Chapter XXXIX: Dick Hammond Is Astonished

A party of friends, all light-hearted and gay,
At a certain French cafe, where every one goes,
Are met in a well-curtained, warm CABINET,
Overlooking a street there, which every one knows.

The dinner is done, the Lafitte in its basket,
The champagne in its cooler is passed in gay haste;
Whatever you wish for, you have but to ask it;
Here are coffee, cigars and liqueurs, to your taste.—O. MEREDITH.

While the young, forsaken wife was occupying her lonely hours with these simple pursuits, and waiting from day to day to hear from her faithless husband, and hoping against hope to see him, events were transpiring in Washington calculated to have an important influence on her destiny. They were but trifles in themselves, however momentous in their effects. They were only a few bachelors’ wine suppers, card parties, and such like means of ruin. But that fate hangs upon trifles, is a truth as old as the history of Eden lost for an apple.

This was the way of it:

After Mr. Richard Hammond had received his final dismissal from Miss Anna Lyon, “that unlucky dog,” as his uncle called him, “fell among thieves.”

FELL AMONG THIEVES. That is the best way to characterize his misfortune in sinking again into the society of that dissipated set of men who ate his dinners, drank his wines, won his money, demoralized his habits and destroyed his reputation.

On a certain evening about this time, poor Dick entertained a few of his “friends” at supper in his rooms, at one of our fashionable hotels.

Among his guests were Captain Reding and Lieutenant Harpe, those two gallant officers of the Loafers’ Guard, who had once affronted Alexander Lyon by obtruding themselves into his opera box, and afterwards insulted Drusilla by following her home.

A lady friend, whose husband, in his profane bachelor days, had been present at this orgie, told me something of what passed there.

When the cloth was removed, and wines, liquors, olives, hookahs, tobacco and cigars were placed upon the table, the “gentlemen” became more than ever at ease.

The conversation, that had wandered over the general subjects of politics, field sports, operas, singers’ throats, dancers’ feet and beauties’ points, now became personal.

“By the way, Hammond,” said Captain Reding, taking the mouth-piece of his hookah from between his lips, and speaking through a cloud of smoke, “I see by the ‘Valley Courier,’ which I found upon your table, that Miss Lyon is really going to marry that prig Alexander. Is it quite true?”

“I believe so, sir,” said Dick, changing color, and helping himself to a deep draught of cognac.

“How the deuce was it that you let the heiress escape you?”

“The heiress, sir? I am not a fortune hunter.”

“Oh, bosh! you know what I mean, well enough. Who the deuce would ever accuse _you_ of being a fortune hunter?”

“Who, indeed? Fortune lavisher would fit you better! Eh, my boy?” put in the gentleman who afterwards reported this conversation, and who must therefore be nameless.

“But to return to the previous question,” said Reding, “the previous question with an amendment. How was it that you let the beauty elude you?”

“The beauty, sir? I fail to comprehend you,” said Dick, coldly.

“Ah, bah!” exclaimed young Lieutenant Harpe, rushing recklessly into the subject, for he was very much the worse for wine. “Why the deuce can’t you speak out plainly, Cap’, and call people by their names?— Miss Lyon! the beautiful Miss Lyon! the elegant Miss Lyon! the accomplished Miss Lyon! the belle of the season! the queen of the haut ton! the adored of Dick Hammond, whom she also adores! the betrothed of Alick Lyon, whom she abhors! And here’s to her!” And with this, he tossed off a big bumper of brandy.

“Yes, that’s so!” said Reding, “and that being so, why the mischief don’t you run off with the girl, eh, Hammy, my boy?”

Now if Dick had not been drinking a great deal more than was good for him, he would never have let his cousin’s name come up in such a company. Even as it was, he rather resented its introduction now, by keeping silence.

“Did you hear me, Hammy, my boy?” persisted Reding. “I asked you why—seeing she liked you so much better than she did that rum curse she was engaged to marry—why you didn’t cut him out and run off with the girl?”

“In the first place,” answered Dick, coldly, looking down into his empty glass, “it is not to be presumed possible that the ‘girl,’ as you ventured to call the lady, would have consented to run off with me.”

“Then I’d be blown to atoms if I hadn’t kidnapped her!” burst forth young Harpe, who was very far gone in inebriation.

“That would scarcely be practicable in the nineteenth century and in Washington city, Lieutenant,” answered Dick.

“No,” laughed Reding; “telegraph wires and detective policemen have been the death and destruction of all gallant enterprises of that sort. Neither do I think such a violent measure would have been necessary in this instance. He could have carried her off with her own consent, and nobody on earth could have prevented _that_, as they were both of age. Why didn’t you do it, my boy, eh? You haven’t answered that question satisfactorily yet.”

