Winter Evening Tales by Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr (books to read now TXT) 📖

Sandwich Islands, or any other inconvenient place."

"No; I have a better plan than that--Clementine, do stop reading a few minutes. I will take that pretty cottage at Ryebank for the summer, and Mr. Selden and his friend shall visit us there. No one knows us in the place, and I will take none of the servants with me."

"Well?"

"Then, Clementine, you are to be the widow Clare, and I your poor friend and companion."

"Good! very good! 'The Fair Deceivers'--an excellent comedy. How I shall snub you, Fan! And for once I shall have the pleasure of outdressing you. But has not Mr. Selden seen you?"

"No; I was married in Maryland, and went immediately to Europe. I came back a widow two years ago, but Mr. Selden has never remembered me until now. I wonder who this friend is that he proposes to bring with him?"

"Oh, men always think in pairs, Fan. They never decide on anything until their particular friend approves. I dare say they wrote the letter together. What is the gentleman's name?"

The widow examined the note. "'My friend Mr. Cleve Sullivan.' Do you know him, Clementine?"

"No; I am quite sure that I never saw Mr. Cleve Sullivan. I don't fall in love with the name--do you? But pray accept the offer for both gentlemen, Fan, and write this morning, dear." Then Clementine returned to the consideration of the lace in coquilles for her new evening dress.

The plan so hastily sketched was subsequently thoroughly discussed and carried out. The cottage at Ryebank was taken, and one evening at the end of June the two ladies took possession of it. The new widow Clare had engaged a maid in New York, and fell into her part with charming ease and a very pretty assumption of authority; and the real widow, in her plain dress and pensive, quiet manners, realized effectively the idea of a cultivated but dependent companion. They had two days in which to rehearse their parts and get all the household machinery in order, and then the gentlemen arrived at Ryebank.

Fan and Clementine were quite ready for their first call; the latter in a rich and exquisite morning costume, the former in a simple dress of spotted lawn. Clementine went through the introductions with consummate ease of manner, and in half an hour they were a very pleasant party. John's "cousinship" afforded an excellent basis for informal companionship, and Clementine gave it full prominence. Indeed, in a few days John began to find the relationship tiresome; it had been "Cousin John, do this," and "Cousin John, come here," continually; and one night when Cleve and he sat down to smoke their final cigar, he was irritable enough to give his objections the form of speech.

"Cleve, to tell you the honest truth, I do not like Mrs. Clare."

"I think she is a very lovely woman, John."

"I say nothing against her beauty, Cleve; I don't like her, and I have no mind to occupy the place that beautiful ill-used Miss Marat fills. The way Cousin Clare ignores or snubs a woman to whom she is every way inferior makes me angry enough, I assure you."

"Don't fall in love with the wrong woman, John."

"Your advice is too late, Cleve; I am in love. There is no use in us deceiving ourselves or each other. You seem to like the widow--why not marry her? I am quite willing you should."

"Thank you, John; I have already made some advances that way. They have been favorably received, I think."

"You are so handsome, a fellow has no chance against you. But we shall hardly quarrel, if you do not interfere between lovely little Clement and myself."

"I could not afford to smile on her, John; she is too poor. And what on earth are you going to do with a poor wife? Nothing added to nothing will not make a decent living."

"I am going to ask her to be my wife, and if she does me the honor to say 'Yes,' I will make a decent living out of my profession."

From this time forth John devoted himself with some ostentation to his supposed cousin's companion. He was determined to let the widow perceive that he had made his choice, and that he could not be bought with her money. Mr. Selden and Miss Marat were always together, and the widow did not interfere between her companion and her cousin. Perhaps she was rather glad of their close friendship, for the handsome Cleve made a much more delightful attendant. Thus the party fell quite naturally into couples, and the two weeks that the gentlemen had first fixed as the limit of their stay lengthened into two months.

It was noticeable that as the ladies became more confidential with their lovers, they had less to say to each other; and it began at last to be quite evident to the real widow that the play must end for the present, or the denouement would come prematurely. Circumstances favored her determination. One night Clementine, with a radiant face, came into her friend's room, and said, "Fan, I have something to tell you. Cleve has asked me to marry him."

"Now, Clement, you have told him all; I know you have."

"Not a word, Fan. He still believes me the widow Clare."

"Did you accept him?"

"Conditionally. I am to give him a final answer when we go to the city in October. You are going to New York this winter, are you not?"

"Yes. Our little play progresses finely. John Selden asked me to be his wife to-night."

"I told you men think and act in pairs."

