7 Which Treats of Love’s Young Dream

THE moon is shining brightly as he quits the cottage, a frosty moon, and the sky is all alight with stars. Mr. Vane Valentine glances approvingly upward as he lights a cigar, and opines he will have a pleasant night for his return walk. His step rings like steel on the hard ground, and reaches the ear of madam, sitting alone and lonely before the fire. She glances after him—a tall, slender figure—and in that look, for one instant, there flashes out something strangely akin to aversion. For he stands in the stead of her son, her only son, her bright, brave, handsome, joyous George, the latchet of whose shoes, at his worst, this stiff young prig is unworthy to loose. Yet the aversion is unjust; it is no fault of Vane Valentine’s that he is here, he has neither sought for, nor forced himself into the position, rather his kinship has been thrust upon him, and Katherine Valentine knows it well. But her spirit is sore to-night, she is a very desolate woman, with all her pride, and pedigree, and wealth, an old, a lonely, a widowed, a childless woman. The cruel words of that other—George’s wife—George’s wife! how strange the thought—nay, George’s widow—the woman he has loved, has married, the mother of his child, ring in her ears, and will not be exorcised.

“You murdered him! You left him to perish in want! You killed him with your pride!” Oh! God, is it true? George in want—suffering—dying! A low, moaning cry, strange, and dreary, and terrible to hear, breaks from her lips, she covers her face with her hands there as she sits alone. Here, with no eye to see, no ear to hear, her pride may drop from her for a little, and love and memory awake. Firelight and moonlight meet and mingle in the room, a fitting spectral light for ghosts to rise out of their graves and keep her company. The house is very still. The servants, with Mrs. Tinker, are at supper. Vane Valentine is on his way to the circus, excited and stimulated by the thought of beholding the adventuress who erstwhile fooled his infatuated Cousin George. Here, alone, she is free to break her heart in silence, after the fashion of some strong women. Tomorrow she will be cold and hard, no trace of weakness or tears will betray her—to-night she is at liberty, and tears as bitter, as burning as ever childish mother shed, wet the pale cheeks as she sits and thinks.

It is not such a long story, this tragedy, to think over—the tragedies of life are mostly briefly told. To Katherine Valentine it is but as yesterday since she last kissed her son—in reality it is eight years since he gave up father, mother, home, friends, name, a fortune—all that men hold best worth the keeping, for sake of the pink and white face, the bold, blue eyes, and flaxen hair she saw a few hours ago.

Let me tell you the story she thinks out, sitting here, a bowed and forsaken figure, that Vane Valentine ruminates over, with contemptuous wonder on his way to the circus—the old story of a “young man married, a young man married. ”

Some forty years before this starry October night, another Valentine—Austin Mordred Valentine—said good-by to old England, to Valentine Manor, to his elder brother, Sir Rupert, and sailed for the new world to seek his fortune. Literally to seek his fortune, and fully resolved to find it. He was twenty years old, good looking, well educated, fairly clever, possessed of plenty of British pluck and “go,” and backbone; not afraid of plodding, of waiting, of hard work, absolutely determined to succeed.

That sort of man does succeed. Austin Valentine succeeded beyond even his most sanguine expectations, and like all men of ability believed implicitly in himself. He took to trade, the first of the name of Valentine who had ever so demeaned himself. They had been freebooters, raiders, hard fighters, hard hunters, hard spendthrifts; had been soldiers, sailors, rectors, lived hard, died hard, distinguished themselves in many ways, but tradesmen none of them had been, until young Austin threw off the traditions and shackles of centuries, emancipated himself, took this new departure, demeaned himself, and made his fortune.

It was time, too, for the Valentine guineas had come to a very low ebb. Riotous living is apt to empty already depleted coffers. Sir Rupert, with every inch of land mortgaged, the manor rented, wandering about the Continent, striving drearily to make the most of nothing, was perhaps a greater object of compassion than Austin in the shipping business and fur trade, with wealth rolling in like a golden river, a millionaire already at thirty years. But Sir Rupert did not think so.

From the heights of his untarnished position, as one of the oldest baronets of the baronetage, he looked in honor from the first, on his only brother’s decadence, spoke of him always as “poor Austin,” and to do him justice declined to avail himself in any way of such ill gotten gain. Austin laughed; he was philosophical as well as shrewd, went on the even tenor of his wealthy way, and finally at three-and-thirty looked about him for a wife.

