The Essential Julian Hawthorne Collection. Julian Hawthorne
Читать онлайн книгу.
length she dropped her eyes, and, with nimble fingers and swiftly-applied hair-pins, wound up her hair into its nocturnal knot. She removed her ear-rings and rings, and put them into the vase; but here reverie overtook her once more, and held her in a meditative half-smile, until consciousness revived, and startled the blood into her cheeks. She walked over to her little sofa, with dispatch and business in her step, and sat down to unlace her boots.
There is something in these little ever-recurring actions, however--these things which we do so often as to do them unconsciously--which predisposes to thought and reflection. Cornelia, having untied the knot, had not got farther than the fourth hole from the top, her eyes meanwhile wandering slowly around the picturesque but rather disorderly little room, before she became dreamily interested in watching the shadow of a neck-scarf she had hung upon the support of the looking-glass, projected upon the wall by the flickering light of the candle. As she looked, her fingers began to labor upon the boot-lace, and her eyes grew gradually larger and darker. Occasionally there were little quiverings of the upper and under lids, barely perceptible movements of the tip of the nose and the nostrils, and twitching at the mouth-corners. By-and-by the twitchings resolved themselves into a smile, very faint and far away at first, but broadening and brightening every moment; now, the dimples were visible at half a glance, and now, upon the still air of the chamber, there rippled forth--
Cornelia put her hand to her mouth, and gave a quick, furtive glance over her shoulder, as if in fear lest some one might have overheard her. She recollected with some relief that the door was locked at any rate, and the curtains down. But, for all that, as she realized what she had been thinking about, and how very far her papa or Sophie would be from laughing if they were told about it, she felt her cheeks tingle, and could not be busy enough with that boot-lace!
There! that was off; now for the other. What a queer man he was, though! Could all that have been put on in the garden--pretending he didn't know! (This was such a tiresome old knot!) If she only hadn't been such a goose and laughed--what must he think? What could have been the reason he rushed off in such a hurry? Probably was afraid she'd tell papa, and then he couldn't be his pupil. Suppose she should tell! that would be mean, though. Perhaps he didn't intend it, after all. He seemed nice in some ways, though he was so queer. Very likely it was only a sort of spasm--an electric, magnetic thing--she had heard of something of the sort. Yes, and she had felt funny herself that evening--a numb, quivery, prickly kind of sensation: it may have been the thunder-storm! It was strange, though; she never remembered to have felt it before. She wondered whether Mr. Bressant ever had. Perhaps deaf people were more subject to it. What a pity he should be deaf! It made it so awfully embarrassing to talk to him sometimes. It must be dreadful for them to be in love with anybody. Imagine having to talk in that way to a deaf person! or being--
This time it was the candle which took upon itself the task of warning and censorship. It flickered, flared, gasped, and went out. It was a very pathetic, and, it is to be hoped, effective way of remonstrance. But the last thing seen of Cornelia, she was sitting on the sofa, leaning carelessly forward, one hand holding her curved, little, booted foot, the knot still untied, her eyes fixed dreamily on nothing, the half-smile flickering on her lips, and the womanly contours of her figure doubtfully lighted and darkly shaded by the uncertain candle-light.
CHAPTER VII.
PROFESSOR VALEYON MAKES A CALL.
The morning following Bressant's arrival was clear and cool. Professor Valeyon looked out of the window of his bedroom, which was at the garden-end of the house, and opposite Cornelia's, and saw the cold, white mists lying in the valley, and the rough hills, like islands, lifting their dark shoulders above it.
As he looked, the sun, having climbed a few inches above the eastern uplands, let a bright glance fall right upon the open spot at the summit of the professor's favorite hill. A few minutes afterward he poured a golden flood into the valley, carrying consternation to the delaying vapors, insomuch that they straightway put themselves into commotion preparatory to departure. No spare time was allowed them; some were bundled off into the dark gullies and passes of the hills; others betook themselves hastily to that side of the valley which was yet in shadow, to sleep a few moments beyond the legitimate time; others still, finding escape impossible, rose heavenward like a mighty incense, and were by the sun converted into something wellnigh as glorious as himself.
"Good simile for a sermon, that! turning persecution into a means of glorification!" thought the professor, recurring to the days of his pastorship.
As may be inferred, the old gentleman was in the habit of getting up early; a praiseworthy practice, but one so universal with elderly people as to suggest a doubt of its being entirely a voluntary virtue. Be that as it may, the professor was up, and proceeded to set his blood in motion over a wash-bowl. His toilet was not so intricate and serious a matter as it might have been forty years or so previous, but was nevertheless a duty most scrupulously and conscientiously performed, from June to December, and round again. The last thing attended to before putting on his coat was always carefully to brush and dispose his hair. Until within two or three years, he had been able to keep up appearances by coaxing a gray rift across the top of the bald place; but it had grown month by month thinner and grayer, and more difficult to keep in position, until at last he had bravely told himself it was a vanity and a delusion, and had consigned it to obscurity and oblivion among the rusty side-locks which still sturdily surrounded the naked and inaccessible summit. Since that time he had occasionally allowed his thoughts to revert to it regretfully, though not bitterly nor rebelliously.
But, on this particular morning, he stood, brush in hand, before his looking-glass with an expression upon his elderly features at once undecided, wistful, and shame-faced; detached, after a short search, a few frosty spears from the assortment at the left side of his head; scrutinized them anxiously for a moment, and then, by the aid of a little water, and cautious brushing and pulling, succeeded in spatting them down into their long-abandoned place.
"I'm an old fool, that's certain!" muttered he, as, after a final surreptitious sort of glance at the unaccustomed embellishment, he turned away. "But then I don't go out calling every day!"
He slipped on his coat, opened his door, and descended the stairs with his usual solid deliberation. As he emerged upon the balcony, the sunshine had just lighted up the tree-tops in the garden, but a little nest of white mist still rested upon the fountain, whose indefatigably small gabble could be heard proceeding mysteriously from the centre thereof. A few large, thin mosquitoes, cold and portentously hungry from their all-night's fast, came swooping at the professor with shrieks of dismal tenuity, intending to get a warm breakfast out of him. But he had had large experience in dealing with such gentry, and, so far from standing treat, he slew several and threw the rest into confusion.
"And now," said he to himself, as he descended the steps, "I'll take a look at Dolly; Michael hasn't let out Lady Bountiful or the hens yet, I suspect."
The barn lay in a separate enclosure to the west of the garden; it was a primitive structure enough, but had been refitted within so as to afford accommodation for the family steed and the cow. The former, Dolly, was a well-preserved bay, neatly put together, and, had the professor been so inclined, she might have become a celebrity in her day. As it was, she had seen no more stirring duty than to convey her owner to and from church, during the years of his ministrations there; to draw the plow and the hay-cart occasionally, and to gallop over the rough country roads beneath the side-saddle, for the benefit of Cornelia or Sophie. She was at this time about fifteen years old, but still retained much of the spirit of her best days, and not unfrequently gave the professor some pains to keep her within bounds.
He threw open the barn-door, and forth upon the crisp air floated the close, sweet smell of hay and cow's breath. Some swallows twittered and glanced up near the dark roof, as smart and wide-awake as if they had not just been startled out of bed. The sun, shining through the cracks and knot-holes into the dusky interior, drew lines of dusty light across the darkness. A hen, that had escaped from the coop and got up into the hay-loft to lay an egg, set up a strongly-remonstrative cackle against being disturbed in so interesting a proceeding. Lady Bountiful lowed