“Because he didn’t dare to!” recklessly interrupted Harpe. “He’s one of the ‘faint hearts’ that will never ‘win fair lady.’ He didn’t dare to.”

“I will answer you in the words of another weak wretch who was stung by sarcasm into crime:

‘I dare do _all_ that may become a man;
Who dares do _more_ is none.’

In other words, Messieurs, I am quite as incapable of running off with another man’s betrothed as I should be in making love to another man’s wife,” said Dick, very gravely.

“Hear! hear! hear!” shouted Harpe; “he wouldn’t run off with another man’s betrothed! oh, no, not he! even when he knows he loves her, and she him! oh, no! no! sooner than he’d make love to another man’s wife. As for me, I’d do either, as often as I could get a chance.”

“Why, man alive,” said Reding to Dick, “we are not in Spain, nor France, nor Germany, nor any other country where betrothal is held to be almost as sacred as marriage; we are in America, where betrothal means simply a conditional engagement between a young man and young woman to marry each other at a definite or indefinite time, _provided_ in the meanwhile neither party should happen to meet with any one he or she likes better. Bosh! such engagements don’t end in marriage once in ten times! Under the circumstances, I don’t think you were bound to respect the betrothal.”

“I differ with you,” said Dick.

“As for me,” put in Harpe, defiantly, “I never in all my life fell desperately in love with a woman, until some other man called my attention to her merits by getting possession of her himself.”

“You’ll end in getting the sausage meat you call your brains blown out, some of these days, my fine fellow, if you don’t take care of yourself,” laughed the nameless gentleman.

“I’d like to know who’s going to do it!” swaggered Harpe.

“Some indignant husband or lover, of course.”

“Let ’em try it,” crowed Harpe.

“I think, Hammond,” continued Captain Reding, “common gallantry required you to try your fortune with that young lady.”

“I wish, Reding, that you would drop the subject here,” said Dick.

“As she never took the least trouble to conceal her preference for you over Lyon, I do not see why we may not discuss the subject here. Why, Dick, it was evident to everybody who saw you three together, that she loathed Lyon and liked you. The thing was clear, it was patent, it was _flagrant_, under the circumstances! Now, come, Dick, honor bright! Why _didn’t_ you marry her?”

“I have answered that question already.”

“Humph! Well! we all thought you would certainly carry off the prize. Why, you were always following her, hovering over her, waiting on her, and even apparently making love to her, which, by the way, was not very consistent with your present declaration that you would be incapable of marrying another man’s betrothed.”

“Hear! hear! hear!” shouted young Harpe.

“That is so,” frankly confessed Dick. “It is true that I sunned myself too much in the light of that bright lady’s smiles. It was the old, old story of the moth and the flame. But no one was hurt except myself. I was smartly singed. I should, perhaps, have been entirely consumed but for a mercifully severe hand that took me away from the fatal light and warmth of the flame, and put me out in the cold and dark. And so—saved me.”

And, saying this, Dick lighted his hookah and withdrew into a cloud of incense.

“Come, Dick, talk prose, not poetry. We’re a practical party here, we are! The mercifully severe hand that took you away from the fire and put you out in the cold, was no other than the fair lady’s hand that tendered you the traditional mitten. I thought so!” laughed Reding.

“No; it was the war-worn hand of a veteran soldier. My uncle had me up before him one morning; actually arraigned me in the most magisterial manner; set Alick’s rights, Anna’s duties, and my own trespasses squarely before me, and then appealed to my honor; to which, I need not say, Messieurs, no one ever yet appealed in vain. I have never seen my fair cousin since that day.”

“Quite right, Hammond. I honor your principles,” said the nameless gentleman.

“Ume-me-me!” groaned young Harpe, rising sanctimoniously. “My brethren, let us _awle_ unite in prayer.”

“Hold your profane tongue, sir,” said Captain Reding, pushing the mocker down into his seat. “And don’t drink any more brandy! You’re crazy now. You’ll be under the table presently.”

“Sober as any man here,” laughed Harpe, dropping into his chair.

“Appealed to your honor, did he, Hammond?” said Reding, turning to Dick. “Well, I suppose the word has some meaning for you and for the gallant old gentleman. But I wonder how Alick Lyon understands honor, and how he reconciles it with his present course.”

“His present course. What do you mean?” inquired Dick.

“I should have said the course he has pursued the whole winter.”

