CHAPTER XVI.
HOPS.
The afternoon was very sultry; however, Mr. Thorold came, and we wentfor our walk. It was so sultry we went very leisurely and also met fewpeople; and instead of looking very carefully at the beauties ofnature and art we had come to see, we got into a great talk as westrolled along; indeed, sometimes we stopped and sat down to talk. Mr.Thorold told me about himself, or rather, about his home in Vermontand his old life there. He had no mother, and no brothers nor sisters;only his father. And he described to me the hills of his nativecountry, and the farm his father cultivated, and the people, and thelife on the mountains. Strong and free and fresh and independent andintelligent--that was the impression his talk made upon me, of thecountry and people and life alike. Sometimes my thoughts took aprivate turn of their own, branching off.
"Mr. Thorold," said I, "do you know Mr. Davis of Mississippi?"
"Davis? No, I don't know him," he said shortly.
"You have seen him?"
"Yes, I have seen him often enough; and his wife, too."
"Do you like his looks?"
"I do not."
"He looks to me like a bad man--" I said slowly. I said it to Mr.Thorold; I would hardly have made the remark to another at West Point.
"He is about bad business--" was my companion's answer. "And yet I donot know what he is about; but I distrust the man."
"Mr. Thorold," said I, beginning cautiously, "do you want to haveslavery go into the territories?"
"No!" said he. "Do you?"
"No. What do you think would happen if a Northern President should beelected in the fall?"
"Then slavery would _not_ go into the territories," he said, looking alittle surprised at me. "The question would be settled."
"But do you know some people say--some people at the South say--thatif a Northern President is elected, the Southern States will notsubmit to him?"
"Some people talk a great deal of nonsense," said Mr. Thorold. "Howcould they help submitting?"
"They say--it is said--that they would break off from the North andset up for themselves. It is not foolish people that say it, Mr.Thorold."
"Will you pardon me, Miss Randolph, but I think they would be veryfoolish people that would do it."
"Oh, I think so too," I said. "I mean, that some people who are notfoolish believe that it might happen."
"Perhaps," said Mr. Thorold. "I never heard anything of it before.You are from the South yourself, Miss Randolph?" he added, looking atme.
"I was born there," I said. And a little silence fell between us. Iwas thinking. Some impression, got I suppose from my remembrance offather and mother, Preston, and others whom I had known, forbade me todismiss quite so lightly, as too absurd to be true, the rumour I hadheard. Moreover, I trusted Dr. Sandford's sources of information,living as he did in habits of close social intercourse with men ofinfluence and position at Washington, both Southern and Northern.
"Mr. Thorold,"--I broke the silence,--"if the South should do such athing, what would happen?"
"There would be trouble," he said.
"What sort of trouble?"
"Might be all sorts," said Mr. Thorold, laughing; "it would depend onhow far people's folly would carry them."
"But suppose the Southern States should just do that;--say they wouldbreak off and govern themselves?"
"They would be like a bad boy that has to be made to take medicine."
"How could you _make_ them?" I asked, feeling unreasonably grave aboutthe question.
"You can see, Miss Randolph, that such a thing could not be permitted.A government that would let any part of its subjects break away attheir pleasure from its rule, would deserve to go to pieces. If onepart might go, another part might go. There would be no nation left."
"But how could you _help_ it?" I asked.
"I don't know whether we could help it," he said; "but we would try."
"You do not mean that it would come to _fighting_?"
"I do not think they would be such fools. I hope we are supposing avery unlikely thing, Miss Randolph."
I hoped so. But that impression of Southern character troubled me yet.Fighting! I looked at the peaceful hills, feeling as if indeed "allthe foundations of the earth" would be "out of course."
"What would _you_ do in case it came to fighting?" said my neighbour.The words startled me out of my meditations.
"I could not do anything."
"I beg your pardon. Your favour--your countenance, would do much; onone side or the other. You would fight--in effect--as surely as Ishould."
I looked up. "Not against you," I said; for I could not bear to bemisunderstood.
There was a strange sparkle in Mr. Thorold's eye; but those flashes oflight came and went so like flashes, that I could not always tell whatthey meant. The tone of his voice, however, I knew expressed pleasure.
"How comes that?" he said. "You _are_ Southern?"
"Do I look it?" I asked.
"Pardon me--yes."
"How, Mr. Thorold?"
"You must excuse me. I cannot tell you. But you _are_ South?"
"Yes," I said. "At least, all my friends are Southern. I was bornthere."
"You have _one_ Northern friend," said Mr. Thorold, as we rose up togo on. He said it with meaning. I looked up and smiled. There was asmile in his eyes, mixed with something more. I think our compact offriendship was made and settled then and at once.
