside 
 and bowed respectfully, looking a little confused, as Miss 
 Belmont passed. Immediately a side-door opened and 
 Mr. Ingraham came out with his portentous frown, that 
 did not altogether conceal a certain good-humored gleam 
 in his eyes. All the girls exclaimed in a breath, " Oh, 
 there's Prof.," and surrounded him and got possession of 
 his hands and began proffering some very earnest petition, 
 looking up to him, towering above them, with the most 
 affectionate admiration. 
 
 "Breaking the rules," said he, ignoring their request 
 and moving up the hall. "What is all this noise about?" 
 
 "Oh, we didn't know you were in there!" they an- 
 swered, saucily. 
 
 Wilma, glancing back as they turned to ascend a flight 
 of stairs running at right angles with the hall, felt the 
 scene grate upon her somehow, and observed that Miss 
 Belmont's face gathered an expression of almost severe 
 disapproval.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK, 1 3 1 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 WITHIN a day or two Wilmingard was settled at Mrs. 
 Woods's Boarding-House for Students (as a neat inscrip- 
 tion above the front door described it) ; Miss Belmont 
 having been at some pains to secure the best place she 
 could find for her. Mrs. Woods was an elderly lady of 
 strict respectability, who lived quite alone, excepting her 
 boarders and a German girl, Rachel, who helped cook for 
 them. Her boarders were her " family," and she took 
 more care and responsibility upon herself concerning their 
 welfare and behavior than is usually included in the con- 
 tract between a boarder and his landlady. She was jealous 
 of the reputation of her house, and required the most cir- 
 cumspect conduct on the part of each member. She knew 
 the academy rules and regulations by heart (and kept a 
 copy of them posted up in her dining-room), and re- 
 ported scrupulously whatever violation of them came un- 
 der her observation, with such honesty of purpose that 
 no one could accuse her of malice or evil intent ; simply 
 rigid justice. She performed her own duty always with 
 careful exactness, and expected the same of others. She 
 would not wrong her milkman out of a half-penny, nei- 
 ther would she allow him to defraud her of a drop of milk. 
 
 When Wilmingard was taken over and introduced to her 
 by Miss Belmont herself (a fact that placed her high in 
 Mrs. Woods's respect), there were already five boarders in 
 advance of her, three young ladies and two young men. 
 She had an opportunity to study their faces the first even- 
 ing, as they sat around the common study-table; a com- 
 mon study-room and table being Mrs. Woods's plan to 
 economize light and fuel. 
 
 The young men were good-looking, bashful fellows, 
 fresh from some out-of-the-way country place, evidently, 
 like Wilma herself. They had been hard-working young 
 men, farmers probably, and now were prepared to be 
 hard students, having a conscientiousness in the matter 
 which "town boys" seldom feel, being "brought up"
 
 I 3 2 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 on learning, rather than \vork, and consequently more 
 or less satiated with books. They had already a good 
 foundation of arithmetic and other solid branches for an 
 education. 
 
 The young ladies were entirely different. One of them, 
 Nellie Beach, had a beautiful face, though there was not 
 much in it, a solid, compact little figure, and taciturn, 
 good-natured disposition. She was hard to get acquainted 
 with ; there seemed to be nothing in her to fasten to. 
 You might admire her to your heart's content, and she 
 would only smile in her slow way, and give you to feel that 
 no amount of flattery could make her vain, so you flattered 
 her all the more. Every day of her life somebody told 
 her in a spontaneous burst of admiration how beautiful 
 she was. The girls were forever twining her chestnut 
 curls around their fingers and sticking rose-buds among 
 them, and squeezing her little, soft, white hands, and 
 praising her Cinderella foot. And Nellie went through 
 it all with a stoical good nature, and plodded on through 
 her studies with a hopelessness of ever knowing anything. 
 It would make anybody's heart ache to see the slow tears 
 force themselves into her pretty eyes over some incom- 
 prehensible text-book mystery. The other two young 
 ladies called each other "Miss Allen" and "Miss Mac- 
 Ivers" with punctilious politeness. It was plain to be seen 
 that the former was only tolerated by the latter because 
 they happened to be thrown together in the same house. 
 
 Of Miss Maclvers, Wilmingard stood in profound and 
 admiring awe from the first moment of seeing her. She 
 was the most elegant person she had ever met, exquisite 
 in feature, and indescribably majestic in form and carriage. 
 She had a certain hauteur that blended in a queenly way 
 with her grace and loveliness, but which sprung from 
 pride of intellect rather than pride of beauty. She was 
 a superior scholar, being somewhere in the mysterious 
 labyrinths of Greek and Latin and the higher mathematics. 
 She was a favorite with Miss Belmont because she com- 
 peted successfully with the advanced class of young men, 
 which few other young ladies did ; and Miss Belmont 
 had some pride of sex, and believed in the even balance 
 of masculine and feminine minds, other things being
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 133 
 
 equal. Miss Belmont, whose great mind was capable of 
 weighing so many other minds, felt that Miss Maclvers 
 was deserving of some credit for her intellectual exertions 
 in view of her great beauty, which would have satisfied 
 so many smaller ambitions. She was a great favorite with 
 Mr. Ingraham also, being in every respect an ornament 
 and an honor to the school. But she took no advantage 
 of his partiality, and was not in the least compromised 
 by it. She was very correct and high-principled. 
 
 As soon as the young men got through with their les- 
 sons they closed their books and went up-stairs, saying, 
 "Good-night," awkwardly, as they left the room, to 
 which only Miss Maclvers, rigidly polite, responded. 
 Shortly afterward the young ladies pushed back their 
 chairs, Nellie giving a weary little sigh. 
 
 "Poor child," said Miss Maclvers, pettingly, with a 
 light laugh, "discouraged, are you?" 
 
 Nellie smiled sadly, and replied in her slow way, " Oh, 
 yes ; it is my natural state. I was born so." 
 
 " Too bad. Can't I help you?" 
 
 " Not unless you could give me a thimbleful of brains. 
 I don't know why I was cut off with such a short allow- 
 ance. If I just had enough to put me through this 
 binomial theorem of Sir Isaac Newton's, I think I should 
 be satisfied." 
 
 "You can't expect to have everything, Nellie," broke 
 in Miss Allen. "If I had your curls I would let Newton 
 and his binomial theorem go to Halifax." 
 
 " The curls would help you a good deal on examination 
 day," said Nellie. 
 
 "Oh, do you know we are going to have a new music- 
 teacher?" said Miss Allen, abruptly, turning to Miss 
 Maclvers, who looked up with slightly-contracted eye- 
 brows ; she always regarded Miss Allen a little coldly to 
 keep down a rising familiarity, to which that young lady 
 was somewhat prone unless reasonably checked. 
 
 "A new music-teacher! What is to become of Mrs. 
 Bramen?" 
 
 "Oh, she is to remain all the same. Prof, couldn't 
 dispense with her, the little beauty," Miss Allen returned, 
 with a sneer. 
 
 12
 
 1 34 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " I do not see why she should be thought indispensable 
 to Mr. Ingraham," said Miss Maclvers. 
 
 Miss Allen reddened. 
 
 " Of course everybody knows he admires her. Did 
 you never see him, when she comes in and goes sweeping 
 up to the rostrum with her long trains, and shawl trailing 
 over her shoulder, get up and hand her a chair, as if she 
 were the Queen of Sheba ? A courtesy he never shows 
 the preceptress." 
 
 "The preceptress does not invite it. Besides, Mrs. 
 Bramen only comes into the chapel occasionally, and is 
 a sort of visitor. What were you going to say about this 
 new teacher? Where is she from ?" 
 
 "From the East," said Miss Allen, laughing. "Isn't 
 that definite? It is all I heard. Her name is Percy. 
 Aint it a pretty name? She is going to board at Petti- 
 bone's." 
 
 "At Pettibone's !" Miss Maclvers elevated her eye- 
 brows. 
 
 "Yes; the Pettibones are going to take lessons of 
 her." 
 
 " I thought they went East for their accomplish- 
 ments." 
 
 " This is the same thing, the East is coming to them," 
 said Miss Allen. "It seems that this Miss Percy was re- 
 commended to them through their Episcopalian bishop, 
 or somebody of immense consequence, and of course 
 ' Congressman Pettibone' has a mighty influence with 
 ' Principal Ingraham,' and so it is all settled. She is to 
 teach only advanced scholars; so I suppose she is away up 
 among the 'old masters,' and has ripened out of the 'new 
 school,' and all that sort of thing. I mean to take of 
 her." 
 
 "You?" said Miss Maclvers, with a slight curve of 
 her lips. 
 
 " Yes. I detest that Mrs. Bramen so much. Anyhow, 
 I don't think a woman who is divorced from her husband 
 ought to be taken into society as she is." 
 
 Punctually when the clock struck ten, Mrs. Woods 
 opened the study-room door and came in. It was the 
 signal for the young ladies to pile up their books, light
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 135 
 
 their several small fluid lamps, that stood on a little shelf 
 in one corner of the room, and go to bed. " 
 
 Mrs. Woods was a tall, spare, strongly-built woman, 
 straight and broad-shouldered, with a form like a man's. 
 She was perhaps sixty years of age. She wore her " back 
 hair" twisted up in a little coil behind, and the front 
 made into two short, iron-gray curls, put smoothly back 
 behind her ears. She had sharp, coalrblack eyes, looking 
 through a pair of spectacles. She said not a word, but 
 stood with her back to the stove and rapped her snuff-box 
 gravely, and took a pinch of snuff while the girls were 
 getting ready. 
 
 Miss Beach and Miss Maclvers went up-stairs. Miss 
 Allen said, taking up her lamp, "Come, Miss Lynne, 
 you and I are to be room-mates, I suppose." 
 
 Their room was in a wing of the house opening out of 
 the study-room. There was still another room beyond 
 it. "That," said Miss Allen, nodding toward it, "used 
 to be Miss Maclvers's room, but she took a notion to go 
 up-stairs this term. I can't say I'm sorry." 
 
 "Why?" said Wilmingard, opening her eyes. 
 
 Miss Allen laughed. " You might have observed that 
 she is not the most agreeable person one could have for 
 a neighbor." 
 
 "I think she is very beautiful, don't you?" said Wil- 
 mingard. 
 
 " Beautiful ! Of course. My dear girl, you don't know 
 what a common remark you have made ; everybody says 
 that. That is, all the new people say it ; the old ones 
 have got used to it." 
 
 Miss Allen, herself, was not beautiful, but she had a 
 finely developed figure ; such a perfectness and robust- 
 ness of physique, that, as she stood before the looking- 
 glass at the dressing-table, combing out her braided hair, 
 Wilmingard instinctively threw back her shoulders. 
 
 "What is your name, Miss Lynne?" she asked, ab- 
 ruptly. "Your given name. If you and I are to live 
 together we don't want to be ' missing' each other all the 
 time." 
 
 "Wilmingard ; but I would rather be called Wilma." 
 
 "Aha; so should I. 'Wilmingard.' What a funny
 
 1 36 HIGH WA TER-MARK. 
 
 name ! Dutch, aint it? My name is Evangeline, but I 
 prefer Eva, with the long sound of E, you know. Dear ! 
 What a stupid set of boarders we have here this term. 
 The boys I mean." 
 
 "They are strangers, aren't they ?" said Wilma. 
 
 "Yes; and likely to continue so," said Miss Allen, 
 laughing, and proceeding to unlace her shoes. " They're 
 not bad looking, but there's no ' get-up' to them ; they're 
 afraid to look you in the face. By the way, how did you 
 happen to stop at Ingraham's?" 
 
 "Mr. Ingraham came down to the hotel and took me 
 there to stay until they could find me a boarding-place." 
 
 "Ah ! And how did you like Mrs. Ingraham?" 
 
 " I didn't see much of her," said Wilma, evasively. 
 
 "No; I suppose not. I've heard them say she's very 
 reserved. I have never had the honor of an introduction. 
 Don't aspire to it. I suppose you fell in love with Miss 
 Belmont?" 
 
 "Oh, yes!" said Wilma. 
 
 Miss Allen laughed. " I just thought that of you. I 
 suspect you are a conscientious little Christian, after her 
 own heart. Except that I don't think she's a Christian ; 
 that is, a denominational Christian. Come to think of it, 
 she reads the Bible, though, reads it beautifully some 
 mornings in chapel. But it is my impression she doesn't 
 belong to church." 
 
 "How could one be a Christian and not belong to 
 church?" said Wilma. 
 
 " How could one be a Christian and belong to church ?" 
 said Miss Allen. "I might be ever so good a Christian, 
 but when it came to church I wouldn't know where to 
 put myself. The churches, you see, my dear, must tear 
 down some of their partitions and dividing walls, and 
 open out, like our parlors with folding doors, before I 
 consent to enter any of them to remain faithful ' until 
 death do us part.' " 
 
 Wilmingard had gone to bed and lay watching Miss 
 Allen's movements. She felt a little shocked and bewil- 
 dered, and did not reply.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. j 3 7 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 A SHORT time after Wilmingard was established at 
 school and at Mrs. Woods's, the academy was favored 
 with a visit from the governor of the State, and his wife 
 and daughter. The ladies were very stiffly and richly 
 dressed, and wore that peculiar style of bonnet known 
 and admired some years ago as the "Sky-Scraper" (the 
 word defines itself to the uninformed), the fair wearer of 
 which rolled her demure eyes beneath it as if pleased with 
 the magnitude of the achievement, and innocently un- 
 conscious of the speculations that might evolve from a 
 philosophic and artistic mind regarding either its utility 
 or beauty. They were accommodated with seats on the 
 rostrum, and sat looking down upon the students like 
 grand pictures in elegant oil-colors. Very urbane, agree- 
 able pictures ; the governor had a benign countenance 
 with a few deep lines about his eyes, and a few more cir- 
 cling away from his mouth upon his cheeks that gave his 
 face the appearance of perpetually smiling. The wife, 
 though similar in general appearance as husbands and 
 wives well mated usually are, seemed more energetic and 
 wide awake. One could not help thinking looking at 
 them that she was probably the " power behind the 
 throne" that had lifted him into eminence. Besides their 
 daughter they were accompanied by another young lady, 
 a little older, who did not seem to be one of them exactly, 
 but appeared like a cheap imitation done or a little over- 
 done in water colors. Her bonnet was a trifle higher, 
 if anything, and the roses in it more vividly red. Her 
 dress was just as stiff perhaps, without the satiny appear- 
 ance of very fine silk. As for her bearing, that was 
 haughtier by a good many degrees than the bearing of 
 any other member of the party. Her role in life was the 
 " poor relation ;" too proud to be the recipient of pecu- 
 niary aid, but ambitious to rank with her grander friends, 
 and inclined to be a little envious and spiteful, and to 
 stick for her rights. (I do not go behind the scenes to 
 
 12*
 
 1 38 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 give this explanation of the young lady ; it was all ap- 
 parent to the observer.) 
 
 Eyes, of course, were raised furtively and respectfully, 
 as in all well-regulated schools, and immediately dropped 
 again. All but Wilmingard's, after the first timid glance 
 she could hardly withdraw hers from the face of the gov- 
 ernor's daughter. It was such a pure, transparent face as 
 to complexion ; such a highly expressive, animated face, 
 with large, droll, black eyes, and a mouth that curved a 
 little as if meant to be satirical, but was far too sweet and 
 too mischievous. 
 
 After they had sat awhile Mr. Ingraham took them out 
 and escorted them over the building, exhibiting the vari- 
 ous apartments and departments as if it were some sort 
 of museum. Finally they went up into the observatory, 
 which was a dirty, dusty, disreputable little look-out, 
 though it commanded a magnificent view, and then came 
 back to the chapel and gave their admiring attention to a 
 few general exercises ; after which the governor was re- 
 quested to address the school, which he did in a pleasant, 
 off-hand way, making his remarks both encouraging and 
 complimentary, as school-visitors are expected to do. 
 Following this they took their departure, Mr. Ingraham 
 accompanying them down-stairs, whereupon there was a 
 general buzz and confusion until the preceptress entered, 
 following the classes from below, and hushed it up with 
 the quiet authority of her presence. 
 
 Of all the faculty, Miss Belmont was the most rigid dis- 
 ciplinarian, and, in consequence, was not a general favorite. 
 There was a certain severity, not in Miss Belmont herself, 
 but in the exercise of her office as preceptress, that was 
 effective in government, but not in winning the popular 
 affection. She seated herself at the desk, and gathered 
 up and put in order all Mr. Ingraham's books and papers, 
 and then, though conscious that the little clock tacked to 
 the wall above her head was pointing to twelve, leaned 
 back in her chair, and commanded five minutes study, 
 sure that they would all know what the penance was for. 
 The room became at once breathlessly still, except for the 
 loud tick, tick, tick, tick, that checked off the seconds 
 one by one. No one knows the length and value of mo-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 39 
 
 ments until they are thus measured for him. Three min- 
 utes passed, and then Mr. Ingraham came in, walked up 
 to the desk, glanced at the clock, and literally swept Miss 
 Belmont out of the way, and tapped the bell, to the in- 
 finite and open exultation of many of the students, though 
 he could see at a glance how the matter stood. Miss 
 Belmont's face crimsoned, and tears of mortification forced 
 themselves into her eyes. 
 
 "It is a shame !" Miss Maclvers declared, with indig- 
 nation, outside in the hall. 
 
 " Served her right !" Miss Allen retorted. " She had 
 no business to keep us after twelve ; she is always doing 
 something on her own account." 
 
 That evening Wilmingard went home a little in advance 
 of the others, which she almost always did, not yet being 
 on locking-arm terms with any of the girls. She walked 
 into the study-room, and had just put her books down on 
 the table, when a rustle near the window startled her, and 
 she looked around. There stood the governor's daughter, 
 just arisen from a chair. Her black eyes, directed to 
 Wilmingard, were red and swollen, and her whole face 
 presented a tearful appearance. 
 
 "Did I frighten you?" she asked, with a gleam of 
 amusement. 
 
 "Yes no. You startled me a little," said Wilma. 
 "Are you are you alone?" 
 
 " No; Miss Morris is here;" nodding toward Wilma's 
 bedroom door. 
 
 " Ah ! you have come to school and are going to board 
 here?" 
 
 " Exactly. You fathom the whole mystery of me at a 
 glance," laughing. "Do you know, I feel a little ac- 
 quainted with you. I met your eyes several times this 
 morning, in school." 
 
 " Yes," said Wilma. " I remember." 
 
 "Seeing there is nobody here to present us to each 
 other, you must tell me your name." 
 
 "Wilma Lynne." 
 
 "'Wilma Lynne;' that is musical. Mine is Belle 
 Raymond." 
 
 "You are the governor's daughter?" said Wilma, her
 
 1 40 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 consciousness adjusting itself to the dignity of the young 
 lady's position. "They said one of the young ladies 
 was the governor's daughter, and I was almost sure it was 
 you." 
 
 "Because I look like my papa, I suppose." 
 
 " Were you feeling homesick just now?" Wilma asked, 
 sympathetically. 
 
 " A little. I have been crying." 
 
 She laughed, and brushed the tears away with her hands. 
 The quaint, unnecessary admission was so odd and funny 
 that Wilma laughed, too. 
 
 The governor's daughter was not very formidable, in 
 tears, at least. She was a very small pattern of a young 
 lady, divested of her bonnet and wraps, though evidently 
 some years Wilma's senior. She was very fragile and deli- 
 cate, and yet had a spirited expression and bearing that 
 seemed to overcome her frail stature. Even her wet eyes 
 had little dampening effect on her lively, animated face. 
 
 She had a quaint, peculiar dignity and primness in her 
 manner and in her dress that strongly individualized her. 
 She was one of the few people who give character to their 
 clothes and possessions, whose gloves and books tell 
 who they belong to. 
 
 "I suppose I may call you Wilma, may I not?" she 
 asked. " You are quite a little girl beside me." 
 
 Wilma opened her eyes. 
 
 "Oh, yes, I'm small!" adding gravely, "but I'm 
 old." From that time she assumed an attitude of kindly 
 guardianship toward Wilma, based on her seniority. 
 "You may call me by my given name, also," she said. 
 " I suppose I ought to tell you I was christened Arabella, 
 but I am never called so except by my brothers, to tease 
 me, or by my friend, Matilda, when she wishes to be par- 
 ticularly impressive." 
 
 " Is that the young lady who is with you here?" asked 
 Wilma. 
 
 "Yes; that is Miss Morris." 
 
 Just then the young lady, who resembled a picture 
 in water colors, made her appearance, and Miss Ray- 
 mond presented her with an air of parade which she 
 usually affected toward her friend. Miss Morris nodded
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 141 
 
 coldly, and made her way to a large arm-chair that con- 
 spicuously occupied the middle of the room, and seemed 
 to be always offering itself to the most important personage 
 present. She had a weary, exhausted air, as though she 
 had sorted over all the things life offered, and found noth- 
 ing to her taste. 
 
 "Tell me the names of all the boarders; how many are 
 there?" said Miss Raymond, unconsciously lowering her 
 voice out of an unacknowledged deference to Miss Morris, 
 which her presence seemed to command. 
 
 "Five, beside me," said Wilma, and named them, 
 while Miss Raymond mentally checked them off. " Miss 
 Maclvers (always first and foremost), Miss Beach, Miss 
 Allen, Mr. Gray, and Mr. Liebenwald." 
 
 " Liebenwald? What a pretty name, and those German 
 names always mean something." 
 
 "Yonder they come," said Wilma, glancing from the 
 window. 
 
 The three young ladies were coming in at the gate ; fol- 
 lowing them the two young men. 
 
 " Dear me ! Can you get me through an introduction 
 to all those?" said Miss Raymond. 
 
 Wilma laughed, and said she would try. She was saved 
 the ordeal. Miss Maclvers came first, and was duly pre- 
 sented, after which she swept Wilma aside, and went 
 through the ceremony with the other four herself. Then 
 Miss Raymond brought Miss Morris into notice with 
 another flourish, and the whole party began to assimilate. 
 
 In chemistry it is found that certain ingredients will 
 not mix without the aid of certain other ingredients. It 
 seemed that the governor's daughter was just the element 
 needed in Mrs. Woods's household to make it harmonious. 
 In the academy, also, she came to be a leading spirit. 
 Whether it was that she unconsciously presumed upon 
 her station a little, not noticeably or disagreeably, or 
 whether from much petting and adulation resulting from 
 her fragility and winsome prettiness, or because of an 
 amusing and childlike confidence and assurance, she 
 seemed to take it for granted always that people would 
 like her as a matter of course. And so they did like 
 her, and she came to rule in an artless, kindly way. She
 
 142 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 founded a fellowship with all around her on the broadest 
 basis. She was as many-sided and as bright and trans- 
 parent as a prism, and turned a sunny face to every one. 
 There is no disparagement in that ; many of us are like 
 pictures, fair upon one side but blank on the other. She 
 thought no one with whom she was thrown unworthy her 
 best efforts to entertain. If a bashful, shrinking girl sat 
 beside her in class or walked with her from the academy, 
 she was all kindness and adaptation. If a higher-depart- 
 ment young man offered her polite attention, she met it 
 with lady-like grace. Even Gray and Liebenwald bash- 
 ful fellows that they were and never aspiring to the no- 
 tice of any other young ladies employed secret strategy 
 against each other for the privilege of carrying an um- 
 brella over her when it rained, or doing any such small 
 service ; though neither of the good souls ever suspected 
 the other of such petty meanness ! 
 
 She was an inimitable mimic, and had a remarkable 
 talent for amusing and entertaining an audience. Now 
 and then of an evening the spirit of acting came upon 
 her, and she would put the whole little circle around the 
 study-table into such an uproar of laughter that Mrs. 
 Woods would throw open the door and appear on the 
 threshold her little iron-gray curls fairly jingling to 
 see what upon earth was the matter ! 
 
 To Wilma, however, there was something exceedingly 
 pathetic in her mirth ; she was so appealingly delicate 
 and frail in body, though determinedly buoyant in spirit. 
 Many times she exhausted all her small stock .of strength 
 to entertain, and then sank back in her place at the table 
 and dropped her head in her little blue-veined hands, 
 and fell to work gravely to make up for lost time, for she 
 was conscientiously studious and industrious. 
 * One evening she invited Wilmingard to go with her to 
 call upon Miss Belmont, a thing none of the other young 
 ladies had ever thought of doing. They rang the bell, 
 and Mr. Ingraham came along the hall in slippered feet 
 and opened the door, his hair rumpled as usual, and a 
 pen in his hand. 
 
 "Well," said he, a smile breaking out like a ray of 
 sunshine from under his cloudy brows.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 143 
 
 He took them each by the hand and drew them towards 
 his study-door. 
 
 "I don't know where anybody is," eaid he; "so come 
 in here." 
 
 "Oh, we called to see Miss Belmont," said Miss Ray- 
 mond. " Isn't she at home?" 
 
 "Miss Belmont!" said Mr. Ingraham, with his pecu- 
 liar combination of frown and smile. "I am getting 
 jealous of Miss Belmont." 
 
 "Oh, don't begrudge her such a poor little portion as 
 us !" retorted Miss Raymond. " You have all the others." 
 
 " Oh, no ; you flatter me. Well, do you wish me to 
 send for Miss Belmont? I presume she is up-stairs." 
 
 " Perhaps we might go right up?" 
 
 " I see ! You want her all to yourself. Be off with 
 you then ; Miss Lynne knows the way." 
 
 He laughed and went into his study and shut the door. 
 As they turned to go up-stairs, they were startled by the 
 apparition of Mrs. Ingraham, who had opened the sitting- 
 room door and stood looking out. Wilma bowed and 
 they passed on. 
 
 " Heavens ! what was that," said Miss Raymond, half- 
 way up the stairs : "a ghost or a lunatic?" 
 
 "It was Mrs. Ingraham," said Wilmingard. 
 
 " You don't tell me ! What a cheerful domestic estab- 
 lishment this must be with such a head ! I have heard 
 whispers about it; but I never listen to whispers." 
 
 They knocked at Miss Belmont's door, and her voice 
 said, "Come in." She was seated at her table with her 
 books before her. She sprang up apologetically, and 
 went forward holding out a hand to each, her eyes 
 beaming. 
 
 " I beg your pardon. I supposed it was James bringing 
 in the letters." 
 
 She led them over to the window. The sun was almost 
 down, and it was growing dusky in the room. 
 
 "Now, we have broken in upon your studies?" said 
 Miss Raymond, ruefully, glancing at the table. 
 
 "Oh, no; at least it is no matter. I am glad to have 
 them broken in upon so." 
 
 " I always want to know my teachers personally," Miss
 
 144 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Raymond went on by way of apology for intruding. " You 
 see, we don't get very near to you in the school-room." 
 
 " I know," said Miss Belmont, smiling. " There is a 
 kind of conventionality in the relation of teacher and 
 pupil that acts as a sort of barrier between them. I am 
 glad you think it worth while to step over the barrier and 
 come a little nearer to me. It is you who must do it, you 
 know, my dears. We teachers feel a great delicacy about 
 thrusting our grave presence upon our pupils out of 
 school." 
 
 "Oh, think of it!" said Miss Raymond. "And we 
 feel a proportionate delicacy about forcing our frivolous 
 selves upon you. We shall have to strike a happy medium 
 somewhere." 
 
 " Perhaps so," said Miss Belmont, laughing. " I have 
 just been making a call," she continued presently, " upon 
 our new music-teacher, Miss Percy." 
 
 " Ah ! has she arrived, then ?" asked Miss Raymond. 
 
 "Yes; she came this morning. Do either of you in- 
 tend to take lessons?" 
 
 "I do," said Wilma. "But I suppose I shall take of 
 Mrs. Bramen. Miss Percy is only going to teach the ad- 
 vanced scholars, I have heard." 
 
 " Yes, I believe so. Have you a great taste for music, 
 or a great desire to learn it, my dear?" 
 
 "I should like to learn it," said Wilma; "I don't 
 know about my taste." 
 
 "She sings sweetly!" exclaimed Miss Raymond. 
 " Do you know, my dear Miss Belmont, Wilma is the 
 most wonderfully and variously gifted young person I 
 have ever met. She can draw beautifully, and she can 
 write poetry, and improvise lovely little airs on the 
 piano, and do anything she turns her attention to. I 
 believe she could win distinction in any given direction 
 if she would narrow down to it." 
 
 "Don't you persuade her to 'narrow down' to any- 
 thing!" said Miss Belmont, smiling and shaking her 
 head. "There is time enough yet for that. Few persons 
 possess more than one dominant talent or faculty; and it 
 is sure to come out, and give the key to their life all in 
 good time. We must begin by cultivating our whole
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 45 
 
 mind and nature uniformly. The starving of one faculty 
 will never feed another, for this reason, that each par- 
 ticular faculty requires its own particular nourishment. 
 You cannot take from one and give to another. Every 
 branch of art or science we master is the opening of a 
 new window letting in light upon the soul. Before you 
 give yourself to a specialty, better open all the windows 
 possible, and get a strong light upon what you wish to 
 do. You can accomplish very little, my dears, until your 
 whole understanding is awakened." 
 
 " Why," said Miss Raymond, laughing, " I have always 
 thought one ought to begin life by marking out a path, 
 and travelling in it with scrupulous exactness, never de- 
 viating from it. And you can't imagine how many paths 
 I have laid out for myself! I have taken music-lessons 
 and drawing-lessons, and lessons in oil-painting, and in 
 all kinds of fancy work, and given myself to each par- 
 ticular thing unreservedly, for the time being, with a 
 solemn resolve to pursue it faithfully through life. There 
 is consistency for you !" 
 
 Miss Belmont laughed. " I should hardly call it in- 
 consistency, my dear. It is right to give one's whole 
 attention to the thing in hand. But, perhaps, not all of 
 us need ever mark out a special path, or follow a special 
 pursuit." 
 
 " Who of us ought, and who of us ought not?" asked 
 Wilma. 
 
 "I suppose only those who have genius need follow 
 some particular bent," interposed Miss Raymond. 
 
 " Then if one have the gift of poetry, you would say 
 he must write it?" said Miss Belmont. 
 
 " Why, certainly." 
 
 "These faculties or talents of ours," said Miss Bel- 
 mont, "all endow us with innate power and strength. 
 Shall we give out this power and strength always through 
 pen or pencil ? May we not simply live beautiful and 
 grand things, the conceptions of which are born in us, 
 rather than try to represent them outside of ourselves ? Not 
 every poet can write, not every artist can paint. There 
 are only a few who can make the world vibrate ; the most 
 of us have only power enough to be felt by a little circle 
 
 G 13
 
 1 46 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 around us. Shall we not rather give out the best there is 
 in us in our daily work, than concentrate our life in a 
 poem or a picture, and throw it out on the World's wide 
 sea, maybe to float and be picked up, maybe to go 
 down and be forever lost? Ah ! the lives that have been 
 wrecked, the noble hearts that have been broken, the 
 eyes that have grown weary with watching and waiting 
 for tidings of the little waifs sent out on the wasteful 
 waters ! Even those to whom glad tidings have come so 
 often, feel them turn to ashes on their lips." 
 
 The sun had gone down. Miss Belmont rose and 
 lighted a lamp that stood on the table, and turned to say, 
 with a smile, " I beg pardon for making you such a long 
 speech. I forget myself, and think I have a class before 
 me instead of some young lady visitors." 
 
 Her eyelashes glistened with tears ; she did not brush 
 them away, perhaps did not know they were there. 
 
 "Oh, pray do not apologize!" said Miss Raymond. 
 "You don't know how glad we are to have you talk to 
 us outside of text- books ! It brings us so much nearer to 
 you, somehow." 
 
 " That is the grand humanity principle, my dear," said 
 Miss Belmont. " Through it we wield our strongest in- 
 fluence. We come nearer to people as individuals than 
 in any other way. As I said, not many of us can so 
 transfer our souls to a picture or a poem, as to come into 
 closest communion with other souls. But nearly all of us 
 can, by individual presence and personal intercourse, 
 touch some hearts and better some lives." 
 
 " I am going to begin to look for the meaning of every- 
 body !" laughed Miss Raymond, rising as she spoke. " I 
 am going to say, See here, madam, or sir, what are you 
 living for? And I will make them teach me their lesson. 
 Why not study people as well as books? A life lived must 
 be as interesting as a life written." 
 
 " Not everybody and not every book has a mean- 
 ing," said Miss Belmont, smiling. " Must you go?" 
 
 " I think we must; the study-bell will soon ring," said 
 Miss Raymond. 
 
 Miss Belmont went to the door with them, and said 
 good-night, and returned to her books but with a heart
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 147 
 
 too deeply stirred for study a smile on her lips and a 
 light in her eyes. She had spent her strength for that 
 night in something outside of books, and felt the better 
 for it. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 " DOES it strike you that Miss Belmont is a little bit 
 self-contradictory, Wilma?" Miss Raymond asked, going 
 home. 
 
 " How?" said Wilma. 
 
 "She warned us so solemnly to-night against narrow- 
 ing down to any one thing; and you know she often 
 preaches to us in school about having an aim." 
 
 "Oh, but I think," said Wilma, "the one refers to 
 our education and the other to our life and character." 
 
 "What rare discrimination, Wilma. Tell me you are 
 not 'gifted'! Now I, with my beclouded brain, that 
 can't see a thing unless somebody shows it to me, should 
 have meanly accused that grand woman of inconsistency ! 
 I beg her pardon. Of course you are right. A person's 
 character is not dependent on his pursuit. But do you 
 think we ought to live to illustrate a principle, and every 
 word we speak and every act we do be charged with it ? 
 What stiff machines we would be ! Oh, heavens ! How I 
 have despaired over that terrible sentence, ' For every 
 idle word spoken ye shall give an account in the day of 
 judgment.' What a formidable array will be brought up 
 against poor little me ! Sometimes I have tried to im- 
 agine the scene. The awful question is propounded, 
 ' Arabella Raymond' (of course I should be called ' Ara- 
 bella' in a blood-curdling way), ' what did you mean by 
 saying so and so?' repeating some of my most meaningless 
 remarks. And I, trembling and stammering, try to set 
 forth some good and sufficient reason, and signally fail. 
 What then ? Alas ! Imagination stands appalled. Oh, 
 Wilma ! What do you suppose will become of those men 
 who have preached these dreadful things to us and frozen 
 our hearts, without bringing forward the all-merciful love
 
 1 48 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 of the tender Father, who cannot look angrily on the 
 playful gambols of his little children any more than on 
 the sports of kittens and lambkins, and the music of 
 birds and falling waters ! And yet, I suppose those men 
 believed what they said, and in all kindness gave us warn- 
 ing. The same Father that pities us who are hurt by 
 their harsh interpretations, also deals kindly with them. 
 How much we all stand in need of the Divine Love ! 
 We all err on this side or that. As for myself, I believe 
 I should rather err on the broad side than on the 
 narrow." 
 
 "I suppose," said Wilma, "the better way is to look 
 after our motives, and see that they, at least, are good. 
 I believe they are the law we shall be tried by." 
 
 " Why, you little liberalist ! Will you let every man 
 set up his own tribunal? It is true that if the heart is 
 pure it does not matter much about the little rivulets that 
 bubble through our lives in words and acts. Wilma, I 
 think those people are the best who never have any per- 
 sonal ambition, or wish to accomplish certain things for 
 themselves, but just go on doing, and doing whatever 
 comes in their way, losing themselves in others. We 
 sometimes say their lives are wasted, and we praise the 
 men and women who have achieved greatness for them- 
 selves. But it seems to me that in the hereafter those 
 wasted lives will be gathered up and made into the 
 brightest crowns. There must be an even balance some- 
 where. Take me ! Oh, Wilma ! I am a poor little piece 
 of drift-wood on the stream of time. What shall I be 
 on the great ocean of eternity!" 
 
 Her hand trembled on Wilma's arm and her whole 
 little frame suddenly shook with sobs. She recovered 
 herself in a moment and laughed, and replied to Wilma's 
 expression of pain and pity: "Oh, I am not under- 
 rating myself, dear ; don't you look so shocked and 
 grieved ! I flatter myself I am just as strong and brave, 
 and of as much consequence as anybody in spirit- If 
 only I were not cooped up in such a poor little shell of a 
 body ! There is where nature has been unfair with me; 
 she hasn't given me a chance, you see. But then she 
 saves me a good deal of trouble and effort. Instead of
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 149 
 
 responding to the invitation to be up and doing, which 
 is liberally extended to all mankind, I sit still and send 
 in my regrets with this grave apology: 'The spirit is 
 willing but the flesh is weak.' Oh, that little word ' if,' 
 Wilma ! What a comforter it is and what a flatterer. It 
 gives us room for so much self-gratulation ! It is such a 
 strong, invulnerable wall that no suspicious doubt can 
 creep through it to wound our vanity. I can shelter 
 myself behind it, you see, and boast what I might do 
 with all the more valor because I shall not be put to the 
 
 test. What grand things we could accomplish if ! 
 
 Oh, my dear, it has stood in the way of far more glorious 
 battles than have ever been fought." 
 
 Wilma was silent, wondering whether she was in earnest 
 or not. It was difficult to tell, her tone was so light and 
 her eyes gleaming full of drollery in the moonlight, and 
 her red lips curved with a half-mocking smile. Yet her 
 words seemed to tremble with a weighty earnestness. 
 
 The other girls, when they got home, were discussing 
 the new music-teacher. The young men had betaken 
 themselves up-stairs. 
 
 " Has anybody seen her?" Miss Raymond asked. 
 
 " I saw her on the street with Ella Pettibone," said Miss 
 Beach ; and Miss Allen took the subject away from her : 
 " Nellie says she is wonderfully fair and has heavenly blue 
 eyes, and dresses in pale gray." 
 
 " Miss Beach has remarkable powers of observation," 
 said Miss Morris, with languid irony. " I had an intro- 
 duction to this extraordinary person this evening, but I 
 failed to discover the color of her eyes ; all that im- 
 pressed itself on me was the coldness of her face." 
 
 "You, Matilda! When and where, pray?" said Miss 
 Raymond. 
 
 " I had occasion to go up to the academy after tea," 
 Miss Morris proceeded to explain. " I had forgotten 
 some of my books. The janitor hadn't shut up yet. Mr. 
 Ingraham and Miss Pettibone and Miss Percy came up 
 and went into the ladies' hall to superintend the putting 
 up of a new grand piano." 
 
 "I heard there was to be one," parenthesized Miss 
 Allen. 
 
 13*
 
 '5 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK, 
 
 " Miss Turner was with me," Miss Morris added, " and 
 Mr. Ingraham introduced us. She looked at us as if we 
 were a different variety of the genus homo from any she 
 had ever seen before." 
 
 "Why, Matilda, is she a supercilious person?" Miss 
 Raymond asked. 
 
 " I don't know what you would call it ; she is as distant 
 as the North Pole." 
 
 "Did she play?" 
 
 " No ; she swept the keys to see how the instrument 
 had stood its journey, and said it was out of tune. For 
 my part, I don't think it is." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " I think she was simply too disagreeable to gratify our 
 curiosity to hear her." 
 
 " Is she disagreeable?" 
 
 " Dreadfully. Did you not think so, Miss Beach ?" 
 
 Poor Nellie, wounded a moment before by Miss Morris's 
 sarcasm, returned, with a little effort at the same thing 
 herself, "I am afraid I was not penetrating enough to 
 discover it. I thought she had a sad, sweet face, and 
 looked too young and innocent to be alone in the world, 
 as somebody said she was." 
 
 Miss Morris smiled, well enough pleased to have her 
 small fire take effect. Nothing suited her better than a 
 clashing of arms. Miss Maclvers laughed. She and 
 Miss Morris had long ago openly declared war. 
 
 "The needle attracts the loadstone," she remarked. 
 "Nellie is not the sort of magnet, perhaps, to draw out 
 ' disagreeableness.' ' 
 
 "A body with no polarity neither attracts nor repels," 
 retorted Miss Morris. She was not especially spiteful to- 
 ward pretty, quiet little Nellie; she cut them all up as 
 occasion offered. 
 
 " Who of us are interested in music?" Miss Raymond 
 asked, to change the subject. " Shall you take lessons, 
 Matilda?" 
 
 "Certainly not," said Miss Morris, with emphasis. She 
 was a fine scholar ; superior even to Miss Maclvers in some 
 things, and felt above mere accomplishments. 
 
 "You will, I suppose, Miss Allen?"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. j 5 ! 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Miss Allen. She always took music 
 lessons and carried about a ponderous instruction-book 
 and rolls of sheet music, though nobody ever heard her 
 play. 
 
 "Miss Percy, I hear, is also a fine elocutionist," said 
 Miss Maclvers to Miss Raymond, whom she usually ad- 
 dressed. " She intends teaching a class, I believe." 
 
 "Does she? Oh, that will be grand ; I shall vote my- 
 self a member of that class," Miss Raymond returned. 
 
 "You read very well now, Arabella," said Miss Morris, 
 patronizingly. 
 
 "Yes; I have been told I have a shrill voice and tol- 
 erably distinct enunciation. Girls, would you like to hear 
 me declaim?" 
 
 She got up and stood in the middle of the floor, with 
 her hands down at her sides, in the stiffest attitude. 
 
 "Ahem! 
 
 " 'Tis not enough the voice be sound and clear, 
 'Tis modulation that must charm the earl" 
 
 She gave the whole piece in ringing, metallic tones, all 
 the girls laughing until the tears came into their eyes, 
 except Wilmingard, who seemed preoccupied. 
 
 "Well, Wilma, my dear; you don't applaud," said 
 Miss Raymond. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, I did not hear," said Wilma. 
 
 "Is the child deaf?" exclaimed Miss Allen. 
 
 "I mean I did not listen," said Wilma, blushing. 
 
 " What a wretched compliment !" said Miss Raymond. 
 " Oh, I know ! Wilma would rather hear me sing." 
 
 She crossed her small hands demurely and began chant- 
 ing, in a doleful strain, " The Lake of the Dismal Swamp." 
 
 "Oh, don't! please don't !" said Wilma. It seemed 
 ghastly to her. 
 
 Miss Raymond instantly desisted, and took her place 
 at the table. 
 
 " I shouldn't think Prof, would give up his elocution 
 class to anybody else," said Miss Allen. "He prides 
 himself so much on his own reading." 
 
 "With good reason," said Miss Maclvers. "I think 
 he renders some things better than any professional elo-
 
 152 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 cutionist I have ever heard. I like him especially in the 
 tragic and pathetic." 
 
 "Oh, yes!" exclaimed Miss Raymond. "He might 
 have been a Booth or a Forrest, if he had taken to the 
 stage. He has touched some chords in me, I know, that 
 were never attuned before." 
 
 " Oh, by the way, Wilma ; I was down to the post-office 
 this evening and got a letter for you," said Miss Allen, 
 tossing it across the table. " I came near forgetting it." 
 
 It was from Charley, and Wilma's face flushed. She 
 was not expecting it. Charley made it a point of writing 
 at a stated time, once a week. This was an "extra." 
 
 She waited until the study-hour was ended and the 
 others had all left the room, and asked Mrs. Woods's per- 
 mission to remain long enough to read it, which was 
 conditionally granted. 
 
 " If you'll be sure an' blow the light out, an' not set the 
 house a-fire when you git through," Mrs. Woods said, 
 "you kin stay as long as you want to. It's my bed- 
 time." 
 
 She went out, and Wilma had a few delicious moments 
 to herself, which, these days, did not often occur. It 
 seemed as if her little, quiet world was dropping far be- 
 hind the broader, busier school-life. Of course she would 
 go back to it again, she believed, never thinking how like 
 a river life is, flowing on and on, growing wider and 
 wider. 
 
 One thing is true ; that if we stretch our boundaries 
 they will never spring back again. We ourselves may 
 shrivel and our lives not fill the channel we have cut, but 
 we cannot narrow the lines our broadest experience has 
 drawn. 
 
 Charley's letters were an outlet into even a bigger, 
 busier world than Wilma lived in. He was a bold sea- 
 man, striking out vigorously into all depths, except that 
 his element was tnought instead of water. He touched 
 all boundaries, it seemed to her, if he did not go be- 
 yond them ! And he sketched for her, with his rapid pen, 
 all the beautiful things he felt and saw. And her heart 
 quivered with the ecstasy of the thought, He is mine, 
 this grand, noble spirit is mine by the supreme right of
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 153 
 
 love ! He was ambitious for her as for himself. He tried 
 to keep her soul keyed to the world's thundering march. 
 But Wilma's life had not risen out of its prelude yet. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Miss PERCY seemed to be in no haste to commence her 
 duties at the academy. Days passed and she did not 
 make her appearance, and in the mean time endless 
 rumors were afloat concerning her. Her beauty, her 
 coldness, her repelling haughtiness, and her marvellous 
 accomplishments all were fruitful themes which, coupled 
 with her being taken up by the exclusive and aristocratic 
 Pettibones, made her an object of much curiosity. Re- 
 garding her personal history and antecedents there was 
 nothing but unfounded speculation. If questioned closely 
 the Pettibones themselves would have had to admit they 
 knew nothing about her. 
 
 At last, one morning, she made her advent in the 
 chapel in time for prayers, Miss Pettibone accompanying 
 her, which was something, in itself, in the way of deep- 
 ening the impressions already conceived of her. For 
 Miss Pettibone had always held herself aloof from the 
 academy students, as much as to say, This country school 
 may do for you, but I patronize Eastern institutions. A 
 little of her pride and dignity seemed reflected on Miss 
 Percy. Only for a moment, however. Miss Percy rose 
 above it, eclipsed it by her own superiority of presence, 
 and threw Miss Pettibone quite into the shade. Mrs. 
 Bramen had come in a few moments before and created 
 the customary sensation, sweeping up to the rostrum with 
 her long train and graceful wrap thrown around her shoul- 
 ders, compelling Mr. Ingraham by some invisible mag- 
 netism to rise and proffer her a chair. She was a hand- 
 some woman ; languid, with a creamy complexion, smiling 
 mouth, and large dreamy eyes with drooping lids. Miss 
 Belmont unconsciously drew away from her. It seemed 
 to her that under all that smiling softness was a cruel 
 G*
 
 '54 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 heart. When Miss Percy entered, Mrs. Bramen's eye- 
 lashes quivered, and her sleepy eyes shot forth a wicked 
 gleam. She was not at the head of her profession, as had 
 long been patent to some of the more advanced young 
 ladies who were ambitious to progress in music, and she 
 was spitefully envious of those who were. She accepted 
 the coming of a superior teacher as a personal affront. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham, on the point of commencing the morn- 
 ing exercises, advanced to meet Miss Percy, and made a 
 place for her and Miss Pettibone in the semi-circle of 
 teachers on the rostrum. She was a slender, fragile- 
 looking creature, with a perfectly white, transparent face 
 and soft, shining, dark hair. She was elegantly dressed, 
 and her garments seemed as much a part of her as the 
 plumage is a part of the bird. 
 
 As soon as she was seated, and looked abroad over the 
 scores of upraised faces with an unconsciously exploring 
 gaze, her blue-rayed, starry eyes riveted every other eye. 
 Yet she repelled quite as much as she attracted. Her 
 glance drew yours by a cold fascination, but her lips had 
 an indescribable curve that seemed to scorn your admi- 
 ration. She raised a singular conflict of feeling ; she 
 appealed to all your chivalry and tenderness, and you 
 felt that you could be a friend to do and die for her, if 
 need be, but that she would not accept your devotion ; 
 that she put you in the attitude of an enemy, and it 
 seemed as if, against your will, you were so. But that if 
 some strong, inconceivable power outside your will com- 
 pelled you to slay her, as Othello his Desdemona, you 
 would yourself, like Othello, be the most despairing 
 mourner. She had the beauty of transparent, ethereal 
 things. If a summer sky, deep blue with white clouds 
 in it, could be also icy cold, Miss Percy's effect upon you 
 would have been the same. There was a delicacy of finish 
 about her (as it were) that gave you the impression that 
 she was finely cultivated, and that the blood in her veins 
 came purified through many generations of high-bred, 
 high-toned ancestry. She seemed costly and precious ; 
 if anything happened to her, if she should be broken 
 from the slender stem on which her young life was grow- 
 ing, it would be as if Michael Angelo's masterpiece were
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 155 
 
 destroyed, or something else equally rare were lost to the 
 world. It would be so great a pity. 
 
 She remained only a short time on this first occasion 
 of her coming up to the academy. A day or two after, 
 she came before Mr. Ingraham's large class in elocution 
 in the ladies' hall, and gave a reading previous to enter- 
 ing on the office of teacher in that department. Her 
 power was something wonderful and impossible to de- 
 scribe. If the description of anything grand could equal 
 the thing itself we might all be capable of grand things. 
 It is the power of genius to rise above description. 
 There was nothing teacher-like about her, no sympa- 
 thetic telegraphy between herself and her pupils. She 
 seemed to be cut off, in the matter of sympathy, from 
 all her kind. Yet she made her art so beautiful and 
 attractive as to seem to be the chief thing, and to ban- 
 ish, for the time being, all other aspirations but the aspira- 
 tion to be an accomplished elocutionist, able to grasp and 
 to express the meanings of the sublimest thinkers and 
 subtlest poets. 
 
 "Words, what are they?" she said, in a little lecture 
 to the class. "Only empty moulds in which to fashion 
 our thoughts. The power, the life of language lies not 
 with him who has written it, but with us who utter it." 
 
 For the hour in which she read and taught everything 
 was forgotten by the class except the thing in hand. The 
 impassioned spirit seemed to work a spell upon them ; 
 they went out from her presence dazed by her power and 
 brilliancy, but no nearer to her than before. When she 
 turned away from a recitation she was, as Miss Morris 
 had said, "distant as the North Pole." 
 
 She was discussed one evening at Mrs. Woods's. Miss 
 Morris said, "The idea of a music-teacher wearing bro- 
 caded silks, and diamonds, and point lace ! I don't be- 
 lieve she is a teacher at all; I believe she is playing a 
 part." 
 
 "What part could she possibly play in this obscure 
 Western village?" said Miss Raymond. 
 
 " One can't tell that. But mark my words, and see if 
 it doesn't turn out that she is masquerading here for her 
 own amusement or somebody's displeasure."
 
 156 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 "I'll bet," said Miss Allen, who could not eradicate 
 certain rough adornments from her dialect, " that she 
 has been an heiress and has lost her fortune." 
 
 "Romantic," said Miss Morris. 
 
 " I should like to hear Miss Belmont's opinion about 
 her," said Miss Raymond. "I wonder if she doesn't 
 know something of her history. It seems to me, always, 
 that she looks at her in a kind of compassionate way." 
 
 " Compassionate !" sneered Miss Morris, with a laugh. 
 "The elegant and aristocratic Percy snubs the precep- 
 tress." 
 
 "That would make no difference with Miss Belmont," 
 said Miss Raymond. 
 
 " Why not ? You must think Miss Belmont very 
 saintly." 
 
 " She is too great-minded to be biased in her estimate 
 of people by their opinion of her." 
 
 "Ah ! what a sublime philosopher." 
 
 "You might well call her a sublime philosopher, with- 
 out any of your sweet irony, Matilda," said Miss Ray- 
 mond, warmly. 
 
 Whether Miss Percy accounted it a misfortune or not, 
 she made many and bitter enemies. Miss Allen went to 
 her to take music-lessons, but showed herself to be so dull 
 and backward, that she was dismissed with the indignant 
 outburst, "I am not here to teach beginners; go to Mrs. 
 Bramen." 
 
 Red with mortification and anger, Miss Allen went, 
 and Mrs. Bramen, in her turn, waxed wroth and set her 
 white teeth and bit her smiling lips at the implied depre- 
 ciation of herself. 
 
 Miss Percy herself had risen so far above the mechan- 
 ical as to have almost forgotten the laws governing her 
 two beautiful accomplishments, making her perception 
 seem intuition and her power supernatural. Nothing 
 could equal her impatience when a pupil seemed to be 
 laboring under the law. " I want you to work by rule, 
 of course," she said; "but above all things, don't let 
 the rule appear in sight. One's greatest endeavor should 
 be to cover up these geometrical lines and angles, as 
 nature does in all her beautiful works. Think of it !
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 5 7 
 
 Men have been for centuries trying to ferret out her laws; 
 but so intricate are they, and so gracefully intertwined, 
 as to be, most of them, past finding out. Mathematics 
 enters into music and poetry as well as into the universe, 
 but only as a skeleton to be elaborately draped." 
 
 She never placed herself beside the pupil at the piano, 
 but walked restlessly about the room possessed of a spirit 
 laboring intensely and suffering so it seemed acutely, 
 until the pupil had risen out of the physical or mechan- 
 ical into the spiritual. Then she would throw off the 
 violent effort with which she constrained (as it were) the 
 pupil, as the clairvoyant throws off the spell he has 
 labored under, ; and her spirituelle face would become 
 almost transfigured. It is impossible to imagine a crea- 
 ture more impassioned and yet so cold. She seemed sus- 
 picious of everybody, except, perhaps, Mr. Ingraham, in 
 whom she placed a shy, childlike confidence. Miss Bel- 
 mont had tried to approach her, feeling sure there was 
 some trouble clouding her young life, and anxious to 
 show her there was yet some tenderness in the great 
 world she looked on with so much dislike and fear \ but 
 Miss Percy repelled her. She was skeptical as a child 
 who has been once deceived, and could not bring herself 
 to believe the preceptress's goodness genuine. Besides, 
 though so delicate, fragile, and alone, and apparently 
 utterly ignorant of the world, she had an independent 
 and proud spirit that would not brook compassion. 
 
 One evening, Wilma and Miss Raymond, delaying a 
 moment in the chapel after school, came down-stairs and 
 heard Miss Percy singing in the ladies' hall. They 
 stopped outside the door and listened. Wilma had never 
 heard anything to be compared with it. She would not 
 have thought it possible for a human voice, controlled and 
 swayed by a human spirit, to so rise, and swell, and trem- 
 ble, and float, and die away, carrying one's very soul with 
 it. Yet it seemed like the answer, the fulfilment of some 
 vague, wild dream or longing, making her wonder, when 
 she thought of it again, if there is not in the vast uni- 
 verse a response to all our questionings ; or whether there 
 is something yet farther beyond toward which each new 
 and wonderful experience is but a step. Who can measure
 
 ! 5 8 HIGH- WA^ TER-MARK. 
 
 a soul, since with every expansion comes the power of 
 still greater enlargement? 
 
 By and by, Miss Belmont came out, closing the door 
 softly. "I have been in paradise," she said, smiling, 
 with wet eyes. 
 
 "And we have been just outside the gates," Miss Ray- 
 mond answered, wittily. " She sings exquisitely, doesn't 
 she?" 
 
 "Exquisitely," repeated Miss Belmont. 
 
 Wilma felt that she could not have ventured to make 
 any comment upon what had so far transcended any pre- 
 vious experience or conception. Comment was common- 
 place; it seemed to bring down the wonderful and ideal 
 to plain matter of fact, and to measure it by the common 
 standards. Wilma had a fine sense that could have un- 
 derstood and appreciated Miss Percy's curl of the lip, 
 when she heard either words of praise or criticism on her 
 wonderful powers. Surely nothing can equal the fine 
 scorn of a smile on the lips of conscious greatness, 
 pecked at or patronized by inferior critics and commen- 
 tators. 
 
 " Miss Belmont, tell us what you think of Miss Percy," 
 said Miss Raymond. 
 
 "I think," said Miss Belmont, "she is far too delicate 
 to be knocked about the world. She ought to belong to 
 some one who would keep her tenderly and not let the 
 winds buffet her roughly. She certainly has been, she 
 must have been, carefully shielded all her life until now. 
 Some strange freak of fortune evidently has set her 
 adrift." 
 
 Just then Miss Percy opened the door and came out. 
 She glanced coldly from one to another, bowed to Miss 
 Belmont, and then turned to Wilma, who was standing a 
 little apart. "Will you come with me, Miss Lynne? I 
 believe you go my way," she said, in her abrupt manner. 
 
 Wilma, taken by surprise, complied. She had fre- 
 quently met Miss Percy's eyes fixed upon her with their 
 half- vague, wondering expression, but she had never di- 
 rectly addressed her a word before. Indeed, it was the 
 first advance she had made toward any one in the acad- 
 emy.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 '59 
 
 When they reached the gate leading out into the street 
 Miss Percy stopped and said, " Suppose we go into the 
 woods, Miss Lynne? The ground is dry and it is not 
 cold to-day." 
 
 Wilma would hardly have had the power to refuse any- 
 thing she might have asked. 
 
 They turned off up the street toward a thick wood that 
 lay along the edge of the town at the foot of the hills 
 and partly covering them. Miss Percy walked fast and 
 Wilma kept silently beside her, with a feeling that her 
 companion might almost be a creature of some other 
 world, so detached she seemed from all the interests and 
 busy, practical concerns of this earth. 
 
 "I have brought a book with me, Miss Lynne," she 
 said, when they had reached the wood and penetrated 
 some distance into it. "And if you care to hear me 
 we will sit down on a log somewhere here, and I will read 
 aloud." 
 
 Wilma said she would like it above all things. 
 
 " Yonder is a log for you, then," said Miss Percy, stop- 
 ping and glancing around. "And here is a stump for 
 me. We shall be a little way apart, which is better." 
 
 She seated herself on the low, mossy stump, a tree 
 near by throwing out a crooked limb for her to lean 
 against, and drew a small volume from among the heavy 
 folds of her dress and opened it. 
 
 "If you get tired presently, you can get up and walk 
 away," she said. "I sometimes lose myself in reading. 
 But don't go off and leave me ; I should be frightened 
 to be left alone in the woods." 
 
 " I shall not get tired," Wilma said. 
 
 The volume was Longfellow, and she read extracts from 
 the Golden Legend, principally Lucifer's monologues, 
 and finally the story of Irmingard, as related to Elsie by 
 the abbess herself. Wilmingard held her breath when 
 she came to the dreadful pursuit : 
 
 " How I remember that breathless flight 
 Across the moors in the summer night ! 
 How, under our feet the long, white road 
 Backward like a river flowed, 
 Sweeping with it fences and hedges,
 
 1 60 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Whilst farther away, and overhead, 
 Paler than I, with fear and dread, 
 The moon fled with us, as we fled 
 Along the forest's jagged edges !" 
 
 Miss Percy's patience gave out before she had finished 
 the recital. Reading the lines, 
 
 " But the same passion I had given 
 To earth before, now turned to heaven 
 With all its overflowing fulness," 
 
 she closed the book with a bitter smile. 
 
 " To think of healing a wounded heart in the solitude 
 of a convent I" 
 
 " I would rather than almost anything else in the world 
 be able to read like that," said Wilma, in a low voice. 
 
 Miss Percy had almost lost consciousness of her already. 
 She looked up. 
 
 "Would you? Well, you may; it is not a very dif- 
 ficult accomplishment. There is one requisite, however." 
 
 "What?" Wilma asked. 
 
 " You must have all these things burned into your soul 
 by the cruel iron of experience. You must taste joy 
 first, unalloyed, pure joy (I think it always comes first), 
 and then you must be racked and tortured, and made to 
 feel with the sharpness of actual pain all there is in your 
 nature to feel of suffering. We know nothing of what it 
 is to be wounded, to be hurt, until the real shock of a 
 blow is felt by our own self. Would you like the experi- 
 ence for the sake of what it would bring?" she asked, 
 mockingly. 
 
 "I don't know," said Wilma, recoiling. "It seems 
 to me," she added, " that I should be willing to suffer a 
 good deal if I might so come into the deeper meanings 
 of things." 
 
 Miss Percy shrugged her shoulders, which gesture seemed 
 to say, eloquently, "How ignorant you are; you don't 
 know what you say." 
 
 Ignorant and romantic. She had studied so many 
 great faces in the Shermans' little cottage at home, and 
 they all had the lines of suffering upon them, and that 
 halo of refinement and intelligence born of suffering and
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 6 1 
 
 the wide knowledge of experience, that she had come to 
 think the enlightenment and perfect awakening of the soul 
 worth any price within the power of this poor earth-life 
 to pay. There have been people, she thought, who have 
 borne all that could be borne, for there must be limits to 
 suffering, and could not I ? She had something of Fred's 
 stoicism. It might be that the greatest strength of both 
 lay in their ignorance of what suffering really was. She 
 had never tried to picture to herself a possible affliction. 
 The sorrows of others which she had read about all had 
 the coloring of romance and the softening effects of dis- 
 tance. Looking through the telescope of a hundred years 
 at things that have been, at combinations of circumstance 
 surrounding a particular object brought out into bold re- 
 lief, all other things being cut away or pressed into a 
 sombre background, what life but has had its poetry, 
 its passion, its tragedy? Alas! that affliction in its day 
 should be so real and unromantic. 
 
 " Come," said Miss Percy, rising. " We will go now. 
 Would you like," she asked, as they neared Mrs. Woods's, 
 "to come to my room sometimes? I will send for you 
 now and then, if you care to come." 
 
 She appeared to be afraid of seeming to ask or want a 
 favor. 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Wilma, gladly. 
 
 She went on down the street, and Wilma crossed over 
 to the gate. Miss Raymond spread the door open and 
 exclaimed, gayly, "Come in, my distinguished young 
 friend ! We are dying to hear all about it ; how did you 
 get so intimate with her, you sly little thing?" 
 
 "I am not intimate with her," said Wilma. "She 
 never spoke to me until to-day." 
 
 " Did she not ? Well, I'm sure she made a pretty bold 
 advance upon you. Where did you go?" 
 
 "Off into the woods. She read Longfellow to me." 
 
 "Oh, girls! do you hear?" said Miss Raymond. 
 "Wilma is getting ahead of us all, she is taking private 
 lessons in elocution." 
 
 "No doubt she will profit by her opportunities," said 
 Miss Morris, scornfully. 
 
