CHAPTER I. MOTHER AND CHILD.

The windows were all open, but shaded fold after fold with muslin transparent as dew drops, and snowy as the drifts of a summer cloud. The floor was spread with East India matting, and in a corner of a chamber stood a couch shaded with clouds of delicate lace and clad in snow white even to the floor—a great easy chair, covered with chaste dimity, stood close by the bed, and further off a miniature couch, snow white also, save where the soft rose tints of an inner curtain, light and silken, broke through the waves of snowy gossamer that flowed over it. Upon the pillow of this pretty couch lay a bouquet of flowers tied loosely by an azure-colored ribbon, and more beautiful still a sleeping infant, with one tiny hand resting like a torn peach-blossom, on its little bosom and its sweet lips parted smilingly, as a bud uncloses to the warm sunbeam. There, in its snowy nest, with the fragrant flowers sending their breath in and out through 6the misty draperies, and half smothered in delicate lace, lay the beautiful infant; and a little way off, upon the larger couch reposed

another being in the first bud and bloom of womanly beauty, not asleep, but with her large eyes wandering tenderly toward the infant, and from that to a bouquet of orange-blossoms and moss-roses that, feebly clasped in her delicate fingers, was yet falling apart and dropping its blossoms over the counterpane.

An air of gentle languor lay upon this young creature, and there was something more than that affectionate tenderness with which a mother regards her young child, in the look that she, from time to time, cast upon the slumbering infant—a shade of sadness, that but for her feeble state, might have taken the strength of passionate regret, seemed ready to break from her eyes in a flood of tears, whenever they dwelt longer than usual upon the babe. But when her grief was ready to break forth, she would allow her eyes to droop toward the flowers that seemed to have some pleasant association connected with their fragrance, and a sweet smile—not the less sweet that there was sadness in it—would part her lips while a faint sigh floated through them.

All at once the infant began to nestle in its crib, and opening its large brown eyes, turned them upon the recumbent female. As if her tears lay so near the surface as to require only this motion to set them flowing, the young mother, as she encountered the infantile glance, shuddered faintly, and large drops gathered in her eyes, and fell one by one over her full but pale cheeks.

“I must not look at it, I must not learn to love it so,” she murmured, turning her head away, and shading her tearful eyes with one hand. “Ah! why should I, a mother so young, and with a husband like him, always find every feeling, every impulse shackled as it springs from my heart? Why was there no one to shield my youth from the blight, that I feel, too surely, will cling around me to the end?”

The infant began to cry, and there came into the room a colored woman, tall and with that superb luxuriance of form that so frequently characterizes the dusky-hued woman of the South. She approached the crib and took the child in her arms, hushing it with a sort of cajoling attempt at tenderness, that seemed to annoy the young mother not a little.

7“Give the babe to me!” she said, feebly reaching forth her arms.

“Better not, better not, missus,” replied the woman, pressing her full lips upon the velvet cheek resting on her bosom—a most unnatural pillow, as the unhappy mother felt all too keenly. “Nurse said last night that young missus must be kept quiet, and the baby not left to fret her so much.”

“Fret me! my child fret me! Give it to me, I say,” cried the young mother so passionately that the color broke over her pale cheek, like the abrupt opening of a rose-bud. “It is cruel, it is unkind, thus to keep a babe from its mother’s bosom. He never ordered it. I know well enough it is not his wish that I should be tortured in this manner.”

“Take the child to its mother. Why do you hesitate in obeying your mistress?” cried a firm and manly voice from the door; and with his lofty step somewhat subdued, a gentleman entered the chamber, whose air of authority awed the negress at once. He approached the young female, who had started eagerly up from her pillow, with every manifestation of deep tenderness in her voice and manner.

“Have you been waiting for me, Zulima?” he said, bending down to kiss the fair forehead of his wife. “I was kept longer than usual at the counting-house this morning.”

“Oh! I knew that you would be here soon,” replied the young wife, taking his hand between both hers, and kissing it with a degree of passionate tenderness that thrilled through her feeble frame, till, in her weak state, excess of feeling became almost painful.

“What! because I scattered my path to your bedside with the flowers you have been wasting?” was the smiling reply.

