Read Ebook: Holden with the Cords by Jay W M L

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Ebook has 574 lines and 42061 words, and 12 pages

Astra bent her head a little stiffly. She doubted the reality of this new-born desire for office decorations.

He took out his purse, and laid a folded bank-note on the table. He expected that she would not look at it, until after he had gone, but she immediately took it up, opened it, and tendered it back to him.

"It is too much," said she proudly. And her look added, "I am no beggar."

"Is it?" inquired Bergan, with apparent surprise. "I thought it agreed tolerably well with the prices that you used to mention as the least you would receive for your works, in the future."

"I have lived to grow wiser," replied Astra,

"It is all the same," rejoined Bergan composedly, "I was about to say that, as my mother has long been entreating me to send her some sort of a portrait, it occurs to me that I cannot do better than to get you to make a medallion or a bust of me, whichever you please. The balance of the note can go toward the first payment. We will arrange for the sittings, as soon as you are at leisure."

Astra's lip trembled. Put in this way, the note might be retained; and no one knew so well as herself what an amount of relief to her, and of comfort to her mother, it ensured. But her pride was very sore, nevertheless, and her face was little grateful, as she dropped the note on the table, somewhat as if it had burned her fingers.

Bergan hastened to change the subject. "I am sorry not to see your mother," he began; but Astra interrupted him.

"She would like to see you very much," said she, "if you don't mind coming to her room. It is several days since she has left it; though I really think that she is better to-day."

"Why should I mind?" asked Bergan, smiling. "She used to call me her son sometimes; though you do take such pains to give me to understand that you utterly repudiate me as a brother."

Astra turned her face aside, to conceal the sudden unbending of the set mouth. "Indeed, I do not," she faltered.

Bergan drew her toward him, just as a brother would have done. "Then you will help me to persuade her to move into more comfortable quarters, at once. I promise you that it shall be arranged so carefully as to give her the least possible fatigue."

Astra shook her head. "It cannot be; it would excite her too much. Her disease is of the heart; and joy kills as surely as sorrow. When I moved her here,--being imperatively forced to do so, because I could not afford to stay where we were,--I determined that, let come what would, she should not be stirred again, until she is a great deal better or--worse. Thank you for the kind thought, but indeed she is best off here, for the present,--now that I have the means of making her tolerably comfortable."

In the last sentence, there was some trace of Astra's old self; and, glad to have gained thus much, Bergan followed her to Mrs. Lyte's bedside.

If he still cherished any belief in the feasibility of removing her, it vanished with the first sight of her face. He wondered what could have led Astra to think her better. Even to his inexperienced eyes, the struggling breath, the beaded forehead, the ashy pallor, indicated but too plainly that the thread of her life was wellnigh spun.

Yet she was less changed, in some respects, than Astra. Her smile had the old sweetness; her face--when the excitement caused by his unexpected visit was calmed a little, and she could breathe easier--had the old expression of gentle resignation. It lighted up, too, at sight of him;--as he had reminded Astra, she had come to regard him with a half-motherly affection, during his residence in her house.

"It is very good of you to come to us," she said, gratefully; "it seems a great while since I have seen any friendly face."

"If I had only known that you were in Savalla, I should have come much sooner," answered Bergan.

"And if I had known that you were here," she responded, "I should certainly have sent for you. It is strange, Astra, that we never happened to hear of him."

Astra's face flushed a little. "We are not in the way of hearing news," she replied, evasively. "But now that he is here, to sit with you a few minutes, I will run out and get that prescription filled, which the doctor left this morning."

Bergan rose instantly. "Let me go, rather," said he.

"N-o, no," said Mrs. Lyte, "it will do her good to have a little run. Besides, I want to talk with you."

Bergan sat down again, and Cathie nestled to his side. Nix, too, came and lay down at his feet, quite in the old Berganton fashion.

"I am very glad to see you," continued Mrs. Lyte, when Astra had left the room, "but I am afraid it is largely a selfish gladness. I am so certain that you will see what can be done for my children after I am gone."

Bergan opened his lips to speak, but she lifted her hand with a deprecating gesture, and went on:--

"Let me say what I want to say; I shall be so much easier in my mind. Do you know how we came to leave Berganton?"

"I do not; I only heard of it when I went back there, in the Fall."