He found one there in Toronto ready to his hand, a rara avis, possessing in herself every quality he most desired in a wife—beauty, family, high-breeding, an ancient name. Her father was Colonel Hamilton, she was the eldest of a family of daughters, scantily provided for, like the Valentines, the Hamiltons were uncomfortably poor and proud.

The young lady had many suitors, was a belle and a “toast ” in the rather exclusive circle in which she moved, but from the first Austin Valentine stood to win. Nothing succeeds like success. His name, his family, his good looks, his riches, all were in his favor.

Colonel Hamilton moved with the world, and had no patrician’s scruples in regard to the shipping interest and vast fur trade with Indians and trappers, whatever the stately Katherine may have had.

But she was a prudent young lady, too; not so very young either, seven-and-twenty perhaps, and there were all the younger ones, and life was rather a dingy affair in the crowded household, and, besides, she was not sentimental at all; but she really—well—had a very sincere regard and—and esteem (it is difficult to find the correct word) for Mr. Austin Valentine.

She said yes when he proposed, and looked quite regal in her white satin and point laces and pearls, everyone said, on her wedding-day.

They went abroad for a year, met Sir Rupert still drearily economizing on the Continent, and the bride groom received his forgiveness and blessing and two lean fingers to shake. He even promised to come over and visit them “some time,” an indefinite period that never arrived.

They visited Manor Valentine, which fine ancestral old place Mrs. Austin resented seeing in the possession of aliens, much more than either of the brothers.

“I’ll pay off these confounded mortages, and come and live here one day,” said Mr. Austin, coolly.

“And I shall be Lady Valentine,” thought his bride.

For all the world knew Sir Rupert never meant to marry—did not care for that sort of thing—was a confirmed invalid, hypochondriac rather, absorbed in himself and his many ailments.

But “creaking doors hang long “—confirmed invalids are mostly tenacious of life, and Mrs. Austin never became my Lady Valentine.

On this October night Austin Valentine has lain for years under the turf, while the hypochondriacal elder brother is still on it, and likely indefinitely there to remain.

They returned to Toronto and set up house-keeping on a princely scale.

Katherine Valentine amply renumerated herself for the dingy years of her maiden life. She spent money lavishly, extravagantly, on every whim and caprice, until even generous Austin winced. But he signed the big checks and laughed.

Let it go—she did honor to him, to his name, to their position as leaders of society—her tastes were aesthetic, and aesthetic tastes are mostly expensive.

Everything turned to gold in his hands, he was a modern Midas without the ass’ ears. Let her spend as she might the coffers would still be full.

And then after ten years a son was born.

When a prince of the blood is born, cannons boom, bells ring, and the world throws up its hat and hoorays. None of these things were done when Katherine Valentine’s son came into the world, but it was an event for all that.

Toronto talked, there was feasting below stairs, there were congratulations from very august quarters, a governor-general and an earl’s daughter were his sponsors, the christening presents, were something exquisite. Sir Rupert wrote a very correct letter from Spa—a weak little pean of rejoicing, but very warmly welcomed. He looked on the boy as his successor, hoped he would grow up to be an honor to the name of Valentine—had no doubt of it with such a mother, trusted he inherited some of her beauty, must be excused from sending anything more substantial than good wishes, the distance, etc.

They named the baby George, after his paternal grandfather—George Hamilton Valentine it stood on the record, and the happiness of Austin and Katherine Valentine, as complete. Surely if ever a child came into the world with the traditional silver spoon in its mouth, it was this one. He did inherit his mother’s statuesque beauty—he was an uncommonly handsome child, healthy, merry—a boy to gladden any mother’s heart.

Years passed—there was no other child. It can be imagined, perhaps, the life this “golden youth ” led, it can hardly be described. And yet he was not spoiled. Idolizing his mother might be, but judicious she was also, and very firm—firmness was a salient point of her character. But she loved him, he was the one creature on earth she ever had absolutely loved—she loved him with all her heart and strength, and mind and soul, as saints love Goel, as He above should be loved. No human heart can make a human idol, and not pay the penalty even here below, in heart-break and despair. And Madam Valentine was no exception. She would not have him sent abroad to school. His uncle, Sir Rupert, wished him to go to Eton and Oxford, as an English lad, and a future baronet, should, but neither father nor mother could bear their darling out of their sight. The boy himself wished it; he was a bold, bright, fearless little fellow at ten, with big, black, laughing eyes, a curly crop of black brown hair, the whitest teeth, the most genial laugh in the world. Even if he had not been a prince by right divine of his birth and heirship, he would still have been charming with that frank bonny face, and winsome smile and glance. He was born a prince by right of that kingly brow, and handsome face—he won all hearts—even as a beggar he would still have been born a conqueror. As heir to fabulous wealth, to a title, it is again more easy to imagine than describe what he was in the provincial city of Toronto.