 Wilma's next letter to her lover was full of the strange 
 14*
 
 ! 6 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 music-teacher. Charley, when he read it, rumpled his 
 curls, and got up and fumed a little. " Those people are 
 turning her foolish little heart," said he. "What do I 
 care about her Miss Percys and her Miss Raymonds ! I 
 must tell her I want to hear more about herself, and not 
 so much about Tom, Dick, and Harry." But he recov- 
 ered himself soon, and sat down and took up his pen. 
 " It is natural for her to be carried off her feet a little at 
 first," he reflected. "The current is pretty strong up 
 there, I warrant, for a little thing who has seen nothing 
 of the world but a bird's-eye view from the top of Little 
 Twin ! After all," he added, with his expansive smile, 
 "so long as her friends are all of the feminine gender, I 
 don't know as I have any reason to grumble." So he 
 wrote a long, and kind, and tender letter as usual, and only 
 remembered to add at the end of it, " Don't let your new 
 friends quite eclipse the old ones, Wilma darling." 
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 
 SOME time after this Wilma wrote Mr. Burns an un- 
 usually elaborate letter. "I must tell you," she said, 
 "more about my dear Miss Percy; for, though I don't 
 seem to know her any better, I love her more, and feel 
 more and more sorry for her. Is it not strange, Charley, 
 that she should take to me of all the students? I think 
 it is because I am so little and unimportant, and so de- 
 tached as it were from all the others. I often go with her 
 into the woods, and sometimes up to her room, at Mrs. 
 Pettibone's. She reads to me a great deal, and from 
 many books I never saw before. She says books are our 
 magnifying glasses through which we may see people and 
 things much clearer than with our own unaided under- 
 standing, because they reflect so accurately and interpret 
 so truly. I happened to speak of this to Miss Belmont 
 one day and she seemed alarmed, and said, ' I don't 
 want you to be wholly educated by books, my dear ; keep 
 your eyes open and make use of your own faculties instead
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 63 
 
 of leaning wholly upon others, even the best and greatest.' 
 That same evening she took me with her to the cottage of 
 a poor family whose little daughter was dead. We went 
 into a poor, plain room where, stretched upon a board 
 supported by two old chairs, lay the sweet, wax-like figure. 
 The mother silent, but oh ! so broken-hearted, came for- 
 ward to receive us in a dumb, anguished way ; a crippled 
 boy with the saddest face I ever saw sat near the window 
 with his crutch beside him. The father came in, big and 
 broad-shouldered and awkward, but made dignified by his 
 great sorrow. Oh, it was heart-rending ! I sobbed aloud. 
 When we came out Miss Belmont said, ' Do you not find 
 here, my dear, a reality of sorrow greater than in the story 
 even of Dickens's Little Nell?' I saw then why she had 
 taken me there. ' Great writers,' she said, 'can better 
 express what you feel than you could express it. But 
 don't depend upon them to tell you what you may see 
 with your own eyes. There is danger of cultivating false 
 sentiment by dwelling too much on imaginary pictures of 
 life. Many people weep over fictitious stories of wrong 
 and suffering who never see the actual tragedies going on 
 under their very eyes. More than that, I have known 
 people to hug a volume of descriptive poetry to their 
 hearts, and delight in it, and bury themselves in it, who 
 never look up to admire the real beauties of earth and sky 
 around them. Be sure that you are living all the time, 
 my child, and not dreaming.' I know nothing about 
 Miss Percy's friends or her past history ; but people must 
 have been very cruel to her some time or she could not 
 say, as she often does, that she has no faith in human 
 nature, or belief in any human creature. When she. talks 
 so I cannot keep silent and let it seem as if I think so 
 too, and so I tell her about my dear friends, and espe- 
 cially about my dear Charley. (I don't know how I first 
 came to speak of you to her ; I never have to any one else, 
 not even Miss Raymond.) And she listens to me, and smiles 
 and shakes her head as if it were a fancy your loving me 
 and my believing that you do. She says we deceive our- 
 selves in such matters as well as each other. Yesterday 
 evening, after school, Miss Belmont asked me to stop in 
 her room a moment. There was a letter lying on her desk
 
 T 64 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 with an Eastern postmark. She said it came from a cler- 
 gyman, and was in reference to Miss Percy. It stated 
 that Miss Percy had suffered a grievous wrong, he was 
 not at liberty to explain the nature of it, and that it had 
 shocked her moral nature and almost overthrown her 
 reason ; that she was a great sufferer both bodily and men- 
 tally, and that the greatest good that could be done her 
 would be to convince her of the love and goodness there 
 is in human nature by being a friend and helper to her in 
 spite of herself. Miss Belmont said, when she had ex- 
 plained it to me, 'I have no way of helping her, my 
 dear, but through you ; Miss Percy allows no one else to 
 come near her. I only want to encourage your friendship 
 for her ; you may do her much good. Not that I wish 
 you, my child, to feel burdened by any great responsi- 
 bility about her, you are too young for that. But by 
 being very tender and kind to her, and showing her in 
 many little ways that you love her, which I think you do, 
 Wilma?' I said I did, dearly. Then she went on to 
 say that there was one thing more, which was that I must 
 not allow any thing Miss Percy did or said to poison my 
 mind and make me doubtful of the goodness of my fellow- 
 beings ; but that I should keep in mind always that there 
 are such things in men and women as truth and honor and 
 love. She said she could not conceive of a greater calam- 
 ity happening to people than the having their faith shaken 
 in these things, and that it often came about from our 
 being disappointed in people and not finding them to be 
 what we took them to be. She said we should never go 
 so far in our worship of an individual seeing that man- 
 kind is human and fallible as that we cannot separate 
 him in our judgment from an infallible principle, like 
 truth, fearing that if we are deceived in him we will cry 
 'there is no truth.' That we should accustom ourselves 
 to contemplate great principles and make them our stand- 
 ards of judgment, so fixed in our understanding that if 
 the whole world were to fall away from them, they would 
 still be our strength and support. ' In a word,' she said, 
 'we must not confound frail humanity with Divinity, nor 
 our imperfect theories with the grand abstract principles 
 of virtue.' After this we walked down street together,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. ! 65 
 
 and she spoke of the frost that had hung on the trees all 
 day, and told me to look far down the street to where the 
 two sidewalks with their two rows of trees came together. 
 It looked like a grand hall in a crystal palace. The 
 sleighing is very fine now, and Miss Maclvers is going to 
 have a ride with one of the higher department young men. 
 I wish you could see her ; she has just come down-stairs 
 in her beautiful velvets and furs, and Miss Raymond calls 
 her the princess. There ! the bells are jingling now, and 
 Miss Raymond says, ' Come, quick, VVilma, let us take a 
 peep through the blinds.' " 
 
 The day following a messenger came for Wilma to go 
 to Miss Percy's room. She was well enough acquainted 
 with the Pettibone house by this time to pilot herself up- 
 stairs, and, when the servant let her in below, she ran up 
 and knocked at Miss Percy's door and entered. The bed, 
 draped in white, was drawn out into the middle of the 
 room, and Miss Percy, also white, with the delicate blue 
 veins outlined upon her temples, lay upon it with her 
 eyes closed and the long dark lashes sweeping her cheeks. 
 Wilma had never seen her so before, and approached the 
 bed surprised and alarmed. Miss Percy opened her eyes 
 and smiled, and held out her hand feebly. It was a mere 
 baby hand, transparent and perfect, and glittering with a 
 heavily-jewelled ring. Wilma took it tenderly. " Dear 
 Miss Percy, I did not know you were so sick." 
 
 "Oh, it is nothing," Miss Percy returned; "I am 
 always an invalid more or less," and withdrew her hand 
 a little impatiently. 
 
 " Is there anything I can do for you?" Wilma begged. 
 
 " Yes, you can read to me ; that is why I sent for you. 
 My eyes are too weak for me to read much, and I can't 
 lie here and think ; it would kill me. Raise me up a little, 
 please, and put that other pillow under my head. Thank 
 you." 
 
 There were some elegantly-bound books on the table. 
 She pointed to them. "Bring the one in purple, and 
 come and sit by the bedside," she said. 
 
 Wilma did as she bade her. 
 
 "Open where the mark is," she languidly directed. 
 
 Wilma opened at " Childe Harold." After a time Miss
 
 1 66 HIGH- WA TER- MA RK. 
 
 Percy opened her eyes and became interested in watching 
 Wilma's face. Soon she put out her hand and stopped 
 the reading. 
 
 "Close your eyes a moment, dear; how prettily your 
 eyelashes curl up ! Did you ever think you were pretty, 
 Wilma?" 
 
 " No," said Wilma, blushing a little ; " I am too dark." 
 
 " Humph ! there are handsome dark people as well 
 as handsome fair ones," said Miss Percy. "You are 
 different from most people, child ; you are more beautiful 
 than your mirror tells you. Your finest expressions are 
 not photographed on a looking-glass. There, read on." 
 
 She closed her eyes wearily again, and Wilma resumed. 
 Often Miss Percy interrupted her, and made her read a 
 line or a stanza over again. Sometimes she repeated whole 
 stanzas herself, and they seemed to throw her into a state 
 of such wild excitement, that at last Wilma felt that the 
 reading was at an end and closed the book. 
 
 Miss Percy seemed to feel no responsibility about 
 Wilma; no fear as regarded her youth and susceptibility 
 that the influence of her unhappy views of life and people 
 might be hurtful to her. Nor was it. Wilma's anchor of 
 faith was in her lover, and grappled her to the best side 
 of human nature and to a firm belief in it. Notwith- 
 standing Miss Belmont's injunctions, which, without her 
 knowing it, bore so directly upon Wilma's own life, she 
 could not separate her lover from all things good and 
 true. He was boundless and infinite to her. She saw 
 nothing beyond him. She saw everything through him. 
 
 Miss Percy bewailed bitterly her lost happiness. And 
 Wilma asked, timidly, " Dear Miss Percy, is not happiness 
 in us?" 
 
 Poor Wilma ! She had learned the forms of speech 
 which we all use upon occasion, but she had not grown 
 into the meanings of them, and could scarcely match her 
 trite little sayings (though there did begin to bud a cer- 
 tain truth in them to her alert understanding) against Miss 
 Percy's bitter experiences. 
 
 " Happiness in us !" said Miss Percy, scornfully. " It 
 is the misfortune of some of us to find that it is in things 
 as hollow as empty tombs."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 6 7 
 
 "What things?" Wilma asked. 
 
 "Well, say friendship, love /" 
 
 Wilma had so often tried to prove that there was truth 
 in those things, and failed, that she was driven to a dif- 
 ferent stand. 
 
 " Well," she said, " you wouldn't think it right to put 
 one's whole happiness and one's whole life in those 
 things, dear Miss Percy? I mean that it is not best, is it, 
 to depend so much upon people, or upon anything outside 
 of us, as to make us either happy or miserable?" 
 
 " What else in this world have we got to depend upon, 
 child? You don't know what you say. Wait until all 
 your props are taken away, and see if you have innate 
 strength enough to stand alone ! Heavens, how easy it is 
 to talk ! There are certain grand virtues attributed to man- 
 kind, and we are apt to think we see them in our friends. 
 But when one after another proves false and empty, can- 
 not you see what a wreck it makes of our faith ? So long 
 as people don't sin against us, we can't see that they sin 
 against anything. If the devil smiles on us, we smile on 
 him, though we know he has just slain our brother; but 
 let him turn against us, and how we rise up in our wrath ! 
 A fault in friendship or in love is the most grievous of all 
 faults ; we can stand anything better than that. How 
 often you hear a man say, self-congratulatorily, of some 
 known villain, 'Well, he never harmed me !' As though 
 we have each got to fight our own battles against our per- 
 sonal foes alone, and not make common cause with each 
 other in fighting evil. Bah ! I am sick of the selfishness 
 of human nature that stands aloof with its arms folded 
 looking on while its fellow-beings are torturing and kill- 
 ing one another. I hate the calm looker-on in the world's 
 fierce battles ; I am glad when he gets a blow ! It is 
 amusing to see him arouse himself to a sense of the hor- 
 rible situation when he himself is the victim !" 
 
 "But all people are not false and selfish and cruel," 
 said Wilma, determinedly, and yet in the gentlest man- 
 ner. She felt it incumbent upon her, in view of many 
 true-hearted friends in whom her faith was firm, to defend 
 the better side. 
 
 " Human nature is just human nature," said Miss Percy.
 
 j68 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 " It is the stuff we are all made of. If only one person 
 were false in a hundred, it would prove the possibility of 
 all becoming so under various temptations." 
 
 Wilma returned quickly, that if one friend were true 
 under all circumstances, was there not an equal likelihood 
 that all might have the element of truth? 
 
 "No," said Miss Percy, sadly. "We start out with 
 the supposition that all are true. My faith was once just 
 as blind and persistent as yours, Wilma. Oh, child ! our 
 happiest days are those in which we lean upon our friends. 
 To be freed from a higher power that guided and directed 
 us brings a responsibility worse than slavery. It is terri- 
 ble to feel you have no arm stronger than your own to lean 
 upon." 
 
 She grasped Wilma's hand suddenly and held it, as if 
 in her weakness she felt the need of something strong to 
 cling to. As if, too, she recognized strength in Wilma. 
 She shut her eyes to keep back the tears springing into 
 them, and her slight frame shook. But in a moment she 
 controlled herself and looked up. No eyes could show 
 more fulness of interest and sympathy than Wilma's. 
 
 "You are a faithful little creature, Wilma," she said, 
 in softer tones. " Not simply faithful to me, but to better 
 things than I, and faithful to them in spite of me. Even 
 when you do not speak, when I hush you up by my vio- 
 lence, there is a something in you looking out of your 
 eyes that steadily opposes me and disproves my miserable 
 theories. What is it, Wilma? Is it faith in your lover? 
 Oh, take heed to it, my child, and do not build your 
 beautiful young life on the foundation of any man's 
 truth and honor ! The world is full of stronger things 
 than love. When I was a little child I was left, an or- 
 phan, to tne guardianship of an uncle, who had charge 
 of a large fortune for me. Through all the years we lived 
 together I idolized him. But my idolatry was destined 
 to end in hate and loathing. I was obliged to fly from 
 him as from my worst foe : my fortune squandered, I 
 friendless, alone, a fugitive. Can you understand a grief 
 like that? No ! there is only one way to learn what mis- 
 ery is, and that is to feel it. But I Oh, God ! I have 
 
 suffered even greater wrongs than that."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 69 
 
 She turned her face to the wall, sobbing bitterly. 
 Wilma, deeply moved, knelt by the bedside. 
 
 " Dear Miss Percy, don't be so unhappy, don't grieve 
 so. Do you not look up to God and heaven ? If this 
 life is all spoiled for you, why, is there not another and 
 far better life to look forward to?" 
 
 "Another life!" exclaimed Miss Percy, and caught up 
 the book which Wilma had dropped, and read with terrible 
 force and clearness, 
 
 " Is't not enough, unhappy thing ! to know 
 Thou art ? Is this a boon so kindly given 
 That being thou wouldst be again, and go 
 Thou know'st not, reck'st not to what regions, so 
 On earth no more, but mingled with the skies ? 
 Still wilt thou dream on future joy and woe ?" 
 
 Throwing the book from her, she sank back upon the 
 pillows utterly exhausted. Her eyelids dropped, and she 
 lay still and white as marble. Wilma, alarmed, caught 
 up a fan that lay on the foot of the bed and began fan- 
 ning her. After a little she revived and looked up. 
 
 "There, kiss me, Wilma, and go. I am tired. I am 
 going to sleep." 
 
 Wilma touched the white forehead, with its little ring- 
 lets of dark hair lying damp upon it, with her lips, and 
 then went softly out with a heavy heart, whose burden 
 she could not shake off. She was one of those whom other 
 people's griefs lay hold of with a vital grasp. In all Miss 
 Percy's horizon she saw no light ; and only in a lesser 
 degree she carried Miss Percy's weary load and felt no 
 hope. 
 
 Passing up the street on her way home she met Miss 
 Belmont at a street corner, and they walked together as 
 far as Mr. Ingraham's gate. Miss Belmont had a whole- 
 some mind that was wonderfully reassuring when one felt 
 inclined to lean toward the gloomy side of life and to 
 doubt the goodness of human nature. Not that Wilma 
 doubted the goodness of any human nature with which 
 she was connected ; none of the shafts Miss Percy threw 
 touched her idols. But they must strike somewhere, and 
 they struck the vague, remote world which took shape as 
 
 H I S
 
 1 70 HIGH- WA 1ER-MARK. 
 
 a cruel monster to Wilma, just as it does to all of us when 
 we separate ourselves from it and look at it in the cold 
 distance. When we go near to it, into it, and make our- 
 self a part of it, and learn to judge it leniently, charitably, 
 its monstrosity wears away, and the great, busy, bustling, 
 wicked, prowling, designing world is our brother and our 
 sister, with a heart like us, and affections and passions, 
 and wounds and suffering and disappointments. 
 
 " Well, how did you find your friend, Miss Percy, my 
 dear?" asked Miss Belmont. " I suppose you have just 
 come from there?" 
 
 "Yes. I found her miserable," said Wilma. 
 
 "In health, or in spirits?" 
 
 "Both." 
 
 "The one follows the other, I think," said Miss Bel- 
 mont. " I believe if Miss Percy were stronger physically 
 she might rise above her mental troubles. But then, to 
 reverse it, if she were stronger mentally she would not, 
 perhaps, be so broken in health ; her mind preys upon her 
 body. I am sorry she takes such morbid views of man- 
 kind. She accuses people of systematic and designing 
 cruelty, whereas their culpability lies chiefly in being 
 humanly fond of self and unmindful of others. We are 
 all sticklers for our rights and dignity ; things of mighty 
 importance to us, but of little consequence to anybody 
 else. No wonder we get hurt ! People are not absolutely 
 wicked, my dear ; only thoughtless and careless and sel- 
 fish. Do you suppose any of us realize how often we 
 pain somebody else ? If my little personality is wounded I 
 try to rise up and look down upon it as the all-seeing, dis- 
 passionate One might do, comparing it with all the other 
 ills and vexations that go to makeup the sorrows of a world. 
 If we are small in anything, my dear, it is in our afflictions. 
 We can't get above our own petty calamities. Think of 
 the great, slow ox that steps upon a worm. Of course the 
 worm is enraged because it can only understand what it 
 feels ; but man, who is superior to both ox and worm, can't 
 blame the ox for all he pities the worm. People jostle us 
 and hurt us all the time, and pass on unmindful ; and the 
 great Eye above us looks down and sees all, and pities all, 
 and forgives all."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 7 1 
 
 When they reached Mr. Ingraham's gate Miss Belmont 
 went in, and Wilma hurried home. Some of the girls 
 had been to the office and brought the mail; there was 
 another "extra" from Charley, a cheery, gossipy letter, 
 written in his lightest vein He had recently entered the 
 law school, and wrote graphically about it, describing 
 mock-court and all the interesting and amusing things 
 connected with it, dashing off his sentences in a vigorous, 
 rapid style peculiar to him. Toward the last the letter 
 ran on to say : 
 
 " I've had my hair cut, Wilma, and my chum Ben says 
 to tell you it looks like thunder; a meaningless slang, if 
 not profanity. We are going out this evening (which ex- 
 plains my visiting the barber-shop, though I am not sure 
 my appearance is improved). We expect to meet a young 
 lion lately arrived from the East, who is making some- 
 thing of a sensation here. A lawyer, by the way; we 
 heard him plead a case very eloquently the other day in 
 court. Absolutely the handsomest man I ever saw ; his 
 name is Courtenay. It seems funny to speak of a man's 
 beauty, doesn't it. There is nothing more contemptible 
 than masculine prettiness; but real masculine beauty, which 
 includes grace, strength, symmetry, is something rather 
 glorious, and, I must say, not often met with. Ben is 
 hurrying me, says it is time to go, and I am not dressed 
 yet. What uniform creatures we men are. Here are 
 Ben and myself, with our white vests and neckties, as 
 much alike as two clothes-pins, setting aside a little differ- 
 ence of feature. By-by." 
 
 Later. " Back again and at my desk to scrawl another 
 line to my darling. Have had a very lively evening, but 
 am disgusted with myself and all concerned on account 
 of it. Saw but little of the magnificent Courtenay; the 
 ladies monopolized him, as might have been expected. 
 They monopolized me, too; kept me playing cards and 
 talking nonsense for three hours. Three hours ! Three 
 precious, golden hours. How poor I feel after wasting 
 so much of my capital ! I might have been reading 
 Shakspeare all that time, and gleaned many a fine thought 
 and expanded my brain. I am not going to spend any 
 more evenings with young ladies who have to entertain
 
 T 7 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 me with cards. Three hours, ugh ! Three hours would 
 have saved the field of Waterloo to Napoleon Bonaparte. 
 However, I have one small comfort, my time is not so 
 precious as Napoleon's was on that occasion. My letter is 
 getting too long, darling, and besides it is past midnight. 
 " With tender love, 
 
 " Your CHARLEY." 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 THE holidays were at hand, and in consequence, a 
 short vacation ; but so short, that but few availed them- 
 selves of the opportunity it offered to go out of town. 
 There was to be a "sociable" in the ladies' hall the 
 last evening of the term, as had long been the custom at 
 Crawford Academy. Immediately after tea, on the event- 
 ful day, Mrs. Woods's young ladies retired into their re- 
 spective rooms to make preparations. Quite elaborate 
 all of them were but Wilma's ; what she should wear was 
 not a very broad question to Wilma, being limited to one 
 or two "best" dresses and a few simple ornaments. She 
 had just combed out her long hair ready for braiding, 
 when Miss Raymond came in already dressed, with her 
 quaint little air of primness and dignity, and turned her- 
 self round to be inspected. 
 
 " How do I look, Wilma?" she asked, with her pretty 
 artlessness. 
 
 "Beautiful," said Wilma; but the word did not ex- 
 press half the admiration in her eloquent eyes. Miss 
 Raymond, pleased with the compliment, whose genuine- 
 ness it was impossible to doubt, smiled and seated herself 
 on the bedside and gave her attention to Wilma's opera- 
 tions. 
 
 "You have such lovely hair, my dear," she said. Her 
 own shining black braids were coiled like a coronet round 
 her shapely little head, daintily poised on its slim, white 
 stem of a neck. 
 
 "A good many people here speak of my har," Wilma
 
 HIGH- WA TER-A1ARK. 
 
 173 
 
 returned ; "at home we never thought much about it ex- 
 cept that it was hard to comb, because it is so thick and 
 long." 
 
 "Let me fix the braids and fasten the bow on," said 
 Miss Raymond, and stood on tip-toe to do it, and then 
 stepped back to consider the effect. 
 
 " Did any one ever tell you you looked well in pink 
 ribbons, Wilma?" 
 
 "Yes, Charley," said Wilma, and stopped, blushing. 
 
 Miss Raymond was again intent upon the hair, touch- 
 ing it up here and there. 
 
 "Charley who, your brother? You have never told 
 me anything about your folks, Wilma. I have told you 
 all about my two brothers, Starr and VVaddy, and every- 
 body else I know." 
 
 Before Wilma had time to reply, Miss Allen came in, 
 and as soon as her toilet was finished, she and Miss Ray- 
 mond went out into the study-room where Mrs. Woods 
 and Rachel were waiting to see the young ladies' dresses. 
 
 "Oh, Miss Raymun' ! sie vill al'ays look so sweet," 
 Rachel exclaimed, clasping her hands ecstatically, and 
 turning for confirmation to Mrs. Woods, whose grim 
 smile expressed as much approbation perhaps as Rachel's 
 utmost enthusiasm ; each regulating the scale of feeling 
 according to her own standard, as different thermometers 
 are regulated. 
 
 Wilma's attire, though pretty and effective, Rachel ran 
 over with a rapidity and completeness of comprehension 
 that larger brains might have envied, the light in her face 
 gradually subsiding. But it blazed up again when the 
 other young ladies made their appearance. Miss Morris, 
 as usual, had fashioned herself upon the model of her 
 friend, and came out gloomy and repellent, as upon most 
 occasions when her poverty was contrasted with others' 
 abundance. Miss Maclvers was resplendent in amber- 
 colored silk, and soft laces and jewelry. Miss Beach was 
 dressed as became her dumpling figure, dimpled shoulders, 
 and baby arms, in low neck and short sleeves, with a gold 
 necklace and bracelets. Miss Allen, the gayest of all, 
 had flowers in her hair, and an immense, fan-shaped 
 train. The latter she spread out like a peacock's tail, 
 
 15*
 
 '74 
 
 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 and glanced over her shoulder to observe the effect, and 
 was rapturously praised by the enthusiastic Rachel in 
 broken English. Rachel stood in great awe of Miss 
 Maclvers, and merely clasped her hands and looked her 
 unbounded admiration of that regal young lady, having 
 an instinct that anything more demonstrative might be 
 resented. Gray and Liebenwald came down-stairs in 
 stiff white collars and fresh cravats, and passed through 
 the room, raising their eyes timidly and with much de- 
 ferential respect (they would not have presumed upon 
 admiration) toward the young ladies. 
 
 Shortly after there was a knock, and Rachel and Mrs. 
 Woods hastily retired. Miss Maclvers went to the door. 
 She had a promised escort from the department of Greek 
 and Latin and the higher mathematics, a Mr. Haviland, 
 and that gentleman now made his appearance. It is 
 reasonable to suppose that Mr. Haviland had enjoyed 
 many more of the advantages of polite society he being 
 a Congressman's son than Gray and Liebenwald ; yet 
 even he looked slightly disconcerted at finding himself 
 alone, in one sense, in such a magnificent company of 
 ladies. Miss Maclvers exerted herself to put him at his 
 ease. 
 
 " It is early, is it not, Mr. Haviland?" she asked, and 
 Mr. Haviland appealed to his watch, and replied that it 
 was a quarter past eight. 
 
 " Oh, it is quite too early to go !" said Miss Allen. 
 
 Presently there was an imperative knock at Mrs. Woods's 
 door, which was the main entrance from the street, and 
 Rachel, shuffling along the hall in a pair of old slippers 
 without heels, ushered into the study-room two young 
 men and announced, "Some visitors for Miss Ray- 
 mond." 
 
 Miss Raymond started up and ran forward, and was 
 lifted quite off her feet by one of them, a young gentle- 
 man with a downy upper lip and smooth, boyish face, 
 a masculine copy of her own. 
 
 " Waddy, let me down ; don't you see the room is full 
 of people !" she exclaimed. 
 
 "Waddy" set her down in mock haste, and lifted his 
 hat to the roomful of people with an impudence that
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 175 
 
 would seem unpardonable to any one not witnessing it. 
 Those who did witness it laughed. The other gentle- 
 man being older to the extent of a luxuriant moustache 
 and chin-whiskers, which he took in his hand while wait- 
 ing his turn to be greeted, was considerably more digni- 
 fied and undemonstrative. He bent his head gravely, 
 and Miss Raymond grasping his two hands, stood on 
 tip-toe to kiss him, after which she introduced to the 
 company, with sisterly pride, her two brothers, "Starr" 
 and " Waddy." 
 
 "Oh, please set me up properly, Arabella!" begged 
 the younger, with his hat in his hand, in the attitude of 
 bowing. 
 
 Miss Raymond laughingly explained that Waddy was 
 "short" for Warren. 
 
 " And an exceedingly undignified abbreviation it is !" 
 said the young man. 
 
 Miss Morris crossed the room with unaccustomed alac- 
 rity, and gave her hand to the elder Mr. Raymond with 
 extreme cordiality. The greeting between herself and 
 Warren was less warm, and on his part tinged with a 
 ceremoniousness very much like his sister's. When the 
 sociable was mentioned, he expressed himself as delighted, 
 and inquired what was considered the fashionable hour to 
 put in an appearance. 
 
 " Perhaps your brother Starr doesn't care to go, Ara- 
 bella," said Miss Morris, feeling that for her part she 
 would be satisfied to remain at home and entertain him. 
 
 But Starr hastened to assure her that nothing could 
 give him greater pleasure, and the young ladies went out 
 to get their wraps. 
 
 Miss Raymond turned back to speak a confidential 
 word to her brothers. "You will have to do the agree- 
 able and escort some of the girls," she said. " Of course, 
 Matilda will expect to go with you, Starr." 
 
 Warren hastily echoed, "Of course!" and Starr shrugged 
 his shoulders. 
 
 " But I shall go with you, too," she added as an offset. 
 " And you, Waddy, must offer yourself to some of the 
 others." 
 
 Warren begged to know how many. "You know,
 
 1 7 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Arabella," he said, " two are all a gentleman can wait 
 upon handsomely. And, by the way, can't you contrive 
 to make that little, black-eyed beauty one of them ?" 
 
 But Miss Maclvers had Magnanimously invited Miss 
 Beach to "go with us," and Wilma and Miss Allen fell 
 to Warren's share. 
 
 The night was quite mild and still ; the moon shone 
 softly on the snow, and the stars glimmered faintly 
 through a thin, delicate mist Warren insisted upon not 
 following the others, but going around a block or two to 
 give him an opportunity to see more of the town ; said he 
 was already familiar with the main street, he and Starr 
 having paraded up and down it some half-dozen times 
 that evening trying to find their sister. When they 
 reached the academy and proceeded to the ladies' hall, 
 after leaving their wrappings in a little room outside, 
 the rest of their party were already upon the floor prome- 
 nading to slow music which somebody was playing on the 
 piano. 
 
 "Would it be agreeable to you to fall in?" Warren 
 asked. He had one of his companions upon either arm, 
 and it being agreeable to them, at a convenient opening 
 they edged into the procession. 
 
 The music, the lights, the warmth, the hum of voices, 
 the numerous and graceful figures in rhythmic motion, 
 had a pleasing effect on the senses. It was Wilma's first 
 sociable, and her cheeks flushed with excited enjoyment 
 of it, and her heart swelled with a longing for Charley 
 to share it with her. Never an emotion stirred in her 
 soul, of pain or delight, but she turned instinctively to 
 him for sympathy. 
 
 There were two circles of promenaders moving, one 
 within the other, in opposite directions, and presently 
 Wilma encountered Miss Percy on Mr. Ingraham's arm, 
 smiling and radiantly beautiful. 
 
 ' That majestic individual is your principal, I take 
 
 it? 
 
 said Warren. 
 'Yes," Miss Allen answered. 
 'And who is the. lady?" 
 
 ' That is Miss Percy, our elocution and music teacher." 
 ' Indeed !" turning his head to look after her. " Ara-
 
 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. 177 
 
 bella's letters have been full of her. A very remarkable 
 looking lady !" 
 
 "Beautiful, don't you think?" asked Wilma. 
 
 "Angelic !" said Warren. 
 
 Farther up the room sat Miss Belmont, talking with one 
 of the ministers of the place. 
 
 After making one or two rounds of the hall, Mr. Ingra- 
 ham seated Miss Percy, and Wilma, asking to be excused, 
 went up to her. 
 
 "I never saw you looking so well as you do to-night, 
 Miss Percy," she said, with fervent admiration. 
 
 "I am trying to fancy myself happy, to see how it will 
 seem," said Miss Percy, with a half-pleased, half-mocking 
 smile. "I have put on one of my old party dresses," 
 glancing at the folds of sheeny silk that swept around her, 
 " and my jewelry, to try to make myself think that things 
 are just as they used to be, and that there is no such thing 
 as sorrow. The night I last wore these things I had never 
 known the meaning of the word ; and now I can scarcely 
 realize that there is such a thing as happiness !" 
 
 Wilma wondered vaguely whether happiness and unhap- 
 piness are real, tangible things, or only phantoms ; the one 
 an ignus-fatuus which we follow, and the other a hideous 
 nightmare which follows us ! 
 
 What are these unseen influences that fasten upon us 
 and make us happy or miserable? Have they any real, 
 sovereign power and right to rule over us, or are they 
 mere superstitions? 
 
 If Wilma had been inclined to doubt the reality of 
 Miss Percy's settled grief, she might with equal cause, per- 
 haps, have doubted her own happiness. 
 
 Though we seldom do have any doubts about our own 
 state ; it is only other people's joys and sorrows that wear 
 an air of romance. 
 
 " Now, if it were a possible thing to forget," said Miss 
 Percy, narrowing her gaze and looking through her long 
 eyelashes, " if memory were not always tugging at one's 
 heart-strings and pumping the zest out of life, one might 
 be happy in this world ; there is enough in it, one would 
 think, and each of us has enough for our needs. Any 
 philosopher would tell us that, I suppose. Miss Belmont 
 H*
 
 178 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 doubtless thinks we have more than we deserve. But it 
 seems to me there is a mistake somewhere ; either we 
 ought to be more like the lower animals, satisfied with 
 physical blessings, or else there ought to be less pre- 
 carious provision for our higher wants. Which do you 
 think it ought to be, Wilma? As it is, the better part of 
 us is too often starved !" 
 
 Wilma had gathered some confused ideas from Miss 
 Belmont about building one's life upon a solid basis, and 
 leaning upon the strong arm of the great fundamental laws 
 underlying the universe; one of which bore strongly upon 
 the physical condition of man, commending to his par- 
 ticular care the house we live in. 
 
 "You will never find a thoroughly healthy, strong per- 
 son in a continued morbid, abnormal state of mind," 
 Miss Belmont said. " Keep the body robust and vigor- 
 ous, and sentimental griefs will vanish like clouds before 
 the sun." 
 
 But would Miss Percy admit that hers was a sentimental 
 grief that she might throw off if she had a good diges- 
 tion? Hardly. It takes a disinterested party to say 
 whether we have good cause to weep. And even he can- 
 not convince us, and only makes himself disagreeable. 
 Sentimental sorrows are as stubborn as any other sorrows, 
 and perhaps appear more blind and exasperating to those 
 who undertake the office of comforters. 
 
 "Perhaps," said Wilma, with a mental struggle to get 
 hold of something to say, "there is enough in the world 
 for all our wants if we could get the right things." 
 
 Miss Percy laughed, bitterly. 
 
 "A beggar might console himself with the same reflec- 
 tion. Though I suppose your words have a far deeper 
 meaning," she added, mockingly, " whether you see it or 
 not. You got them from Miss Belmont, I suspect." 
 
 Wilma reddened. 
 
 " How little either you or Miss Belmont know of these 
 things," Miss Percy continued, with her narrowed gaze. 
 
 " Surely Miss Belmont knows," said Wilma, who could 
 not conceive of Miss Belmont's being in the dark upon 
 any subject whatsoever. 
 
 "Why? Because she professes to be a philosopher?
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 179 
 
 She is a mere bookworm, a mathematician laying out 
 her life by the square and compass. She seems no more 
 human or sympathetic than the stars in the heavens. She 
 has not a particle of interest for me." 
 
 Wilma had seldom seen Miss Percy so excited about 
 anything not pertaining to herself. Her cheeks glowed 
 and her eyes flashed defiantly. But her very vehemence 
 disproved her professed indifference to the preceptress. 
 Miss Belmont had an interest for her, inasmuch as she 
 aroused in her a spirit of angry resistance. 
 
 Wilma had a dim perception of the attitude of the two 
 toward each other. Miss Belmont, calm, strong, clear- 
 headed, understood and pitied Miss Percy's unhappy con- 
 dition. The preceptress did not dwell upon and lament 
 the innumerable sorrows of mankind ; the important thing 
 with her was their effects upon individuals. Miss Percy 
 was keen enough to see that not her afflictions, even had 
 they been known to Miss Belmont, but their results in 
 her were compassionated. And this sort of compassion, 
 though generous and broad, was yet unconsciously tinged 
 with contempt for the weakness and wil fulness that would 
 not rise above the accidents of life. And it stung Miss 
 Percy into asking herself the startling question, "Am I 
 exaggerating my suffering, and are my sorrows not real ? 
 could I get above them and take hold of life anew?" 
 Arousing her momentarily out of the luxury of her grief 
 and making her ashamed, as a drunken man brought sud- 
 denly to sober consciousness in the presence of clear- 
 minded people, who feel a certain fine scorn for his weak- 
 ness, might feel ashamed. Miss Belmont, in her strength 
 and wisdom, seemed to so sit in judgment upon her and 
 draw her out of her abandonment. And she did not 
 want to be drawn out of it; she was like a morbid, sick 
 person who shuts the blinds and will not let the sun come 
 in with its cheer and brightness. 
 
 Miss Percy had scarcely ceased speaking when, glancing 
 across the room, she met Miss Belmont's eyes fixed upon 
 her with a half-sad, wistful expression, and to Wilma's 
 surprise she got up abruptly and went over and sat down 
 beside her in the place which the minister had just va- 
 cated.
 
 1 80 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "What do you want me to do?" was her sudden, un- 
 expected question. "You have something in your face 
 when you look at me that seems like reproach. Do you 
 think me wicked, weak, worthless?" 
 
 Miss Belmont met the flashing, defiant, yet half-relent- 
 ing face without any pretence of not understanding her. 
 
 "What do I want you to do?" she asked. "Gather 
 up your forces and live." 
 
 " My forces are spent," said Miss Percy, bitterly. 
 
 "No; they are not spent," returned the preceptress. 
 " Some of them are even too strong. Your imagination 
 never sleeps; it carries away your reason and judgment, 
 and destroys all interest in reality. My dear, your feet 
 are not fastened to any spot; you take hold of nothing 
 tangible; and humanity is so weak when it stands alone." 
 
 Large tears gathered slowly in Miss Percy's blue eyes. 
 
 "You need not have told me that," she said, tremu- 
 lously, but with a strong effort to keep up her pride. " I 
 once had friends in whom I trusted, but I have learned the 
 sad lesson that one cannot rely even on one's friends." 
 
 "There is a still sadder lesson," said Miss Belmont: 
 " that one cannot rely on oneself. We know not what 
 forces may develop in us under the stress of circum- 
 stances. I had a motto given to me once, to fit a certain 
 event in my life, that I have endeavored to guide myself 
 by in all my relations with others. It is this, ' Be true 
 yourself and let time shape the rest.' My dear, there are 
 few things which we greatly need that will not come to 
 us by being true and waiting patiently." 
 
 "You preach like all the rest !" said Miss Percy, curl- 
 ing her lip. " Why don't you preachers and teachers 
 say, Do this or do that? I can do, but I cannot wait." 
 
 " Because no one dare lay down a special law for an- 
 other; each must be a law to himself," said Miss Belmont. 
 
 " What ! not even you who live so far above us and 
 have no part or interest in the affairs of weak mortals?" 
 
 Miss Belmont winced. 
 
 " If I had no part or interest in the affairs of weak 
 mortals, I should indeed be a poor sympathizer and 
 teacher," she said, her great heart quivering for a mo- 
 ment; for, under all her philosophy, Miss Belmont was
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 8 1 
 
 tender and sensitive. Her philosophy only helped her 
 to bear and to hide her hurts. 
 
 " Consider me a child, irresponsible, and without dis- 
 cretion to exercise free will; and take me in hand," said 
 Miss Percy, with a smile and half-sneer, as doubting 
 whether anything could be made out of her case.- 
 
 " Well, the first thing I should do with you," said Miss 
 Belmont, smiling, "would be to put you on a mental 
 diet. I would take away your books and your music for 
 a time and allow you no unwholesome reflections. I 
 would wake up all your faculties that are asleep, and lull 
 to sleep all that have been on too long a strain." 
 
 " My books and music?" said Miss Percy, opening her 
 large eyes. "They are my only comforters." 
 
 "But they are morbid comforters," said Miss Belmont. 
 " I sometimes wish no books were written to sympathize 
 with our selfish sorrows and so exaggerate them. We 
 should have books that would take us out of ourselves 
 and interest us in things more worthy our thoughts than 
 our own petty troubles, which we are always too prone to 
 magnify. Believe me, my dear Miss Percy, this sorrow 
 which you are hugging to your heart, and which is drain- 
 ing all the good out of your life, is not so gigantic as you 
 think it is, if you would but thrust it away from you far 
 enough to enable you to look at it dispassionately. People, 
 I believe, are more selfish and more blinded to duty 
 more reckless in their sorrows than in their joys, or even 
 their pleasures and dissipations. Everything must give 
 way to the majesty of grief. I cannot but think that one 
 of the reasons why people yield to it so completely and 
 with so little compunction, springs from the old belief 
 that there is merit in being miserable', a sort of sacrament 
 in self-inflicted pain. For really, my dear, many of our 
 heartaches are self-inflicted ; and there is, after all, a sort 
 of satisfaction or luxury in them that gives our yielding 
 the character of indulgence, and makes it a crime to waste 
 our lives in vain regret and sorrow." 
 
 Miss Percy's eyes were downcast, and her lips had lost 
 something of their usual haughty curve. Miss Belmont 
 was watching her narrowly. She continued speaking in 
 the kindest, most persuasive manner. 
 
 16
 
 1 8 2 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " I know how hard it is to turn about and right oneself 
 after a great shock; a trouble comes upon us and revolution- 
 izes the world for us, and after that every other way seems 
 barred except the narrow channel of sorrowful memory 
 and bitter regret. And this narrow channel comes to be, 
 finally, scarcely more than a habit. The keenest griefs, 
 by and by, lose their strong emphasis of pain, and the 
 most we have to do is to break up habit, and herein lies 
 our duty." 
 
 "Duty," said Miss Percy, sneeringly, and yet with a 
 tremulousness that showed how painfully and throbbingly 
 her heart vibrated. " What duty can one have who 
 stands alone, cut off from all the world?" 
 
 " My dear, no one can be so cut off; family ties may 
 be severed (and, indeed, we are apt to place too great a 
 stress upon these), but there is our common humanity 
 which nothing can destroy, and which is forever creating 
 duties for us toward our fellow-men. Besides, there is 
 something you owe to yourself which you should not 
 defraud yourself of. You have a fine nature to be de- 
 veloped and cultivated ; you have talents that ought to be 
 employed. You have it in you, by your genius and ac- 
 complishments, to shed abroad on those around you great 
 spiritual warmth and light. You hold in your hands a 
 power to elevate and refine that the fewest possess. My 
 dear, our duties correspond exactly with our abilities, and 
 in the grand book-keeping of life ought to balance." 
 
 Miss Percy was growing restive, and Miss Belmont was 
 warned that she had fallen into the common, tiresome 
 habit of preaching. She checked nerself with a sigh, and 
 Miss Percy got up abruptly and walked away with a 
 haughtier step than usual. She spoke to Miss Pettibone 
 and the two left the room together. After that her man- 
 ner bore even a more marked coldness toward the pre- 
 ceptress, which that patient heart bore as it did all the 
 hard, unkind things of life, without protest. 
 
 In the mean time, Mr. Ingraham, frowning and smiling 
 more than ever, and diffusing a very genial influence 
 everywhere (his presence seemed to radiate to the farthest 
 corner, no matter how large the room), came up with 
 Miss Raymond upon one arm, and invited Wilma to take
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 83 
 
 the other. Wilma had lost consciousness of her surround- 
 ings and sat still, thinking. Mr. Ingraham's voice aroused 
 her, and she got up gladly and took the offered arm, feel- 
 ing the old sense of protection with which he had inspired 
 her on their first day's acquaintance, a feeling that Mr. 
 Ingraham was able to call into play at will. 
 
 "How much I should enjoy this, now, if we could 
 dance," said Miss Raymond, her face radiant. Some 
 one else had taken the piano-stool and was playing a 
 delicious waltz. 
 
 "Pooh, pooh," said Mr. Ingraham. "How does 
 dancing differ from this? A mere acceleration of mo- 
 tion, like when one's horse breaks into a gallop." 
 
 "Well, who wouldn't rather gallop than walk?" said 
 Miss Raymond. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham shook his head. 
 
 "Pray, did you never dance?" said Miss Raymond, 
 looking up at him archly. 
 
 " Did I never dance? Yes; and I have seen the folly 
 of it." 
 
 " Oh, well, we want to see the folly of it, too," she said, 
 saucily. 
 
 Mr. Ingraham laughed. " Do you want to see the folly 
 of it, Miss Lynne ?" he asked, looking down. 
 
 "No," said Wilma, quickly; "I would rather stop 
 short of that." 
 
 "Good !" said he, throwing back his head. "Better 
 not wear things out ; stop while they have a pleasant taste 
 and will leave a sweet memory." 
 
 He had become suddenly grave, and knit his black 
 brows. But Wilma was too young and inexperienced to 
 wonder whether he had not tasted some bitter dregs. A 
 moment later she dropped his arm abruptly and stood 
 still. Looking down and following her glance, he saw 
 framed in the door-way they were just passing, a hand- 
 some young stranger standing with his hat in his hand. 
 Wilma took a step forward, and the stranger advanced 
 with a smiling, expansive expression of face and held out 
 his hand. 
 
 "Oh, Charley! how you startled me," she said. Her 
 eyes as she looked up at him were full of tears.
 
 1 84 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Did I?" said he. "It was stupid of me to come 
 upon you so abruptly. I really could not avoid it, though ; 
 that is, it was impossible for me to let you know before- 
 hand. But do you know, I had it in my mind that sur- 
 prise adds something to the joy of meeting !" 
 
 The current of promenaders swept by, they drifting a 
 little to one side. Miss Raymond, comprehending the 
 situation with her accustomed quickness, had drawn Mr. 
 Ingraham away. Mr. Burns, annoyed by the many pairs 
 of curious eyes levelled at them by the promenaders in 
 passing, drew Wilma's hand through his arm and fell in 
 with the procession. 
 
 " I might have known it would be a shock to you," he 
 said, ruefully ; " but I had no time to write after I had 
 made up my mind to come." 
 
 " Don't think about it," said Wilma. " It is all over 
 now, and oh, I am so glad to see you." 
 
 Mr. Burns was very susceptible in some respects. A 
 pleased flush spread itself over his boyish face, and his blue 
 eyes kindled. 
 
 "Are you?" said he, pressing her hand close against 
 his side. They moved on for a little while in silence, 
 each feeling a rush of tender emotion to which the music 
 seemed to play a happy accompaniment. 
 
 By and by the current began to crystallize into little 
 knots and clusters, and Wilma, observing Mr. Ingraham 
 in the centre of one of them, said to Charley, "I must 
 introduce you to somebody, must I not ? To Mr. In- 
 graham ?" 
 
 Mr. Ingraham was a great man to Wilma, who did not 
 in the least comprehend Mr. Burns's view of him. Mr. 
 Burns's life had widened out much more than Wilma's, 
 and principals of country academies occupied no very 
 high rank in the social and intellectual world which his 
 broad consciousness embraced. He lost sight of that 
 which he himself advocated, that a man can make the 
 most of himself just where he happens to be placed. Per- 
 haps he hardly believed in the truth of his own theory 
 (so many of us unwittingly preach one principle and act 
 upon another), or else had little faith in its ever being put 
 into practice. People so often justify in their lives being
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. x 85 
 
 placed by fortune (or what not) in modest positions that 
 perhaps a young man of Mr. Burns's limited observation 
 could hardly be expected to look for anything but a school- 
 master in a schoolmaster. He had a suspicion (and in it 
 lay, secretly, a flattering hope such as most ambitious 
 young men feel) that greatness will eventually show itself 
 at the front; whether forcing its way there by its own 
 volition and momentum, or borne there by circumstances, 
 was a question with which he sometimes wrestled, the two 
 sides gathering weight, alternately, from such illustrious 
 examples as Bonaparte, William the Conqueror, Shak- 
 speare, and others. He did not care particularly to be 
 introduced to Mr. Ingraham, he said, but if it came in 
 the way he had no objection. 
 
 It did come in the way, Mr. Ingraham himself advancing 
 to shake hands with the stranger with great cordiality. 
 True to his prejudice, Mr. Burns was not favorably im- 
 pressed ; he disliked an overflowing manner, and in- 
 trenched himself all the more strongly with a dignified 
 reserve. His pride was of a very sensitive sort; there 
 was something presumptuous and not altogether respect- 
 ful, to him, in the easy familiarity with which many people 
 approach us. 
 
 He had hardly got through the introduction, however, 
 when Mr. Starr Raymond came up to them and grasped 
 his hand. 
 
 "Why, how do you do, Burns?" said he. "Who 
 would have thought of meeting you here. Why didn't 
 you tell us you had friends here, and come with us?" 
 
 " How did I know you had friends here and were com- 
 ing !" retorted Mr. Burns, laughing. "Though, by the 
 way, I did know. You have a sister?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Miss Raymond had come up on her brother's arm. At 
 this moment she stood a little in the background. Mr. 
 Raymond brought her forward. 
 
 " Arabella, I wish to make you acquainted with a highly- 
 esteemed friend of mine, Mr. Charles Burns." 
 
 "I think I must shake hands with one so impressively 
 introduced," said Miss Raymond, with her usual readi- 
 ness. "Besides, you appear to me in the double char- 
 
 16*
 
 ! 86 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 acter of my brother's friend and Miss Lynne's friend, 
 Mr. Burns." 
 
 Mr. Burns said he considered himself happy in being 
 so well recommended. 
 
 It turned out that Mr. Raymond was also a collegian 
 and a senior, and a member of Mr. Burns's law class. 
 They stood talking a moment, something about the 
 route and the train each had taken to reach Crawford, 
 and Warren came up and begged Wilma and his sister to 
 go with him to the other end of the room, where some 
 sort of amusing game was being played creating a good 
 deal of merriment. Warren was already familiar with 
 most of the company. 
 
 Finding themselves alone, Mr. Burns and Mr. Raymond 
 locked arms and made a slow circuit of the hall. Neither 
 of them seemed to be made of the stuff that mixes readily 
 with a crowd. 
 
 "Is Miss Lynne a relative of yours?" Mr. Raymond 
 inquired, not curiously, but by way of showing a polite 
 interest in his companion's affairs. 
 
 " No, a friend," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "This is a large school, if these are all students," Mr. 
 Raymond remarked. 
 
 " Yes ; and there are some very interesting faces among 
 them," Mr. Burns returned, glancing around with the air 
 of one whose judgment is mature. His eyes rested upon 
 Miss Maclvers. Young Raymond also had singled her 
 out. 
 
 " How beautiful she is!" said he. "I have been in- 
 troduced to her, and I believe I will try to cultivate her 
 acquaintance a little." 
 
 "Now is your opportunity, then," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 Miss Maclvers was sitting a little apart and alone. He 
 turned aside and joined the group where Wilma and Miss 
 Raymond were standing, and Starr approached Miss Mac- 
 lvers. 
 
 " May I presume upon my introduction to ask you to 
 take my arm?" said he, with that gallantry that seems at 
 once so natural and so graceful in the young ; and Miss 
 Maclvers arose. 
 
 "Yes; it is stupid to be sitting still," she said, with a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RJC. ^7 
 
 laugh, laying one hand upon his arm, and adjusting her 
 train with the other. 
 
 "Though this promenading is but mildly exciting," 
 said he, smiling back at her, their eyes on a level. 
 
 At the opposite side of the room, Miss Morris sat 
 watching them with spasms of anger. " She has been 
 trying for that all the evening," she said to herself, fiercely, 
 and felt a bitter regret that it was not Mr. Burns who was 
 her victim. " He would have suited her quite as well as 
 Starr," she said, without intending any disparagement of 
 Starr. 
 
 Perhaps she was right. Miss Maclvers had keen dis- 
 crimination, and though Mr. Burns was not strikingly 
 handsome, he had a fine figure, an intellectual face, and 
 extremely noble, dignified bearing. Miss Maclvers was 
 quite capable of setting him up beside Mr. Raymond and 
 drawing the lines of difference between them. " Not 
 quite so smooth, but has more character, more energy ; 
 will make a better figure in the world," was the sum of 
 her mental calculation. 
 
 Meantime, Mr. Burns, who had little thought to bestow 
 upon anybody but Wilma, said to her, " Haven't you had 
 enough of this? Suppose we go and take a walk down 
 these pretty streets of yours. It is beautiful out-doors, 
 and it seems to me it will be pleasanter walking alone by 
 moonlight than promenading among all these people by 
 lamplight." 
 
 "So I think," said Wilma, glad that he had proposed 
 it. 
 
 They went out into the little anteroom where she had 
 left her wrappings. There was no light but the moon 
 shining in softly. 
 
 "It is beautiful!" said Wilma, glancing from the 
 window. 
 
 The town, snow-enshrouded, lay white and still below. 
 
 "Yes," said Charley; "the moon has on her misty 
 bridal-veil to-night, something like my Wilma will wear 
 one of these days." 
 
 He was helping her on with her things, tying her 
 hood-strings under her chin, and he took her round, 
 radiant face in his hands and kissed it.
 
 1 88 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "You have grown more beautiful than ever, my dar- 
 ling," he said. 
 
 "I beautiful? How can you say so after coming out 
 from yonder!" said Wilma, nodding toward the hall, but 
 nevertheless blushing with pleasure. 
 
 Charley shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "What are all those to me?" he said. "You are my 
 Wilma ; so long as I have you, let the wide world wag as 
 it will." 
 
 They went down the long halls and stairways, dimly 
 lighted, and through the wide doors standing open. Out- 
 side all was quiet, and only the pleasant sounds from above 
 came, subdued, through the closed windows. The white 
 snow-crust, covering the ground and glimmering in the 
 soft light, was unbroken except by the several distinct 
 paths leading down to the different gates and hard-beaten 
 by the tread of many feet. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 "I FORGOT to ask, Charley, how you happened to 
 come?" said Wilma, after they had got outside upon the 
 path, and were walking slowly with arms interlocked, both 
 feeling delightful thrills of gladness at being together 
 again. 
 
 " Because I wanted to see my Wilma," said he, looking 
 down and twining his arms around her lovingly. " My 
 eyes were longing to behold her, my arms ached to clasp 
 her, my heart was hungry for her. You see," he added, 
 playfully, "I can't get along without you, my darling, 
 any more than I can get along without several other 
 things that go to make up the sum of human happiness, 
 I will not say human existence; we can exist, you know, 
 under very adverse circumstances. I possess a good many 
 things you among them that I shouldn't like to give 
 up ; but I suppose if some unexpected disaster were to 
 sweep them away (for instance, if some other fellow were 
 to come between you and me and carry you off), I should
 
 HIGH- WA TER- MARK. ! 89 
 
 go on citing and drinking and living all the same. The 
 animal, you see, my dear, predominates to the last, and 
 holds on to life after the affections and all the finer qual- 
 ities of the being are vanquished." 
 
 He tried to meet Wilma's eyes, but she did not look 
 up. The bare possibility of her ever being lost to him, 
 or divided from him by any of the accidents of life, hurt 
 her. She wanted to believe that their relations to each 
 other were like the relations of the planets in the uni- 
 verse, fixed and unalterable. She disliked the idea of 
 change. She wanted to believe in all the old traditions. 
 The saddest of all things to her was the thought that any 
 life should be built upon an unreality, or that any one's 
 firm hope should be fixed upon a thing that would never 
 be. And to have Charley set up, even in jest, so dreadful 
 a possibility, he had a habit of setting up possibilities, 
 and of maintaining that the world was full of them, and 
 that no one ought to be surprised at their unexpected 
 realization in whatever quarter, was a cruel jar to her 
 faith. There was no balm to her in the thought that his 
 existence would be spoiled without her, and that, though 
 divided from her, he might still be true to her; if they 
 were ever separated, therein would lie the utter ruin of 
 all happiness and joy. She could conceive of no com- 
 promise with a destiny that would take him from her. 
 Nor is it remarkable that, without experience, she could 
 not take into account the thousand little attendant cir- 
 cumstances that at last will make the most aggravated 
 sorrow bearable. She had still much of a child's tenacity 
 of affection. Of course Charley could not know what 
 feeling his words stirred in her ; we are such short-sighted 
 mortals, we penetrate such a little way into the soul's 
 solitude of those nearest us ! That Wilma should have 
 a deep inner life of thought and emotion apart from him, 
 and yet in which he was held with such strength of devo- 
 tion, he did not suspect; and, being of a rather playful 
 disposition, he liked to tease her sometimes. 
 
 " I did not intend to come quite so soon," he explained, 
 as they walked on. " I intended to run down, by and by, 
 and spend a day with you. But yesterday I had a letter 
 from my mother, urging me to come home. The letter
 
 1 90 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 alarms me ; it is very short and written in a feeble hand. 
 Oh, Wilma, the thought of losing my mother is almost 
 more than I can bear ! You never knew her, Wilma; you 
 don't know what a good, good mother she has been to me. 
 She has been an inspiration to me all my life, leading me 
 onward and upward. And I have been so contented 
 away from her. I have left her in her lonely old age 
 with cruel thoughtlessness. How selfish we are, how 
 blindly we go on, and deceive ourselves into thinking we 
 are doing our highest duty ! I always wanted to make the 
 most of myself for my mother's sake. At least I told 
 myself so ; and I wanted to be worthy of her pride of 
 me that always seemed to have a sort of prophecy in it 
 for my splendid future which was to be the delight of her 
 old age. My love for her at the very commencement of 
 my life was my strong motive-power. My wish to please 
 and satisfy her has influenced me always. How we lose 
 sight of our aim and miss it in the very pursuit of it ! It 
 is like toiling to reach a certain goal and rinding at the 
 end that the goal is gone, has been removed out of our 
 reach. We never think how time, too, is rushing on and 
 may change all things for us. There is no such thing as 
 marking out a straight path in life and gaining a direct 
 end. We trust too much to the absoluteness of things. 
 Time is treacherous, deceitful, changeable." 
 
 "Oh, no, Charley," said Wilma, "don't say so. Time 
 gives us only the present moment and promises nothing 
 more." 
 
 " In one sense, I suppose so," said Mr. Burns. " But 
 the present is not big enough for a man to live in. There 
 are very few present moments in a lifetime that satisfy 
 us. We have got to be reaching out, reaching out, though 
 we know that at the last, when we are about to lay our 
 hands on the thing we have struggled for, it may be 
 snatched from us." 
 
 "But, Charley dear," Wilma said, gently, "don't you 
 ever think that you are gaining something every day that 
 you live and work that cannot be snatched away from you ? 
 Don't you think we talk too much about great ends and 
 aims, thinking that our lives are wasted unless we accom- 
 plish them?"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. I g l 
 
 " Oh, yes ; it is true we are gaining something for our- 
 selves," said Charley ; " but I was thinking of my mother 
 and of how I have deceived myself into believing I left 
 her for her good, and for the final happiness and satisfac- 
 tion she would derive from my making the most of myself. 
 I begin to think that through all I have thought much 
 more of myself than of her. I ought to have devoted 
 my life to her as she has devoted hers to me." 
 
 "And do you really think, Charley," Wilma said, 
 "that she would like to be paid back in kind ? I don't 
 think so. I believe you are much more of a comfort and 
 satisfaction to her as you are than you would be if you 
 had stayed with her and devoted yourself to her, as you 
 say. I think I know just how a mother a large-hearted 
 mother would feel about that. Dear Charley, I know 
 how even /feel about it. I don't mind your being away 
 from me any more, knowing that you are growing into a 
 great man. I don't mind anything, so that you love me." 
 
 "No; you women are such unselfish creatures!" 
 Charley exclaimed, winding his arm around her again 
 and drawing her close to him. " Unselfish and generous. 
 And how men impose on your unselfishness and generos- 
 ity ! How many men are skeptical of it. I thank God 
 that my faith in womanhood is so firmly rooted, through 
 my mother and through you, my darling !" 
 
 " And do you think your faith would need that posi- 
 tive evidence?" said Wilma, looking up with a smile. 
 
 " I don't know," said he, shaking his head and tossing 
 back his curls. " I am a lawyer, you know, and I de- 
 mand proofs. My mother and you are my witnesses." 
 
 "And you love us," said Wilma, "and it is your love 
 that gives the verdict. If you found us false, what would 
 become of your judgment then ?" 
 
 "I shall not find you false," said he, "and so my 
 judgment will stand, strongly supported to the end. I 
 suppose one couldn't have a well-grounded belief in the 
 goodness and purity of womanhood without having known 
 some good and pure women." 
 
 " Miss Belmont argues differently," said Wilma. "She 
 says we must leave individuals entirely out of the question, 
 and place our feet upon a solid foundation of principles.
 
 192 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK, 
 
 She says the qualities which ought to make men and 
 women do exist as absolutely as God exists. But that 
 we ought not to expect to find them, or be disappointed 
 at not finding them, in the men and women we love. 
 And, dear Charley," Wilma added, "it is so hard for 
 me to do that ; it is so hard for me to see abstract things. 
 Take Honor, Truth, Goodness, they are all unreal to 
 me ; they are all mere sentiment, until I fasten them to 
 something. I fasten them to you, Charley, and then I 
 see and understand. Miss Belmont says the reason why 
 she would detach principle from personality is because 
 human nature is changeable and fallible. But you are 
 not, Charley !" Clasping his arm suddenly with both her 
 little hands, and looking up with a passionate earnest- 
 ness, startling to him, her eyes brimful of tears. 
 
 "I hope, in God, not in a way to destroy your faith 
 in those things!" he said, fervently. "You humble me, 
 Wilma ; you must not bound the attributes of God by 
 the little measure of man !" 
 
 "Oh, I do not," said Wilma. "Cannot a man be 
 truthful, honorable, noble?" 
 
 "A man may change," said Mr. Burns; "or, rather, 
 he may grow out of one thing into another, and so ap- 
 pear to change. We cannot tell what the future will 
 make of us. Our promises to-day may not be binding 
 upon our consciences to-morrow. Our own self is a 
 mystery that we cannot unravel that we cannot vouch 
 for. I can imagine such a thing as this, Wilma, that 
 though I could never love anything else in the world so 
 well as you, yet there might be circumstances in which 
 I would feel bound to give my life to something else 
 rather than to you, though I have pledged it to you. I 
 can only hope, and trust, and sincerely believe that no 
 such appalling duty will ever come between us." 
 
 Wilma winced again under the dreadful possibility. 
 Simple absence from Charley had no pain for her now, 
 as she said ; but separation, division of heart, of interest, 
 of life, took all life away. 
 
 " You will not always feel as you do now, dear," Char- 
 ley continued. " I am glad and proud to embody your 
 ideals or principles for a little while ; they will soon
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 193 
 
 outgrow me. By and by, when your mind grows bigger, 
 and your wings are fledged, and your practical little feet 
 that cling so desperately to tangible things let go of earth, 
 and you soar up into space and stand alone in the pres- 
 ence of the absolute, your soul quickened to a perception 
 of principle rather than example, unaided by men and 
 women and the blush of physical beauty and the music 
 that is audible to the senses; seeing all goodness, truth, 
 beauty, with the spiritual vision, you will not need to find 
 me enthroned upon the heights, exquisite as a rose, beauti- 
 ful as a rainbow, and mighty as an archangel to convince 
 yourself that these are grand things in the world." 
 
 "Don't laugh, Charley," said Wilma, so appealingly 
 that he took the sweet, earnest face in his hands again, 
 and kissed it affectionately. 
 
 "It is true, darling," said he, smiling and shaking his 
 head. "This buoyant thing, this soul that is in you, and 
 which I cannot touch or hold, will rise far above me and 
 will find that its Charley does not fill all space, one of 
 these days. Do you know, Wilma" (very seriously), "that 
 you would be placing a heavy responsibility upon me, in 
 what you have just said, did I not know that you inevi- 
 tably will soar above me, I mean above the human in 
 me? If I fall you must not. I dislike that sort of de- 
 pendency upon one another. I would like you to believe 
 in me, of course; and I would like you to think as I do 
 upon all great and important questions ; but not because 
 I do. I would like you to harmonize with me and yet be 
 independent of me. There is no growth in us when we 
 simply follow and imitate, without thinking. It is like 
 scattering grain in a soil so shallow that it is thrown up 
 next day to bleach in the sun. Better sunk a fathom 
 under ground and not a sprout appear for a score of years. 
 I am not alarmed about you, Wilma," he added, smiling, 
 "or weighted with any great responsibility about you; 
 but do not fancy, darling, that I do not appreciate the 
 solemnity of my relation to you. No man could realize 
 more fully the preciousness of a woman's love given into 
 his keeping than I. But I know that you will find your 
 way whether I lead you or not. And I love you all the 
 more for being able to feel this confidence in you. By 
 i 17
 
 194 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 the way, Wilma, it has always seemed to me that your 
 Miss Percy must be rather a weak sort of person. I 
 would not envy the man that has wrecked her tiny boat. 
 Of course it was a man ! Has she never told you about 
 any false lover?" 
 