“What was that? I don’t like Lyon. I can not now. I all but hate him. But, still, I do not think him capable of doing anything dishonorable. He is too proud to do so, for one thing,” said Alick’s generous foe.

“Well, may be so. But I’d like to know what his ideas of honor are; or how he can _honorably_ reconcile his position in respect to Miss Lyon with his relations to the little beauty at Cedarwood.”

“‘The little beauty at Cedarwood!’” echoed Dick, in astonishment.

“Yes, little Drusa!”

“Little Drusa—”

“Come, now, Dick, don’t you be Forestic, Murdochic, Wallackic, or tragic after any of these schools. They’re not in your line. So leave off echoing my words and staring at me.”

“But you said something about a girl that he has got hidden away at Cedarwood?”

“Yes, I did.”

“I don’t believe it!” said Dick, bluntly. Then remembering that he was the host speaking to his guest, he courteously added: “You are mistaken, sir. Lyon, with all his faults, is not a villain.”

“Who said he was? I didn’t. All I say is, that he has got just the sweetest little beauty you ever saw in your life cozily concealed in a pretty cottage orneé at Cedarwood. And he is very fond of her, and she is entirely devoted to him; and he calls her sweet love, and little Drusa. And she is just the loveliest little creature the sun ever shone upon, with a clear pale face, and lustrous dark hair and eyes, of such unfathomable depths of passion and of thought that she might well be supposed to be from the East, and be a daughter of the Druses.”

“Are you _sure_ of this?” asked Dick, with emphasis.

“I’ll swear to it.”

“_Who_ is she then?”

“Ah! that I don’t know.”

“_What_ is she to him?”

“Can’t undertake to say. I’ll swear that this little beauty is living under his protection in his house at Cedarwood. But whether she is his wife, or his sister, or his mother, or his maiden aunt, of course, I can’t tell. Doubtless it is some highly respectable connection of that sort, Mr. Alexander Lyon being master of the house. If it was _you_, Dick, you see we should all know what to think!” laughed Captain Reding.

Dick Hammond had been gazing steadily into the face of the speaker, and rubbing his own brows very thoughtfully and occasionally frowning painfully. But now he suddenly started up, struck his hand upon his forehead, and exclaimed:

“Good Heaven! It must be Drusilla Sterling!”

“Humph! Forestic again! You know her then?” said Captain Reding.

“Know her? I’ve known her from childhood. Poor little thing! So this is what became of her!” said Dick, in a voice of great pain, as he dropped dejectedly into his seat again.

“How look here, you know; none of that! Don’t you be gettin’ up any interest in her; because, you see, I’ve made up my own mind that way. And when Lyon marries I mean to take the pretty cottage and the pretty girl both off his hands,” drawled Harpe, very drowsily, for he was in the last stage of intoxication, and almost asleep.

“You can so well afford that sort of thing, with your lieutenant’s pay!” laughed “nameless.”

“Who is this girl, Dick, since you know her?” inquired Reding.

“She is as pure and good a girl as lives in this world. And, gentlemen, if she is at Cedarwood, as you say, under Alick’s protection, my life and soul on it, she is his wife, or she believes herself to be such!” said Dick, earnestly and almost angrily, as if he challenged even the thoughts of men if they wronged the friendless girl.

No one seemed disposed to contradict him in words, no matter how much they may have differed from him in opinion.

“But who is she then, Hammond?” persisted Captain Reding, who never, if he could help it, left a point unsettled.

“Drusilla Sterling, a clergyman’s orphan; brought up in Alexander Lyon’s family; a protegée of his mother, a pet of his father. Little less than a year ago she disappeared from her home, and could never be traced by her friends. So she is with him, the hypocritical scoundrel! But she is his wife, or thinks herself so! My life and soul on it, she does, for she could not fall—she could not. I have known her from her earliest childhood—the sweetest child that ever lived—a little saint!”

“But are you sure she is the same with Alick’s girl?” inquired Reding.

“I fear there is no doubt of it. The coincidence of name and circumstance is so complete. I can’t think why I didn’t recognize her when you first mentioned her; though in truth I never heard her called Drusa, but Drusilla; and I never thought of her as a woman, but merely as a child, and most certainly couldn’t associate her memory with any thoughts of license, but always with the most sacred sanctities of home.”

“Were you her lover in the past as you are her champion in the present, Hammond?” laughed Reding.

“No—yes—I don’t know.”

“Clear, to the point, and satisfactory, that answer!” laughed the captain.

“I mean to say that I loved her, but not in the sense you mean. I loved her only as a great New Foundland dog might love a baby; as a big brute like myself might love such a little angel as she was,” said Dick, gravely.

