Various

“Dead—dead thou wert!—cold lay that form

In rarest beauty moulded,

And meekly o’er thy still, white breast

The snowy hands were folded.

Pale wert thou as the lily buds

Twined ’mid thy raven tresses,

And cold thy lip, and still thy heart

To all my wild caresses!”

—Grace Greenwood.

The beautiful residence of Mr. Hastings was situated in the suburbs of the city, so that Emily, although familiar with all the gayeties and fashionable delights of life in town, was constantly surrounded with all the sweet influences of Nature. The rippling of streams and the rustling of forest leaves were the music of home voices, and winding paths through green fields and woods, up sunny hill-sides and over mossy rocks, were dearer than the gay promenade in the city, or even the aristocratic drive with her father’s noble grays.

The day following that of her interview with Edgar, was bright with a warm May sunshine, and beautiful in all the just unfolded loveliness of spring. The breeze came whispering at her open window with an eloquence not to be resisted, and with a brain full of busy fancies, and a heart laden with sweet thoughts, she sauntered out into the delicious air. With a light quick step she walked along the graveled street, past cultivated grounds and noble dwellings, until she reached the green turf and wooded slopes beyond. And here where the fresh, glad life of Nature seemed kindred with her own, she loitered leisurely along grass-bordered lanes, and beneath grand old trees, dreaming of Edgar, of his genius and of his goodness, and of his love for her.

On her route, where a river curved around the foot of a gently sloping hill, in the shadow of old forest trees was made a rural cemetery—so beautiful with its quiet paths, and its cool shades, that the living loved to wander there; they who came not to watch beside the dead, as well as they who tended the flowers upon the graves of those they had lost.

Through a low ivy-covered gateway of stone, Emily entered the quiet place. There were no massive railings and lofty monuments, no superb carvings and costly devices, but love had made very beautiful this last resting-place of the dead—sweet flowers were blooming every where, and murmuring streams were guided along by the well-trodden paths. Here and there arose a simple shaft or a light column, and the graves of a household enclosed by a green hedge, or surrounded by shadowing trees.

As Emily passed through the familiar walks, she came suddenly upon a grave in a remote corner of the cemetery, beside which sat a solitary mourner. The spot was unenclosed, save by a few dark pines, and the outline of the grave upon the grassy turf distinctly visible. A small while slab lay upon the centre of the green mound, and at its head grew a rose-tree of wonderful beauty, bending till its weight of pure, white buds and blossoms, touched the long bright grass upon the grave.

Its simple loveliness touched the heart of Emily, and drawing near, she stooped down and read upon the pure marble—“Dear Elise.” Her young eyes filled with tears, and with an irresistible impulse she turned her face, full of tenderest sympathy toward her who sat beside the grave, and murmured,

“Was it your Elise?”

The woman, who had been unheeding until now, looked up at the sound of that earnest voice, and meeting a glance of such sorrowing gentleness, answered softly—

“Yes, my only, only child!”

There was something in the eye now first raised to hers, that eye sunken but still wonderfully beautiful—a half-remembered expression, that riveted Emily’s gaze, and invested with a deep interest the stranger before her. Laying her hand gently upon that of the woman, she said softly—

“Is it long since you laid her here?”

“Only a few weeks,” was the reply; “there were buds on the rose-tree when I brought it here.”

“And was it hers?” asked Emily, stooping down to inhale the rich fragrance of the beautiful flower.

“Yes, and it was the dearest treasure she possessed. Oh! how often have I watched her as she sat beside it at the window, with her proud head bending over her work, its blossoms not more delicate and pure than the brow against which they bloomed. Oh, my Elise, how beautiful she was! I used to think that in all the wide world, there was not, there could never be a face so surpassingly lovely. I only cared to live that I might look upon her beauty: I worshiped, I adored my child, and God has taken her from me!”

