PECULIAR

CHAPTER I. A GLANCE IN THE MIRROR.

“Wed not for wealth, Emily, without love,—’tis gaudy slavery; nor for love without competence,—’tis twofold misery.”—Colman’s Poor Gentleman.

It is a small and somewhat faded room in an unpretending brick house in one of the streets that intersect Broadway, somewhere between Canal Street and the Park. A woman sits at a writing-table, with the fingers of her left hand thrust through her hair and supporting her forehead, while in her right hand she holds a pen with which she listlessly draws figures, crosses, circles and triangles, faces and trees, on the blotting-paper that partly covers a letter which she has been inditing.

A window near by is open at the top. March, having come in like a lion, is going out like a lamb. A canary-bird, intoxicated with the ambrosial breath and subduing sunshine of the first mild day of spring, is pouring forth such a Te Deum laudamus as Mozart himself would have despaired of rivalling. Yesterday’s rain-storm purified the atmosphere, swept clean the streets, and deodorized the open gutters, that in warm weather poison with their effluvium the air of the great American metropolis.

On the wall, in front of the lady at the table, hangs a mirror. Look, now, and you will catch in it the reflection of her face. Forty? Not far from it. Perhaps four or five years on the sunny side. Fair? Many persons would call her still beautiful. The features, though somewhat thin, show their fine 2Grecian outline. The hair is of a rich flaxen, the eyes blue and mild, the mouth delicately drawn, showing Cupid’s bow in the curve of the upper lip, and disclosing, not too ostentatiously, the whitest teeth.

Her dress is significant of past rather than present familiarity with a fashionable wardrobe. If she ever wore jewels, she has parted with all of them, for there is not even a plain gold ring on her forefinger. Her robe is a simple brown cashmere, not so distended by crinoline as to disguise her natural figure, which is erect, of the average height, and harmoniously rounded. We detect this the better as she rises, looks a moment sorrowfully in the glass, and sighs to herself, “Fading! fading!”

There is a gentle knock at the door, and to her “Come in,” an old black man enters.

“Good morning, Toussaint,” says the lady; “what have you there?”

“Only a few grapes for Madame. They are Black Hamburgs, and very sweet. I hope Madame will relish them. They will do her good. Will she try some of them now?”

“They are excellent, Toussaint. And what a beautiful basket you have brought them in! You must have paid high for all this fruit, so early in the season. Indeed, you must not run into such extravagances on my account.”

“Does Madame find her cough any better?”

“Thank you, Toussaint, I do not notice much change in it as yet. Perhaps a few more mild days like this will benefit me. How is Juliette?”

“Passablement bien. Pretty well. May I ask—ahem! Madame will excuse the question—but does her husband treat her with any more consideration now that she is ill?”

“My good Toussaint, I grieve to say that Mr. Charlton is not so much softened as irritated by my illness. It threatens to be expensive, you see.”

“Ah! but that is sad,—sad! I wish Madame were in my house. Such care as Juliette and I would take of her! You look so much like your mother, Madame! I knew her before her first marriage. I dressed her hair the day of her wedding. People used to call her proud. But she was always kind to 3me,—very kind. And you look like her so much! As I grow old I think all the more of my old and early friends,—the first I had when I came to New York from St. Domingo. Most of them are dead, but I find out their children if I can; and if they are sick I amuse myself by carrying them a few grapes or flowers. They are very good to indulge me by accepting such trifles.”

“Toussaint, the goodness is all on your side. These grapes are no trifle, and you ought to know it. I thank you for them heartily. Let me give you back the basket.”

“No, please don’t. Keep it. Good morning, Madame! Be cheerful. Le bon temps reviendra. All shall be well. Bon jour! Au revoir, Madame!”

He hurries out of the room, but instantly returns, and, taking a leaf of fresh lettuce out of his pocket, reaches up on tiptoe and puts it between the bars of the bird-cage. “I was nigh forgetting the lettuce for the bird,” says he. “Madame will excuse my gaucherie.” And, bowing low, he again disappears.