 " Oh, no," said Wilma, a little hurt. 
 
 " I did not see her, did I ?" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " No ; she went away before you came." 
 
 " I should like to have seen Miss Belmont. Your Mr. 
 Ingraham, Wilma, is a small tyrant, who domineers over 
 you, and makes the balance even by a good deal of petting. 
 1 suppose," he added, " Miss Belmont doesn't patronize 
 sociables?" 
 
 "Oh, yes; she was there a little while. She never 
 stays long. She says she doesn't think the young folks 
 need her when it comes to amusement." 
 
 " Oh ! And all her acts are mere matters of duty. I 
 like that spirit of self-importance !" 
 
 " Charley ! What makes you so sarcastic ?" 
 
 "Sarcastic, am I? Well, it seems to me we never cut 
 so ludicrous a figure as when we set ourselves up to do 
 nothing but what has the air of duty, and put a value on 
 everything we do and say, and are fearful of spending our 
 worth upon an unworthy object or occasion." 
 
 "You don't understand Miss Belmont, Charley," said 
 Wilma, firmly. "Indeed, I am afraid I describe people 
 very poorly, since you get such impressions of them." 
 
 "There! now, I beg your pardon, Wilma. I didn't 
 mean to offend you. Your descriptions are perfect. I 
 am afraid the fault all lies with me ; I suspect I am jealous 
 of your friends." 
 
 They had reached the farthest limit of Main Street, 
 the point where it was merged into the country highway, 
 and crossing over, went up on the other side. When 
 they got to Mrs. Woods's gate, Wilma stopped and Char- 
 ley looked up at the house and said he meant to photo- 
 graph it upon his mind, so that in future he could picture 
 her there, seated at one of the windows. Wilma told him 
 which window was hers. A naked jasmine-vine clambered 
 over it. 
 
 "By the way, Wilma," said he, "I have not told you
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 195 
 
 my errand yet, at least not all of it. My mind has been 
 so full of it that maybe you have guessed it, though. I 
 want to take you home with me. Can you spare me a 
 few days?" 
 
 Wilma looked up with a sudden leaping of joy in her 
 eyes. 
 
 "Home, Charley? Oh, is it possible? It is such a 
 short vacation they did not expect me to come home this 
 time." 
 
 " We will surprise them," said Charley. " Have you 
 never been the least bit homesick, Wilma? I could 
 never gather from your letters that you were." 
 
 " But I was at first," said Wilma. "After I got accus- 
 tomed to things here, I wouldn't let myself think of 
 home, that is, in the way of wishing myself there." 
 
 " You are a little philosopher," said Charley. " Well, 
 I suppose you must go in ; it is getting late. I will come 
 for you to-morrow morning at nine o'clock; the train 
 leaves at a little past nine." 
 
 He went with her up into the porch and bade her 
 "good-night," and walked back to the hotel. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 THE following morning, when Mr. Burns came to take 
 Wilma to the train, he met a young gentleman Miss 
 Maclvers's escort of the previous evening at Mrs. 
 Woods's gate. He had driven up in an elegant livery 
 sleigh to take that young lady out riding. Exchanging 
 the formal salutations of strangers, they walked up into 
 the little porch together. Mr. Burns, being foremost, 
 knocked, and Miss Maclvers, in plumes and velvets and 
 furs, opened the door, and was a little taken aback upon 
 meeting his face instead of Mr. Haviland's, and blushed; 
 then bowed with her usual superb grace, and, catching 
 sight of the higher department young man over his 
 shoulder, came forward royally, and was escorted to the 
 sleigh, with its bright linings and robes, and whirled away
 
 1 9 6 HIGH- IV A TER-MARK. 
 
 with a joyous jingling of bells, than which nothing seems 
 more in keeping with youth and cold weather and fine 
 spirits. Mr. Burns turned his head and looked after her 
 as she passed him and went down the steps. 
 
 Wilma coming to the door to meet him, he asked, 
 "Who is that beautiful creature?" 
 
 "Why, that is Miss Maclvers," said Wilma. 
 
 " Oh, the belle and beauty of Crawford ! Well, she 
 certainly deserves the title. Are you ready?" he asked, 
 passing into the study-room; "we haven't much time. 
 There is the hack already." 
 
 Wilma hastened to put on her hat and cloak. 
 
 " I have nothing but this valise to take," she said. " I 
 thought it wouldn't be worth while to pack my trunk." 
 
 " No, you will be back within a week," said Charley. 
 
 Home! home to mother, Fred, Blanche, Miss Barker, 
 and her quaint old friends; home to all Hazelville, to 
 the old church and school-house, and the race and the 
 mill and Twin Pionts. What a thrilling, thrilling glad- 
 ness to feel the first rushing motion of the train, home- 
 ward bound, after a school-girl absence of three months ! 
 I know it is trite to describe it.. But how many, many 
 trite and common things are forever bubbling up new and 
 strange and sweet in young hearts ! 
 
 Mr. Burns did not share the feeling. Though usually 
 buoyant and hopeful, and determined to look on the 
 bright side, he could not shake off the sad foreboding 
 that his mother's letter had awakened in him. Whenever 
 the train stopped so that he could talk, he told Wilma of 
 his childhood that had been so tenderly protected by his 
 mother's love. Things long forgotten came up and 
 flooded his memory, and magnified her gentleness and 
 goodness to him. 
 
 It was new to Wilma, and it endeared him to her more 
 than ever. He had always been extremely reserved, even 
 to her, regarding this side of his life. She knew that 
 between him and his mother there was an unusual tender- 
 ness, and so sacred that he hardly ever touched upon it. 
 She felt grateful that he did so now in his sad appre- 
 hension. 
 
 It was not many hours' ride; the distance was barely a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 I 97 
 
 hundred miles. But there was a change of cars and some 
 delay, which they took advantage of to get a lunch at a 
 small station and to walk about, the day being pleasant. 
 
 Charley had telegraphed that they were coming, and 
 so now at home they were all watching and waiting. And 
 in a darkened chamber lay Charley's mother watching 
 and waiting, and asking in a faint voice, " Will he come 
 soon?" 
 
 Two or three women moving noislessly about answered 
 soothingly, "Yes; only be patient a little while longer, 
 he will soon be here," And put something moist to the 
 dry, thin lips, and laid their hands on the damp, wrinkled 
 brow, and glanced at each other, shaking their heads. 
 
 But he came too late. When he reached home and 
 ran up from the gate and laid his hand eagerly and 
 tremblingly on the door-knob, and pushed open the door, 
 his mother was gone. For a time he knew nothing; his 
 limbs gave way, the color left his face, and he sank into 
 a chair utterly overcome by the shock. 
 
 By and by he awoke to the realization of his great 
 sorrow, but to nothing else. Wilma and all other things 
 were as completely crowded out of his life as though they 
 had never been. He went back to his childhood and 
 was alone with his mother. He remembered nothing but 
 that he and she were all the world to each other, and now 
 she was gone, gone. She had been his first, his only in- 
 centive once, toward a high career. When he was a 
 little boy his great ambition to be great was to please her. 
 Latterly, he had lost sight of it, but now he went back 
 to it and thought he had nothing to live for. For now 
 she was dead. Oh, was she dead ? They had told him 
 so, but was it true? He got up and went into her cham- 
 ber, her pretty chamber ! No one else was ever so 
 carefully neat and tasteful as his mother. There on the 
 white bed, with her waving, silvery hair parted smoothly 
 above her broad forehead which, in spite of its wrinkles 
 and its age and the stamp of death upon it, was very like 
 his own, she lay rigid and still. He sank down upon his 
 knees and covered up his face and groaned aloud, so that 
 the women who were busied about the room left their 
 solemn work and went out with streaming eyes.
 
 j 98 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 DEATH cuts off all the little resources that other afflic- 
 tions have of hope, or lingering expectation, or doubt 
 even. There is no extenuation, no compromising with 
 this sorrow, or putting it off. It has got to be met. In 
 all its abruptness, in all its enormity, in all its hopeless- 
 ness. He is dead. There is nothing beyond that. There 
 is the end so far as concerns our relations and intercourse 
 with him of whom this grave sentence is written. There 
 is a final giving up and putting away, out of our lives, of 
 something that cannot be brought back. Perhaps there 
 is something merciful in the absoluteness of it ; we are 
 reasonable creatures, and however sorely we are wounded, 
 we must and will finally see the great necessity of adjust- 
 ing ourselves to the irremediable change. Nothing else 
 is so compulsory. In answer to all other discouragements 
 and sorrows we say, " While there is life there is hope." 
 And so we go on through all the wearisome years with 
 sickened hearts, forever torn and forever bleeding. Death 
 makes but one wound, and when it is healed it never 
 reopens. 
 
 Charley's mother was dead. The sad rites and cere- 
 monies were all over, and a new snow had covered up 
 the new grave, and Charley sat with Wilma in Mrs. 
 Lynne's little parlor. It was hard for him, he could not 
 reconcile himself to it. 
 
 "There is no use," he said, again and again, with a 
 burst of tears. "I can't give her up. It tears my life 
 up by the roots. Oh, Wilma, there is something so ter- 
 rible in this thing death. It is such a fatal, final thing. 
 It is such a destroyer of one's hopes and plans and am- 
 bitions. It takes all the zest out of life. It sickens me. 
 I hate the sight of books and the thought of school. 
 Everything seems so empty, living and working so use-- 
 less. What is life anyhow? What is the final end to be 
 gained by all this striving? My mother lived and labored 
 and suffered for sixty years. And this is the end. I do
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 1 99 
 
 not say her life is wasted ; her best years were given to 
 help and comfort others who, themselves, are long since 
 dead. But it seems to me a faithful life of sixty years is 
 worth some permanent good thing." 
 
 "Dear Charley," said Wilma, gently, "does not your 
 mother's life go on in you? And will not your actions, 
 inspired first by her, be a sort of reward to her? Per- 
 haps nothing is really permanent in this world. But lives 
 may be good while they last, and running on into other 
 lives make a continuous good, and the world grows better. 
 Surely, Charley, from the grave where your mother lays 
 down her work you can take it up and carry it forward. 
 Is not that a beautiful thought?" 
 
 "You are a good little comforter, Wilma," Charley 
 said. " What is there, after all, to do but go on ! Per- 
 haps it is enough simply to help each other, even though 
 man's beginning and end are centred in this poor, fleet- 
 ing earth. That is a sad view to take of life, is it not? 
 We can hardly go about with cheerful faces and hopeful 
 hearts, thinking that this is all ! And yet, who knows? 
 Oh, Wilma!" he exclaimed suddenly, coming and seat- 
 ing himself beside her and taking her hand, " you are 
 all that is left to me now. I have made very few friend- 
 ships. I have not cared to make any. Do you know I 
 am tempted, sometimes, to take you and go away to some 
 sunny clime and try to forget this busy, struggling life 
 that, after all, only ends in death ! Why should we hurry 
 and fret ? Why not drift as peacefully down the stream 
 as we can, since the end is the same ?" 
 
 " We cannot, Charley, we cannot go away and for- 
 get," said Wilma. "It makes no difference where we 
 are ; we carry our own little world with us everywhere. 
 Besides, it is not right, is it, dear Charley, to turn aside 
 from the path we have marked out for ourselves, and 
 which our friends have marked out for us, in our calmest 
 and wisest moments?" 
 
 " No, no, no !" said he. " I talk at random. I am not 
 myself. Let us go and walk ; or, stay, the snow is too 
 deep for you ; I will go myself." 
 
 He put on his hat and greatcoat hurriedly ; and his 
 heart ached when he remembered how many, many times
 
 200 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 in such weather his mother had cautioned him to wrap 
 his scarf around his neck and keep himself warm. 
 
 " Poor mother, poor, poor mother !" he said, with a 
 groan, and went out. 
 
 He set his face against the north wind and walked 
 briskly several miles into the country. When he came 
 back in the edge of the evening, with ruddy cheeks and 
 a keen appetite, the morbidness of his sorrow was gone, 
 though it was many months before the conscious aching 
 went out of his sorely-wounded heart. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 THE spring following the death of Mr. Burns's mother, 
 Mrs. Woods's boarders were all back in their old places, 
 with the exception of Mr. Gray, who had "gone West." 
 His place was taken by a Mr. Langworthy, a higher de- 
 partment student. 
 
 One afternoon, when Wilma had finished her recita- 
 tions at the academy, she got permission to leave the 
 building and go down to see Miss Percy, who was again an 
 invalid ; Mr. Ingraham always being more than willing 
 to grant such permission. When she came back at tea- 
 time, Miss Raymond met her with the delightful informa- 
 tion that to-morrow was May-day, and Mr. Ingraham had 
 granted the school (upon petition) a holiday They were 
 to go into the woods, "to those hills away over east of 
 town," Miss Raymond said, "which look so beautiful in 
 the distance. Mr. Ingraham says there is a stone-quarry 
 there, and we will have a chance to hunt fossils. Then 
 there is Miss Belmont's botany class. V 
 
 "Oh, do you suppose there are any flowers?" Wilma 
 asked. " Maybe I can get some for Miss Percy. She was 
 wishing for some wild-flowers to-day." 
 
 " She is a wild-flower herself," said Miss Raymond. 
 "You are always thinking of her, Wilma, though I don't 
 know as we should quarrel with her about that ; she has 
 few enough to think of her, poor thing. But it is her
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK:. 2OI 
 
 own fault. I have put forth my best efforts to be agree- 
 able to her, and she repulses me continually. I should 
 think she had no taste or penetration whatever, if she 
 didn't like you ; that one spark of discrimination re- 
 deems her in the eyes of your friend Arabella, my dear; 
 and I am constrained on that account to be civil to her 
 still." 
 
 "Thank you," said Wilma, laughing. 
 
 Everybody was jubilant over the holiday plan ; even 
 Miss Maclvers discussed it enthusiastically with young 
 Langworthy, who was trying to eclipse Mr. Haviland in 
 her regard. 
 
 Early in the morning, before it was time to start, Wilma 
 ran down to see Miss Percy again. She found her much 
 better, though looking very fragile and delicate, and pro- 
 portionately lovely. Her complexion was never a sickly 
 pallor, but a clear, beautiful transparency; and her large, 
 bright eyes were unfathomably blue and deep. Her pretty 
 silken hair curled about her white neck and forehead in 
 delicate little ringlets, and was loosely caught up at the 
 back. There was a peculiarly happy and childlike expres- 
 sion upon her face that only appeared at rare intervals 
 when she was free from bodily pain and forgot, moment- 
 arily, her mental suffering. 
 
 "You see I am much improved, Wilma," she said, 
 cheerfully; "I am going to get up to-day. How is it 
 out-doors?" 
 
 " Beautiful !" said Wilma; "and the birds are singing 
 among the trees as I have not heard them sing before this 
 spring." 
 
 "Open the shutters, please," said Miss Percy; "you 
 have no idea how I long for summer skies. I have spent 
 a great part of my life in Florida, and I hate these cold 
 Northern winters." 
 
 Wilma put by the .crimson curtains and threw back the 
 blinds, and let in the fragrant breath and sunshine of May. 
 Away beyond were the woods just budding into delicate 
 greenness, and all things seemed bent upon a resurrection 
 of freshness and beauty, such as would blot out even the 
 remembrance of last year's decay. The very air had a 
 strength of life and buoyancy that lifted the spirit heaven- 
 i*
 
 202 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 ward as if borne on invisible wings. Wilma turned from 
 the window intending to speak of the holiday. Miss 
 Percy was opening her lips to say, " Is this Friday ? Yes ; 
 I recollect. I wish it were Saturday, so that you could 
 stay with me all day." 
 
 A quick thought shot through Wilma's mind, and its 
 shadow crossed her face. 
 
 Miss Percy had keen perceptions. 
 
 "What are you thinking about?" she asked, smiling. 
 "One can see the images that pass behind your transpa- 
 rent face, but cannot wholly define them." 
 
 " I was thinking whether I might not stay with you 
 anyhow," said Wilma, blushing. 
 
 "Do you think your preceptress" curling her lip 
 "would give you permission?" 
 
 "Dear Miss Percy, Miss Belmont would give me per- 
 mission to do anything that would be a pleasure or a ben- 
 efit to you!" said Wilma, earnestly. "Shall I go and 
 ask her if I may stay with you ?" 
 
 " Yes ; if you will be so kind," she said. " The days 
 are so long, and it kills me to stay here alone ; and I do 
 not care to have the Pettibones sit with me, they are so 
 stupid." 
 
 Wilma tied her hat-strings and started down-stairs. 
 Miss Percy called to her, " Will you please tell them to 
 send Bridget up here? I hate these country houses with 
 no bells." 
 
 Wilma tapped at the sitting-room door, and was bade to 
 "come in." 
 
 " Miss Percy," she began, advancing the name as soon 
 as she opened the door, as a sort of apology for her in- 
 trusion, for she stood in considerable awe of the aristo- 
 cratic Pettibones, " says, if you please, she would like 
 to have Bridget sent up to her." 
 
 "Is it possible," said Miss Ella Pettibone, breaking 
 into a laugh, and looking across at her mother (they were 
 the only occupants of the room), " that Miss Percy sends 
 so courteous a request ? Or are we indebted to you, miss, 
 for the politeness?" 
 
 Wilma blushed, but did not reply. 
 
 "You just step out into the kitchen and speak to
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 203 
 
 Bridget, will you?" said Mrs. Pettibone, good-naturedly, 
 nodding toward a side door. 
 
 Wilma complied, and passed through a large dining- 
 room, and opened another door which let her into Bridget's 
 domain. That worthy domestic was busy washing up the 
 breakfast dishes. Wilma had already made her acquaint- 
 ance in Miss Percy's room. She delivered her message, 
 and Bridget straightway wiped her hands and prepared to 
 go up-stairs. 
 
 "The purty dear!" she ejaculated. "It's her break- 
 fast she'll be afther wantin' now, I suppose. Though it's 
 precious little she'll ate when she gits it." 
 
 Wilma went out the back way and hurried home. Miss 
 Raymond was waiting for her; the others had all gone up 
 to the academy, from whence they were to start. 
 
 "You are all ready, are you not, Wilma?" she asked, 
 meeting her in the porch. " We must hurry or we shall 
 be late." Wilma had not thought of anybody's disap- 
 pointment but her own. 
 
 " I am not going," she said, bravely. 
 
 "Wilma!" 
 
 " I am going back to stay with Miss Percy. I came to 
 tell you." 
 
 It was hard for her that Miss Raymond reproached her 
 so with her eyes, and said no word. Great tear-drops 
 welled up and rolled down her cheeks. She went on hur- 
 riedly, her lips trembling, "She is sick, you know, and 
 lies there all alone; and I couldn't bear to leave her. 
 And so I told her I would stay with her." 
 
 "And she was selfish enough to keep you !" said Miss 
 Raymond, with flashing eyes. 
 
 " Oh, no, no ! She doesn't know there is a holiday. 
 She would not have consented if she had known." 
 
 " Then I shall go and tell her, and make her release 
 you." 
 
 "No, no!" Wilma laid her hand upon her arm. 
 "She would be angry with me; you can't understand 
 how she would feel about it." 
 
 " Do you understand howl feel about it?" said Miss 
 Raymond, coldly. "You knew I depended on you to- 
 day, the other girls are all gone."
 
 204 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Oh, what shall I do !" said Wilma, deeply distressed. 
 " Miss Percy is sick and weak ; she can't reason as stronger 
 people do. I depended on you, on your kind good 
 nature, not to be hurt and offended ; and you are hurt and 
 offended." 
 
 " I am a wicked wretch !" said Miss Raymond, throw- 
 ing her arms around Wihna's neck. "You depended on 
 me, and I have shown myself small and mean. As though 
 it were not hard enough for you to give up your holiday, 
 without my making it harder." 
 
 "Yonder comes Miss Belmont," said Wilma; "let us 
 run across the street ; you can go up to the academy with 
 her." 
 
 They crossed over and met Miss Belmont on the side- 
 walk. 
 
 "Don't you think, Miss Belmont," said Miss Ray- 
 mond, "that Wilma can't go! She has to stay with 
 Miss Percy." 
 
 "Oh, no; don't say it in that way," said Wilma. "I 
 don't have to stay. I offered to stay of my own accord. 
 And it seems treacherous and deceitful in me to want to 
 go all the time and not to tell her." 
 
 "You did not tell her?" said Miss Belmont, raising 
 her eyebrows. 
 
 "No," said Wilma; "she wouldn't have listened to 
 my staying if I had told her." 
 
 " But do you think it was quite right, dear, to place 
 her under such an obligation to you without her knowing 
 it ? She is so proud and sensitive, I am afraid she would 
 hardly take it as a kindness." 
 
 Wilma had not thought of it in that way. " What shall 
 I do?" she said, with tears in her eyes. "I cannot go 
 back and tell her now." 
 
 "No," said Miss Belmont, taking her hand and hold- 
 ing it kindly ; " you cannot go back and tell her now." 
 
 Wilma, to cut the matter short, withdrew her hand 
 hurriedly, smiled, and said "good-by," and ran away 
 with the tears in her eyes. 
 
 " The dear child," said Miss Belmont. " What would 
 she not do for Miss Percy ?" 
 
 "What would she not do for anybody?" said Miss
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 205 
 
 Raymond. "She is the most generous, unselfish little 
 creature I ever knew. I hope Miss Percy appreciates 
 her." 
 
 " Whether she does or not," said Miss Belmont, " Wil- 
 ma's own good heart rewards her ; she never will suffer 
 the bitterest pains that mortals can feel." 
 
 Wilma gave herself no time for regret, but hurried back 
 to Miss Percy. She ran lightly up-stairs and opened the 
 door and found her she had been up and got herself 
 dressed in some soft, gray fabric lying across the bed 
 asleep. Sleeping like a little child, with her lips parted 
 and wreathed with a smile. Wilma went softly to the 
 window and sat down on a low ottoman, and looked 
 away to the hills where the school was going for its holi- 
 day. Her tumultuous thoughts and heart-throbbings were 
 greatly at variance with the stillness of Miss Percy's room. 
 By and by, her gaze dropped into the street back of the 
 Pettibone premises, and there went the school, teachers 
 and students, in all the happy abandon of holiday free- 
 dom. There were so many voices talking and laughing 
 that the distant murmur of them floated up to her without 
 carrying any intelligible words. Most of the young men 
 bore lunch-baskets. Mr. Ingraham, with his tall hat, was 
 surrounded, as usual, by half a dozen merry girls, who 
 had conspired together to keep off Mrs. Bramen. Mrs. 
 Bramen was therefore reduced to the escort of one of the 
 uncomely professors, which, however, as a polite woman, 
 she accepted with grace. Mr. Langworthy had outgen- 
 eraled Haviland, and walked beside Miss Maclvers and 
 carried her parasol. Haviland, who was gentlemanly 
 and not resentful, accepted the situation and dropped 
 back with Miss Belmont and Miss Raymond, who still 
 kept together. Once Wilma saw them glance up at the 
 window where she sat, and was tempted to raise the sash 
 and flutter her handkerchief. Changing her mind, she 
 drew back a little so that they might not see her. In a 
 few moments they had turned down another street and 
 passed out of sight ; and Wilma, sitting alone in the 
 silence, soon lost all regret and recollection of them, in 
 a long, delightful revery, such as she used frequently to 
 indulge in before the era of these busy school-days. She 
 
 18
 
 206 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 had no conception of the length of time that had elapsed 
 when Miss Percy called to her. 
 
 "Wilma? Why, how long I have slept. I didn't 
 mean to go to sleep. I was so tired after dressing myself 
 that I thought I would lie down and rest. Will you look 
 at my watch on the bureau, please, and see what time it 
 is?" 
 
 Wilma took the little jewelled watch off its velvet 
 cushion, and said it was nearly twelve o'clock. 
 
 " So late?" said Miss Percy. " Then our carriage will 
 soon be here. Do you know, I have ordered a carriage 
 for you and me ; we are going to have a holiday. I would 
 always rather walk than ride, but I have not strength 
 enough to walk now." 
 
 Wilma's face flushed guiltily. 
 
 "Bridget will bring us up some lunch," Miss Percy 
 continued. "I think I hear her coming up the back 
 stairs now." 
 
 She walked across the room and opened the door ; and 
 Bridget, shuffling along the hall in her working slippers, 
 came in with a great tray of dainties, which she set upon 
 a little table that she had previously cleared of books and 
 various articles not rightfully belonging to it ; Miss Percy 
 having rather careless habits. 
 
 "An* ye think ye will go for the ride, do ye, ma'am?" 
 she asked. 
 
 "Certainly, Bridget," said Miss Percy, smilingly. 
 
 "Mistress Pettibone thinks it's a great risk, indacle." 
 
 "Oho!" laughed Miss Percy. "A great risk. Tell 
 Mrs. Pettibone it will be a great benefit." 
 
 "Well, cud ye think o' anything more as I cud get for 
 ye now?" Bridget asked, with her hands on her hips, 
 surveying the table. 
 
 "Oh, no; you have thought of everything and 
 more than I should have thought of, Bridget. Thank 
 you," said Miss Percy. She was very kind and gracious 
 to Bridget ; she was altogether good-natured and amiable 
 to-day, and Wilma was charmed with her; and would 
 have been happy, but for the generous deception she had 
 practised upon her. Bridget said she must go clown and 
 spread the luncheon for the family. In less than half an
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 207 
 
 hour she came hurrying back again to say that the carriage 
 was waiting. Miss Percy wrapped herself up carefully, 
 and Bridget half carried her clown the stairs and saw her 
 comfortably seated among the cushions, with Wilma be- 
 side her; and then stood shading her eyes with her hand 
 to watch them off. 
 
 Away they went, whirling up the long main street, 
 smoothly graded, past all the beautiful houses with their 
 green yards and budding shrubbery. The sun shone and 
 the birds sang, and the wind blew soft and warm from the 
 South. The woods were getting green, the lilac buds were 
 swelling, and the wild plum and crab-apple trees were 
 blossoming out in delicate pink and white. There was 
 beauty and fragrance and gladsomeness everywhere. They 
 splashed through a shallow, clear little stream with a peb- 
 bly bottom and clean, white, sandy borders, and scared 
 the birds twittering in the bushes ; and Wilma put out her 
 hand and caught it full of white, sweet-scented blossoms 
 and gave a spray to Miss Percy, and scattered the tiny 
 leaves like snow-flakes over the scarlet lap-robe. They 
 came to cross-roads and the driver called back, 
 
 " Which way now?" 
 
 "Oh, no matter," said Miss Percy. "The road to 
 the right looks rather the more inviting, doesn't it, 
 Wilma?" 
 
 "Yes; it is the woodiest" said Wilma, leaning out. 
 
 They turned down a long, green lane with farms and 
 farm-houses and abundant shade-trees upon either side of 
 it. Men were ploughing and women making gardens all 
 along. From the lane they passed into a winding road 
 through a stretch of woods, and going for some distance 
 in a southerly direction, Miss Percy leaned out of the 
 carriage and looked away to the left, where there was a 
 long line of hills stretching away in the distance. 
 
 " Look yonder, Wilma, there's something waving there 
 on the brow of that hill," she said. "It looks like a 
 flag." 
 
 "It is a flag," said Wilma, "and people are moving 
 about. I wonder oh ! it's the school." 
 
 "The what?" said Miss Percy. 
 
 "Why, it's May-day," said Wilma, in confusion. Miss
 
 20 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Percy looked at her so that she was bound to explain. 
 " Mr. Ingraham gave the school a holiday." 
 
 "And why did not you go?" 
 
 Wilma was silent. 
 
 " You thought you would be self-denying, and stay with 
 me?" 
 
 Miss Percy's blue eyes dilated, and her red lips curled 
 scornfully. 
 
 " I don't demand any sacrifices, Miss Lynne. I will not 
 accept them." 
 
 "Oh, Miss Percy!" said Wilma, inexpressibly pained. 
 " Pray, don't be offended. I wanted to stay with you. I 
 would rather a thousand times please you than please 
 myself." 
 
 Miss Percy, leaning out, called to the driver, and 
 asked if there were a road leading up to the hill where 
 they saw the flag waving. 
 
 " Yes'm," said he, pulling up; "there's a road t'other 
 side o' the hill, windin' up in there som'ers." 
 
 "Find it, and drive up there," said Miss Percy, and 
 leaned back in her seat again. 
 
 Wilma, shrinking into her corner, was silent, feeling 
 crushed and miserable. But yet, in all her little troubles 
 (how little they would look in the breadth of later expe- 
 rience, and yet how stinging they were then!) Wilma 
 had one infallible comfort. It was Charley. The thought 
 of him brought always and ever a sweet, consoling balm. 
 How deeply she could trust in him, how securely lean 
 upon him ! He loved her; he was never, never unkind 
 to her. Tears came into her eyes, but they were tears 
 of tenderness as much as of grief. 
 
 Suddenly Miss Percy exclaimed, to Wilma's unbounded 
 relief, "Look yonder, Wilma! Is not that Miss Ray- 
 mond's brother?" 
 
 Wilma looked and recognized " Waddy" approaching 
 from another road on horseback. 
 
 "Ho!" said he, drawing up alongside. "Why, is it 
 you, Miss Lynne?" lifting his hat, with a smile. "I be- 
 lieve I have lost my way," he continued. "I am hunt- 
 ing Crawford Academy ; they told me it was out in the 
 country indulging in a. fete champetre to-day. I saw a flag
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 209 
 
 waving before I got into the woods, but I have lost it now, 
 and don't know exactly where to go." 
 
 "Keep right along 'ith us; we'll come 'thin sight of 
 'em purty soon," said Miss Percy's driver. 
 
 "Thank you !" Warren returned, and said to Wilma, 
 "Then you are bound for the picnic, too?" 
 
 "No, I think we are too late for that," said Wilma; 
 "but we are going to drive up there." 
 
 She presented Warren to Miss Percy, who bowed, but 
 could not be induced to talk, though Warren appealed 
 to her many times with his bright, admiring eyes as he 
 rode along beside the carriage. In a few minutes they 
 came to the scene of rural festivity, and Miss Raymond 
 came flying up, overjoyed to meet her brother. 
 
 "And you, Wilma I" she exclaimed. "Is it possible? 
 You sly little thing, to think of your getting us all off, 
 trudging on foot through the heat and dust, and then fol- 
 lowing in this magnificent style !" A look in Wilma's 
 face checked her, and she added, " I am so glad you have 
 come ! Hasn't the day been fine? How do you do, Miss 
 Percy?" she said, her manner taking an unconscious touch 
 of formality. 
 
 "I am very well, thank you," said Miss Percy, coldly. 
 
 " Do you know," said Miss Raymond, turning to Wilma 
 again, after looking around and discovering that her brother 
 was conversing very earnestly with Nellie Beach, " we are 
 talking of going home already. We have gathered all 
 the flowers we could find and all the petrified remains we 
 can carry, and oh, you don't know how tired we are ! 
 Miss Belmont has sick headache, too, and is hardly able 
 to stand." 
 
 Wilma glanced at Miss Percy, who, without looking at 
 her, said to Miss Raymond, " If Miss Lynne wishes to 
 walk back with you, Miss Belmont can have her place in 
 the carriage." 
 
 Wilma arose gladly, and Warren came up and helped 
 her out. She and Miss Raymond went to hunt up Miss 
 Belmont, whom they found sitting under a tree, leaning 
 her head against its trunk, and looking very white and 
 sick. 
 
 "Ah, so you came after all, did you, dear?" she said, 
 1 8*
 
 2 1 o HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 smiling faintly and pressing Wilma's hand. " How did 
 it happen?" 
 
 " Miss Percy got a carriage for us to take a ride. When 
 we got out of town she saw the flag waving here, and I 
 had to explain. She is very much offended," said Wilma. 
 
 "Well, don't grieve, child," said Miss Belmont, "it 
 will all come right ; Miss Percy is impulsive. Leave it to 
 time and your own sweet faithfulness." 
 
 Miss Raymond had gone to fetch Miss Belmont's hat 
 and parasol. Wilma could not tell these things to her, 
 because her affection for herself would bias her judgment. 
 But Miss Belmont was broad enough to take in every- 
 thing and do justice to both Miss Percy and herself. 
 When Miss Raymond came back, Miss Belmont got up 
 and walked slowly to the carriage. As it rolled away, 
 she leaned back and closed her eyes, being too sick to 
 talk, except to thank Miss Percy for her kindness. 
 
 The students and professors, with one impulse, began 
 to gather up their baskets and other belongings, and set 
 their faces homeward in clusters of two, and three, and 
 half a dozen. Warren threw his horse's bridle over his 
 arm and walked with Nellie Beach, and Miss Raymond 
 and Wilma followed at a little distance.
 
 THIRD BOOK. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 I HAVE no desire to connect this history with the his- 
 tory of the Great Rebellion, inasmuch as the latter has 
 been, already, the groundwork of so much romance. 
 Inasmuch, also, as that nothing which is written can equal 
 in interest and intensity what was the common experience 
 of all in those sad times. But in the beginning of Wil- 
 ma's second school year civil war began to be loudly 
 talked of, and I am obliged to touch upon it in so far as 
 it concerns the lives of personages in this narrative. 
 Wilma's first serious consideration of it came about through 
 Charley's letters, which by rapid degrees took a high tone 
 of patriotism, and inspired her with not so much enthu- 
 siasm as dread of war. Starr Raymond wrote gravely to 
 his sister, and Warren declared himself ready to enlist 
 under the first banner hoisted, and at the tap of the first 
 drum. Suddenly, as we all remember (for great shocks 
 come suddenly, however long anticipated), it came, the 
 call to arms, the quick response. 
 
 Mr. Langworthy got into the habit of reading the daily 
 papers aloud of an evening, the boarders being all seated 
 around the study-table anxious to hear. One evening he 
 began aji account of a thrilling volunteer speech made by a 
 famous young attorney at the capital. "At the close of 
 which," ran the paragraph, "one hundred young men, 
 the flower of the city, chiefly from the senior class and 
 law department of the university, headed by the talented 
 and promising Charles Burns, stepped out of the ranks 
 of scholarship and entered the ranks of volunteers. It 
 was a thrilling scene. The meeting was held in the large
 
 2 1 2 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK, 
 
 assembly-room, which was densely crowded. Enthusiasm 
 mounted to the highest pitch. Men cheered, women 
 fainted and were carried from the building. The elo- 
 quent recruiter was himself elected captain, and Mr. Burns 
 first lieutenant of the splendid company." 
 
 As Mr. Langworthy, with kindling eyes, read the glowing 
 account, Wilma, at the other side of the table, sat as if 
 turned to stone, her eyes blank and staring, her lips com- 
 pressed and bloodless. 
 
 "Wilma!" Miss Raymond exclaimed, affrightedly. 
 
 The exclamation aroused her, and she started up with 
 a wild look and cry, and ran toward her bedroom door. 
 The other young ladies staring at one another blankly, 
 arose, after a moment, with one impulse and followed her. 
 The young men sprang to their feet, ready for any emer- 
 gency, but not knowing what to do. 
 
 "Is it a fit?" Miss Allen had asked, and Liebenwald 
 caught at the idea and looked to his companion. 
 
 "Go for a doctor?" 
 
 Langworthy shook his head. "Wait and see," he re- 
 plied. 
 
 "Wilma, dear Wilma, what is it, what is the matter?" 
 Miss Raymond cried, throwing her arms around her. 
 
 Wilma had taken down her hat and shawl, and was trying 
 with trembling hands to put them on. 
 
 " Charley ! Charley has gone to the war !" she said. 
 
 "But what are you going to do, Wilma, dear? You 
 cannot go to him," said Miss Raymond, persuasively. 
 
 "No, no. But he must have written ; he wouldn't leave 
 me to find out in this cruel way. I must go to the post- 
 office ; it's raining and no one has been there to-night." 
 
 "Oh, I know!" exclaimed Miss Allen, in a whisper, 
 in Miss Maclvers's ear, a liberty she would not have taken 
 or Miss Maclvers allowed under less exciting circum- 
 stances. " It's that Mr. Burns who was here once, long 
 ago, you remember?" 
 
 " So I think we have all inferred," said Miss Mac- 
 lvers, haughtily, withdrawing her ear. 
 
 " Well, dear me. Send one of those fellows out there 
 to the post-office, can't you?" said Miss Morris. "I 
 wouldn't think of going out in this rain."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 213 
 
 " Oh, no, no," said Wilma, " I must go myself. 4 ' 
 
 "Of course," said Miss Raymond, "it is better she 
 should go, and I or some one must go with her." 
 
 " Not you, certainly, Arabella," said Miss Morris with 
 emphasis, she being a sort of guardian of Miss Raymond's 
 health. 
 
 Miss Maclvers, much to everybody's surprise, stepped 
 forward. " I will go with her, myself," she said. " Wait, 
 Miss Lynne, until I get my wraps." 
 
 It still rained a little when they stepped out, and the 
 night was dark and chilly. Miss Maclvers tucked Wil- 
 ma's hand under her arm, and spoke comfortingly to her, 
 but without much effect. Wilma was so sorely wounded 
 as to be quite reckless about what was due to anybody's 
 dignity and importance, but walked along with her head 
 bowed and her tears falling fast, hardly conscious of the 
 august being beside her, upon whom she had always 
 before looked with so much awe. As for Miss Maclvers, 
 her haughty lips curled with mingled contempt and envy. 
 That that Mr. Burns, whom she had once seen and ad- 
 mired as so handsome and intellectual, whose fine, earnest 
 eyes she had met, the remembrance of which made her 
 cheeks flush even yet, should belong, in his affections 
 and in betrothal, to this simple little goose ! In her secret 
 heart Miss Maclvers felt that she would like to exchange 
 places with the simple little goose, and go with a proud 
 heart for the expected letter which, sure enough, was 
 waiting. For it was a time when maidenly ambition 
 pointed to military heroes. Though maidenly love, such 
 as Wilma's, shrank with terror from the thought of giving 
 up their lovers to make military heroes. 
 
 Happy news is well enough conveyed in letter, but sad 
 news can come in no more crushing form. There you are 
 alone with it. It is like a stab in the dark; the hand 
 that strikes you is hid from you. No arm to steady you, 
 no eye to look pityingly upon you. Nothing, nothing 
 but the cruel, wounding words. 
 
 The woman who handed out the letter went back to the 
 domestic quarter of the establishment, and Wilma and 
 Miss Maclvers were left alone in the outer office. In jus- 
 tice to Wilma be it said that she did not presume to
 
 214 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 open and read her letter in that presence without first ask- 
 ing permission, which being accorded, she retired a little 
 to one side and broke the seal. Miss Maclvers, with an 
 instinct of delicacy, also turned aside and walked to the 
 window to watch, by the light of a few street lamps, the 
 rain still pattering on the sidewalks and in the muddy 
 streets. A carriage, shining wet, went splashing by, and 
 an omnibus and men and boys. Now and then she glanced 
 furtively at the little figure quivering with choked sobs ; 
 and, having a tender spot in her nature, as the hardest 
 of us have, tears sprang into her own eyes. 
 
 Turning around when she had read the letter, it was 
 not a long letter, and regardless of her wet cheeks, 
 Wilma held it out and asked, timidly, almost apolo- 
 getically, "Would you like to read it, Miss Maclvers? 
 It is all about the volunteering and that Captain Cour- 
 tenay who made the speech. Oh, I wish there were no 
 Captain Courtenay !" with a burst of tears. "I never 
 let any one read his letters before, but now it seems like 
 like as if he were dead, and it don't matter now." 
 
 "There, there; don't cry so, dear," said Miss Maclvers, 
 soothingly. " It is not so bad as that ; not nearly so bad 
 as if he were dead." 
 
 She put her arm around Wilma and drew her close to 
 her side, while she looked over the letter. 
 
 "Why, surely," she thought, "there is nothing here 
 to call for tears, unless they were tears of pride and joy at 
 having such a lover !" 
 
 The letter breathed the most inspiring, soul-stirring 
 sentiments ; such as dried her wet lashes and made her 
 fine eyes flash with patriotic fire. 
 
 " I know that it will hurt you, darling," he wrote; "I 
 would have come and told you if I could, instead of writ- 
 ing. I will come soon and see you, Wilma. I tried to 
 prepare you a little in some of my preceding letters ; but 
 I know that it will be a shock to you, all the same, to 
 know that I have enlisted. Be brave, my little one. I 
 know you will ; and believe this, Wilma, that whether 
 collegian or soldier, I am the same to you always, my 
 darling, your CHARLEY."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 2 1 5 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 CRAWFORD ACADEMY was not deaf to the call to arms. 
 Nearly the whole department of Greek and Latin and 
 the Higher Mathematics drew off at the beck of Miss 
 Maclvers's especial escort, young Haviland, and donned 
 government uniforms, and shouldered government muskets, 
 and went into camp. Not that it was much comfort to 
 Miss Maclvers. Mr. Haviland was not her lover in an 
 accepted, or even in an offered sense ; and showed no 
 disposition to become so, notwithstanding that she came 
 down from her pride and dignity and manifested some 
 womanly and even tearful emotion in view of his depar- 
 ture for the dangerous scenes of war. She actively in- 
 terested herself in a flag, which was to be presented to 
 his company by the young ladies of the academy, and 
 was appointed to make the presentation speech, to which 
 he responded, expressing the company's gratitude in a 
 brief, heart-felt acceptance of the gift, which they em- 
 phasized with three tremendous cheers. Afterward he 
 thanked Miss Maclvers, personally, for her great kind- 
 ness to, and interest in, a young Union volunteer like him- 
 self. And pressed her hand with much warmth and 
 fervor, and looked eloquently into her dark eyes that 
 were humid and tender. But it was in the spirit of a 
 soldier, rather than of a lover. She was so superior, so 
 exalted, and he so modestly unpresuming, that he would 
 never have suspected her of the weakness of any personal 
 feeling for himself. 
 
 Just previous to their going away Captain Haviland's 
 company Mr. Ingraham permitted another sociable in 
 the ladies' hall in their honor ; and on this occasion 
 consented to have dancing. For how could the strangely 
 compounded enthusiasm of the time confine itself to any 
 milder form of expression than the delicious excitement 
 of a ball-room, with its music and rhythmical motion ? It 
 happened again, strangely enough, that Mr. Burns came 
 the very day of the sociable. Wilma's first letter, after
 
 2 1 6 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 the crushing news of his enlistment reached her, carried 
 with it a shock of surprise to him that she should be so 
 greatly affected by it, followed by a tender pity that was 
 eager to soften the blow to her. In the excitement of 
 patriotism that had hurried him into the ranks he had 
 scarcely thought of her War was a something that 
 concerned the men of the nation, and a something 
 beside which all the private and personal affairs of life 
 became small and insignificant. Perhaps it was this very 
 thought that was so crushing to Wilma. She who had 
 always been supreme in her lover's life, and consulted 
 regarding its smallest interests and changes, saw it rushing 
 by her in a great sweep and leaving her behind. And 
 the thought (very narrow and selfish, no doubt it was) 
 striking her so sharply and reflecting itself back to him 
 in her complaining letters, aroused him to a view of the 
 case from her standpoint. He had written that he would 
 come soon, but there had been so much delay that Wilma's 
 terrified heart began to doubt whether he would come at 
 all. And in reply to her fears he wrote, in extreme ten- 
 derness, " Let me take your hand in mine, darling, across 
 this wide stretch of forest and prairie, and help you to 
 wait." 
 
 And he came at last, unexpectedly. Wilma, on her 
 way down street, met him a little way from Mrs. Woods's 
 gate, with a burst of tears. 
 
 "Why, why," said he, stopping and taking both her 
 hands, "what is the matter? You have a very sorrowful 
 welcome for me. Come, come ! why, I counted on your 
 being a perfect little Spartan !" 
 
 " I don't think you thought of me at all," said Wilma, 
 weakly, in a hurt voice. But her heart was so sore. 
 
 Mr. Burns's brows contracted. He was eminently 
 good-natured and sunny, but still capable of sternness. 
 He had come very tenderly disposed toward Wilma, and 
 felt the hardness of parting from her. But she, in her 
 blindness (pain will make us blind), somehow repelled 
 him ; made him almost wish he had not come. Still 
 holding her hand, he turned her about to walk back with 
 her. 
 
 "Are the students in there?" he asked, nodding
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 217 
 
 toward the house, and thinking it would be awkward to 
 go in just now if they were. 
 
 " Some of them are there," said Wilma. 
 
 " Then let us go and take a walk in the woods," said 
 he. 
 
 He wore his uniform, and in Wilma's eyes looked the 
 most nobly beautiful being upon the earth. He had a 
 tall, lithe, symmetrical figure and graceful bearing. His 
 bright hair curled about his white temples. His face was 
 radiant with a new light ; his eyes flashing, his soul at high 
 tide for battle and for glory. Not that he or any of those 
 enthusiastic young volunteers rejoiced in the great calam- 
 ity of the nation ; but it had come upon us, and we must 
 fight. So, hurrah ! If there's glory in it, we'll win the 
 glory. The Union is to be preserved, and we will pre- 
 serve the Union though we die for it. That was the spirit 
 of the times. It was Charles Burns's spirit, but very hard 
 for Wilma to catch ; it called upon her for so great a sac- 
 rifice. But, then, was it any harder for her to buckle on 
 her lover's sword and send him to battle, to danger, to 
 death, than for many a maiden who had no lover to buckle 
 a sword upon ? It may not be a fair question or one that 
 anybody can answer impartially, because we all speak out 
 of our own experience. We who have loved and buried 
 our loved ones, in one way or other, apply this pathetic 
 philosophy to our wounded hearts, 
 
 " 'Tis better to have loved and lost, 
 Than never to have loved at all." 
 
 And we who have never loved, or, loving, have not lost, 
 smile, superior to such melancholy sentiment. 
 
 Wilma felt that her lover was almost as good as lost (so 
 to speak). It was agonizing to her to look upon him, 
 her brave, beautiful, chivalrous Charley ! It seemed as 
 if her heart must break with grief and tenderness. Now 
 that he no longer belonged wholly to her, but was being 
 borne away from her upon this great public wave, he 
 seemed more dazzling and splendid to her than ever 
 before. 
 
 They went into the woods, and Mr. Burns did his best 
 to inspire her with some of his own enthusiasm ; but 
 K 19
 
 2 1 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 failing in that, and his good-humor coming back, he 
 attempted to throw it all off lightly. 
 
 "What does it signify?" said he. "I shall probably 
 come back in a few months with the gratifying and exalted 
 sense upon me of having done something for my country. 
 A feeling that is calculated to make a man think better of 
 himself for the rest of his life. I know whereof I speak, 
 Wilma," he added, laughing; "for haven't I heard some 
 old soldiers recount their heroic deeds? And heaven 
 knows, I think we wretched beings have need to be stim- 
 ulated into thinking well of ourselves sometimes!" 
 
 Wilma felt that he was only parrying her fears, trying 
 to soothe her into unconsciousness of the dangers of war, 
 and still clung to her own dark side of the picture. So 
 that he finally came down to an honest view of the sub- 
 ject, which was better, and owned that, as to his life, 
 the possibility of losing it, that had no place in his 
 thoughts. He had given it already, and no longer reck- 
 oned upon it. An admission that chilled Wilma's blood 
 and made her lips dumb. For what could she say after 
 that? His generosity, his grandeur of soul, humbled 
 her. How many leagues he had gone beyond her ! 
 
 His real self, he said, his conscious being, he believed 
 would live on, and go on thinking and working and loving 
 all the same. He told Wilma that he saw no difference 
 in being on this side, or that, of the wall between him 
 and eternity; except, perhaps, that the society over there 
 is better than here, and one can mingle with it more freely 
 by not being borne about in a clumsy body. "I have a 
 great curiosity about that other side of life," he said, " of 
 whose glories it hath not entered into the heart of man to 
 conceive. Do you know, Wilma, that after hearing so 
 much about heaven, one is a little surprised, upon going 
 through the scriptures, to find so little said about it there ! 
 Of course there is a heaven to answer to the cravings of 
 men's souls. There must be a heaven in which are gath- 
 ered up the jewels that melt away from earth. I should 
 like to know what Shakspeare and all those grand souls 
 have been about over there all these years ! Something, 
 I've no doubt, that will be for our good when we get there. 
 I'll tell you what, Wilma, if some rebel puts a bullet
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 219 
 
 through my head, or my heart, I'll just embrace the 
 opportunity to slip out of this mortal prison-house, and 
 I'll go and explore the unseen land against you come; 
 and when you come I can take you by the hand and lead 
 you all through the wonderful regions. It strikes me that 
 heaven must be a safe place to put one's friends, Wilma ! 
 There is not half the danger of losing them there as in 
 having them straying about this earth, where there are so 
 many snares and dangers and pitfalls. The mother is 
 sure of the baby that is taken up in Abraham's bosom ; 
 she is not sure of the one that is left to wander here." 
 
 "You speak of heaven, Charley," said Wilma, looking 
 up with a struggling smile, "as you might of Italy !" 
 
 " And why not?" said he. " I have never seen either 
 place. My imagination pictures the one, my spirit pene- 
 trates, almost, to the other. I sometimes fancy that in 
 each of our souls is wrapped up the germ of our heaven. 
 I don't want any man to make my heaven for me; let 
 Milton and Dante confine themselves to their own king- 
 doms. I want to fashion mine. I want it to grow out of 
 myself. My idea of it is that it will be no more and no 
 less than we can each of us fully appreciate and enjoy. 
 There may be much more of it than we know, of course ; 
 but for us there will be just what we can take in. Just 
 enough of freedom, of unconstrained thought, of peace, 
 of love. Here we have not enough, you know. We are 
 never quite full of the things we like. Something hinders 
 us; we can't go far enough, or high enough, or deep 
 enough. We can't get much farther than our bodily 
 senses can take us. Sense is the outer wall built up around 
 our souls, and beyond that we can go but a very little way 
 without getting wofully mystified. Still, we have a pretty 
 wide range, we men and women have ; see how much we 
 know ! bah, see how little we know. At all events I am 
 satisfied, both with this world and the next. I believe in 
 them both with all my heart. It's a grand scheme, this 
 scheme of life ! I have no fears." 
 
 Wilma was silent. A new world seemed opening. Her 
 lover stood revealed to her in a largeness of mind and 
 thought nay, of actual life with which she had not 
 kept pace, of which, until this moment, she had had no
 
 2 20 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 conception. How small, how narrow, how selfish were 
 her complainings compared with his pure motives and 
 grand aims! And she had tried to bind down to herself, 
 and to her little world, this great, generous nature. 
 
 They had strayed away, out of town, to the little peb- 
 bly stream that, a year ago, she and Miss Percy had 
 crossed in their pleasant drive. Wilma was reminded of 
 it by the pink and white blossoms on the trees and the 
 birds twittering in the bushes. Charley gathered a hand- 
 ful of the blossoms and tucked them in her hair. 
 
 " I don't know which are most becoming to you, 
 Wilma," he said, smiling, "the pink or the white blos- 
 soms, or the green leaves. I'm not much on effects; think 
 you look well in any of them. You are a sober little 
 thing, Wilma," he added. "Why don't you wear some 
 gay colors, blue for instance?" 
 
 " Like your uniform?" said Wilma, smiling, and laying 
 her hand on his sleeve. 
 
 " No ; a brighter blue," said he. " More like the sky. 
 Was ever anything so blue as the sky?" Glancing up 
 through the trees. 
 
 " Your eyes, Charley," said Wilma. 
 
 "And yours are brown, aren't they? Contrast," said 
 he. " I like contrasts. Did you tell me you drove 
 through this rivulet when you went a-maying that time, 
 you and Miss Percy?" 
 
 "Yes; and everything looked then just as it does now, 
 except that it is a little later in the season now." 
 
 "You are very fond of riding," said Charley. "Are 
 you not ? I like to walk. Contrast again. Though that 
 is hardly the sort of contrast to make a harmony, is it ? 
 We want to travel together, you and I, and we must adopt 
 some mode agreeable to us both, when we begin our jour- 
 ney, Wilma, eh?" 
 
 " If we ever begin it !" said Wilma, with tears starting 
 afresh. 
 
 "Nonsense!" said Charley. "We shall journey to- 
 gether through all eternity. And, by the way, Wilma, there 
 comes in another of the delights of heaven, perfect con- 
 geniality of souls ! How often we hear this question, Shall 
 we know each other there ? Whether we will or not de-
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 221 
 
 pends very much on whether we know each other here. 
 Shall I know my mother, with the earthly tie of mother 
 and son broken and dissolved between us? -We must 
 keep -in mind that all things earthly perish ; that death 
 breaks all relations, except the relation of soul to soul. 
 If you and I keep close to each other, darling, in mind, 
 in thought, *in spirit, we shall know each other there. 
 Will not that be a beautiful recognition ?" 
 
 They had sat down together upon a fallen tree, and 
 Charley had been busy making a wreath. 
 
 " There, Wilma ! now take off your hat, and let me 
 put this on your head ; we'll play it's May-day, and I'll 
 crown you Queen o' May. There ; you've no idea how 
 pretty it looks. Can't you step down there, and see your- 
 self in the water? You look like a fajry." 
 
 "A brownie !" said Wilma. 
 
 "Well, a brownie; that is a fairy all the same. Say, 
 to come back to a dropped subject, why don't you wear 
 some gayer colors ?" 
 
 " I don't know. I will, if you want me to. You spoke 
 of blue, but Miss Barker would never allow me to wear 
 blue, I'm so dark. I have worn pink a good deal, you 
 know." 
 
 "And looked as pretty as a rose," said Charley. 
 
 "But who will care how I look when you are gone?" 
 said Wilma. 
 
 "My dear, I shall care all the same. I shall see you in 
 my thoughts and in my dreams." 
 
 " And in your thoughts and dreams you can deck me 
 as you like." 
 
 " I must have a picture of you, Wilma," said Charley. 
 " A good one. I will send you one of mine when I go 
 back. By the way, are we not staying out here a good 
 while ? I see the sun is getting low. Do you remember 
 how often we used to watch the sun set from the top of 
 Little Twin? I have not been to Hazelville since my 
 mother died. I have always intended going. It would be 
 a sad sort of pleasure to me to stand once more beside 
 her grave ; but I am afraid I shall not be able to do it. 
 Poor mother, she never thought her boy would be a 
 soldier!" 
 
 19*
 
 2 22 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 They had arisen, and were walking slowly back toward 
 Mrs. Woods's. 
 
 "What a revolution circumstances make in a man's 
 life," continued Mr. Burns. "In all my ambitions and 
 plans and aspirations, I never took this circumstance 
 war into account. I thought, somehow, in spite of all 
 that was said, that, as a nation, we had done with blood- 
 shed, had got above it. That, however much the foreign 
 heathen might cut and slash each other, we were superior 
 to it. Alas, we are all made of one common clay ! What 
 a vain conceit for any of us to fancy ourselves bright ex- 
 ceptions to the general rule ! I have looked across the 
 ocean at men killing one another, and felt that sort of 
 pitying contempt we entertain for inferior creatures. 
 Now these same creatures are in the ascendant, and will 
 stretch up their necks, and look across at us. Bah, what 
 wretches we are !" 
 
 " Then, why do you go?" said Wilma, as one catches 
 at a straw. 
 
 " One can't escape. I belong to a period ; I must act 
 with the times. I don't approve of war, but it's not a 
 time to proclaim it when the country is in arms and the 
 enemy in our midst. The mistake is here : we are not 
 diligent enough in times of peace to elevate ourselves 
 above the possibility of war ; we are working up to it, 
 and in the mean time we must do the best we can." 
 
 When they reached Mrs. Woods's gate, Mr. Burns 
 looked at his watch. " It is five o'clock, Wilma. I will 
 go down to the hotel and eat my supper and then come 
 back if you want me, and stay until time for this sociable 
 you speak of. I always happen here in time for your fes- 
 tivities." 
 
 Wilma assented and went in. The tea-bell was jingling, 
 and as soon as tea was over she went into her room to 
 dress for the evening. Miss Raymond helped her. 
 
 "You are to be the belle of the evening," she said, 
 "because you have such a handsome lover." 
 
 She^ braided Wilma's hair and wound it about her 
 head ;* and looped up her white muslin dress with bows 
 of pink ribbon and tiny sprays of clematis, and then pro- 
 nounced her lovely. Which she was, with her pretty,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 223 
 
 oval face saddened a little, and her sweet, brown eyes 
 looking as if there were tears back of them. 
 
 "Hark!" said Miss Raymond, peeping from the win- 
 dow. " I hear some one coming, and it is that lieuten- 
 ant of yours. What a soldierly figure and bearing he has, 
 Wilma ! I suspect you are very proud of him !" tapping 
 her cheek. " There, you must go out, now ; he has come 
 up into the porch." 
 
 Wilma went out and opened the door. There was no 
 one in the study-room, and Charley took her in his arms 
 and bent down and touched his lips to her forehead, al- 
 most with solemnity. There had always been in his 
 affection for her, and in his treatment of her, a great deal 
 of reverence. 
 
 "My Wilma!" he said, tenderly, "how can I leave 
 you? You are dearer to me than anything else in the 
 world, except those abstract things we call honor, prin- 
 ciple. I told you once you remember, do you not? 
 that it might be I should some time be compelled to give 
 my life to something else rather than to you ; and the 
 time has come, darling. And I am hardly prepared for 
 it. Just now I feel unstrung at the sight of you and the 
 thought of leaving you." 
 
 "But if you love me, Charley," said Wilma, with a 
 sad little smile that showed the heartache beneath it, " if 
 we have each other's affections, that is having the best 
 part of each other, is it not? So long as you live I shall 
 feel that you are near to me. But if you fall " 
 
 Her lip quivered and her eyes filled with tears. 
 
 " If I fall," interrupted Charley, " your life must blos- 
 som all the more ; it must blossom for us both. I know 
 it will. I know something of the spirit that is in you, 
 my darling ! It will not be easily crushed. You know 
 what I have always aimed at, Wilma, for you and for me. 
 If I never come back to you, make your life what I would 
 have it to be. Can you promise me that?" 
 
 It was a moment of as great solemnity as either had 
 ever experienced. Wilma's heart was too full for utter- 
 ance, and she answered by a pressure of the hand. 
 
 One by one the young ladies came out, dressed, and 
 flooded the little sitting-room with bloom and elegance.
 
 224 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Captain Haviland, and one or two other gentlemen in 
 uniform, among them Starr Raymond, Captain Cour- 
 tenay's second lieutenant, who had arrived on the evening 
 train from the capital, and whom his sister greeted with 
 a flood of tears, which she immediately dashed away, her 
 disposition being a good deal like an April day. Mr. 
 Burns was introduced to all that were new to him, and 
 shook hands, cordially, with those whom he had met be- 
 fore, and made himself delightfully agreeable. 
 
 Miss Maclvers, hearing him remark that his regiment 
 was encamped, for drill, at the beautiful little city of 
 R , one of the loveliest places in the West, he de- 
 clared, turned to him and said, with a charming smile, 
 "Do you think so? That is my home." 
 
 " Indeed?" said he, turning to look at her, and feeling 
 strongly attracted. Presently he drew his chair near to 
 her. 
 
 "I shall regret," he said, his eyes lingering upon her 
 beautiful face with frank admiration, " that you are not 
 at home when I go back to my regiment !" 
 
 "Oh, but I shall be there then, I presume," she re- 
 turned. " I intend going home to-morrow." 
 
 "You do? And I return tomorrow," said he. "I 
 hope you will not think me presumptuous if I contrive to 
 take the same train ?" 
 
 "Oh, no," she answered, laughing, and added arch- 
 ing her exquisite brows something about its being fitting, 
 " in these per'lous times," for ladies to travel with armed 
 knights. She went on, her color rising and her beauty 
 growing upon him, to tell him about her home, its situa- 
 tion, its elevation upon the summit of a terraced hill, and 
 its distance from the camping-ground. And, looking 
 into each other's eloquent eyes, and making delightful 
 excursions into each other's consciousness, they were both 
 mutually pleased. 
 
 " I think I remember the place you describe," said Mr. 
 Burns. " We have passed it occasionally in our evening 
 walks. I remember the fountain and the terraces and the 
 image of the Newfoundland dog. I hope you will be so 
 gracious as to invite us to come and see you?" 
 
 "Oh, yes, certainly," she answered, laughing. "If
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 225 
 
 the war does no other good it ought certainly to develop 
 hospitality in us toward the defenders of our country." 
 
 Mr. Burns's face flushed pleasurably. 
 
 "You say 'us?'" continued Miss Maclvers, raising 
 her eyes. 
 
 " Yes ; I included Captain Courtenay," said he. " He 
 and I usually stroll out together." 
 
 " I have heard of Captain Courtenay, frequently," said 
 Miss Maclvers. "The papers speak very flatteringly of 
 him." 
 
 "The papers cannot do him justice," said Mr. Burns, 
 quietly. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "Because nobody can describe him. One must see 
 Captain Courtenay ; his presence, his manner, his looks, 
 voice, gestures, bearing, create an effect upon you that 
 no description could give you a conception of. If you 
 saw him you would comprehend what I mean. It seems 
 to me he has it in him to be great, more than any other 
 man I have ever met ; but whether fortune will make him 
 an Alexander or Napoleon Bonaparte, I can't say." 
 
 "In what direction is he capable of greatness?" asked 
 Miss Maclvers. "As a soldier?" 
 
 "As a soldier, or statesman, or orator, or anything he 
 might turn to," said Mr. Burns, smiling. "I see you 
 are incredulous, so I'll say no more." 
 
 "Oh, yes, go on. What else? I am deeply inter- 
 ested." 
 
 "Well, then, he is the most magnificently handsome 
 man I have ever seen. You will think that a great step- 
 ping-down, I suspect, to pass from a man's splendid capa- 
 bilities to his mere looks." 
 
 " Ah, I suspect you meant to deepen my interest in 
 your gallant captain," laughed Miss Maclvers. 
 
 " And so persuade you to let me take him to call upon 
 you," said Mr. Burns. " Maybe you are right." 
 
 " Oh, of course, you must bring him to see me." 
 
 "Thank you. You plant an oasis in the desert. I 
 dreaded the tedium of camp life." 
 
 Some one said it was time to go to the academy, and 
 Miss Maclvers glanced at her little, diamond-studded 
 *K
 
 226 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 watch and arose. Mr. Burns started up and crossed over 
 to Wilma. 
 
