A Changed Heart: A Novel. May Agnes Fleming
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on Captain Cavendish; his thoughts were hundreds of miles away. Not very pleasant thoughts, either, judging by his contracted brow and compressed lips, as he leaned against a tall rock, his eyes looking out to sea. He started up after awhile, with a gesture of impatience.
"Pshaw!" he said; "what's the use of thinking of it now? it's all past and gone. It is Fate, I suppose; and if Fate has ordained I must marry a rich wife or none, where is the good of my puny struggles? But poor little Winnie! I have been the greatest villain that ever was known to you."
He walked along the beach, sending pebbles skimming over the waves as he went. Two fishermen in oilcloth trowsers, very scaly and rattling, were drawing up their boat, laden to the water's edge with gaspereaux, all alive and kicking. Captain Cavendish stopped and looked at them.
"Your freight looks lively, my men. You have got a fine boatload there."
The two young men looked at him. They were tall, strapping, sunburnt, black-eyed, good-looking fellows both, and the one hauling up the boat answered; the other, pulling the fish out of the nets, went on with his work in silence.
"Yes, sir, we had a good haul last night. The freshet's been strong this spring, and has made the fishing good."
"Were you out all night?"
"Yes; we have to go when the tide suits."
"You had a foggy night for it, then. Can you tell me which is the road to Redmon?"
The young fisherman turned and pointed to a path going up the hillside from the shore.
"Do you see that path? Well, follow it; cut across the field, and let down the bars t'other side. There's a road there; keep straight on and it will fetch you to Redmon. You can't miss the house when you get to it; it's a big brick building on a sort of hill, with lots of trees around it."
"Thank you. I'll find it, I think."
He sauntered lazily up the hillside-path, cut across the fields, and let down the bars as he had been directed, putting them conscientiously up again.
The road was a very quiet one; green meadows on either hand, and clumps of cedar and spruce wood sparsely dotting it here and there. The breeze swept up cool and fresh from the sea; the town with its bustle and noise was out of sight and hearing.
He was walking so slowly that it was nearly half an hour before Redmon came in sight – a large weather-beaten brick house on the summit of a hill, with bleak corners and reedy marshes, and dark trees all around it, the whole inclosed by a high wooden fence. The place took its name from these marshes or moors about it, sown in some time with crimson cranberries and pigeonberries, like fields of red stars. But Captain Cavendish only glanced once at Redmon; for the instant it had come in sight something else had come in sight, too, a thousand times better worth looking at. Just outside the extremity of the fence nearest him there stood a cottage – a little whitewashed affair, standing out in dazzling contrast to the black cedar woods beside it, hop-vines clustering round its door and windows, and a tall gate at one side opening into a well-cultivated vegetable garden.
Swinging back and forward on this gate was a young girl, whom Captain Cavendish recognized in a moment. It was a face that few young men forgot easily, for its owner was a beauty born; the figure was petite and plump, delightfully rounded and ripe indeed, with no nasty sharp curves or harsh angles; the complexion dark and clear, the forehead low, with black, arching brows; the eyes like black beads; the cheeks like June roses; the lips as red, and ripe, and sweet as summer strawberries, the teeth they parted to disclose, literally like pearls, and they parted very often, indeed, to disclose them. The hair was black as hair can be, and all clustering in little short, shining rings and kinks about the forehead and neck. Captain Cavendish had seen that face for the first time last night, in the window with Charley Marsh, but he was a sufficiently good judge of physiognomy to know it was not necessary to be very ceremonious with Miss Cherrie Nettleby. He therefore advanced at once, with a neat little fiction at the top of his tongue.
"I beg your pardon," he said politely, "but I am very thirsty. Will you be kind enough to give me a drink?"
Miss Cherrie, though but nineteen in years, was forty at least in penetration where handsome men were concerned, and saw through the ruse at once. She sprang down from the gate and held it open, with the prettiest affectation of timidity in the world.
"Yes, sir. Will you please to walk in."
"Thank you," said the captain, languidly, "I believe I will. My walk has completely used me up."
Miss Cherrie led the way into the cottage. The front door opened directly into the parlor of the dwelling, a neat little room, the floor covered with mats; a table, with books and knicknacks in the center; a lounge and a rocking-chair, and some common colored prints on the walls. It had an occupant as they came in, a sallow, dark-eyed girl of sixteen, whose hands fairly flew as she sat at the window, netting on a fisherman's net, already some twenty fathoms long.
"Ann," said Cherrie, placing a chair for their distinguished visitor, "go and fetch the gentleman a drink."
The girl turned her sallow but somewhat sullen face, without rising.
"There ain't no water in," she said, curtly.
"Go for some now," said Cherrie. "I'll knit till you come back."
"No, no!" hastily interposed Captain Cavendish. "I beg you will give yourself no such trouble. I am not so thirsty as I thought I was."
"Oh, we'll want the water anyhow to get the boys' dinner," said Cherrie, throwing off her scarlet shawl. "Go, Ann, and make haste."
Ann got up crossly, and strolled out of the room at a snail's pace, and Miss Cherrie took her place, and went to work industriously.
"Is that your sister?" he asked, watching Cherrie's hand flying as swiftly in and out as Ann's had done.
"Yes, that's our Ann," replied the young lady, as if every one should know Ann, as a matter of course.
"And do you and Ann live here alone together?"
Cherrie giggled at the idea.
"Oh dear, no. There's father and the boys."
"The boys, and are they – "
"My brothers," said Cherrie. "Two of 'em, Rob and Eddie. They fish, you know, and Ann, she knits the nets."
"Are those you are now making for them?"
"Yes, these are shad-nets. I hate to knit, but the boys pay Ann for doing it, and she does them all. I guess you'll be pretty thirsty," said Cherrie, laughing as easily as if she had known him for the past ten years, "before Ann gets back with the water. She's horrid slow."
"Never mind. The longer she is away, the better I shall like it, Miss Cherrie."
Miss Cherrie dropped her needle and mesh-block, and opened her black eyes.
"Why, how did you find out my name? You don't know me, do you?"
"A little. I trust we shall be very well acquainted before long."
Cherrie smiled graciously.
"Everybody knows me, I think. How did you find out who I was?"
"I saw you last night."
"No! did you, though? What time? where was I?"
"Sitting in a window, breaking a young gentleman's heart."
Cherrie giggled again.
"I'm sure I wasn't doing any such thing. That was only Charley Marsh."
"Only Charley Marsh. Had you and he a pleasant walk home this morning?"
"Now, I never. How did you know he saw me home?"
"A little bird told me. I only wish it had been my good fortune."
"Oh, what a story!" cried Cherrie, her wicked black eyes dancing in her head; "I wonder you ain't ashamed! Didn't I hear you wanting to ride home with Miss Natty. I was peeking out through the dining-room door, and I heard you as plain as could be."
"Well, I wanted to be polite, you know. Not having the honor of your acquaintance, Cherrie, I knew there was no hope of escorting you;