Afloat and Ashore, James Fenimore Cooper [romantic story to read TXT] 📗

the manner in which I was received by Grace and Lucy. The first exclaimed "Miles!" precisely as the last had exclaimed; her colour heightened, and tears forced themselves into her eyes, but she could not be said to blush. Instead of first manifesting an eagerness to meet my salute, and then shrinking sensitively from it, she flung her delicate arms round my neck, without the slightest reserve, both arms too, kissed me six or eight times without stopping, and then began to sob, as if her heart would break. The spectators, who saw in all this the plain, honest, natural, undisguised affection of a sister, had the good taste to walk on, though I could see that their countenances sympathised with so happy a family meeting. I had but a moment to press Grace to my heart, before Mr. Hardinge's voice drew my attention to him. The good old man forgot that I was two inches taller than he was himself; that I could, with ease, have lifted him from the earth, and carried him in my arms, as if he were an infant; that I was bronzed by a long voyage, and had Pacific Ocean whiskers; for he caressed me as if I had been a child, kissed me quite as often as Grace had done, blessed me aloud, and then gave way to his tears, as freely as both the girls. But for this burst of feeling on the part of a grey-headed old clergyman, I am afraid our scene would not altogether have escaped ridicule. As it was, however, this saved us. Clergymen were far more respected in America, forty years ago, than they are to-day, though I think they have still as much consideration here as in most other countries; and the general respect felt for the class would have insured us from any manifestations of the sort, without the nature and emotion which came in its aid. As for myself, I was glad to take refuge in Rupert's hearty but less sentimental shake of the hand. After this, we all sought a seat, in a less public spot, and were soon sufficiently composed to converse. As for the gentleman named Drewett, he waited long enough to inquire of Lucy who I was, and then he had sufficient tact to wish us all good evening. I overheard the little dialogue which produced this explanation.

"A close friend, if not a near relation, Miss Hardinge?" he observed, inquiringly.

"Oh, yes," answered the smiling, weeping girl, with the undisguised truth of her honest nature--"both friend and relative."

"May I presume to ask the name?"

"The name, Mr. Drewett!--Why it is Miles--dear Miles--you surely have heard us speak of Miles--but I forget; you never were at Clawbonny--is it not a most joyful surprise, dearest, dearest Grace!"

Mr. Andrew Drewett waited, I thought, with most commendable patience for Grace to squeeze Lucy's hand, and to murmur her own felicitations, when he ventured to add--

"You were about to say something, Miss Hardinge?"

"Was I--I declare I have forgotten what it was. Such a surprise--such a joyful, blessed surprise--I beg pardon, Mr. Drewett--ah. I remember now; I was about to say that this is Mr. Miles Wallingford, of Clawbonny, the gentleman who is my father's ward--Grace's brother, you know."

"And how related to yourself, Miss Hardinge?" the gentleman continued, a little perseveringly.

"To me! Oh! very, very near--that is--I forget so much this evening--why, not at all."

It was at this moment Mr. Drewett saw fit to make his parting salutations with studied decorum, and to take his leave in a manner so polite, that, though tempted, I could not, just at the moment, stop the current of my feelings, to admire. No one seemed to miss him, however, and we five, who remained, were soon seated in the spot I have mentioned, and as much abstracted from the scene around us, as if we had been on the rustic bench, under the old elm, on the lawn--if I dare use so fine a word, for so unpretending a place--at Clawbonny. I had my station between Mr. Hardinge and Grace, while Lucy sat next her father, and Rupert next to my sister. My friend could see me, without difficulty, owing to his stature, while I saw the glistening eyes of Lucy, riveted on my face, as leaning on her father's knee, she bent her graceful form forward, in absorbed attention.

"We expected you; we have not been taken altogether by surprise!" exclaimed good Mr. Hardinge, clapping his hand on my shoulder, as if to say he could now begin to treat me like a man. "I consented to come down, just at this moment, because the last Canton ship that arrived brought the intelligence that the Crisis was to sail in ten days."

"And you may judge of our surprise," said Rupert, "when we read the report in the papers, 'The Crisis, Captain Wallingford .'"

"I supposed my letters from the island had prepared you for this," I observed.

"In them, you spoke of Mr. Marble, and I naturally concluded, when it came to the pinch, the man would resume the command, and bring the ship home. Duty to the owners would be apt to induce him."

"He did not," I answered, a little proudly perhaps, forgetting poor Marble's probable situation, for an instant, in my own vanity. "Mr. Marble understood well, that if I knew nothing else, I knew how to take care of a ship."

"So it seems, my dear boy, indeed, so it doth seem!" said Mr. Hardinge, kindly. "I hear from all quarters, you conduct commended; and the recovery of the vessel from the French, was really worthy of Truxtun himself."