She paused, but encouraged by the earnest, attentive face of Emily, continued:

“I am of Italy, and my Elise inherited the dark eyes and impassioned nature of the land of her birth. When my child was but two years old, I left my native shores, and with my only relative, my father, followed my young American husband to his own land. And here, before many years, he died and left me, with a charge to watch over unceasingly, our marvelously beautiful child, who, with her father’s fair, transparent complexion and regular features, had also inherited his delicate constitution.

“We were poor, and I labored hard, but I cared not, so that Elise were happy—so that I could but find her the books she loved, and save her slight hands from menial labor. No day was so dark, or so full of care, that I did not find time to braid her magnificent hair around her noble head, and it was joy enough to look once into her soft eyes, and see her faint smile at my fond pride.

“Elise was not like me—she had a soul filled with thoughts of beauty and of poetry, and she talked of things in which I could not sympathize; the world seemed to her full of voices, and heaven held more for her than for me. I felt that I could not understand my child—hers was a purer and a greater nature than mine, and I looked upon her with a reverent worship. I felt that God and the angels were near to her, and that her wonderful beauty was, I knew not how, connected with the spirit within.”

“And was there never a portrait of your gifted, beautiful child?” interrupted Emily, in a quivering tone.

The question seemed to stir a deep fount of feeling—the stranger’s face flushed, and passionate tears gushed from her eyes.

“Ah, yes! but I may not have it—I may not see it long,” she cried. “Oh, my child, I must leave you forever!”

Emily was startled by this emotion, but in a few moments the mother became calm and continued:

“Not many weeks before Elise’s illness, as we were walking in the city, an artist observed my child, and followed her to our humble home. He praised her loveliness to me, in words which I cannot now remember, though I well recollect their import. He said her beauty was remarkable—was rare. In all his life he had never seen a face to compare with it, never an eye so glorious, so full of soul; he said such beauty should not be lost to the world, and he begged that I would let her sit to him, offering at the same time a liberal compensation.

“My heart was filled with a proud joy, but I let Elise decide for herself, and alter many urgent entreaties, she at length consented. Ah, I was very, very happy! I felt that her beauty was not to wither in unappreciation—the world would know of her loveliness—through the artist they might hear of her, and who could tell the happy days in store for my child. And I joyed also to know that now in the bright mornings she would be walking through the gay streets of the city, in the glad, fresh air, instead of bending wearily over her needle-work in our small dark room.

“For several mornings I accompanied Elise to the studio of the artist, though I could ill afford the time, but at length I found it utterly impossible, for our daily bread was to be earned, and Elise went alone. I sometimes fancied that when she returned at noon, she looked weary from her long walk, but she never complained, and I only thought her more beautiful than ever. One day she returned, and flinging into my lap her little green purse, heavy with silver, she said languidly—

“‘The picture does not need me any more, and I am very glad, for my head aches sadly—they say the portrait is very like me, mother.’

“I resolved to go with her to see it on the following day, but—oh, Father in Heaven! when the time came that I looked upon it first, my child lay here. I cannot tell you how she faded in my arms day by day—but, when I had seen her own rose-tree planted over the place of her rest, and had wept upon the green sod till the fountain of tears seemed dry, slowly and wearily I sought the studio of the painter, longing, yet almost fearing, to look upon her image there. Oh, what a vision met my gaze! I had thought to see her semblance—to trace a likeness to my loved Elise in the artist’s work; but there, full of life and beauty as though she had never left me, she stood before me. I wept over that picture tears more passionate than I had shed beside her grave, and I begged and received permission to visit it every day.

“A few nights after, on returning to my home, I found that my aged father, who had long been yearning to return to the land of his youth, had been making some arrangements with friends who were in a few months to sail for Italy, feeling that I would not refuse to go with him, now that my only tie to America, to life, save him, was severed. A week before I would have said yes—would have left the dear grave of my buried Elise, and gone with my father to die in the land of our birth; but now I seemed held by a living tie—I felt as if my child were with me here, and I must take her, or my heart would break. I told my father and his friends this; we were all poor, but they loved me, and by the sale of many little articles—some how dear, God only knows, we raised money enough to buy the picture, at the price which I had often heard from Elise the artist demanded for a portrait.