He grew and prospered; he had masters for every language, every science, every ology under the sun. He had his horse and his dogs, and he drove, and he rode, and he studied, or let it alone, and made glad the hearts of a doting man and woman. But mostly he studied, he was fairly industrious, he had his own notions of noblesse oblige, and what it became a prince to know ere he came into his kingdom. He had a resident tutor, besides these masters, he had a pretty taste for music, played the piano and sang, until his mother thought him a modern Mozart, did himself credit on the violin, painted a little, sketched a great deal, wrote Latin verses with fluency, spoke French and German. With it all he grew and grew; shot up like Jack’s bean stalk, indeed, and at eighteen stood five-feet-eleven, in his very much embroidered velvet slippers.

As a matter of course he broke hearts, though eighteen is full young for a gentleman to go energetically into that business. But the truth is, he could not help it. He looked and played the mischief! Those dark bright eyes that laughed so frankly on all the world, wrought sad havoc with sixteen-year-old hearts—indeed, with hearts old enough to know better.

He waltzed—”oh like an angel!” cried out a chorus of young soprano voices. He sang deliciously. He was past master of the art of croquet, of flirtation, of billiards, boating, archery, base-ball; what was there he did not do to perfection? At eighteen and a half, his mother was not the only lady in the Canadian universe, who thought the sun arose with his rising, and set when his bewildering presence disappeared.

And just here, when Eden was at its fairest, sunniest, sweetest, the serpent came, and after him—the deluge!

“Mother,” said George Hamilton Valentine, one day at breakfast, “I think I shall take a run over the border, and spend a week or two in New York. Parker can come, too, if you think the wicked Gothamites will gobble your only one up alive. Too prolonged a course of Toronto is apt to pall on a frivolous mind.”

Of course, she said Yes. He did pretty much as he pleased in everything by this time. Even her gentle silken chain was felt as a fetter, and rebelled against. He took the discreet resident tutor, Mr. Parker, and a drawing-room car for New York. But he did not return in a week, nor in two, nor in three; and at the end of, five, Mr. Parker wrote a letter, that fell like a bursting bomb into the palatial mansion at home, and caused a message to flash over the wires with electric swiftness, summoning the wanderers back.

They came back. Nothing was said. A glance of intelligence passed between madam and the tutor; then she looked furtively, anxiously at her son. He was precisely the same as ever, in high health, fine spirits, and full of his recent flying trip. The mother drew a deep breath of relief. There was no change that she could see. Only Mrs. Tinker, who had washed Master Georgie’s face at five years old, and combed his hair, and kissed him to the point of extinction, saw a change. She did more; she saw her photograph. A confidant George must have; and after a hundred extorted vows of secrecy, reducing Mrs. Tinker almost to the verge of tears with protestations of eternal silence he forced from her, he showed her the photographs. And Mrs. Tinker looked at them, and shrieked a shriek, and covered her shocked old eyes with her virtuous old hands. For—the hussy had no clothes on, or next to none, or what Mrs. Tinker considered none—never having seen the Black Crook, or a ballet, or anything enlightened or Parisian, in her stupid old life.

“Oh! Master George, my dear, how can you! The wicked, improper young—young person!” cried Mrs. Tinker, in strong reprobation; “take them away, Master Georgie, my dear—do’ee, now. I wonder at you for showing me such things! I do, indeed!”

“Oh, come, I say!” cries George, but being only a boy, and nearly as innocent as Mrs. Tinker herself, he blushed, a fire red too. “Look here, you dear old goost! Don’t you see she is in tights? How could she perform on the trapeze with petticoats flapping about her heels? Here is one. Now, look at this; she has a dress on her—well, a costume; they’re all in costume. Bother your modesty! You’re old enough to know better! Look here, I say; did you ever in all your life see any one half so lovely?”

“I never saw any one half so indecent! Do you call that a dress—that thing! Why, it don’t cover her nasty knees! Oh, my dear, my dear, take ’em away, and put ’em in the fire! She must be a little trollop to be took in that—that scandalous costoom, if that’s its name. What would your blessed mamma say, Master George, if she saw them sinful pictures?”