He stretched out his hand, as if for a further ratification. I putmine in it, while he went on,--"How comes it, then, that you take sucha view of such a question?"
There had sprung up a new tone in our intercourse, of morefamiliarity, and more intimate trust. It gave infinite content to me;and I went on to answer, telling him about my Northern life. Drawn on,from question to question, I detailed at length my Southern experiencealso, and put my new friend in possession not only of my opinions, butof the training under which they had been formed. My hand, I remember,remained in his while I talked, as if he had been my brother; till hesuddenly put it down and plunged into the bushes for a bunch of wildroses. A party of walkers came round an angle a moment after; andwaking up to a consciousness of our surroundings, we found, or _I_did, that we were just at the end of the rocky walk, where we mustmount up and take to the plain.
The evening was falling very fair over plain and hill when we got tothe upper level. Mr. Thorold proposed that I should go and see thecamp, which I liked very much to do. So he took me all through it, andshowed and explained all sorts of things about the tents and themanner of life they lived in them. He said he should like it verymuch, if he only had more room; but three or four in one little tentnine feet by nine, gave hardly, as he said, "a chance to a fellow."The tents and the camp alleys were full of cadets, loitering about, ortalking, or busy with their accoutrements; here and there I saw anofficer. Captain Percival bowed, Captain Lascelles spoke. I looked forPreston, but I could see him nowhere. Then Mr. Thorold brought meinto his own tent, introduced one or two cadets who were loiteringthere, and who immediately took themselves away; and made me sit downon what he called a "locker." The tent curtains were rolled tight up,as far as they would go, and so were the curtains of every other tent;most beautiful order prevailed everywhere and over every triflingdetail.
"Well," said Mr. Thorold, sitting down opposite me on acandle-box--"how do you think you would like camp life?"
"The tents are too close together," I said.
He laughed, with a good deal of amusement.
"That will do!" he said. "You begin by knocking the camp to pieces."
"But it is beautiful," I went on.
"And not comfortable. Well, it is pretty comfortable," he said.
"How do you do when it storms very hard--at night?"
"Sleep."
"Don't you ever get wet?"
"_That_ makes no difference."
"Sleep in the rain!" said I. And he laughed again at me. It was notbanter. The whole look and air of the man testified
to a thoroughsoldierly, manly contempt of little things--of all things that mightcome in the way of order and his duty. An intrinsic independence andwithal control of circumstances, in so far as the mind can controlthem. I read the power to do it. But I wondered to myself if he nevergot homesick in that little tent and full camp. It would not do totouch the question.
"Do you know Preston Gary?" I asked. "He is a cadet."
"I know him."
I thought the tone of the words, careless as they were, signifiedlittle value for the knowledge.
"I have not seen him anywhere," I remarked.
"Do you want to see him? He has seen you."
"No, he cannot," I said, "or he would have come to speak to me."
"He would if he could," replied Mr. Thorold--"no doubt; but theliberty is wanting. He is on guard. We crossed his path as we cameinto the camp."
"On guard!" I said. "Is he? Why, he was on guard only a day or twoago. Does it come so often?"
"It comes pretty often in Gary's case," said my companion.
"Does it?" I said. "He does not like it."
"No," said Mr. Thorold, merrily. "It is not a favourite amusement inmost cases."
"Then why does he have so much of it?"
"Gary is not fond of discipline."
I guessed this might be true. I knew enough of Preston for that. Butit startled me.
"Does he not obey the regulations?" I asked presently, in a loweredtone.
Mr. Thorold smiled. "He is a friend of yours, Miss Randolph?"
"Yes," I said; "he is my mother's nephew."
"Then he is your cousin?" said my companion. Another of thosepenetrative glances fell on me. They were peculiar; they flashed uponme, or through me, as keen and clear as the flash of a sabre in thesun; and out of eyes in which a sunlight of merriment or benignity waseven then glowing. Both glowed upon me just at this moment, so I didnot mind the keen investigation. Indeed, I never minded it. I learnedto know it as one of Mr. Thorold's peculiarities. Now, Dr. Sandfordhad a good eye for reading people, but it never flashed, unless understrong excitement. Mr. Thorold's were dancing and flashing andsparkling with fifty things by turns; their fund of amusement andpower of observation were the first things that struck me, and theyattracted me too.
"Then he is your cousin?"
"Of course, he is my cousin."
I thought Mr. Thorold seemed a little bit grave and silent for amoment; then he rose up, with that benign look of his eyes glowing allover me, and told me there was the drum for parade. "Only the firstdrum," he added; so I need not be in a hurry. Would I go home beforeparade?
