Read Ebook: Honor Edgeworth; Or Ottawa's Present Tense by Vera

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Ebook has 1579 lines and 128095 words, and 32 pages

"It is such a queer destiny, Nanette," she said repeatedly, "this man may hate me. He was only a boy when papa knew him; perhaps he has grown up a wicked man that will detest me, you know Nanette, people change a great deal sometimes."

"Don't fret, my beauty," was all the disconsolate woman could say. "You may be sure your father did not act in the dark, where his little girl was concerned. He had great trouble in finding the gentleman's address at all, so you may be sure he looked for other information at the same time."

"Yes, I suppose he did," Honor sighed, half resignedly. "What the end will be, time will tell."

"Are you ready, love?" Nanette asked plaintively, turning towards Honor.

"Yes I am," the girl answered with a sigh, "ready for the battle of life--come along, Nanette."

Just as she uttered the words, and before she had stepped from the railway carriage, the guard, accompanied by a gentleman, thrust his head in, and hurriedly announcing "Mr. Rayne, ladies," darted off again, leaving them together. The long looked for moment had arrived: the first meeting, upon which so many thoughts were spent by all three, was already over. Honor Edgeworth raised her eyes to the gentleman announced, and a smile of infinite relief broke over her face; Mr Rayne raised his hat to the younger lady, and a mysterious smile of infinite admiration stole over his face. He broke the silence by addressing Nanette.

"I presume, madam," he began, "you are the person in charge of Miss Edgeworth, the young lady recommended to my future care?" and before she had time to answer, he had extended both hands to Honor.

"Yes, sir," said Nanette, a little nervously, "I give into your hands all that I hold dearest in life;" and then, lowering her voice, she continued, almost to herself, "I can go back again to my poor old home, but the sunshine is gone out of it forever."

Henry Rayne looked quickly up at her: he was assisting Honor out, as she spoke.

"Is it possible that you are not coming to Canada with us?"' he asked in a confounded tone.

"Ah, sir!" answered the poor creature, "I will go in heart, indeed, but there was no provision made to send me all the way with the child."

"Oh this can never be," Henry Rayne interrupted, hurriedly, "I have intended from the first, that you should not be left. Come, come, we will manage everything smoothly by and by. Do not leave one another now, unnecessarily, when you have been together all your lives." There was a shout of delight from both, and clasped in each other's arms, never to part again, they thanked God sincerely for His goodness to them, so far.

"The dear child, sir, I'd have died without her." Nanette sobbed through the tears of joy.

"Of course you would," Henry Rayne answered, handing them into the carriage that awaited them. He cast an admiring glance on "the child" in question, as he sat himself opposite to her on the leather buttoned seat of the hack. If "child" she must be, she would undoubtedly prove an interesting one, for she was now, to all appearances, in her seventeenth year, and showed promises of future development into a splendid woman. For the first few moments Nanette never ceased her protestations of gratitude, and when at last she finished them in a great sob behind her handkerchief, Honor looked sweetly up in Mr. Rayne's face and said.

"Your first act, dear guardian, was one of unsolicited kindness. What will after years bring, when we have learned to respect and love you, and do you good turns as well? The future seems so bright, now that Nanette is coming, for," she explained "you must know, Mr. Rayne, she is the only mother I have ever known, and when dear papa lived he treated Nanette just as he would a member of his own family."

"And I will never be the one to make the first difference," answered Mr. Rayne. "My house is large; I am a crusty old bachelor, with no other tie binding me to the world, except this new link that has just filled me with a desire to live anew from this out. All I have is at your disposal: you must make yourself perfectly at home with me. I don't know much about winning the confidence and hearts of young girls now, but I shall expect you to come to me with yours, because henceforth you are going to be all my own."

"I do not wish to dispute it, Mr. Rayne," Honor answered sweetly, "but I have a presentiment that you are going to spoil me."

When they had reached their rooms, Honor turned with a bright smile on her face, and said to Nanette,

"Don't you think he will be just lovely and kind, dear Nanette? He is a perfect gentleman."

"God bless him," answered Nanette, "he is a good man and has a good heart, and we must never have him regret what he has done for us."

"Well, it is a great weight off my mind anyhow," said Honor, with a sigh of relief, "I am full of hopes now for the future, and I know we cannot help loving dear kind Mr. Rayne;" and over such enthusiastic words Honor and Nanette fell into their deep calm sleep.