“I say, look here,” says Master George, rather alarmed, “don’t you go and say anything to the mater about this. You’re as good as sworn, you know. And I’ll thank you not to call names, Mrs. Tinker. She’s no more a trollop than—’than you are,’ ” is on the point of George’s tongue, but having a general respect for old age, and a very particular respect for Mrs. Tinker, he suppresses it, and stands looking rather sulky.

“Bless the dear boy!” cries Mrs. Tinker, mollified at sight of her darling in dudgeon; “I won’t, then, only, if she’s a friend of yours, Master Georgie, do beg of her to put on her clothes next time! Do ‘ee now, like a lovey!”

George laughs; it is not in his sunny, boyish nature to be irate for more than a minute at a time.

“I’ll tell her,” he says, gleefully; “she’ll enjoy the joke. Tinker, she’s just the jolliest, prettiest, sweetest little soul the sun shines on to-day! And she’s the dearest friend I have in the world.”

“Ah!” says Tinker, with a deep groan.” What’s her name, Master George?”

“Mimi; isn’t it a pretty name? It seems to suit her somehow. Mimi Trillon.”

He pauses a dreamy rapturous look comes into his eyes; a flush passes over his face. “Mimi! Mimi!” he repeats, softly, to himself.

Mrs. Tinker knows the symptoms. At an early period of her career the fatal disease attacked herself. Tinker was the object, and she attained Tinker. He is dead and gone now, and it is thirty years ago, but Mrs. Tinker remembers, and a vague, and sudden, and great dread for her boy stirs within her.

“What is she, Master George?” she asks next.

“Well, she’s—she’s a professional lady,” answers George.

The reply does not come fluently. He looks tenderly down at the picture he holds, as if he would like to kiss it while he speaks.

“She is not rich, she—she works for her living. She’s a sort of actress. But she’s the dearest, prettiest little love in all the world.”

“She looks like a jumping Jack!” cries out Mrs. Tinker, in the bitterness of her feeling, “and a misbehaved jumping Jack, at that!”

With which she goes, and George goes, too, laughing. She feels that duty bids her tell all this to Madam Valentine, but loyalty to Master George forbids; she cannot bring herself to tell tales of her boy. So she says nothing, but fears much, and trusts to time to set crooked things straight, and to absence to make this youthful swain forget.

But he does not forget; neither does the professional lady he met in New York, doing the flying trapeze. For, one day, some two months later, in pulling out his handkerchief, he pulls a letter out of his pocket, and quits the room without noticing it. It is his mother who chances to pick it up. The peaky, school-girlish looking scrawl surprises her.

“Dear old Georgie,” it begins, and the signature is “Your ever-loving little ‘Jumping Jack.’ ”

Madam Valentine, inexpressibly horrified, reads it through, her face flashing with haughty amaze and disgust. Then another feeling—fear—comes, and turns her white to the very lips. Illy spelt, illy written, vulgar in every word it is yet a love-letter—a love-letter in which a promised marriage is spoken of. The signature puzzles her. George has told his beloved Mrs. Tinker’s fancy name for her, and it has tickled the erratic humor of the vivacious Mimi. She has adopted it.

“Some horrible pet name, no doubt,” the lady thinks. “Gracious Heaven! what a strange infatuation for George!”

Nothing is said. Mr. Valentine is consulted, is shocked, is enraged, is panic-stricken, but his wife is convinced it is not yet too late. She will take him away, and at once—at once! They will go to Europe; he shall make the tour of the world, if necessary, with Sir Rupert; he shall never return to Toronto. What a mercy—what a direct interposition of Providence—that this letter fell into her hands when it did!

George is told the wish of his heart shall be gratified. He shall throw up study, and travel for the next three years. Uncle Rupert wishes it so much! She will go with him to Spa, where Sir Rupert at present is, will spend the winter in Italy, and return home in the spring. Is not George delighted?

George does not look delighted. Six months ago he would have done so, but we change in six months. He looks reflective, and a good deal put out, and goes up to his room and writes rather a long letter, and takes it to the post himself. Then he waits.

Preparations begin, go on rapidly; in a week they will be ready to start. But just two days before the week ends the terrible blow falls. He goes up to his room one night and—is seen no more! He makes a moonlight flitting, with a knapsack and a well-filled pocket-book. He is “o’ er the border and awa’ wi”—Mimi Trillon, the trapezist, the tight-rope dancer, the “fair girl graduate with golden hair” from the back slums of New York!