Mrs. Lyte briefly explained the circumstances which had led to the removal. She stated, furthermore, that she had written to Major Bergan, upon the failure of the Bank where her money was invested, and inquired if he had sold the house, and whether there was any balance in her favor. To which he replied that he had done nothing about the matter, and proposed to do nothing, at present; he only wished that she would come back, and live in it, as before. But this was impossible, she had now no means of maintaining so large and expensive a place. She had, therefore, written again, to the effect that she asked nothing better than the immediate foreclosure of the mortgage, and the sale of the property. Would he attend to it at his earliest convenience, and forward her the balance? To this letter there had been no reply; she took it for granted that a purchaser had not been found. What she desired of Bergan, in the event of her death, which she believed to be near at hand, was to hurry forward the sale of the place, and secure something for Astra, if possible. This he promised to do; and he added, in a tone that brought instant conviction to her mind, and tears of gratitude to her eyes, that, however this matter terminated, neither Astra nor Cathie should lack friendly aid, at need.

When he finally took his leave, Bergan beckoned Astra to the door. "Are you alone here?" he inquired. "Is there no one to share your labors and your cares?"

"We brought our old Chloe with us," replied Astra; "she would not be left behind, and indeed, I do not know what we should have done without her. But lately the good old creature has insisted upon going out to do a day's washing, now and then, to bring something into the family purse; she is out to-day. When she is home, she does all she can."

Bergan recollected the old slave, and doubted nothing of her fidelity. But, in the woful event that he foresaw, Astra would need other help, other sympathy, he thought.

"Is there no one you can send for,--no relative, no friend, in Berganton, or elsewhere?" he persisted.

"None," replied Astra. "And what accommodations have we for such a friend, if we had one?"

There was nothing more to be said. He shook her hand warmly, told her that he had promised her mother to come again on the morrow, lifted his hat, with his usual courtesy, and went down the street, in such a maze of pity and perplexity, that he forgot to notice which way he went.

When he became cognizant of his whereabouts, he was standing before a large, old-fashioned mansion fronting on one of the principal squares of the city. On the door was a silver plate, bearing the name of "DIVA THANE, ARTIST."

ORDERED STEPS.

Bergan was much struck with the fact that his aimless walk--aimless, at least, so far as his own intention was concerned--had first led him, in virtue of his meeting with Cathie, to Mrs. Lyte's bedside, and next to the studio of Miss Thane. Accepting both these leadings as parts of the same providential plan, though he could discern but the slightest possible relation between them, he knocked at the studio door.

"Come in!" was the immediate response, in Miss Thane's clear, cold monotone.

Bergan pushed open the door, which was a little ajar, and found himself in the presence of the artist. She was standing at her easel, palette and brushes in hand; and she waited to give several touches to her work, before turning toward her visitor.

If she felt any surprise at sight of him, her face betrayed none. Yet it seemed to Bergan that some change had come over that face since he beheld it last--a certain suggestion of weariness under its languor, of dissatisfaction under its chill pride--which he accepted as a good augury for the task that he had in hand.

Miss Thane seemed to divine, at once, that his visit had some object other than the pleasure of seeing either herself or her pictures. After a few quiet words of greeting, she rested one hand upon her easel, and stood waiting, calm, proud, and exceeding beautiful, to be informed of its nature.

Bergan was scarcely prepared to make known his errand so abruptly. He had promptly entered the studio, in obedience to his first impulse; but he had counted upon some little time thereafter to arrange his thoughts and feel his way, some flow of conversation to be duly turned to his advantage, or some clue to the deep mystery of Miss Thane's sympathies,--possibly, too, some further light upon the inscrutable design of Providence, in sending him hither.

After all, was not the most straightforward course likely to be the best one?

"Miss Thane," said he, gravely, "my own volition has had so little to do with bringing me here, that I scarcely know why I am come. But I believe that it is to try to interest you in a sister artist--a sculptor--who is in sore need of aid that you might give her."

Miss Thane put her hand into her pocket, and drew out her purse; but before she could open it, Bergan stopped her with a deprecating gesture.

"Pardon me," said he, "but that sort of aid, I can give myself, if it be necessary."

"What am I to do, then?" asked Miss Thane, wonderingly.

"Whatever one delicate, refined, large-hearted woman can do for another, in the way of cheer, encouragement, sympathy, and consolation."

Miss Thane gave him a long look out of her deep eyes, partly surprised, partly meditative.

"What put it into your head to come to me on such an errand?" she finally asked, with a singular, half satirical emphasis.

"Because when I was wondering to whom I could go," answered Bergan, "I found myself standing before your door. Because you did me the honor, two weeks ago, to ask me a certain question, and I thought that this might be the beginning of a better answer than I was able to give you."

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