“I could not have believed my stricken heart capable of the joy that throbbed through all its pulses, as I entered the painter’s room with my treasure-laden purse in my hand. I know my voice faltered—but oh, Heaven! how it died within me when I heard a firm denial of my request! Tears and pleadings—all a mother’s agony availed not; for some purpose of his own, some artists’ exhibition—what, I could not wholly comprehend—he would have the picture for his own—he would not yield it up, but coldly and calmly persisted in his refusal. Day after day I have been to him, but in vain. The time of our departure is drawing near, and I know that duty to my father demands that I leave him not to go down the way of life alone. I must go—I must leave my child, that blessed, pictured face forever!”

The woman’s frame trembled violently, and passionately exclaiming—“Oh, Loring, Edgar Loring!” she laid her face upon the grave and wept convulsively.

Emily had been listening, her upturned eyes wet with tears, and when the last, wild exclamation of the stranger reached her ear, she started quickly, a deadly faintness came over her heart, a paleness to her cheek, and she too drooped her young head, bowed with a sudden wretchedness, upon the grave before her. Swiftly thought after thought, memory after memory crowded upon her brain, all forcing with an anguish unalterable, the fearful dread that Edgar was cold and selfish—Edgar was untrue. That picture of Elise, with the deep eyes so like the mother’s beside her—yes, she had seen it, and Edgar had told her it was an ideal work—and oh, mockery! that her loveliness was remembered in the vision. And she felt that a fearful moment in her life was now come: it was only necessary to prove the identity of the picture she had seen with that of the stranger’s child, to convict Edgar of the basest falsehood; and he who could deceive a heart young and trusting as hers, of what was he not capable!

Then awoke the latent power, the unrevealed energy of her spirit, and with an intense effort she calmed the tumultuous heavings of her heart, and strove to bring back her own quiet smile to those quivering lips. For some moments neither spoke, and when Emily lifted her head from the sod where the mother still lay, her face was calm, save a bright, uneasy flush upon her cheek. Lightly she touched the prostrate form before her, and said gently—

“I know this artist, and it may be that I can do something for you; describe to me this picture—I think that I have seen it.”

Then minutely, Mrs. Revere (for my readers must know it was she,) described the face of her Elise—and the faint ray of hope died out in the breast of Emily. Calmly she gathered from the mother all needful information—her name and residence and time of sailing, then giving her own address, and uttering words of hope and consolation, arose and left the spot.

There was no joy in the sunshine, no music in the song of birds, as she wended her way homeward over the very ground where a few hours before she had passed lightly, restless for very happiness. Reaching her home she slowly ascended to her own room, and closing the door, flung herself upon a couch and buried her face in its crimson cushions. Not till then did she know how great had been the strength exerted to keep down her rising tears, to command her trembling voice, to hide from other eyes her bitter sorrow. Long and passionately she wept now, but it was a weeping over the awakening from a dream. Edgar was cold-hearted—Edgar was false! That which she had thought to be the beautiful struggle of genius toward perfection, was but a selfish ambition. And she had been trifled with—duped—and as the humiliating thought rushed upon her, she lifted her sweet head, and the proud flush crimsoned cheek, neck and brow.

Emily’s love for Edgar was but in its early bloom—scarcely known even to herself; yet her pure, true soul would have risen above even a stronger, deeper, more engrossing passion. She had not loved the being now revealed to her, but “a creature of her dreams,” invested with all the beauty and nobleness which he seemed to possess; and it was with her young faith in human goodness still unshaken, that she mourned over the vanishing of this first, and dearest vision of her womanhood.

Emily did not meet the family at tea that evening, she “had a headache, and required rest”—but at night when her beloved mother came fondly to inquire if she were ill, she flung herself into her arms and told her all: all Edgar’s flattery and half-revealed love, all his falsehood, all the sad story of the childless mother, and besought her advice and aid in the course upon which she was now resolved.

Happy for that young heart that it could breathe out its first sorrow against a mother’s fond cheek—that the pillow of that stricken head was a mother’s loving bosom.

——