 On the way to the academy Miss Allen remarked to 
 some of the girls, "If Wilma doesn't look sharp, Miss 
 Maclvers will get her handsome lieutenant away from 
 her." 
 
 " So I think," said Miss Morris. "And no great won- 
 der. What the young man can see in that little Miss 
 Lynne to admire is more than I can fathom." 
 
 "Matilda," said Miss Raymond, warmly, "if you 
 can't see anything noble or beautiful in Wilma Lynne 
 yourself, go and ask Miss Belmont to describe her to 
 you." 
 
 "Pray excuse me," said Miss Morris, sneeringly. 
 
 The ladies' hall was beautifully decorated with leaves 
 and flowers, and festooned with flags. Two immense 
 chandeliers overhead flooded it with light, and a full 
 band of music was playing and lading the air with a pas- 
 sionate joy and sadness. The soft, warm wind drifted 
 through the open windows. The night was magnetic and 
 subtle and strange. Voices were subdued, eyes were beam- 
 ing, cheeks glowing, and hearts beating high with the 
 tumultuous glory feeling that war brings. 
 
 Wilma, coming in on her lover's arm, was conscious of 
 the strange vibration of the atmosphere, and seemed to 
 feel, under all the music and the hum of voices and the 
 lights and beauty and fragrance the far-off booming of 
 battles ; and above the sublimity of an eternity and of 
 grand lives budded in earth, amid all its strifes and tumults, 
 expanding in everlasting life and bloom. Charley had so 
 opened up and brought near to her wonderful spiritual 
 regions. She determined to get up on a level with him 
 and look abroad. Ah, she could do that, with her hand 
 upon his arm, thrilled by the magnetism of his touch, 
 his voice in her ear, his face bending above her ! It is 
 certain she was lifted up above all the small, practical 
 affairs of her little life. All the hopes they had had, all 
 the plans they had made, sank into nothingness. What 
 mattered anything but that he loved her and that in heart 
 they were united ! After all, what were earthly ties ? They 
 might kill her Charley, but though the bare thought
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 227 
 
 made her heart bleed they could not take him from her ! 
 Brave little Wilma ! She was coming up grandly, as Char- 
 ley had said she would. She had given up his life just as 
 he himself had given it up, and was standing on the 
 heights with him as they had stood together on the top 
 of Little Twin. 
 
 Many couples were promenading to the heavily-charged 
 music. A number of soldiers were there in uniforms not 
 yet stained with blood ; officers with* shoulder-straps and 
 swords dangling, supporting upon their arms fair partners 
 whose eyes beamed with a softened radiance ; for when 
 men are brave women are more tender. A little group 
 collected and stood talking together, and, at its breaking 
 up and falling into line with the promenaders, Captain 
 Haviland offered his arm to Wilma, and Mr. Burns turned 
 to Miss Maclvers ; and for the first time in her life Wilma 
 saw him detached from herself and giving his smiles and 
 the dear light of his eyes to another, who answered back 
 with glances charged with electric power. They walked 
 before her, and his head was slightly bent toward his com- 
 panion. It flashed upon Wilma that she had as yet taken 
 but one step in grief, a very baby step. Charley was 
 going away, and she had cried as a child might cry whose 
 toy was broken. The heart can be quickly educated. 
 In a moment it came to her that this sort of separation, 
 though it were to last till death, was nothing, nothing 
 compared with soul -division. To lose Charley was 
 nothing; to lose his love was all the world. And the 
 possibility of losing it was dimly shadowed forth in his 
 frankly apparent admiration of Miss Maclvers. Mr. 
 Burns himself did not dream of the possibility ; he be- 
 lieved that he needed Wilma as much as he ever needed 
 her. But it is true his world was widening out. He had 
 not changed in respect to her ; she still held the same 
 safe corner of his heart. But many other corners had 
 been opened up. Certainly life was larger than he had 
 once thought it. The world had more interests for him than 
 he had counted upon, many interests which she did not 
 share. It would have surprised him to have been brought 
 suddenly to face the thought that she was not indispensa- 
 ble to him. It would have been a shock to him no less
 
 22 8 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 than to her, and perhaps not less painful to him than to 
 her. He would have lost confidence in himself; he 
 would have been hurt and humiliated. But just now he 
 was saved from it; he felt himself to be true and loyal. 
 He was happy ; he was fearless ; launched upon a great 
 wave of public enthusiasm. It is not often in our lives 
 that we can throw ourselves forward with the tide ; usually 
 we must stem it. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 THE following morning Mr. Burns came to bid Wilma 
 good-by and to take Miss Maclvers to the train. Miss Mac- 
 Ivers's great trunk was packed and strapped, and standing 
 in the porch waiting to be carried to the depot. Miss 
 Maclvers herself came down-stairs in an elaborate, pearl- 
 gray travelling-dress, with some bits of rose-color here and 
 there to set it off. And again the electric fire that flashed 
 between her own and Mr. Burns's eyes the night before, 
 lighted up both faces when they met. 
 
 Though Miss Maclvers was not a coquette. She had 
 too much dignity to descend to vulgar flirtation. She 
 disliked coarseness. She rather scorned the admiration 
 that is based upon mere physical beauty. She felt that 
 she charmed Mr. Burns by something more than that, and 
 she liked the homage he paid her with his eloquent eyes, 
 which seemed to explore her mind as well as her face. 
 She liked the intellectual intercourse with an understand- 
 ing like his. They could measure each other. Both of 
 them had read a good deal, and partly in the same direc- 
 tion. She was, perhaps, the more polished, but he had 
 thought farther. 
 
 Most of the students were in the study-room, and there 
 was no opportunity for Wilma to speak to Mr. Burns 
 aside, though her heart ached for some tender parting 
 word. A dray came for Miss Maclvers's trunk. 
 
 " I did. not order a carriage," said Mr. Burns. " I did 
 not know what your arrangements were."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 229 
 
 "Oh, I intend to walk to the train," said Miss Mac- 
 Ivers. " It is only a step." 
 
 "Then perhaps we had better start," said he, looking 
 at his watch. " We will have barely time." 
 
 Miss Maclvers arose, and Mr. Burns turned to Wilma, 
 who was waiting with trembling heart for the leave-taking. 
 All her courage had ebbed away. 
 
 "You will go to the train with us and see us off, will 
 you not, Wilma?" said he. 
 
 Oh, why were all these people here to witness this su- 
 preme parting? Why could they not have one little 
 moment alone? A little while ago she could not bid 
 Charley "good-by" in the presence of her own family. 
 Now, she felt reckless enough to throw her arms around 
 his neck before them all ; but that he himself seemed 
 constrained. 
 
 "Let me go with you, too, Wilma," said Miss Ray- 
 mond, "so that you will have company back." 
 
 As they passed out the gate, which Mr. Burns held open, 
 she slipped her hand through Miss Maclvers's arm and 
 said, significantly, " We will walk on and leave the lovers 
 to follow at their leisure." 
 
 Mr. Burns, with the charm of Miss Maclvers's presence 
 still upon him, could hardly recall himself at once to the 
 old attitude of tenderness toward Wilma. 
 
 "What a fine morning!" he said, alighting upon the 
 commonest of topics. " I am going to begin cultivating 
 an extra affection for old mother nature, now that I am 
 to be turned out of doors, with her green sod for my 
 carpet and the blue sky for my roof! I don't mean to 
 spend much of my time cooped up in a little soldier's 
 tent, I can tell you. I have a sort of reckless feeling 
 about all the duties and obligations of life, like a boy let 
 loose from school." 
 
 "But do you think it is right to feel so, Charley?" 
 Wilma asked, merely because he paused there. 
 
 " Oh, no ; I suppose not. A soldier is morally respon- 
 sible, the same as anybody else. But I am upset. I am 
 jostled out of my course. I shall be all right by and by, 
 when I get settled. I hope so." 
 
 "How long will you be in camp at R .?" Wilma
 
 230 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 asked, not without reference, in her thought, to Miss 
 Maclvers. 
 
 " I don't know. It will depend, partly, on how fast our 
 regiment fills up, a couple of months, maybe. I have 
 gained something by coming to see you, haven't I?" he 
 asked, nodding toward Miss Maclvers. " I shall have a 
 place to visit while I am in camp. What a charming 
 person she is !" 
 
 "Yes; she is very beautiful and accomplished," said 
 Wilma. 
 
 They had no time to spare at the depot ; the train was 
 coming in. Mr. Burns had to attend to Miss Maclvers's 
 trunk. Then he shook hands with Miss Raymond, kissed 
 and embraced Wilma hurriedly, helped Miss Maclvers up 
 the steps, and sprang up after her, waving Jais hand as the 
 train moved off. Wilma stood looking after it with stream- 
 ing eyes, and Miss Raymond put her arm around her 
 gently, and drew her away. A number of by-standers 
 were lounging about, to whom a soldier's leave-taking 
 was no new thing. 
 
 Mr. Burns, standing on the platform outside, pitying 
 the pain in Wilma's face, turned as soon as they were out 
 of sight of the town, and said to himself, with a sigh, 
 "Poor Wilma ! well, it can't be helped ;" and went into 
 the car and looked about for his companion, and took a 
 seat beside her with the air of a "natural protector;" 
 the little cloud that had settled upon his face vanishing 
 rapidly in the light of hers. People looked curiously 
 and admiringly at the handsome pair, and wondered if 
 the beautiful lady were the soldier's bride. And Miss 
 Maclvers enjoyed the situation ; she liked to triumph ; 
 she liked to hold an advantageous position before the 
 world. In that she differed from Mr. Burns. He did 
 nothing for effect ; he was not concerned about anything 
 people thought or said; he did not imagine that folks 
 could be interested in speculating about him. 
 
 They stopped at a small station, and a woman with 
 two children was gathering up her bundles to get off. 
 Mr. Burns, observing her hurry and confusion, went 
 and helped her courteously, and then came back and sat 
 down again.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 231 
 
 " You are very gallant !" laughed Miss Maclvers, mock- 
 ingly, and, though it grated on Mr. Burns's finer sense, he 
 smiled back at her. 
 
 " Gallant is hardly the word, is it?" said he. "Call 
 it a little act of humanity." 
 
 " Oh, very well!" She turned her head and looked 
 out of the car-window, and presently exclaimed, " What a 
 blank, aimless stare the people have who congregate about 
 these depots !" 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Burns; "I suppose it is curiosity 
 that brings them here, and yet their faces show very little 
 of that." 
 
 "And they all belong to our species," said Miss Mac- 
 lvers. "Now, if we could classify them in some lower 
 order; but we can't. Humiliating, isn't it?" 
 
 "Well, I don't know," said he; "I hate to think 
 about it. One is inclined to fall in with an article of the 
 Buddhist's creed, which is, that we are not all immortal 
 beings; only a few can attain to the sanctified state they 
 call Nirvana" 
 
 "But Buddhists are not predestinarians, are they?" 
 said Miss Maclvers. "The 'chosen few' are not elected; 
 their immortality depends on themselves." 
 
 "Every man is elected at his birth," said Mr. Burns, 
 " to a certain heritage. He has within him the germs of 
 his own fate." 
 
 " I fancy our destinies are written upon our faces," 
 said Miss Maclvers, laughing, and still looking from the 
 window. " See, what a dreadful old woman! Do you 
 not think such faces are fated?" 
 
 " What is fate?" Mr. Burns asked. " My opinion, as 
 I have just intimated, is that it is a something within us, 
 and which shapes us, rather than a something outside 
 overruling us. But we must be careful," he added, "and 
 not judge people altogether by their outward seeming ; 
 we may not be able always to read the signs correctly." 
 
 "Of course not. People are not answerable for their 
 looks ; it is the moral nature we may criticise and find 
 fault with." 
 
 "May we, really?" said Mr. Burns, looking at her 
 with his smiling eyes, and a charming curve about his
 
 232 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 lips (which you and I, reader, know deepened, in after- 
 years, to almost a sneer). 
 
 "Are we any more responsible for our moral nature 
 than for our faces ? For my part, I think our physical 
 nature is quite as much under our control as our moral." 
 
 "How can that be?" said Miss Maclvers, opening her 
 eyes. 
 
 "We can educate the expression of the face, but the 
 features will remain the same ; what more can we do with 
 the mind ? We can cultivate it, we can tone it down, 
 but we cannot change it." 
 
 "You teach me a broad charity," said Miss Maclvers. 
 
 " Charity for others, and for ourselves, too," said Mr. 
 Burns. " Heaven knows ! we have need to have a good 
 deal of charity for ourselves sometimes, to save us from 
 dire humiliation and despair." 
 
 "I never thought of that !" said Miss Maclvers. "I 
 did not suppose Ve had any right to pity and forgive our- 
 selves." 
 
 " We have as good right to pity and forgive ourselves, 
 as we have to pity and forgive others. Let us be just." 
 
 The train moved on ; and at such a rapid and roaring 
 speed that conversation, except in the intervals of stop- 
 ping at small stations for a minute or two at a time, was 
 next to impossible. Miss Maclvers put her elbow on the 
 window-sill and leaned her cheek upon her hand and 
 looked out ; the fresh spring breeze blowing in her face 
 and deepening its delicate rose-color, and fluttering her 
 ribbons and taking liberties with her fleecy gray veil ; 
 sometimes fastening it to Mr. Burns's shoulder-straps, 
 and sometimes making it hover over him like a cloud. 
 She had hardly ever, with all her beauty, looked so beau- 
 tiful as she did now. But Mr. Burns was not looking at 
 her. It seemed that he did not care to look at her, except 
 when he talked to her ; he was not in love with her ; he 
 sat with his eyes straight before him, thinking ; he had 
 an exceedingly active brain, and was always digging into 
 some abstract subject. The little conversation with Miss 
 Maclvers had given him a cue and he was following it up. 
 Miss Maclvers had too much tact to engross him. 
 
 When they reached R , a carriage was waiting for
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 2 33 
 
 her, and he helped her into it, pressed her hand cordially 
 but not sentimentally, and said he should soon avail him- 
 self of her kind permission to visit her. The carriage 
 whirled away, and he directed his steps at once to the 
 camping-ground, his thoughts pleasantly tinged with rec- 
 ollections of the brief journey. 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 CAPTAIN COURTENAY declined the honor of an intro- 
 duction to the imperial beauty and belle of R (for 
 
 such Miss Maclvers was considered in her own town), say- 
 ing, when Mr. Burns mentioned it to him a day or two 
 after his return to camp, enigmatically, "I have more 
 women on my hands now than I know what to do with." 
 
 It is true that he was courted most assiduously, though 
 not at all successfully, by the fair sex wherever he went. 
 
 Mr. Burns, hotly indignant, retorted, "You need not 
 fear that Miss Maclvers is likely to throw herself on your 
 hands!" 
 
 Captain Courtenay smiled cynically, and Mr. Burns 
 caught up his hat and left the tent and made his way 
 over into the town, designing to pay his first visit to his 
 agreeable travelling companion. The sun was barely 
 half an hour high, and the day's heat and bustle and dust 
 were over. Life in the busy city was quieting itself to a 
 subdued hum. From one of the several imposing churches 
 a chime of bells rang out, clear and sweet, calling to even- 
 ing prayers, and a few belated sisters of some charitable 
 order were hastening away. 
 
 "Poor things!" said Mr. Burns, to whom they in 
 passing deigned no glance, but kept their eyes resolutely 
 on the pavement. " I pity them, because they shut out 
 from their hearts and lives so much of this sweet world. 
 But why should I pity them ? Their lives are full of some- 
 thing else, of course : of hope in the future, of faith. 
 No doubt they pity me!" And he smiled and looked 
 
 20*
 
 234 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 about him, and felt with intense thankfulness that he was 
 open to all the joyous influences that could be borne in 
 upon him. He glanced up at the blue sky, and around 
 upon the green earth, and breathed the pure air, and took 
 in the beauty and fragrance blooming inside the pretty 
 garden fences, and honestly thanked heaven that he was 
 as he was ; a man free from prejudice and unfettered by 
 superstition ; charitable and kindly disposed toward all 
 men ; fearless and independent in thought ; determined 
 to examine all things and grasp whatever was good, and 
 throw away what was evil. It was characteristic of him 
 that he prosecuted boldly, and without fear of becoming 
 disloyal to Wilma, his acquaintance with Miss Maclvers. 
 He had unbounded confidence in himself. He believed 
 in growth and development and expansion, and was 
 ready to press on and take the consequences. 
 
 A river crossed the main street of the city, in the midst 
 of it, spanned by an iron bridge. Many people were 
 traversing the bridge to and fro. Mr. Burns paused mid- 
 way across it and leaned upon the railing, and looked 
 down into the clear, swift-running water. The sun shone 
 aslant upon it, and was reflected from the shining sides 
 of many a silvery fish that, rising almost to the surface, 
 flapped himself over and darted down out of sight swift 
 as an arrow. Mr. Burns enjoyed such scenes, and felt 
 just now a freedom to enjoy them which he had not often 
 allowed himself in the last few, studious years. He 
 turned away half reluctantly and walked on. He soon 
 passed into a side street, and ascended a long, sloping 
 hill, on whose terraced summit stood the mansion Miss 
 Maclvers had described as her home. The fountain was 
 spouting in front, and on one of the green terraces lay 
 the huge image of a Newfoundland dog. By these Mr. 
 Burns was convinced he had not mistaken the place. He 
 opened an iron gate, and went up the broad stone steps 
 that led to the main entrance. The dewy evening air was 
 heavy with the fragrance of climbing roses that wreathed 
 themselves around the massive stone-work of the portico 
 guarding the door. He rang the bell, and turned to look 
 about him while waiting. The view was fine. Nearly 
 the whole city with the river, now dark with the gather-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 235 
 
 ing shadows, winding through it was spread out below, 
 and sharply defined in the slanting sunlight that came 
 from behind. Beyond was the camping-ground, on an 
 open, level plain, and the red light shone upon that, too. 
 Mr. Burns was reminded of Little Twin and of Wilma. 
 
 " Poor little Wilma !" he said, thinking of her grieved 
 face as the train moved off. 
 
 The door opened behind him, and he turned around 
 and felt in his vest-pocket for a card. 
 
 " Is Miss Maclvers at home?" 
 
 "Yes, sah. Walk in, sah," said the ebony black attend- 
 ant, and showed him through a thickly-matted hall into a 
 high, spacious room that had an air of costly elegance, 
 suggestive of Miss Maclvers herself. The windows were 
 raised, and through the half-open Venetian blinds the wind 
 came softly, swaying the cobweb curtains. Mr. Burns 
 seated himself and looked about him with pleasure at the 
 beautiful pictures and other gems of art that decorated 
 the room. His nature was peculiarly receptive ; and just 
 now he gave himself up wholly to the things and circum- 
 stances around him, and was willing that the stream of 
 passing scenes and events should flow in upon him un- 
 checked. As he himself had said, he had given his life 
 to his country and no longer reckoned upon it. He was 
 broken off from his old pursuits, and felt singularly free 
 from care and responsibility. It seemed to him that des- 
 tiny, or Omnipotence, for he had a happy faith in the 
 conscious love and power of God, was managing his af- 
 fairs. He had come to that place in life where he might 
 simply drift, for a little time. We know he was energetic, 
 but he did not make himself miserable because his ener- 
 gies, just now, were not needed. He had no personal 
 dread of war, and his soul was serene and happy. 
 
 Miss Maclvers did not keep him waiting. She came in 
 and swept up to him with her white hand extended and 
 her beautiful face, which blushed so easily and so prettily, 
 animated with a cordial welcome. She was carefully 
 dressed, though perhaps not with reference to him, and 
 looked altogether elegant. She was not a soft, luxurious 
 woman ; her face was intelligent, her figure erect, her 
 manner dignified, though she had, also, a good deal of
 
 236 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 womanly grace. She awoke in Mr. Burns, who probably 
 saw her at her best, a lofty, refined admiration. 
 
 "You found the way easily, did you?" she said, draw- 
 ing up a chair and seating herself near him. 
 
 "Oh, yes; one could hardly miss it," said he; "there 
 is no other place like it in the city." 
 
 "No other high, terraced hill," said Miss Maclvers. 
 " I have always liked it for the view." 
 
 "Yes; I observed it as I came up. It is fine. I see 
 you have the whole camping-ground mapped out over 
 yonder." 
 
 Miss Maclvers laughed. 
 
 " Oh, yes ; and I take my opera-glass and fetch it over 
 here, sometimes, and inspect it at my leisure." 
 
 " Do you ? But you must drive over some day and see 
 us at close quarters." 
 
 "Yes; papa has spoken of it. By the way, where is 
 your Captain Courtenay ? I think you promised me an 
 introduction to him." 
 
 Mr. Burns's brows contracted. 
 
 "I am afraid I was a little presumptuous; the captain 
 doesn't seem disposed to go out much." 
 
 Miss Maclvers blushed with chagrin, wishing she had 
 not mentioned the subject. The best she could do was to 
 change it ; which she speedily did, and with so much tact 
 that Mr. Burns did not notice her embarrassment. She 
 asked if he would not like to step out on the terrace. 
 
 " It is not dark yet," she said. " Indeed, it will not be 
 dark, for the moon is up." 
 
 She preceded him and took a light wrap from the rack 
 in the hall and threw it around her shoulders. Outside, 
 on the steps, stood a tall, imposing, elderly gentleman 
 with a narrow, high-bred face and lofty expression. He 
 had clear and rather cold, gray eyes, set close together. 
 A man of integrity and honest convictions, but full of 
 strong prejudices; accustomed to great deference and 
 expecting it. Miss Maclvers introduced him as "papa," 
 and Mr. Burns addressed him as " Colonel Maclvers." 
 He had been a soldier himself, and still carried himself 
 as one. He turned courteously and extended his hand. 
 
 "I am pleased to make your acquaintance, sir," he
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 237 
 
 said, lifting his hat and bowing with dignity. " My 
 daughter spoke of you as being her escort from Crawford, 
 the other day; I must thank you, sir." 
 
 "Oh, no," said Mr. Burns, smiling and taking the of- 
 fered hand cordially, his easy, modern manners contrast- 
 ing strongly with the elder gentleman's stately bearing ; 
 " the obligation was on my side." 
 
 "Ah, true!" said the colonel. "It is a pretty even 
 exchange when a gentleman can give his protection in 
 return for a lady's society. I remember the time when I 
 liked nothing better myself." 
 
 He turned to his daughter and asked if they could not 
 have chairs out on the terracfe. '"Or, stay," he contin- 
 ued ; " I am afraid it is too damp. Not for you and I, 
 lieutenant ; we would make but poor soldiers if we were 
 afraid of a little dew ! I was considering Maude." 
 
 "Pray don't consider me, papa," said Miss Maclvers. 
 " I am proof against dampness. Let us go around to the 
 south side of the house, there are some rustic seats 
 there." 
 
 She led the way and they followed. The colonel 
 seemed to regard conversation as a masculine monopoly, 
 and left little room for his daughter ; which, to a young 
 man of Mr. Burns's chivalric nature, was a great annoy- 
 ance. The colonel related many anecdotes of his soldier 
 life as what veteran does not? " Many a night," said 
 he, " I have slept upon the frozen ground with only the 
 sky above me. I suppose you will learn to do the 
 same." 
 
 " I suppose so," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " The chief thing to dread in war is not the fighting," 
 continued the colonel ; " it's the weather." 
 
 " Yes ; nature is a better mother to all her other chil- 
 dren than to us," said Mr. Burns. "She leaves us to 
 our own devices. Is it not so?" turning to Miss Mac- 
 lvers. 
 
 "Well, that is fair, is it not?" said she, "since she 
 gives us intelligence and means. We would hardly ex- 
 change our ingenuity to clothe ourselves for the plumage 
 of the bird, would we?" 
 
 " No," said Mr. Burns, laughing ? " it was an idle com-
 
 2 3 8 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 plaint." And added, after a moment, "All complaining 
 is foolish, since we find that the balance is struck every- 
 where throughout nature's domains. I am more and 
 more convinced of the evenness of things every day of 
 my life. We have no right to envy neither do I think 
 we have good reason to pity our neighbors. We may 
 rest assured that the affairs of each life are properly ad- 
 justed somehow." 
 
 " Then that relieves us of responsibility about our 
 neighbors," said Miss Maclvers, laughing. 
 
 "No, no," returned Mr. Burns. "Of course, the 
 destinies of men are not in our hands. God rules. But 
 He needs us in His providence. He needs to use us in 
 His grand economy. He works for all the suffering and 
 down-trodden through our humanity. We can neither 
 help nor hinder the great events of life; but through our 
 moral nature, through our charity and generosity, we can 
 soften the blow and soothe the pain." 
 
 Having so delivered himself, Mr. Burns felt that the 
 conversation was perhaps taking a more serious turn than 
 the occasion demanded, and got up and looked around. 
 Over beyond the town the moon shone upon the camp- 
 ing-ground, and the white tents looked as if asleep in the 
 valley. How peaceful, in its beginning, seemed this little 
 thread of the war. 
 
 " I have hardly seen a finer view than this in my life- 
 time," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " I selected it," said the colonel, also rising, "twenty 
 years ago, when this town was but a little village, on 
 account of the view." 
 
 Soon after they went into the house, and Miss Mac- 
 lvers played. The colonel explained to Mr. Burns, "I 
 get quite hungry for music, sir, when Maude's away; she 
 being the only daughter." 
 
 "You have sons?" said Mr. Burns, to whom it seemed 
 that the colonel's remark left an opening for the question. 
 
 " No, sir; no, I have nobody but Maude." 
 
 Miss Maclvers was not an especially brilliant performer, 
 but her music pleased her papa, who, so long as there 
 was no great discord, was not disposed to be critical. He 
 gave Mr. Burns an aasy-chair, and reclined his stately
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 239 
 
 figure in another, placed his polished boots on a foot-rest, 
 and leaned back, closing his eyes, and allowed himself to 
 drift peacefully away on the waves of sweet sound. When 
 his musical appetite was appeased, and Miss Maclvers 
 arose from the piano, he at once left his chair, and, after 
 asking Mr. Burns if he would have a cigar, which he 
 declined, he bade the young people "good-night," cour- 
 teously, and went out. 
 
 A little later Mr. Burns took his departure, and walked 
 over to the camp-ground through the still moonlight, 
 filled with thoughts of how beautiful the world was, how 
 many bright nooks and corners it held, how many agree- 
 able people. 
 
 "If one will only keep himself open to genial influ- 
 ences," he soliloquized, "one can take in worlds. If we 
 have the magnet of attraction in us, a thousand things 
 will spring up responsive to enlarge and beautify our 
 lives." 
 
 When he got back to his tent he sat down and com- 
 menced a letter to Wilma, giving her an account of his 
 visit. Miss Maclvers, he said, was pronounced the most 
 
 beautiful and accomplished young lady in R , and 
 
 he accounted it a great favor to be permitted to visit her. 
 He had never calculated upon anything so agreeable in 
 the monotony of camp life. He wondered Wilma had 
 not told him more about her ; she had had so much to say 
 of Miss Percy and Miss Raymond and the preceptress, 
 but so little of this imperial Miss Maclvers. 
 
 "I wish you could see her here, Wilma," he wrote; 
 "she was not properly 'set' in that wretched little board- 
 ing-house sitting-room. (By the way, couldn't you find 
 pleasanter quarters in Crawford ?) Here, surrounded by 
 all the elegancies and refinements of her beautiful home, 
 she is a princess." 
 
 It will hardly surprise anybody that Wilma's heart did 
 not respond, but throbbed despairingly. But Mr. Burns 
 did not mean to hurt her, never dreamed that he hurt 
 her. He simply wrote, as he had always done, what was 
 uppermost, the things that most pleased and interested 
 him. Had Wilma complained he would have been in- 
 dignant. He rather prided himself on the purity of his
 
 240 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 soldier-life compared with the lives of most of his fellow- 
 officers. He stooped to nothing coarse and low any more 
 than he had done in his chaste student life; and few 
 young men had been so blameless in their college career 
 as he. 
 
 He got speedily into the habit of spending his evenings 
 with Miss Maclvers. Sometimes he escorted her to the 
 theatre and opera. They never spoke of Wilma. Miss Mac- 
 lvers ignored her. And perhaps Mr. Burns unconsciously 
 felt that Wilma would not be in keeping with the elegant 
 atmosphere of her home and the society she moved in. 
 Into that society he himself became soon initiated, though 
 without effort on his part, and found himself lionized to 
 an extent that was surprising if not altogether delightful. 
 There was a charm in his youth and freshness and in his 
 originality of thought that won him numerous friends 
 and admirers. Moreover he was so pure, so unsullied. 
 Many brilliant women who courted him felt rebuked for 
 their own unworthy lives by the guilelessness of his. He 
 suspected no evil where there was much deceit and treach- 
 ery, and heart-burning and despair. The world was fresh 
 and sweet to him. 
 
 Of course his letters to Wilma took the tone and color 
 of his new experience ; and rumors reached her of his 
 
 popularity at R , which made her heart thrill with 
 
 pride while yet it ached with anguish. It was a new de- 
 velopment in her Charley to become a star in the social 
 system. He had always been praised for being talented 
 and scholarly, but never for being brilliant in society and 
 fascinating to ladies. It seemed to her she had never 
 understood him, had never foreseen his splendid possibil- 
 ities. It was selfish, it was presumptuous, in her to feel 
 hurt that she was now often crowded out of his brilliant 
 life, to the extent of his forgetting to write to her at the 
 time which for years had been set apart for writing to 
 her. 
 
 It became a dread for her to go to the post-office those 
 days when she ought to hear from him. The agony 
 of suspense, while she stood waiting to see whether the 
 postmistress would hand her out the familiar letter or 
 give her head its little negative shake, was almost more
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 241 
 
 than she could bear. Yet she never blamed him. She 
 exalted him so much above herself that if he should cease 
 altogether to care for her, was it a thing to be wondered 
 at? 
 
 Miss Belmont said to her one day, " My dear, you must 
 go home ; you have studied too hard ; you will be sick." 
 
 But Wilma could not bear the thought. How dreadful 
 would be to her now the old, quiet, solitary life at Hazel- 
 ville ! Even Fred, kind-hearted, rough Fred, was gone. 
 He had gratified his patriotism by enlisting as a drummer- 
 boy. He wrote to Wilma that he thought he could serve 
 his country as well with a drum-stick as with a musket. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 ONE afternoon Miss Maclvers, in company with her 
 stately papa, drove out to the camp-ground and around 
 among the tents. It was warm and pleasant, and the 
 soldiers were lounging about in and out. A number of 
 visitors were upon the ground, and a band was playing 
 and flags were waving. Miss Maclvers put aside her veil, 
 and leaned forward and looked about with interest, it 
 being her first visit to the camp. 
 
 "Look yonder, Maude; there is your friend the lieu- 
 tenant," said the colonel. 
 
 Mr. Burns and Captain Courtenay were walking slowly 
 back and forth before their rather pretentious tent, the 
 captain smoking a cigar. They were the two most dis- 
 tinguished-looking figures upon the ground. Miss Mac- 
 lvers drew back and blushed deeply in passing. Captain 
 Courtenay removed his cigar and paid a soldier's usual 
 tributary glance of admiration to a pretty face ; though 
 Captain Courtenay's glance was not altogether flattering 
 to women. Mr. Burns gave the beautiful military salute 
 with his own individual grace, and Miss Maclvers bowed. 
 There was this difference between the two young men : 
 Captain Courtenay doubted all women, and Mr. Burns 
 believed in all.
 
 242 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 The colonel would have drawn up and spoken to them, 
 but that Miss Maclvers, seeing his intention, urged him in 
 a low voice to drive on. 
 
 "So," said Captain Courtenay, pleasantly, in a pecu- 
 liarly slow, indolent way he had of speaking, " that is 
 your imperial Miss Maclvers?" 
 
 " Why, how do you know ? " said Mr. Burns, surprised ; 
 "had you seen her before?" 
 
 "No. I inferred it." 
 
 Later in the evening, when Mr. Burns was getting him- 
 self ready for his accustomed visit, the captain said, 
 "You asked me some time ago to call with you and get 
 introduced to Miss Maclvers; is it a standing invita- 
 tion?" 
 
 "If you choose to consider it so," said Mr. Burns, a 
 little coldly. 
 
 "Then you may take me this evening." 
 
 If Mr. Burns had seen any way out of it he would have 
 declined. He admired Captain Courtenay extremely, 
 and saw no flaw in his splendid character except his con- 
 temptuous regard for women. He was honorable and 
 proud-spirited, asking no aid of office or rank to lift him 
 up. In his own opinion, fully as much as in the opinion 
 of others, he would have graced any office or any rank. 
 He was a general favorite with the soldiers, whom he 
 treated with a dignified courtesy that won their high 
 respect. He was always elected to take command in 
 drilling and in dress-parade, being accomplished in mili- 
 tiry tactics and having a marvellous power of com- 
 manding. 
 
 On the way to call upon Miss Maclvers, he took his 
 handsome black beard in his hand, and turned to Mr. 
 Burns abruptly, and said, " Do not think me'curious, but 
 are you in love with Miss Maclvers?" 
 
 "No," said Mr. Burns, unhesitatingly. "Why, do 
 you intend to fall in love with her?" 
 
 " No. I merely wished to know how the matter stood." 
 
 They were let in as usual by the ebony attendant, and 
 Mr. Burns, being a warm and admiring friend of both 
 parties, felt a good deal of anxiety as to how they would 
 impress each other. He had got an idea, somehow (how
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 243 
 
 subtly these things creep into our consciousness !), that 
 there was a sort of antagonism between them ; a sort of 
 defiance on Miss Maclvers's part, and a disposition on the 
 part of Captain Courtenay to take it up. And he meant 
 in bringing them together, if possible, to get rid of that, 
 and establish them on an easy, pleasant footing with each 
 other. "Such things can be done," he told himself, "by 
 an adroit mutual friend," and rather plumed himself on 
 his tact, a quality, by the way, which he did not often 
 exercise. But at the moment of performing the ceremony 
 of introduction between them, being struck anew by 
 the softness and dignity and gentle deference of Captain 
 Courtenay's manner, and the rare beauty and grace of 
 Miss Maclvers, and the proud bearing of both, there 
 seemed to flash a challenge between them as their splendid 
 eyes met. Miss Maclvers dropped hers, with a blush that 
 did not die away directly, but settled in her beautiful 
 cheeks, and burned there throughout the evening. Cap- 
 tain Courtenay's visit was a surprise to her, and of course 
 he held the more advantageous position. It occurred to 
 Mr. Burns how well matched they were, either for conflict 
 or harmony. 
 
 Captain Courtenay seldom removed his eyes from Miss 
 Maclvers's face ; and to Mr. Burns, watching them both 
 narrowly, it seemed that his glance conveyed the most 
 respectful deference and the subtlest flattery that an ac- 
 complished man could throw into the finest pair of dark 
 eyes in the world. Miss Maclvers felt the power of it. 
 It penetrated her like music, making every motion of her 
 beautiful, proud form more graceful and rhythmic, and 
 every tone of her sweet voice more sweetly modulated. 
 She played for them, and her fingers, tingling to the very 
 tips with the new, strange something that was infused into 
 her veins, seemed inspired. Mr. Burns had neve*r thought 
 she played well before. The evening passed rapidly and 
 enchantingly. Mr. Burns certainly had the gratification 
 of seeing his two friends at their best ; they each exerted 
 a power upon the other to bring out their most brilliant 
 hues. 
 
 On their way back to the camp he endeavored to get 
 the captain's opinion of Miss Maclvers, but he evaded
 
 244 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 all questionings and was unusually silent, which Mr. 
 Burns regarded as a favorable indication. "She will 
 raise the standard of womanhood in his estimation," he 
 thought, with pride in his ladylike friend. 
 
 Once Captain Courtenay made this significant remark : 
 " I like proud, high-spirited women who can hold their 
 own." 
 
 At first Mr. Burns was not altogether comfortable in 
 the thought of being eclipsed ; but detecting himself in 
 that state, he pulled up short and confronted the situation. 
 " Bah ! I am not going to enact the dog in the manger," 
 he said. " I'll step aside and give the captain a fair field." 
 He did step aside, and found himself a little lonely and 
 a little low-spirited. He gradually left off going to Miss 
 Maclvers's, and evening after evening the captain went 
 alone. His thoughts turned back to Wilma with some 
 compunction, and he began writing to her with more 
 regularity and at greater length. But to Wilma, who had 
 known him so long, and whose discernment sharpened 
 by her great affection and her great fear was so acute 
 in all that pertained to him, there seemed to be little 
 heart in his letters, very little of that inner life of his 
 that she liked so well. He wrote much less of himself 
 and more of trivial outside matters. There was a light- 
 ness, an affectation of levity that she thought was put on 
 to cover up a growing and melancholy indifference. The 
 dread forced itself upon her sometimes, in these sad days, 
 that she must give him up. But it was beyond her strength ; 
 she could not. Every tender word he wrote brought tears 
 to her eyes, because she felt that it was designed to com- 
 fort her, merely, and not written in the fulness of love as 
 he had once written tender words. 
 
 A few nights after Captain Courtenay's introduction to 
 Miss Maclvers a grand ball was given in honor of the several 
 regiments encamped there, and Mr. Burns dwelt at some 
 length upon it in one of his letters. He himself had 
 attended it, though not to dance. He wrote to Wilma : 
 " I can't dance. I don't believe I want to learn. I know 
 I should never be a good dancer. The idea of putting on 
 * pumps' and hopping about over the floor, well, it ain't 
 my style. I believe you dance (?), and you shall teach me
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 ^45 
 
 how. We will have a music-box and wind it up, and you 
 and I can dance until it runs down. Would that be nice, 
 or wouldn't it? Well, I am happy to say that once in 
 my life I have attended a grand ball, like De Quincey, 
 where the brilliant lights, the enchanting music, the beau- 
 tiful forms, and flashing jewelry conspired to make a veri- 
 table fairy-land. One has to witness such a thing and get 
 imbued with the half sad, half joyous spirit of it to be 
 able exactly to appreciate it. I can't say that I get as 
 deeply intoxicated as some people do ; but it is a fact, 
 nevertheless, that all the next day the bewildering music 
 was still ringing in my ears, and bewildering forms were 
 revolving before me in the intricate mazes of certain 
 labyrinthine dances. By the way, I don't know a single 
 figure of any one dance. I don't care to know. I like 
 the mystery of it, a mystery as beautiful and incompre- 
 hensible as the wonderful dresses looped and festooned 
 about the exquisite figures. I fancy I enjoyed the ball as 
 much as anybody else there. There are always a good 
 many ladies who don't dance; and one's uniform is a 
 passport to speedy acquaintance. It doesn't do for 
 people to stand on ceremony with us, because they will 
 only have us such a little while. I have always thought 
 there was a great waste of time in getting acquainted with 
 people. We throw up a barricade of conventionality 
 around us and keep people off, instead of trying to get 
 at them. If a man will open himself to me and allow 
 me to do the same, it won't take long to find out whether 
 we are going the same way and can travel together, or 
 vice versa, and pass on in our respective courses. 
 
 " Captain Courtenay escorted Miss Maclvers to the 
 ball, and they were the 'observed of all observers.' 
 Can there be a beauty superior to human beauty when. we 
 see it not only in physical perfection, but spiritualized and 
 refined to the highest degree? I think not. By the way, 
 I have not spoken of these two before in the same con- 
 nection, have I ? I suspect Miss Maclvers employed your 
 humble Charley as a stepping-stone to Captain Courte- 
 nay, if the sequel proves anything. A pretty long step ! 
 But I am not sorry to be the instrument of such a happy 
 consummation. I never before saw a union of such splen- 
 
 21*
 
 2 46 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 did masculine beauty and feminine loveliness. The cap- 
 tain made a feint of asking my permission to take Miss 
 Maclvers to the ball. I told him I stood ready to resign 
 my claims (if I had any) at a moment's warning. From 
 politic motives, partly, I must confess. I would not risk 
 a rivalry with the captain, who is a king and conqueror 
 wherever he goes. Besides, I am too loyal a subject of 
 his to wage war against him even for the smiles of woman, 
 except my own darling's." 
 
 Which was a very sweet and tender sentiment to end a 
 letter with. But Wilma had got to be such a sensitive, 
 exacting little wretch she told herself that she took 
 exception even to the style of chirography in which that 
 closing line was written, being a careless scrawl across 
 the whole width of the page. It was one of Mr. Burns's 
 characteristics that he always used the largest sized letter 
 paper, a broad, fair sheet. He felt cramped on a mod- 
 erate page. 
 
 This was quite a long and pleasant and gossipy letter, 
 and Wilma tried hard to make herself believe it was all 
 she could desire. It occurred to her after reading it over 
 many times, until she knew every line by heart, to take it 
 up and read it to Miss Percy, who, at this time, was more 
 of an invalid than she had ever been before, and she had 
 so little to interest her. She reflected, with a pang, that 
 there was nothing in the letter which might not be pub- 
 lished in the newspapers as a spicy correspondence, for 
 all it revealed of her own and Charley's relation to each 
 other, excepting in that one line which she would sup- 
 press, thinking what a difficult matter it was to invest a 
 love-scene or a love-letter with sufficient dignity to lift it 
 above the ridiculous in the mind of a disenchanted party 
 such as Miss Percy was. 
 
 It was not her custom, as we know, to read Mr. Burns's 
 letters to any one ; but she began to want to talk about 
 him, and hear others talk about him and praise him to 
 her; she began to want to reassure herself of him by the 
 impressions made upon others by what she, herself, said 
 of him. The fondest deception ! Since she gave the ut- 
 most bias in his favor, in all that she said, that her great 
 love was capable of.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 247 
 
 Miss Percy, lying back upon her pillow, transparent as 
 a waxen image, and much more beautiful because of the 
 soul within her, which, in spite of its pride and bitter- 
 ness, seemed at times very noble and lovely to Wilma, 
 expressed even a greater pleasure and interest in the pros- 
 pect of the letter than she had expected. 
 
 " Raise me up a little, dear, before you begin," she 
 said, and Wilma put her loving arm underneath the fragile 
 form and raised her up. She was not much to lift. Then 
 she sat down by the bed-side and besan reading in a low, 
 slightly agitated voice, and had nearly finished when Miss 
 Percy threw up her hands and uttered a cry. Wilma 
 dropped the letter and sprang up and bent over her, 
 trembling. The white face was terribly convulsed. 
 
 " What is it, Miss Percy, what shall I do?" 
 
 She again slipped her arm under the pillow and raised 
 her up. A little stream of blood oozed from her lips and 
 ran down, staining her white garments and the counter- 
 pane with red. Wilma, terrified, laid her down again 
 and ran to the top of the stairs calling for help. Some 
 of the servants heard her and came running through the 
 hall. In a few minutes the whole household was in the 
 room, and a doctor was sent for, and everything was done 
 that could be thought of before his arrival. When he 
 came he could advise nothing but perfect quiet and the 
 closest care. 
 
 " Was this hemorrhage brought on by any sudden shock 
 or excitement?" he asked of Mrs. Pettibone. 
 
 "Not that I know of; Miss Lynne was the only one 
 who was with her. Do you know of anything, Miss 
 Lynne?" 
 
 "No," said Wilma ; " I was reading her a letter when 
 she screamed out, and I raised her up and the blood began 
 to flow." 
 
 " Was it a letter that she had received ? There might 
 have been something in it that affected her," said the 
 doctor. 
 
 " Oh, no ; the letter was mine," Wilma answered. 
 
 "Strange!" said the doctor, and took up his hat and 
 went out. The servants and various members of the 
 family, who had waited to hear the medical opinion,
 
 2 48 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 followed him, and only Mrs. Pettibone and Wilma re- 
 mained. 
 
 After a very long time, as it seemed, Miss Percy opened 
 her eyes her face still contracted as with great inward 
 pain, though whether of body or mind none could say 
 and beckoned to Wilma, who instantly bent over her, 
 never having left the bed-side. She made some slight, 
 feeble motion with her hand, and when Wilma put hers 
 within it, the slender fingers closed around it, and a 
 more peaceful expression came into the pained face, and 
 the blue eyes closed again. By and by, it seemed that 
 she slept, the doctor having administered a soothing po- 
 tion, though with a continual low moaning, showing that 
 she still suffered. During the day a number of persons, 
 including the preceptress and Mr. Ingraham, came into 
 the hall below and were heard to inquire softly and then 
 go away, no one being allowed to come up. All day and 
 all night she lay, scarcely moving, her eyes closed and 
 taking no notice of what was going on around her. 
 Wilma watched beside her, still holding her hand and 
 never closing her eyes; never, hardly, taking them from 
 the troubled face all the long night. In the morning, 
 Mrs. Pettibone, who was a kindly-disposed, though 
 rather a purse-proud, elderly lady, made her go down to 
 breakfast with the family, and told her she had better 
 slip out and get a breath of fresh air. She put on her 
 hat and went into the garden ; she must not go far lest 
 something might happen. She sat down upon a rustic 
 seat, folded her hands idly in her lap, and fixed her eyes 
 vacantly upon the ground. How sad the world seemed, 
 and what a little time it had taken it to change from 
 brightness to gloom. A year ago how happy she was ! 
 She thought of Fred away off in the South, of Charley, 
 of Charley's mother, of Miss Percy, and life seemed very, 
 very dark. Some one called her, and she sprang up and 
 ran into the house and flew up-stairs to Miss Percy's 
 room. Miss Percy was dead ! The little stream of 
 blood that trickled from her lips marked its way upon 
 her neck, and again stained her white garments and the 
 sheet and counterpane with red. 
 
 Wilma threw herself down by the bed-side in violent,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 249 
 
 uncontrollable grief, that those who stood about wondered 
 at and could not pacify. Poor child, she was weeping 
 for all her sorrows ! She could listen to nothing, hear 
 nothing, until the storm was over. Then she arose and 
 turned away, and went down-stairs and home to Mrs. 
 Woods's, and told them the sad news, and then took a 
 walk by herself, hardly knowing whither her steps tended, 
 feeling, with indescribable anguish, that every day a door 
 was closing against her ; for people had been her doors 
 and windows, through which she went out into a great, 
 sunny world of love and trust, and was happy ; she had 
 not learned that there are other doors and other win- 
 dows. Who of us does, until we are locked up within our 
 wretched self and forced to find a way through our suffer- 
 ing out into the light? By and by, she came to the 
 little brook and sat down upon the log, alone, where she 
 and Charley had sat together a short time before, and 
 leaned her aching head against a projecting limb, wishing 
 she, too, might die, and so went to sleep. When she 
 awoke, Miss Belmont was sitting beside her. 
 
 'Were you quite tired out, dear?" she asked. 
 
 ' Why, was I asleep?" said Wilma. 
 
 ' Yes ; I suppose you dropped asleep without knowing 
 
 it. ' 
 
 'You have heard?" said Wilma, looking up. 
 
 'Yes; and I came, immediately, to find you; they 
 told me which way you came. It has been hard for you, 
 my poor child." 
 
 "Oh, no," said Wilma; "I was not thinking of that, 
 of myself." 
 
 " I know. But it is right some one should think of you. 
 Mrs. Pettibone told me how faithful you were throughout." 
 
 " If it could only have done some good !" said Wilma, 
 her tears falling again. 
 
 "It did do good, dear; you did her good all along. 
 You have nothing to reproach yourself with, and so your 
 sorrow can have no bitterness in it. Miss Percy was very 
 unhappy ; she had no resources within herself, I doubt 
 if she ever would have had. Her sorrow, whatever it was, 
 had eaten into her soul like a canker. She has told me, 
 many times, how much she longed for this change, this 
 i*
 
 250 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 rest that has come to her. I was up in her room a little 
 while ago, and she looks, oh, so peaceful ! We ought to 
 be thankful that it is all over." 
 
 " Oh, but it seems so hard !" said Wilma. " She was 
 so young, and so beautiful and gifted." 
 
 "But remember, dear," said Miss Belmont, " it was 
 her life that was hard, not her death. That, it seems to 
 me, is merciful. Shall we not believe it is all for the best? 
 At any rate, she is quite beyond us now, our help and 
 our tears. But she is in the hands of the Great Father. 
 Can we not trust our dear treasures with Him, my child ?" 
 
 Wilma remembered what Charley had said ; that heaven 
 was a safe place to put one's friends, and the thought, for 
 a moment, thrilled her sad heart. There will be no 
 changes there ! everything will be safe and lasting. No 
 death, no disappointments, no loss. 
 
 Miss Belmont persuaded her to go back home. She, 
 herself, went with her and spent a part of the day at Mrs. 
 Woods's, and tried to beguile her into a more cheerful 
 mood ; and, indeed, thought it strange she did not succeed 
 better. She did not know all the causes of Wilma's de- 
 jection. She made, poor child (without knowing it), a 
 cloak of her friend's death though her grief for that was 
 deep and sincere to cover other wounds. After Miss 
 Belmont left her she sat down and wrote a line to Charley, 
 telling him of her bereavement ; and that gave her more 
 comfort than anything else. She carried it to the post- 
 office, reflecting that he would receive it in a few hours, 
 and perhaps answer it. 
 
 Mr. Burns was getting himself ready to attend the fu- 
 neral of Miss Maclvers's father, who had dropped dead, 
 suddenly, in the street one morning, and was to be buried 
 being an old soldier with military honors, when a sol- 
 dier brought him the sad little letter. He tore off the 
 envelope hastily and read it, his brows contracting. 
 
 "What is it?" said Captain Courtenay. "You seem 
 disturbed. Have you had bad news?" 
 
 "Yes, rather," said Mr. Burns, going on with his dress- 
 ing. "A friend of mine writes me of the death of a 
 friend of hers. A singular creature, but capable of in-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 251 
 
 spiring a great deal of affection, it seems to me. There, 
 read it if you like," tossing him the letter. 
 
 Captain Courtenay took it up and glanced at it care- 
 lessly, changed countenance, and got up abruptly and 
 went out, crushing the letter in his hand. Presently he 
 came in again. " I shall not be able to attend the 
 funeral," he said ; " I am obliged to go out of town." 
 
 " Why, good heavens !" said Mr. Burns. " What shall 
 we do without you?" 
 
 " Get some one else." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 THE morning following Miss Percy's death, early, 
 before it was fairly light in fact, Wilma arose and dressed 
 herself, and stole out of the house and down to Mrs. Pet- 
 tibone's. She knew it was her last chance to spend o^e 
 more hour alone with her friend. In a little while people 
 would be thronging in, for everybody was curious about 
 Miss Percy, and would come, like vultures, to devour the 
 lovely, proud face with their hungry eyes, assured that no 
 flashing of the azure orbs could rebuke their curiosity 
 now. She felt, as she hurried along, that she would like 
 to stand between the poor, dead face that could no longer 
 defend itself, and the eager, frying world, and keep it off. 
 But that could not be. The church and the Pettibones 
 had taken it in hand, and there was to be an imposing 
 funeral. Knowing that her friend Bridget was an early 
 riser, she went around to the back of the house, intending 
 to get let in at the kitchen-door. 
 
 Bridget had just straightened herself up in bed, and 
 was in the act of twisting up her hair and fastening it with 
 a comb, which she took out at night and laid on the little 
 stand at the head of her bed, when she heard the timid 
 knock. 
 
 " Who's there?" she demanded, a little defiantly, paus- 
 ing in her toilet-making, with her hands up to her head. 
 
 "It is Wilma. Will you please let me in?"
 
 252 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 She bounced out of bed directly, and hurried out and 
 opened the door without ceremony, revealing herself in 
 her calico night-dress, her broad, bare feet flattened on 
 the kitchen-floor. 
 
 " Good gracious me, child ! an' what brought ye out i' 
 the night the like o' this?" 
 
 "Oh, it is morning," said Wilma. "See! it is almost 
 broad day ! I wanted to see Miss Percy once more, 
 Bridget, before they all came in. Will you let me go 
 up?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ; to be sure. Go right up ; ye know the way 
 yerself. The pratty lady !" 
 
 Wilma made her way silently through the darkened 
 rooms, and along the hall and up the long, carpeted 
 stairs. She pushed open Miss Percy's door and went in, 
 closing it softly. Everything was changed. The crimson 
 curtains at the windows had been taken down, and were 
 replaced by thick, stiff white ones, that hung in still folds 
 and looked as if chiselled in marble. The bed, smooth 
 and white, was drawn to the farther side of the room, and 
 Miss Percy lay upon it peacefully, all trouble smoothed out 
 of her perfect face and the great stillness of death upon it. 
 Even the little ringlets on her forehead were motionless, 
 unstirred by the faintest breath of air. Wilma approached 
 softly, and looked down upon the sweet face, that soon 
 became obscured by the fast, fast-falling tears. By and 
 by she knelt down and covered her face with her hands, 
 and so lost herself in a sad revery as to be insensible to 
 all external sounds and motions. Sounds and motions 
 there were in the hall and on the stairs ; subdued voices, 
 muffled footsteps, and the soft opening and closing of 
 doors; then again perfect quiet. 
 
 Suddenly it was borne in upon her consciousness that 
 another presence beside the dead was in the room, and, 
 with a great throbbing of heart, she raised her head and 
 looked up. A tall figure, wrapped in a dark cloak, stood 
 opposite to her on the other side of the bed, gazing down, 
 as she had done, on the face of the sleeper. Presently 
 the cloak was thrown back, revealing a soldier's dark-blue 
 uniform, a shoulder-strap, and a sword-hilt ; and a white, 
 beautifully-shaped man's hand was put out to touch, with
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 253 
 
 a curious but gentle touch, the marble forehead and the 
 delicate ringlets of hair. The face looking down was 
 blanched and white as the dead face, with just the differ- 
 ence there is between the whiteness of life and health and 
 the whiteness of death. It had strong contrasts of hair 
 and eyes and heavy brows and lashes, and was the finest 
 masculine face Wilma had ever seen. Its striking beauty, 
 as much as the shock of finding it there when she looked 
 up, held her silent, until the dark eyes, travelling slowly 
 through the dimness of the room, took her in, and widened 
 with surprise and inquiry. Then she arose and stammered, 
 " I you frightened me, sir; I did not hear you come in." 
 
 "You must have been profoundly absorbed," he re- 
 turned ; and though the words were ungracious, they 
 were uttered in a deep voice, exquisitely modulated as 
 though it had been carefully trained to convey the finest 
 and subtlest shades of meaning. 
 
 "You are a friend of hers?" Wilma asked, in spite of 
 the awe with which she regarded him, and turning, as she 
 spoke, to leave the room. 
 
 " I yes, I am a friend of hers," he answered. " Pray 
 don't go away; I am about to go myself;" and without 
 another glance at the dead he drew his cloak around 
 him and crossed the room with a gliding, smooth, and 
 noiseless motion, and laid his hand on the door-knob ; 
 then stopped and looked back. 
 
 "Is the funeral to take place to-day?" he asked, in an 
 indescribably gentle voice; and when Wilma answered, 
 "Yes," he dropped his eyes and murmured something 
 that sounded to her like " My poor Ginevra !" but she was 
 not sure. He went directly down-stairs and out the front 
 door, meeting no one. 
 
 The sun was up, but it was Sunday morning, and Craw- 
 ford was not yet wide awake. A few hours later the 
 church bells began to ring, and then to toll ; and Miss 
 Percy's costly coffin (she had left ample means to defray 
 the expenses of an elaborate funeral) was carried into the 
 church followed by a vast procession, at the head of which 
 went the minister, in his sable garments, chanting these 
 words, weighted with the echoes of so many solemn voices, 
 on so many solemn occasions, " I am the resurrection and 
 
 22
 
 254 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 the life." And so borne about from house to church and 
 from church to burial-ground, and preached over and 
 chanted over, and gazed upon, the beautiful, haughty 
 stranger, whom nobody knew, and whose feet were so 
 weary, was laid to rest, and left for the daisies to bloom 
 over. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 SHORTLY before Mr. Burns's regiment left R , Miss 
 
 Maclvers, who had no near relatives, shut up her beautiful 
 home and went away, much to everybody's surprise. She 
 was supposed to be engaged to Captain Courtenay, they 
 had been so openly devoted to each other, and it was 
 strange she should go out of town so long as he remained. 
 To be sure (there were those who had watched closely 
 and were posted), he did not visit her at all after her 
 father's death, though they had once been seen walking 
 together in the dusk of a moonless evening. And one 
 shrewd female detective, who could put two and two to- 
 gether, averred that it was by Miss Maclvers's own ap- 
 pointment. She had written him a note, which he had 
 answered, and then followed the meeting. Those who 
 saw her said she was greatly changed. She grew white 
 and thin, and seemed quite broken-hearted, though her 
 step was as proud and her bearing as haughty as ever. Her 
 father's death was a heavy blow. 
 
 Mr. Burns, with friendly sympathy, went one evening 
 to see her, but she begged to be excused ; saying, in a 
 little twisted note which she sent down to him by a ser- 
 vant, that she was not well. She thanked him kindly, 
 and he was quite touched by her evident deep grief. 
 
 A day or two after he heard that she was gone, and 
 asked Captain Courtenay, inadvertently, if he knew 
 where. 
 
 " How the devil should I know?" demanded the cap- 
 tain, with unwarrantable impatience. 
 
 Mr. Burns flashed up. 
 
 " How should you know ? Haven't you openly devoted
 
 HIGH- IVA TER-MARK. 255 
 
 yourself to her in the face and eyes of this whole com- 
 munity, until it is the universal belief that you are going 
 to marry her?" 
 
 "I was not aware of it," said the captain. "The 
 ' universal belief is a damned nuisance, gotten up to 
 compel people to a stereotyped line of action. I repu- 
 diate it." 
 
 Mr. Burns had learned in their brief intercourse that 
 there was a certain cold, hard side to Captain Courtenay 
 which it was worse than useless to contend against, and 
 he dropped the subject. 
 
 At Crawford Academy there was little attention paid to 
 books in those days. Nothing was studied, even by school- 
 girls, but the national problem ; nothing was read but the 
 newspapers. Still, Miss Belmont, the only one of the 
 faculty who stood faithfully at her post, and could see no 
 necessity for neglecting her duty though the whole edifice 
 of government were tottering to its fall, held steadily 
 on with her classes and tried to keep up an interest, though 
 all the time there were tears in her eyes, or just back of 
 them, ready to start and fall whenever her glance encoun- 
 tered a vacant seat. Sometimes a vacant seat became 
 more conspicuously vacant after an announcement by let- 
 ter or telegram that some one had fallen. Then the girls 
 would make a green garland and lay upon the desk and 
 tie a knot of crape to the chair, until one by one the va- 
 cant seats were so marked and consecrated. 
 
 Wilma and Miss Allen one day performed the touching 
 little ceremony of the wreath and the mourning-badge, 
 standing weeping beside the chair that had been Mr. 
 Liebenwald's. Gray and Liebenwald were both gone, 
 now. Gray had joined a Western regiment, and fell at 
 Pea Ridge, Liebenwald at Island No. 10. 
 
 In the latter part of the second year of the war, Mr. 
 Ingraham and most of the professors threw up their peace- 
 ful commissions and entered the army. It was one morn- 
 ing, after prayers, that Mr. Ingraham, tapping the little 
 silver bell on his desk (though that was hardly necessary, 
 the study-hall was always quiet now), in as cheerful a 
 manner and with as much avoidance of sensation as possi-
 
 256 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 ble, made the announcement that he was about to go. 
 He had waited till nearly all his "boys" had gone, he 
 said ; until many of them had fallen, and he could not sit 
 there looking at those vacant seats any longer. 
 
 That was the almost total breaking-up of Crawford 
 Academy. Very few cared to stay after "Prof." was 
 gone. None but those who had held to duty and to Miss 
 Belmont rather than to Mr. Ingraham. Then were shown 
 Mr. Ingraham 's personal power and influence. He had 
 bound his students to himself, rather than to principle 
 and to their own best interests. They were half wild at 
 the parting. They clustered around him with streaming 
 eyes, and followed him to the station, and clung to his 
 hands, kissing them, on the very steps of the cars as they 
 were moving off. Oh, it was too bad, they said ; it was 
 too horrible, that that grand head, with its silver hairs, 
 should be made a target for rebel bullets ! Even Miss 
 Belmont broke down. She bade him " good-by" at the 
 door of her recitation-room, and then went back and sat 
 down, burying her face in her hands, and wept uncon- 
 trollably ; then rallied, and took up sadly, but firmly, the 
 broken threads he had left. 
 
 In the mean time, came letters from Mr. Burns. Not 
 regularly, or very often ; but they were enough to make 
 links in the long chain of suspense and sickening, deferred 
 hope. Mr. Burns was becoming disgusted with the whole 
 business of war. Thought it incredible that in this nine- 
 teenth century men should stand up and kill one another 
 by the hundreds. Great heavens ! would we never get 
 above the savage ? What good is all our progress, our re- 
 finement, our cultivation ? At sound of the trumpet it is 
 all swept away like silken cobwebs, and men are blood- 
 hounds. " Here we are," said he, "some thousands of 
 us, figuring on a great chess-board ; yonder, at Washing- 
 ton, and down below, at Richmond, sit the men who are 
 cunningly playing us against each other. Is this what I 
 have shaped my life for? Is this what I was brought into 
 the world and carefully trained through years of tender 
 infancy and childhood for, all my teaching and educa- 
 tion tending toward the cultivation of a higher nature in 
 me? Is this man's noblest end, most glorious destiny, to
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 257 
 
 stand and be shot down, himself dealing death to others? 
 I cannot see it. I had meant to do better things with my 
 life. War is a fine subject to write about and to talk about ; 
 poets and orators have made the most of it. But practically 
 I mean in the everyday details of it it is an idle, de- 
 moralizing, cruel thing. Heavens ! when I think of these 
 golden days, spent in lounging about camp by thousands of 
 men, it maddens me. Why are we not doing something 
 for the advancement of men, rather than for their destruc- 
 tion ? Even a battle-field is not a sublime spectacle to 
 me, especially after the battle ! I go about among the 
 dead and dying, see the suffering, the mangled bodies, 
 and blood, and slain beasts, and I am sickened, horrified. 
 Oh, God ! will it never end? I want to get away from 
 the battle-smoke and the din of musketry, and shrieks and 
 wounds, and curses and agonized prayers, and death, and 
 find some peaceful spot where men are whole, not man- 
 gled and bruised and broken, and where women are light- 
 hearted and gay, and unused to the sight of blood. To 
 me, the grandest thing in war is the individual heroism of 
 some brave souls. In a whole army of men, moving and 
 acting with one impulse, we lose sight of the individual. 
 But he is here as elsewhere, each separate, living atom 
 a world within itself, and the centre, it may be, of another 
 world. When one man falls the shock is almost sure to 
 vibrate through some little circle far away; for few of 
 us are so poor, or obscure, as not to have a place in the 
 world, and friends. (In my gloomiest moods I some- 
 times fancy no one is so poor as I in this respect. I have 
 not one living relative that I am aware of.) 
 