The story of Emily Bute Charlton may be briefly told. Her mother, Mrs. Danby, was descended from that John Bradshaw who was president of the court which tried Charles the First, and who opposed a spirited resistance to the usurpation of Cromwell in dissolving the Parliament. Mrs. Danby was proud of her family tree. In her twentieth year she was left a widow, beautiful, ambitious, and poor, with one child, a daughter, who afterwards had in Emily a half-sister. This first daughter had been educated carefully, but she had hardly reached her seventeenth year when she accepted the addresses of a poor man, some fifteen years her senior, of the name of Berwick. The mother, with characteristic energy, opposed the match, but it was of no use. The daughter was incurably in love; she married, and the mother cast her off.

Time brought about its revenges. Mr. Berwick had inherited ten acres of land on the island of Manhattan. He tried to sell it, but was so fortunate as to find nobody to buy. So he held on to the land, and by hard scratching managed to pay the taxes on it. In ten years the city had crept up so near to his dirty acres that he sold half of them for a hundred thousand 4dollars, and became all at once a rich man. Meanwhile his wife’s mother, Mrs. Danby, after remaining fourteen years a widow, showed the inconsistency of her opposition to her daughter’s marriage by herself making an imprudent match. She married a Mr. Bute, poor and inefficient, but belonging to “one of the first families.” By this husband she had one daughter, Emily, the lady at whose reflection in the mirror we have just been looking.

Emily Bute, like her half-sister, Mrs. Berwick, who was many years her senior, inherited beauty, and was quite a belle in her little sphere in Philadelphia, where her family resided. Her mother, who had repelled Berwick as a son-in-law in his adversity, was too proud to try to propitiate him in his prosperity. She concealed her poverty as well as she could from her daughter, Mrs. Berwick, and the latter had often to resort to stratagem in order to send assistance to the family. At last the proud mother died; and six months afterwards her firstborn daughter, Mrs. Berwick, died, leaving one child, a son, Henry Berwick.

Years glided on, and Mr. Bute had hard work to keep the wolf from the door. He was one of those persons whose efforts in life are continual failures, from the fact that they cannot adapt themselves to circumstances,—cannot persevere during the day of small things till their occupation, by gradual development, becomes profitable. He would tire of an employment the moment its harvest of gold seemed remote. Forever sanguine and forever unsuccessful, he at last found himself reduced, with his daughter, to a mode of life that bordered on the shabby.

In this state of things, Mr. Berwick, like a timely angel, reappeared, rich, and bearing help. He was charmed with Emily, as he had formerly been with her half-sister. He proposed marriage. Mr. Bute was enchanted. He could not conceive of Emily’s hesitating for a moment. Were her affections pre-engaged? No. She had been a little of a flirt, and that perhaps had saved her from a serious passion. Why not, then, accept Mr. Berwick? He was so old! Old? What is a seniority of thirty years? He is rich,—has a house on the Fifth Avenue, and another on the North River. What 5insanity it would be in a poor girl to allow such a chance to slip by!

Still Emily had her misgivings. Her virginal instincts protested against the sacrifice. She had an ideal of a happy life, which certainly did not lie all in having a freestone house, French furniture, and a carriage. She knew the bitterness of poverty; but was she quite ready to marry without love? Her father’s distresses culminated, and drove her to a decision. She became Mrs. Berwick; and Mr. Bute was presented with ten thousand dollars on the wedding-day. He forthwith relieved himself of fifteen hundred in the purchase of a “new patent-spring phaeton” and span. “A great bargain, sir; splendid creatures; spirited, but gentle; a woman can drive them; no more afraid of a locomotive than of a stack of hay; the carriage in prime order; hasn’t been used a dozen times; will stand any sort of a shock; the property of my friend, Garnett; he wouldn’t part with the horses if he could afford to keep them; his wife is quite broken-hearted at the idea of losing them; such a chance doesn’t occur once in ten years; you can sell the span at a great advance in the spring.”

This urgent recommendation from “a particular friend, entirely disinterested,” decided Bute. He bought the “establishment.” The next day as he was taking a drive, the shriek of a steam-whistle produced such an effect upon his incomparable span, that they started off at headlong speed, ran against a telegraph-pole, smashed the “new patent-spring phaeton,” threw out the driver, and broke his neck against a curb-stone; and that was the end of Mr. Bute for this world, if we may judge from appearances.

