Chapter 14. Lottie A Mysterious Problem

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_ CHAPTER XIV. LOTTIE A MYSTERIOUS PROBLEM

After a brief toilet, Lottie came down to tea looking like an innocent little lamb that any wolf could beguile and devour. She smiled on De Forrest so sweetly that the cloud began to pass from his brow at once.

"Why should I be angry with her?" he thought, "she did not understand what I was aiming at, and probably supposed that I meant to read her asleep, and yet I should have thought that the tones of my voice--Well, well, Lottie has been a little spoiled by too much devotion. She has become accustomed to it, and takes it as a matter of course. When we are married, the devotion must be on the other side of the house."

"I thought Mr. Hemstead would be back this evening?" she said to her aunt.

"No, not till to-morrow evening. You seem to miss Frank very much."

Then Lottie was provoked to find herself blushing like a school-girl, but she said, laughingly, "How penetrating you are, auntie. I do miss him, in a way you cannot understand."

But the others understood the remark as referring to her regret that he had escaped from her wiles as the victim of their proposed jest, and Bel shot a reproachful glance at her. She could not know that Lottie had said this to throw dust into their eyes, and to account for her sudden blush, which she could not account for to herself.

Before supper was over, Harcourt came in with great news, which threw Addie into a state of feverish excitement, and greatly interested all the others.

"Mrs. Byram, her son, and two daughters, have come up for a few days to take a peep at the country in winter, and enjoy some sleigh-riding. I met Hal Byram, and drove in with him. Their large house is open from top to bottom, and full of servants, and to-morrow evening they are going to give a grand party. There are invitations for you all. They expect most of their guests from New York, however."

Even languid Bel brightened at the prospect of so much gayety; and thoughts of Hemstead and qualms of conscience vanished for the time from Lottie's mind. The evening soon passed, with cards and conjectures as to who would be there, and the day following, with the bustle of preparation.

"I don't believe Frank will go to such a party," said Addie, as the three girls and De Forrest were together in the afternoon.

"Let us make him go by all means," said Lottie. "He needn't know what kind of a party it is, and it will be such fun to watch him. I should not be surprised if he and Mrs. Byram mutually shocked each other. We can say merely that we have all been invited out to a little company, and that it would be rude in him not to accompany us."

Mrs. Marchmont was asked not to say anything to undeceive Hemstead.

"It will do him good to see a little of the world," said Lottie; and the lady thought so too.

The others were under the impression that Lottie still purposed carrying out her practical joke against Hemstead. At the time when he had saved them from so much danger the evening before, they felt that their plot ought to be abandoned, and, as it was, they had mainly lost their relish for it. Hemstead had not proved so good a subject for a practical joke as they had expected. But they felt that if Lottie chose to carry it on, that was her affair, and if there were any fun in prospect, they would be on hand to enjoy it. The emotions and virtuous impulses inspired by their moment of peril had faded almost utterly away, as is usually the case with this style of repentance. Even Bel was growing indifferent to Lottie's course. Harcourt, who with all his faults had good and generous traits, was absent on business, and had partially forgotten the design against Hemstead, and supposed that anything definite had been given up on account of the service rendered to them all.

Lottie was drifting. She did not know what would be her action. The child of impulse, the slave of inclination, with no higher aim than to enjoy the passing hour, she could not keep a good resolve, if through some twinges of conscience she made one. She had proposed to avoid Hemstead, for, while he interested, he also disquieted her and filled her with self-dissatisfaction.

And yet for this very reason he was fascinating. Other men admired and flattered her, bowing to her in unvarying and indiscriminating homage. Hemstead not only admired but respected her for the good qualities that she had simulated, and with equal sincerity recognized faults and failures. She had been admired all her life, but respect from a true, good man was a new offering, and, even though obtained by fraud, was as delightful as it was novel. She still wished to stand well in his estimation, though why she hardly knew. She was now greatly vexed with herself that she had refused to visit Mrs. Dlimm. She was most anxious that he should return, in order that she might discover whether he had become disgusted with her; for, in the knowledge of her own wrong action, she unconsciously gave him credit for knowing more about her than he did.

