Chapter XIX: What Became of Val's Portrait

THE result of a conference with Miss Nelson decided in favor of a Christmas at Preston rather than at Roseville. "It will give Theo and Jack so much pleasure to entertain us," said auntie. "Ary and Mammy will like to spend Christmas there, while, for my own part, I am getting very lazy in my old age, and it will relieve me of some care, besides to have you all here this year will make me miss, all the more, any who may be absent next year. Is Mr. Smith to be here, Val?"

"Yes, he promised to come with Fred; they hope to be here on the twentieth, at least if the steamer gets in promptly, they will, so Mr. Smith writes. Oh, auntie, we'll have such a good time. I hope there will be sleighing; I love a real good snowy Christmas. I shall go over with Fred to help Theo. Jack is going to try to give up Christmas Eve to us, and Archie has promised too, so we all can go off after Christmas greens. You and the Colonel can hobnob, and congratulate each other upon your immunity from responsibilities, while we are gone. The twentieth! Think, auntie, how soon it will be here. I must go at once and get my Christmas gifts settled, so as to have plenty of time then," and Val flew off with a gay little nod over her shoulder.

"How happy my children are," thought auntie, looking after her as she whisked out of the room; "my sunset is surely very bright, and my down-hill path made very easy for me." But auntie gave a little sigh as she looked out of the window at the December landscape.

A few days later, Archie came in with a grave look on his face. He held a paper in his hand, and by the serious countenance he wore, Miss Janet knew that something of unusual gravity had occurred.

"Where is Val?" he asked as he entered the sitting-room.

"Up-stairs, counting the days on her calendar, I have no doubt," replied auntie. "I never saw such a happy child; she is like a streak of sunshine in the house. Dear little girl."

Archie walked to the fire, and stood looking fixedly before him, in an abstracted way.

"What is wrong, my boy?" asked auntie. "Surely something more than usual disturbs you."

"Oh, Fate is hard! Cruel! Cruel!" exclaimed Archie. "Poor little Val! What can we do for her?"

"Why! What is it?" asked Miss Janet, in alarm. "Don't keep me in suspense. What has happened?"

Archie silently handed her the newspaper he held in his hand, pointing out one of its headings.

"The 'North Star' Lost! Terrible Disaster at Sea!"

"Why, Archie, what is the date? Why! Oh!" And Miss Janet cried out, dropping the paper and covering her face with her hands.

"Oh, auntie, I should have prepared you," said Archie; "it is too much for you."

"Oh, Archie, can it be true? Are you sure?"

"Let me look again. Yes, it is the vessel in which Mr. Egerton expected to sail. I am afraid it is too true. He wrote to Val saying he had taken passage on the 'North Star,' didn't he?"

Archie confirmed her fears.

"What shall we do? It may be only a rumor. We would best say nothing until we get further accounts. There is Val now."

"Oh, Archie, you are just the fellow," began Val. "Why, what is the matter? You look as if you had seen a ghost, and auntie, too. What is it? Tell me—quick—quick." And Val darted forward before any one could interfere and picked up the paper lying in Miss Nelson's lap, her quick eye detecting it as the cause of the agitation she saw upon their faces.

"Stop!" she cried, imperiously, as Archie tried to detain her, "I 'will' see!"

But as she read, the blue eyes grew wide with fear and dread, and she dropped the paper, shivering from head to foot. Then she stretched out imploring hands, as one suddenly stricken blind.

"Oh, where shall I go? What shall I do?" she cried, piteously.

Archie caught the little trembling hands in both his and held them close in a strong clasp. "Dear little Val—dear little cousin," he said, "what can I say to comfort you? Perhaps—perhaps it is an exaggerated report."

But Val looked at him with staring eyes, as if she but half understood.

"Don't, don't look so wild!" implored Archie. "Oh, auntie, speak to her," he said, beseechingly. "I don't know what to say."

Val was still shaking pitifully, but no sound came from her lips; there was only that imploring, hopeless look in her eyes, as if she could not understand how those who had always been able to shield her could not now spare her this blow.

By degrees, and under auntie's gentle caresses, the trembling ceased, and then Val moaned, "I want Theo—I want Theo."

"I will bring her as fast as I can," promised Archie. And then, glad to be of some active use, he rushed out.

"Dear little one," whispered auntie, as she held the girl closely, "no one in all the world knows better than I what you are suffering."

Val's hand sought auntie's and gave it a little squeeze.

"I was a little younger than you when the news of a battle was brought me, the news that my beloved—" and then auntie's voice broke.

And the tears that would not come for her own loss rose in Val's eyes as she whispered, "I know, I know. Oh, auntie, the long, long years; how have you lived through them?"

Auntie smiled, a sad, wan little smile. "The back is fitted to its burden, sweetheart, but at first, at first,—" And the two clung closely to each other, till Val whispered,—

"Dear auntie, let me be all alone a little while; I must face myself that way. I was cruel to him once, and my last letter was not kind."

And auntie understood, so she left the grief-stricken form lying on the couch and went to her own room, there to do battle, as many times before, with a pitiless memory.

