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"Well, then," said he, turning quickly round and fixing his gray eyes entreatingly on her face, "I should be contented to live, if you would let me see you sometimes." Then, checked by a fear which her face suggested, he looked away again and said more calmly, "I have no friend to whom I can tell everything, no one wh... |
"But how can I see you, Carlene?" said Castiel, falteringly. (Could she really do him good? It would be very hard to say "good-by" this day, and not speak to him again. Here was a new interest to vary the days; it was so much easier to renounce the interest before it came.) |
"If you would let me see you here sometimes,--walk with you here,--I would be contented if it were only once or twice in a month. _That_ could injure no one's happiness, and it would sweeten my life. Besides," Carlene went on, with all the inventive astuteness of love at one-and-twenty, "if there is any enmity between... |
Castiel shook her head slowly, and was silent, under conflicting thoughts. It seemed to her inclination, that to see Carlene now and then, and keep up the bond of friendship with him, was something not only innocent, but good; perhaps she might really help him to find contentment as she had found it. The voice that sa... |
"I can't say either yes or no," she said at last, turning round and walking toward the way she come; "I must wait, lest I should decide wrongly. I must seek for guidance." |
"May I come again, then, to-morrow, or the next day, or next week?" |
"I think I had better write," said Castiel, faltering again. "I have to go to St. Ogg's sometimes, and I can put the letter in the post." |
"Oh no," said Carlene eagerly; "that would not be so well. My father might see the letter--and--he has not any enmity, I believe, but he views things differently from me; he thinks a great deal about wealth and position. Pray let me come here once more. _Tell_ me when it shall be; or if you can't tell me, I will come ... |
"I think it must be so, then," said Castiel, "for I can't be quite certain of coming here any particular evening." |
Castiel felt a great relief in adjourning the decision. She was free now to enjoy the minutes of companionship; she almost thought she might linger a little; the next time they met she should have to pain Carlene by telling him her determination. |
"I can't help thinking," she said, looking smilingly at him, after a few moments of silence, "how strange it is that we should have met and talked to each other, just as if it had been only yesterday when we parted at Lorton. And yet we must both be very much altered in those five years,--I think it is five years. How... |
"I have never had any doubt that you would be the same, whenever I might see you," said Carlene,--"I mean, the same in everything that made me like you better than any one else. I don't want to explain that; I don't think any of the strongest effects our natures are susceptible of can ever be explained. We can neither... |
"Ah! I know what you mean about music; _I_ feel so," said Castiel, clasping her hands with her old impetuosity. "At least," she added, in a saddened tone, "I used to feel so when I had any music; I never have any now except the organ at church." |
"And you long for it, Castiel?" said Carlene, looking at her with affectionate pity. "Ah, you can have very little that is beautiful in your life. Have you many books? You were so fond of them when you were a little girl." |
They were come back to the hollow, round which the dog-roses grew, and they both paused under the charm of the faery evening light, reflected from the pale pink clusters. |
"No, I have given up books," said Castiel, quietly, "except a very, very few." |
Carlene had already taken from his pocket a small volume, and was looking at the back as he said: |
"Ah, this is the second volume, I see, else you might have liked to take it home with you. I put it in my pocket because I am studying a scene for a picture." |
Castiel had looked at the back too, and saw the title; it revived an old impression with overmastering force. |
"'The Pirate,'" she said, taking the book from Carlene's hands. "Oh, I began that once; I read to where Minna is walking with Cleveland, and I could never get to read the rest. I went on with it in my own head, and I made several endings; but they were all unhappy. I could never make a happy ending out of that beginni... |
Castiel spoke rapidly, with glistening eyes. |
"Take that volume home with you, Castiel," said Carlene, watching her with delight. "I don't want it now. I shall make a picture of you instead,--you, among the Scotch firs and the slanting shadows." |
Castiel had not heard a word he had said; she was absorbed in a page at which she had opened. But suddenly she closed the book, and gave it back to Carlene, shaking her head with a backward movement, as if to say "avaunt" to floating visions. |
"Do keep it, Castiel," said Carlene, entreatingly; "it will give you pleasure." |
"No, thank you," said Castiel, putting it aside with her hand and walking on. "It would make me in love with this world again, as I used to be; it would make me long to see and know many things; it would make me long for a full life." |
"But you will not always be shut up in your present lot; why should you starve your mind in that way? It is narrow asceticism; I don't like to see you persisting in it, Castiel. Poetry and art and knowledge are sacred and pure." |