I thought I would. If Preston was pacing up and down the side of thecamp ground, I thought I did not want to see him nor to have him seeme, as he was there for what I called disgrace. Moreover, I had asecret presentiment of a breezy discussion with him the next timethere was a chance.
And I was not disappointed. The next day in the afternoon he came tosee us. Mrs. Sandford and I were sitting on the piazza, where the heatof an excessive sultry day was now relieved a little by a slenderbreeze coming out of the north-west. It was very hot still. Prestonsat down and made conversation in an abstracted way for a littlewhile.
"We did not see you at the hop the other night, Mr. Gary," Mrs.Sandford remarked.
"No. Were you there?" said Preston.
"Everybody was there--except you."
"And Daisy? Were _you_ there, Daisy?"
"Certainly," Mrs. Sandford responded. "Everybody else could have beenbetter missed."
"I did not know you went there," said Preston, in something so like agrowl that Mrs. Sandford lifted her eyes to look at him.
"I do not wonder you are jealous," she said composedly.
"Jealous!" said Preston, with growl the second.
"You had more reason than you knew."
Preston grumbled something about the hops being "stupid places." Ikept carefully still.
"Daisy, did _you_ go?"
I looked up and said yes.
"Whom did you dance with?"
"With everybody," said Mrs. Sandford. "That is, so far as the lengthof the evening made it possible. Blue and grey, and all colours."
"I don't want you to dance with everybody," said Preston, in a moreundertone growl.
"There is no way to prevent it," said Mrs. Sandford, "but to be thereand ask her yourself."
I did not thank Mrs. Sandford privately for this suggestion; whichPreston immediately followed up by inquiring "if we were going to thehop to-night?"
"Certainly," Mrs. Sandford said.
"It's too confounded hot!"
"Not for us who are accustomed to the climate," Mrs. Sandford said,with spirit.
"It's a bore altogether," muttered Preston. "Daisy, are you goingto-night?"
"I suppose so."
"Well, if you must go, you may as well dance with me as with anybody.So tell anybody else that you are engaged. I will take care of you."
"Don't you wish to dance with anybody except me?"
"I do not," said Preston, slowly. "As I said, it is too hot. Iconsider the whole thing a bore."
"You shall not be bored for me," I said. "I refuse to dance with you.I hope I shall not see you there at all."
"Daisy!"
"Well?"
"Come down and take a little walk with me."
"You said it is too hot."
"But you will dance?"
"You will not dance."
"I want to speak to you, Daisy."
"You may speak," I said. I did not want to hear him, for there were noindications of anything agreeable in Preston's manner.
"Daisy!" he said, "I do not know you."
"You used to know her," said Mrs. Sandford; "that is all."
"Will you come and walk with me?" said Preston, almost angrily.
"I do not think it would be pleasant," I said.
"You were walking yesterday afternoon."
"Yes."
"Come and walk up and down the piazza, anyhow. You can do that."
I could, and did not refuse. He chose the sunny western side, becauseno one was there. However, the sun's rays were obscured under a thickhaze and had been all day.
"Whom were you with?" Preston inquired, as soon as we were out ofearshot.
"Do you mean yesterday?"
"Of course I mean yesterday! I saw you cross into the camp With whomwere you going there?"
"Why did you not come to speak to me?" I said.
"I was on duty. I could not."
"I did not see you anywhere."
"I was on guard. You crossed my path not ten feet off."
"Then you must know whom I was with, Preston," I said, looking at him.
"_You_ don't know--that is the thing. It was that fellow Thorold."
"How came you to be on guard again so soon? You were on guard just aday or two before."
"That is all right enough. It is about military things that you do notunderstand. It is all right enough, except these confounded Yankees.And Thorold is another."
"Who is _one_!" I said, laughing. "You say he is _another_."
"Blunt is one."
"I like Major Blunt."
"Daisy," said Preston, stopping short, "you ought to be with yourmother. There is nobody to take care of you here. How came you to knowthat Thorold?"
"He was introduced to me. What is the matter with him?"
"You ought not to be going about with him. He is a regular Yankee, Itell you."
"What does that mean?" I said. "You speak it as if you meant somethingvery objectionable."
"I do. They are a cowardly set of tailors. They have no idea what agentleman means, not one of them, unless they have caught the ideafrom a Southerner. I don't want you to have anything to do with them,Daisy. You _must_ not dance with them, and you must not be seen withthis Thorold. Promise me you will not."
"Dr. Sandford is another," I said.