At that day, Truxtun was the great gun of American naval idolatry, and had as much local reputation, as Nelson himself enjoyed in England. The allusion was a sore assault on my modesty; but I got along with it, as well as I could.

"I endeavoured to do my duty, sir," I answered, trying not to look at Lucy, and seem meek; "and it would have been a terrible disgrace to have come home, and been obliged to say the French got the ship from us, when we were all asleep."

"But you took a ship from the French, in that manner, and kept her too!" said a soft voice, every intonation of which was music to me.

I looked round and saw the speaking eyes of Lucy, just clear of the grey coat of her father, behind which she instinctively shrank, the instant she caught my glance.

"Yes," I answered, "we did something of that sort, and were a little more fortunate than our enemies. But, you will recollect we were much favoured by the complaisance of poor Monsieur Le Compte, in leaving us a schooner to work our mischief in."

"I have always thought that part of your story, Miles, a little extraordinary," observed Mr. Hardinge; "though I suppose this Frenchman's liberality was, in some measure, a matter of necessity, out there, in the middle of the Pacific."

"I hardly think you do Captain Le Compte justice, sir. He was a chivalrous fellow, and every way a gallant seaman. It is possible, he was rather more in a hurry than he might have been, but for his passengers--that is all--at least, I have always suspected that the wish to have Miss Merton all to himself, induced him to get rid of us as soon as possible. He evidently admired her, and could have been jealous of a dead-eye."

"Miss Merton!" exclaimed Grace. "Jealous!"

"Miss Merton!" put in Rupert, leaning forward, curiously.

"Miss Merton! And jealous of dead-eyes, and wishing to get rid of us!" said Mr. Hardinge, smiling. "Pray who is Miss Merton? and who are the us ? and what are the dead-eyes?"

Lucy was silent.

"Why, sir, I thought I wrote you all about the Mertons. How we met them in London, and then found them prisoners to Monsieur Le Compte; and that I intended to carry them to Canton, in the Crisis!"

"You told us some of this, certainly; but, though you may have written 'all about' a Major Merton, you forgot to tell us 'about all the Mertons. This is the first syllable I have ever had about a Miss Merton. How is it, girls--did Miles speak of any one but the Major, in his letter?"

"Not a syllable to me, sir, of any young lady, I can assure you," replied Grace, laughing. "How was it to you, Lucy?"

"Of course he would not tell me that which he thought fit to conceal from his own sister," said Lucy, in a low voice.

"It is odd I should have forgotten to mention her," I cried, endeavouring to laugh it off. "Young men do not often forget to write about young ladies."

"This Miss Merton is young, then, brother?"

"About your own age, Grace."

"And handsome--and agreeable--and accomplished?"

"Something like yourself, my dear."

"But handsome, I take it for granted, Miles," observed Mr. Hardinge, "by the manner in which you have omitted to speak of her charms, in your letters!"

"Why sir, I think most persons--that is the world in general--I mean such as are not over-fastidious, would consider Miss Merton particularly handsome--agreeable in person and features, I would be understood to say."

"Oh! you are sufficiently explicit; everybody can understand you," added my laughing guardian, who had no more thought of getting me married to his own daughter, than to a German princess of a hundred and forty-five quarterings, if there are any such things; "some other time we will have the particulars of her eyes, hair, teeth, &c., &c."

"Oh! sir, you may save me the trouble, by looking at her yourself, to-morrow, since she and her father are both here."

" Here! " exclaimed all four in a breath; Lucy's extreme surprise extorting the monosyllable from her reserve, even a little louder than from the rest.

"Certainly, here; father, daughter, and servants; I dare say I omitted to speak of the servants in my letters, too; but a poor fellow who has a great deal to do, cannot think of everything in a minute. Major Merton has a touch of the liver complaint; and it would not do to leave him in a warm climate. So, no other chance offering, he is proceeding to England, by the way of America."

"And how long had you these people on board your ship, Miles?" Grace asked, a little gravely.

"Actually on board, with myself, about nine months, I should think; but including the time in London, at Canton, and on the island, I should call our acquaintance one of rather more than a year's standing."

"Long enough, certainly, to make a young lady sufficiently obvious to a young gentleman's memory, not to be forgotten in his letters."

After this pointed speech, there was a silence, which Mr. Hardinge broke by some questions about the passage home from Canton. As it was getting cool on the Battery, however, we all moved away, proceeding to Mrs. Bradfort's. This lady, as I afterwards discovered, was much attached to Lucy, and had insisted on giving her these opportunities of seeing the world. She was quite at her ease in her circumstances, and belonged to a circle a good deal superior to that into which Grace and myself could have claimed admission, in right of our own social position. Lucy had been well received as her relative, and as a clergyman's daughter; and Grace on her own account,