 "Do not misunderstand me, Wilma; I do not regret 
 coming into the army. I would do the same thing over 
 again to-day, with my eyes wide open to all these horrors. 
 There is no other way. I only lament that in all these 
 enlightened, progressive centuries we have not outgrown 
 such barbarities. Of course I know that out of the blood 
 spilled now will grow the olive-branch by and by, and 
 the world will be better, perhaps, that we have fought and 
 died. I spoke of there being some heroes among us; 
 Captain Courtenay is one of these. He is the bravest, 
 best, most indefatigable officer I know, caring for every- 
 
 22*
 
 258 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 body, looking out for everybody's comfort. After every 
 engagement his first business is to inquire who is missing, 
 and to help care for the wounded and bury the dead ; and 
 then to write the tenderest letters to the stricken friends 
 at home, letters, I suspect, that will be sacredly saved 
 and handed down, yellow with age, a century hence." 
 
 So Mr. Burns continued to write. But all the time it 
 was pressing upon him, like a nightmare, that his love for 
 Wilma, born in his early boyhood, was dying out. For 
 many months he struggled against the thought and would 
 not believe it. Even if there were nothing else to be 
 taken into account, no consideration for Wilma, it hurt 
 him that he had miscalculated his own stability of affec- 
 tion. It touched his honor, his truth, his firm self-confi- 
 dence. For Wilma had not changed. He could find no 
 excuse, outside of himself, for his variableness. 
 
 One evening (the army was encamped in a strip of 
 woods bordering a small stream) he went out and took a 
 melancholy walk up and down, thinking life held very 
 little. The sun was going down, so the world turned 
 round. To-day, to-morrow, and so on to the end. Was 
 there anything on which to fasten hope, anything worth 
 planning for and aspiring to? Gloomier than the duski- 
 ness of twilight the shadows gathered in his blue eyes. 
 He went back to the tent. It was warm, but the curtain 
 was lowered and a dim light burning within. He raised 
 the curtain and saw Captain Courtenay sitting at a small, 
 improvised table, with his back to the door. Near him 
 stood a young officer, evidently just arisen from a camp- 
 stool, whom he had frequently seen, but whose acquaint- 
 ance he had never made, being frustrated in sundry friendly 
 overtures by the officer's reserve and evident avoidance 
 of him. A slender young fellow, who walked with a 
 proud step, his head bent down, and his military hat 
 pulled low over his eyes. He was said to be very wealthy ; 
 he had a tent to himself, and a servant who followed him 
 about like a dog. At this moment the servant was stand- 
 ing a few feet from Mr. Burns. Captain Courtenay got 
 up and laid his hand on the young man's shoulder, and 
 appeared to be remonstrating with him or demanding a 
 promise from him in some low-spoken words. His face
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 2 59 
 
 was pale from strong feeling, and wrought into an ex- 
 pression of combined firmness and gentleness. The 
 other's manner was greatly agitated. Mr. Burns, on the 
 point of retreating, was suddenly surprised by the young 
 man covering his face with his hands and exclaiming, in 
 a muffled voice, "Oh, heavens! what shall I do?" and 
 rushing past him out into the darkness. Captain Courte- 
 nay's eyes, following him, encountered Mr. Burns, and in 
 the first flash of surprised glances interchanged he seemed 
 to turn a shade paler. But he recovered himself in- 
 stantly. 
 
 " Ah ! have you finished your walk?" he asked. 
 
 " Yes. Did I interrupt your interview with Captain 
 Reeves?" 
 
 " No ; the interview was at an end. The young man 
 is in some trouble." 
 
 " So I inferred. Anything connected with his com- 
 mission ?" 
 
 " No; a little personal matter." 
 
 "It seems to me," said Mr. Burns, smiling, "that you 
 have succeeded better with Captain Reeves than any of 
 the rest of the officers have. I have observed you two 
 walking together several times lately. Raymond and I 
 were speaking of it yesterday ; he doesn't notice us poor 
 devils." 
 
 "You and Raymond had better let him alone," said 
 the captain, seating himself at the table and drawing some 
 papers from his pocket, his manner plainly showing that 
 he wished the subject dropped. By and by he remarked, 
 " I have not a doubt that our cavalry will be repulsed to- 
 morrow morning if they rn^ke an attack, as they propose 
 to do ; and in that case the rebels will follow them up and 
 we will probably come to an engagement here." 
 
 His prophecy was correct. Before nine o'clock the 
 routed cavalry came flying back in a disorderly retreat, 
 and shouted out, swinging their ragged hats, " Go in and 
 fight now, you infantry; we've had enough of it. The 
 rebels are right after us ; they are sure not to halt till they 
 come to that belt of timber over yonder." 
 
 "This broad plantation between will make a splendid 
 battle-ground," said a young officer, with swelling chest.
 
 2 60 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 The enthusiasm ran along the lines, and every man 
 caught it. Even Mr. Burns, disgusted, satiated, melan- 
 choly, felt electrified. His eyes kindled, his nostrils di- 
 lated, his cheeks paled as they always did with passion or 
 excitement. He straightened himself, and threw back his 
 shoulders, and was every inch a soldier. Preparations 
 went forward rapidly, for enthusiasm is a swift worker. 
 About noon the picket-line stationed some rods out in the 
 field was fired upon by the rebel pickets, and a slight skir- 
 mishing was kept up until late in the afternoon. A num- 
 ber of officers, grouped together, were drinking coffee and 
 eating a light luncheon. 
 
 " I hardly think we shall do any fighting to-night," the 
 colonel of Mr. Burns's regiment had just remarked, and 
 Captain Courtenay, getting up and striking a match to 
 light his cigar, glanced across the plantation and answered, 
 
 " Do you think not? It seems to me the firing is get- 
 ting more brisk along the picket-line. Look ! By heav- 
 ens ! there they come." 
 
 Simultaneously the bugles sounded, and every man 
 sprang to his place. Out from the opposite stretch of 
 timber arose a dense line of rebel cavalry, with colors fly- 
 ing and drums beating, and advanced at a swift gallop, 
 arms in rest, close up to the Union lines. They were met 
 with a tremendous discharge of musketry and driven back. 
 The battle-smoke slowly clearing away, revealed, here and 
 there, a prostrate horseman in the dust ; the rest had all 
 galloped back to the shelter of the woods again. Among 
 the few Union soldiers who had dropped out of their 
 places and lay on the ground, bleeding, was Captain 
 Courtenay's second lieutenant, Starr Raymond. Mr. 
 Burns came up hurriedly, and knelt down beside him ; a 
 soldier had raised him up and was putting some water to 
 his lips. He gave a gasp or two, and was still. 
 
 "Dead," said the soldier. "Shot right through the 
 side, you see?" showing a rent in the blue uniform. 
 
 "Yes; carry him off the field," said Mr. Burns, and 
 moved away, thinking whether the world and humanity 
 had gained anything by this brave death. 
 
 There was barely time to carry off the wounded and 
 dead before a rapid advance was made by solid ranks of
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 261 
 
 rebel infantry. They were met as the cavalry had been 
 met, but as fast as they were cut down the living stepped 
 over the dead, filling up the vacant ranks and pressing 
 closer, closer, until the excited command was given, high 
 above the din, "Charge bayonets !" The Union soldiers, 
 overpowered and dismayed, gave way and fled in utter 
 confusion. But reinforcements were close at hand, and 
 before nightfall the enemy were again driven back. The 
 battle had raged barely an hour, and two thousand lives 
 were cut off. Captain Courtenay's roll-call, in the morn- 
 ing, had numbered ninety-seven ; to-night a little com- 
 pany of thirty made up his command. 
 
 " This is the most disastrous day we have had," he said, 
 walking back and forth in his tent, greatly agitated. 
 
 " It was a desperate fight," returned Mr. Burns. "It 
 is the first time I have drawn my sword," taking it from 
 its sheath and examining the blade. " I should have been 
 bayonetted if you had not come to my aid, Burr." 
 
 "Yes, I was looking out for you," said the captain; 
 "but I came near being too late." 
 
 So intense a feeling came over them both at the recol- 
 lection of the perilous moment that they silently clasped 
 hands. 
 
 A soldier came in on some errand, despatched it, and 
 then lingered to ask: "Did you hear about Captain 
 Reeves?" addressing Mr. Burns. 
 
 Captain Courtenay wheeled around. " What about 
 Captain Reeves?" he demanded. 
 
 "Shot, dead," said the man. 
 
 " Good God ! You must be mistaken, man !" 
 
 " No, sir ; he fell in that first cavalry charge, and his 
 servant carried him off the field. He's lying in a little 
 hut down here on the river-bank." 
 
 Captain Courtenay caught up his hat and started out, 
 exclaiming to the man, " Show me the way !" 
 
 Mr. Burns, left alone, was speculating on the violence 
 of his friend's emotion, and wondering what there could 
 be between him and the young officer, when another vis- 
 itor, one of the college boys, raised the curtain and 
 looked in. 
 
 " Hello ! lieutenant, alone?"
 
 262 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 "Yes; come in, Craig," said Mr. Burns, and motioned 
 him to a camp-stool. " Well, how do you find yourself?" 
 
 "Unscathed, thank the Lord," said Craig. "This has 
 been a dreadful day." 
 
 "It has, indeed. Poor Raymond !" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " And did you hear about Captain Reeves?" 
 
 "Yes; Courtenay has just gone down to see him. 
 Dead, they say." 
 
 "But did you hear nothing else?" said Craig, incred- 
 ulously. 
 
 "No. What else?" 
 
 " Why, Lord bless your soul, lieutenant, Captain Reeves 
 was a woman !" 
 
 "Good God!" 
 
 " It is a fact. Bribed her way into the army, they say. 
 It leaked out as soon as she was dead. They have sent 
 for some of the hospital nurses to come and take charge 
 of her." 
 
 A sudden suspicion pierced Mr. Burns like a knife. 
 
 " Do you suppose Captain Courtenay knew?" he asked, 
 feeling his heart harden against his friend. 
 
 " I hardly think so ; and yet it might be," said Craig. 
 And Mr. Burns regretted that he had awakened the idea. 
 
 " No," he returned, combatting it ; "I don't think he 
 knew. It is impossible ! Suppose we walk down to that 
 little hut. Is it far?" 
 
 "Not above twenty rods." 
 
 They stepped out and walked down the river a little 
 way, and came to a rude log cabin, from whose small, 
 square windows a dim light shone. The front door was 
 open, and they entered what appeared to be the main 
 room of the building. It was occupied by soldiers keep- 
 ing guard. Back of it was another small apartment, and 
 they were told to pass on into that. They expected to 
 find Captain Courtenay there, but the room was unoccu- 
 pied except by one motionless figure stretched upon a 
 long bench and covered with a flag. Craig advanced and 
 put out his hand to uncover the face. Mr. Burns, into 
 whose heart a sickening fear had crept, grasped his arm. 
 
 " Don't do that !" said he. " She is a woman." 
 
 "Why, good Lord !" Craig exclaimed, turning round,
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 263 
 
 "what's the matter? You' re as white as a ghost. Sit down 
 and let me run for some water." 
 
 He was gone in an instant, and Mr. Burns swiftly and 
 stealthily approached the motionless figure, and, with 
 trembling hand, turned back the flag and looked down 
 on the beautiful face of Miss Maclvers. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 IT was an agonized question in Mr. Burns's mind, after 
 that, how he should meet his friend ; his faith in him was 
 cruelly shaken. He went back to the tent ; the captain 
 was not there. He threw himself on his couch and 
 counted the wretched hours of the night as they dragged 
 on. Toward morning he fell asleep, and awoke when 
 the captain, a little later, raised the tent curtain and came 
 in. His face was white ; his heavy, dark hair was wet 
 with dew ; he shivered as if with the cold. Mr. Burns, 
 with a groan, turned his face away and feigned sleep. 
 When morning came and he was obliged, almost, to take 
 a stand for or against his friend, he thought it the hardest 
 thing in his life that he could do neither. He avoided 
 meeting his eyes and only spoke when spoken to ; and 
 that was very seldom, for the captain was more taciturn 
 than usual, and seemed wholly occupied with what was 
 going on within himself, whatever that might be. Evi- 
 dently he was oblivious of any change in Mr. Burns. If 
 he suffered, suffering made no impression on his strong 
 physique. In a day he was wholly recovered from the 
 shock of Miss Maclvers's death, so far as looks went. 
 
 Mr. Burns, on the contrary, grew haggard, pale, hollow- 
 eyed. He was full of tender humanity, and naturally 
 prone to melancholy; and educated in it somewhat by 
 the suffering around him and the sorrows by which the 
 whole world seemed helplessly burdened. At home, 
 among his books, associated through them with great 
 minds living on and on, and intimate with fields and 
 woods and sky and water, studying nature's laws and
 
 264 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 pursuing her intricate and beautiful paths as science and 
 art and literature traced them, the world and man had 
 seemed far more sublime problems. Of course it was be- 
 cause he jvas so pressed down and hemmed in by circum- 
 stances, and moving without any volition of his own, that 
 he took such a sad view of things. He could not get 
 up and look at his life, or at any life, from an outside 
 standpoint. The whole plan of human destiny seemed 
 small, brief, petty, living in the midst of its boiling and 
 seething. Could a life come out and separate itself, clear 
 and pure, from all this? 
 
 In the midst of these gloomy days came a letter from 
 Wilma. He was sitting in his tent, alone, when it was 
 brought to him, and he took it up and opened it with a 
 new weariness. Crises will come. We can no more 
 avoid jthem in the small affairs of our lives than in the 
 storm that has long been gathering in the heavens. Every 
 line in Wilma's letter tended toward a crisis, though there 
 was a strong effort at cheerfulness in it. 
 
 Mr. Burns caught up his hat and rushed out of the tent 
 and took his way down along the creek to a lonesome spot 
 in the woods, where he could give free vent to his excited 
 feelings. 
 
 " I cannot bear it ! I cannot bear it !" he said, with a 
 groan, crushing the letter in his hand. " I must write to 
 her and tell her that the dream is over. It breaks my 
 heart ; but I must. Oh, Wilma ! why were we ever so 
 linked together in our tender years, since the chain must 
 be broken ? God help me ! God help us both ! Why does 
 no rebel bullet find its way to me? I am ready, and it 
 would be as good a death as any, perhaps, to die for my 
 country !" 
 
 He said it with bitterness, looking back at his old aspi- 
 rations toward a high, intellectual life. He even felt some 
 pity for himself as he might have felt for another. So 
 young ! So full, a little while ago, of the enthusiasm of 
 living; and now, in place of it all, keen disappointment 
 and a probable cruel, bloody death. He bowed his head 
 in his hands and groaned aloud. By and by, he took out 
 his handkerchief and wiped his face, and straightened 
 himself up with an air of resolution, and turned toward
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 265 
 
 the camp ground again and hurried into his tent. There 
 was nobody there, for which he thanked heaven, and sat 
 down to write to Wilma. He told her how long he had 
 struggled and how hard he had tried to be true to her. 
 " God knows," he said, " I meant to be faithful. In the 
 old time, I never foresaw any possibility like this. I 
 thought it was all settled between you and me for all our 
 lives. I did not think anything could change my feeling 
 toward you. I don't know now, why it is changed ; I 
 only know that it is. That the old tender love is gone, 
 gone. I can't get it back. And surely, surely, Wilma, 
 the thought that I cannot is as despairing to me as to you. 
 I would to God I could. I esteem and respect, and love 
 you yet, in a certain way, more than any one else I know. 
 I have never met any one I could compare with you in 
 the relation in which you stood to me. I have never met 
 any woman whom I could ask to be my wife but you ; and 
 yet I feel that between us the bright dream is over. Oh, 
 Wilma, Wilma! what shall we do?" 
 
 There came over him the thought of how Wilma had 
 fastened all good and noble principles and sentiments to 
 him, and believed in them through him, and he had a 
 momentary dread of shaking her trust in them ; and he 
 wrote, " I know that you will not believe the less in the 
 truth of mankind because one man has changed to you. 
 
 I have a strong faith in you and in your power to " 
 
 He stopped and drew his pen through the last line. He 
 would not let it seem that he prompted her or suggested to 
 her to bear up under the affliction he himself had brought 
 upon her. Surely it would come from him with a poor 
 grace ! 
 
 Thinking that he had written all that it was possible 
 for him to write, and that he was powerless to comfort 
 where he had struck such a cruel blow, he abruptly closed 
 his letter with these words, destined to fall as the clods 
 fall on the coffin -lid : "The night is coming on. It 
 rains, and the wind sweeps by, and the shadows gather 
 thickly around me. And so ends the saddest, dreariest 
 day of my life. Oh, Wilma, Wilma, Wilma!" 
 
 He did not sign his name ; the handwriting was enough. 
 And, hearing the captain coming in, he folded and sealed 
 M 23
 
 2 66 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 the letter hastily, and dropped it in the letter-box ; then 
 turned, with sad heart-yearning, toward his friend. 
 
 "Burr, tell me, for God's sake! were you all along 
 aware that Captain Reeves was Miss Maclvers ? Was it 
 your doing?" 
 
 Captain Courtenay turned upon him with a passion- 
 white face and haughty, gleaming eyes. 
 
 "Was what my doing?" 
 
 " Getting Miss Maclvers into the army." 
 
 " By God ! do you take me for Lucifer let out of hell? 
 I have half a mind to compel you to draw your sword !" 
 laying his hand upon his own. 
 
 "You couldn't compel me to draw my sword," said 
 Mr. Burns, sadly. "I want to know about Miss Mac- 
 lvers. If her death, or her being here, did not shock 
 you, perhaps you cannot understand how it hurt me. But 
 I would like to know the circumstances as you know 
 them." 
 
 Captain Courtenay was silent a moment, and then an- 
 swered, " You doubtless remember giving me the im- 
 pression that Miss Maclvers was a woman capable of 
 taking care of herself. Upon that supposition I sought 
 her society to vary the tedium of camp-life, taking no 
 
 thought beyond that. After we left R I knew no 
 
 more of her movements than you did, until one evening 
 in taking a stroll it was about a week previous to our 
 engagement here I accidentally encountered Captain 
 Reeves in the wood with his hat removed, and recog- 
 nized him. I used every means in my power to persuade 
 her to go back home. And that evening when you saw 
 her here in the tent, I told her that if she did not resign 
 her commission within twelve hours I would take meas- 
 ures to compel her to do it. I thought she had. She 
 sent me a note the following morning saying she was on 
 the point of quitting the army. It was just after the cav- 
 alry were repulsed. I have not a doubt she wilfully threw 
 herself in the way of death." 
 
 Mr. Burns crossed over and grasped his friend's hand ; 
 his eyes were filled with tears. 
 
 " I thank God ! I thank God !" he said, in a hoarse voice. 
 
 Captain Courtenay's face was deadly pale and his lips
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 267 
 
 compressed. His hand shook as Mr. Burns's fingers closed 
 around it. 
 
 Neither spoke again for some moments. Mr. Burns 
 went back to his place and sat down. By and by he said, 
 in the low, changed voice we all use after a strong emo- 
 tion has passed over us, "I am sorry that it^ got out." 
 
 "It did not get out that it was Miss Maclvers^' the 
 captain returned, in the same low voice. "The nurses 
 came that night, and I had them dress her in some of their 
 own clothes; and, they accompanying me, I took her to 
 
 W , and left her in charge of a minister there to be 
 
 buried, and told him to write a certificate of her death 
 
 and send it to a lawyer in R . I represented that she 
 
 was a hospital nurse." 
 
 " You did all this for her !" said Mr. Burns. "And I 
 thought of nothing beyond the fact that she was dead." 
 
 " It was my business more than yours, perhaps, to take 
 charge of her," said the captain. 
 
 "True; she loved you," said Mr. Burns; and added, 
 looking up, "and I thought you loved her?" 
 
 The captain shrugged his shoulders. "No. I would 
 to God I had never seen her ! I'll tell you, Charley, if a 
 man could look beyond his acts to their consequences, he 
 wouldn't blunder so much." 
 
 It was a very strong admission for Captain Courtenay 
 to make. 
 
 "Still," said Mr. Burns, "certain trees bear certain 
 fruits. We can guide ourselves pretty well by the law of 
 cause and effect; yet," thinking of his own affairs, 
 "it's true we can't foresee results. The best of motives 
 may bring about the saddest consequences." 
 
 His letter to Wilma was barely despatched before he 
 began to feel the pain of suspense and anxiety as to how 
 she would receive it and what she would reply. He tor- 
 tured himself for days with picturing her anguish when 
 she should know for a certainty that all was over between 
 them. The certainty that all was over between them 
 hardly brought any relief to himself, so great was his 
 sorrow for her pain. And he could not fully assure him- 
 self, at any time, that he had done what was right and 
 best ; especially, as the long months passed and no word
 
 268 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 came from her, he began to doubt, and to wonder some- 
 times, if he were not altogether wrong. He began to 
 think more tenderly of her. Now that the chains were 
 broken and he was no longer bound, he began to see her, 
 as things are seen in the distance, in the vanished, beau- 
 tiful past. A halo gathered about the gentle head. Then, 
 as the long silence continued, he began to think she had 
 given him up easily, and to feel hurt. No doubt (he 
 thought) he had exaggerated both her affection for him 
 and her grief at losing him, and it confirmed an old sus- 
 picion he used to have in their early love-days that Wilma 
 could not feel as deeply as he felt. So, perhaps, it was 
 better ended ; though it saddened him to reflect what 
 bubbles young loves and hopes are ! He wondered if all 
 faith, all belief, all enthusiasm would end like this ; if 
 we must be forever blindfolded, and forever having the 
 bandages taken off, to be shown the emptiness of things ! 
 He came to the conclusion to make no more plans, enter- 
 tain no more aspirations, have no hopes or beliefs in any- 
 thing. He would not be a tool, a toy, a child. He 
 would not let the beautiful deceits of this world play with 
 him and toss him aside, bruised and broken. He would 
 not let himself be puffed up with faith in a bubble that 
 would explode by and by. He turned a cold, dispassion- 
 ate eye upon all the rush and swell of life, and looked 
 with a sort of pitying contempt upon the ambitions and 
 strivings and enthusiasms of men and women. How far 
 he had risen above it, an isolated, melancholy spectator ! 
 Sometimes he fancied Captain Courtenay held the same 
 advantageous position as a sceptical looker-on. And yet, 
 though he had apparently no faith in the Jack-a-lanterns, 
 he still pursued them. It was a mystery to Mr. Burns, 
 who, losing faith, lost all enjoyment. His watch must be 
 genuine gold, or it was worthless to him ; a woman must 
 be true, or he took no pleasure in her beauty. But Cap- 
 tain Courtenay could take up a thing, admire it, enjoy it, 
 throw it away without regret, without, apparently, feel- 
 ing of any kind. Mr. Burns had learned, through much 
 suffering, that the roots of his nature struck deep. In 
 future he would keep himself high and dry, and not take 
 root.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 269 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 WILMA was still living in a faint hope, broken now and 
 then by the intrusive suspicion that, perhaps, it was her 
 duty to herself and to Mr. Burns, and it might be (oh, 
 heavens, what a sickening thought !) that he was leaving 
 it to her to break the slender thread that still held them 
 together. But we cannot put the knife to our own diseased 
 limb ; and in time she came to think it a merciful respite 
 that he did leave it to her. (Though we disinterested 
 parties all know that if a leg or an arm has to be ampu- 
 tated, it is better to use despatch and not consult the 
 patient's sick fancy.) Sometimes pride, even in so gentle 
 a nature as hers, urged to resentment of his coldness. 
 But the uncertainty respecting his real attitude toward 
 her whether it was coldness, or whether the seeming 
 indifference was merely the outgrowth of his changed 
 life forbade decisive action on her part, and hope still 
 whispered, " Be true to yourself and let time shape the 
 rest," Miss Belmont's beautiful motto. 
 
 Miss Belmont was making arrangements, at the close of 
 the school year, to go South and enter a hospital. She 
 had studied medicine and surgery, and thoroughly under- 
 stood the house we live in ; and felt that she could do 
 good service with her knowledge and skill, and strong 
 nerves and woman's gentleness. So Wilma was thinking 
 about going home, and dreading the pain which the old, 
 familiar scenes would bring to her sore heart. 
 
 It lacked yet a week or two of the close of the term 
 when she went one day to the post-office and unexpect- 
 edly received Mr. Burns's letter. She hurried home and 
 went into her room and sat down to open it with trem- 
 bling hands. She read it through, and it seemed as if 
 the wings of death fanned her face. She grew numb and 
 cold and faint. Her eyes were bright and dry, and set 
 in their sockets. Her lips were parted and her breath 
 came hard, so hard that every breath was a groan. By 
 and by, she got up with eager stealthiness and locked the 
 
 23*
 
 270 
 
 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 door, and felt a kind of secret exultation that the whole 
 world was shut out and she was alone with this terrible 
 thing, this devil-fish that grappled her heart. She put the 
 letter folded up and crushed back into its envelope with 
 her shaking hand down deep in her trunk, as though 
 she would hide the knife that had stabbed her ; and then 
 fell down with her face upon the floor moaning, but not 
 realizing what hurt her. Late in the evening she heard 
 Mrs. Woods come and try her door ; she raised her head 
 and listened with quickened senses, and felt the strange 
 throb of secret exultation again when she went away, 
 knowing that she would not again be disturbed. The 
 moon shone nearly all night long through the uncovered 
 window, and looked down unpityingly upon her misery. 
 Now and then she got up and walked about, or knelt be- 
 side a chair and laid her tearless face upon it. She never 
 approached the bed ; she could touch nothing but what 
 was hard and unyielding. 
 
 She was glad when morning broke ; any change the 
 least must bring some relief. She sprang up at the first 
 sounds of life and stir in the house, and began rapidly to 
 make her toilet ; pulling down her long hair and brushing 
 it carefully, and bathing her face. When she came to 
 look in the glass her face was ashy gray, with heavy 
 shadows under the eyes. She brightened it up with as 
 cheerful an expression as possible ; she had will-power 
 enough to do that, and to go out to breakfast looking 
 much as usual, though her lips and eyes were still dry 
 and her throat so husky that she dared not trust herself to 
 speak. Everything seemed strange. Even the clink of 
 the teaspoons in the cups, as Mrs. Woods served the coffee, 
 struck her with a new sound. She ate what she could, 
 and then got up hurriedly and said she was going out. 
 She remembered that it was Saturday. She went into her 
 room and put on her hat in great haste and started off to 
 the woods. Some pent-up power within her seemed hur- 
 rying her all the time. She made straight for an old, 
 unused road she knew of, where she and Miss Percy used 
 to go, with branches of trees meeting overhead. When 
 she reached it, lying in a deep solitude that was unbroken 
 except by the notes of a few little birds, and the crack-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 271 
 
 ling of twigs under the tiny feet of small, swift, wood 
 animals, she marked out a " beat" for herself and walked 
 back and forth upon it, back and forth ; neither thinking 
 nor feeling much, and yet in a state of intense conscious- 
 ness. By and by, a thought struck her like a flash of in- 
 spiration. She saw a swift way out of this dumb misery. 
 She would go and drop herself into the big mill-pond ; 
 she could hear the water roaring over the dam at a little 
 distance. She darted away through the underbrush, 
 quickly and stealthily, with her wild, bright eyes, as 
 though some one might be on her track, and soon came 
 out on the edge of the pond. Not far off she saw a man 
 with a gun looking up into a tree, and she sped back into 
 the bushes before he saw her. What should she do now ? 
 Her heart was throbbing like the heart of a frightened 
 animal. She must get out of the woods ; the solitude was 
 dreadful. Soon she found herself on the road to "pic- 
 nic hill," as it had been called ever since the May-day 
 party, and she determined to go up there. It was a long 
 way, but then there was such a good view of the country 
 from the top of the hill, and she wanted to get up and 
 look around. She walked at a great rate; when she saw 
 any one coming she hid herself among the trees and 
 bushes along the road-side, thinking that on no account 
 must she be seen or people would know that something 
 had happened to her. At last she came to the top of the 
 hill and stood looking around in her strange solitariness. 
 If at any time a thought of Charley crossed her mind she 
 drove it away with a shudder, and walked on faster and 
 faster, filling her brain with a thousand other fancies to 
 crowd out the misery of thinking of him. There was no 
 luxury in this grief, she could not hug it to her bosom and 
 weep over it. All she thought of was to banish it, to get 
 away from it. 
 
 At last it occurred to her that she was very far from 
 home and must get back. Half-way back she began sud- 
 denly to get faint, and thought perhaps she was going to 
 die. She sat down on the mossy roots of an old tree 
 and laid her head back against its trunk, and looked 
 up through the leaves at the sunny blue sky with fleecy 
 white clouds floating dreamily across it, and felt that it
 
 272 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 would be immeasurably sweet to die, so sweet, so ex- 
 quisite, that her lips opened and she laughed aloud. Then 
 her eyelids drooped, and her consciousness began slowly 
 to ebb away. She had a little note-book and pencil in 
 her pocket, the latter a present from Charley, the recol- 
 lection of which at this moment gave her a scarcely-felt 
 twinge of pain ; she thought of taking them out and 
 writing that she would like to be buried beside Miss 
 Percy. But it required too much effort ; her hands lay 
 heavy and listless in her lap.
 
 FOURTH BOOK. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 THE High-Water-Mark attorneys had not often been 
 called upon outside their own county for legal services, 
 albeit they had something more than a local reputation, 
 and were highly spoken of in the profession. Some time 
 after the ball whose history I have recorded some chap- 
 ters back, an important ward and guardian case was put 
 into their hands, to be conducted at Hammond Springs, 
 the county-seat of an adjoining county, distant some 
 thirty or more miles. There being no regular public 
 conveyance, they went in their own light, open buggy. 
 Notwithstanding the season was far advanced, being near 
 Christmas, the weather was still fine and the roads in 
 excellent condition. Mr. Burns, who liked travelling 
 across the country in this manner for the sake of what he 
 could see and feel of nature in her various moods, took 
 up the lines and cracked the whip over " Nobby 's" ears 
 and set off in good spirits, the tide of memory that had 
 swept over him a few evenings back having slowly ebbed 
 away. 
 
 Hammond Springs was a remarkable town, barely half 
 a dozen years old, but containing a population of over 
 four thousand, about one-third only being native Amer- 
 icans, the others gathered from all parts of the earth 
 almost. As they approached the town, and the houses 
 and manners and speech of the people began to betoken 
 the foreign element, Mr. Burns exclaimed, sweeping his 
 arm comprehensively over the landscape and widening 
 the range of his inner vision until it took in all the broad 
 land of Columbia, "What other country under heaven 
 M* 273
 
 274 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 could stand such a mighty influx of foreign immigration ! 
 could take all these strange chickens under its wings, and 
 clothe and feed and preserve them in harmony with each 
 other?" 
 
 "I look upon foreign immigration, when it takes the 
 attitude of a peaceable farming community," returned 
 Mr. Courtenay, "as it appears to about here, as a rather 
 good thing for the country." 
 
 Mr. Burns, disgusted at having the wind taken out of 
 his sails, retorted, "Who would dispute that ! But it does 
 not always take the attitude of a peaceable farming com- 
 munity. It is oftentimes a seething, boiling, formidable 
 element, fomenting in and throughout our domains. It 
 lifts up its voice in the councils of the nation, and impu- 
 dently meddles in all our affairs. And yet," he continued, 
 expanding again, "Brother Jonathan goes serenely and 
 powerfully on, carrying forward his mighty projects, 
 maintaining the dignity of his institutions, and holding 
 easily, confidently, and securely the reins of his stupen- 
 dous government. He is a brewer on a larger scale, is 
 Brother Jonathan, and the scum of his boiling works off 
 in the process of naturalization. America is a grand idea! 
 Human progress couldn't have got along without it." 
 
 He paused, and, as Mr. Courtenay made no response 
 (he was going over the impending lawsuit in his mind, 
 and paying little attention to Mr. Burns's eulogies of the 
 nation), he lost himself in contemplation of the sublime 
 picture he had called up. 
 
 They drove into town and drew up at the nearest 
 American hotel, or what by its sign-board and other 
 pretensions purported to be American, the landlord of 
 which came out in his shirt-sleeves, and, to their inquiry 
 about board and lodging, sorrowfully shook his head. 
 
 He could give them a dinner, but not a bed. He " wass 
 werry full ; he haf so many boarders und travellers, und 
 de court wass met, und dere wass theater dis veek, und so 
 much beoples." Evidently he regretted his inability to 
 serve them as much as they regretted it. 
 
 " We should have written and engaged rooms as they 
 do at watering-places," said Mr. Burns, ruefully. 
 
 However, they dismounted and went into the office.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 275 
 
 A number of men were sitting and standing about, talk- 
 ing and smoking, and waiting the final summons to dinner. 
 Before Mr. Courtenay had fairly relieved himself of his 
 outside wrappings, a gentleman, stepping in from the 
 street and hastily removing a cigar from his lips, came 
 up and grasped his hand with much more warmth than 
 ceremony. " Bless my soul, Courtenay ! is it possible ?" 
 he exclaimed. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, who held that a man's personal dignity 
 is apt to be impaired by such hearty familiarity, lifted his 
 eyes a little coldly to the speaker's dark, attenuated face ; 
 but travelling back mentally in the space of a second 
 to his college-days, he placed it (somewhat changed) 
 among the best faces of his recollection, and very cor- 
 dially returned the greeting. 
 
 "What, Woodbury!" said he. "How is it I meet 
 you here?" 
 
 "You find me at home," said Mr. Woodbury. "I 
 have hailed from this place for the last five years. I did 
 not hear until a short time ago that you were retained on 
 this suit ; I have been out of town. I learned some time 
 ago that you were located at High-Water-Mark, a God- 
 forsaken little hamlet, isn't it? excuse me, and always 
 intended running down to see you, but I haven't made it 
 out yet." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay introduced Mr. Burns, to whom Mr. 
 Woodbury, who was still holding fast to him, at once 
 transferred his hand. 
 
 "I am happy to make your acquaintance," he said, 
 cordially. "You are both employed on this case, are 
 you not?" 
 
 "I assist Mr. Courtenay," Mr. Burns modestly returned. 
 
 "You are on the right side, but you have strong oppo- 
 sition," said Mr. Woodbury. "The Marchmonts of 
 
 N City are considered the best legal talent we have 
 
 got around here." 
 
 "So I understand," said Mr. Courtenay, and felt his 
 spirits rising. He liked to " lock horns with his equals." 
 
 " Parke Marchmont," continued Mr. Woodbury, "ex- 
 pects to be our next congressman ; he is working for the 
 nomination already. I wish, for my part, we had some
 
 276 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 good man to put up against him. By the way, Courtenay, 
 why not you ? I always thought you would make a states- 
 man." 
 
 "Circumstances have gone against me," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. 
 
 "Or, rather, he goes against circumstances," put in 
 Mr. Burns. 
 
 "I suspect that is the way of it," said Mr. Woodbury, 
 smiling ; "he was always so confoundedly proud. Do 
 you remember how, instead of Courtenay, we used to call 
 you Coriolanus?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay looked as if he did not relish the rem- 
 iniscence. The bell rang, and Mr. Woodbury accompa- 
 nied them into the dining-room. Two gentlemen came 
 in presently and sat down opposite to them. Mr. Wood- 
 bury looked up, recognized them, and introduced them 
 as the Marchmont brothers ; upon which they all con- 
 versed together with the freedom and suavity common 
 among men. When they arose from the table, however, 
 the two parties at once separated, the Marchmonts going 
 off up-street, and the others stepping into the office again. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay asked, "Where can we get lodging, 
 Woodbury? We are in a quandary." 
 
 " Has our Dutch friend no accommodations?" asked 
 Mr. Woodbury. " I suppose not, though ; they seem to 
 be crowded here. Why, damn it ! come home with me ; 
 we have room enough for a dozen." 
 
 It seemed to be a sudden inspiration. 
 
 "Then you are a family man?" said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 " Certainly. Why, Lord bless you ! I've been married 
 years. I don't just remember how many; my wife 
 could tell you the exact date. Have I the advantage of 
 you?" 
 
 "Of both of us," said Mr. Burns; his question in- 
 cluded them both. 
 
 " Let me see ; are you going up to the court-house?" 
 asked Mr. Woodbury. 
 
 They said they supposed so. 
 
 " Then I'll send a despatch to Belle, to my wife, 
 and go with you." 
 
 He went to the desk and scribbled a hasty line, and
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 277 
 
 gave it to a boy to carry to Mrs. Woodbury, and then 
 they stepped out. 
 
 "I dislike to inconvenience ladies," said Mr. Courte- 
 nay, regretfully. "Isn't there some private boarding- 
 house, anything that could give us shelter?" 
 
 " Lord, yes ! there are a dozen Dutch hovels that could 
 accommodate you right here in this neighborhood. Would 
 you like to look at some of them?" 
 
 The young men laughed and declined. 
 
 "Smart-looking fellows!" said one of a knot of men 
 clustered around the office-stove as they went out. 
 
 "Yes," responded another. "The dark one that's 
 Courtenay, isn't it has an eye in his head that I'll wager 
 would hold a jury." 
 
 " Humph ! the other one has the keenest eye to my 
 thinking," said a third. 
 
 " Did you see Parke Marchmont taking the measure 
 of them? Ha, ha! it'll take him to the end of his tape- 
 line, I guess." 
 
 "I mean to attend that trial straight through," said 
 the first speaker ; " there'll be some sharp practice. I've 
 heard say those High-Water-Mark lawyers would be more 
 than a match for the Marchmonts. I think they have the 
 best side." 
 
 "As to right, yes; as to money, no." 
 
 "If they win, they'll have money as well as right." 
 
 "Ever been to High-Water-Mark?" A runner for an 
 Eastern dry-goods house threw out the question care- 
 lessly, and one of the before-mentioned speakers took it 
 up and answered, " No." 
 
 "You would be surprised to see such fine birds come 
 out of so shabby a nest," said he. 
 
 An elderly gentleman, who had not spoken before, 
 shook his head and replied, charitably, "You can't judge 
 a man by the place he hails from in this Western country. 
 Wait till they have had time to build their nests." 
 
 The young men accompanied Mr. Woodbury home in 
 the evening, with a good deal of reluctance, which they 
 tried to cover up, feeling that an invitation so cordially 
 given ought to be accepted with a good grace, especially 
 as there was no alternative. 
 
 24
 
 278 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Mr. Woodbury's residence, a pretty and tasteful frame 
 structure, was situated at the upper end of the town, and 
 a little isolated from other houses ; having a large space 
 of ground around it, decorated with trees and shrubbery, 
 and enclosed by a neat picket fence. 
 
 "You say you have lived here only five years?" said 
 Mr. Burns, as they walked up from the gate. 
 
 "Only five years," said Mr. Woodbury. "I went to 
 work the minute I got here, and built my house, laid out 
 my grounds, and put out the trees and bushes. Back of 
 the house you will find a raspberry patch, a bed of straw- 
 berry vines, a grove of wild plum-trees, et caetera." 
 
 "You have done wonders !" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "I accomplished all that in one year," continued 
 Mr. Woodbury, "and then I went back East after my 
 wife." 
 
 " Oh, then you didn't bring her with you at first ?" 
 
 "No; bless your soul, she nearly cried her eyes out as 
 it was, over the desolateness of the Western country." 
 
 "Burr," said Mr. Burns, "why couldn't we fix up 
 some of our lots in High-Water-Mark? We could put 
 fences around them and set out trees and shrubbery, and 
 so help along the town, besides making the lots more 
 salable." 
 
 "We might," said Mr. Courtenay, but his inflection 
 conveyed no strong assurance that the thing would be 
 done. 
 
 The hall door, when they mounted the steps, proved to 
 be locked, and Mr. Woodbury rang the bell. 
 
 "My wife and her 'help'," he explained, with an 
 amused smile he always wore when he in any way referred 
 to Mrs. Woodbury, "are both cowardly little souls, and 
 protect themselves with bar and bolt, in the absence of 
 the head of the house." 
 
 Presently a light step came tripping along the hall, and 
 Mr. Woodbury, with a low, pleasant laugh and a nod to his 
 companions, as much as to say, "It's my wife," tapped 
 a peculiar little tap on the door, and instantly bolt and 
 bar were withdrawn and it flew open, and the daintiest 
 of little women, with coal-black eyes and a smiling mouth, 
 stood to welcome them. One of her small hands found
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 279 
 
 its way into her husband's, which was not lost upon Mr. 
 Burns, who envied men that had sweet wives and pleasant 
 homes. 
 
 " Well, wife, here are the gentlemen," said Mr. Wood- 
 bury. "Did you get my despatch? Mr. Courtenay; 
 Mr. Burns." 
 
 " Yes, I got your despatch," she returned. " How do 
 you do, gentlemen ? Mr. Courtenay, my husband, has 
 spoken of you to me many times, and you are welcome to 
 my house." 
 
 She extended her hand last to Mr. Burns, making it 
 even between them by leading him toward the parlor 
 door, the others following. As for Mr. Burns, when the 
 light of the suspended lamp in the parlor (for it was dusk) 
 struck her pretty, piquant face, it seemed to him there was 
 something strangely familiar in it, though he could place 
 it nowhere among the faces of his recollection. 
 
 " I believe we ought to apologize for intruding upon 
 you," Mr. Courtenay began, with stiff politeness, before 
 seating himself in the chair she wheeled around for him ; 
 but she interrupted him with a gesture of her little fore- 
 finger. 
 
 " Don't speak of intruding; if you had lived as long in 
 the West as I have, and seen as little society, and been as 
 hungry for home faces sometimes, you wouldn't apologize 
 for coming into an old friend's house! Besides," she 
 added, gayly, "I was expecting you; my Tom had the 
 unwonted forethought to send me an avant- courier /" 
 Looking up archly at her tall, broad-shouldered spouse, 
 who smiled down upon her with the utmost pride and 
 affection, feeling no solicitude about the impression she 
 might make, fastidious as he knew his friend Courtenay 
 to be. 
 
 "But is it not strange," said he, "that I had the fore- 
 thought to bring them here! eh, wife? My wife, you 
 see, is so eminently hospitable that I have gradually eased 
 my mind of responsibility in that direction, and trust the 
 social matters all to her. So much so that she accuses 
 me of negligence sometimes." 
 
 "Mr. Courtenay," said Mrs. Woodbury, "if you are 
 acquainted with my husband you will not be surprised to
 
 2 8o HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 hear that he has eased his mind of a good many other 
 responsibilities, and handed them over to his wife." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, relaxing wonderfully under her influ- 
 ence, replied, with a laugh, "Tom always was noted for 
 thoughtlessness." 
 
 Mr. Burns felt that there was something in the atmos- 
 phere of Mr. Woodbury's home, pervaded by the pres- 
 ence of his sprightly wife, which made him appear to 
 better advantage there than elsewhere. 
 
 Almost immediately after they were seated, and before 
 they had time to fall into any of the awkward silences 
 which frequently occur after the first gush of welcomings 
 and inquiries, among people who are wholly new and un- 
 assimilated to one another, a little silver bell jingled and 
 Mrs. Woodbury led her guests out to tea, which was 
 served in a small recess opening, by an arched entrance, 
 into the sitting-room. The table, elegantly spread, stood 
 in the centre of the room, and was surrounded by a 
 wilderness of plants and flowers. Delicate vines were 
 wreathed round picture-frames and brackets, and looped 
 in graceful festoons along the edge of the ceiling; some 
 exquisite white statuettes on the mantle peeped out from 
 perfect little bowers of green leaves, and in a miniature 
 grove of fuchsias and geraniums blooming in a bay win- 
 dow, the crimson curtains of which were looped back, 
 hung a canary bird's cage. Mr. Burns, who had a natural 
 affinity for refinements of all kinds, brightened up with 
 his most expansive expression ; he took the liberty of 
 congratulating Mrs. Woodbury on her successful creation 
 of a fairy-land. 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury blushed at the flattery most fairy house- 
 wives are susceptible to, and replied, " Thank you, Mr. 
 Burns ; your appreciation does me good. My Tom is 
 blind to the beauties of my kingdom !" 
 
 "Wife, you know I used rather to like your flowers," 
 returned Mr. Woodbury, meeting her smilingly reproving 
 glance. "But from practical experience in taking care 
 of them through several severe winters," addressing Mr. 
 Burns, "I begin to fail of seeing any profit in them. 
 Why, sir," ignoring the admonitory shake of his wife's 
 little forefinger, " the fuel those things cause to be con-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 2 8 1 
 
 sumed, yearly, is no inconsiderable item in this woodless 
 country as a matter of domestic economy. That rose 
 which you see blushing so beautifully yonder, represents 
 to me simply an inestimable amount of care and anxiety, 
 to say nothing of expense, to preserve it intact. And 
 after all," he continued in away that was highly amusing 
 to his guests, taken in connection with the defiant, pretty 
 face opposite, whose charming remonstrance he seemed 
 to like to challenge, "what is a rose? A pretty, fleeting, 
 evanescent thing ! a bit of color and a breath of perfume. 
 The only tangible thing about it is the getting up bitter 
 cold nights to make fires for it." 
 
 He ended with his pleasant, half-inaudible laugh, draw- 
 ing his napkin across his mouth and looking at his wife. 
 
 " Don't listen to him, gentlemen 1" she said, " for the 
 sake of the future Mrs. Burns and Mrs. Courtenay, who 
 may have a taste for house-plants." 
 
 "If they do have that deplorable taste," said Mr. Wood- 
 .bury, " pray don't encourage its cultivation. I used to 
 bring home all the green things I could find, to please 
 my wife." 
 
 "You see, Mr. Burns, he speaks of pleasing his wife in 
 the past tense !" she said. " The way .of it is, we have 
 got to have fires all the time, anyhow, to keep other 
 things from freezing. My poor plants are the scape- 
 goat." 
 
 There was a piano in the sitting-room, and after tea 
 Mr. Woodbury said, "Belle, can't you give us a little 
 music?" 
 
 The invitation was warmly seconded by the visitors, 
 and Mrs. Woodbury seated herself, turned the leaves of a 
 huge book of bound sheet music and began an airy fantasia ; 
 and her husband took the young men slyly into his confi- 
 dence so much as to say that she was considered a very 
 fine performer. After which he bestowed himself com- 
 fortably upon the sofa, propped his cheek upon his hand 
 and closed his eyes, shutting out sight for the more com- 
 plete enjoyment of sound, it might be supposed. Mr. 
 Burns, lying back in an easy-chair, watched the dexterous 
 fingers fly over the keys, and gave himself up to the joy- 
 ous influence of the musical rhythm. Mr. Courtenay, 
 
 24*
 
 282 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 dimly listening, embraced the opportunity to go over the 
 impending lawsuit again. When the music ceased, Mr. 
 Woodbury arose and stepped into the hall for his overcoat 
 and hat. 
 
 " The mail comes in about this time," he said. " Will 
 either of you walk down street ?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay arose. 
 
 "If you are going, Burr," said Mr. Burns, "I will 
 excuse myself and remain with Mrs. Woodbury, if she 
 will allow me." 
 
 " My wife will be very glad of your company," said 
 Mr. Woodbury. 
 
 "Indeed, I will!" she exclaimed; and then, as the 
 door closed upon the other two, she added, "Oh, no- 
 body gets so lonely as I these long winter evenings ! It 
 is such a calamity to me that the mail comes in at this 
 hour. Mr. Woodbury wouldn't always go down town 
 after supper, if it wasn't for that; and then when he goes 
 and gets among the men, he never realizes how fast the 
 time is going with him and how slowly with me." 
 
 Mr. Burns, lying back in his easy-chair, slowly rocking 
 himself to and fro and feeling very luxurious, said, in his 
 heart, that if he. were situated as Mr. Woodbury was 
 such a beautiful home and such a charming wife the 
 mail and the men down town might go to thunder ; he 
 would spend his evenings at home. 
 
 " Mrs. Woodbury," he said, suddenly, leaning forward 
 and looking at her, "excuse me, but have I not some- 
 where met you before? Your face is unaccountably fa- 
 miliar to me." 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury laughed. 
 
 "I was waiting to see if you would remember me; I 
 thought you would by and by. I recognized you almost 
 immediately. I hardly know how to recall myself to 
 you, without mentioning a mutual friend of ours, Wilma 
 Lynne." 
 
 Mr. Burns started and flushed. 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury had purposely thrust the name upon 
 him, and watched narrowly, without apparent interest, 
 its effect. 
 
 He sat still for a moment and then answered, "I re-
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 283 
 
 member. You were Miss Raymond, the governor's 
 daughter." 
 
 "Yes; they always called me the 'governor's daugh- 
 ter' at Crawford," said Mrs. Woodbury, smiling, and 
 added (speaking to herself), pathetically, " Poor papa!" 
 
 A long pause followed, but not an awkward one. 
 Mr. Burns was too deeply stirred to be conscious, and 
 Mrs. Woodbury's faithful and affectionate memory was 
 recalled to the death of her father, whom she had ten- 
 derly loved and whom she still deeply mourned. From 
 thinking of him she passed on to thinking of her brothers, 
 and suddenly burst out with, " Oh, Mr. Burns, I have 
 just remembered, you were with Starr when he was shot 
 down !" 
 
 Mr. Burns slowly gathered up his thoughts. 
 
 "With Starr? Oh, yes, yes. I held him up in my 
 arms while he breathed his last gasp. Poor fellow ! he 
 hardly knew what hurt him, his death was so sudden." 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury's tears were falling fast. Presently 
 she dashed them away and looked up. 
 
 " Do you know, it never occurred to me until this mo- 
 ment that my husband's much-praised college friend was 
 this same Captain Courtenay, the head of my brother's 
 company, and your bosom companion ! Now, isn't that 
 singular? We used to hear so much about Captain Courte- 
 nay, and to think I am entertaining him in my house ! 
 I remember asking Mr. Woodbury once if he thought 
 they were related, and he said it was not at all likely. 
 Well, well, what a dice-box the world is ! Forever 
 shaking us up and dropping us out in all sorts of attitudes 
 towards each other. They said he and Miss Maclvers 
 seemed to admire each other so much. But she went 
 
 away before the regiment left R . And do you know, 
 
 Mr. Burns," Mrs. Woodbury continued, impressively, 
 " that Miss Maclvers went into the hospitals, and by some 
 means heaven knows what ! she was killed ; and her 
 body, which had been buried, was taken up and brought 
 
 back to R , and interred in the beautiful cemetery 
 
 there, and a splendid monument erected over it." 
 
 Mr. Burns sat as numb as a stone and made no answer. 
 He felt as if it was the shaking off of a horrible night-
 
 284 HIGH WA TER-MARK. 
 
 mare when the outside hall-door opened, and he heard 
 the men's voices. He got up and took a turn around the 
 room. His face was so pale that Mr. Cqurtenay observed 
 it, and asked, when they went up-stairs to bed, "Aren't 
 you feeling well, Charley?" with a solicitude he always 
 showed for his friend, but for nothing else. 
 
 " No, not very well. Do you know, Burr, this Mrs. 
 Woodbury is a sister of Starr Raymond's?" 
 
 "No; is she? How did you find out ?" 
 
 " I used to meet her when I went to Crawford Academy 
 to visit a friend, and she remembered me." 
 
 "Ah, Crawford Academy! I suspect you had some 
 disturbing conversation then. Did she refer to her 
 brother?" 
 
 " Oh, yes ; and and to Miss Maclvers. Her remains, 
 she says, were taken up and removed to R ." 
 
 Few words suffice for a subject so fraught with pain and 
 horror, and nothing more was said. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 THE following morning, after breakfast, Mr. Woodbury 
 invited his guests into the library, with the offer of cigars, 
 which Mr. Burns declined. 
 
 " Ah ! don't smoke? Then perhaps you don't care to 
 accompany us? In which case I have no doubt my wife 
 will be glad to entertain you here. I have an idea you 
 and she are rather congenial, on the subject of flowers, 
 at any rate," laughing. 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury retorted that she was glad to entertain 
 any gentleman who didn't smoke. Mr. Burns was well 
 pleased ; he liked women's society-; it brought out the 
 truest, tenderest side of him. Mr. Woodbury closed the 
 library door and opened a window a little way. 
 
 "My wife is particular about my smoking," he ex- 
 plained. " I am not to light a cigar anywhere about the 
 house but here, and I am instructed always to ventilate a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 285 
 
 little so that the tobacco-scent will not settle on the books 
 and things." 
 
 He drew up an arm-chair for himself, motioned Mr. 
 Courtenay to another, and they sat down with a spittoon 
 between them, their feet elevated at a comfortable angle. 
 
 "It takes some time," Mr. Woodbury continued, "to 
 learn all one's matrimonial lessons. My wife, as you may 
 observe, is quite the pink of particularity. I was a good 
 while getting broken in to her exact ways; though now, 
 I flatter myself, I am beginning to run pretty smoothly. 
 How is it you are not married, Courtenay ? You came 
 West shortly after graduating in the law-school, didn't 
 you?" 
 
 They had talked it all up at the breakfast-table, about 
 Mr. Woodbury's college friend -being one and the same 
 with the famous Captain Courtenay, whom his wife re- 
 membered so well. Mr. Woodbury's last question cov- 
 ered up the first so that Mr. Courtenay saw no necessity 
 for replying to it. 
 
 " Yes," said he. "I came West shortly after graduating, 
 and when the war broke out I went into the army. Sub- 
 sequently, after travelling about a little, I found my way 
 out here." 
 
 "And how the devil did you come to settle in High- 
 Water-Mark?" said Mr. Woodbury. "A town without a 
 railroad, or any other advantages, I suppose?" 
 
 " It has the advantage of being the finest site for a town 
 of any place I know," returned Mr. Courtenay, with 
 some spirit. And added, with his customary sanguinity 
 touching that point, "Besides, we shall have a railroad 
 before long." 
 
 " I don't see," said Mr. Woodbury, knitting his brows, 
 "what possessed you to come West, anyhow! Your 
 chances were good in the East, damn it ! You could 
 have held your own with the best of them." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay made no answer, but watched the little 
 cloud of smoke he was sending up and, by and by, asked, 
 " Do you practice law?" 
 
 "Not much," said Mr. Woodbury. "I am engaged 
 in the land- office business." 
 
 "Pays well, doesn't it?"
 
 286 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 " Pretty well. One has a good many chances. I buy 
 up tax-titles, and that sort of thing. Don't you speculate 
 any?" 
 
 " No. That is, very little. The fact is I hate dab- 
 bling in anything outside the profession. Burns and 
 myself have some land ; we get hold of a piece occasion- 
 ally ; I suppose we shall make something out of it after 
 a while." 
 
 "Oh, yes; certainly you will, if you hold on to it. 
 The law, Courtenay, one can't live on the law ! It's 
 a good starting-point ; but you have got to reach beyond 
 it. I remember you were never practical ; you always 
 let the boys get the advantage of you in money matters. 
 You were cut out for something higher than a financial 
 career. We used to prophesy you would make a poet or 
 an orator, or something out of the ordinary line. How- 
 ever, much depends on circumstances. The present times 
 don't seem to demand a Homer or a Cicero, and so there 
 are no Homers and Ciceros forthcoming. I have no 
 doubt they would rise up if the exigencies of the day 
 called them. I suspect it will take some great convulsion 
 to bring you out ; the world will never get the best there 
 is in you until it brings some mighty force to bear upon 
 you." 
 
 "It brought the late war," said Mr. Courtenay, "to 
 bear upon me, and I went into it, and came out of it, an 
 obscure captain." 
 
 Unwittingly, Mr. Woodbury had touched a chord in 
 his bosom that had vibrated on his life. It was his one 
 intense and all-absorbing consciousness that there was 
 within him a strong power to be and to do, if occasion 
 came ; and he had been secretly and half-unconsciously 
 preparing himself for the time when all there was in him, 
 all he could accumulate of brain, of mental power, of 
 culture, would be demanded. His pride and his reserve, 
 his loathing to take hold of small things (or things that 
 seemed small in comparison with his great ideas) were a 
 sort of saving of himself toward some indefinite, grand 
 end. 
 
 "The late war," said Mr. Woodbury, "was not the 
 right kind of force. I can sympathize with Halleck,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 287 
 
 who, when asked to write a poem on it, said, ' No, the 
 rebellion was a monstrous mutiny.' Besides, the days 
 when men achieve mighty things with the sword are over. 
 Why don't you go into politics?" 
 
 " I am on the wrong side." 
 
 " Ah, is that so? Can't you come over ?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay shook his head. 
 
 "I remember," said Mr. Woodbury, smiling, "you 
 were always a stickler for principle. But do you know I 
 have fancied your principles were hereditary, handed 
 down to you from an aristocratic ancestry, like your 
 name !" 
 
 "You spoke yesterday," said Mr. Courtenay, "about 
 putting up some one against Marchmont in the nomina- 
 tion for Congress. Why not try my friend Burns ? He 
 votes your straight ticket." 
 
 "Is that so?" said Mr. Woodbury. "Is he posted; 
 can he talk?" 
 
 " He can talk with the best of them. I believe he 
 could travel over this Congressional district and win more 
 friends than any other man in it." 
 
 "Personal friends; yes, I have no doubt of it. He is 
 prepossessing ; I like his address. But political friends, 
 influential friends, are what one needs." 
 
 "Yes, I know," said Mr. Courtenay. "Still, I think 
 it might be done ; we have some time to work in. Of 
 course, one of the chief things to be done will be to get 
 the people acquainted with him ; he is not known." 
 
 "Oh, damn it, that's not worth a continental!" said 
 Mr. Woodbury. "When we speak of the people we 
 mean the party, and the party will carry him through 
 safe enough, if by hook or crook we can get his name on 
 the ticket. You get him the nomination in your county 
 convention next spring, and I'll do what I can for him 
 
 here. I have some little influence in N City, too. I 
 
 don't mind telling you that I entertain a personal spite 
 against Marchmont, and would rather enjoy defeating 
 him." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay reflected that he would not explain this 
 latter circumstance to his friend. Mr. Burns was of such 
 a peculiar and fastidious disposition that he would not
 
 2 88 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 enjoy (to say the least) taking advantage of any sinister 
 motives on the part of his helpers. He would have all 
 things open and above-board. 
 
 "Have you and Mr. Burns talked it up?" asked Mr. 
 Wood bury. 
 
 "No," said Mr. Courtenay. "And really, I can't say 
 he would accept the nomination if it were offered to him. 
 It was my own idea." 
 
 Mr. Woodbury laughed and said he thought it would 
 be well, before taking any other steps, to find out. He 
 reached for the cigars and passed them again to his com- 
 panion. 
 
 "My father," said he, "was an Episcopal bishop of 
 the diocese of Maryland, as you may perhaps have heard. 
 He never smoked, but I have some pleasant recollections 
 of him connected with my early experience with the weed. 
 His study opened on a wide, grassy lawn, where I used 
 to stroll in the summer evenings, during vacation, smoking 
 my cigar. Often and often he would come to the window, 
 pen in hand, I can see his tall form yet, a little stooped 
 at the shoulders, and his benign face with its border of 
 thin, white hair blown about by the wind, and call to 
 me. And, when I presented myself before him, cigar 
 respectfully removed, but knowing very well what would 
 follow, he would say, ' Thomas, my son, you know that I 
 have always opposed your smoking, and that I regard it as 
 a very pernicious and entirely unnecessary practice ; but, 
 if you must smoke, mind, I say if you must smoke, 
 come in here where I can enjoy the odor of your cigar ! 
 So, then, I would sit in his easy-chair, puffing away quite 
 as much for his pleasure as my own, while he wrote at 
 his desk. I never knew a man who had a finer taste in 
 the matter of smoke, and yet I don't think he ever put a 
 cigar in his mouth." 
 
 " Your father is dead, is he not ?" asked Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Oh, yes. He died about the time I was married. 
 I was married in Baltimore. My wife was staying there 
 with her grandmother when I became acquainted with 
 her." 
 
 "You are not a member of the Episcopal Church?" 
 asked Mr. Courtenay.
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 289 
 
 " No, nor of any other," said Mr. Woodbury. " I well 
 remember how, when I went to college, I cut loose from 
 church restraints and declared myself an independent 
 thinker. My father, hearing of my heresy, came up to 
 have a talk with me ; the only time he ever visited Har- 
 vard ; perhaps you remember?" 
 
 "Yes, I do," said Mr. Courtenay. "I remember think- 
 ing, as he sat beside President K , looking around 
 
 upon us with his mild, benevolent eyes, that he was the 
 most beautiful old man I had ever seen ! You don't re- 
 semble him, Woodbury." 
 
 "No," said Mr. Woodbury, " I am like my mother ; 
 she was half Spanish. Well, when he came to see me, I 
 told him frankly we were always open as the day with 
 him, we children that up to my twentieth year I had 
 implicitly and obediently, and I thought blindly, fol- 
 lowed him, and that then I had begun to see that it was 
 time for me to stop and think ; and the result was I had 
 sought out a path for myself. 'In which,' said he, 'it 
 seems you have been going at a pretty good jog ! Well, 
 my son, I am glad to find that you have a head of your 
 own, and a disposition to investigate and to push forward. 
 But don't you think it is about time for you to stop and 
 think again ?' That was all ; he was never coercive even 
 in things which he considered of vital importance to us 
 after we were able to reason. Well, I did stop and think, 
 but I never could bring myself into harmony with my 
 father's beloved creed. After a time I don't think it 
 troubled him any. He came to say, ' As you will, Thomas ; 
 I see that it is no idle and lawless breaking away from a 
 righteous restraint, but a growing out of it, if I may so 
 speak. You have reasoned and arrived at convictions ; 
 which is the right of every man. I do not hold you to 
 be an outlaw like one who tramples down the walls of his 
 church and scoffs at even the soul of religion.' ' 
 
 They had some more conversation relating to " old 
 times," in which Mr. Woodbury was the chief talker; 
 and then came back to politics again, and discussed Mr. 
 Burns's possible chances. After which they spoke of the 
 impending lawsuit, in which Mr. Woodbury was able to 
 post his friend to a considerable extent, as well as to en- 
 N 25
 
 290 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 lighten him respecting public sentiment and the pecu- 
 liarities of the several parties involved. 
 
 In the mean time Mr. Burns and Mrs. Woodbury, after 
 conversing in a lively way upon various topics, pleasant 
 to both, birds, flowers, books, music, drifted back to 
 Crawford Academy again ; each being anxious to know 
 what was in the other's mind concerning Wilma Lynne, 
 but neither liking to mention her name. Mrs. Woodbury 
 had all a woman's curiosity to learn what had been the 
 causes of separation between the two who had loved each 
 other so tenderly ; and Mr. Burns had all a man's anxiety 
 to find out what had befallen the woman whom he had 
 treated cruelly, however inevitable had been his course of 
 action. 
 
