The Belle of Bowling Green
“But there must be some opinion,” continued Mrs. Bloommaert. “Men cannot
disappear without leaving at least an opinion.”
“Well then, there are several opinions. Some think he has gone to the
Niagara frontier, others to Washington, and not a few are sure he is on
his way to New Orleans. I myself think New Orleans very likely; he has
interests and friends there.”
And Sappha listened and ate her bread to this sorrowful news. Only her
colourless face revealed her suffering at that moment; but it showed
itself in various ways after this certainty had been accepted. One of
the most pronounced forms it took was a feeling of intense dislike and
anger towards Annette. She would not go to Annette’s house, nor would
she see her if she called at the Bowling Green house. Her reasons were
sufficient to herself, and Mrs. Bloommaert thought her daughter
justified in her conduct. Not yet could she ask Sappha to forgive; not
while her eyes held that look of pain and despair, and her whole manner
that of one standing smitten and dismayed before a barrier she could not
cross.
As a matter of course, the unhappy Sappha passed her days “going
quietly,” almost hopelessly, for there was in her grief that element of
tragic fatality, that sense of Fate shaping life by the most trivial
things, that renders men and women despairing. Never before had she
given sway to a temper so unreasonable, so impetuous, so passionately
hasty. And surely not without the co-operation of the stars had Annette
called just at that early hour in the morning--Annette, jealous,
miserable, ill-tempered, envious, full of suspicions, and delighting in
making misery for others as well as herself. Then, unfortunately, Mrs.
Bloommaert was ill; and Annette, unrestrained by her presence, while
Sappha’s sympathies had been called on all night long and her temper
unconsciously frayed and irritated by her inability to prevent her
mother’s suffering. Oh, every trivial thing had been against her, even
to the small event of her going to the back parlour after breakfast! For
had she remained, as was her usual custom, in front of the house, she
would have seen Annette’s interview with her father, and been prepared
for whatever she might say.
All these considerations gave a sort of fatality to her quarrel with
Leonard, but they did not induce any kinder feeling towards Annette. She
regarded her, if not as the author, at least as the tool and messenger,
of evil; and Annette was quickly made to feel her position. Of course
she was angered by it. And Annette was easily made angry at this time,
for Achille had never been so provoking and unmanageable. In spite of
her complaints, he had lately spent all his days with De Singeron, who
was now on the point of sailing for France; and the episode of Leonard’s
duel had been specially aggravating, because she had not been taken into
confidence concerning it. And with that singular obtuseness common to
selfish people, she considered Mrs. Bloommaert’s coolness and Sappha’s
constant refusals to see her as a quite uncalled-for show of offence.
She told herself she had only repeated what every one was saying, and
that if Sappha had any sense of what was proper and respectable she
would have been grateful for her candour. “People are always asking to
be told the truth,” she complained, “and then when you put yourself out
of the way to tell it, they are sure to be angry at you.”
When three weeks had passed in this uncomfortable manner, Annette began
seriously to miss her accustomed sources of that familiar friendship
which admits of confidence and some showing of individuality. She awoke
one morning with a sense of isolation and of not being properly loved
and cared for; that was too intolerable to be endured longer, and taking
little Jonaca with her as a kind of peacemaker, she called on her aunt
and Sappha. As the carriage drew up at the Bloommaert house she saw
Sappha rise, and when she entered the parlour only Mrs. Bloommaert was
present.
“Good-morning, aunt Carlita! I have brought Jonaca to see you.”
Mrs. Bloommaert kissed the babe, and said she “looked well,” and then
resumed her sewing.
“Where is Sappha, aunt?”
“She is in her room. She is not well, and I cannot disturb her.”
“Oh, indeed, aunt, I saw her as I passed the window. She need not run
away from me.”
“Has Sappha run away from you? Why has she done that?”
“I suppose because I told her some things about Leonard Murray. It was
right for her to know them; but I have no doubt, now that Leonard has
run away, she blames me for all his faults.”
“Leonard has not run away, and it is very wrong and very spiteful in you
to make such remarks.”
“Nobody knows where he is, and he has left New York. What do you call
that, aunt?”
“I call it minding his own affairs, and as for saying no one knows where
he is, that is a lie. Because he did not tell Annette St. Ange where he
was going, is that proof that he has told no one? Indeed, Annette, if
you can believe it, there are a few people of consequence in New York
beside yourself--and Mr. St. Ange.”
“Well, then, you need not be angry, aunt. And it is not kind nor yet
religious to call what I say ‘a lie.’ No one ever used such a word to me
before.”
“You forget. Often I have heard your grandmother say the same thing.”
“She was more polite than to say ‘a lie’; she might doubt what I told
her, though always afterwards she found out I was right.”
“Indeed, Annette, you must excuse me from discussing your perfections
this morning. I am busy. Sappha is sick.”
“I am going upstairs to see her, aunt.”
“You are not, Annette. You have hurt her sufficiently. I will not allow
you to go and tell her that Leonard has ‘run away,’ for instance. And I
dare say you have plenty of such sharp speeches ready.”
“I have not--I have only----”
“If they are not ready, ’tis no matter. They spring up to your thoughts.
I ask you to excuse me this morning, for I have many things to attend
to.”