“Oh, yes, all women are angels until they are—found out!” mused Lieutenant Harpe, rousing himself.

“What did you say, sir?” coolly inquired Dick.

“I say,” defiantly answered Harpe, “that all women are angels until they are found out, and then they are fallen angels, every one of ’em!”

“Speak for the women you know best, sir! for those you have been brought up with; for those you associate with; for those nearest and dearest to you. For, _of course_, of them only _can_ you speak from knowledge! As for me, I judge a man and his family by his judgment of women. He who traduces the sex defames his own mother—and his sisters, wife, and daughters if he has them!” said Dick, indignantly.

Instead of attempting a reply to this scathing rebuke, the weak traducer of woman looked around on his companions, with a tipsy smile, and winking knowingly, said: “_I_ don’t mind _him_, bless you! _He_ don’t know what he’s talking about; he’s _tight_—tight as ever he can be! He wants to quarrel now; he’s always quarrelsome in his cups!”

And having delivered himself of this opinion, he crossed his arms upon the table, dropped his head upon them, and resigned himself to sleep.

“Poor Harpe, he has a very weak brain,” said Captain Reding.

No one else made any comment.

“Reding,” said Dick Hammond, turning to the captain, “I want you to tell me how you discovered the residence of this poor girl at Cedarwood.”

“Why, you see we first saw her with him at the opera. It was quite early in the season, and they were in a private box. Harpe and I were in the orchestra seats. When the curtain fell on the first act we went around there to get a nearer view of the pretty creature, hoping also to get an introduction to her. But Lord bless you, Lyon scowled at us as if he thought we had come to pick his pockets. We wouldn’t take notice of his black looks, but by being perfectly civil and self-possessed ourselves we compelled him to treat us with something like courtesy. But it was _only_ something-like; it wasn’t the genuine article itself; for he wouldn’t ask us to sit down, nor he wouldn’t present us to the pretty girl. And from that day I don’t think he ever brought her into the city again.”

“Then how did you discover her residence and her relations to him?”

“I am going to tell you. Some days after that we met Lyon in the reading-room of the Brown House. We chaffed him about the mysterious little beauty, you may be sure. But he stopped us by telling us that she was the daughter of a clergyman, and was only passing through the city under his escort, and that she had returned to her home in the country.”

“A mere evasion, of course.”

“Yes; but we did not question the fact at the time; although we did wonder how Alick come to be trusted with the escort of a young lady.”

“I should think so. Pray go on.”

“A little later we discovered the truth by chance. I went to spend a few days with an acquaintance I have living about a mile from Cedarwood. And while there, guided by some negroes, I went on a coon-hunt by torch-light. Did you ever see a coon-hunt by torch-light?”

“Often, when I was a boy; never since.”

“Well, the sport was quite new to me, and as a natural consequence I got separated from the dogs and darkies, and got lost in the woods.”

“A good beginning for an adventure,” said the nameless gentleman.

“Yes. Well, to resume—while I was trying to find a path, I saw a bright, indeed a brilliant light, shining through the trees at some distance. I went towards it, and found a beautiful cottage ornée, with its front windows splendidly illuminated.

“There was a party,” said one of the guests.

“No; though as it was now between two and three o’clock in the morning, on seeing the lighted windows I was struck with the same thought. They are having a blow out in there, I said to myself. But it was nothing of the kind, my friends!”

“What was it, then?” inquired Dick, anxiously.

“Wait till I tell you. I pushed on towards the house, and when I came up to it, I saw no carriages, no servants, no life, no motion. Everything was as still as death. In fact, the whole house was closed up except the two brilliantly illumined windows, from which the light streamed far across the lawn, and deep into the woods.”

“Go on! go on!” said Reding’s companions, speaking in a chorus. And the captain, who had only paused to take a drink, continued:

“‘Well,’ I said to myself, ‘this is rum go, anyway!’ And after walking around and around the pretty place, without seeing or hearing anything, I just climbed up to the window-sill and peeped through the lighted window.”

Here the captain paused for pure aggravation.

“Well! well! what did you see?” exclaimed several voices.

“What did I see? Ah, my friends, I had a full view of a small terrestrial paradise! and a beautiful mortal houri! a little domestic Eden, with a sweet little Eve within it! an enchanted bower, with a sleeping beauty!”

“Do speak plainly, Reding! that’s a good fellow!” said the nameless gentleman.