She had no definite purpose for the future. Instead of coolly carrying out a deliberate plot, she was merely permitting herself to be carried along by a subtle undercurrent of interest and inclination, which she did not understand, or trouble herself to analyze. She had felt a passing interest in gentlemen before, which had proved but passing. This was no doubt a similar case, with some peculiar and piquant elements added. A few weeks in New York after her visit was over, and he would fade from memory, and pass below the horizon like other stars that had dazzled for a time. The honest old counsellor, conscience, recklessly snubbed and dismissed, had retired, with a few plain words, for the time, from the unequal contest.

She met Hemstead at the door on his return, and held out her hand, saying cordially, "I'm ever so glad to see you. It seems an age since you left us."

His face flushed deeply with pleasure at her words and manner. Expecting an indifferent reception, he had purposed to be dignified and reserved himself. And yet her manner on the morning of his departure had pained him deeply, and disappointed him. It had not fulfilled the promise of the previous day, and he had again been sorely perplexed. But his conclusion was partly correct.

"She is resisting the truth. She sees what changes in her gay life are involved by its acceptance; and therefore shuns coming under its influence."

What a strange power God has bestowed upon us! There is some one that we long to influence and change for the better. That one may know our wish and purpose, recognize our efforts, but quietly baffle us by an independent will that we can no more coerce and control than by our breath soften into spring warmth a wintry morning. We can look pleadingly into some dear one's eyes, clasp his hands and appeal with even tearful earnestness, and yet he may remain unmoved, or be but transiently affected. Though by touch or caress, by convincing arguments and loving entreaty, we may be unable to shake the obdurate will, we can gently master it through the intervention of another. The throne of God seems a long way round to reach the friend at our side,--for the mother to reach her child in her arms,--but it usually proves the quickest and most effectual way. Where before were only resistance and indifference, there come, in answer to prayer, strange telentings, mysterious longings, receptivity, and sometimes, in a way that is astonishing, full acceptance of the truth.

"The wind bloweth where it listeth," were the words of the all-powerful One, of the beautiful emblem of His own mysterious and transforming presence.

Again He said, "How much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him."

Here is a power, a force, an agency, that the materialist cannot calculate, weigh, or measure, or laugh scornfully out of existence.

As upon a sultry night a breeze comes rustling through the leaves from unknown realms of space, and cools our throbbing temples, so the soul is often stirred and moved by impulses heavenward that are to their subjects as mysterious as unexpected.

To a certain extent, God gives to the prayerful control of Himself, as it were, and becomes their willing agent; and when all mysteries shall be solved, and the record of all lives be truthfully revealed, it will probably be seen that not those who astonished the world with their own powers, but those who quietly, through prayer, used God's power, were the ones who made the world move forward.

While Hemstead would never be a Mystic or a Quietest in his faith, he still recognized most clearly that human effort would go but little way in awakening spiritual life, unless seconded by the Divine power. Therefore in his strong and growing wish that he might bring the beautiful girl, who seemed like a revelation to him, into sympathy with the truth that he believed and loved, he had based no hope on what he alone could do or say.

But her manner on the previous morning had chilled him, and he had half purposed to be a little distant and indifferent also.

It did not occur to him that he was growing sensitive in regard to her treatment of himself, as well as of the truth.

He readily assented to Lottie's request that he should accept Mrs. Byram's invitation, and found a strange pleasure in her graciousness and vivacity at the supper-table.

His simple toilet was soon made, and he sought the parlor and a book to pass the time while waiting for the Others. Lottie was a veteran at the dressing-table, and by dint of exacting much help from Bel, and resting content with nature's bountiful gifts,--that needed but little enhancing from art,--she, too, was ready considerably in advance of the others, and, in the full UNdress which society permits, thought to dazzle the plain Western student, as a preliminary to other conquests during the evening.

And he was both dazzled and startled as she suddenly stood before him under the chandelier in all the wealth of her radiant beauty.

Her hair was arranged in a style peculiarly her own, and powdered. A necklace of pearls sustained a diamond cross that was ablaze with light upon her white bosom. Her arms were bare, and her dress cut as low as fashion would sanction. In momentary triumph she saw his eye kindle into almost wondering admiration; and yet it was but momentary, for almost instantly his face began to darken with disapproval.