Emily’s marriage did not turn out so poorly as the retributions of romance might demand. But on Mr. Berwick’s death she followed her mother’s example, and married a second time. She became Mrs. Charlton. Some idea of the consequences of this new alliance may be got from the letter which she has been writing, and which we take the liberty of laying before our readers.

CHAPTER II. A MATRIMONIAL BLANK.

Dear Henry: You kindly left word for me to write you. I have little of a cheering nature to say in regard to myself. We have moved from the house in Fourteenth Street into a smaller one nearer to the Park and to Mr. Charlton’s business. His complaints of his disappointment in regard to my means have lately grown more bitter. Your allowance, liberal as it is, seems to be lightly esteemed. The other day he twitted me with setting a snare for him by pretending to be a rich widow. O Henry, what an aggravation of insult! I knew nothing, and of course said nothing, as to the extent of your father’s wealth. I supposed, as every one else did, that he left a large property. His affairs proved to be in such a state that they could not be disentangled by his executors till two years after his death. Before that time I was married to Mr. Charlton.

Had I but taken your warning, and seen through his real feelings! But he made me think he loved me for myself alone, and he artfully excited my distrust of you and your motives. He represented his own means as ample; though for that I did not care or ask. Repeatedly he protested that he would prefer to take me without a cent of dowry. I was simpleton enough to believe him, though he was ten years my junior. I fell foolishly in love, soon, alas! to be rudely roused from my dream!

It seems like a judgment, Henry. You have always been as kind to me as if you were my own son. Your father was so much my senior, that you may well suppose I did not marry him from love. I was quite young. My notions on the subject 7of matrimony were unformed. My heart was free. My father urged the step upon me as one that would save him from dire and absolute destitution. What could I do, after many misgivings, but yield? What could I do? I now well see what a woman of real moral strength and determination could and ought to have done. But it is too late to sigh over the past.

I behaved passably well, did I not? in the capacity of your step-mother. I was loyal, even in thought, to my husband, although I loved him only with the sort of love I might have entertained for my grandfather. You were but two or three years my junior, but you always treated me as if I were a dowager of ninety. As I now look back, I can see how nobly and chivalrously you bore yourself, though at the time I did not quite understand your over-respectful and distant demeanor, or why, when we went out in the carriage, you always preferred the driver’s company to mine.

Your father died, and for a year and a half I conducted myself in a manner not unworthy of his widow and your mother. At the end of that period Mr. Charlton appeared at Berwickville. He dressed pretty well, associated with gentlemen, was rather handsome, and professed a sincere attachment for myself. Time had dealt gently with me, and I was not aware of that disparity in years which I afterwards learned existed between me and my suitor. In an unlucky moment I was subdued by his importunities. I consented to become his wife.

The first six months of our marriage glided away smoothly enough. My new husband treated me with all the attention which I supposed a man of business could give. If the vague thought now and then obtruded itself that there was something to me undefined and unsounded in his character, I thrust the thought from me, and found excuses for the deficiency which had suggested it. One trait which I noticed caused me some surprise. He always discouraged my buying new dresses, and grew very economical in providing for the household. I am no epicure, but have been accustomed to the best in articles of food. I soon discovered that everything in the way of provisions brought into the house was of a cheap or deteriorated quality. I remonstrated, and there was a reform.

8One bright day in June, two gentlemen, Mr. Ken and Mr. Turner, connected with the management of your father’s estate, appeared at Berwickville. They came to inform me that my late husband had died insolvent, and that the house we then occupied belonged to his creditors, and must be sold at once. Mr. Charlton received this intelligence in silence; but I was shocked at the change wrought by it on his face. In that expression disappointment and chagrin of the intensest kind seemed concentrated. Nothing was to be said, however. There were the documents; there were the facts,—the stern, irresistible facts of the law. The house must be given up.