All this time Henry Rayne was smoking quietly in the parlor below, and thinking of the lovely face that was going to shed its radiance henceforth on his silent home. Already he longed for the morning to come, that he might look on it again. In the course of his meditation, a thought came to him, which had not suggested itself before, and it was this:

"Ah poor child, with heart of woman Solitary, quiet, grave; Strong of will and firm of purpose Self absorbed in silence brave"

A page or two, of the record of time, turned over unnoticed, will not be missed out of the careers of our characters, it will include the days that have elapsed since that night that Honor Edgeworth lay wide awake on her pillow, playing with the shadowy visions of a possible future, as they danced around her bed, since that night in Manchester, when Nanette slept so contentedly and Henry Rayne smoked in moody silence by the fire-place in the hotel parlor. When we become interested again, it is a clear, bright day, blue and white threads of filmy loveliness flit along the sky, a soft, gentle breeze is blowing, and over the restless waves of the broad Atlantic the "Parisian" is skipping gracefully. She is nearing the port, and many are the anxious, weary faces that turn landward with a sigh upon their lips.

Among the others that are gathered here and there on her broad decks, on this lovely glorious afternoon, we are compelled to notice the graceful, slender form, of a young girl, who sits a little away from the others, with her head leaning on her folded hands, and her sad eyes resting on the troubled waters in a fixed, but vacant stare, she is thinking, it is evident, and thinking deeply, there is not a muscle moving in her handsome face, her lips are set, her chin is slightly raised, the loose locks are blowing with the wind now and then from off her brow, but her eyes ever seek the deepest depth of the green blue sea. She might be a perfect statue, only for the gentle heaving of her breast, that rises and falls in little sighs.

Every one has noticed her, but none would intrude upon her in this reverie, that seems to be her normal state, her face has assumed that expression of intense emotion that could fascinate the most unwilling victim, and indeed they are very few who are not willing to pay a tribute at that shrine, while she in her unconsciousness, is living the long sunny hours, down in the bottomless sea, trying to penetrate it with the eyes of her soul, trying to fathom the fathomless, to understand the mysterious, and to shape into existence the uncreated, these are the strange things that rivet the gaze of Honor Edgeworth on the spray of the billows below. At last she starts up, as if in broken slumber, and turns suddenly 'round.

Two heavy hands have been laid on her slender shoulders, two eyes full of glowing admiration are turned upon her, and Henry Rayne, in a low, loving voice says in her ear:

"Come back to the deck of the 'Parisian' Honor for a little while, you have been down with the 'whales and little fishes' long enough now."

Her eyes filled with tenderness as she looked up to the good face bending over her.

"Oh Mr. Rayne, is it you?" she said "I was wondering where you were, is Nanette sleeping yet?"

"Yes, my dear," he answered, drawing a seat near hers, "and I've been amused by the little window there for fifteen minutes, wondering what there was existing capable of making any one strike such a thoughtful attitude as yours."

"Because, I suppose," laughed Mr. Rayne "you are always in that state of blissful forgetfulness, and if you don't mind yourself you'll fall into a chronic state of dreaming, and then be no more to us than a veritable somnambulist, now, you wouldn't like that, would you?"

"Oh, there is no fear of that, I am not spiritual enough yet to abandon stern reality altogether, but I fancy you will often tire of me before you grow quite accustomed to my strange caprices?"

"Ah, ha! Mr. Rayne, who is waxing romantic now," the girl cried playfully, "I'm so glad to have caught you once. But do you know, I sometimes wonder, if all these days have not really been spent in my fairy land, for things have happened as harmoniously as though life were not a series of discords at its best, Nanette was not forced to leave me, and you did not get bored at my eccentricities, and I liked you so much right away, and our safe journey, and everything together."

"Well, I hope it will convince you my child," said Rayne earnestly, "that life in its common-place acceptation is not so dreadful as you have pronounced it--wait a while--a little practical experience will serve to persuade you, that there are a few redeeming traits in the big, nasty world after all, and will force you to give up these wild theories of idealism that are strangely out of place in a young girl of our period."

"So many tell me that," said Honor distractedly, "but I can't know of course, just yet, what difference all the complicated circumstances that wind themselves around other girl's lives, will make in mine, if they change me at all, they must make an entirely different person of me, and if they are baffled, I will only be stronger and more obstinate than ever in my own views. Either of these must be my destiny, as yet I know no partiality towards either one, but I think it is because I feel so safe in myself that I defy other influences to do their worst."