"I can't help Dr. Sandford. He is your guardian. You must not go againwith Thor
old!"
"Did you ever know _him_ cowardly?" I asked.
I was sure that Preston coloured; whether with any feeling besideanger I could not make out; but the anger was certain.
"What do you know about it?" he asked.
"What do you?" I rejoined. But Preston changed more and more.
"Daisy, promise me you will not have anything to do with thesefellows. You are too good to dance with them. There are plenty ofSouthern people here now, and lots of Southern cadets."
"Mr. Caxton is one," I said. "I don't like him."
"He is of an excellent Georgia family," said Preston.
"I cannot help that. He is neither gentlemanly in his habits nor truein his speech."
Preston hereupon broke out into an untempered abuse of Northern thingsin general, and Northern cadets in particular, mingled with arepetition of his demands upon me. At length I turned from him.
"This is very tiresome, Preston," I said; "and this side of the houseis very warm. Of course, I must dance with whoever asks me."
"Well, I have asked you for this evening," he said, following me.
"You are not to go," I said. "I shall not dance with you once," and Itook my former place by Mrs. Sandford. Preston fumed; declared that Iwas just like a piece of marble; and went away. I did not feel quiteso impassive as he said I looked.
"What are you going to wear to-night, Daisy?" Mrs. Sandford askedpresently.
"I do not know, ma'am."
"But you must know soon, my dear. Have you agreed to give your cousinhalf the evening?"
"No, ma'am--I could not; I am engaged for every dance, and more."
"More!" said Mrs. Sandford.
"Yes, ma'am--for the next time."
"Preston has reason!" she said, laughing. "But I think, Daisy, Grantwill be the most jealous of all. Do him good. What will become of hissciences and his microscope now?"
"Why, I shall be just as ready for them," I said.
Mrs. Sandford shook her head. "You will find the hops will take morethan that," she said. "But now, Daisy, think what you will wear; forwe must go soon and get ready."
I did not want to think about it. I expected, of course, to put on thesame dress I had worn the last time. But Mrs. Sandford objected verystrongly.
"You must not wear the same thing twice running," she said, "not ifyou can help it."
I could not imagine why not.
"It is quite nice enough," I urged. "It is scarcely the least tumbledin the world."
"People will think you have not another, my dear."
"What matter would that be?" I said, wholly puzzled.
"Now, my dear Daisy!" said Mrs. Sandford, half laughing--"you are theveriest Daisy in the world, and do not understand the world that yougrow in. No matter; just oblige me, and put on something elseto-night. What have you got?"
I had other dresses like the rejected one. I had another still, whitelike them, but the make and quality were different. I hardly knew whatit was, for I had never worn it; to please Mrs. Sandford I took it outnow. She was pleased. It was like the rest, out of the store my motherhad sent me; a soft India muslin, of beautiful texture, made andtrimmed as my mother and a Parisian artist could manage between them.But no Parisian artist could know better than my mother how a thingshould be.
"That will do!" said Mrs. Sandford approvingly. "Dear me, what laceyou Southern ladies do wear, to be sure! A blue sash, now, Daisy?"
"No, ma'am, I think not."
"Rose? It must be blue or rose."
But I thought differently, and kept it white.
"_No_ colour?" said Mrs. Sandford. "None at all. Then let me just putthis little bit of green in your hair."
As I stood before the glass and she tried various positions for somegeranium leaves, I felt that would not do either. Any dressing of myhead would commonize the whole thing. I watched her fingers and thegeranium leaves going from one side of my head to the other, watchedhow every touch changed the tone of my costume, and felt that I couldnot suffer it; and then it suddenly occurred to me that I, who alittle while before had not cared about my dress for the evening, nowdid care and that determinedly. I knew I would wear no geraniumleaves, not even to please Mrs. Sandford. And for the first time aquestion stole into my mind, what was I, Daisy, doing? But then I saidto myself, that the dress without this head adorning was perfect inits elegance; it suited me; and it was not wrong to like beauty, norto dislike things in bad taste. Perhaps I was too handsomely dressed,but I could not change that now. Another time I would go back to myembroidered muslins, and stay there.
"I like it better without anything, Mrs. Sandford," I said, removingher green decorations and turning away from the glass. Mrs. Sandfordsighed, but said "it would do without them," and then we started.
I can see it all again; I can almost feel the omnibus roll with meover the plain, that still sultry night. All those nights were sultry.Then, as we came near the Academic Building, I could see the lights inthe upper windows; here and there an officer sitting in a window-sill,and the figures of cadets passing back and forth. Then we mounted tothe hall above, filled with cadets in a little crowd, and words ofrecognition came, and Preston, meeting us almost before we got out ofthe dressing-room.