“They were welcome and very sweet, for they told me that you were soon to follow,” said the young wife, gathering the scattered flowers together with her hand. “See! your little daughter has kept hers in better condition. She is not old enough to tear her flowers to pieces the moment they come within reach!”

“Like her mother, ha! Zulima!” said the gentleman, shaking his head, but smiling fondly all the time. “She must have more patience and less pride than her mother, this pretty child—or she will be”—

8“As unfortunate and as unhappy as her mother has been,” said the young wife, and her eyes filled with tears.

“I only hope she will be as lovely and as innocent, whatever her lot may prove, and as truly beloved, Zulima,” he added, after a moment’s pause; and with an expression of deep feeling, mingled with a shade of sadness, the proud husband gazed upon his wife and child till the tears clouded his own fine eyes.

For a moment there was silence between the husband and wife. Both were gazing upon the infant, and both were occupied with thoughts where pain and tenderness were almost equally blended. Pride, stern and lofty pride, tinged the sweet current of his reflections, and she—impulsive young creature—thought of nothing but her sufferings, her passionate love for him, and of the beautiful child she was sheltering upon her bosom with one fairy arm, from which she had impatiently flung back the loose sleeve of her night-dress, as if detesting the delicate lawn for coming between her and that little form.

“You will not send her away!” said the young creature, lifting her eyes to the face of her husband, which was becoming more and more thoughtful each moment. “Ah! if you knew how much I love her!”

“I know—I know, Zulima,” said the husband, interrupting the beautiful pleader with an accent which, though not unkind, told how the slightest opposition chafed his proud nature. “It is natural. You must love the child; who could help it? but do you not love me better?—do you not love its future fame? its father’s fame?—your own reputation, well enough to relinquish her for a time?”

“I have thought of it all—I know what the world will say of me—but I cannot give her up—indeed, indeed I cannot.” The young mother rose in the bed, and with her child folded to her bosom with one arm, cast the other round the proud man’s neck, and drew his face down till it touched the infant, as she covered his forehead with kisses. “You will keep us both—you will not take our child from me!”

“Zulima, it must be,” said the husband, drawing gently back, and freeing himself from her fond embrace, while his fine features bespoke the terrible pain which it cost him to be firm. “While the man who has once claimed you for his 9wife remains unpunished, I cannot acknowledge you mine, legally, innocently mine, as in the sight of Heaven you are.”

“I do not ask it. Let the world think of me as it likes. I will submit to reproach—to suspicion—any thing—but leave my child—never!”

“Zulima!” was the firm and almost reproachful reply; “do you think that your reputation is separate from mine? Shall I cast a stain upon my wife which no after time can efface, and then produce her, wronged and sullied, to society? Listen to me, Zulima; cease weeping and listen! The man is yet alive who has called you wife”—

“I know—I know!” cried the poor young creature, shuddering from head to foot, and burying her face in the pillows; “Oh say no more! I will give up the child—but spare me that subject!”

“No, Zulima. Let us speak of it this once, and then it shall be banished our lips forever. Think you that it is not painful to me as to you?”

How painful it was might be guessed by the colorless cheeks and the quivering of that proud man’s lips while he was speaking.

“While a mere child you became the dupe and victim of this vile man, De Grainges. He wronged your confidence, wronged your love”—

“No, no! I did not love him—I was a child—I knew not what love was!” broke in passionate murmurs from the pillow where Zulima’s face was buried. “Do not say I loved that man!”

“My poor wife! I know that you did not love him. I know quite as well that you do love me. Look up, sweet child! I would give worlds that I could speak of all this without distressing you thus. Bear with me only a minute longer. My only wish is to reconcile you, if possible, to the inevitable.”

“I will listen,” replied the tortured young mother.

