"You see," continued Mr. Sylvester still looking at Miss Belinda.
She answered with a doubtful shake of the head and an earnest glance at the girl as if she perceived something in that bright young soul, that even she had never observed before.
"Have you ever been away from home?" he now asked.
"Never, I know as little of the great world as a callow nestling. No, I should not say that, for the young bird has no Aunt Belinda to tell of the great cathedrals and the wonderful music she has heard and the glorious pictures she has seen in her visits to the city. It is almost as good as travelling one's self to hear Aunt Belinda talk."
It was now the turn of the mature plain woman to blush, which she did under Mr. Sylvester's searching eye.
"You have then been in the habit of visiting New York?"
"I have been there twice," she returned evasively.
"Since my marriage?"
"Yes sir;" with a firm closing of her lips.
"I did not know you were there or I should have insisted upon your remaining at my house."
"Thank you," said she with a quick triumphant glance at her demure little shadow, who looked back in amaze and was about to speak when Miss Belinda proceeded. "My visits usually have been on business; I should not think of troubling Mrs. Sylvester." And then he knew that his wife had been aware of those visits if he had not.
But he refrained from testifying to his discovery. "You speak of music," said he, turning gently back to Paula. "Have you a taste for it? Would it make you happy to hear such music as your aunt tells about?"
"O yes, I can conceive nothing grander than to sit in a church whose every line is beauty and listen while the great organ utters its song of triumph or echoes in the wonderful way it does, the emotions you have tried to express and could not. I would give a whole week of my life on the hills, dear as it is, for one such hour, I think."
Mr. Sylvester smiled. "It is a rare kind of coin to offer for such a simple pleasure, but it may meet with its acceptance, nevertheless;" and in his look and in his voice there was an appearance of affectionate interest that completed the subjugation of the watchful Miss Belinda, who now became doubly assured that whatever neglect had been shown her by her niece was not due to that niece's husband.
Mr. Sylvester recognized the effect he had produced and hastened to complete it, feeling that the good opinion of Miss Belinda would be valuable to any man. "I have been a boy on these hills," said he, "and know what it is to long for what is beyond while enjoying what is present. You shall hear the organ my child." And stopped, wondering to himself over the new sweet interest he seemed to take in the prospect of pleasures which he had supposed himself to have long ago exhausted.
"Hear the organ, I? why that means—O what does it mean?" she inquired, turning with a look of beaming hope towards her aunt.
"You must ask Mr. Sylvester," that uncompromising lady replied, with a straightforward look at the fire.
And he with a smile told the blushing girl that according to his reading, mortals went blindfold into fairy-land; and she understood what he meant and was silent, whereupon he turned the conversation upon more common-place subjects.
For how could he tell her then of the intention that had awakened in his breast at the first glimpse of her grand young beauty. To make her his child, to bequeath to her the place of the babe that had perished in his arms three long years before—That meant to give Ona a care if not a rival in his affections, and Ona shrank from care, and was not a subject for rivalry. And the if which this implied weighed heavily on his heart as moment after moment flew by, and he felt again the reviving power of an unsullied mind and an aspiring nature.
X.
THE BARRED DOOR.
"A school boy's tale; the wonder of an hour."—Byron.
"Did you know that your niece was gifted with rare beauty as well as talents?" asked Mr. Sylvester of Miss Belinda as a couple of hours or so later, they sat alone by the parlor fire, preparatory to his departure.
"No, that is," she hastily corrected herself, "I knew she was very pretty of course, prettier by far than any of her mates, but I did not suppose she was what you call a beauty, or at least would be so considered by a person accustomed to New York society."
"I do not know of a woman in New York who can boast of any such claims to transcendent loveliness. Such faces are rare outside of art, Miss Belinda; was Mrs. Fairchild a handsome woman?"
"She was my sister and if I may say so, my favorite sister, but she was no more agreeable to the eye than some others of her family," grimly returned the heavy browed spinster with a compression of her lips. "What beauty Paula has inherited came from her father. Her chief charm in my eyes, however, springs from her pure nature and the unselfish impulses of her heart."
"And in mine," rejoined he quietly. Then with a sudden change of tone as he realized the necessity of saying something definite to this woman in regard to his intentions toward the child, he remarked, "Her great and unusual talents and manifest disposition to learn, demand as you say, superior advantages to any she can have in a small country town like this, fruitful as it has already been to her under your wise and fostering care and such shall she have; but just when and how I cannot say till I have seen my wife and learned what her wishes are likely to be in regard to the subject."
"You are very kind, sir," returned Miss Belinda. "I have no doubt as to the good-will of your intentions, and the child shall be prepared at once for a change."
"And will the child," he exclaimed with a smile as Paula re-entered the room, "be so kind as to give me her company in the walk I must now take to the cars?"
"Of course," replied her aunt before the young girl could speak, "we owe you that much attention I am sure."
And so it was that when he came to retrace his way through the village with its heavy memories, he had a guardian spirit at his side that robbed them of their power to sadden and oppress.
"What shall I say for you to the grim, city streets when I get back?" inquired he as they hastened on over the snow covered road.
"Say to them from me? O you may give them my greeting," she responded half shyly, half confidingly. Evidently for her he was one of those rare persons whose presence is perfect freedom and with whom she could not only think her best but speak it also. "I should like to make their acquaintance, but indeed they would have to do well to vie in attraction with these white roads girded by their silver-limbed trees. The very rush of life must seem oppressive. So many hopes, so many fears, so many interests jostling you at every step! Yet the thought is exhilarating too; don't you find it so?"
It was the first question she had asked him and he knew not how to reply. Her eyes were so confiding, he could not bear to shake her faith in his imagined superiority. Yet what thoughts had he ever cherished
