Home as Found, James Fenimore Cooper [bookreader txt] 📗

of her place, and ought to be in the

kitchen."

 

"But, Miss Ring, what well-bred person does it?" sputtered Mr.

Moreland. "No one ever heard of such a thing in good society. 'Tis

quite shocking! Altogether unprecedented."

 

"It strikes me as being excessively coarse!"

 

"Oh! manifestly; quite rustic!" exclaimed Mr. Edson.

 

"What can possibly be more vulgar?" added Mr. Walworth.

 

"I never heard of such a thing among the right sort!" said Mr.

Mosely.

 

"A young lady who can be so brazen as to come into a room without a

gentleman's arm to lean on, is, in my judgment at least, but

indifferently educated, Hajji or no Hajji. Mr. Edson, have you ever

felt the tender passion? I know you have been desperately in love,

once, at least; do describe to me some of the symptoms, in order that

I may know when I am seriously attacked myself by the disease."

 

"_Mais, ceci est ridicule! L'enfant s'est sauvee du Charenton de New-

York._"

 

"From the nursery rather, Mademoiselle; you perceive she does not yet

know how to walk alone."

 

Mr. Edson now protested that he was too stupid to feel a passion as

intellectual as love, and that he was afraid he was destined by

nature to remain as insensible as a block.

 

"One never knows, Mr. Edson," said the young lady, encouragingly.

"Several of my acquaintances, who thought themselves quite safe, have

been seized suddenly, and, though none have actually died, more than

one has been roughly treated, I assure you."

 

Here the young men, one and all, protested that she was excessively

clever. Then succeeded a pause, for Miss Ring was inviting, with her

eyes, a number six to join the circle, her ambition being

dissatisfied with five entertainees, as she saw that Miss Trumpet, a

rival belle, had managed to get exactly that number, also, in the

other room. All the gentlemen availed themselves of the cessation in

wit to gape, and Mr. Edson took the occasion to remark to Mr.

Summerfield that he understood "lots had been sold in seven hundredth

street that morning, as high as two hundred dollars a lot."

 

The _quadrille_ now ended, and Eve returned towards her friends. As

she approached, the whole party compared her quiet, simple, feminine,

and yet dignified air, with the restless, beau-catching, and worldly

look of the belle, and wondered by what law of nature, or of fashion,

the one could possibly become the subject of the other's comments.

Eve never appeared better than that evening. Her dress had all the

accuracy and finish of a Parisian toilette, being equally removed

from exaggeration and neglect; and it was worn with the ease of one

accustomed to be elegantly attired, and yet never decked with finery.

Her step even was that of a lady, having neither the mincing tread of

a Paris grisette, a manner that sometimes ascends even to the

_bourgeoise_ the march of a cockneyess, nor the tiptoe swing of a

_belle_; but it was the natural though regulated step, of a trained

and delicate woman. Walk alone she could certainly, and always did,

except on those occasions of ceremony that demanded a partner. Her

countenance, across which an unworthy thought had never left a trace,

was an index, too, to the purity, high principles and womanly self-

respect that controlled all her acts, and, in these particulars was

the very reverse of the feverish, half-hoydenish half-affected

expression of that of Miss Ring.

 

"They may say what they please," muttered Captain Truck, who had been

a silent but wondering listener of all that passed; "she is worth as

many of them as could be stowed in the Montauk's lower hold."

 

Miss Ring perceiving Eve approach, was desirous of saying something

to her, for there was an _eclat_ about a Hajji, after all, that

rendered an acquaintance, or even an intimacy desirable, and she

smiled and curtsied. Eve returned the salutation, but as she did not

care to approach a group of six, of which no less than five were men,

she continued to move towards her own party. This reserve compelled

Miss Ring to advance a step or two, when Eve was obliged to stop

Curtsying to her partner, she thanked him for his attention,

relinquished his arm, and turned to meet the lady. At the same

instant the five 'entertainees' escaped in a body, equally rejoiced

at their release, and proud of their captivity.

 

"I have been dying to come and speak to you, Miss Effingham,"

commenced Miss Ring, "but these _five_ giants (she emphasized the

word we have put in italics) so beset me, that escape was quite

impossible. There ought to be a law that but one gentleman should

speak to a lady at a time."

 

"I thought there was such a law already;" said Eve, quietly.

 

"You mean in good breeding; but no one thinks of those antiquated

laws now-a-days. Are you beginning to be reconciled, a little, to

your own country?"

 

"It is not easy to effect a reconciliation where there has been no

misunderstanding. I hope I have never quarrelled with my country, or

my country with me."

 

"Oh! it is not exactly that I mean. Cannot one need a reconciliation

without a quarrel? What do you say to this, Mr. Edson?"

 

Miss Ring having detected some symptoms of desertion in the gentleman

addressed, had thrown in this question by way of recal; when turning

to note its effect, she perceived that all of her _clientelle_ had

escaped. A look of surprise and mortification and vexation it was not

in her power to suppress, and then came one of horror.

 

"How conspicuous we have made ourselves, and it is all my fault!" she

said, for the first time that evening permitting her voice to fall to

a becoming tone. 'Why, here we actually are, two ladies conversing

together, and no gentleman near us!"

 

"Is that being conspicuous?" asked Eve, with a simplicity that was

entirely natural.

 

"I am sure, Miss Effingham, one who has seen as much of society as

you, can scarcely ask that question seriously. I do not think I have

done so improper a thing, since I was fifteen; and, dear me! dear me!

how to escape is the question. You have permitted your partner to go,

and I do not see a gentleman of my acquaintance near us, to give me

his arm!"

 

"As your distress is occasioned by my company," said Eve, "it is

fortunately in my power to relieve it." Thus saying, she quietly

walked across the room, and took her seat next to Mademoiselle

Viefville.