 "Did you know Miss Belmont ?" Mrs. Woodbury 
 asked. 
 
 "I knew of her," said Mr. Burns. " She was a re- 
 markable woman, I suppose." 
 
 " Oh, a beautiful woman ! One of the loveliest char- 
 acters I have ever known. And do you know, Mr. 
 Burns," said Mrs. Woodbury, lowering her voice to its 
 most impressive key (Mrs. Woodbury was fond of thrill- 
 ing narrative), " that she was mortally wounded by the 
 explosion of a shell at Gettysburg, where she was taking 
 care of some disabled and dying soldiers." 
 
 " Did s/iequit the academy and go into the hospitals?" 
 asked Mr. Burns. 
 
 "Oh, yes; and the curious part of it was this: We 
 girls used to believe, though we scarcely whispered it to 
 each other, that Miss Belmont had a strong, secret affec- 
 tion for Professor Ingraham. Not an impure affection ; 
 but a kind of grand, reverential love. It used to speak 
 out in her sweet, patient eyes, sometimes ; but I think 
 she would have died at the stake rather than give any 
 other evidence of it. Well, when she lay dying, in a 
 large building that had been turned into a temporary hos- 
 pital, it happened that Mr. Ingraham, who was a colonel 
 then, was brought in, faint and bleeding. Some one re- 
 marked, in his hearing, that Miss Belmont was about 
 breathing her last. He sprang up from the couch where 
 he lay, and asked ' Who is that ?' They told him ' A
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 291 
 
 nurse; Miss Belmont.' 'Good God!' said he; 'can it 
 be Lucile?' and rushed into the little chamber where she 
 lay, and called her name. The nurse, who stood at the 
 foot of the bed watching her, and who told me the story, 
 said she had thought a moment before that Miss Belmont 
 was dead. Her forehead was clammy, her eyelids drooped, 
 and her form was rigid and cold. But at the sound of 
 his voice her eyes opened instantly, and shone with inef- 
 fable light. ' I never before,' said the nurse, ' saw a soul 
 so stand out, as it were, upon a human face.' ' 
 
 When Mrs. Woodbury finished the story she sat for a 
 minute or two, crying silently ; the war had given her 
 many a wound that had not yet stopped bleeding. Mr. 
 Burns got up and walked back and forth across the room ; 
 presently he stopped and asked, 
 
 " Mrs. Woodbury, can you tell me where Miss Lynne 
 is now?" 
 
 Mrs. Woodbury brushed away her tears with her hands, 
 and looked up with a little hardening of expression. She 
 did not wish to feel kindly toward this man, whom she 
 believed had wrecked her friend's happiness; but some- 
 how, against her will, he had greatly won her tenderness, 
 with his gentle ways, his half-melancholy face, and appeal- 
 ing, earnest, sympathetic eyes. It was not possible to 
 blame him harshly. 
 
 "No," she said; "I don't know where she is. The 
 last I heard of her or from her she was on the point of 
 going to New York among her father's relatives. They 
 were wealthy, aristocratic people, I believe. You knew, 
 I suppose, that her family was entirely broken up?" 
 
 "No," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "You don't tell me!" Again Mrs. Woodbury's im- 
 pressive manner came into requisition. " Why, her 
 mother and her little sister both died of diphtheria ! 
 You know how prevalent it was at one time ; and her 
 brother was killed in some battle, I forget where. Of all 
 the lives I have ever known, it seems to me, Mr. Burns, 
 that Wilma Lynne's has been the most cruelly shorn. 
 She founded herself upon her friends ; her whole tender 
 nature was rooted in them. And see how they have 
 dropped away from her! I don't know; I think there
 
 292 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 was enough in her to get above it all ; if so, she is a grand 
 woman to-day." 
 
 Mr. Burns was deeply stirred, and felt true to his 
 mercurial nature an intense impulse to go and find 
 Wilma Lynne, to push aside space and whatever other 
 obstructions divided them, and meet her face to face, 
 heart to heart, again. Of course it was impractical, as 
 many of his impulses were ; but it compelled him, for 
 the moment, to strong energy of action. He asked Mrs. 
 Woodbury to excuse him, and put on his hat and went 
 out for a rushing, headlong walk that was one of the 
 habits of his younger days. When he came back, a little 
 exhausted in body and his recollection soothed, the other 
 gentlemen were coming out of the library and said it was 
 time to go down to the court-house. 
 
 Their case came on that morning, and lasted through 
 the week, creating intense excitement. There were a 
 multitude of witnesses, and the attorneys were all shrewd 
 and wide-awake, feeling that their own interests in many 
 ways, besides the interests of the parties implicated, de- 
 pended on the issue. 
 
 The day upon which Parke Marchmont arose to plead, 
 the court-room was crowded with an alert, expectant audi- 
 ence. There is something more vitally interesting in the 
 eloquence of the bar than in that of pulpit, stage, or ros- 
 trum, because it is concentrated upon a particular case in 
 hand. There is something tangible for it to fasten itself 
 upon. Something depends upon it, waiting for a public 
 decision that will strongly affect individuals. And say 
 what we will about the fascinations of abstract things 
 when we have risen up so as to grasp them, there is a 
 humanity in us all that makes us pause and look on with 
 keen attention when our fellow-beings are struggling. 
 Mr. Marchmont, to begin with, was very prepossessing 
 in his appearance and manners. He had pleasant, light- 
 blue eyes, blonde hair, and a well-developed figure, such 
 as a certain class of complacent men attain to at forty. 
 His personality was strong, bland, persuasive. He pleaded 
 well ; he brought out the claims of his side in the clearest 
 light, and threw those of the other into obscurity. It 
 began to seem absurd, in the most candid minds, that the
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 2 93 
 
 other side should have set up any pretensions. He sat down, 
 when he had concluded his lengthy and somewhat flowery 
 argument, amid thundering applause, and Mr. Courte- 
 nay, who was his especially recognized opponent (Mr. 
 Burns had chiefly conducted the examination and cross- 
 examination of witnesses), arose to follow him. At the first 
 sound of his marvellous voice, so powerful and so thrill- 
 ing in its rare modulation, not falling upon the ear simply 
 but striking deep into the emotions that are susceptible to 
 the finest things in sight and sound and feeling, the people 
 in the farthest corners of the room raised themselves upon 
 tip-toe to get sight of him. He had an intense personal 
 magnetism which, combined with great mastery of lan- 
 guage, his comprehension of men, and his profound 
 knowledge of law, made him the most formidable op- 
 ponent Parke Marchmont had ever contended against. 
 A few human beings can raise and sway the emotions like 
 the swelling of the sea, and we cannot define the subtle 
 influence that makes the blood curdle, and the hair rise, 
 and the nerves quiver, and the muscles grow tense. Mr. 
 Courtenay had this power, and upon this great occasion 
 it was fully called out. 
 
 Mr. Woodbury had the satisfaction of confirming to 
 his wife what he had often affirmed of his admired friend 
 and school-fellow. " I always said," he remarked, " that 
 the force of tremendous circumstances would send him up 
 like a sky-rocket." 
 
 " But will he burn out as quickly?" asked Mrs. Wood- 
 bury, laughing. 
 
 " Oh, yes !" with a shrug. " He'll be the same cold, 
 reserved fellow to-morrow that he was yesterday." 
 
 No one in the court-room was more profoundly stirred 
 than Mr. Burns. He felt a strong, new impulse of en- 
 thusiastic and affectionate pride in his friend. 
 
 Before Mr. Courtenay had taken his seat it was felt, 
 universally, that his cause had triumphed. When he came 
 down people began crowding forward for a nearer view 
 and a hand-shake. But, though he enjoyed a victory and 
 liked the breath of incense when it floated up to him from 
 afar, he hated being lionized and fawned upon. So he 
 had quietly stepped out, and, linking his arm in Mr. Burns's 
 
 25*
 
 294 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 (there was no other man living with whom he would have 
 linked arms), walked homeward. When they reached 
 Mr. Woodbury's gate, Mr. Burns laid his hand upon the 
 latch and paused a moment and said, with feeling, 
 
 "You made a grand plea, Burr, the grandest lever 
 heard!" 
 
 ' ' It annoyed me that there were so damned many women 
 in court," said Burr, and Mr. Burns opened the gate and 
 passed on. 
 
 The day following, on the drive homeward, after a 
 silence not unusual between the two friends, Mr. Courte- 
 nay remarked, " Woodbury thinks you might stand a 
 chance to get the nomination for Congress next spring." 
 
 "I !" said Mr. Burns, to whom the remark had a sin- 
 gular abruptness, the idea it carried having never occurred 
 to him as among the possibilities of his career; though 
 doubtless it had floated through his dreams years ago, as 
 in the case of most American youths. 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Courtenay. " Marchmont isn't very 
 popular, and his defeat yesterday will go against him and 
 in your favor. People like to vote for the best man. 
 You'll have to advertise yourself a little." 
 
 "A good deal, I should say," said Mr. Burns, incred- 
 ulously. But Mr. Courtenay's matter-of-fact way of put- 
 ting the question began already to inspire him with a 
 remote hope, against which he immediately began to 
 argue by way of clearing up the ground. 
 
 "What likelihood is there of my getting the nomina- 
 tion ?" said he. " There will be a candidate from every 
 county in the district; and our county doesn't take the 
 lead, even supposing I received the nomination at our 
 convention." 
 
 "There will be no trouble about that," said Mr. Cour- 
 tenay. "And I am convinced you have made a point at 
 Hammond Springs." 
 
 "I think it is you who made the point at Hammond 
 Springs," retorted Mr. Burns. 
 
 " No matter, it will be known at N City as the 
 
 High-Water-Mark lawyers ; and N City is the strong- 
 hold of your party." 
 
 "And the home of the Marchmonts," said Mr. Burns.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 295 
 
 "You must recollect," said Mr. Courtenay, "that a 
 man is not always a prophet in his own land. Woodbury 
 thinks there will be nothing to contend against there ex- 
 cept a mere local pride ; and he assures me that the people 
 of that thriving town are by no means narrow. They 
 are at least big enough to embrace the whole district and 
 take the best man in it." 
 
 " Then I would recommend you to their consideration," 
 said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " No," Mr. Courtenay returned. "I was referring to 
 your party. There are none of us broad enough to go 
 beyond party lines. We chain a candidate to our plat- 
 form as we chain a dog in the back yard. I couldn't be 
 your candidate because you couldn't bring me near enough 
 to get the shackles on my feet." 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 A FEW days after the young men's return from Ham- 
 mond Springs, an official-looking package was brought 
 into the office by the errand-boy, who had been despatched 
 for the mail, which proved to be from the contractors of 
 a railroad that had been several times surveyed through 
 the country, setting forth a proposition, on their part, to 
 go on and construct the road, and asking aid ; especially 
 soliciting the influence of these very influential attorneys. 
 Mr. Burns came up at once to a high pitch of enthusiasm, 
 and spent several days about town talking up the subject 
 with the prominent men of the place. When in the 
 office, too, he thought and spoke of nothing else, and 
 was a good deal chafed by his friend's non-excitability, 
 as often happened. 
 
 "They want money and right of way," he was saying, 
 one evening argumentatively. 
 
 "Of course," interrupted Mr. Courtenay, to whom 
 that fact was so clear that it seemed useless to speak of it. 
 
 "Well, the question is, how are they to get it? They
 
 296 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 must get it through us. I was talking with Deacon Clyde 
 to-day." 
 
 "And what does,the deacon think?" said Mr. Courte- 
 nay, in a tone implying a rather contemptuous regard for 
 the deacon's opinion, whatever it might be. 
 
 "He says," returned Mr. Burns, "that it will depend 
 greatly upon you and me whether we get a road or not." 
 
 "He flatters us." 
 
 " No, it has got to be talked into the people, and we 
 must do the talking." 
 
 A few days later, the president of the company, who 
 was an old college friend of Mr. Courtenay's, and who 
 had heard of him through Mr. Woodbury, took a trip up 
 the line and came to see him. A hearty, cordial, corpu- 
 lent man, to whom Mr. Burns gave his hand with great 
 warmth. 
 
 All Mr. Courtenay's school friends had the same high 
 opinion of his intellectual power. 
 
 "You are just the man I want, Courtenay," said the 
 president. " I can't talk; never could, except in a blunt, 
 matter-of-fact way. The people, you see, need stirring 
 up ; and it takes more diplomacy of eloquence to touch 
 men's pockets than their consciences. They have settled 
 down here on these prairies and have learned to do with- 
 out many conveniences. They do all their own work, 
 they haul all their grain off to other markets, and they 
 carefully save their dollars. They don't like to pay out 
 money at a venture, and without immediate returns, for 
 a railroad. They are cautious, skeptical, doubtful. Well, 
 you see, their faith must be educated. And you, my 
 friend," laying his hand upon Mr. Courtenay's shoulder, 
 and not perceiving that gentleman's distaste for the flat- 
 tering insinuation, " must be the educator." 
 
 "I think," said Mr. Courtenay, with a slight shrug, 
 at which the hand was removed, "that I must turn you 
 over to Mr. Burns, who greatly transcends me in the 
 kind of ability you require for the furtherance of your 
 project." 
 
 A little cooled but not discouraged, the president leaned 
 back in his chair and gave Mr. Burns an examining look 
 with his keen, bright eyes, that seemed to be aided in any
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 297 
 
 investigation they might make by a high, prominent, per- 
 tinacious, Roman nose. The result appeared to be satis- 
 factory. Mr. Burns and Mr. Griggs (the president) were 
 soon sailing along on the top wave of railroad enthusiasm. 
 They took Nobby and drove out into the country, and 
 paid some flattering attention to a few of the wealthiest 
 farmers. They examined the river for bridging and se- 
 lected a site for the depot, and discussed the whole subject 
 in all its bearings. It was a kind of work Mr. Burns par- 
 ticularly delighted in, it was for the public good. It is 
 true, that in his old aspirations toward becoming a benefac- 
 tor of the human race, he had never thought of railroads. 
 But who of us go straight to our aim ? We must allow 
 something for the rush and pressure of circumstances, as the 
 ocean currents allow for the rotation of the earth. Where 
 so many and such great forces are at work outside of us, 
 we must expect to swerve and bend a little. 
 
 Before Mr. Griggs went away he said, confidentially, 
 " Can't you get Courtenay to work for us?" 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Mr. Burns. " He is as much inter- 
 ested as we are, and will get up and shake his mane, by 
 and by, but we must wait for him a little." 
 
 Before spring was well advanced the railroad excitement 
 became intense. There were meetings in town-halls all 
 over the county, and bonfires in the streets, and warm 
 discussions upon every hand. The High-Water-Mark 
 attorneys were the most indefatigable workers on the line. 
 After speaking in all the towns and villages, they began 
 canvassing townships and school-districts, and even visited 
 farmers in their homes. 
 
 Here Mr. Burns had a decided advantage over his 
 friend. Familiarity with the people was not to Mr. 
 Courtenay's taste, was not in his nature. His lofty and 
 polished bearing was extremely out of place in farm 
 kitchens. Whereas Mr. Burns could lend a helping hand 
 to lift a pail of water or put a stick of wood in the stove 
 for any woman, young or old, pretty or homely, Mr. 
 Courtenay stood aloof and embarrassed the blushing 
 farmers' daughters with his admiring glances and grand 
 manners. Whether intentional or not, Mr. Courtenay 
 had a way that inspired people with awe and kept them 
 
 N*
 
 298 
 
 PIIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 at a distance. He could charm and carry away an audi- 
 ence and play upon their emotions as upon a harmonious, 
 many-stringed instrument, but he could not come down 
 and meet his fellow-beings on the broad level of friendly, 
 social intercourse. People applauded him, admired him 
 enthusiastically, were proud of an opportunity to hear 
 him speak, and repeated over and over again in private 
 what he said in public, especially his sharp sarcasms and 
 witticisms. But few approached him. Mr. Burns, on 
 the contrary (except when his mood was bitter or melan- 
 choly), was affable, kind, courteous, easy of access. 
 Nobody could doubt his sincerity who looked into his 
 eyes, or whose hand he grasped. He made many friends. 
 Mr. Courtenay intimated to him once, slyly, that he was 
 killing two birds with one stone, his prospects for Con- 
 gress were brightening. But he flushed angrily and 
 denied any conscious effort in the direction of bettering 
 his chances. 
 
 But Mr. Woodbury and other of his friends and the 
 enemies of the Marchmonts had not been idle ; and his 
 name was beginning to be wafted about in political cir- 
 cles. Some talked confidently and others pooh-poohed. 
 What ! a stranger, young, unknown ? But then he was a 
 soldier, and had given four years' arduous service to his 
 country ; and that fact had weight in those days. In 
 subsequent political gatherings a point was made of this : 
 that whereas Mr. Marchmont had sat in his office gathering 
 rich harvests of gold, his opponent had toiled through wear- 
 isome marches, through sickness and battle and danger. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay was induced to make one grand, rallying 
 speech for his friend at Hammond Springs. After touch- 
 ing upon the war, and his candidate's faithful service, he 
 said : " But, gentlemen, it is not because Charles Burns was 
 a soldier, brave and generous to the laying of his life upon 
 his country's altar, that I solicit your votes in his behalf. 
 These are not the necessary qualifications for the office to 
 which he aspires. The arduous toils and dangers of war, 
 the rude camp-life would hardly fit a man for a seat among 
 the polished legislators of the nation ; but, gentlemen, 
 when Mr. Burns laid down his books and took up the sword 
 the great university of M could not boast a more
 
 HIGH- IVA TER-MARK. 
 
 299 
 
 accomplished scholar. The war has been three years 
 ended. Mr. Burns came back wounded, ' tired' (as we 
 used to sing) 'of the war on the old camp-ground,' and 
 gave himself, with renewed zeal, to his books, to his pro- 
 fession, and to a careful study of the times ; and to-day," 
 Mr. Courtenay took a step down toward his audience 
 and put his whole soul into the conclusion of his sentence, 
 making an indescribable gesture toward his friend, thrilling 
 all hearts and turning all eyes in one direction, " I would 
 match this soldier against any gentleman who has never 
 been deprived of his books and his easy-chair, or had his 
 mind distracted with thoughts of his bleeding country 
 for a single night, in knowledge of law, statesmanship, 
 and acquaintance with all that pertains to government 
 and the affairs of nations." 
 
 When the general convention met at N City, fate 
 
 or the chances of politics decided in Mr. Burns's favor, 
 and he became the regular candidate of his party, much 
 to his surprise. He could hardly believe it possible that 
 he was really on the road to Congress, with a strong prob- 
 ability of reaching that goal. Things began to take on 
 a rosy hue again ; a little while ago the whole world had 
 seemed faded, and he not thirty yet. Perhaps he had 
 hardly tasted life ; perhaps the richest and best experience 
 of living was yet to come. All that he had gone through 
 seemed a long way off. Of course that was the spring, 
 the seed-time ; and in these last, discontented, apparently 
 idle years, it might be that the seeds were swelling, sprout- 
 ing, taking root. And now the sun shone, the birds sang, 
 and the green leaves would begin to shoot up. 
 
 For the space of a week the opposing wing of the party 
 made no sign, and it was thought that all feeling had died 
 away ; but, at the end of that time, Mr. Marchmont came 
 out, with a flourish of trumpets, as the people's candidate, 
 and the struggle must all be repeated on a larger scale. 
 
 Mr. Burns had an instantaneous presentiment, when 
 the news reached him, that it was all over with him. He 
 said as much to Mr. Courtenay, who laughed at the idea 
 and felt his own combativeness rising on behalf of his 
 friend. 
 
 "I have a feeling," said Mr. Burns, "that all these
 
 300 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 things have transpired once before, sometime in the dim, 
 past ages, and that they ended in defeat." 
 
 "You are too visionary," said Mr. Courtenay ; and 
 aroused himself and went up to Hammond Springs and 
 made the afore-mentioned speech. 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 SUMMER came on apace, reached its climax of heat, 
 dust, listlessness, and prostration, and began to wane. 
 One day a party of individuals ladies and gentlemen 
 alighted from a covered conveyance in front of the hotel. 
 One of the gentlemen, throwing the lines to Fred, held a 
 short consultation with the landlord, who had come out 
 on the steps ; the result of which was that they all pro- 
 ceeded into the house and up-stairs to the parlor. 
 
 " One, two, three, four, five, how many are there, 
 and who can they be?" said Mr. Burns. He and Mr. 
 Courtenay were just going down to supper. Two of the 
 gentlemen, of middle age nearly, had the air of school- 
 masters, and several of the ladies had a corresponding air. 
 There were two, however, that were probably school-girls; 
 young, pretty, and deep in flirtation with two daintily- 
 moustached young gentlemen, who waited upon them with 
 scrupulous gallantry. Besides all these there were still 
 two other ladies, who, by some indistinguishable line, 
 seemed to be divided from the others, and, you would 
 say, did not belong to the party. Not very young, one 
 was perhaps twenty-five, though slender and girlish-look- 
 ing, and the other ten or a dozen years older. There 
 was something in their dress and carriage that was not 
 exactly western, they were easy, graceful, evidently cul- 
 tivated. This much the attorneys, coming in after them 
 and passing on into the office, took note of though they 
 did not see their faces. The landlord bustled out into 
 the kitchen to give orders about the supper and then 
 came back. 
 
 "Who air they, an" where air they from?" asked a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 301 
 
 dry-goods' clerk, who was vigorously brushing his hair 
 that he had previously made soaking wet at the wash- 
 stand. 
 
 " A party o' pleasure-seekers from N City; mostly 
 
 school-ma'ams, I take it," said the landlord. " Except two 
 that they picked up on the way. The stage broke down 
 between here and Winchester, and the two lady passengers 
 got in with these folks and came on." 
 
 "Pleasure-seekers, and come here !" laughed the clerk. 
 
 "An 1 why not?" demanded the landlord, who thought 
 it politic to uphold the reputation of the village as a pleas- 
 ure-resort. " There ain't another town within a hundred 
 miles that's as neatly set down in the bend of a river as 
 this town is ; and as for the river itself, there's no purtier 
 stream on the globe. What with the falls, which is what 
 people comes mostly to see ; and what with the water, as 
 clear as crystal, showing every pebble in the river-bed, 
 I'd like to know where you'd find a more temptin' spot ; 
 and then at this season the maples look jest like so many 
 gorgeous foliage plants." 
 
 " Well, it does seem nice, looking at it that way," ad- 
 mitted the clerk ; " like a picture, as one may say; but 
 livin' right here we don't think much about them things. 
 I expect it's about the same with the folks at Niagara 
 Falls." 
 
 The last supper-bell rang, and they all went in and 
 seated themselves in their accustomed places. The party 
 of pleasure-seekers filed in through the hall-door and 
 ranged themselves around the lower end of the long table 
 which was always reserved for the travelling public. All 
 excepting the girlish-looking lady, whose non-appearance 
 was about the only thing the attorneys at the upper end 
 of the table made a note of. Her companion, though 
 middle-aged, was an exceedingly comely and interesting 
 woman. She might not have been even pretty in her 
 youth, having the palest of yellow hair, with eyes and 
 complexion to match. But she was plump and fair, and 
 her cheeks were still rounded, and her face was educated 
 and refined into a beauty of expression very agreeable to 
 see. She was full of a quiet strength and energy that 
 compelled great faith in her capability. She was one 
 
 26
 
 302 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 whose presence in time of danger would inspire courage, 
 and on whose judgment upon a wide range of subjects 
 one might safely rely. You would hardly limit her; you 
 would expect her to be almost infinite in resources. 
 When she had finished her supper, she said to the girl 
 who waited upon her, "You may bring me a cup of tea, 
 if you please, to carry up-stairs to Miss Stuvysant." 
 
 "Is your friend no better, madam?" asked one of the 
 professors. 
 
 "No; her head aches badly. She is not very strong." 
 
 "She doesn't look strong," said one of the lady pro- 
 fessors, sympathetically. 
 
 "Stuvysant, Stuvysant! where have I heard that name 
 before?" said Mr. Burns, as they stepped off the hotel 
 porch and went back to the office. 
 
 "I think you have seen it in the newspapers," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. "There is a lady reader of that name." 
 
 "Do you suppose this is the same?" Mr. Burns asked. 
 
 "It may be. Nothing more likely than that she should 
 be travelling across country in a stage, seeing we are lim- 
 ited in the matter of railroads." 
 
 "Which we shall not be long, thank heaven!" said 
 Mr. Burns, and they forthwith drifted away on that en- 
 gaging topic. 
 
 Work had already begun all along the line, and before 
 another year the cars would be steaming through High- 
 Water-Mark. 
 
 When Miss Stuvysant's friend carried her cup of tea 
 up-stairs, she found her lying across the bed in the little 
 chamber that had been assigned them. She sat up directly 
 and asked, " Why, is your supper over already, Miss Cleve- 
 land ?" lifting up a face that must be striking to any 
 beholder; not for any distinctive feature, though the 
 features were all fine : large brown eyes, soft hair, a 
 smooth, dusky skin, a delicate finish, but for a deep 
 meaning underlying it, a strong, beautiful soul shining 
 through it. It seemed feverish just now, there being an 
 unnatural, unusual glow in eye and cheek. 
 
 Miss Cleveland sat down on the edge of the bed and 
 carefully concealed the anxiety she began to feel as she 
 scrutinized the flushed face.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 33 
 
 " Yes, 1 have finished my supper," she said, " and have 
 brought you some tea. Is your head better?" 
 
 "My head? Oh, yes, my head is better. It doesn't 
 ache at all now. But say, listen ! can you hear my heart 
 beat ? It throbs so that it moves my whole body. See ! 
 I can't hold my hand still." 
 
 " My dear," said Miss Cleveland, " what is the matter?" 
 
 Miss Stuvysant laughed, and got up and walked about 
 rapidly. 
 
 "The matter? Why, I have heard some news ! and it 
 seems as if my heart will leap right out of my mouth. 
 Did you ever have that sensation?" 
 
 She stopped and held her two hands clasped over her 
 heart ; her face was inexpressibly radiant. She unclasped 
 her hands and put one finger upon her wrist. 
 
 "I never thought," she exclaimed, "that my pulse 
 would beat like that again !" 
 
 She seated herself beside Miss Cleveland, and twined 
 her arms around her. 
 
 "Did you ever think there was a secret about me? 
 Well, all these years that you and I, my best of cousins, 
 have been together am I not an ungrateful creature ? 
 I have had a secret. Yet not so much a secret, after all, 
 as a motive ; a deep-seated, unswerving motive. Would 
 you think it?" 
 
 "I should think, my darling," said Miss Cleveland, 
 with the utmost tenderness and admiration, " that you 
 had all your life been actuated by something grand and 
 noble and true to make you what you are !" 
 
 "Do you indeed think so?" said Miss Stuvysant, tears 
 shining on her eyelashes and in her eyes as she lifted them 
 up. " My egotism and my great reliance upon you make 
 me think that you do. Is it not sweet to accomplish in a 
 little measure what you have earnestly striven to do ? Well, 
 I have been actuated by something grand and noble and 
 true, by a life, by a beautiful life. I have tried to make 
 mine what that was, and what it would come to be, if it 
 continued on this earth, in the distant time when both it 
 and mine should ripen, with silver hairs, for eternity. 
 Oh, my friend, I have lived with one strong purpose and 
 effort to make my life run parallel with that life !"
 
 304 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 11 You said you had heard some news," said Miss Cleve- 
 land, who had a misgiving that her friend's mind was 
 wandering. 
 
 "Yes," said Miss Stuvysant, without any explanation. 
 " But I do not know that I have any cause to feel happier 
 for it ; yet I do feel happier. Say ! would you dare to 
 let yourself enjoy a blissful dream when you knew it was 
 but a dream?" 
 
 " I am afraid," said Miss Cleveland, " that we all please 
 ourselves with dreams more or less." 
 
 Miss Stuvysant got off the bed and went over to the 
 window looking down into the street. Miss Cleveland 
 came and stood beside her. 
 
 "Some people assert this," she said, "that our joys 
 and our griefs are equal." 
 
 "Yes," said Miss Cleveland; " if a pendulum swings 
 back, it must swing forward again just as far. I suppose 
 it is so with us." 
 
 "If we are evenly balanced," said Miss Stuvysant, 
 looking up; "not otherwise, I think. Some of us are 
 so unhappily constituted that if we swing back- we can 
 never get forward again. But there is," she added, 
 thoughtfully, "a grand principle in that pendulum move- 
 ment. Not many of us would shrink from going down 
 into the depths if we could rise correspondingly on the 
 heights." 
 
 Just then Mr. Burns and Mr. Courtenay stepped out of 
 the hall-door directly under the window, which was open, 
 and Mr. Burns made the remark recorded above. Miss 
 Stuvysant listened with an extraordinary brightness of 
 cheek and eye, and exclaimed, "I wonder how they got 
 hold of my name?" 
 
 " They probably heard me mention it at table," said 
 Miss Cleveland; "I told the girl to give me some tea to 
 bring up to you. I hope," she added uneasily, " that 
 the stage will be along to-morrow ; we have not got very 
 comfortable quarters here." 
 
 " But do you know," said Miss Stuvysant, seating her- 
 self by the window, and folding her hands on the casement, 
 "I have a fancy that I would like to stop here a little 
 while ! I might recover my truant health here, perhaps,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 35 
 
 as well as in Denver City. Look yonder ! across the val- 
 ley ; and away over the prairie to the north , and at that 
 long line of woods circling away. Is it not beautiful? 
 And then," narrowing her gaze, "the village itself is 
 pretty. There are a good many neat little cottages, and 
 there is the school-house ! I never see a school-house 
 without a thrill of interest. There must be even more at- 
 tractions in the place than we can see from this window," 
 she added, laughing, " to induce that party of excursion- 
 ists to spend their holiday here. They told me there was 
 a remarkable stream of water running through that body 
 of timber." 
 
 "I do not doubt it," said Miss Cleveland. "These 
 Western streams are all beautiful." 
 
 "And do you object to stopping here a few days?" 
 Miss Stuvysant asked, looking up wistfully. 
 
 " My dear child ! how can we possibly stop here longer 
 than is just necessary?" said Miss Cleveland, glancing 
 around the narrow room. 
 
 "Oh, not here, of course!" said Miss Stuvysant. 
 "But maybe we could get lodging somewhere in the 
 village." 
 
 "I hardly believe it. Still we might. I could ask the 
 landlord, I suppose." 
 
 " Do, pray !" said Miss Stuvysant. 
 
 Miss Cleveland arose at once, and went down-stairs. 
 
 The landlord, upon being consulted, said, " I know 
 of only one place where I think it likely you could git 
 board, an' that's at Deacon Clyde's. They take boarders 
 up there sometimes, if they are the right sort ; the dea- 
 con's folks are a little stuck up." 
 
 " Would you be so kind as to see them for me ?" asked 
 Miss Cleveland. 
 
 "Yes; I can do that. Did you want to go right 
 away?" 
 
 " We would like to go right away, if possible." 
 
 She went back up-stairs, and the obliging landlord 
 posted off to the deacon's, revolving in his mind the 
 possibility or impossibility, almost of entertaining so 
 many guests in case the deacon could not take these two 
 off his hands. After a little family consultation, in which 
 
 26*
 
 306 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 both Evelyn and Maggie joined, it was decided that the 
 ladies should come. 
 
 "It will be nice for a change, Evy," Maggie said. 
 " We can give them the front chamber up-stairs ; and of 
 course they will keep to themselves a good deal. And, 
 besides," she added, aside, " he says they are real ladies, 
 and I suppose they will be very pleasant company." 
 
 Evelyn did not particularly favor the plan, but gave up, 
 as she always did when there was not much at stake, to 
 Maggie. 
 
 "I'll have Fred bring 'em up right away," said the 
 landlord. " We're purty full at our house. The stage '11 
 be along some time to-night, I suppose, and fetch their 
 trunks." 
 
 So it was settled ; and in less than an hour the two 
 ladies, tired and travel-worn, were taking off their wrap- 
 pings in the pretty front chamber at the deacon's. The 
 windows, facing the west, commanded a view of the river 
 some rods distant, or of the strip of timber through 
 which it ran, and a long line of low, wooded hills, 
 stretching away, beautiful in autumn-tints. 
 
 " Isn't this restful?" said Miss Stuvysant, dropping into 
 a low rocking-chair in front of a small wood-stove with 
 isinglass windows through which the fire-light shone out 
 cheerful and red. And then added, laughingly, " I half 
 believe in special providences." 
 
 Miss Cleveland, folding up her shawl and putting it 
 away, smiled and shook her head. 
 
 " Special providences, my dear, come to those who are 
 looking for them. One might wander along the sea-beach 
 all day without finding a single pretty shell, unless he had 
 eyes for shells." 
 
 The following morning was perfect as an Indian summer 
 morning ; quiet and still, with a mellow, dreamy, hazy 
 atmosphere, and the sun shining through with agreeable 
 warmth and veiled brightness. Mr. Burns stood in the 
 office door, and felt like a fledgling anxious to quit its 
 nest. The world seemed so broad and inviting outside; 
 the day was so beautiful, the weather so fine, and the aii 
 so soft ; while everything was particularly dull, dusty, and
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 307 
 
 stupid inside. It was too warm for a fire, and the stove, 
 unblacked and rusty, with a whitish, burnt-out look, and 
 the dead ashes in the grate, was a saddening spectacle. 
 
 "Burr," said Mr. Burns, "we haven't been to the 
 river for a month ; suppose we take a stroll down that way 
 this morning." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay replied with a smile that showed itself 
 in the corners of his eyes, "I am a little suspicious of 
 your motives ; that party of school-ma'ams intend to 
 spend the day in the woods and along the river, do they 
 not ? gathering pebbles and snail-shells. I think I 
 heard some such plan discussed among them yesterday 
 evening." 
 
 " Upon my honor," said Mr. Burns, with unnecessary 
 emphasis, "I did not think of them. However, there is 
 a mile or two of river circling around the village ; we 
 could probably keep out of their way." 
 
 "Oh, yes," said Mr. Courtenay, "and I don't know 
 that I object, even, to stumbling in their way; we would 
 doubtless be counted in with the natural features of the 
 landscape." 
 
 " Or classed among the animals indigenous to the cli- 
 mate," laughed Mr. Burns. " Though most other animals 
 seek cover at the approach of strangers." 
 
 The wind was a little chilly, for all that the sun shone, 
 as they started off; having come up in the last ten minutes, 
 as prairie winds will do. Down in the woods it was much 
 warmer ; more hazy and more dreamy. One might easily 
 look at the sun by half shutting his eyes and glimmering 
 at it through his eyelashes. Dead leaves lay thickly on 
 the ground unstirred by the wind. Dry twigs snapped 
 under foot and birds twittered here and there. Rabbits 
 darted into thickets, and squirrels skipped about upon 
 limbs high over head, or disappeared mysteriously in holes 
 and hollow trunks of trees. It was as if nature had 
 dropped into her easy-chair and was taking a nap before 
 bringing out her war-forces for the winter campaign. 
 
 The two attorneys sauntered along down the white, 
 sandy road and took a seat upon a log in a sheltered, cozy 
 spot on the river bank. Mr. Courtenay lighted a cigar,
 
 308 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 and Mr. Burns inhaled its fragrance with a sense of en- 
 joyment. The river rolled industriously along at their 
 feet with a pretty, gurgling sound ; and innumerable small 
 fishes basking in the sun wriggled their small bodies in 
 the shallow water that lapped the white sand at its edge. 
 After a short, dreamy time, in which present surroundings 
 drifted away like a ship at sea, they heard voices ap- 
 proaching. 
 
 " That party of school-ma'ams," said Mr. Burns, with 
 a rueful glance back over his shoulder. 
 
 "Only two of them, though," he added, "and by the 
 way they are the two who are not school-ma'ams, Miss 
 Stuvysant and her chaperon. I take it she is her cha- 
 peron." 
 
 Miss Stuvysant had an open book in her hand ; as they 
 came slowly on she closed it, dropped a fine tissue veil 
 over her face, and they turned and walked down the river 
 bank. 
 
 "I wish I could see that woman's face," said Mr. 
 Burns, his eyes following them. " She diffuses a mag- 
 netic influence through the atmosphere that touches me 
 even here." 
 
 "You are very susceptible," said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Yonder," exclaimed Mr. Burns, looking back again, 
 " come the excursionists ! Shall we move on, or sit here, 
 'so still among the solitudes that the shy creatures of the 
 woods will think us stumps?' " 
 
 " I think it would be as well, seeing they are right upon 
 us," said Mr. Courtenay, "to sit still. It would be un- 
 dignified to run away." 
 
 "Oh, yonder's a boat, yonder's a boat!" exclaimed 
 one of the young ladies whom they called " Kitty." 
 
 " But don't you see that it's chained ?" called the other 
 one after her, for she had skipped away like a frolicsome 
 young animal and was half-way down the bank. 
 
 " I believe I have a key that fits that lock," said Mr. 
 Courtenay, drawing a bunch of keys from his pocket. 
 " It is Fred's boat; we used it one Sunday evening, if you 
 remember." 
 
 " Better take the responsibility of loaning it an hour or 
 two," said Mr. Burns. "It places a young fellow in an
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 39 
 
 awkward position not to be able to gratify a lady's wishes 
 under such circumstances." 
 
 The " young fellows" had both come up and stood 
 contemplating the chained creature as it rocked to and 
 fro in the shallow water, with an air of idle powerlessness, 
 hands in their trowsers pockets. 
 
 " If we knew who owned it," said one of them, giving 
 it a little kick with the toe of his patent-leather boot. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay got up and stepped leisurely forward. 
 
 " Here is a key, gentlemen, that I think will answer; 
 the boat belongs to one of the men up at the hotel. I 
 don't suppose there would be any objection to your using 
 it." 
 
 The young men thanked him and proceeded to unfasten 
 the boat. The young ladies looked up shy and blushing. 
 Mr. Burns arose and. joined his friend, and they strolled 
 away down the river. With a good many little screams 
 and ejaculations the young ladies were helped into the 
 tiny vessel, and the young men shoved it off and sprang 
 in after them. As for the professors and lady teachers, 
 who were evidently the pebble and snail-shell division of 
 the party, they proceeded farther up the bank and went 
 stooping about collecting geological specimens. 
 
 " Now wouldn't I thmile," said one of the young gen- 
 tlemen, who lisped, " if we'd upthet?" 
 
 " Oh, my goodness ! what should we do?" exclaimed 
 the girls. 
 
 "Really and truly, Herbert, what would you do?" 
 asked Kitty, looking up engagingly into the face of the 
 gentleman who lisped. 
 
 " I?" said he, smiling down at her. "I think I should 
 thwim out and call for help." 
 
 "Oh, you ungallant creature," said Kitty, and turned 
 away with a pout. 
 
 Meantime the two ladies who were not school-ma'ams 
 walked down to the falls and stood watching the water 
 splash and toss for a while, and then disappeared in the 
 woods. Discovering which, Mr. Burns lost interest in the 
 day, the river, the stroll, and the pleasure-seekers, and 
 proposed going back home. Towards evening the two 
 ladies walked down to the hotel, past the law-office, to
 
 3io 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 see about their trunks, which had not been sent up yet. 
 Mr. Burns standing idly in the doorway stepped back as 
 they came up, and Mr. Courtenay glancing from the win- 
 dow said, " Ah, the gray lady again !" 
 
 " What a finely-poised figure she has !" said Mr. Burns. 
 "Did you observe it?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay said yes, he had observed it. 
 
 " I am quite sure she is the reader whose name we have 
 seen in the papers. Her whole person, her attitudes 
 and movements, are full of language and expression. I 
 have a strange sort of fancy that she has felt the same 
 things that I have felt myself. It seems to me that there 
 hangs about her the atmosphere of a Byron, a Tennyson, 
 a Hawthorne, a Goethe. The rhythm of her motion is 
 as familiar to me as an old melody." 
 
 " You are disposed to be sentimental," said Mr. Court- 
 enay. " Hadn't you better write a little more poetry?" 
 
 "But why," said Mr. Burns, "cannot one get an 
 'air' from the people he lives with and who attune and 
 educate his soul even though they might be dead ages 
 ago?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay said the subject was one he had not con- 
 sidered ; and that in any case it lay too deep in meta- 
 physics for his practical mind to fathom. 
 
 In the evening, after the deacon's early tea, the visitors 
 were invited into the parlor. Subsequently, when the 
 lamps were lighted, Miss Cleveland excused herself and 
 went up-stairs to write a letter to a long-neglected friend. 
 After detailing the events of the journey westward, which, 
 as has appeared, had been undertaken for the benefit of 
 her friend's health, she said: "And now we are settled 
 down here in this little village of High-Water-Mark for 
 I cannot say how long. 
 
 "As you know, it matters little to me ; I am an individ- 
 ualized atom, not adhering to any particular spot. I have 
 my late magazines, leaves still uncut, a few choice books, 
 some needlework, my pen, and Miss Stuvysant. If I 
 had not the latter, my conscience would prick me sorely, 
 sometimes, with the hint that I am leading a very idle 
 existence. But I am comforted with the reflection that I 
 am needful to her. I am not one of those over-righteous
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 x i 
 
 souls who are afraid to accept ease and rest when they 
 come right in the way. If my Good Shepherd leads me 
 through green pastures and beside still waters, I am con- 
 tent to follow." 
 
 (I am bound to say explanatorily of Miss Cleveland 
 that when her path lay through stony places, through 
 bitter trial and humiliation, as it had done some ten or 
 fifteen years before, she did not shrink, but went bravely 
 on and came out one of those glorified victors which we 
 see, here and there, with invisible crowns on their brows.) 
 
 "I have told you," she went on, "so much about my 
 dear Miss Stuvysant, and yet I am convinced you can 
 never have a true conception of her until you have seen 
 her for yourself. She is something more than a genius. 
 She has the broadest mental and moral capacity of any 
 one I ever met, and she is perfectly balanced. 
 
 " People are apt to be one-sided, you know; to grow 
 only one way. Genius almost always shoots out in a cer- 
 tain direction like the tail of a comet. But Miss Stuvy- 
 sant radiates on all sides. She is the finest interpreter of 
 the deep and beautiful meanings of other minds, as shown 
 in their works, that I have ever known. 
 
 " She might do something grand, herself. I tell her she 
 might be a great writer, but she says the world has not 
 digested the half that is written now ; that there are beau- 
 tiful things in books that lie unnoticed, year after year, like 
 a pile of goods upon a counter waiting to be shown. And 
 she has the rarest tact and ability to show them. Did you 
 ever think how useless and meaningless words are until a 
 living soul is breathed into them ? Mere empty wine- 
 glasses. All that the mighty dead have given us are their 
 thought-moulds ; and if we have understanding and in- 
 spiration to fill them we may live as greatly as they." 
 
 Miss Cleveland was going on thus enthusiastically, 
 warming with her theme, when the subject of it came 
 quietly in and got her cloak and hat and passed out again. 
 She looked up, a little surprised, but asked no questions, 
 she seldom put so much constraint upon her friend as 
 to inquire into her actions and intentions, and resumed 
 her writing. 
 
 Miss Stuvysant wrapped her cloak around her outside
 
 312 
 
 HIGH WATER-MARK. 
 
 in the hall, and then went softly down-stairs and out of 
 the house. Miss Clyde was playing as she passed the 
 parlor-door. There was no moon, and, being a little 
 cloudy, it was rather dark. She passed swiftly out the 
 gate and down toward the village, the force of a strong 
 determination speeding her on. Not a soul was upon 
 the streets ; it was, indeed, a very quiet little village, and 
 all the stores and public places were already shut up, 
 and half the people asleep in their beds. She crossed 
 over, near the hotel, and came up on that side. A bright 
 light shone out through the one window of the law-office. 
 She stopped when she came near it, scarcely breathing, 
 her small hands clasped tightly, and her heart thumping 
 loudly in her bosom. Only one person was visible through 
 the window, Mr. Burns seated in an office-chair talking 
 to his friend opposite. His hair was tossed back, and he 
 was smiling and a little flushed, as though he were tri- 
 umphing in a debate, and there was a good deal of his 
 boyhood's beauty and grace upon him for the moment. 
 Miss Stuvysant gazed with her intense soul in her eyes, 
 and wrung her hands silently. 
 
 " Oh," she cried out in her heart, at last, " is it, is it 
 possible, after all these dividing years and circumstances, 
 that our two lives have come so close together again ? So 
 close that a few steps would bring us face to face ! Oh, I 
 knew it would come some time, at some ripe moment. I 
 knew that I must see you once more, my Charley, else 
 there is no labor and rest, no trial and compensation, no 
 cross and crown ; no even balance of anything in this 
 world." 
 
 She stretched out her hands in the darkness, her heart 
 yearning, and her eyes raining tears down her cheeks. 
 
 " My darling, my noble Charley, whose pure and grand 
 ambition pointed out the way of life to me, and led me 
 always as by an invisible hand, I have seen your face once 
 more, and I thank God !" 
 
 Her head dropped forward upon her bosom, and for a 
 single moment she knelt down upon the pavement, alone 
 in the darkness, then sprang up and sped swiftly home- 
 ward. Miss Clyde was still playing, and at the window 
 above still sat Miss Cleveland, bending her calm face
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 313 
 
 over her writing-desk. Miss Stuvysant felt that she could 
 not go in the house just yet. She sat down upon the 
 door-step. 
 
 "My Charley, my Charley!" she murmured, with a 
 tender smile on her lips, her eyelashes still wet; "to 
 think what a little space divides us ! And yet, and yet, 
 oh ! why have I forgotten that it is not space alone that 
 divides us, that ever divided us ! If only oceans and 
 mountain-chains, years ay, death itself, divided us, what 
 sweetness there would still be in the separation ! But this 
 eternal soul-estrangement, this echoless silence that lies 
 between us ! My darling, I have tried to believe that my 
 poor love for you would widen into sympathy with the 
 Infinite Love, and that my great sorrow would unlock for 
 me all sorrowing hearts, and teach me a broader charity 
 and tenderer affection for others than I should ever have 
 felt without it. Yet I did not limit the infinite in wor- 
 shipping you. I expanded your noble nature to infinity." 
 
 She so lost herself in revery that it was some time be- 
 fore her thoughts again took shape, and when they did, 
 the attitude of her mind had changed toward him so that 
 she no longer felt herself to be in communion with him. 
 "How strange," she said, "that now I am so near to 
 him he seems a thousand miles farther away than before ! 
 It is, because seeing him I realize how he has put me away 
 out of his consciousness, out of his life. It flows on with- 
 out me, unheeding me. I am dead to him ! How would 
 he meet me ? But I shall not meet him ! With all the 
 gathered fortitude of years I could not now undergo 
 that. And yet it is the thing I have hoped for and prayed 
 for, and promised to myself as a crowning reward. But 
 I have seen his face, and is not that enough ? Yet how 
 little, O God ! have I, indeed, this night reached the 
 full realization of this hope upon which I have fed my 
 strength all these long, long years ! And is there nothing 
 beyond? I have aimed at this, only this, and it has 
 come. What now?" 
 
 She might have sat the night through in the cold and 
 
 darkness, and with the wind blowing drearily over her, 
 
 if Miss Cleveland, having finished her letter, had not 
 
 come down in some alarm to look for her. She had never 
 
 o 27
 
 3 1 4 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 before brought herself to face the absolute fact that the 
 separation between herself and her lover had been indeed 
 final and effectual. She saw it now most clearly. 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 ELECTION-DAY was at hand, and political excitement had 
 reached its highest pitch. Mr. Burns's enthusiasm fired 
 his veins like the old ambitions of his boyhood. It is 
 true that we go all along through life with about the same 
 passions and hopes and impulses, except that they have 
 different objects. On the eve of election Mr. Courtenay 
 said, "You have grown thin, Charley; this excitement 
 has burned you out pretty fast." 
 
 " I know," said Mr. Burns ; " I can't help it. Whether 
 I win or lose, I shall feel vastly relieved when the thing is 
 well over." 
 
 ft Well," said Mr. Courtenay, "seeing the climax is so 
 near at hand, and you can do nothing more to help on your 
 cause, don't you think you had better be letting yourself 
 down a little so as to be able to meet a possible defeat?" 
 
 "I can't let myself down," returned Mr. Burns, impa- 
 tiently, "until the whole business is over." 
 
 " In that case, I am afraid you will fall hard if the worst 
 comes." 
 
 "Well, if I fail this time I'll no more of it. One de- 
 feat is all I can stand." 
 
 " You show very little pluck, Charley," said Mr. Courte- 
 nay. " Do you recollect the fable about the ant and the 
 grain of corn ?" 
 
 " Oh, for heaven's sake," said Mr. Burns, " don't bring 
 up any fables ! That wretched insect might have accu- 
 mulated a fortune, in smaller particles, if he had not 
 stubbornly persisted in trying to carry such a stupendous 
 load." 
 
 "He succeeded, though," said Mr. Courtenay. "I 
 would rather exhaust my life in one grand effort than 
 drib it out in little things."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 315 
 
 "And if you fail in your grand effort? I can picture 
 nothing more melancholy than a life devoted to the pur- 
 suit of one thing, giving up all else, and failing in its 
 accomplishment." 
 
 "I don't know why you should regard it as so melan- 
 choly," said Mr. Courtenay. "Lives are not so few or 
 so significant upon this earth that the loss of one need 
 be considered lamentable. The loss of one maggot in a 
 cheese might be felt by its immediate neighbors in the 
 way of giving them a little more room, but it would 
 hardly be perceptible to our larger vision." 
 
 "What wretched comparisons you make," said Mr. 
 Burns. " You strip man of all his dignity and import- 
 ance." 
 
 " Well, perhaps the figure I used was not attractive," 
 said Mr. Courtenay. " But I have a habit of speculating 
 about how the great mass of human beings must look to 
 some Higher Intelligence whose scope of vision is broad 
 enough to take in the world's millions. I suspect it very 
 closely resembles a nest of wriggling, struggling, quarrel- 
 some vermin, trampling each other under foot and rejoic- 
 ing in each other's downfall." 
 
 "I suppose you mean that as a hint at political con- 
 tention?" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "Oh, by no means ! I meant it quite generally. It 
 holds true in nearly all our relations with each other." 
 
 "But it is a fact," said Mr. Burns, "that there is 
 hardly any sort of contest in which there is less praise- 
 worthy emulation. If my election to Congress depended 
 on my making myself worthy more worthy than some- 
 body else of the office, I would give my heart and soul 
 to the task. But nothing depends upon myself but skilful 
 management of outside forces and strategic movements 
 against the enemy. It is merely a cultivation, on a little 
 higher plane, of the savage and cunning instincts of our 
 nature. If the high places in the nation were to be won 
 by hard labor and study, by great moral and intellectual 
 manhood, I could push forward with all the forces in me, 
 and feel that I, at least, had a worthy aim." 
 
 "You go in for Civil Service Reform, I take it," said 
 Mr. Courtenay.
 
 3 1 6 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 " I go in for something that calls for the best there is in 
 the men who lead," said Mr. Burns, "and for the best 
 men." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay had taken up off the desk two or three 
 little county papers that had lain there a week unopened, 
 and tore off the wrappers. Running his eye over them, 
 he came upon this item in the " Winchester Independent," 
 and, with a laugh, read it aloud for his friend's edifica- 
 tion : " Our would-be congressman, Mr. Charles Burns, 
 who waves his sword so gallantly and flaunts his lieuten- 
 ant's commission in our faces (the only recommendations 
 he shows, by the way), did, we understand, draw four 
 years' soldier's pay and loiter in the rear of the army, in 
 the hands of doctors and hospital nurses, for that length 
 of time ; a position, we have no doubt, more in accordance 
 with the gentleman's fastidious taste and delicate con- 
 stitution than beneficial to the country. A sword is well 
 enough, but we would prefer having it drawn in battle to 
 seeing it paraded on election-day." 
 
 "The scoundrel !" said Mr. Burns, red and white by 
 turns with anger. " It is that brainless fop who blows 
 the horn for country dances, damn him !" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay laughed. " My dear boy, he handles 
 you gently to what some of your political friends have 
 handled Marchmont. He appears to accuse you of cow- 
 ardice ; did not I, myself, bring pretty much the same 
 charge against your opponent?" 
 
 " You did it with more decency," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "You mean I ground my knife down to a finer edge. 
 It probably cut deeper." 
 
 "What a detestable business it is," said Mr. Burns. 
 " Run a man for office, and it is like starting up a deer 
 and setting the hounds after it." 
 
 The momentous day dawned and faded ; a busy, noisy, 
 harrowing day. When the election returns came in 
 slowly, and balancing pretty evenly for a day or two, now 
 this one ahead, and now that they showed, at the last, 
 a majority for Marchmont. Mr. Burns staggered a little 
 under the shock, and looked white about the lips and 
 haggard about the eyes, but recovered and bore himself 
 like a man who has the true courage in him. It was a
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 317 
 
 little trying to hear the condolences of his friends, and 
 he waived them off as lightly as possible. 
 
 "It is all right, gentlemen; we are beaten and must 
 give up," he said, smilingly, shaking the hands that were 
 held out in useless sympathy, and getting back into the 
 office and shutting himself up with Burr, who was quite 
 cut up on his account. 
 
 "It seems incredible, Charley," he said. "Up to 
 this time I thought your chances were absolutely sure. 
 I knew there was a good deal of chicanery going on, but 
 I had no idea they would defeat you." 
 
 "Well," said Mr. Burns, "I suppose all I have to do 
 is to settle down to the old routine again." 
 
 The prospect seemed dreary enough. 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 THE forerunner of winter a blustering, disagreeable 
 avant courier came in with a dismal rain ; cold, pene- 
 trating, and exceedingly uncomfortable. The trees were 
 not yet stripped of their leaves, which hung dripping and 
 wet. The sky gave no hint of any brightness back of its 
 heavy, leaden canopy ; and the faith of human nature is 
 not yet so happily grounded in his beneficent majesty, 
 the sun, but that it wavers a little when he hides his face, 
 and we childishly say, " Will it ever shine again ?" Mr. 
 Burns, who, in these latter years, had become very sus- 
 ceptible to the moods of the weather, and feeling some- 
 how that the dreary days were more typical of life than 
 the pleasant ones, got out his guitar from under the bed 
 in the back room (he had learned to play it a little while 
 he was in the army), put it in as good tune as he could 
 for the dampness, and sang Longfellow's "Rainy Day," 
 looking out into the bleak, deserted street with the spirit 
 of melancholy brooding in his blue eyes. 
 
 Mr. Courtenay, serenely smoking, looked up when he 
 had finished and said, " Now suppose you give us ' Den 
 Lieben, Langen Tag;' those songs are calculated upon 
 
 27*
 
 3 1 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 such a day as this to put us in cheerful harmony with 
 nature." 
 
 Mr. Burns, laughing, said, "I beg your pardon, Burr, 
 I know it's damnable." And got up and put the guitar 
 in its box and shoved it under the bed again. 
 
 " What are you doing?" Mr. Courtenay asked. " Don't 
 mind me ; if you feel like venting yourself in that way, 
 do so. I haven't the least objection." 
 
 Mr. Burns said he had vented himself sufficiently in 
 that way, and came back to his place at the window. 
 He still stood looking out when Miss Cleveland passed 
 by, wrapped in a waterproof cloak and carrying an 
 umbrella. He startled his friend by an exclamation, and 
 the light of awakened interest, or attracted attention, 
 broke athwart his melancholy eyes. 
 
 " What is it?" Mr. Courtenay asked. 
 
 " Miss Cleveland passing by. Her face, Burr, is a 
 wonderful break in the dreary monotony of a day like 
 this. Did you ever observe what a cheerful, hopeful, 
 animated face it is?" 
 
 " No," said Mr. Courtenay, indifferently. He was not 
 in the habit of observing faces that were not young and 
 pretty. 
 
 " If I thought I could compass such an act of gal- 
 lantry," said Mr. Burns, "I would rush out when she 
 goes back and volunteer to carry her umbrella for her. 
 But she seems such a competent sort of person that I am 
 afraid she would think it a superfluous attention." 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. Courtenay; "elderly females, I have 
 observed, prefer to manage their own umbrellas. If it 
 was the other one, now, Miss Stuvysant !" 
 
 " We never see Miss Stuvysant," said Mr. Burns. "I 
 wonder if she is hermitizing herself at the deacon's? By 
 the way, Burr, what an age it has been since we called at 
 the deacon's. I had almost forgotten about those ladies, 
 we have been so engaged with that confounded election. 
 I suppose it is really incumbent upon us to go and present 
 ourselves to them." 
 
 "The obligation doesn't rest very heavily upon me," 
 said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "I don't know that it would upon me, either," said
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 3*9 
 
 Mr. Burns, " if I had not so often met those pleasant 
 eyes of Miss Cleveland's. I wonder," he continued, 
 "what is the secret of such happy, hopeful, kindly eyes? 
 What have they looked on in this dreary world ? What 
 have they found to content them ? I suppose we all feel 
 the ' strong necessity of living,' but I can hardly conceive 
 what happy combination of circumstances would make 
 people glad of their life. For me, I am nothing but an 
 hour-glass, through which time sifts his tedious sands. It 
 certainly seems to me, sometimes, that man has been 
 made a sorry jest of." 
 
 " In what way?" Mr. Courtenay asked. 
 
 "In being endowed with a capacity for things which 
 do not exist ! In being deceived a thousand times with 
 bubbles that, before they are in his grasp, promise to sat- 
 isfy his hungering, but burst the moment he touches them, 
 and float away, leaving him, each time, a little sadder, a 
 little wiser, and with the void in his soul constantly in- 
 creasing, and demanding something better, larger, higher 
 than the toys which have proven worthless. Thus we go 
 on, from one thing to another, from the plays of child- 
 hood to the grave pursuits of men ; from the primer 
 rhymes to the grandest poems ; from the twittering of 
 birds and our mother's lullaby to the finest orchestra, 
 and it is always the same ; belief and ecstasy at first, dis- 
 satisfaction and scepticism at the last." 
 
 "You have not fathomed everything, yet," said Mr. 
 Courtenay. "You have not yet come into the natural 
 and lawful inheritance of man ; to which, it seems to 
 me, -with your tastes and disposition, you have the clearest 
 title. A man like you ought to marry. Stretch out your 
 hand in your imagination and surround yourself with 
 an ideal home ; let there be warmth, color, books, music, 
 an atmosphere of perfect refinement ; prattling, blue-eyed 
 babes, pretty little copies of yourself, in whom you could 
 see a continuation of yourself away down through the 
 future, and a sweet woman with a heart that loved you, 
 and do you still think you would contend that life held 
 nothing worth while?" 
 
 A smile crossed Mr. Burns's face, and his inner vision 
 dwelt half tenderly, half painfully, upon the picture, a
 
 320 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 picture that his memory had sanctified as among his ear- 
 liest, happiest dreams. 
 
 "How do I know," said he, "but that even that is 
 one of the bubbles that would break on my lips ? The 
 way of it is, everything is dazzling, and blinds our eyes 
 until we grasp it. Yet I do believe," he added, "that 
 the gratification of the affections does do more toward 
 reconciling people to existence than anything else." 
 
 "You must not, Charley," said Mr. Courtenay, "take 
 yourself as a type of the great masses of humanity. Look 
 at the thousands who have a strong interest in living and 
 working ! Because you have nothing to lay hold of do 
 not, therefore, conclude that there is nothing satisfactory 
 to man in. this world, and that consequently the world is 
 a failure." 
 
 "'The greatest good to the greatest number,'" said 
 Mr. Burns, laughing. " Perhaps that is the best law we 
 could make, and yet it is imperfect. The greatest good 
 to all men, I would have it. My sympathies have always 
 been with the few who are crushed for the sake of the 
 many. One human being, you see, is capable of all the 
 joy and all the suffering in the world, and if the world 
 could make all people happy but one man, and he was 
 left desolate and hungry and cold, it would be a failure." 
 
 "I think he would be a failure," said Mr. Courtenay, 
 "and rather than have my feelings lacerated with sym- 
 pathy for him I should vote for his extinction." 
 
 "You never," said Mr. Burns, "can carry on an argu 
 ment on legitimate grounds !" and went over and stood 
 before the book-case and scanned the backs of the books, 
 all standing upright in military order. It was among hib 
 few occupations to keep them so ; and Mr. Courtenay, 
 who had careless habits in regard to the books, made it 
 necessary for him to go over them, dusting and straight- 
 ening up, once or twice a week. His eye fell upon the 
 large, handsome, leather-bound volume of Shakspeare, 
 and he exclaimed, dramatically, " Where are you, William 
 of Stratford ? You have solved that momentous question 
 To be, or not to be for yourself, but not for us. Burr, 
 if we could believe that all these great, grand souls were 
 gathered somewhere in the Beyond, and were waiting for
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 321 
 
 us, we would have something to live for and to strive for, 
 a glorious immortality ! There are some sweet spirits 
 here," tapping the books, "that I would much like to 
 meet ; communion with whom would satisfy the utmost 
 longing of my soul." 
 
 " But I strongly suspect," said Mr. Courtenay, " that all 
 the immortality those sweet spirits possessed they put into 
 their works and left behind them. Humanity absorbs and 
 reabsorbs them, and so they live on through the ages." 
 
 " That theory cuts off all a man's possibilities," said 
 Mr. Burns, "and even loses to the world the lesson of 
 grand lives lived in obscurity. Nothing is of any conse- 
 quence when it is past, but the leaving our mark upon 
 time. If our advanced thinkers had not progressed quite 
 beyond the idea of immortality of spirit, we might, in 
 this liberal day, with regard to the life beyond the 
 grave, have the most beautiful conception the human 
 mind is capable of. Theology has taken away so many 
 of its old restrictions that we are left to wander in Elysian 
 fields of imagination ; and every man can choose for him- 
 self out of the illimitable. But alas ! we know nothing. 
 And the fear of there being nothing behind the great 
 curtain of death palsies our energies, makes us say, If 
 this is all, how little!" 
 
 Presently, Mr. Courtenay got up and put on his hat 
 and great-coat. Mr. Burns asked where he was going. 
 
 "Around to old Shankey's to get a bottle of wine," 
 said he. " It may put us into a more hilarious mood." 
 