"Well, dear," said Mr. Rayne, rising, "You won't blame me for the consequences, when you really want my opinion I'll give it to you, I'll try to show you fairly and honestly both sides of the picture of life, I would like to see you stand by its colossal works of art, you may perhaps care to imitate the artists. All that is great and good within my reach, you will see, and yet, I think it wise that you should turn from the luxury of wealth and self-indulgence now and then, to look unshrinkingly upon the squalid misery and wantonness that haunt the greater half of the world. But, come, we will go inside, the air is somewhat chilly, and if Nanette intends to wake at all, she must be looking for us now."

Leaning on the arm of her guardian, Honor slowly walked towards the door of the entrance, followed by many an admiring glance from the other passengers. They found Nanette rubbing her tell-tale eyes, and avowing that she had not "slept a wink" all day.

Under the roof of Henry Rayne's comfortable house everything has undergone a change, there is a primness and a fitness about the rooms that used not to be there, a cosy look peeps out from every turn and corner of the well-furnished apartments. The pantry shelves are whole rows of temptations. Very tame lions looking meekly out with their "jelly" eyes, and rare birds perched in trembling dignity on some pudding that has come "beautifully" out of the mould. In fact it seems that good Mrs. Potts has converted her whole "receipt book" into shelves of substantial and dainty representatives, but such fruitful contemplations as these will surely rouse one to action, and appropriate "action" in a well-filled pantry forebodes merciless slaughter for these culinary imitations of animal life.

Upstairs appeals less dangerously to the material element. It is neat and enticing everywhere. There is the sitting room where Mr. Rayne spent his long, thoughtful night under the gaslight with Robert Edgeworth's letter lying between his numbed fingers. The fire burns there cheerfully now--there is no other light than that cast by the fitful flames which leap and dwindle in shadows through the twilight that lingers still, huge fanciful phantoms skipping over the walls and the ceiling and floor, a little flickering subdued light that trembles on the great arm chairs. "Flo" is curled up, with both ends saluting one another, on the velvet rug before the fender, and at a civil distance away is a purring bundle of gray and white pussy, with her paws doubled in and her eyes blinking at the half-burned coals. There is a bird cage in each window, and an odd little lullaby chirp or the grating of the little iron swings is the only sound besides the loosening and falling of the embers every now and then.

"You must make yourself at home, Honor, for the present, with things as they are. After a while we can make things more comfortable, may be, but this is my little home as it was intended for the last days of an old bachelor, to be spent all by himself," and as he spoke, Henry laughed out right, and beckoned her to follow Mrs. Potts.

When Honor stood upon the rich red rug at the threshold of her door, she uttered a low exclamation of wonder.

"This can't be for me, Mrs. Potts" she said, folding her hands and looking in dismay around her.

"Indeed it is, miss, and not a bit too good is it aither, for yer jewel ov a face to smile on. Och, shure it'll be doin' me old eyes good from this out to be lookin' at yer purty face. But come now, miss, you must be bate out entirely wid the joultin 'o the cars. Let me onfasten them things for ye."

Mrs. Potts was quite at home with the "dear young lady" all at once. As she helped to undo the girl's wrappings she grew less shy and reserved, and prattled on, "Shure it'll be the life o' the master altogether, to have ye around the big house that was allays so lonesome like for the wont ov a lady like yerself is, to cheer it up."

"I hope I may do that," said Honor earnestly, "for Mr. Rayne deserves all the comfort it is in our power to give him."

"Oh, troth! yer right there, missy, an' its only half what he desarves the whole of us together could give him, but shure, if we give him all we're able, an' our good intinshions along wid that, he won't be the man to grumble at that same."

Honor began to understand the character of this old servant immediately. She recognized all those traits that invariably betray the Irish nationality. Such whole-souled creatures are of too universal a type ever to be mistaken.

"Well, then, ye'r ready now, miss, are you?" Mrs. Potts queried when all was over. "Well, if ye like, ye can go an' wait for the ould lady, for she's not fixed up yet, an' I'll jist run and throw an eye over the table, ye know, I'm Jack of all thrades for a while."

"Go, my good woman, by all means," Honor answered, "we will be down directly; don't wait for us."

Potts, who rather suspected an odor of over-done victuals, bounded down to the kitchen, leaving Honor in Nanette's care. Nanette's room was next to Honor's, and had been used as a sort of spare room up to the present time. It was now intensely comfortable and neat, without anything costly or expensive which could make poor Nanette feel out of her element.

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