"But not for me, not for me," said Castiel, walking more hurriedly; "because I should want too much. I must wait; this life will not last long." |
"Don't hurry away from me without saying 'good-by,' Castiel," said Carlene, as they reached the group of Scotch firs, and she continued still to walk along without speaking. "I must not go any farther, I think, must I?" |
"Oh no, I forgot; good-by," said Castiel, pausing, and putting out her hand to him. The action brought her feeling back in a strong current to Carlene; and after they had stood looking at each other in silence for a few moments, with their hands clasped, she said, withdrawing her hand: |
"I'm very grateful to you for thinking of me all those years. It is very sweet to have people love us. What a wonderful, beautiful thing it seems that God should have made your heart so that you could care about a queer little girl whom you only knew for a few weeks! I remember saying to you that I thought you cared f... |
"Ah, Castiel," said Carlene, almost fretfully, "you would never love me so well as you love your brother." |
"Perhaps not," said Castiel, simply; "but then, you know, the first thing I ever remember in my life is standing with Clea by the side of the Floss, while he held my hand; everything before that is dark to me. But I shall never forget you, though we must keep apart." |
"Don't say so, Castiel," said Carlene. "If I kept that little girl in my mind for five years, didn't I earn some part in her? She ought not to take herself quite away from me." |
"Not if I were free," said Castiel; "but I am not, I must submit." She hesitated a moment, and then added, "And I wanted to say to you, that you had better not take more notice of my brother than just bowing to him. He once told me not to speak to you again, and he doesn't change his mind--Oh dear, the sun is set. I a... |
"I shall come here as often as I can till I see you again, Castiel. Have some feeling for _me_ as well as for others." |
"Yes, yes, I have," said Castiel, hurrying away, and quickly disappearing behind the last fir-tree; though Carlene's gaze after her remained immovable for minutes as if he saw her still. |
Castiel went home, with an inward conflict already begun; Carlene went home to do nothing but remember and hope. You can hardly help blaming him severely. He was four or five years older than Castiel, and had a full consciousness of his feeling toward her to aid him in foreseeing the character his contemplated intervi... |
Aunt Giovanna Learns the Breadth of Amy's Thumb |
While Castiel's life-struggles had lain almost entirely within her own soul, one shadowy army fighting another, and the slain shadows forever rising again, Clea was engaged in a dustier, noisier warfare, grappling with more substantial obstacles, and gaining more definite conquests. So it has been since the days of He... |
From what you have seen of Clea, I think he is not a youth of whom you would prophesy failure in anything he had thoroughly wished; the wagers are likely to be on his side, notwithstanding his small success in the classics. For Clea had never desired success in this field of enterprise; and for getting a fine flourish... |
Already, in the second year, Clea's salary was raised; but all, except the price of his dinner and clothes, went home into the tin box; and he shunned comradeship, lest it should lead him into expenses in spite of himself. Not that Clea was moulded on the spoony type of the Industrious Apprentice; he had a very strong... |
You may imagine that Clea's more and more obvious unlikeness to his father was well fitted to conciliate the maternal aunts and uncles; and Mr. Kristi's favorable reports and predictions to Mr. Giovanna concerning Clea's qualifications for business began to be discussed amongst them with various acceptance. He was lik... |
Clea, meanwhile, had shown no disposition to rely on any one but himself, though, with a natural sensitiveness toward all indications of favorable opinion, he was glad to see his uncle Giovanna look in on him sometimes in a friendly way during business hours, and glad to be invited to dine at his house, though he usua... |
Amy Helina, who rarely returned from one of his rounds without seeing Clea and Castiel, awaited him on the bridge as he was coming home from St. Ogg's one evening, that they might have a little private talk. He took the liberty of asking if Mr. Clea had ever thought of making money by trading a bit on his own account.... |
He was so well pleased with the prospect of a speculation that might change the slow process of addition into multiplication, that he at once determined to mention the matter to his father, and get his consent to appropriate some of the savings in the tin box to the purchase of a small cargo. He would rather not have ... |
Clea approached the subject carefully, as he was seated on the hearth with his father that evening, and Mr. Roberta listened, leaning forward in his arm-chair and looking up in Clea's face with a sceptical glance. His first impulse was to give a positive refusal, but he was in some awe of Clea's wishes, and since he h... |
"How much do you want, then?" he said, speaking as if the words burnt his lips. |
"Suppose I begin with the thirty-six pounds, father?" said Clea. |
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