 Mr. Burns did not object, as he often had done. In 
 spite of his morbid views of life, and his reckless throw- 
 ing away or at least wasteful disuse of energy, he had a 
 keen consciousness of the dignity of manhood, which lay 
 like an anchor at the bottom of a stormy sea, on which he 
 might toss hither and thither but could not quite float 
 away. When Mr. Courtenay came in with a little puff 
 of winter about him, and literally shut the door to the 
 world locking it he came forward, almost eagerly, with 
 the dogged thought, one must do something, and made 
 at the same time a half-angry resistance to the feeling, 
 strong within him, that it was contemptible to drink wine 
 for the purpose of raising one's spirits. The question 
 o*
 
 3 22 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 came up, was it any worse for himself than for Burr? 
 And some inner consciousness answered in the affirmative. 
 Burr had no evidence about him of any reproving inner 
 consciousness. It was just the time of day, he said, set- 
 ting the bottle down upon the table and shaking the rain- 
 drops from his hair, for a little stimulus to come in and 
 help on the tide that regularly ebbs and flows in the human 
 system once every twenty-four hours; in his case reach- 
 ing the lowest point somewhere about mid-day, and com- 
 ing up steadily to high tide from that time until ten or 
 eleven o'clock P.M. 
 
 On this day high tide occurred a little earlier than 
 usual, being artificially accelerated, and about dusk the 
 young men had arrived at such a pitch of hilarity as re- 
 quired the guitar to be brought in again. Their two 
 voices Mr. Burns's treble and Burr's deep bass made 
 an excellent duet. No matter, now, if the night did close 
 in in utter darkness and the wind, in angry gusts and heavy 
 with rain, sweep round and over them, driving against the 
 windows, rattling the unstable little building and threat- 
 ening to shake it down over their heads. It had defied 
 worse storms. They had built up a fire and opened the 
 grate, and the ruddy light played over their faces that 
 were soon devoid of melancholy, though from time to 
 time expressive of pathetic emotion as the sentiment of 
 the song waxed touching and appealed to their stimulated 
 susceptibilities. The old war songs were all gone over 
 with intensified recollection of days gone by. Some 
 negro melodies were feelingly rendered, and Sweet Home 
 and Kathleen Mavourneen. The latter, especially, Mr. 
 Burns excelled in ; singing it with a pathos bordering on 
 affectation, which, somehow, one rather likes in a man's 
 voice. Then Burr called for Star of the Evening, which 
 was his favorite, and conducted the air himself; Mr. 
 Burns giving him a desultory accompaniment and impro- 
 vising a disconnected alto. 
 
 Fred came over from the hotel and said "missus" had 
 been keeping their supper warm for an hour, and wanted 
 to know what was the matter. Mr. Burns, disturbed at 
 the interruption, was about to despatch him back with the 
 good-natured message to let the supper go to thunder;
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 323 
 
 but Burr, who was always the cooler on these occasions, 
 returned a polite answer to the effect that they were ex- 
 tremely sorry to have occasioned any inconvenience, but 
 they did not care for supper, being very much engaged ; 
 at which Fred glanced with a broad grin at the bottle and 
 the glasses. Mr. Burns poured him out a sparkling goblet 
 and bade him drink to his own good health and life-long 
 prosperity. After which he took his departure, Mr. 
 Courtenay getting up to relock the door. 
 
 It was mail-night, and men were splashing along the 
 streets with lanterns and umbrellas. Many of them, 
 hearing the music in the office, paused outside and 
 listened, or peered in at the window; jested among 
 themselves, and reported as a good piece of gossip when 
 they got home that " them lawyers was havin' a jubilee 
 again to-night with their wine an' their singin'." And 
 it is a fact lamentable or otherwise that the social 
 standing of the reckless attorneys did not suffer greatly 
 from such reports. I am bound to say in their defence 
 that they had never allowed themselves to become beastly 
 intoxicated ; but they took no pains to contradict various 
 assertions to that effect, and no precautions against their 
 being made. They sang their songs and emptied their 
 glasses in the face and eyes of the whole village ; Mr. 
 Courtenay because he held public opinion in supreme 
 contempt, and Mr. Burns because he scorned secrecy and 
 preferred to take the bad consequences of bad conduct on 
 the spot. It is true some of the more orthodox members 
 of the community gathered their respectable garments 
 around them and passed by with averted faces, meaning 
 to frown down such goings-on. But the large majority 
 looked with indulgent eyes on the little irregularities of 
 these two bright lights. 
 
 Deacon Clyde was one who stopped outside in the rain 
 and the darkness, and reported to his family and the two 
 lady guests who were all gathered, as usual during the 
 early evening hours, in the sitting-room, busied with va- 
 rious sorts of light work, that the lawyers were having a 
 concert, and he guessed they were a little tipsy; adding, 
 "They've got to have a bout once in a while, I s'pose, to 
 keep the blues off."
 
 3 2 4 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "What kind of a concert?" asked Mrs. Clyde, looking 
 up through her spectacles as tne deacon took out his news- 
 paper and brought his arm-chair up to the light. 
 
 "A kind of a private one," said he, laughing; "any- 
 how, the audience was all on the outside. Some of 'em 
 tried to get in, but the door was locked. They had their 
 refreshments spread out on the table, and Mr. Burns was 
 playing his banjo." 
 
 " Oh, uncle ! his guitar," said Maggie, looking up and 
 then blushing deeply. 
 
 " Maggie knows ! he played it under her window one 
 night," exclaimed Mrs. Clyde, with a wink at the visitors, 
 rather proud to mention the circumstance. 
 
 "Auntie !" said Maggie, and bent over her work. 
 
 Miss Stuvysant, with her hands lying in her lap, turned 
 her luminous eyes upon Maggie's face like one who had 
 received a shock and was struggling silently and with the 
 strong effort of accustomed self-control to adjust herself 
 to a strangely altered condition of things. They had 
 been domiciled at the deacon's a couple of weeks, and 
 she had heard frequent laudable mention of the attorneys: 
 their knowledge, their eloquence, their indefatigable efforts 
 toward getting the railroad, and their growing popularity. 
 During the political campaign, when Mr. Burns's chances 
 for Congress were the universal topic of discussion, she 
 had felt a feverish excitement perhaps greater than his 
 own. And when it was all over, it was a hard thing 
 one of the many hard things in her painful relation to 
 him that she could not go and offer a word of sympathy. 
 Though, of course, the bare thought of going to him only 
 crossed her mind when she forgot, momentarily, the great 
 gulf lying between them. It may seem strange, yet it is 
 a fact, that such moments of delicious forgetfulness did 
 come, even after all these years. It is said that when one 
 has lost a limb the sensation of its being still in its place 
 frequently occurs. So when one has lost a friend, the 
 old, sweet sensation of the friendship steals back, and the 
 waking up from these delusions is almost as full of anguish 
 as the first shock. 
 
 It was perhaps the saddest -thing in poor Wilmingard's 
 case that she felt herself capable of making Mr. Burns's
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 325 
 
 life a complete and perfect life. She knew his proud, 
 sensitive, loving, hopeful, despairing nature so well ! She 
 knew just where she could soothe, encourage, cheer, sym- 
 pathize. She felt that she understood just how time 
 and circumstances had swept between them, causing the 
 estrangement which he himself had at last made final. 
 The thought that he might come, some time, to give the 
 love that had been hers to another woman had never 
 troubled her since the death of Miss Maclvers. It did 
 not seem possible. Neither did she believe he would 
 ever come back to her. What she hoped for and looked 
 forward to was that she might at last stand on a high level 
 with him above the throbbing passion-world when re- 
 collection had lost its sharpness of pain. This was her 
 religion. She believed that she was following the invisi- 
 ble guidance of his spirit. She had come upon him un- 
 awares in this obscure little village, which fact in itself 
 was a shock, because she had always thought of him as 
 mingling in the rush and tide of life and activity. But 
 the stories of his fame and popularity made her heart 
 thrill again with the old pride she used to feel in him. 
 She had never before had a hint of the things she had 
 heard to-night. And it seemed as if the strong current 
 on which she had been borne all these years, up to this 
 moment, was setting back with a mighty revulsion. She 
 felt like letting go the oars she had pulled so long and 
 sinking down. It is pitiful to find that we have built our 
 life upon a delusion ! And yet there may be something 
 in the life itself indeed, there must be if the habit we 
 have acquired is a good habit to compensate for the 
 shaken foundation. 
 
 As soon as she could steady her voice and movements 
 she arose and bade the family good-night, with her usual 
 kindly courtesy, and went up-stairs. Kneeling beside 
 her trunk, she opened it and brought out from its depths 
 a portrait of Mr. Burns, taken in his uniform and with 
 the first flush of his military enthusiasm upon him. She 
 held it in her hand, looking at it passionately, with tears 
 in her eyes. 
 
 "Oh, can it be," she cried, "that you have made so 
 little of your noble self? When you were but a boy you 
 
 28
 
 326 HIGH- WA TER- MA RK. 
 
 scorned such follies as you are engaged in to-night, my 
 proud Charley !" 
 
 She recalled Mrs. Clyde's jest and Maggie's blushes, 
 and felt her lip curl; but gazing at the beautiful, boyish 
 face, with its high, proud look, she dropped her head 
 upon her arm, and wept as she had hardly ever wept be- 
 fore. 
 
 When Miss Cleveland came up a little later, the light 
 which had beamed in Miss Stuvysant's eyes ever since 
 she had known her the light which shines from a soul 
 looking up with hope and trust seemed to have gone 
 out. 
 
 CHAPTER XLII. 
 
 THE following evening being a little less dreary than 
 its predecessor, Mr. Burns, again referring to the deacon's 
 family and their guests, proposed to go up and call upon 
 them. Mr. Courtenay declined, saying, "I have a sus- 
 picion that you will not see Miss Stuvysant, and I do not 
 care to make the acquaintance of the elderly lady." 
 
 " The acquaintance of the elderly lady is what I par- 
 ticularly look forward to," said Mr. Burns, and immedi- 
 ately prepared himself for the visit. It was cold, and he 
 stepped to the closet, remarking, "I think I had better 
 get out my great-coat." 
 
 "Yes, I would," approved Mr. Courtenay; "it does 
 not give you so much the appearance of an invalid as the 
 blue cloak does." 
 
 "What shall I say for you," inquired Mr. Burns, "in 
 case they happen to speak of you ?" 
 
 "You may say that I am indisposed," said Mr. Courte- 
 nay. "I'll back up the statement by not leaving the 
 office until you come back. If you are not well enter- 
 tained, you can make my case pretty serious and come 
 home early." 
 
 "You would do for a diplomatic ambassador at the 
 court of France, or some other polite nation. I wonder
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 3 2 7 
 
 why you never directed your talents to that end," said 
 Mr. Burns, and went out. 
 
 As had happened upon a former occasion, when he was 
 ushered, with a little atmosphere of cold air about him, 
 into the warmth and light of the deacon's parlor, the 
 Kirkwoods and their nephew (the doctor) were there, 
 which again struck him with a not altogether pleasant 
 sensation at first. But they all arose and welcomed him, 
 as before, with so much cordiality that the feeling was 
 dispelled, and he took his place upon the sofa, near Mag- 
 gie, with a disposition to make himself agreeable. His 
 first quick glance around the room had shown him that 
 the strange ladies were not present. But he did not mind 
 that after a moment, with Maggie's bright face before 
 him, and knowing that her whole being was pulsing with 
 delight that he was near. There is a subtle flattery in the 
 knowledge that our presence gives pleasure which is very 
 soothing, and which makes us turn very kindly towards 
 the one who conveys it. 
 
 Maggie at once broached the subject of the strange 
 ladies, having an impulsive way of plunging into subjects. 
 
 " Did you know that that Miss Stuvysant, whom Eva 
 
 and I heard read at N City once, was stopping here ?" 
 
 she 1 inquired. 
 
 "I supposed it was the same," said Mr. Burns. "I 
 heard you had some visitors. I did not know but I might 
 have the pleasure of meeting them this evening." 
 
 "Would you like to meet them?" asked Maggie. "I'll 
 go and ask them to come down !" And before Mr. Burns 
 could protest, she darted away, skipped up the stairs, and 
 knocked at the visitors' door. 
 
 They seemed to have settled themselves for the evening. 
 Miss Stuvysant was writing, and Miss Cleveland had some 
 work in her hands. 
 
 "We have another arrival down-stairs," said Maggie, 
 a little out of breath and with the color brightening in 
 her cheeks. "And I didn't know but you would come 
 down now. Mr. Burns is here and wishes to see you." 
 
 " Indeed?" said Miss Cleveland. 
 
 Miss Stuvysant dropped her pen and looked up, her 
 face growing pale.
 
 328 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 " Shall we go down ?" Miss Cleveland asked. 
 
 "Oh, no; I will not," said Miss Stuvysant. "But 
 suppose you go down ?" she added. 
 
 Miss Cleveland deliberated a moment and then arose. 
 "Well," she said, with a little laugh, " I'll smooth my 
 hair and come presently; you need not wait for me, 
 Maggie." 
 
 Maggie hastened back. 
 
 " Well," said Mr. Burns. " Did you succeed?" 
 
 "Miss Cleveland is coming down," Maggie returned. 
 " But Miss Stuvysant refused. I'm sorry. She is the one 
 I wanted you to see." 
 
 " Do you think so much more of her than of the other 
 lady?" Mr. Burns asked. 
 
 "Oh, I like them both," said Maggie. "But Miss 
 Stuvysant is so much I hardly know what to say, so 
 much more attractive than Miss Cleveland. She charms 
 you so with her sad eyes and sweet smile." 
 
 " Oh, has she sad eyes?" 
 
 "Maybe you would not think so," said Maggie. "Eva 
 doesn't. But when I sit and look at her a long time I 
 always think I see something sad in her eyes. Eva says 
 they are dark and thoughtful, that is all. But I cannot 
 see much difference between 'sad' and 'thoughtful,' can 
 you?" 
 
 Mr. Burns laughed. "There is a philosophy in that," 
 said he, and of course Maggie did not understand. 
 
 At that moment Miss Cleveland came in. Miss Clyde 
 being near the door, drew up a chair for her near Mrs. 
 Kirkwood, with whom she immediately fell into conver- 
 sation, after shaking hands with the minister and bowing 
 to Doctor Webster and Mr. Burns, whose names Miss 
 Clyde mentioned. The doctor and Mr. Burns had each, 
 in turn, arisen and sat down again. Mr. Burns being at 
 some distance from her watched her face, liking it all the 
 better the more he saw of it. Quiet, yet animated, blue- 
 eyed, intelligent. 
 
 By and by, when a convenient opportunity occurred 
 (Mrs. Kirkwood being called out of the room by Mrs. 
 Clyde to be shown something in another part of the 
 house), he excused himself to Maggie and crossed over
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 2 9 
 
 to her. She looked up with a smile and held out her 
 hand to him. 
 
 "I think I have met your eyes before, Mr. Burns," 
 she said. "And, besides, you are a person of so much 
 note in the village that one cannot be here long without, 
 at least, getting acquainted with your reputation." 
 
 "My reputation," said he, flushing a little at the re- 
 membrance of his dissipations, which he knew to be 
 greatly enlarged upon by the village gossips, " I am afraid, 
 will not commend me to you. I must make a strong per- 
 sonal effort to win your favor." 
 
 Miss Cleveland laughed. 
 
 " Well," she said, " I am so much of an egotist, that 
 I ground my opinions of people upon my own judgment 
 of them rather than upon hearsay." 
 
 "Good; that gives one a better chance," said he. 
 " It is not that I pride myself on being a superior lawyer, 
 but I would always rather plead my own cause." 
 
 "To be sure," she returned. "You have a vital in- 
 terest in it, and of course would plead eloquently. But, 
 really, Mr. Burns," she continued, "whatever we hear of 
 people it seems to me that it is right to withhold judgment 
 upon them until we have seen and studied them a little. 
 The soul of a man is an excellent stenographer and takes 
 him down in shorthand upon his face, upon his move- 
 ments and actions. And a little careful study will enable 
 us to decipher the hieroglyphics which the unseen sculp- 
 tors are working upon us." 
 
 " But that study," said Mr. Burns, " is sadly neglected, 
 as is shown by our being so often taken in." 
 
 " And by our sometimes entertaining angels unawares," 
 returned Miss Cleveland, smiling. " Perhaps we as often 
 fail to appreciate as we overestimate. I was admiring, 
 the other day, a fine collection of photographed statuary, 
 and I came across the portrait of an obscure country 
 clergyman that had gotten among the beautiful ideal 
 pictures. It was a homely, intelligent, sympathetic face, 
 with lines drawn all over it, representing thought and 
 feeling, and it struck me that one living, human being 
 who was being carved from within was worth more than 
 all the chiselled marble in the world. That is, that the 
 
 28*
 
 33 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 lesson of his life was worth more than all the lessons 
 wrought in stone. I am afraid we sometimes fail to esti- 
 mate the value of each single life. There are so many 
 people in the world, there are such crowds wherever we 
 turn, that we mass them together like so many inanimate 
 things. We all like to be individualized. I suppose that 
 is why so many of us struggle for fame and position. 
 We want to be lifted up where people can see that we are 
 one, apart from the many." 
 
 " And do you think it of consequence to be one among 
 the many?" Mr. Burns asked. "I mean, do you con- 
 sider that this brief life of ours is of sufficient importance, 
 even at the best, to induce us to make the most of our- 
 selves?" 
 
 " Oh, most assuredly, Mr. Burns ! Why, do you doubt 
 it ? It seems to me that now, more than ever before in 
 the history of the world, it is worth while to beautify and 
 elevate our lives. And certainly, it has always been of 
 importance that men should make the most of themselves. 
 We can see that very easily can we not? by looking 
 back on the steps that have been taken upward from mere 
 animal existence. It is of incalculable benefit to us that 
 men did what they could with their hands and their 
 brains in the past ; and what we can do in the present 
 may be infinitely beneficial to future generations." 
 
 "Why do you say," asked Mr. Burns, "that the 
 present is a better time to be and to do than the past 
 has been ?" 
 
 " Oh, because we have so much better light, so much 
 greater freedom. The old shells of prejudice and super- 
 stition are crumbling away, and the souls of men are 
 bursting forth with new life. We are at the dawn of a 
 new era of unfettered thought and purpose. I do not 
 envy your sex, Mr. Burns ; but I feel this : oh, to be a 
 man in this nineteenth century and alive to the grandeur 
 of it ! Is it possible you have not yet waked up to that? 
 If so, I must give you a shake." 
 
 "I wish to heaven you could!" said Mr. Burns. "I 
 wish you could rouse me out of the morbid lethargy I 
 have fallen into in this excuse me damnable little 
 hamlet."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 331 
 
 "I will do my best," said Miss Cleveland, laughing, 
 "and if I prick you hard you must cry out. I wish," 
 she added, " you could meet my friend." 
 
 " And can I not?" he asked. 
 
 " I am afraid not. She is something of an invalid just 
 now, and does not wish to meet strangers. However, 
 I will try and persuade her to make an exception of 
 you." 
 
 "Do," said Mr. Burns. "Lay my forlorn case before 
 her, and maybe she will take pity on me." 
 
 It was a little dinner party, to which the Kirkwoods 
 had been invited, and Mr. Burns, being pressed to re- 
 main, did so, chiefly on Miss Cleveland's account. It 
 seemed to him that the deacon's parlor walls were stretch- 
 ing away into infinite proportions with this woman in 
 them whose mind showed such a vast expanse. Her pres- 
 ence was like the out-door air, in which he could take 
 deep, delicious breaths, and feel intensely satisfied. She 
 gave him that comfortable assurance and security that a 
 strong hand-clasp in the darkness gives to a child or a 
 woman. At dinner he had her beside him ; Maggie and 
 Dr. Webster sat opposite. The doctor looked across and 
 asked Miss Cleveland the stereotyped question, " Madam, 
 how do you like the West?" 
 
 " Oh, very well, indeed," she answered. " This is not 
 my first visit. I suppose I should not be saying anything 
 original, if I offered an objection to the wind !" 
 
 " That depends on what original is," said Mr. Burns. 
 " I hold that anything we discover for ourselves is orig- 
 inal." 
 
 "Then we must all have a vein of originality," said 
 Mrs. Kirkwood, "for I hardly think any one would fail 
 to make the discovery you speak of who spends any time 
 on the prairies." 
 
 Mr. Burns laughed. "Mrs. Kirkwood and I," said 
 he, "discussed the subject of the prairies, on a former 
 occasion, at great length." 
 
 As soon as they adjourned to the parlor, Miss Cleve- 
 land excused herself, fearing her friend might be lonely, 
 and went back up-stairs, and to Mr. Burns the stimulus 
 of the evening was gone. The parlor walls narrowed
 
 33 2 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 down again to commonplace dimensions, and all the 
 faces grew dull and the voices irksome. He felt an im- 
 patient longing to get away ; and I, his biographer, am 
 obliged to hurry him off as soon as is possible and polite. 
 Bowing himself from the deacon's door-step, the door 
 Maggie held open, lighting him out and feeling, some- 
 how, that his leave-taking was very unsatisfactory, he 
 hastened home and found Mr. Courtenay smoking and 
 reading as usual, with a good fire in the stove. He laid 
 aside his book, but kept on smoking. The president of 
 the railroad company had made him a present of a hand- 
 some meerschaum pipe, which he took great pride and 
 interest in coloring. 
 
 "Well!" he said. "Did you have a pleasant even- 
 ing?" 
 
 "Very, indeed," said Mr. Burns. "You ought to 
 have gone." 
 
 " Did you see the ladies?" 
 
 " I saw Miss Cleveland." 
 
 "The elderly spinster." 
 
 "She is a grand woman !" said Mr. Burns, uncompro- 
 misingly. "She is a woman with a soul, and to me her 
 face is beautiful beyond description." 
 
 " I should have thought her past the stage of beauty," 
 said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Of course, I do not mean mere outside, physical 
 beauty. I mean the beauty that shines from within," said 
 Mr. Burns. 
 
 " Ah !" Mr. Courtenay took his pipe from his lips 
 and eyed it admiringly. " I see. You are not taken 
 with an image of clay, however exquisitely fashioned. 
 You prefer the meerschaum that grows more beautiful with 
 age and the glowing life within it. I had never thought 
 of applying that to woman." 
 
 "Burr," said Mr. Burns, half jestingly and half in 
 earnest, " I am lost in astonishment sometimes that you 
 and I have held together so long, seeing what little sim- 
 ilarity there is between us !" 
 
 " I suspect that is just the secret of our holding to- 
 gether," said Burr. "Existence would have been too 
 tame if we had not disagreed so well."
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 333 
 
 CHAPTER XLIII. 
 
 Miss STUVYSANT had spent the evening in intense 
 excitement, walking the greater part of the time back 
 and forth the short length of the chamber, every nerve 
 a quiver. Now and then she had opened the door and 
 leaned over the banisters to catch, if possible, the tones 
 of the voice that had once struck so thrillingly upon her 
 ear and whose echoes sounded in her memory yet, running 
 like an undercurrent through all the music glad or sad, 
 or gentle or tumultuous of her life, and which she had 
 never yet found it in her heart even to try to hush. But 
 the closed parlor doors shut off all distinct sounds, and 
 only a confused hum reached her. When her friend came 
 up-stairs she turned toward her with bright, inquiring 
 eyes. 
 
 " My dear, I am afraid you have had a long, lonely even- 
 ing," said Miss Cleveland. "I got so deeply interested 
 in that young lawyer that I could not tear myself away. 
 I think it would have done you good to meet him ; more- 
 over, I think it would have done him good to meet you." 
 
 " Why so?" Miss Stuvysant asked. 
 
 "Because I think he needs a little help. He feels so 
 keenly the social and intellectual poverty of a place like 
 this." 
 
 " Well," said Miss Stuvysant, with a flash of her dark 
 eyes, " the world is wide and contains incalculable wealth 
 in those directions. I suppose he was not compelled to 
 plant himself in the desert. If one deliberately puts one- 
 self in the way of poverty he must accept its privations. 
 And he ought to do it without complaining." 
 
 Miss Cleveland laughed. 
 
 " My dear, I wonder if ever one friend endeavored to 
 prepossess another in favor of a third, and succeeded? I 
 fully intended you should like Mr. Burns, and I ignorantly 
 thought I could show him to you just as he appeared to 
 me. Now to me there was something rather noble in his 
 taking a stand in these Western wildernesses instead of
 
 334 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 hovering, like so many other busy bees, around the sweet 
 cups of Eastern wealth and pleasure. He is not one who 
 must simply gather up from the outside ; there is enough 
 in him to grow up and make a man. I like that spirit of 
 sturdy independence that cuts loose from the helps that 
 so often prove hindrances, and stands alone. Such natures 
 have a chance to grow broad and strong ; and they do. 
 I unwarily admitted that Mr. Burns complained. I have 
 no doubt, my dear, that that grand old oak which you 
 and I observed standing in the midst of a ten-mile stretch 
 of loveliness on the prairie not very far from here, mur- 
 murs in its leafy top at its isolation from all its kind. And 
 yet if it had grown among a thousand others it might not 
 have been half so fine. However strong we are, we all 
 want sympathy. Mr. Burns, I think, is peculiarly in need 
 of it. It may be the breakers have not tossed him about 
 much bodily ; to outside eyes his life may appear serene 
 enough ; but to me he seems to have had a great deal of 
 inner experience. He has fought and suffered, and hoped 
 and despaired, and labored all within himself; there is 
 evidence in his face of fires that have burned fiercely 
 and smoulder yet perhaps. I fancy that life to him has 
 seemed sometimes maybe it does now like struggling 
 in deep water to save himself from sinking down. That 
 is why I said he needed a hand held out to him. He 
 knows that he is endowed with a rare nature, and he has 
 a dread of its being wasted. He wants to do something, 
 and be something worthy of himself. And this, my dear, 
 is the farthest remove from egotism. I have hardly a 
 doubt that his life here is just the right discipline for 
 something that may come hereafter. It is only in the 
 rebound from the lowest that we reach the highest. Our 
 feet must touch bottom in the dark, deep streams of life 
 if we would have our elastic souls spring up to meet the 
 brightness of a perfect day." 
 
 "Oh, I know that, I feel that !" said Miss Stuvysant, 
 fervently. " I do believe with a firm conviction which my 
 own experience has strengthened, that everything which 
 comes to us is for our good. Everything, I mean, except 
 our own sins and mistakes. And even those may be 
 turned to account in bettering our after-lives ; though I
 
 HIGH- IV A TER-MARK. 
 
 335 
 
 dislike that thought, there is a sort of exultant selfishness 
 in it ; our sins and mistakes have so close a bearing upon 
 our fellow-beings ! I almost hated the king in Auerbach's 
 On the Heights." 
 
 "But after all," said Miss Cleveland, " the only thing 
 left him was to take the consequences of his sin and, as 
 you say, turn them to account in bettering his after-life." 
 
 After a little silence fraught with deep feeling, at least 
 on the part of Miss Stuvysant, she said, "I have never 
 told you much about myself, dear Miss Cleveland ! Long 
 before I knew you there was a time when everything was 
 so dark to me that I longed to die. I did not think of 
 the rest and peace that many people link with the idea of 
 death. I only wanted oblivion. I shrank as much from 
 consciousness upon the other side of the grave as upon 
 this. If I thought of God at all and believed in Him, I 
 believed only that He was good and merciful and would 
 not drag me up into another miserable existence after this 
 was ended. I was a poor little handful of dust animated 
 with suffering rather than with life ; for life means growth 
 and blossom and fruitage, and I did not live in any such 
 sense." 
 
 "But, my dear child," said Miss Cleveland, interrupt- 
 ing her, "you lived in the sense in which trees live in 
 winter. The soil in which our souls' growths spring up 
 must have a season of inactivity, a sort of brooding-time, 
 as it were." 
 
 Miss Stuvysant smiled, though tears were rolling down 
 her cheeks. 
 
 "Well, it was a hard, cruel, bitter winter," she said. 
 "Oh, I pity myself, even now, in the recollection of it ! 
 I was so little and frail, so borne down and dejected, so 
 rejected and cast down, as though utterly unworthy of all 
 I craved. Oh, it is so hard when, in the ignorance and 
 innocence of youth, you have believed in yourself through 
 the strong assurance of those you loved, to be put aside ! 
 To lose not only your place in the hearts you trusted, but 
 even in your own happy self-confidence ; for that follows 
 when the arm you leaned upon and relied upon as upon the 
 very truth of God, turns and casts you off. Then it is 
 that woman forgets her womanliness, and pride cannot
 
 336 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 come to her rescue. Then she bows down. Oh, God, 
 pity her! Oh, God, pity her !" 
 
 She fell upon her knees by the bedside, and covered 
 her face with her hands in a wild paroxysm of tears. Miss 
 Cleveland knelt down and wound her arms strongly around 
 her. 
 
 " My dear child," she said, " do not give way to that 
 feeling ! I knew you must have suffered ; I knew it be- 
 cause you are what you are. It could not be otherwise. 
 But it is all past and gone now ; you have many dear 
 friends who feel your worth, and you are restored to faith 
 in yourself. And it is a truer faith than that grounded 
 in youthful inexperience and in your friends' kindly praise. 
 Can you not look back even now and think that all was 
 for the best? After the smoke of battle has cleared away 
 we can see just where we stood. We may see, too, how 
 the very cloud that oppressed us protected us. Think of 
 this, dear child. What are they that have never struggled 
 and suffered ? Their souls' depths have never been sounded. 
 The passionate music that has pulsed along the great world's 
 throbbing heart through all the past has no deep meanings 
 for them. I used to like to repeat, during my own time 
 of trouble, 
 
 " ' In life's goblet freely press 
 
 The leaves that give it bitterness, 
 Nor prize its colored waters less ; 
 For in thy darkness and distress, 
 
 New life and strength they give. 
 For he who has not learned to know 
 How false its sparkling bubbles glow, 
 How bitter are the drops of woe 
 With which its brim may overflow, 
 
 He has not learned to live.' '' 
 
 Miss Stuvysant dried her tears and arose. 
 
 "It is weak of me to do this," she said. "It is not 
 often of late years that I have felt so broken down as I 
 have to-night." 
 
 " You will feel better to-morrow," said Miss Cleveland, 
 caressingly; "go to bed and sleep. These things will 
 come tiding back to us all through life. A great sorrow 
 will never quite fold its wings and lie still in the past." 
 
 There had been frequent openings and closings of the
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 337 
 
 doors below, and all the visitors had departed, and the 
 family had retired to their respective rooms ; the deacon 
 and his wife to slumber peacefully, Maggie to divide pleas- 
 ant and painful thoughts between Mr. Btirns's indifference 
 and Dr. Webster's gallantry toward her, and Evelyn to 
 lie awake for hours torturing herself with speculations as 
 to why Mr. Courtenay had ceased his visits. 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 THE following day, late in the afternoon, a visitor 
 sprang out of a buggy in front of the law-office and came 
 in, carrying a whip in his gloved hand. He introduced 
 himself as Ralph Rosevelt. Perhaps they had heard of 
 him, he suggested, with bland egotism. Oh, yes, they 
 had heard of him, the rich farmer and cattle-buyer living 
 at the extreme northeast corner of the county. Mr. Cour- 
 tenay set out a chair which Mr. Rosevelt, thanking him, 
 declined, saying that his business was brief. He had 
 come to engage an attorney's services on a trifling law- 
 suit. He was a large, burly man, showily dressed, dis- 
 playing a good deal of jewelry about his person, and con- 
 veying an idea of wealth and vulgarity. When he spoke 
 of the lawsuit he hinted, with a smirk, that there was a 
 woman connected with it ; at which Mr. Burns looked up 
 sharply, and Mr. Courtenay, with a fine sense of decency, 
 dropped his eyes. Mr. Rosevelt, catching Mr. Burns's 
 glance, was disconcerted a little, and moved back his chair 
 and sat down, tapping the floor with the handle of his 
 whip ; and thereafter addressed himself chiefly to Mr. 
 Courtenay, the countenance of that accomplished attor- 
 ney expressing nothing but polite interest as he inquired 
 into the nature of the case. It seemed that Mr. Rosevelt 
 had been proceeded against by the husband of the woman 
 for beguiling her affection away from himself. 
 
 "And you wish to prove the accusation groundless, I 
 suppose?" said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Of course. What else could a man do?" Mr. Rose- 
 p 29
 
 338 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 
 
 velt demanded, with a laugh. "And between you and 
 me it is groundless, which is the ugliest part of it, ha, ha.' 
 The fellow's a fool and doesn't know it; he has got the 
 brightest and most virtuous little woman in the world, and 
 he doesn't know that, either. Too smart for him by a 
 damned sight ; and so high-strung that she would snap if 
 you touched her with the tip of your finger." 
 
 " I suppose he wants to get some money out of you," 
 said Mr. Courtenay. 
 
 "Yes, no, I don't think it's that so much as his 
 temper. The fool's jealous ; which is another way of 
 saying his wife's too good for him ; an acknowledgment 
 I wouldn't make, for my part, ha, ha." 
 
 He glanced at Mr. Burns again, who seemed to have a 
 subduing effect upon him, for he drew down his face and 
 arose. At that moment another visitor, having hitched 
 his horse to a post outside, came in. A small, sandy- 
 haired, excitable individual, who also carried a whip in his 
 hand which he clutched nervously as his glance encoun- 
 tered the burly Rosevelt. 
 
 "You here, you scoundrel?" he hissed, getting in- 
 stantly almost beside himself with rage and hate. 
 
 Rosevelt grasped his whip as if to strike him, but con- 
 trolled himself. The new-comer Marks was his name 
 turned to the attorneys. 
 
 " Have both you gentlemen agreed to take sides with 
 that villain against honor and decency? I can tell -you 
 in a few words how the case stands between us. He 
 wants to beat me in law, while at the same time he exults 
 over me in his mean soul in the triumph of winning away 
 my wife. He wants a double triumph, and he hasn't even 
 the decency to conceal it. He makes a boast of it." 
 
 Mr. Courtenay was about to recommend milder language, 
 when Mr. Burns interposed. " I believe," said he, " that 
 Mr. Courtenay has agreed to a proposition from Mr. Rose- 
 velt ; if you wish, I will undertake the prosecution." 
 
 "But I intended to retain you both," exclaimed Mr. 
 Rosevelt. " You are partners, are you not?" 
 
 "No, we are not. And I assure you, sir, you will find 
 Mr. Courtenay fully adequate for your defence if I prose- 
 cute."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 339 
 
 "When is the trial to take place?" Mr. Courtenay 
 asked. 
 
 "Oh, immediately," said Mr. Rosevelt. "Before 
 Squire Blakey, our Briarly Hollow magistrate. I presume 
 the court is already assembled. It is four o'clock now, and 
 we've got a ten-mile drive," taking out a massive gold 
 watch. " You can get right in with me and we'll be off." 
 
 "Thank you," said Mr. Courtenay. "I have a con- 
 veyance of my own which I would prefer taking, and that 
 will save you the trouble of bringing me back." 
 
 " And you," said Mr. Marks, addressing his attorney, 
 "can ride with me, and I will explain the case on the 
 way." 
 
 "I am much obliged," said Mr. Burns, a little coldly; 
 " but I presume the case will develop itself when the wit- 
 nesses appear. I will go with Mr. Courtenay." 
 
 Mr. Rosevelt had already gone out and driven off at a 
 fast trot. Mr. Marks followed him, and Mr. Burns went 
 out the back door to harness Nobby, leaving Burr to gather 
 up a few law-books and put them in a valise. 
 
 Nobby was a fleet-footed animal, and Mr. Burns took 
 great pride in his gait and carriage ; a feeling, by the way, 
 which his companion did not share. Nevertheless it was 
 nightfall when they drew up before Squire Blakey's un- 
 pretentious abode with its homely surroundings, rickety 
 stables, straw-covered sheds, and spacious barnyard with 
 cattle lying down and dogs coming up to bark a good- 
 natured welcome. Mr. Burns was about to apostrophize 
 the scene in a line or two of pastoral poetry, when a half- 
 grown boy detached himself from a group in the door- 
 yard and came up to the carriage, examined Nobby with 
 the glance of a connoisseur in horse-flesh, and laid his 
 hand upon the rein with the kindly familiarity which the 
 boy-nature readily assumes toward the lower animals. 
 "Feed him oats, or corn?" he asked, shutting one eye 
 and looking up inquiringly with the other. 
 
 " He won't murmur at either," said Mr. Burns, getting 
 upon the ground and stretching his legs. " Rub him 
 down well, my boy; we have given him a pretty hard 
 drive. I suppose," he added, "we shall bring up all 
 right if we follow the path that leads up from this gate?"
 
 340 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Yes," said the boy, who seemed to have a facetious 
 vein, "it aint much of a trick to find the right door; 
 there's only one, except another clean round t'other 
 side o' the house." 
 
 Thus enlightened they opened the gate and proceeded 
 toward the house. Lights were flashing through the un- 
 covered windows, and showed them a commodious kitchen 
 improvised into a court-room ; the squire seated at a table 
 on which lay a pile of books and some writing utensils, 
 and a motley assemblage of people seated upon chairs and 
 benches. The squire himself arose to open the door and 
 received them pompously, never having had the pleasure, 
 as he said, of making their legal acquaintance before. 
 His daughter, a young lady of some pretentions to style 
 and fashion, and with an air of feeling superior to her 
 surroundings, conducted them coquettishly across into the 
 best room to take off their hats and great-coats. Her 
 mother, a spare, elderly woman, in a clean white cap 
 with loosened strings, came in and apologized for having 
 "court" held in the kitchen. 
 
 "There's so many that comes stragglin' in at sich a 
 time as this," she explained, " that it would ruin a body's 
 carpet. ' ' 
 
 "You are quite right," said Mr. Burns, stepping over 
 to the little parlor stove, in which a newly-kindled fire 
 crackled and snapped, to warm his hands. "The kitchen 
 is quite good enough for gatherings of this nature." 
 
 The carpet was a rag carpet, and the long, white cur- 
 tains, looped with scrupulous precision, were coarse mus- 
 lin ; but it was a nice, tidy room nevertheless, and it 
 would have been a pity to bring all those coarse boots and 
 their tobacco- chewing owners into it. As soon as the 
 attorneys got the numbness warmed out of their fingers, 
 for it had been quite chilly riding, they stepped out to 
 the "court-room," and preparations were made for the 
 trial to begin. 
 
 The woman who " was connected with it" was a pretty, 
 bright-eyed brunette, with hot, indignant blushes in her 
 cheeks. Mr. Courtenay wondered how she came to be 
 married to the sandy-haired individual, and Mr. Burns 
 was surprised at her reputed preference for the burly Rose-
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 34 I 
 
 velt. Public sentiment appeared to be in her favor, but 
 that was all, the evidence, such as there was, being upon 
 the other side. Mr. Burns felt himself in a delicate posi- 
 tion between sympathy and consideration for the woman, 
 and indignation toward Rosevelt. It appeared to him, as 
 the case developed itself, that Mrs. Marks was the victim 
 of both the accused and the accuser, and that she held 
 them both in disdain for dragging her through the mire 
 of a public lawsuit. Her husband was jealous, irritable, 
 and bad tempered ; and Rosevelt, who admired her and 
 had taken several occasions of forcing his society upon 
 her out of revenge for her contempt of him, had played 
 upon her husband's jealousy and anger, and so, inadver- 
 tently, brought the matter before the public, rather glory- 
 ing in the notoriety, but anxious to throw the costs upon 
 his adversary. The misdemeanors for which he was ar- 
 raigned were not very flagrant violations of law, and yet 
 sufficient, perhaps, to have turned the tide against him 
 he having no witnesses and depending wholly upon his 
 lawyer, had not that shrewd barrister hit upon a device 
 that necessitated an adjournment until the following morn- 
 ing, and then brought the trial to a speedy close. It was 
 this : Opposed to half a dozen disreputable men and 
 women who affirmed that upon several occasions they had 
 seen Mrs. Marks in company with defendant at unseason- 
 able hours and in out-of-the-way places, Mr. Courtenay 
 brought double the number of witnesses to declare under 
 oath that nothing of the kind had ever been seen by them. 
 No amount of questioning or cross-questioning could elicit 
 anything further, not a particle of evidence was there to 
 bear upon the case in hand, and Mr. Burns looked upon 
 it as rather a cumbersome joke, and not being in a face- 
 tious humor, passed it over, in making his plea, with little 
 comment. His astonishment was extreme when Mr. Cour- 
 tenay arose and made that absurd testimony the ground- 
 work of a long and able argument. Selecting one >f the 
 leather-covered volumes from the kitchen table, he turned 
 the leaves and pointed to a paragraph containing the pro- 
 vision that "Judgment shall be rendered in favor of that 
 side upon which there is a preponderance of testimony." 
 Taking this for a text, and warping it so that a superior 
 
 29*
 
 342 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 number of witnesses was made to appear analogous to a 
 " preponderance of testimony," he drew a striking com- 
 parison between the two sides of the house, and sat down 
 amid boisterous applause. 
 
 Mr. Burns arose indignantly, and endeavored to explain 
 the sophistry. " Is it necessary," he demanded, "that 
 the whole neighborhood should witness a theft in order to 
 convict the robber?" He quoted and read law in regard 
 to witnesses and testimony at great length, and got him- 
 self thoroughly warmed up on the subject ; and for once, 
 at least, was a match for his ready-witted opponent. Mr. 
 Courtenay replied ; parliamentary rules were set aside, 
 and the argument descended to a personal debate, having 
 little reference to judge or jury. Finally, after repeated 
 calls to order from the "court," who felt that its dignity 
 was being disregarded, they sat down, having expended 
 their sharpest sarcasms upon each other ; whose subtle- 
 ties, though but imperfectly understood, were loudly ap- 
 plauded by the gaping audience. The squire summed up 
 the testimony, and in his "charge" dwelt at great length 
 upon defendant's preponderancy of evidence (having a 
 leaning toward the wealthy Rosevelt), and the jury brought 
 a verdict in his favor. 
 
 Mr. Marks fairly stamped with rage and disappointment, 
 while his opponent indulged in a supercilious quietude of 
 manner, probably for the sake of contrast. Mrs. Marks, 
 of whom Mr. Courtenay had made pathetic mention in 
 his plea, and to whom Mr. Burns had referred in the most 
 delicate and respectful manner as being in no way an- 
 swerable for the charges brought against Rosevelt, and in 
 his opinion uncompromised by them, arose, when the trial 
 was at an end, and approached him with eyes still flashing 
 and cheeks still burning, and thanked him for his kind- 
 ness and consideration. 
 
 " I would like to see you on business of my own," she 
 said, with a quivering of her lips. "I mean to get a 
 divorce. I can't live with him after this. Will you come 
 over to my house?" 
 
 "Where do you live?" Mr. Burns asked. 
 
 "Across the fields, yonder, about a mile from here. 
 I want you to see mother."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 343 
 
 "Very well," said Mr. Burns. " I will see what I can 
 do," and she turned away. 
 
 Domestic troubles were, of all things that came in the 
 way of his professional practice, the most sickening to 
 Mr. Burns's soul. There were other cases wherein poor 
 men's earnings were wrenched from them by the hard 
 grasp of the law, or where widows and orphans suffered 
 through fraudulent tricks of apparent justice, that had 
 made him wish, many a time, he had chosen some other 
 work to do in the world than seeking to disentangle the 
 threads that vice and cunning and bad nature are forever 
 weaving around the innocent and unsuspecting. But this 
 cutting among the heart-strings that had once thrilled to 
 the sweet music of love, this making of widows and or- 
 phans that should be left to the hand of death alone, 
 were most distressing. 
 
 To go back to the evening before. After adjournment 
 Mr. Rosevelt invited both attorneys home with him to 
 spend the night, ignoring, in Mr. Burns's case, any un- 
 pleasantness in their relations toward each other ; showing 
 that somewhere in his coarse nature at least, so Mr. 
 Burns interpreted it there was a streak of delicacy and 
 good breeding. Though it might have been mere policy, 
 a man of Mr. Rosevelt's cunning and experience and 
 success in certain directions being capable of looking a 
 great way ahead, and keeping a good many irons in the 
 fire ready for future use. There seemed to be no other 
 way; the squire's house was small and overflowing with 
 boys and girls in all stages of growth, and they were 
 constrained to accept the hospitality that offered. 
 
 As they were about starting Mr. Rosevelt remarked to 
 Mr. Courtenay, "If it is not objectionable to you or 
 your friend, I would like to have you get in with me, 
 and Mr. Burns can follow us." 
 
 "Certainly not," they said. 
 
 Mr. Rosevelt's place was not above a mile and a half 
 distant, and was situated in the belt of timber close by the 
 river. The house, however, was approached by a long ave- 
 nue of maples, very bright just now in their autumn dress. 
 At the end of this there was a wide "clearing" for the
 
 344 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 buildings, with here and there a picturesque and mighty 
 oak left standing. The house was a large, white Gothic 
 cottage-house, with porticoes and verandas, and green 
 blinds at the windows. It was enfolded lovingly in the 
 arms of two or three of the massive oaks, and had a most 
 homelike and beautiful aspect, bursting upon the sight in 
 the stillness of a perfect moonlight night. It was very 
 late, but there were lights glimmering through the blinds. 
 Long before they reached the gate at the end of the 
 avenue, a deep-mouthed dog began baying loudly and 
 tugging at a huge chain by which he was fastened in one 
 corner of the yard. Two men came out of the rear of 
 the house and took charge of the horses. 
 
 "Folks sitting up yet?" Mr. Rosevelt asked. 
 
 "Yes, sir," one of them answered, respectfully. 
 
 Mr. Burns began insensibly to think better of his host. 
 As they walked up the path to the front door, it struck 
 him that it was the loveliest, most peaceful-looking abode 
 he had seen in the West. Surely the man out of whose 
 brain the conception of it had come, and whose hands 
 had executed it, must have a good side to him. Two 
 small boys, with curly heads and the brightest black eyes, 
 came running to meet him as he opened the door, but 
 backed down shyly at the sight of the strangers. Four 
 other boys, two of them quite grown, were seated round 
 a large centre-table strewn with magazines and papers. 
 A tall woman, with a queenly head and grand, dark eyes, 
 sat among them, but arose as they entered, and the boys 
 all followed her example. 
 
 Mr. Rosevelt addressed her as "wife," and presented 
 the attorneys, whom she received with grave but kindly 
 courtesy ; starting a little when Mr. Courtenay's name 
 was mentioned, and looking at him sharply. 
 
 "And here," Mr. Rosevelt continued, "you see the 
 rest of my family, Frank, the eldest, and Ralph, and 
 Jake, and Ben, and those little urchins under the table, 
 Ned and Joe. They," he added, with a laugh, "are 
 genuine backwoodsmen; never have seen 'society,' ha, 
 ha. Marjory," addressing his wife, " you must take them 
 East next time you make a trip and get them a little used 
 to the world."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 345 
 
 "That is a lesson they will learn soon enough," said 
 Mrs. Rosevelt, smiling toward Mr. Burns, whose face, 
 from the first moment, she seemed to like. "I thought 
 I would give nature the first chance with them. They 
 run about the woods and paddle their little boat upon the 
 river, and we teach them all the time without their know- 
 ing it, and they are as happy as any other young animals." 
 
 "You are adopting the German method with them," 
 said Mr. Burns; and added, laughing, "I shall always 
 regret that I lived my childhood before the days of ' Kin- 
 dergarten.' I pity myself even now poor little morsel 
 of humanity ! when I look back on my early school- 
 days." 
 
 "Yes; the world is getting better to the children in 
 many respects," said Mrs. Rosevelt. 
 
 "And better for the grown folks, also; is it not, 
 mother?" remarked Frank, the eldest, in a voice so rich 
 and deep for his years, he could not have been above 
 eighteen, and, moreover, falling upon Mr. Burns's ears 
 with such a strangely familiar sound, that he started and 
 looked keenly at the speaker, who returned his gaze with 
 a pair of mild but intensely black eyes. 
 
 Mr. Burns's thought was, " What a beautiful boy ! I 
 must have seen a painting somewhere that looks like him." 
 
 Like the other Rosevelts, he had black hair curling all 
 over his head, but his skin was fair and rosy. He was 
 short in stature and rather fleshy ; his hands and feet were 
 remarkably small, but finely shaped, his fingers tapering 
 to delicate, shell-tinted tips. Evidently he was not vain 
 of his beauty; it rather embarrassed him. He blushed 
 like a girl under Mr. Burns's continued, admiring gaze. 
 It was easy to discover, in the course of half an hour, 
 that he was the idol of the household, and that he de- 
 served the affection his charming person and manners 
 inspired. He had recently graduated at the State Uni- 
 versity, and was now about to enter a theological seminary 
 and study for the ministry. He told Mr. Burns, subse- 
 quently, that he had hesitated between preaching and 
 teaching. He would have liked to secure a professorship 
 of rhetoric and elocution in some college. " I am a 
 worshipper of language," he said. " I love words better 
 v*
 
 346 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 than pictures or music. They are the more laconic and 
 precise expressions of thought. They have been born of 
 the stress of human needs and polished by the utterance 
 of millions. I love to trace them back to their begin- 
 nings; I like to know the circumstances that called them 
 into being. I know language changes, but we can still 
 dive down through all the variations and grasp the old, 
 imperishable roots." 
 
 "And have you gone to the bottom of many languages?" 
 Mr. Burns asked, not without a touch of sarcasm ; for that 
 had come to be almost a habit of his mind. 
 
 The young man blushed, and seemed to draw back a 
 little. 
 
 "Oh, no!" said he. "I beg your pardon, if I gave 
 you such an impression." 
 
 Mr. Burns, sorry that he had wounded him, hastened 
 to make reparation. 
 
 " I suspect you have given some attention to elocution, 
 and I should like to hear you read. Excuse me for saying 
 it, but you have, it seems to me, a very remarkable voice." 
 
 "It is a natural endowment, however, Mr. Burns," said 
 Mrs. Rosevelt, who had been a listener to the conversa- 
 tion. "Frank has been too thorough a student to give 
 his time to the cultivation of one faculty, except inci- 
 dentally. "However," she added, "we all like his read- 
 ing, and I am sure it will give him pleasure to entertain 
 you." 
 
 "Marjory," said Mr. Rosevelt, shortly after they were 
 seated, "can't we have a little music before we retire?" 
 
 He seemed, in the midst of his home-circle, greatly 
 influenced by its air of refinement. His coarseness was 
 toned down, and his selfishness and egotism passed into 
 the wider channel of affection for, and pride in, his family. 
 He was very generous, too, as regarded money, spending 
 it lavishly for the comforts and luxuries of life, and for 
 the good of his wife and children. Selfishness was the 
 root and tree of his nature, but it bore some sweet blos- 
 soms, nevertheless. 
 
 Mrs. Rosevelt went to the piano, an old-fashioned but 
 finely-toned instrument, standing open and loaded with 
 music. The boys all gathered around her and took the
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 347 
 
 different parts in a quartette, making a charming picture 
 as well as a most pleasing harmony. It was after this 
 that Mr. Burns had the before-mentioned conversation 
 with Frank. 
 
 By and by Mrs. Rosevelt took the two younger children 
 and went out of the room. Ralph and Jake also said 
 "good-night," and vanished. Mr. Rosevelt and Mr. 
 Courtenay, at a little distance, sat talking together. Mr. 
 Burns was suddenly startled by the appearance of a woman 
 standing in the doorway near him and looking across at 
 Burr, who did not observe her, with a wild, unearthly 
 expression. He had not heard her step, and there was 
 no rustling of the soft, dark garments she wore. In a 
 moment she turned, threw up her hands, and glided away 
 as noiselessly as she came. Mr. Burns looked inquiringly 
 at his companion. 
 
 "It is my Aunt Laura, my mother's sister," he ex- 
 plained, with a slight shade of embarrassment. 
 
 Mrs. Rosevelt re-entered, and the little circle broke up 
 for the night. The following morning after breakfast 
 Mr. Burns went back to his room to look for some papers 
 he had missed, and, the window being hung upon hinges, 
 he opened it and stepped out on the veranda to look 
 about and to collect his thoughts for the day's business. 
 Burr and Mr. Rosevelt were in the yard below, at some 
 distance, leaning against the fence, smoking cigars. Mr. 
 Burns took a turn around the corner of the house and 
 went down a short flight of steps, at the foot of which 
 was a clump of shrubbery that had not yet lost its foliage, 
 .and came suddenly upon a figure, which he recognized as 
 the apparition of the evening before, crouching behind it, 
 parting the leaves with her hands, and looking with an 
 intense gaze in the direction of the men, from whose 
 sight she was herself safely concealed. 
 
 "Poor thing; insane," thought Mr. 'Burns, compas- 
 sionately. 
 
 Hearing his step she sprang up wildly, stared at him an 
 instant, and then turned and flew away with almost in- 
 credible speed and noiselessness. 
 
 It took some time for Mr. Rosevelt to gather up his 
 witnesses, and the trial was not resumed until afternoon ;
 
 348 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 and in the mean time Mr. Burns prosecuted his acquain- 
 tance with the Rosevelt family. Frank took him into a 
 long parlor with a high ceiling and entertained him for 
 an hour, with readings and recitations, in the most charm- 
 ing manner, evincing the rare cultivation which proves 
 that the highest art is the perfection of nature. His lan- 
 guage was a continual surprise, such as would indicate in 
 an older man years of thought and study ; but at the 
 same time he exhibited the pure guilelessness of a child. 
 He reverenced his mother with an absolute devotion, and 
 informed Mr. Burns with tears of tenderness in his beau- 
 tiful eyes that he owed everything he possessed, even his 
 capacity of appreciating and enjoying, to her. 
 
 "She has never fallen short in anything," he said. 
 " Her mind is so large, her sympathies so broad, that 
 they go beyond me in every direction. I lose myself 
 in her larger world. I think," he added, "it is because 
 of her indomitable energy ; she has none of that inertia 
 which prevents the most of us from developing our possi- 
 bilities. You observe that she has a remarkably fine 
 physique. She has bodily capability as well as mental. 
 Her sons, with the exception of myself, resemble her." 
 
 " But you have vigor," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " I have vitality," said he, laughing. "I am too fat. 
 I have to fight against inertia." 
 
 The trial closed before nightfall, but there being every 
 appearance of a heavy storm, the attorneys were con- 
 strained to accept Mr. Rosevelt's hospitality again. Mr. 
 Burns was the more easily persuaded, as he had it in his 
 mind to see Mrs. Marks again before he went home. 
 Then, too, he had been pressed to come back by Mrs. 
 Rosevelt, who seemed to feel that his companionship was 
 good for her son. 
 
 It cleared up about dusk, after a brief but fierce storm 
 of wind and rain, and the moon came out. Mr. Burns, 
 ascertaining that the Marks's cottage was barely half a mile 
 from Mr. Rosevelt's, excused himself for an hour and 
 stepped over there. It was a very small cottage, but 
 white and clean, and the garden and grass-plot around it 
 were protected from the outside world of greedy animals
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 349 
 
 by a neat picket-fence. Everything about it bore evidence 
 of labor and care. The walk up from the gate was clean 
 swept and bordered with flower-beds, though the flowers 
 had long ago been nipped by the frost. 
 
 Mr. Burns knocked, and the door was opened by Mrs. 
 Marks, who had evidently been crying. An old lady, 
 whom she very much resembled, and whom she introduced 
 as "mother," sat rocking a golden-haired child to sleep 
 in her arms. Another lay on a little bed in one corner 
 of the room. 
 
 "I hope you haven't come to urge Susie on to get a 
 divorce," said the old lady, bridling a little at mention 
 of Mr. Burns's name. 
 
 " Far from it," said he. " I have come to try to make 
 peace, and I am glad that heavenly spirit has an advocate 
 here before me." 
 
 "Well, that's right," said the old lady. " Better to 
 grin an' bear, than to go to getting divorces an' bringin' 
 disgrace an' hardships on the little ones. It's bad enough 
 when Providence sees fit to separate parents an' scatter 
 families, without them taking it in their own hands to do 
 it. I know it's awful the way John has been going on, 
 but then he's jealous an* quick-tempered ; I always knowed 
 that, an' so did Susie afore she married him. An' if she 
 liked him well enough to put up with it then, she ought 
 to now." 
 
 " Oh, mother ! put up with all the disgrace ? how can 
 I?" Susie exclaimed, wringing her hands and bursting 
 out afresh. " I don't know how you, as a mother, can 
 advise me to it !" 
 
 " Oh, Susie ! it is because I am a grandmother," said 
 the poor old lady, stroking with her withered hand the 
 golden hair of the sleeping child on which her tears fell 
 fast. "John loves these little ones, and you, too, in spite 
 of all his faults ; and he is fond of his home, and has 
 worked so hard to make it comfortable for us all. Think 
 how he has toiled, summer an' winter, an' day an' night 
 almost ; an' all for you." 
 
 "Perhaps, Mrs. Marks," said Mr. Burns, who felt that 
 the mother would be sure to win in the end, "we had 
 better let the matter rest for a little time. Decisive ac- 
 
 3
 
 350 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 tions at such times as this are almost sure to be regretted. 
 Is Mr. Marks about? I would like to have a little talk 
 with him." 
 
 " He is out-doors, somewhere," said the old lady, and 
 he took up his hat, bade them "good-night," and went 
 away. 
 
 When he reached the gate he found Mr. Marks leaning 
 moodily upon it. He started violently and exclaimed, 
 " What ! have you been to see my wife about getting a 
 divorce?" 
 
 " I don't think your wife will want a divorce if you can 
 turn over a new leaf and make a man of yourself," said 
 Mr. Burns, a little sharply. "I have recommended her 
 not to attempt it at present. Not that I have any doubts 
 about her being able to obtain it. I have none. But it is 
 better in almost every case for a husband and wife to hold 
 together if they can, especially if there are children. 
 Children have rights in such matters that ought to be 
 respected; though parents seldom think of that. And 
 now I would recommend you to treat your wife with a 
 little more respect than you have just shown in dragging 
 her before the public in this disgraceful way. Such an 
 outrage is more than almost any sensitive, delicate woman 
 can bear. The proceedings of yesterday and to-day have 
 proved to me, beyond a doubt, that you have a good and 
 virtuous wife ; one who ought to be held far above sus- 
 picion. Make yourself worthy of her. Go and ask her 
 forgiveness, and her mother's who gave her to you, for 
 your treatment of her. Sell out your property here, and 
 go to some new place and begin over again. That is the 
 best advice, as a friend, that I can give you." 
 
 " I would sell to-morrow if I could !" said the excitable 
 man. 
 
 "Well, perhaps I may help you to find a buyer," said 
 Mr. Burns. " How much land have you?" 
 
 "Only a 'forty.' " 
 
 "Very well, I will try what I can do for you." 
 
 He said "good-night" and walked away, a little sick 
 at heart, as he always was at any exhibition of the woes 
 of the world.
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 35 x 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 
 THE night was so still and beautiful that Mr. Burns, as he 
 approached theRosevelt premises again, felt averse to going 
 in-doors. Besides, he wanted to think over the Marks's 
 affairs and make up his mind how he could help them. 
 He turned off into an ornamental grove or what had 
 been planned for an ornamental grove just north of the 
 house, and walked slowly along a narrow path under a 
 row of maple-trees. He soon became conscious of an- 
 other presence ; the faint odor of a cigar was wafted to 
 him from somewhere, and he felt sure that Burr, like 
 himself, had strolled out for an hour of quiet thinking. 
 But how could he have excused himself from the family? 
 It might be that owing to the lateness of the hour the 
 night before when they retired, they had dispersed earlier 
 to-night. 
 
 Mr. Rosevelt had said to him when he went away, " If 
 you stay late and we are gone to bed when you come 
 home, you can step into your room through the window, 
 if Mr. Courtenay will leave it unfastened." 
 
 He glanced at his watch and found that it was already 
 past ten o'clock. Just then a figure emerged from a path 
 that led from the house a few rods ahead of him and 
 walked leisurely across a broad lawn to the left. He 
 made sure it was Burr, and was about to follow and call 
 out to him when, from the opposite side of the lawn, 
 appeared another figure, which he, by and by, recognized 
 as " Aunt Laura," coming direct to meet him. It looked 
 very much, in that quiet, hedged-in spot, like a contrived 
 plan. He stopped and leaned against the tree in whose 
 shadow he was standing, and felt a strange, but not new, 
 misgiving of his friend. Was it possible Burr had known 
 this lady hitherto? 
 
 He flung away his cigar when she approached him, and 
 for once forgot his accustomed courteousness and did not 
 bow or lift his hat. Perhaps there was something in the 
 intense earnestness of her manner that would have made
 
 352 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 such formality appear trifling. She came up to him in a 
 half- beseech ing, half-defiant attitude, her hands extended, 
 but her bearing erect. Burr folded his arms and stood 
 as if hardening himself against appeal. It was plain that 
 it was not a sentimental meeting. Perhaps in some far- 
 away beginning his relations with this strange creature 
 had been sentimental enough, and now had come the 
 hard reality. 
 
 Mr. Burns could hear the sound of their voices, but no 
 intelligible words. Presently, as if to favor him, they 
 turned and walked slowly toward him, the woman talking 
 vehemently but in slightly muffled tones. 
 
 " No," said Burr, in a low, emphatic voice, " it is use- 
 less for you to talk, Laura ; I should think your intuition 
 would tell you it is a ' lost cause.' The past is dead and 
 cannot be resurrected. Go back home. Don't stay here 
 in this wilderness." 
 
 " Stop !" she cried. " I had something to tell you, a 
 secret I have kept from you for eighteen years. But your 
 heart is hard as adamant ; and now, God forgive me ! I 
 will murder you, Burr Courtenay." 
 
 She sprang in front of him with fierce tragedy, and, 
 quick as thought, drew a pistol from her bosom and 
 levelled it at his breast. But Burr, who was remarkably 
 quick and adroit, when disposed to be, caught her wrist 
 and wrenched it from her and flung it away. It lodged 
 almost at Mr. Burns's feet. Burr held her hand for a 
 moment, and then let it drop. Almost instantly a small, 
 pointed stiletto gleamed in the moonlight. She grasped 
 it in both her hands and made a plunge at him. 
 
 " I have waited years for this hour," she cried, " and I 
 am prepared for it !" 
 
 But again Burr caught her hands and held them, try- 
 ing, as it seemed, to subdue the fierce spirit with his 
 magnetic eyes. 
 
 " Laura, what are you thinking of, to suppose you 
 could match your poor, little strength against mine? If 
 you wanted to kill me, and I suppose you did, why did 
 you not conceal yourself among those trees, and fire on me 
 as I passed along ? It would have been much surer, and 
 I do not know that I should have cared much. I am
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 5 3 
 
 not very tenacious of life ; it is not so sweet to me as it 
 was once, when you and I loved each other, Laura ! 
 But I could not let you kill me with my eyes open. I 
 respect the law of which you know I am an humble 
 representative too much to allow myself to become an 
 aider and abettor of murder." 
 
 She shuddered at the word "murder," and he let go 
 her hands again without depriving her of the knife. She 
 let it drop upon the ground, and burst into tears. 
 
 "There, don't cry, Laura !" he said, and put out his 
 hand and touched her with a sort of caress, which cer- 
 tainly was more cruel than his harshness to her. " Go 
 into the house, some one may miss you ; and as soon as 
 you can, go back home ; you will be far happier there. 
 You have wealth, and that is as much happiness as half 
 the world ask. If it is any satisfaction to you to know 
 that I shall never marry again, why, believe me, I never 
 shall." 
 