She at once surmised the cause; and at first it amused her very much, as she regarded it as an evidence of his delightful ignorance of society and ministerial prudishness.

"I gather from your face, Mr. Hemstead, that I am not dressed to suit your fastidious taste."

"I think you are incurring a great risk in so exposing yourself this cold night, Miss Marsden."

"That is not all your thought, Mr. Hemstead."

"You are right," he said gravely, and with heightened color.

"But it's the style; and fashion, you know, is a despot with us ladies."

"And, like all despots, very unreasonable; and wrong at times, I perceive."

"When you have seen more of society, Mr. Hemstead," she said, a little patronizingly, "you will modify your views. Ideas imported in the Mayflower are scarcely in vogue now."

He was a little nettled by her tone, and said with a tinge of dignity, "My ideas on this subject were not imported in the Mayflower. They are older than the world, and will survive the world."

Lottie became provoked, for she was not one to take criticism of her personal appearance kindly, and then it was vexatious that the one whom she chiefly expected to dazzle should at once begin to find fault; and she said with some irritation, "And what are your long-lived ideas."

"I fear they would not have much weight with you were I able to express them plainly. I can only suggest them, but in such a way that you can understand me in a sentence. I should not like a sister of mine to appear in company as you are dressed."

Lottie flushed deeply and resentfully, but said, in a frigid tone, "I think we had better change the subject I consider myself a better judge of these matters than you are."

He quietly bowed and resumed his book. She shot an angry glance at him and left the room.

This was a new experience to her,--the very reverse of what she had anticipated. This was a harsh and discordant break in the honeyed strains of flattery to which she had always been accustomed, and it nettled her greatly. Moreover, the criticism she received had a delicate point, and touched her to the very quick; and to her it seemed unjust and uncalled for. What undoubtedly is wrong in itself, and what to Hemstead, unfamiliar with society and its arbitrary customs, seemed strangely indelicate, was to her but a prevailing mode among the ultra-fashionable, in which class it was her ambition to shine.

"The great, verdant boor!" she said in her anger, as she paced restlessly up and down the hall. "What a fool I am to care what he thinks, with his backwoods ideas! Nor shall I any more. He shall learn to-night that I belong to a different world."

De Forrest joined her soon and somewhat re-assured her by his profuse compliments. Not that she valued them as coming from him, but she felt that he as a society man was giving the verdict of society in distinction from Hemstead's outlandish ideas. She had learned from her mother--indeed it was the faith of her childhood, earliest taught and thoroughly accepted--that the dictum of their wealthy circle was final authority, from which there was no appeal.

Hemstead suffered in her estimation. She tried to think of him as uncouth, ill-bred, and so ignorant of fashionable life--which to her was the only life worth naming--that she could dismiss him from her mind from that, time forth. And in her resentment she thought she could and would. She was very gracious to De Forrest, and he in consequence was in superb spirits.

As they gathered in the parlor, before starting, De Forrest looked Hemstead over critically, and then turned to Lottie and raised his eye-brows significantly. The answering smile was in harmony with the exquisite's implied satire. Lottie gave the student another quick look and saw that he had observed their meaning glances, and that in consequence his lip had curled slightly; and she flushed again, partly with anger and vexation.

"Why should his adverse opinion so nettle me? He is nobody," she thought, as she turned coldly away.

Though Hemstead's manner was quiet and distant, he was conscious of a strange and unaccountable disappointment and sadness. It was as if a beautiful picture were becoming blurred before his eyes. It was more than that,--more than he understood. He had a sense of personal loss.

He saw and sincerely regretted his cousin Addie's faults; but when Lottie failed in any respect in fulfilling the fair promise of their first acquaintance, there was something more than regret.

At first he thought he would remain at home, and not expose himself to their criticism and possible ridicule; but a. moment later determined to go and, if possible, thoroughly solve the mystery of Lottie Marsden's character; for she was more of a mystery now than ever. _

Read next: Chapter 15. Hemstead Sees "Our Set"

Read previous: Chapter 13. A Lover Quenched

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