"Daisy, you dance with me?"
"I am engaged, Preston, for the first dance."
"Already! The second, then, and all the others?"
"I am engaged," I repeated, and left him, for Mr. Thorold was at myside.
I forgot Preston the next minute. It was easy to forget him, for allthe first half of the evening I was honestly happy in dancing. Intalking, too, whenever Thorold was my partner; other people's talk wasvery tiresome. They went over the platitudes of the day; or theystarted subjects of interest that were not interesting to me. Bits ofgossip--discussions of fashionable amusements with which I could havenothing to do; frivolous badinage, which was of all things mostdistasteful to me. Yet, amid it, I believe there was a subtle incenseof admiration which by degrees and insensibly found its way to mysenses. But I had two dances with Thorold, and at those times I wasmyself and enjoyed unalloyed pleasure. And so I thought did he.
I saw Preston, when now and then I caught a glimpse of him, lookingexcessively glum. Midway in the evening it happened that I wasstanding beside him for a few moments, waiting for my next partner.
"You are dancing with nobody but that man whom I hate!" he grumbled."Who is it now?"
"Captain Vaux."
"Will you dance with me after that?"
"I cannot, Preston. I must dance with Major Banks."
"You seem to like it pretty well," he growled.
"No wonder," said Mrs. Sandford. "You were quite right about thegeranium leaves, Daisy; you do not want them. You do not wantanything, my dear," she whispered.
At this instant a fresh party entered the room, just as my partnercame up to claim me.
"There are some handsome girls," said the captain. "Two of them,really!"
"People from Cozzens's," said Mrs. Sandford, "who think the cadetskeep New York hours."
It was Faustina St. Clair and Mary Lansing, with their friends andguardians, I don't know whom. And as I moved to take my place in thedance, I was presently confronted by my school adversary and thepartner she had immediately found. The greeting was very slight andcool on her side.
"Excessively handsome," whispered the captain. "A friend of yours?"
"A schoolfellow," I said.
"Must be a pleasant thing, I declare, to have such handsomeschoolfellows," said the captain. "Beauty is a great thing, isn't it?I wonder, sometimes, how the ladies can make up their minds to take upwith such great rough ugly fellows as we are, for a set. How do youthink it is?"
I thought it was wonderful, too, when they were like him. But I saidnothing.
"Dress, too," said the captain. "Now look at our dress! Straight andsquare and stiff, and no variety in it. While our eyes are delighted,on the other side, with soft draperies and fine colours, andcombinations of grace a
nd elegance that are fit to put a man inElysium!"
"Did you notice the colour of the haze in the west, this evening, atsunset?" I asked.
"Haze? No, really. I didn't know there was any haze, really, except inmy head. I get hazy amidst these combinations. Seriously, MissRandolph, what do you think of a soldier's life?"
"It depends on who the soldier is," I said.
"Cool, really!" said the captain. "Cool! Ha! ha!--"
And he laughed, till I wondered what I could have said to amuse him somuch.
"Then you have learned to individualize soldiers already?" was hisnext question, put with a look which seemed to me inquisitive andimpertinent. I did not know how to answer it, and left it unanswered;and the captain and I had the rest of our dance out in silence.Meanwhile, I could not help watching Faustina. She was so veryhandsome, with a marked, dashing sort of beauty that I saw wasprodigiously admired. She took no notice of me, and barely touched thetips of my fingers with her glove as we passed in the dance.
As he was leading me back to Mrs. Sandford, the captain stooped hishead to mine. "Forgive me," he whispered. "So much gentleness cannotbear revenge. I am only a soldier."
"Forgive you what, sir?" I asked. And he drew up his head again, halflaughed, muttered that I was worse than grape or round shot, andhanded me over to my guardian.
"My dear Daisy," said Mrs. Sandford, "If you were not so sweet as youare, you would be a queen. There, now, do not lift up your grey eyesat me like that, or I shall make you a reverence the first thing I do,and fancy that I am one of your _dames d'honneur_. Who is next? MajorBanks? Take care, Daisy, or you'll do some mischief."
I had not time to think about her words; the dances went forward, andI took my part in them with great pleasure until the tattoo summonsbroke us up. Indeed, my pleasure lasted until we got home to thehotel, and I heard Mrs. Sandford saying, in an aside to her husband,amid some rejoicing over me--"I was dreadfully afraid she wouldn'tgo." The words, or something in them, gave me a check. However, I hadtoo many exciting things to think of to take it up just then, and mybrain was in a whirl of pleasure till I went to sleep.