“Very well. You have hardly noticed little Jonaca, and you have really
told me to go away. I think you have behaved in a very rude and unkind
manner. You can say to Sappha I am sorry for her. If she will remember I
told her often that Leonard Murray was not at all sincere. I don’t think
he ever loved Sappha well enough to wish to marry her.”
“Good-morning, Annette!” And with these words Annette found herself
alone. She immediately drove to her grandmother’s. She felt sure of
appreciation there. And madame was delighted to see her and the child.
She took the little one in her arms and held it to her breast with a
soft cradling motion that soon put it to sleep, and then she laid it
tenderly down among the pillows on the sofa.
“So sweet, so pretty is she!” sighed madame. “I wonder if it is possible
that I was ever like to her!”
“Once I too was so sweet! so pretty! so loved and happy! but
now--now----”
“Well then, _now_, you are also sweet and pretty and loved and happy.”
“Oh, no, I am not, grandmother. Every one is cross with me, every one
seems to hate me--except you.”
“_Hush! hush!_ What you are saying is not true. It is unlucky to put
into words such thoughts.”
“I have just been at aunt Carlita’s, and she hardly noticed Jonaca, and
told me she was busy, and I must excuse her.”
“Where was Sappha?”
“Aunt says she is sick. She would not let me see her.”
“Well, then, Sappha looks ill--I have noticed it.”
“She is fretting about Leonard. You know he was really made to fight
that duel. I think Achille made him fight it, and now he has run away
from New York. I suppose he did not like to meet his acquaintances.”
At this point Annette suddenly stopped speaking, being admonished
thereto by her grandmother’s rising anger. The old lady was regarding
her with an expression Annette seldom saw on her face, but which was one
she did not care to neglect.
“Have you said all the wickedness in your heart, Annette?” she asked
sternly. “You know that false, false, false! are all your words. The
truth I had from Achille--the whole truth--and Leonard has not run away;
why then should he run away? Your uncle Gerardus tells me that very
wisely and very honourably he behaved. Also, I heard from him about the
affair in New Orleans. That, then, was a duel to be proud of.”
“In New Orleans? What affair in New Orleans, grandmother? I never heard
of that.”
“Achille can tell you. Ask him.”
“He has not told me, and he knows. You see then, how much he trusts me,
grandmother. I will not ask him. You tell me, grandmother.”
“No, I will not tell you what he has kept from you. Good reasons he may
have, of which I know nothing.”
“_So!_ I begin to find out things! Very good! I shall make Achille tell
me.”
“Can you make Achille speak if he wishes not to speak? Try it once, and
you will be sorry. Annette, Annette, I fear me for your future, if so
unreasonable you are!”
“Unreasonable! Grandmother! I assure you I have many good reasons for
all I do. Very unhappy I have been lately! Oh, I wish you would pity me
a little!”
“Surely Annette St. Ange needs not pity. Come, now, tell me all your
troubles,--very small are they,--and in telling they will go away.
Achille loves you--is kind to you; Jonaca is well, you are well--what
then is the matter?”
“If Achille loves me, he loves far better that pastry cook.”
“There it is--‘that pastry cook.’ You have no good right to use those
words, and well you know it. The pastry cook De Singeron is now Count de
Singeron, and goes home to take again his place in a court regiment. But
_so!_ even if he were yet a pastry cook, he is the friend of Achille; he
is loved by Achille; by you also he ought to be loved for Achille’s
sake.”
“You always take Achille’s part.”
“When Achille is right and you are wrong.”
“Thank goodness, I have done with the Count de Singeron! He left New
York yesterday, and Achille sat up all night and cried about it.”
“Have you quarrelled--you and Achille?”
“No one can quarrel with Achille. If I get angry he says only, ‘Madame
is not well,’ or ‘Madame needs a little rest,’ and then bows and leaves
me--perhaps he kisses my hand, and then I feel as if I should like
to---- Oh, grandmother, it is terrible! If he would only get angry!”
“My dear one, you know not the anger of such men as Achille. _That_
would be terrible indeed! I warn you of it. To rude words or cross words
he will never condescend; but--but--the thing he will _do_, if you love
him, your heart it will break!”
“He does not talk to me as he should. Here is this New Orleans affair! I
am not told of it, and Leonard’s duel with Mr. Gilson I knew nothing of
till it was over--and so it was really Achille who is to blame for the
trouble with Sappha.”
“Oh! Oh! The trouble with Sappha! What did you do to Sappha, Annette?”
“Nothing much--it is not worth telling you, grandmother.”
“The judge of that I will be myself.”
“I do not wish to tell you, grandmother. It is nothing.”
“Very good! I will ask Sappha. The truth she will tell me, I know.”
“I do not like that Sappha should complain of me to you, grandmother. I
will tell you myself. It was the dreadful morning of the duel. When I
awoke I found Achille had gone, and I was afraid he would be hurt, and
very angry indeed that he should mix himself up in Leonard Murray’s
disgraceful quarrel. I thought I ought to have been considered. Just
think, grandmother, how disagreeable it was likely to be for me--every
one of the De Vries coming to talk it over, and all the Cruger women,
and Fanny Curtenius, and the Sebrings, Fishers, Ogdens, and all the rest
of them. I felt as if I could not bear the shame, and then never to have
been consulted about such an affair! It was too bad.”
“That was to spare you anxiety. Achille was thoughtful for you.”