“I know, Zulima, that you were deceived by this bad man—that he wedded you while his wife was living, and that you fled from his home the moment this truth was made known. Of all this I was thoroughly convinced before you became my wife; but until this man is convicted in open court and before the whole world, how can I convince society of that which to 10me is a sacred truth? how, before the fact of his previous marriage is thus publicly substantiated, can I proclaim the union which has made me more than happy? Zulima, I am a proud man—sensitive to public opinion—careful of my standing in the world. Were a breath of suspicion to rest upon the fame of my wife, I should never be happy again. You are young—supposed to be unmarried—living here under the roof of my dearest friend, who, with one exception, is alone in my confidence. In a few months this man, now in prison, will receive the punishment of his crime. Do you not see the peril of keeping this child with you till after that event enables me to claim my wife before the world? Zulima! look up—say that

you forgive me the pain I am causing—say, that, for my sake, you will submit to have this little one sent from you for a season—only for a season.”

Subdued and touched to the heart by the depth of feeling with which this appeal was made, Zulima arose from the pillow where she had been striving to subdue her grief, and taking the infant in her trembling arms, motioned her husband to receive it. The moment she was relieved from the sweet burden, the young creature fell back, and closing her eyes, tried to check the grief that, however suppressed, still clamored at her heart. It was all in vain: the tears gushed like shattered diamonds though the thick and silky lashes, and she grasped the counterpane nervously with one hand, in a terrible strife to force back the agony that was choking her. Poor young mother! she felt with that keen intuition, which is like a prophecy, that she was not parting from her child for a season, but forever.

“You consent, Zulima? You will give up our little one with no anger, and without all this bitter grief?” cried the strong man, pale as death, and bending over the young mother, with the child pressed to his bosom.

“I will, I do,” burst from those pale and trembling lips.

The husband turned away; his limbs trembled, his eyes were blinded with moisture, and the weight of that little babe seemed to bend and sway his strong frame, as if he had been a reed. He looked back upon the mother. There she lay, the wet eyelids closed and quivering—her white lips pressed together, and so pale, that but for the agitation of her features 11she might have seemed stricken dead in the midst of her anguish. He returned to the couch.

“Zulima, would you kiss the babe before it goes!”

“I dare not—I dare not,” broke from those pale lips; then Zulima held back her sobs, for his footsteps were departing—a door closed—husband and child both were gone. Then the mother’s anguish broke forth, her arms were flung upward, her quivering hands clasped wildly together—a moment and they fell heavily upon the orange flowers that still littered the bed, crushing them in her utter insensibility.

Then, while the young wife lay so pale and deathly there stole toward the bed that negro woman, who bent down till the bright Madras ’kerchief turbaning her forehead mingled with the chestnut tresses that lay scattered over the shoulder and bosom of the sufferer. She listened a moment, as if to make herself quite certain that what seemed so deathly was not death itself, and then glided from the chamber.

The negress stole softly through the open hall, and into a spacious garden; a row of small white buildings stood at the farther extremity, gleaming in snowy patches through the vines and trees that embowered that portion of the garden. These were the slave-dwellings belonging to a rich plantation some three miles from New Orleans—belonging to the husband of Zulima, and occupied for a season by his bosom friend that the infancy of his child might be honorably sheltered. And here in a little whitewashed room of the slave dwelling this bosom friend was impatiently watching the approach of the female slave whom he had placed—a dark spy—in the bed-chamber of that helpless young wife. With his face close to one of the four panes of glass that admitted light to the humble room, he watched the fiery colors of the Madras turban, which the woman always wore, as it glided like some gorgeous bird through the thick foliage, nearer and nearer to the den where he had for two hours been waiting for news from the sick-chamber. The slave entered her dwelling, and sat down before

her master, full of that consequential assumption that a little power is certain to call forth in one of her ignorant and degraded class.

“Well, Louisa,” said the master, with a show of careless indifference, for he was of a cool and subtle temperament, with 12passions slow and calculating, but all the more grasping for the deliberation, with which, like well-trained hounds, they were let free from the leash of his strong will; “Well, Louisa, how is the lady this morning?”

“Oh, she am about de same, Massa Ross—no danger of her going off dis bout anyhow,” replied the negress, turning her head on one side and moving a palm-leaf fan before her face, with an air of self-conceit that made her auditor smile, spite of his preoccupation.

“She just had a little fainting spell when I come out, but it won’t last long—no danger!”

“Has she had any visitors this morning—has he been there, Louisa?”