After these bearers of ill-tidings had gone, Mr. Charlton turned to me. But I will not pain you by a recital of what he said. He rudely dispelled the illusions under which I had been laboring in regard to him. I could only weep. I could not utter a word of retaliation. Whilst he was in the midst of his reproaches, a servant brought me a letter. Mr. Charlton snatched it from my hand, opened, and read it. Either it had a pacifying effect upon him, or he had exhausted his stock of objurgations. He threw the letter on the table and quitted the room.

It was your letter of condolence and dutiful regard, promising me an allowance from your own purse of a hundred dollars a month. What coals of fire it heaped on my head! To please Mr. Charlton I had quarrelled with you,—forbidden you to visit or write me,—and here was your return! The communication coming close upon the dropping of my husband’s disguise almost unseated my reason. What a night of tears that was! I recalled your warnings, and now saw their truth,—saw how truly disinterested you were in them all. How generous, how noble you appeared to me! How in contrast, alas! with him I had taken for better or worse!

I lay awake all night. Of course I could not think of accepting your offer. In the first place, my past treatment of you forbade it. And then I knew that your own means were narrow, and that you had just entered into an engagement of marriage with a poor girl. But when, the next day, I communicated my resolve to my husband, he calmly replied: “Nonsense! Write Mr. Berwick, thanking him for his offer, and 9telling him that, small as the sum is, considering your wants, you accept it.” What a poor thing you must have thought me, when you got my cold letter of acceptance. Do me the justice to believe me when I affirm that every word of it was dictated by my husband. How I have longed to see you in person, to tell you all that I have endured and felt! But this circumstances have prevented. And now I am possessed with the idea that I never shall see you in this life again. And that is why I make these confessions. Your marriage, your absence in Europe, your recent return, and your hurried departure for the West, have kept me uncertain as to where a message

would reach you. Yesterday I got a few affectionate lines from you, telling me a letter, if mailed at once, would reach you in Cincinnati, or, if a week later, in New Orleans. And so I am devoting the forenoon to this review of my past, so painful and sad.

Let me think of your happier lot, and rejoice in it. So your affairs have prospered beyond all hope! Through your wife you are unexpectedly rich in worldly means. Better still, you are rich in affection. Your little Clara is “the brightest, the loveliest, the sunniest little thing in the wide world.” So you write me; and I can well believe it from the photograph and the lock of hair you send me. Bless her! What would I give to hug her to my bosom. And you too, Henry, you too I could kiss with a kiss that should be purely maternal,—a benediction,—a kiss your wife would approve, for, after all, you are the only child I have had. Mr. Charlton has always said he would have no children till he was a rich man. He and the female physician he employs have nearly killed me with their terrible drugs. Yes, I am dying, Henry. Even the breath of this sweet spring morning whispers it in my ear. Bless you and yours forever! What a mistake my life has been! And yet, how I craved to love and be loved! You will think kindly of me always, and teach your wife and child

to have pleasant associations with my name.

All the rich presents your father made me have been sold by Mr. Charlton; but I have one, that he has not seen,—a costly and beautiful gold casket for jewels, which I reserve as a present for your little Clara. I shall to-morrow pack it up carefully, 10and take it to a friend, who I know will keep and deliver it safely. That friend, strange as it may sound to you, is the venerable old black hair-dresser, Toussaint, who lives in Franklin Street. Your father used to say he had never met a man he would trust before Toussaint; and I can say as much. Toussaint used to dress my mother’s hair; he is now my adviser and friend.

Born a slave in the town of St. Mark in St. Domingo in 1766, Pierre Toussaint was twelve years the junior of that fellow-slave, the celebrated Toussaint l’Ouverture, born on the same river, who converted a mob of undrilled, uneducated Africans into an army with which he successively overthrew the forces of France, England, and Spain. At the beginning of the troubles in the island, in 1801, Pierre was taken by his master, the wealthy Mons. Berard, to New York. Berard, having lost his immense property in St. Domingo, soon died, and Pierre, having learnt the business of a hair-dresser, supported Madame Berard by his labors some eight years till her death, though she had no legal claim upon his service. Bred up, as he was, indulgently, Pierre’s is one of those exceptional cases in which slavery has not destroyed the moral sense.