"John is a noble fellow. I pretended to think that his cousin had ill-used him, and he defended him until I was ashamed of myself; absolutely said, Clement, that you were a sufficient excuse for Mr. Clare's will. Then he blamed his own past idleness so much, and promised if I would only try and endure 'the slings and arrows' of your outrageous temper, Clement, for two years longer, he would have made a home for me in which I could be happy. Yes, Clement, I should marry John Selden if we had not a five-dollar bill between us."

"I wish Cleve had been a little more explicit about his money affairs. However, there is time enough yet. When they leave to-morrow, what shall we do?"

"We will remain here another month; Levine will have the house ready for me by that time. I have written to him about refurnishing the parlors."

So next day the lovers parted, with many promises of constant letters and future happy days together. The interval was long and dull enough; but it passed, and one morning both gentlemen received notes of invitation to a small dinner party at the widow Clare's mansion in ---- street. There was a good deal of dressing for this party. Cleve wished to make his entrance into his future home as became the prospective master of a million and a half of money, and John was desirous of not suffering in Clement's eyes by any comparison with the other gentlemen who would probably be there.

Scarcely had they entered the drawing-room when the ladies appeared, the true widow Clare no longer in the unassuming toilet she had hitherto worn, but magnificent in white crepe lisse and satin, her arms and throat and pretty head flashing with sapphires and diamonds. Her companion had assumed now the role of simplicity, and Cleve was disappointed with the first glance at her plain white Chambery gauze dress.

John had seen nothing but the bright face of the girl he loved and the love-light in her eyes. Before she could speak he had taken both her hands and whispered, "Dearest and best and loveliest Clement."

Her smile answered him first. Then she said: "Pardon me, Mr. Selden, but we have been in masquerade all summer, and now we must unmask before real life begins. My name is not Clementine Marat, but Fanny Clare. Cousin John, I hope you are not disappointed." Then she put her hand into John's, and they wandered off into the conservatory to finish their explanation.

Mr. Cleve Sullivan found himself at that moment in the most trying circumstance of his life. The real Clementine Marat stood looking down at a flower on the carpet, and evidently expecting him to resume the tender attitude he had been accustomed to bear toward her. He was a man of quick decisions where his own interests were concerned, and it did not take him half a minute to review his position and determine what to do. This plain blonde girl without fortune was not the girl he could marry; she had deceived him, too--he had a sudden and severe spasm of morality; his confidence was broken; he thought it was very poor sport to play with a man's most sacred feelings; he had been deeply disappointed and grieved, etc., etc.

Clementine stood perfectly still, with her eyes fixed on the carpet and her cheeks gradually flushing, as Cleve made his awkward accusations. She gave him no help and she made no defence, and it soon becomes embarrassing for a man to stand in the middle of a large drawing-room and talk to himself about any girl. Cleve felt it so.

"Have you done, sir?" at length she asked, lifting to his face a pair of blue eyes, scintillating with scorn and anger. "I promised you my final answer to your suit when we met in New York. You have spared me that trouble. Good evening, sir."

Clementine showed to no one her disappointment, and she probably soon recovered from it. Her life was full of many other pleasant plans and hopes, and she could well afford to let a selfish lover pass out of it. She remained with her friend until after the marriage between her and John Selden had been consummated; and then Cleve saw her name among the list of passengers sailing on one particular day for Europe. As John and his bride left on the same steamer Cleve supposed, of course, she had gone in their company.

"Nice thing it would have been for Cleve Sullivan to marry John Selden's wife's maid, or something or other? John always was a lucky fellow. Some fellows are always unlucky in love affairs--I always am."

Half a year afterward he reiterated this statement with a great deal of unnecessary emphasis. He was just buttoning his gloves preparatory to starting for his afternoon drive, when an old acquaintance hailed him.

"Oh, it's that fool Belmar," he muttered; "I shall have to offer him a ride. I thought he was in Paris. Hello, Belmar, when did you get back? Have a ride?"

"No, thank you. I have promised my wife to ride with her this afternoon."

"Your wife! When were you married?"

"Last month, in Paris."

"And the happy lady was--"

"Why, I thought you knew; everyone is talking about my good fortune. Mrs. Belmar is old Paul Marat's only child."

"What?"

"Miss Clementine Marat. She brings me nearly $3,000,000 in money and real estate, and a heart beyond all price."

"How on earth did you meet her?"

"She was traveling with Mr. and Mrs. Selden--you know John Selden. She has lived with Mrs. Selden ever since she left school; they were friends when they were girls together."

Cleve gathered up his reins, and nodding to Mr. Frank Belmar, drove at a finable rate up the avenue and through the park. He could not trust himself to speak