Belford's Magazine, Volume II, No. 8, January, 1889

“Your sister?” Van stared at the cheaply-clad night wanderer, as though he had had too much Regent’s punch.

“Yes, sister Rose – Rose Wood,” she said, with the confidence of acquaintance. “I’m her sister, you know – Blanche.”

“Blanche? Your name is Blanche? I cannot tell you how happy I am to have chanced along just now, Miss Wood;” and Van bared his head in the cutting night wind to the blanket-shawled girl in the night-liner, as he would not have done at high noon to a duchess in her chariot. “But I’m wasting your time from your mother; so good-morning; and may your Christmas be happier than its eve.”

“Good-by! And oh, how I thank you!” the girl said, again extending her hand over the cab door. “I’ll tell Rose, and she shall thank you, better than I can!”

“Good-night! But don’t trouble her,” Van said, releasing the girl’s hand. “One minute, Murphy,” he added aside to the driver; “here’s your Christmas-gift!”

A bright gold piece glinted in the dirty fur glove, in which Dennis Murphy looked to find a shilling under the next gas-lamp.

“Blanche! and the same golden hair, too!” Van muttered to himself, as the cab rocked and ricketted down the street. “Well, I suppose that is what the poet means by ‘the magic of a name’!” and he suddenly recalled that he was still standing bareheaded in the blast. “And Rose Wood’s sister looks like that! Well, verily one half the world does not know how the other half lives!”

Then he turned and strode rapidly homeward; pulling hard, as he thought many strange thoughts, on the dead cigar between his lips.

Once in his own parlor, Van Morris walked straight to the mirror over the mantel, and looked long and steadily at himself. Then he tossed Mr. Allmand’s half-smoked cigar contemptuously into the grate, lit one he selected carefully from the carved stand near, and threw himself into a smoking-chair before the ruddy glow of coals.

“I must be getting old,” he soliloquized. “I didn’t use to get bored so easily by these things. Either balls are not what they were, or I am not. Now, ‘there’s no place like home!’ Not much of a box to call home, either!” And he glanced round the really elegant apartment in half-disgust. “There’s something lacking! Andy’s the best fellow in the world, but he’s so wanting in order. Poor old boy! Wonder if he will drink anything more? I surely must blow him up to-morrow morning. How deucedly sharp she is!” and he smiled to himself. “She saw through Rose Wood’s game at a glance. Wonder if she saw through me?”

He looked steadily into the glowing coals, as though castles were building there. Once or twice his lips moved soundlessly; and suddenly he reached over to the escritoire near by, and taking an oval case from it, opened it, and gazed long and earnestly at the picture in it. The face was the average one of a young girl, with stiff plaits of hair stiffly tossed over the shoulder, in futile chase after grace; but the wide blue eyes were a glory of purity and trust, and they were the eyes of Blanche Allmand.

Then he rose abruptly, walked to the sideboard, and filled a glass with water. Then he placed carefully in it the cactus flower and camelia bud, which had never left his hand since he plucked them in the conservatory. As he did so, Morris’ face grew serious, and looked down wistfully into the fire.

When he raised his eyes they were full of hopeful light, and they rested long and steadily upon the flowers.

“Yes! It is better!” he exclaimed aloud, as though continuing a train of thought. “Some of that family bloom only once in a century. I cannot look for miracles, and many a hand may reach for my flower. Yes, to-morrow shall settle it! The Italian was even more philosopher than poet when he said, ‘Amare e no essere amato e tiempo perduto’!”

VI

When Mr. Andrew Browne tumbled into the cosy parlor of that bachelor’s box at 4 A.M. on Christmas morning, he was by all odds the happiest man of his acquaintance, even if he knew himself, which was more than doubtful.

He slammed the door, slung his fur-lined overcoat across the sofa, turned up the gas until it whistled merrily, and poked the fire until it roared again. Then he hunted the boot-jack, and drew off one boot; changed his mind, and flung himself into the smoking-chair, and stretched booted and unbooted foot to the blaze. Thus posed, he trolled out, “Il segreto per esser felice,” in a rich baritone; only interrupting his tempo to spit out superfluous ends, bitten from his cigar, in the effort to phrase neatly and smoke at the same time.

“Why the deuce don’t you get to bed?” growled Van Morris from the next room. He was aroused from dreams of Blanche Allmand, music, diamond solitaires, and orange-blossoms, mixed into one sweet confusion. “Stop your row, can’t you? and go to bed!”

“You go to bed yo’sef!” responded the illogical Andy, rising, not too steadily, on his one boot, and throwing wide the folding-door. “Who wants to go to bed? I sha’n’t.”

“You’re an idiot!” muttered Mr. Morris; and he turned his face to the wall.

“Guess am an idiot,” responded Andy, blandly. “But I ain’t tight, – only happy! I’m the happiest idiot —Il segreto per ess– Say, Van! I’m so devilish happy, ol’ boy!”

Morris turned over with a groan, and pulled the covering over his head. The strong, small word he uttered as he did so is not to be found in the church service. But Andy was not to be snubbed in that style. He stepped forward; attempted to sit on the bed’s edge; miscalculated his momentum, and succeeded in landing plump on the centre of his friend’s person.