“Well, then, I saw a nice, cozy drawing-room, the very picture of elegance and comfort; a fine fire of sea coal in the grate; a luxurious little supper set forth in a splendid service on a round marble table; by its side an easy chair, and a pair of slippers; at a short distance and nearer the chimney corner a little stand, with an astral lamp and some books; and near it a lovely young creature, reclining in a resting chair, fast asleep, with the book she had been reading fallen upon her lap.”

“What a beautiful picture,” said one of the company, while the others listened in silence.

“I immediately recognized the beauty of the opera box; but as I live, gentlemen, I did not then connect her in my thoughts with Alexander Lyon. On the contrary, I believed his account of her, and I said to myself—‘There is the little darling waiting up for her clerical papa, who has gone to make a pastoral call on some one of his parishioners who is dying.’ And I hung there by the sill of the window, and looked in and fed my eyes upon the sweetness of the scene.

“Well? what then?”

“Then I heard horse’s feet coming. ‘Papa is returning,’ I said to myself. And I dropped from the sill and hid myself in some thick bushes below it, to wait till papa should pass, so that I might make my retreat unobserved. It appears that the horseman went first around to the stable; for soon I heard rapid footsteps approaching the house. And you may judge my surprise when I saw a young man run lightly up the stairs, and saw the door fly open, letting out a flood of light, and the little beauty rush into the arms of the new comer, whom I then plainly recognized as Alexander Lyon.”

“Great Heaven!” exclaimed Dick Hammond, in agitation.

“As if it had not been enough to know him by his face and form, I had his voice also in evidence of his identity. ‘Are you as glad to see me as all this, my little Drusa?’ he asked. And she answered with a shower of soft caresses and silvery tones.”

“And then?” inquired Dick.

“Why, then, of course, the house swallowed them up. The door was shut and locked, and the brilliant windows were darkened, and they had their happiness all to themselves, while I was left out in the cold.”

“You could not have been mistaken in what you supposed you saw and heard?” inquired Dick.

“No; how could I? That was not the only time I looked in at those windows either. A sort of fascination drew me there, to look in upon that lovely young creature. While I remained in the neighborhood, under the cover of coon hunting, I paid a visit to the lighted windows every night. Ah! night after night! night after night did that sweet little creature sit there waiting for him, leaving the windows open to guide him home, and keeping his supper warm, while he, sorry dog, was engaged gallanting Miss Anna about to balls and theatres, and scowling at better men than himself if they so much as looked at the belle.”

“Reding, I am deeply grieved to hear this; scarcely less so than I should be if the poor child were my own sister. But I repeat and reiterate most emphatically this truth, that she is really his wife, or believes herself to be so!” said Dick, earnestly.

“I think you are quite right, Hammond! The young creature herself, and all her surroundings breathed so sweetly of what you called ‘the sanctities of home life’ that no one looking on her could think evil of her. Indeed I thought evil of _myself_ though, sometimes, for seeming to play the spy. But I couldn’t resist the temptation of looking into that beautiful interior. I meant no harm.”

“And your contraband pastime was never discovered?”

“Oh yes,” laughed Reding. “She rose once and turned round so suddenly, that she saw me before I could drop from my perch. She screamed and disappeared; and I could have scourged myself for frightening her.”

“And then, I suppose, your stolen visits ceased.”

“Not a bit of it. I was only more cautious. But one night I purposely let myself be seen by _him_, on a rare occasion, when he happened to come home before daylight. It was to be my last visit, for I was about to leave the neighborhood.”

“Did he know you?”

“No! for as soon as he got a glimpse of my face, he blazed away at me with his revolver, and you may rest assured, I didn’t stop to claim his acquaintance! All, he had a good chase after me, and I had a good run and a good laugh! When I returned to the city, I couldn’t keep the joke to myself. I had to tell Harpe, for which I was afterwards sorry; for the scurvy fellow, with a party of his companions, having met the poor little girl in the city after Lyon had left, took advantage of her unprotected state and followed her home, and would have intruded into her house, if they had not been prevented by her servants.”

“Reding,” said Dick, gravely, “after what I have told you of this young lady, I hope and trust that you will abstain from speaking of her anywhere, and from doing anything to annoy her at any time. In a word, I appeal to your manhood, to treat her in all respects as you would treat the most honored woman of your acquaintance.”

“I never wished to do otherwise, and as I never expect to see the little angel again, I shall never have a chance of doing otherwise. But here, I declare, the day is breaking! And we ought to do the same! Wake up, Harpe! Come! Good night, Hammond!”

And so the party separated.

Dick Hammond remained, walking up and down the room in deep thought. At length he took a sudden resolution—to seek Drusilla.