 He put her from him gently, and turned and walked 
 rapidly away. She looked after him with streaming eyes, 
 raised her hands imploringly, and then in utter hopeless- 
 ness and helplessness dropped them and went slowly 
 toward the house, sobbing and moaning. 
 
 It was many minutes before Mr. Burns could wake up 
 from the horrible nightmare into which this strange scene 
 had thrown him. His great love for his friend had re- 
 ceived another cruel wound, but it could not die. Much 
 as he loathed deceit and heartlessness, he could not loathe 
 Burr Courtenay. The side which he had turned to him 
 had. always been gentle and noble, even self-sacrificing. 
 Burr must surely, all his life, have been the victim of 
 strange circumstances ! The words, " If it will be any 
 gratification to you to know that I shall never marry 
 again," made a startling revelation to him. Had Burr 
 then once been married, and to this woman ? What a 
 history had been going on in the soul of his friend all 
 these years that he had known nothing of! It was a 
 grief to him, which he could not get over, that Burr had, 
 after all, never taken him into his heart, but had kept him 
 always on the outer threshold with the door closed be- 
 tween. And yet, when he thought of it, it had been a 
 
 30*
 
 354 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 good deal so with himself. His own secret had lain, for 
 years, away from Burr's sight. There had been genuine 
 loving-kindness between them, but not the sympathy that 
 discloses all the soul's emotions. 
 
 They started home early the following morning, and 
 drove the greater part of the way in silence ; Mr. Barns 
 being too heavy-hearted to care to keep up conversation, 
 and Mr. Courtenay too preoccupied. His face looked 
 blanched and hollow, as if he had not slept. For days 
 they lived quite apart from each other, by tacit consent. 
 Mr. Burns had the feeling that in his desponding moods 
 he could no more turn to his friend with the secret assur- 
 ance of being rallied out of them ; for he, too, had his 
 burdens to bear. And there is a kind of generous mock- 
 ery in trying to lighten another heart when one's own is 
 heavy laden, which he would not subject. Burr to. One 
 thing he was glad of: that Burr seemed to have ceased 
 altogether his attentions to Miss Clyde, and also quite 
 ignored the foolish child, Sarah Jenkins, not so much as 
 bowing to her on the street. One day he met the former, 
 and was pained to see that she was looking quite white 
 and thin ; but she still carried herself with the old, proud 
 bearing. She was one who could suffer death, and not 
 cry out. Burr had always had a preference for these 
 queenly women. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVI. 
 
 IN the midst of Mr. Burns's melancholy depression of 
 spirit, his mind reverted to Miss Cleveland. Her society 
 and friendship for he felt himself able to grasp that, be- 
 lieving, when he remembered her calm face and cloudless 
 eyes, that there could be no disguises between himself and 
 her could not fail to be a help to him. He caught at 
 the idea with his customary avidity, and began to carry 
 it into effect. For a week every evening found him at 
 Deacon Clyde's door, asking always for Miss Cleveland, 
 so that Maggie's heart grew sick and she fell back upon
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 355 
 
 her old resolution again, though perhaps with not so many 
 tears, for, as I have intimated, Dr. Webster was looming 
 up in her horizon ; dim as yet, like the moon before 
 the sun has set, but promising to grow brighter, as that 
 pale beauty does when His Supreme Majesty has veiled 
 his splendor. 
 
 Miss Cleveland always came down and met him with 
 a cordial face and kindly hand-pressure and beguiled him 
 away from himself into her own serene, hopeful world, 
 showing him glimpses of a thousand reasons why it is 
 worth while to live, without a hint of the didactic in word 
 or manner. Miss Cleveland's life was a continual lesson, 
 and a most pleasing one, with a sort of Kindergarten prin- 
 ciple running through it ; a constant teaching without 
 seeming to teach, which is the great secret of successful 
 instruction. There is a perversity in young human animals 
 as in young colts; they will eat grass in a green pasture, 
 but they hate to have the halter slipped around their necks 
 and be led to the stable where the hay is cut and dried. 
 Mr. Burns no more dreamed that Miss Cleveland prepared 
 his lessons for him than the colt suspects his master of 
 fencing in the pasture field. But she did. She knew 
 that he stood in need of a little wholesome food ; some 
 of the fresh, green grass growing up strong and sweet 
 above last year's sod. To him it all seemed the spontane- 
 ous, unthinking budding out of the womanhood in her. 
 There was something, he told himself, in the delicate fibre 
 of a woman's mind, cultivated and pure, that chimed in 
 exactly with the organization of his own ; which, itself, 
 had a feminine tone and sweetness that no strong man 
 need be ashamed of. 
 
 One evening it was cold and raining a little, and Mr. 
 Courtenay, whose life was flowing on again without any 
 perceptible ruffling of its unfathomable waters, would have 
 thought it much too disagreeable to venture out, Mr. 
 Burns donned his great-coat and started off up the hill. 
 It was a little earlier than usual, and when Bridget ushered 
 him into the parlor it was not yet lighted except by the 
 coals in the grate, that made a subdued though cheerful 
 play of lights and shadows upon the walls. The room 
 had a soft, penetrating warmth permeated by some delicate
 
 356 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 perfume; and seemed all the more inviting with just that 
 glow-worm of fire. Drawn up before it were two low 
 rocking-chairs moving slowly to and fro. 
 
 "Ah, is it you, Mr. Burns? Good-evening," said Miss 
 Cleveland's voice out of the soft darkness, as she rose to 
 meet him. "Now I shall have the great pleasure of in- 
 troducing my two friends to each other. Miss Stuvysant 
 happens to be down-stairs this evening, Mr. Burns." 
 
 She took Mr. Burns's hand and carried it on to Miss 
 Stuvysant, who had risen as if electrified, and stood still. 
 
 "You will not be able to see each other's faces," Miss 
 Cleveland added, laughing. " Pray be seated, Mr. Burns, 
 and I will go and find a lamp." 
 
 She went out, and Mr. Burns took the chair she had 
 vacated. Miss Stuvysant, unable to move, still stood with 
 her hand resting on the back of hers. The firelight shone 
 faintly upon her, and Mr. Burns looked at her inquiringly, 
 and wondered if she were meditating flight. 
 
 " I must prevent that," he thought ; " at least until they 
 bring a light so that I can see her face." And he made 
 a plunge at conversation. 
 
 Miss Stuvysant's lips had tried to form the words, " Will 
 you excuse me, Mr. Burns?" but no sound passed them. 
 To his remark that the night seemed to be getting stormy, 
 she returned, in a low voice, dropping into her chair, 
 " Yes, the wind sounds very wintry." 
 
 Bridget came in with a lamp and said, " Miss Cleve- 
 land begs ye to intertain each other fur a spell ; she has 
 something out here to see to." 
 
 She hurried out the moment she had set the lamp on 
 the table, and Mr. Burns met Miss Stuvysant's eyes and 
 sprang to his feet. " My God ! it is Wilmingard." 
 
 She, too, rose up, and in the moment that intervened 
 before he locked her two hands in his, she regained her 
 strength, and in her face, in her deep, shadowy brown 
 eyes, he saw, by an inner vision, as plainly as we see ob- 
 jects with the external eye, the reflection of the wide gulf 
 which his hand had made between them. The first mo- 
 ment of recognition, that which she had sometimes, in 
 self-indulgent moods, allowed herself to look forward to 
 as the supreme moment of her life, fanned into sudden
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 357 
 
 flame his old, boyish loyalty to her. But it faded in the 
 quick-following consciousness of all that had since divided 
 them, and their present relations to each other. Mr. 
 Burns loosened his grasp and she withdrew her hands. 
 She was the first to speak, and though her voice was 
 steady and quite under her control, she showed no affec- 
 tation of unconsciousness or indifference regarding their 
 attitude toward each other. 
 
 "I presume we should both have avoided this meeting 
 if we could have foreseen it," she said. "If you will 
 excuse me, I will go and see if Miss Cleveland will not 
 come in now " 
 
 "Wilraaj" 
 
 He stepped before her and put out his hand as she turned 
 toward the door. His mind was rapidly linking the past 
 with the present, and showing him through what she had 
 gone to reach the height she stood upon now; for her 
 noble, patient, tender face revealed so much to which he 
 alone, perhaps, had the key ! 
 
 "Do not go!" he said. "Sit down and let us talk. 
 Your life for I have heard something of it, and I see 
 something of it in yourself, as you stand there forbids 
 the presumptuousness of my asking your forgiveness, even 
 for the wrongs I have done you. They were wrongs, 
 though you may have borne them unharmed, and they left 
 their stain upon me in your mind. Can you forget it in 
 so far as to give me your friendship, Wilma?" 
 
 "I have never withdrawn my friendship from you," 
 she said, sinking down in her chair and feeling the 
 dreariness of reaction from a long-deferred hope at last 
 fulfilled. 
 
 When we are brought face to face with a reality about 
 which we have had inspired dreams, there is always a dis- 
 parity which shocks more or less. A broad charity, such 
 as Christ displayed upon the cross, would bid us drop its 
 mantle over even the atrocious Jews crying " Crucify 
 him! Crucify him!" when we remember what a hard 
 thing it would be to bring an ideal religious faith down 
 from the very heavens and fasten it upon a man, one of 
 ourselves, and very near to us through poverty and lowli- 
 ness of station.
 
 35 8 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Miss Stuvysant, with her eyes fixed upon the actual face 
 whose glorified memory had been her guiding-star, sat 
 stupefied with one mighty consciousness ; the grand cli- 
 max of years had come, the sublimest moment she would 
 ever know was passing. She felt that this meeting, which 
 she would have deferred yet many years, was the closing 
 act in the exquisite drama that had united their two lives. 
 She looked, with a shudder and sickened heart, beyond 
 into the blank, blank years that would follow upon this 
 wild night, with no light in the distant horizon. And 
 yet, was it possible that the dream upon which she had 
 fed her life until it grew and widened and blossomed, had 
 its reality in this man? She had placed him so high, and 
 she had climbed so unweariedly to reach him, that now 
 her eyes examined him with a sharp criticism, to find 
 whether she had been deceived. What they saw in the 
 first eager exploration was a form more slender than of 
 old, a whitish face much worn, hair a little thinned at the 
 temples and turning gray, and a mouth with a kind of 
 settled irony. The eyes had their old intensity of expres- 
 sion, but the radiance of youthful hope and inspiration 
 was gone. It is not strange that in the first moments her 
 heart sickened with a terrible disappointment, and a dread 
 that she had lived in a delusion. Charles Burns had al- 
 most ceased to be a tangible being to her. Her love for 
 him had widened into a religion. She had worshipped 
 him in all the beautiful and noble things her eye and mind 
 could grasp. Her very life, strongly rooted in the good 
 and true, had grown out of him. 
 
 Mr. Burns had no such intense consciousness as hers ; 
 the difference between them was this, that- she was still 
 living in the dream he had awakened from. His chief 
 thought was, as he contemplated her with eye and mind, 
 " Thank God, I have not ruined her life ; she has made a 
 noble woman of herself." 
 
 He had proposed that they sit down and talk. But an 
 awkward silence fell upon him which he could not break. 
 She was not embarrassed ; the consequences to herself 
 to her inmost life that would follow this meeting ab- 
 sorbed her completely. The spell under which she had 
 lived a sad yet half-enchanted life all these years was
 
 HIGH- WA TE R-MARK. 3S 9 
 
 broken by his actual presence, and it mattered little 
 whether they talked or not. 
 
 But two people, whatever their relations, cannot sit and 
 look at each other in silence many seconds. The wind 
 was beginning to rattle the shutters and drive the frozen 
 rain against the window-panes. Mr. Burns got up and 
 walked to one of the windows and stood looking out a 
 moment and then came back. 
 
 "It is strange I never thought of its being you," he 
 said. "I knew that your real name was Stuvysant, of 
 course, and yet it never came into my mind that the Miss 
 Stuvysant I read about might be you. You took it when 
 you began your readings?" 
 
 " No," she returned ; "I took it after the death of my 
 mother and sister, and when I went back to my father's 
 relatives; or, rather, they gave it to me." 
 
 "I was shocked when I heard of the death of your 
 mother and little Blanche," said he. 
 
 "And Fred, too, is dead. He was killed near Vicks- 
 burg," she returned. 
 
 There seemed to be nothing more to say. Each realized 
 that though they had come very near to each other in the 
 first instant of Mr. Burns's recognition, the rebound from 
 the shock was sending them farther and farther apart every 
 moment. 
 
 "What will be the end of this?" Mr. Burns thought. 
 
 Miss Cleveland opened the door and came in ; before 
 she had time to close it, the outer hall-door blew open 
 violently, letting in a hurricane of wind and fine snow 
 and sleet, slamming other doors and arousing the deacon 
 and his wife to come and see what was the matter. 
 
 " What a terrible night," said Miss Cleveland, as they 
 all started toward the hall. 
 
 "It suggests to me," said Mr. Burns, after he had 
 helped the deacon to close and secure the door, " that I 
 had better take my departure. I did not dream of its 
 storming so." 
 
 He tossed back his chair with a gesture that Wilma well 
 remembered, and took down his great-coat. 
 
 "Oh, you can never face such a storm as this," inter- 
 posed Mrs. Clyde. " We will give you a bed here. The
 
 360 HIGH WATER-MARK. 
 
 girls are not at home ; they went out to spend the after- 
 noon and did not get back; we have plenty of room for 
 you." 
 
 "Oh, no, thank you, Mrs. Clyde," he returned. "I 
 am greatly obliged to you, but I cannot stay. The fact 
 is, I don't like to miss the chance of a battle with this 
 wind. A storm arouses all the combativeness in me, 
 which is a good thing occasionally. I remember it used 
 to be my great delight when a boy to get out and confront 
 old Boreas in his grand high moods." 
 
 The sight of Wilma recalled it to him. She stood a 
 little behind the others in the doorway, in order to appear 
 interested in what, for the moment, was a thing of para- 
 mount importance, while he buttoned his coat and drew 
 on his gloves. He glanced at her with his old-time smile, 
 and she inclined her head and then stepped back into the 
 room. 
 
 After all, what a commonplace meeting it was ; the 
 naturalness of it seemed to rob the past of all its romance 
 and mock the strong tension of her life. What a dreamer 
 she had been ! 
 
 "Well, if you must go," Mrs. Clyde said, "father had 
 better take you out the back way. If we open this door 
 again we shall have another hurricane." 
 
 "Oh, yes, certainly," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 "I am sorry your visit is cut off so short," said Miss 
 Cleveland. " But you must come again when the weather 
 settles." 
 
 "Thank you, I certainly shall," he returned. 
 
 The deacon took him out through the kitchen and held 
 a light against the window, so that he could find his way 
 to the gate. He had a hard fight, but it was good for him 
 as he had said. Mr. Courtenay opened the door and let 
 him in, with the snow all beaten into him and frozen in 
 his hair. 
 
 "Heavens, what a night it is!" he exclaimed. "I 
 had no idea it had grown so cold. I think my ears are 
 frostbitten." 
 
 "Well, it seems to me," said Mr. Courtenay, deliber- 
 ately, "that a fellow who would venture out such a night 
 as this deserves some such chastisement, especially if he
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 6 1 
 
 does not try to appease the wrath of the gods by tying up 
 his ears." 
 
 "The wrath of the gods," returned Mr. Burns, "is 
 usually appeased by the precaution of men ! But I have 
 always had a prejudice against tying up my ears." 
 
 He took off his great-coat and shook the little icicles 
 from his hair and seated himself by the fire. 
 
 It continued to storm through the night, but in the 
 morning the wind dropped down, though it was extremely 
 cold. The snow was piled up along the sidewalks like 
 fine, sifted flour. The more Mr. Burns thought of his 
 meeting with Wilmingard, the more excited and inter- 
 ested he grew. He had not been shaken as she had been. 
 There was no very deep feeling lying in his heart to be 
 rudely awakened ; only a painful regret that he had once 
 wounded her. And her manner seemed to show that, 
 though she had felt it deeply, she cherished no hardness 
 against him. 
 
 "Some women," he thought, "would have met me 
 with a proud, assumed coldness or smiling indifference ; 
 but there is not a shadow of affectation in her. She 
 assumes nothing ; she ignores nothing. The wreck that 
 I have made of our young loves lies before us, and she 
 neither appeals to me nor reproaches me. She does not 
 seem to see in me the cause of her suffering, for I can see 
 that she has suffered. She has accepted her share of the 
 world's sorrows without complaint against the instruments 
 of her torture. What a grand charity is that ! I fancy 
 she neither despises all men because of me, nor sees an 
 exceptional monster in me. However one might wrong 
 her, I believe she could still give him credit for all the 
 good there was in him. Poor Wilma !" he apostrophized, 
 "she has gone through an ordeal such as has burned the 
 life out of many a heart. And -she stands strong and 
 delicate and self-poised and womanly." 
 
 Even in the short time they had been together his mind 
 had taken many impressions of her which his memory, 
 dwelling upon, brought out and defined as clearly as 
 stereoscopic views, though perhaps many of them had 
 long ago been unconsciously imprinted on the palimpsest 
 of his boyish appreciation of her, and brightened now in 
 Q 3'
 
 362 HIGH- WATER-MARK. 
 
 the light of his manhood's discernment. However it 
 might be, he began to realize, with very little present 
 acquaintance, the perfectness of womanhood in her. He 
 grew impatient of another meeting, and yet felt some 
 delicacy about forcing it upon her. 
 
 " She would have gone on her way without letting me 
 know," he said ; " and yet, under the circumstances, how 
 could she do otherwise?" 
 
 So he took his resolve and planned to see her again. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVII. 
 
 FOR two or three days it continued very cold ; so bit- 
 terly cold that people did not leave their firesides except 
 from absolute necessity, and the consciences of those who 
 held constant activity to be a duty could offer no reproach 
 for idleness. There are occasional times in the lives of 
 us all when some strong power outside of us takes things 
 in its own hands and eases us, momentarily, of our accus- 
 tomed burdens. It may even be a suffering and a loss to 
 us, but the loosening of the tension of our lives gives us 
 rest. 
 
 One day, quite late in the afternoon, a sleigh, with 
 bells, dashed up to the office-door, and a man, hidden in 
 buffalo-wrappings, sprang out and knocked loudly with 
 the handle of his whip. Mr. Burns hastened to open the 
 door, and the man stepped in and undid the strings of 
 his cap and took it off, and they recognized him as Mr. 
 Rosevelt's hired man. 
 
 "There's been awful doings up to our place," he said, 
 hurriedly, " and I have come to get Mr. Courtenay to go 
 up. Mrs. Rosevelt, she sent me. That crazy sister o' 
 hern tried to commit suicide; an' Mr. Rosevelt interfered, 
 an' she shot him, an' it's doubtful if he's livin' by this 
 time. But if he is he wants to make his will ; an' if she 
 is she wants to make hern, too, I reckon ; anyway, she 
 keeps commandin' them to send for Mr. Courtenay."
 
 HIGH-WATER-MARK. 363 
 
 Mr. Burns glanced covertly at his friend, and saw his 
 face blanch to marble whiteness. 
 
 " I've got to take the doctor with me," the man con- 
 tinued. " They said you would most likely want to drive 
 your own horse. Could you be ready to go right off?" 
 
 Mr. Courtenay roused himself. 
 
 "Will you go with me, Charley?" he asked, with an 
 appealing look in his eyes that seemed the nearest ap- 
 proach to a craving for sympathy Mr. Burns had ever seen 
 there. His voice, too, faltered a little, and his hands 
 trembled. 
 
 " Certainly I will go with you," said Mr. Burns. " But 
 it is just supper-time ; hadn't we better go down to supper 
 first ? And I will get Fred to harness Nobby and bring 
 him around while we drink a cup of tea." 
 
 "Perhaps so," Burr assented. 
 
 "Well, then," said the man, tying on his cap again, 
 "I'll drive on; you know the way an' can start as soon 
 as you're ready. The doctor's waiting." 
 
 They got ready, speedily, and went down to supper; 
 but owing to some delay on Fred's part they were not 
 able to leave town for nearly an hour after the messenger 
 had gone. 
 
 The sun was going down with a red and yellow glare, 
 seen dimly through clouds of fine-sifted snow. The wind 
 had risen, and it seemed to be growing colder. Nobby 
 floundered through deep drifts and galloped over patches 
 of hard, rough ground that the wind had bared of snow. 
 
 "It'will be a fearful ride," thought Mr. Burns. 
 
 After they had got out of town a little way, and were 
 driving along a lane somewhat sheltered from the wind, 
 Mr. Courtenay said, "Charley, this is a wretched time to 
 tell a story, but I wish to give you a few facts of a narra- 
 tive which I will fill out hereafter in detail. I was once 
 married to this woman whom we are going to see ; it was 
 a clandestine marriage contracted when we were at school, 
 a sort of Gretna-Green affair. I was barely eighteen, and 
 she not quite so old. She had a terrible temper, and 
 mine, though not so demonstrative, was equally fierce. 
 We quarrelled one day, and she ran away from me and 
 went home and told her parents. They were greatly en-
 
 364 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 raged and forbade my ever seeing her again, which, 
 indeed, I had no desire to do. They took her to Europe 
 and travelled for a year or two and then came back, and, 
 after a time, took pains to let me know they had procured 
 a divorce, which was false. She Laura Wallihan was 
 her name would not give me up, but has always seemed 
 to think she had a wife's claim upon me. I have been 
 evading her for eighteen years. She came upon me once, 
 away down in Florida, when I was on the eve of marrying 
 again, supposing I was free of her. She broke the 
 heart of the woman I was to marry, the sweetest, proud- 
 est, most sensitive and delicate creature I ever knew, 
 and poisoned her mind against me. She died I will tell 
 you where at Crawford Academy. Your little friend, 
 Wilma Lynne, was her guardian angel, and loved her and 
 cared for her to the last moment of her life, and was the 
 one mourner who followed her to the grave ; though I, 
 myself, was there, concealed in the thick shrubbery of 
 the cemetery." 
 
 He paused a moment or two, for the wind, sweeping 
 fiercely across the prairie, seemed to have taken away his 
 breath. Then he resumed. " I used to have lofty aspira- 
 tions. I wanted my name to ring round the world. At 
 one time, when I was very young, I hesitated between the 
 two splendors of being a great actor and a great statesman. 
 Patriotism triumphed, and I fixed my mark to become 
 another Daniel Webster. But all that changed. Emer- 
 son says, does he not ? ' That whatever we strongly wish 
 will surely come to us.' I believe the contrary ; whatever 
 we feel a strong aversion to, we will, in time, embrace. 
 That was my case. From wishing for fame I went to the 
 opposite extreme, and exerted all the ingenuity I possessed 
 to hide both myself and my name. That has not been 
 difficult since the war. I, in my turn, employed a lie to 
 aid me. I contrived to have Laura informed that I was 
 killed in battle. And she partly believed it until the 
 other day when we were summoned on that cursed law- 
 suit." 
 
 He paused again, and Mr. Burns said, in tones of deep 
 sympathy and sorrow, " Then she is still your lawful 
 wife?"
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 365 
 
 "She is still my lawful wife," said Mr. Courtenay. 
 " Since I saw her, I have been meditating flight again, 
 and debating in my mind whether I should ask you to 
 accompany me. Charley, my boy, you have been the 
 brightness and the strength of my life for seven years. I 
 dare say you have thought sometimes you were leaning on 
 me, but it was the other way." 
 
 They drove on for many minutes without speaking again. 
 Mr. Burns's heart was torn with the strongest emotions : 
 pain, grief, self-reproach, and unbounded veneration for 
 the brave soul that had carried its dreadful burden so 
 long and borne it so well ; that scarcely even now com- 
 plained. The wind rose higher and higher until it fairly 
 shrieked, and the fine snow drove fiercely against them, 
 and night was closing in. Mr. Burns stood up and tried 
 to peer ahead into the gathering darkness. 
 
 " My God ! Burr, I believe we're off the road. Whoa, 
 Nobby." Nobby was glad enough to come to a halt. 
 There was no house in sight ; no light, no tree, nor any- 
 thing but the broad, white plain, with waves of wind and 
 snow sweeping over it. Nobby, in trying to evade the 
 wind, had veered constantly to the right, and so lost the 
 road. 
 
 "Do you not think we had better turn back?" Mr. 
 Burns asked. " We shall never be able to get through." 
 
 "Yes, let us turn back," said Burr. "This is damn- 
 able ! Nobby will surely find the way home." 
 
 So they turned him about, and rode on, and on, and 
 on. It seemed as if it would last forever. A horrible fear 
 crept into Mr. Burns's soul. It seemed to him he was 
 being hardened into a marble figure. 
 
 " Burr, this is terrible !" he said. 
 
 Burr, upright and immovable, answered in a muffled 
 monosyllable. 
 
 Some minutes passed. 
 
 " Burr, are you very cold ?" 
 
 " No; but I am numb, I can't move. I think we are 
 going to perish here, Charley." The words came thick 
 and at little intervals. 
 
 "Oh, no, Burr; not so bad as that. Not on this 
 bleak, wild prairie, with no house in sight."
 
 3 66 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 On, Nobby, with white fetlocks and foaming nostrils ; 
 snorting, plunging, on, and on, and on. 
 
 "Burr?" 
 
 No answer. 
 
 11 Burr !" with a little shake. 
 
 A muffled response. 
 
 "Are you freezing, Burr?" 
 
 Mr. Burns's voice sounded strange and weird, even to 
 himself, pitched in a high key to penetrate Burr's dulled 
 ear, and caught up by the wind, and borne off shrieking. 
 
 " Burr, are you very cold ?" 
 
 "No not cold," answered Burr, with slow, difficult 
 enunciation. 
 
 Mr. Burns, with his own numbed hands, tried to tuck 
 the robes closer around him. Nobby embraced the op- 
 portunity of slackened rein to turn out of the road, for, 
 at last, they had struck it again, and the sleigh, striking 
 a prairie-boulder, upset, and something snapped. Nobby, 
 frightened, broke loose, and in a moment was out of sight 
 and hearing, in the darkness and the roar. Mr. Burns 
 got up clumsily and tried to right the sleigh. Burr, also 
 aroused by the shock, staggered to his feet, but sank back 
 upon the ground. 
 
 "Burr, in the name of God, what are we to do? Can 
 you walk?" 
 
 " No, I think not, Charley. I I" his voice stopped. 
 
 "We are not far from home, Burr; not above half a 
 mile, I think. Come, get up, and let us try." 
 
 No answer. 
 
 "Burr, let's try to get to town; we'll perish if we 
 don't move on, Burr." He shook him by the shoulder. 
 
 " I I'm quite comfortable now, Charley. I can sleep 
 here very well." 
 
 Burr's consciousness was almost gone. He spoke like 
 one who was politely declining a favor. 
 
 " You are freezing, Burr !" shrieked Mr. Burns. " Here 
 is my hand, pull !" 
 
 "I I can't, Charley. You go. Go, and get home." 
 
 "And leave you here to perish? Burr Courtenay, I 
 will lie down here and we'll die together if you don't 
 make an effort to get up."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 6 7 
 
 The severe tone aroused Burr's dull faculties. With 
 Mr. Burns's help he staggered to his feet again, but 
 offered no resistance to the mighty wind. Mr. Burns 
 upheld and steadied him ; forced him forward a step ; 
 another step, and then he faltered and sank down again, 
 his limbs too stiff and numb to support him. Mr. Burns 
 groaned. 
 
 " It's no use, Charley. Don't mind me, go." 
 
 "Go, and leave you, Burr, to die alone? Good God! 
 do you think I would forsake you now?" 
 
 "For help, Charley," came almost unintelligibly from 
 Burr's lips, and then, oblivious of the cold, he nestled 
 closer to the ground, like a sleepy child, and the snow 
 drifted over him. No effort of Mr. Burns could arouse 
 him again. 
 
 " He is right !" he said, seeing a gleam of hope. " I 
 could never get him home against this wind, God knows 
 if I -can get there myself! But I'll try; I may save him 
 yet." 
 
 His whole soul went out in a strong prayer, " GOD 
 
 GRANT IT !" 
 
 As quickly and dexterously as he could with his be- 
 numbed fingers, he seized the robes and blanket from the 
 sleigh and flung them over Burr, tucking them closely in 
 around him, and then, bracing his slender form against 
 the fearful storm, he started forward, pressing on step by 
 step, sustained by the strong hope of saving Burr. The 
 cape of his blue cloak, which he sometimes flung on over 
 his great-coat, flapped wildly about him. He gathered it 
 over his head, and with his chin bent in upon his breast, 
 kept his breath in the face of the wind.
 
 368 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 CHAPTER XLVIII. 
 
 THE landlord of the hotel, together with Fred and 
 Dick Gibson, several boarders, including Dr. Webster, 
 several loafers and two storm-stayed travellers, sat around 
 the bar-room stove, which was kept constantly red-hot. 
 
 " Hear it ! it sounds like the disembodied spirits of the 
 accursed," said one of the travellers to the other, not pro- 
 fanely, but in a kind of listening awe. 
 
 They were Eastern men, and this was their first experi- 
 ence of a prairie "blizzard." 
 
 "Yes," said the other, responsive. "What is it that 
 gives to the elements such unearthly voices ? Were you 
 ever at sea in a storm?" 
 
 His friend shook his head. 
 
 " Well ; this is something like it ; the creaking, and 
 snapping, and roaring. It would seem that a thousand 
 demon maniacs were careering upon the wind, laughing, 
 cursing, screaming, and battling with each other. There is 
 a weird poem running in my mind ;" and the imaginative 
 traveller began repeating it : 
 
 " On such fearful nights as this, 'tis said, 
 That vaulted tombs give up their dead ; 
 That hideous spectres, ghastly and grim, 
 Steal stealthily round in the firelight dim ; 
 And demon birds, borne on wind and rain, 
 Flap their black wings 'gainst the window-pane." 
 
 " One might easily be persuaded to believe that, to- 
 night," said the other, with a shrug. " That wind would 
 certainly be uncanny if we were not surrounded by these 
 jolly fellows, whose scepticism banishes ghostly delu- 
 sions." 
 
 The "jolly fellows" had been, one after another, tell- 
 ing ludicrous stories to hold up superstition to ridicule. 
 But as the traveller, with thrilling effect, repeated his weird 
 lines, they paused and listened, with cold chills creeping 
 over them and hair bristling on end. Fred, especially,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 369 
 
 with open mouth and wide-stretched eyes, felt his knees 
 shake. 
 
 For a moment or two everybody was silent. Then 
 came a heavy thud upon the door outside. The travellers 
 sprang to their feet ; the landlord paused in the act of 
 poking the fire ; Fred rolled over on the floor, and Dick 
 Gibson, with Dr. Webster to help him draw the bolts, 
 opened the door. The others, not less startled, sat still 
 and expectant. Something fell forward ; a man wrapped 
 in a dark-blue cloak. Every one in the room sprang to- 
 ward him, and half a dozen voices exclaimed, " Lawyer 
 Burns!" 
 
 They lifted him up and laid him on a wide, wooden 
 settee. 
 
 "Burr," he gasped. "Go for Burr. He is freezing, 
 dying!" 
 
 "Where!" they all cried. 
 
 "Out past Jenkins's place. Only a little way. Be 
 quick ! quick !" 
 
 The struggling voice ceased and the swollen eyelids 
 closed. A little while longer, and Mr. Burns could not 
 have told his errand. 
 
 In a moment or two all had started out to look for Burr 
 excepting the landlord, the two travellers, and Dr. Web- 
 ster, who were tacitly left to take care of the motionless 
 figure on the settee, whose garments were already begin- 
 ning to drip with melted snow. 
 
 "We must remove him from this room at once," said 
 Dr. Webster, who immediately became the recognized 
 authority. " The stove is red-hot, you see. He must be 
 got to bed. Here, help me take off his boots and these 
 outside wrappings." 
 
 The travellers sprang to his assistance. 
 
 " There's a bed in the sitting-room," said the landlord ; 
 "we'll take him in there." 
 
 He opened the intervening doors and cleared a passage, 
 and they lifted him up and bore him through. 
 
 " He wasn't much to carry," said one of the travellers 
 when they had laid him upon the bed. " I don't see how 
 he stood up against this wind." 
 
 "He has got pluck!" said the landlord. "A good 
 Q*
 
 370 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 deal more than the other one has ; though the other one's 
 twice as strong." 
 
 "He has escaped freezing, marvellously," announced 
 Dr. Webster. " His hands and feet are frozen, but other- 
 wise he is only benumbed and exhausted. He is sleeping 
 heavily, you see ; he will lie so for hours. In the mean 
 time we must bathe his hands and feet in cold water." 
 
 The landlord hastened to bring it, and they all set to 
 work. 
 
 Meanwhile, a sled had been got ready with incredible 
 despatch, and half a dozen men sprang into it and urged 
 the horses forward through the drifts and blinding snow. 
 They drove some distance, and then descrying the lights 
 of the Jenkins's windows for it was Sarah Jenkins's wed- 
 ding night, and in every room lamps were glimmering 
 a man, with a lantern carefully protected by an old blanket 
 he wore around him, got out and went on ahead. Pres- 
 ently he stopped and threw the light forward. It fell on 
 the overturned sleigh. All the others sprang out then 
 and ran on except the driver. 
 
 " I don't see anything of him !" shouted the man with 
 the lantern, above the wind. The sleigh was empty and 
 all was white around it. 
 
 " Yonder !" cried another. " There's something flap- 
 ping." 
 
 He pressed forward and seized it. It was a tag of buf- 
 falo skin. In a moment all hands were pulling at it. 
 Underneath lay Burr. The light of the lantern flashed 
 in his face. It was white as the white snow around it. 
 Some one stooped and laid his hand upon it. It was like 
 marble. He touched the forehead, eyelids, cheek ; drew 
 off one fur glove and clasped the stiffened fingers, then 
 looked up, awe-struck, into the others' faces. 
 
 They did not take him up at once ; they gathered in a 
 little circle around him as if, instinctively, to protect him 
 from the fierce storm, and looked down upon him, silent 
 and speechless. Not one of them but would have risked 
 his life to save him. He had shone like a brilliant star 
 among them and they had worshipped him. They had 
 been wont to boast of him ; to think that whatever ad- 
 vantages other towns might have, they had no kingly
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 371 
 
 Courtenay. But their strong arms and their warm sym- 
 pathies availed nothing now. The man with the lantern 
 turned away ajid motioned to the driver to come nearer. 
 They had hastily thrown some straw into the sled-box. 
 Some one spread it out and tried to keep the wind from 
 blowing it away. Others raised him up and carried him 
 and laid him down upon it, and brought the robes and 
 blanket and spread over him reverently, but did not tuck 
 them in as Charley had done; there was no need. Then 
 they drove on, and the pitiless, cold wind blew over him. 
 
 CHAPTER XLIX. 
 
 IT was morning and the sun shone. It was cold, but 
 marvellously calm, as if he who once hushed the winds 
 had spread out his hands again and said, "Peace: be 
 still." 
 
 "Burr? Where's Burr ?" Mr. Burns, starting up with 
 the familiar name on his lips, looked around upon the 
 strange walls. 
 
 Dr. Webster was at his bedside. " How do you feel 
 this morning, Mr. Burns, after your accident?" he asked, 
 with attempted lightness, as if the upsetting of the sleigh 
 and necessitated walking home were the only things to 
 be remembered or regretted. 
 
 " Where's Burr ?" demanded Mr. Burns, with rising 
 impatience and contracting eyebrows, like a child whose 
 question had been set aside. 
 
 "He is up-stairs," said the doctor, and added, with 
 professional gravity and authority, "I would advise you, 
 Mr. Burns, not to worry or excite yourself much. You 
 were quite chilled when you got home last night, and I 
 have some dread of fever after the the exposure." 
 
 " What did they take him up-stairs for ? Wasn't this bed 
 wide enough for us both ?" Mr. Burns returned. It seemed 
 to him that he could not now bear even temporary sep- 
 aration from his friend. Burr's story had come back to
 
 372 
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 him with his first awakening, and brought the same pain 
 and tender sympathy he had felt when it was related. 
 
 "Burr must be worse off than I am," he added; "he 
 was out longer, though I covered him up with the robes 
 and came on as fast as I could, and sent the men. They 
 found him didn't you say they found him ?" turning upon 
 the doctor with fierce inquiry, as a horrible misgiving 
 occurred to him. 
 
 "Yes; they found him a short distance from town," 
 the doctor returned, though he quailed a little under the 
 intensely questioning gaze. 
 
 " Thank God !" Mr. Burns lay back upon the pillow 
 restfully, and seemed at last satisfied. By and by he 
 said, with his face averted and speaking partly to himself, 
 "You have- no idea what a terrible storm it was. I 
 thought we should perish. Burr thought so, too ; only I 
 could not give up to die there; it was too horrible." 
 
 A shudder passed over him. 
 
 " I think I will get up now, doctor. My hands feel 
 queerly and my feet, too. I'm afraid I can't walk." 
 
 He had put his feet out on the floor. 
 
 " Were they much frozen?" 
 
 " Yes ; quite badly," said the doctor. " Here are some 
 large slippers for you to put on ; they are the landlord's." 
 
 "Large? I should think they were," said Mr. Burns, 
 with a laugh, as he slipped his feet into them. "But I 
 can walk better in them than in my stocking-feet. Now, 
 if you will have the goodness to tell me what room Mr. 
 Courtenay is in, doctor, or show me the way, I will go 
 up and see him." 
 
 Dressed and standing upon his feet, Mr. Burns recovered 
 the air of dignity and reserve he habitually preserved in 
 the presence of strangers. The doctor hesitated. Mr. 
 Burns, in some surprise, glanced up. 
 
 " Good God ! he is not dead I" 
 
 The doctor answered by a look : Dead. 
 
 After a time he led the way up into the long, dim par- 
 lor. Is that Burr? that long, draped form lying there so 
 still ? Is it Burr's presence that fills the room with such 
 an awe and majesty ? The doctor went forward with 
 noiseless tread and folded back the sheets, and Mr. Burns
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 373 
 
 stood and gazed upon the one face that he loved. It was 
 white and beautifully chiselled as the finest marble face ; 
 the forehead broad and smooth, the arched, black brows 
 exquisitely pencilled, the long lashes sweeping the cheeks, 
 and the glossy, wavy beard flowing down upon the chest. 
 But the grand intellect beneath was forever stilled. 
 
 Some one had carefully brushed back the black masses 
 of hair; there were more white threads mingled with it 
 than Mr. Burns had thought ; a few, too, in the glossy 
 beard that he had never noticed before. He took up one 
 of the exquisitely-shaped hands and knelt down, pressing 
 it against his heart. 
 
 "Oh, my friend, my Burr!" he cried. "Can it be 
 that you are dead ? Would to God that I had perished 
 with you !" 
 
 He dropped his head upon the pulseless body, and so 
 remained for many minutes, groaning aloud. Then he 
 arose, and laid tfie dead hand gently down and turned 
 and grasped the doctor's living hand, his eyes strangely 
 bright. 
 
 "Can you tell me, Dr. Webster," said he, "can any 
 intelligence upon this earth reveal to me the knowledge 
 of where my friend is now ? There lies the immaculate 
 form of Burr Courtenay! but where, in this vast uni- 
 verse, is the immaculate soul? Shall I ever find it again? 
 You did not know him, Dr. Webster," he added, drop- 
 ping the hand, and walking up and down the room. 
 "You never saw his eyes beam with tenderness greater 
 than a woman's; or flash in battle when he led his regi- 
 ment forward in the face of death. How the soldiers 
 loved him ! And how tender he was of them, even the 
 least of them ! He felt for all their woes and wounds 
 and sufferings ; and in the midst of his arduous duties he 
 found time to write their dying messages to friends at 
 home, tender, comforting letters that could not but 
 soothe the hearts his sad tidings wounded. He told them 
 where their loved ones were sleeping, and marked their 
 graves often with his own hands. And now he is 
 dead!" 
 
 He ceased speaking, but continued to walk up and 
 down the room, groaning, but shedding no tears. And 
 
 32
 
 374 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 where was the voice that would have comforted him for 
 its own awful silence ! Had it gone out on the pitiless 
 night-wind calling him Charley, Charley? and he had 
 not answered. 
 
 Suddenly he thought of the consequences to others 
 (and with a feeling of jealousy that any but himself 
 should have a claim upon Burr) that would follow upon 
 this terrible death. He remembered Miss Clyde, and his 
 heart ached for her. He remembered Laura Wallihan 
 as Burr had called her, and he could not bring himself 
 to consider her as Burr's wife with a bitterness that 
 amounted to hatred. One thing he determined upon : 
 if possible he would prevent Burr's history from being 
 made public. Miss Clyde might have the sad privilege 
 of mourning for him if she would, he would take pains 
 that her grief should not be poisoned, by this terrible rev- 
 elation. 
 
 Dr. Webster, seeing that his mind was in some way 
 diverted, asked if he would not now go below. 
 
 "Oh, no!" said he. "No, I shall stay here. The 
 time will be short enough." 
 
 So the doctor went away and left him. 
 
 He sat down in a chair by Burr's side. Cold drops 
 were starting out on his forehead and about his mouth, 
 and there was a strange trembling at his heart as he re- 
 flected how utterly alone he was now ; and for the second 
 time in his life he pitied himself. Then he remembered 
 Wilma, and vaguely wondered whether the past might 
 not be bridged over, and they two clasp hands again as 
 in their tender young spring-time, or with even a better 
 understanding and appreciation of each other; for they 
 could both see things more clearly now than in those 
 days. They had both suffered. But when he remem- 
 bered the grave reserve of her manner, though it was 
 kind and not resentful, he doubted whether anything 
 could be done. And certainly he had not the heart to 
 try. What mattered anything now ! 
 
 Somebody opened the door and said, "Mr. Burns, 
 there is a lady here who wishes to see you." 
 
 Mr. Burns started up, thinking of Miss Cleveland, 
 there was certainly no other woman in the place who
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 375 
 
 would come to show him a little sympathy, and asked, 
 " Can she come up here ?" 
 
 "Maybe so; I'll see," said the messenger, and went 
 down. 
 
 Presently a tall woman in black entered, and put aside 
 her veil, revealing the noble but much changed face of 
 Mrs. Rosevelt. 
 
 " I learn that you have trouble as well as we, Mr. 
 Burns," she said, coming up and giving him her hand, 
 or, rather, clasping his with a strong, sympathetic clasp. 
 " We supposed Mr. Courtenay purposely evaded coming 
 when we sent for him, and it was so imperative that he 
 should come that I came myself to fetch him. I presume 
 you did not know, Mr. Burns, that your friend had a wife 
 and son?" 
 
 "A son! impossible," said Mr. Burns. "I learned 
 very recently that he had a wife." 
 
 "And a son, also," repeated Mrs. Rosevelt, "whom 
 it will surprise you to know is our Frank." 
 
 " Your Frank ! Frank Rosevelt." 
 
 It required but a momentary retrospection of his brief 
 acquaintance with the young man to enable Mr. Burns to 
 adjust his mind to the startling fact. The next moment 
 he wondered why he had not discovered it for himself. 
 There was every resemblance between father and son ; 
 voice, face, manner, gestures. Except that Frank was a 
 sort of refinement of Burr, smaller in stature and more 
 delicate in mental and moral organization. 
 
 " My sisters will reveal these things to Frank," con- 
 tinued Mrs. Rosevelt, "and I thought it but right that 
 Mr. Courtenay should recognize the son beside the dead 
 body of the mother." 
 
 'Then she is dead?" said Mr. Burns, not without a 
 feeling of relief. 
 
 "Yes, both she and my husband," said Mrs. Rosevelt. 
 
 There was something so touching in the way this grand 
 woman seemed to reserve her own griefs that Mr. Burns 
 silently clasped her hand again. 
 
 "Our troubles, if nothing else, ought to unite us, my 
 dear Mrs. Rosevelt," he said. " Is there anything I can 
 do for you?"
 
 376 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 "Nothing, except to let it be known that your friend 
 had a son who will inherit his name." 
 
 Mr. Burns drew back. He was thinking of Miss 
 Clyde. 
 
 "Is that necessary, Mrs. Rosevelt," he asked. Mrs. 
 Rosevelt looked up with a flash of indignation in her eyes. 
 
 " I mean does the young man wish it," he continued. 
 
 "I hardly know whether he wishes it," she returned. 
 " But circumstances force it upon him." 
 
 "I do not know that I ought to speak of it to you," 
 said Mr. Burns, with an impulse to be frank with her, 
 "but my friend, not knowing that he had a wife living, 
 has for years past been paying attention to a young lady 
 here, in the village. I was thinking that it would be 
 very embarrassing to her to have these things brought to 
 light." 
 
 " Hardly as embarrassing for her, I think," returned 
 Mrs. Rosevelt, "as for Mr. Courtenay's son to continue 
 all his life and consciously, too in a false position; any 
 disinterested person, Mr. Burns, must see that he, first of 
 all, should receive justice." 
 
 Mr. Burns's better judgment decided so, too. 
 
 " Where is he?" he asked. " Did he come with you?" 
 
 "Yes; he is below, waiting to see his father." 
 
 His father ! 
 
 Mr. Burns thought it was a bitter thing to have his 
 friend wrenched from him in these last hours. He turned 
 and walked to the other side of the room, and while he 
 stood there looking out of the window the young man 
 came in. He heard his voice and started, it was so like 
 Burr's. But he did not turn round. By and by, Frank 
 came up to him, and held out his hand with a gentle cour- 
 tesy that was also much like Burr's in his softer moods ; 
 and his young, beautiful face, now white with intense, sor- 
 rowful emotion, was not without a close resemblance to 
 the marble face yonder. Not so proud and not altogether 
 so perfect, but possessing even greater winsomeness, and 
 a fascination equally strong, but not dangerous. 
 
 "I have not come to rob you of your friend, Mr. 
 Burns," he said, sadly. "I have only come to mourn 
 with you. I hope you will not think me an intruder."
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 377 
 
 " No ; you have the better right," said Mr. Burns. 
 
 " Pray, do not say so !" Frank returned, feeling hurt. 
 " It is mockery. I have no right. He never knew of 
 my existence. I was nothing to him, but he, of neces- 
 sity, is something to me." 
 
 Mr. Burns felt rebuked. A sense of delicacy induced 
 him, by and by, to offer his arm to Mrs. Rosevelt and go 
 below, leaving the young man alone with his dead father. 
 He asked Mrs. Rosevelt if Burr and his wife were to be 
 buried together. 
 
 "Oh, no," she returned. "They were not united in 
 life, why should they be in death? My sister will be 
 carried to-morrow to Winchester Cemetery, which is 
 nearer to us ; of course we shall leave all this to you." 
 
 Burr's funeral was not to take place until the day after. 
 
 There were no railroads to connect High-Water-Mark 
 with any other town, but in a few hours the news had 
 spread far and wide. Mr. Woodbury and several other 
 gentlemen drove down from Hammond Springs and del- 
 icately consulted with Mr. Burns about the arrangements 
 for the burial, which he begged to entrust wholly to them; 
 the simpler citizens of High-Water-Mark standing back 
 a little in awe of them. 
 
 The day of the burial Mr. Burns was unable to leave 
 his room. He sat the greater part of the time with his 
 face buried in his hands, groaning from time to time, but 
 speaking to no one unless especially addressed. Even the 
 first shock was hardly so bad as this fuller realization of 
 his loss. To think that he should be living in the world 
 without Burr ! He had gradually let go of everything 
 save this one friend, and now there was nothing to hold 
 to. He listened for hours to the constant stream of people 
 filing up and down the narrow stairs and in and out the 
 long, dim parlor, and felt that it was almost unbearable. 
 
 No fire had been kindled in the long 'parlor, and Burr 
 still lay in all his splendid beauty, not even having lost 
 his awe-inspiring presence. They had dressed him in the 
 blue uniform he had taken off when he left the army ; 
 and from all the towns and villages around came squads 
 of soldiers to do honor to him. Scarcely one person in 
 
 32*
 
 378 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 the community but what claimed the privilege of a last 
 look; and none approached him irreverently or gazed 
 upon him without emotion. A few wizen-faced old 
 women, who had been wont to shake their heads at men- 
 tion of his name, laid their yellow, skinny hands upon 
 his forehead, and wondered how Evelyn Clyde would 
 take it. 
 
 Poor Evelyn ! in her proud, happy days she had gath- 
 ered her treasures into her own heart. No mortal shared 
 them. Now they were in ashes and utter ruin, and she 
 turned her heart into a sepulchre and cherished them still. 
 And with the stoicism of a cold, proud nature, whose 
 every feeling and hope were centred upon an object and 
 wrecked in an overthrow, she closed her lips and went 
 about silent and cold and white, almost, as he who had 
 died in the snow. 
 
 CHAPTER L. 
 
 THE fever which Dr. Webster had intimated as likely 
 to follow Mr. Burns's exposure followed in due course. 
 The torturing ceremonies of funeral and burial were hardly 
 over before he fell into a state of forgetfulness lasting 
 many days. 
 
 Frank Courtenay begged leave of her whom he still 
 called "mother" to stay with him. "I will take my 
 father's place to him, in as far as I can," he said, with 
 tears in his eyes. " It must be," he added, " that there 
 was a great deal of good in my father, else a man like 
 Mr. Burns could not have loved him so." 
 
 Dr. Webster, also, was especially kind and attentive ; 
 and when at last intelligence returned to the long-wan- 
 dering eyes, and with it the crushed sadness that comes 
 after sickness and grief, these two were beside him. But 
 sympathy from strangers, at first, was so distasteful that 
 he turned away. And then, little by little, their thought- 
 ful presence and tender care won upon him and softened 
 his heart with feelings he had thought would never spring 
 up again. Dr. Webster, who was gaining a small practice,
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 79 
 
 often left him alone with young Courtenay ; and gradually 
 they began to speak of Burr ; and Mr. Burns recalled and 
 poured into the ears of the deeply-sympathetic son a 
 thousand incidents of his life, until he seemed a hero. 
 
 There was a broad charity in the soul of this young 
 man that could look with impartial eyes on the lives of 
 his parents, nor judge them harshly or with reference to 
 the sorrow they had brought upon himself. 
 
 Mr. Burns saw it, and came to love the gentle youth 
 whose pure life seemed purged of all the evils that had 
 befallen theirs. Certainly all that was good and noble in 
 Burr Courtenay survived in this son whom he had given 
 to the world. Though he was so young, he was ripe in 
 thought and study ; and a strong and deeply-sympathetic 
 imagination in him took the place of experience in older 
 people. He had inherited Burr's eloquence and remark- 
 able command of language. But Burr's personal ambition 
 had been transmitted to him in the broader form of a de- 
 sire backed by a strong energy of will to help others 
 forward. Burr's tender-heartedness led him to do a thou- 
 sand kindnesses, but his pride kept him always aloof from 
 others. Frank was reserved, but the book of his inmost 
 life might be laid before the world. 
 
 Mr. Burns remembered a theory of Burr's ; that no 
 good thing, once existing, can ever be lost ; and that any 
 being endowed with the life-principle, will give out life in 
 some form for the good of the world, as Michael Angelo 
 his pictures, as Beethoven his music, as Homer his poems, 
 as Washington his patriotism, and, Mr. Burns added, 
 as Burr Courtenay his son. Sometimes it seemed to him 
 almost as if his friend had passed through some strange 
 transformation and come back to him. And yet the great 
 difference remained that the consciousness of the one was 
 not the consciousness of the other. Showing that no 
 being can slip into another's place, but that each must 
 make his own niche in the world and in the heart of a 
 friend. No one can dislodge another, and himself fill the 
 vacancy ; the world is broad and the heart is elastic ; and 
 no one being can fill the mould that has been fashioned 
 by another. And so Mr. Burns mourned still for the 
 friend whose history was so interwoven with his own,
 
 3 8o HIGH- WA TER-MA RK. 
 
 and with whose soul he had become so familiar in their 
 long years of intimacy. Even after he was able to get up 
 and go about he delayed, many weeks, returning to the 
 office. His wound was too tender to bear, yet, any 
 probing. 
 
 One day, about the opening of spring, Frank said to 
 him, " Mr. Burns, I must leave you now and go back to 
 my studies." 
 
 " How can I spare you?" said Mr. Burns. 
 
 But in the end it was better. The effect of the young 
 man's earnest resolution to take his place in the world 
 and prepare for work was more strengthening to the in- 
 valid, who was an invalid in mind as well as in body, 
 than even his tender care of him. 
 
 We have many precepts ; but those things that stand 
 out like lights upon a dark road, in the long history of the 
 world, are noble lives that have not been turned aside by 
 the little pebbles of circumstance, but have gone straight 
 to a grand aim. 
 
 Dr. Webster, in the light and brightness of advancing 
 spring, began to look shabby as to his clothes, which 
 were getting threadbare, and to talk about going back 
 home. 
 
 "Don't do that," said Mr. Burns. "You have got a 
 foothold, and we are sure to have better times when the 
 railroad is completed. Come into my office, you are very 
 welcome ; and, in the mean time, I will take pleasure in 
 making you a loan of a few dollars. And you shall have 
 the use of my horse for your country practice. Are the 
 inducements sufficient?" 
 
 Dr. Webster answered by grasping his hand. "You 
 are a true friend," said he, and added, " I do not know 
 what I could do if I went home ; my mother is a widow 
 and poor, and the town in which she lives is already 
 supplied with medical talent. There would be nothing 
 for me there except manual labor of some kind, and I 
 have not fitted myself for that." 
 
 " And you shall not do that," said Mr. Burns. " There 
 are more hands in the world than brains." 
 
 The doctor had it in his mind to tell him that some 
 time back, when his prospects had seemed brighter, he had
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 3 8 x 
 
 thought he might some day ask Maggie Atherton to be 
 his wife ; but he did not mention it until several weeks 
 afterward, when they had both gone into the office and 
 the doctor had arranged his medical books beside the 
 ponderous law-books. Then Mr. Burns said, " Why not 
 do it now? My dear friend, if you have a great happi- 
 ness within your reach, grasp it and hold it close to your 
 heart, or it will vanish from you. Maggie has property, 
 and it seems to me she could get no better security for it 
 than you are able to give." 
 
 "Is that really the way to look at it?" said Dr. Web- 
 ster, doubtfully. 
 
 Mr. Burns said, smiling, "It is the way in which I, a 
 man of experience, of gray hairs, and of legal mind, 
 look at it. What more would you have?" 
 
 " Nothing !" said the doctor. "And I will take your 
 advice in this, as in many other things, my best friend." 
 
 Mr. Burns went with him occasionally to Deacon 
 Clyde's, and offered to poor Evelyn the most delicate 
 sympathy his tender soul could devise, and that came 
 nearer to softening the ice about her heart than any other 
 influence. She came at last to lean upon him a little, and 
 her crushed soul began to send out little tendrils in other 
 directions. She grew kind to the poor, and made a good 
 many homes brighter for her queenly presence in them ; 
 and little Maggie, always loving her and admiring her 
 above all others, worshipped her now. She seemed, in 
 some sort, sanctified by having been the altar on which a 
 great fire of love was kindled. 
 
 The spring came on apace. Work on the railroad was 
 going forward with a great rush, and High-Water-Mark 
 prospects were brilliant. Earth seemed new and happy, 
 and the world was alive with singing birds and whistling 
 ploughboys; and the green grass waved over Burr Courte- 
 hay's grave.
 
 382 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 CHAPTER LI. 
 
 ONE day, in looking over the papers, Mr. Burns saw a 
 reference to Miss Stuvysant, who, with her friend, had 
 left High-Water-Mark the day upon which Mr. Courtenay 
 was buried, and gone back East. 
 
 " She does not need me," said he, bitterly ; "and yet, 
 by my own act, she was made independent of me. I was 
 the only thing she leaned upon, and when I wrenched 
 myself away from her she grew up tall and strong. Well, 
 they say the only way to reach our highest possibilities is 
 to have our props taken away ! And yet, God pity us all 
 who are left standing alone !" 
 
 Dr. Webster had told him a few days before that the 
 deacon had given his consent to his marriage with Mag- 
 gie, and that the wedding was soon to take place. A part 
 of Maggie's property consisted of a house and grounds 
 not far from the deacon's; and repairs and furnishing 
 had already begun, and Maggie was as happy as a bird, 
 with perhaps the exception of a tender little regret, now 
 and then, over her first love. 
 
 "But after all," she would say to herself, consolingly, 
 " Dr. Webster will, maybe, make me happier than Mr. 
 Burns could. For Mr. Burns has never seemed to me 
 to be quite happy himself; and yet," she added, thought- 
 fully, with a common, egotistic, and yet pretty conceit, 
 " if he had loved me and married me, I might have made 
 him happy. I would have been so good to him, like the 
 poor soul in ' Tender and True.' ' And then she would 
 pull herself up sharply, and chide herself for disloyalty 
 to the doctor, who she told herself severely never 
 dreamed of her being such a deceitful little wretch. 
 
 It had been her great wish from the first hour of her 
 engagement to go on a long wedding-trip, away down 
 East, to visit the doctor's relatives, and to get a glimpse 
 of the mountains and of the great ocean. And so, almost 
 the first Eastern bound train that passed through High- 
 Water-Mark carried away the happy bride and groom,
 
 HIGH- WA TE R-MARK. 
 
 383 
 
 and the white, stately Evelyn, whom Maggie had begged 
 and entreated, with tears, to accompany them. It was in 
 the evening, and Mr. Burns had gone with them to the 
 depot, which was distant nearly half a mile from the 
 centre of the village, and had bidden them "good-by," 
 and waved his handkerchief as the train swept away. 
 
 Before returning to the office he went down and 
 walked, by moonlight, along the river bank, recalling, 
 as only the strongly imaginative can recall, with vivid 
 memory, his past life, and the friends who, one by one, 
 had dropped away from him. "Is there, then," he 
 murmured, "no reality in these sweet things, Love and 
 Friendship? Is the practical part of life the eating and 
 drinking and accumulating all that is left to us in our 
 latter years? Oh, that a little of the poetry and sweet- 
 ness would linger round us all the way down the long 
 journey !" 
 
 Frank Courtenay had written a poem for the Alumni of 
 his alma mater, and sent him a printed copy. When he 
 read it, the thought occurred to him that here was a na- 
 ture that would preserve the best things of life to its very 
 close. He would never lose faith in humanity ; he would 
 think it always worth his grandest efforts to work for the 
 bettering of the race. 
 
 He had written in one of the many beautiful letters 
 Mr. Burns received from him, "It should be the great 
 effort of each generation to work for the good of itself, 
 and increase the annual aggregate of happiness of its mil- 
 lions. I believe strongly in the present ; because it is our 
 one, actual possession." And again, " We are not justi- 
 fied, it seems to me, in cheapening and depreciating this 
 life, as ministers and psalmists often do, by calling it a 
 ' fleeting show,' a 'day of probation,' and so forth. To 
 me it is a noble gift, to be enjoyed and made beautiful. 
 Whatever man's future may be, in his present form and 
 conditions, he is certainly created with directest reference 
 to the world he inhabits ; let him get as much good out 
 of the world and give as much to it as is in his nature, 
 and he will have little time to expend in vague specula- 
 tions of what may come hereafter. I can see so much 
 and enjoy so much, in one little hour, of actual beauty !
 
 384 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 Why should I close my eyes and let ray fancy revel in the 
 unreal?" 
 
 Walking along beside the river-bank, and thinking partly 
 of his young friend and partly of his own youth, when he 
 was hopeful and full of zest, Mr. Burns felt a sudden 
 strong desire to revisit his boyhood's home and his 
 mother's grave. Perhaps something of what he had lost 
 would return to him in that sacred spot. He had never 
 sold his mother's little cottage; and he pictured it stand- 
 ing in its orchard of apple, and peach, and wild plum 
 trees, the flagstones in front covered with moss, maybe, 
 and the grass and weeds growing rank around it. The 
 thought of going back to it, of perhaps making up his 
 mind to spend the rest of his years in that quiet spot, 
 came like an inspiration, quickening the sluggish stream 
 of his life into a strong current. He turned about and 
 walked hurriedly home ; packed some clothes into a small 
 trunk, and sat up all night, dozing from time to time in 
 his chair, waiting for the early morning train. 
 
 " Let us make haste, Wilma, or the sun will be down 
 before we reach the top of Little Twin, and I don't want 
 to miss it to-night ; it's my last chance for a good many 
 months, you know." 
 
 The shadows lay upon Hazelview exactly as they had 
 done ten years before ; and the sun, throwing his level 
 beams from low down in the west, lighted up the tops of 
 the hills and trees. Mr. Burns was crossing the race alone 
 upon the two logs thrown over it, when these words came 
 back to him exactly as he had uttered them so long ago, 
 as though given back in echo from the low hills hemming 
 in the quiet water. Involuntarily he cast his eyes west- 
 ward and quickened his steps up the long hill and stood 
 finally upon its summit with uncovered head. He had 
 gazed upon many a grander scene, but none that shed 
 such peace upon his soul, a peace so tender and sweet 
 that it caused tears to well up in his eyes. 
 
 Was it a dream ? or had he actually lived those ten 
 years that used to stretch out so gloriously beyond him ! 
 
 He gazed down upon the changeless water lying far
 
 HIGH- WA TER-MARK. 
 
 385 
 
 below, in the shadow, with just the moon dipping into it 
 and throwing a shining pathway athwart it, as it had done 
 so many, many nights before ; as it had done on that last 
 memorable night. He stood still and fancied Wilma be- 
 side him, looking up with her soulful eyes. Surely, surely, 
 this must be real ! The past has rolled back and they 
 stand again, hand in hand, at the entrance of life. 
 
 There was a cloud before the sun, purple and crimson 
 and gold. It broke away gradually, and the sun burst 
 forth and shone for a moment gloriously, then went down. 
 Mr. Burns's spirit sank into profound sadness. He stood 
 with folded arms and bowed head, his cloak thrown back 
 over his shoulders. He fancied something touched him 
 upon the arm, and started and looked around. Surely, it 
 must be Wilma's presence that steals upon him in the 
 half-darkness ! All at once, upon the perfect stillness of 
 the hour, breaks the tolling of a bell, down below. One, 
 two, three, he counted the strokes mechanically, up 
 to twenty-six. As the lingering vibration of the last 
 mournful stroke died away, he turned and walked slowly 
 back to the village. He inquired of the first person he 
 met, a stranger, " Who is dead?" 
 
 "A lady, somewhat noted as an elocutionist, who re- 
 turned here a few days ago after an absence of some 
 years," said the stranger. "I have forgotten the name 
 she went by, but the old settlers call her Wilma Lynne." 
 
 THE END. 
 
 33
 
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