“Confound you!” gasped the latter, breathless. “You’re as drunk as – as a fool!”

“No, I ain’t,” chuckled Andy, imperturbably happy. Then he laughed till the bed shook; composing himself suddenly into gravity, with a fierce snort – “No, I ain’t: you’re sober!”

“And when she asked, I said you never drank,” reproached the irate and still gasping Morris. “I lied for you!”

“Tha’s nothing. I’ll lie for you; lie for you to-morrow – see’f I don’t! Say, Van, ol’ boy, I ain’t tight; only happy —so happy! Van! Van!” and he shook the pretended sleeper heavily. “I’m goin’ to reform! I’m goin’ to be married!”

“What? Rose Wood?”

Van Morris sat bolt upright in bed now. The tone of voice in which he invoked Miss Wood might have brought response from that wise virgin, disrobing for triumphant rest full ten blocks away.

But he found it vain to argue with Andy’s mixed Burgundy and champagne punch. Contradiction but made him insist more strongly that he was engaged to the old campaigner, whom Morris had so manœuvred to outflank. Finally, in a miscellaneous outfit of evening pants, night-gown, and smoking-cap, he succeeded in getting the jubilant groom in futuro into bed, where he still hummed at the much-sought secret of happiness, until he collapsed with a sudden snore, and slept like the Swiss.

Then Morris walked the floor rapidly, wrapped in thought and a cloud of fragrant cigar-smoke. Then he threw himself once more into the smoking-chair, and gazed long and earnestly into the coals, a heavy frown resting on his face. Suddenly it cleared off; the sunshine of a broad smile took its place; and Van tossed the end of his cigar exultingly into the fire. Then he rose and stretched himself like a veritable son of Anak, when

“Stalwart they court the rapture of the fight.”

“I have it, by George!” he cried. “I’ll get the poor fellow out of this box, if the old girl did induce him to pop, and accepted him out of hand! Andy! I say, Andy, wake up!” and he ran into his chum’s room, dragged him out of bed, and had him at the fire, before he was well awake.

Mr. Andrew Browne was no longer in a mood even approaching the jubilant. He had utterly forgotten the secret per esser felice, during his two hours’ nap. He confessed to a consuming desire for Congress-water, and made use of improper words upon finding only empty bottles, aggravating in reminiscence of it, in the carved ebony sideboard.

Finally he sat down, with his head in his hands, and told his story dismally enough.

Miss Rose Wood’s carriage had been dismissed, as per programme. Andy had led the German with her, and a bottle of champagne at his side. He had walked home with her; had told her – in what wild words he knew not – that he loved her; and had been, as Van had surmised, “accepted out of hand.”

“And, Van, I’m bound, as a man of honor, to marry her!” finished the now thoroughly dejected fiancé. “Yes, I know what you’d say; it is a pretty rum thing to do; but then she mustn’t suffer for my cursed folly!”

“Suffer? Rose Wood suffer for missing fire one time more?”

Surprise struggled with contempt in the exclamation Morris shot out by impulse.

“But, if she loves me well enough to engage – ” Andy began, rather faintly; but his mentor cut him short.

“Love the d —deuce!” he retorted. “Why, she’s a beggar and a husband-trap!”

“But her family? What will they think?” pleaded Andy, but with very little soul in the plea.

“Poor little Blanche!” muttered Morris, half to himself. “Bah! the girl has no heart!”

“Blanche?” echoed Van, in a dazed sort of way. “Why, you don’t suppose Blanche will know it! I never thought of her!” and he rose feebly, and stood shivering in his ghostly attire.

“Why, of course, Rose Wood couldn’t keep such great news. Why, man, you’re the capital prize in the matrimonial lottery; but hang me if Miss Wood shan’t draw another blank this time!”

There was a compound of deadly nausea and effortful dignity in the elbows Mr. Andrew Browne leaned upon the mantel, which hinted volumes for what his face might have said, had it been visible through the fingers latticed over it.

“I am a gentleman,” he half gasped. “It may be a trap; but I’ll keep my word, and —marry her, unless – unless, Van, you get me out of it!”

“Go to bed, you spoon!” laughed his friend. “I have the whole plan cut and dried. I’ll teach you your lesson as soon as you sleep yourself sober.”

Morris stood many minutes by the bedside of his quickly-sleeping friend; but, when he turned into the parlor again, his face was pale and stern.

“The way of the world, always,” he said aloud. “One inanely eager, another stupidly backward. ‘Fools rush in where angels fear to tread!’ Poor boy! he’d give as much to-morrow to unsay his words as I would to have spoken those I nearly said last night!”

The chill gray dawn outside was wrestling at the windows for entrance with the sickly glaring gas-light within. Morris drew aside the heavy curtains and pressed his forehead against the frost-laced pane. Long he looked out into the gray haze with eyes that saw nothing beyond his own thoughts. Then he turned to the fire again. The gray ash was hiding the glow of the spent coals. Then he took up the glass once more and looked earnestly at the contrasted flowers it held. He replaced it almost tenderly, and walked slowly to his own room.