 

Miss Ring held up her hands in amazement, and then fortunately

perceiving one of the truants gaping at no great distance, she

beckoned him to her side.

 

"Have the goodness to give me your arm, Mr. Summerfield," she said,

"I am dying to get out of this unpleasantly conspicuous situation;

but you are the first gentleman that has approached me this

twelvemonth. I would not for the world do so brazen a thing as Miss

Effingham has just achieved; would you believe it, she positively

went from this spot to her seat, quite alone!"

 

"The Hajjis are privileged."

 

"They make themselves so. But every body knows how bold and unwomanly

the French females are. One could wish, notwithstanding, that our own

people would not import their audacious usages into this country."

 

"It is a thousand pities that Mr. Clay, in his compromise, neglected

to make an exception against that article. A tariff on impudence

would not be at all sectional."

 

"It might interfere with the manufacture at home, notwithstanding,"

said John Effingham; for the lungs were strong, and the rooms of Mrs.

Houston so small, that little was said that evening, which was not

heard by any who chose to listen. But Miss Ring never listened, it

being no part of the vocation of a _belle_ to perform that inferior

office, and sustained by the protecting arm of Mr. Summerfield, she

advanced more boldly into the crowd, where she soon contrived to

catch another group of even six "entertainees." As for Mr.

Summerfield, he lived a twelvemonth on the reputation of the

exceedingly clever thing he had just uttered.

 

"There come Ned and Aristabulus," said John Effingham, as soon as the

tones of Miss Ring's voice were lost in the din of fifty others,

pitched to the same key. "_A present, Mademoiselle, je vais nous

venger_."

 

As John Effingham uttered this, he took Captain Truck by the arm, and

went to meet his cousin and the land agent. The latter he soon

separated from Mr. Effingham, and with this new recruit, he managed

to get so near to Miss Ring as to attract her attention. Although

fifty, John Effingham was known to be a bachelor, well connected, and

to have twenty thousand a year. In addition, he was well preserved

and singularly handsome, besides having an air that set all

pretending gentility at defiance. These were qualities that no

_belle_ despised, and ill-assorted matches were, moreover, just

coming into fashion in New-York. Miss Ring had an intuitive knowledge

that he wished to speak to her, and she was not slow in offering the

opportunity. The superior tone of John Effingham, his caustic wit and

knowledge of the world, dispersed the five _beaux_, incontinently;

these persons having a natural antipathy to every one of the

qualities named.

 

"I hope you will permit me to presume on an acquaintance that extends

back as far as your grandfather, Miss Ring," he said, "to present two

very intimate friends; Mr. Bragg and Mr. Truck; gentlemen who will

well reward the acquaintance."

 

The lady bowed graciously, for it was a matter of conscience with her

to receive every man with a smile. She was still too much in awe of

the master of ceremonies to open her batteries of attack, but John

Effingham soon relieved her, by affecting a desire to speak to

another lady. The _belle_ had now the two strangers to herself, and

having heard that the Effinghams had an Englishman of condition as a

companion, who was travelling under a false name, she fancied herself

very clever in detecting him at once in the person of Aristabulus;

while by the aid of a lively imagination, she thought Mr. Truck was

his travelling Mentor, and a divine of the church of England. The

incognito she was too well bred to hint at, though she wished both

the gentlemen to perceive that a _belle_ was not to be mystified in

this easy manner. Indeed, she was rather sensitive on the subject of

her readiness in recognizing a man of fashion under any

circumstances, and to let this be known was her very first object, as

soon as she was relieved from the presence of John Effingham.

 

"You must be struck with the unsophisticated nature and the extreme

simplicity of our society, Mr. Bragg," she said, looking at him

significantly; "we are very conscious it is not what it might be, but

do you not think it pretty well for beginners?"

 

Now, Mr. Bragg had an entire consciousness that he had never seen any

society that deserved the name before this very night, but he was

supported in giving his opinions by that secret sense of his

qualifications to fill any station, which formed so conspicuous a

trait in his character, and his answer was given with an _aplomb_

that would have added weight to the opinion of the veriest _elegant_

of the _Chaussee d'Antin._

 

"It is indeed a good deal unsophisticated," he said, "and so simple

that any body can understand it. I find but a single fault with this

entertainment, which is, in all else, the perfection of elegance in

my eyes, and that is, that there is too little room to swing the legs

in dancing."

 

"Indeed!--I did not expect that--is it not the best usage of Europe,

now, to bring a quadrille into the very minimum of space?"

 

"Quite the contrary, Miss. All good dancing requires evolutions. The

dancing Dervishes, for instance would occupy quite as much space as

both of these sets that are walking before us, and I believe it is

now generally admitted that all good dancing needs room for the

legs."

 

"We necessarily get a little behind the fashions, in this distant

country. Pray, sir, is it usual for ladies to walk alone in society?"

 

"Woman was not made to move through life alone, Miss," returned

Aristabulus with a sentimental glance of the eye, for he never let a

good opportunity for preferment slip through his fingers, and,

failing of Miss Effingham, or Miss Van Cortlandt, of whose estates

and connections he had some pretty accurate notions, it struck him

Miss Ring might, possibly, be a very eligible connection, as all was

grist that came to his mill; "this I believe, is an admitted truth."

 

"By life you mean matrimony, I suppose."

 

"Yes, Miss, a man always means matrimony, when he speaks to a young

lady."

 

This rather disconcerted Miss Ring, who picked her nosegay, for she

was not accustomed to hear gentlemen talk to ladies of matrimony, but

ladies to talk to gentlemen. Recovering her self-possession, however,

she said with a promptitude