“Dar, now, you ask me dat, Massa Ross, just as if he didn’t come ebery morning of him life.”

“Then he has been there,” rejoined the man, “and left her fainting. Tell me, Louisa,—oh here is the Napoleon that I promised.”

“There, that am something like Massa Ross,” and the negress tied the gold in a corner of her handkerchief, and thrust it into her bosom. “Yes, he was there a long time.”

“Well,” interrupted Ross, evidently getting impatient, “tell me all that passed, word for word; do not forget a look or a syllable—and another gold piece is ready when you have done.”

And the negress, thus stimulated, told him all. That scene of tender anguish—the struggle of love and pride which she had witnessed in the sick chamber—all was related; and oh! how its exquisite pathos, its touching dignity was desecrated by the vulgar mind and coarse speech of that slave woman!

Ross listened to it all, his face changing with every sentence; for, with only that coarse witness, he did not think it necessary to control his features with the dissimulation that had become a habit. He listened, and as he felt, thus the evil man looked. When the woman ceased speaking the exultation of a fiend was in the smile that curled his lip.

“And he was determined—spite of her caresses, spite of her tears. I knew that it would be so. He is not a man to waver, having once taken a resolution—but the child, Louisa? I have recommended a woman up the river to take charge of 13it, but you, my good Louisa, must still be its nurse. It seems a feeble little thing; do you not think so, Louisa?”

“Feeble! Lor a massa! No; it’s the best-natured, healthy little thing I ever see,” was the reply, and Louisa agitated her palm-leaf fan with considerable violence.

“But away from you, Louisa, with some one less kind, it may become sickly in a very little time, you know.”

“Sure enough!” and Louisa half suspended the action of her fan, as she fell into a fit of profound contemplation.

“With you to give it medicine and superintend, if it were ill, I should feel quite safe,” said Ross, and a strange, fiendish smile crept over his lips. “Of course, I should come and see you very often.”

“Oh! you would. Well, den, I haven’t nothing to say against going with the baby.”

“Wherever I send you, Louisa?”

“Well, yes, I don’t care, if it isn’t so far off that you can’t come once a week or so to see us, Massa Ross; but I won’t go far, now I tell you.”

“Well, now, go to your charge. I will see you again to-morrow.”

The negress arose, and with an insolent twist of her head to the left shoulder, stood in the door-way fanning herself.

“Well,” said Ross, impatiently, “well, what are you waiting for now!”

“Dis piece of gold in my bosom, Massa Ross,” and the negress placed a plump ebony hand upon her heart. “It is ’gun beginning to feel lonesome.”

“Oh! I had forgotten; here, here.”

Louisa drew forth the pocket handkerchief, which, from its embroidery and exquisite lace, must have been purloined from her mistress, and a second Napoleon was nested in her bosom.

“Stop,” said Ross, as she was going out; “You said that the lady was fainting—that he took the child forth in his arms. Where is it now?”

“How should I know? I s’pose he took the baby to your wife. She was in the back parlor, and he turned that way.”

“There he is now. Go back into the room, Louisa, go back!” Ross seized his hat as he spoke, and leaving the slave-house, wound through a grove of fruit trees that sheltered 14him from sight, and taking a serpentine path, came leisurely forth into that part of the garden, where he had seen Mr. Clark. The proud man was walking hurriedly forward, his arms folded, and one white aristocratic hand thrust into the bosom of his black dress. He was very pale, and his finely cut features bore traces of great internal anguish. He saw Ross, and turned quickly toward him.

“It is over, my friend; it is all over,” he said, grasping the hand which Ross extended, and wringing it hard. A smile, full of proud anguish, broke the firm and classical beauty of his mouth, and his eyes spoke volumes of suffering.

“What is over? what has happened?” inquired Ross, startled and turning almost as white as his friend.

“My wife! my child!”

“What of them? what has happened to them, my friend?”

“Nothing but that which was inevitable. But Zulima, my poor, poor wife! It would wring your heart to see how she suffers from the separation from her child.”

“But the child; is it yet with her?”

“Hark!” said the other, lifting his hand. “Do you not hear?”