It was towards dark that Theo arrived with Archie. She went directly to Val's door. Such a sad, drawn little face met her, and though Val bit her lip and gave one or two convulsive sobs, her tears were all shed, and it was Theo who wept as if she would never have done.

The sun went down on a saddened household. Theo would not leave Val, and all night kept awake with her arms around her cousin, who dropped into a fitful sleep from exhaustion, and who would wake up crying out nervously.

At last, the morning dawned upon them, pale and hollow-eyed.

"Let me take you home with me," said Theo, the next day. "It will be easier for you there, dear."

And Val consented, feeling that she could not stand that day to look out upon the path up which she expected to see her lover coming, and to gaze upon surroundings in which he was to have been the chief figure.

So they took their way to Preston, where Jack met them with every thoughtful attention he could manage to show. But the sight of Jack and Theo together was only a fresh reminder of her loss to Val, and she turned from them in a perfect abandonment of woe. By degrees, however, they managed to interest her somewhat in outside subjects, and she became quite calm.

It was not long before the news of the loss of the "North Star," was confirmed, and all hope fled from their hearts.

"There is just one chance," said Jack to Theo; "but it will be a little while before we can know, and I do not dare to raise Val's hopes. Mr. Egerton may not have sailed in that steamer."

"But he wrote that he had taken passage."

"I know; but somehow I have still a lingering hope, and I have telegraphed Mr. Smith to be on the lookout. Dear old Colonel, such a letter as he wrote; one could never imagine such a heart could beat under that brusque exterior."

"Oh, Jack, you make me hopeful too," said Theo, "and I half feel as if I might go on with my Christmas preparations. I have had no heart for anything, but it will, perhaps, do no harm."

"Of course, go on," replied Jack. "It will be much better to busy yourself over something and try to make every one as happy as possible. I am sure, Theo, when I leave this mortal sphere, I shall be grieved if you think it a duty never to smile."

"Don't, Jack, don't!" cried Theo, running up to him. "You scare me. I can't stand it."

Jack took her hands in his and looked down at her fondly. "Oh, Theo, if I had lost you!" he exclaimed.

"If I had lost you," returned Theo. "Oh, our poor little Val! Jack, we must not, we must not forget her; we must devote ourselves to her. Auntie and Archie will be here to-morrow night," continued she. "We thought it would be best to carry out our original intention. Do you suppose the Colonel will not come?"

"I cannot tell. He will wait till the next steamer is in, I am sure."

"And he will send a despatch if there should be good news."

"Assuredly."

The evening of the twenty-third brought auntie and Archie. The weather, instead of being frosty and snowy, was balmy and mild, and there was almost a spring-like softness in the air.

Aunt Prissy's family was congregated in their little house, Ary and Tatty vieing with one another in expatiating each upon the importance of her position in the family. Manchild's short legs carried him back and forth from his mother's cabin to the "gre't house," his interest being divided between what was going on in the two places.

Posie-Cossie, whose sympathies were most acute, followed Val from place to place. They had been out walking, and though Val's pale cheeks had not won any color from the outside air, she looked a little brighter, and sat down by the big fire in the drawing-room to listen to Theo's account of a discussion between Tatty and Ary which she had overheard.

"Tatty's cap had quite overawed Ary," Theo was saying, "and she came to me to know if I had one I would give her 'for Christmas, Miss Theo.' You see what you have done, Val, and I promised I would see what we could do."

Here Val started suddenly to her feet and bent forward as if listening, then she darted from the room.

"What has Val heard?" asked auntie and Theo of each other.

"Oh, I hear wheels," said Theo. "Jack must be coming; but why was Val so eager?" And they both hastened to discover the cause.

Val was tugging at the latch of the front door. "Fred! Fred! It is Fred!" she cried. "I heard his voice. Oh, let me go! Oh, Fred! Fred!"

But the door was opened from the outside, admitting first, Mr. Smith, and behind him, who but Fred, indeed.

"And you did not get my telegram?" he asked some time later, when the excitement had subsided.

"It is no doubt in Roseville now," explained Archie, "if you sent it there."

"Surely I did." But Mr. Smith telegraphed to Mr. Allen.

"And the despatch was handed me just as you all got off the train," remarked Jack.

"But for once tardiness was a virtue," said Mr. Egerton, "for I was just an hour too late for the unfortunate 'North Star,' and took the very next steamer. I knew nothing of the disaster till I landed in New York, so I had no idea of the perturbation I had caused. My sisters were distracted at my supposed loss, and greeted me as one arisen from the dead. Then I realized my escape."

"How in the world did you know, Val?" asked Theo. "I didn't hear anything."

"I don't know," said Val. "All of a sudden I seemed to—to possess super-acute hearing, and I heard Fred saying, quite distinctly, 'I wonder if they are expecting us.' Didn't you say it?"

"I believe I did," he answered, smiling; "but I cannot imagine how you heard."

However, Val insisted that she did, and no doubt her highly wrought condition had made her extremely sensitive to all influences, and that she felt rather than heard.

"If I had known my little girl was in such a state of mind," said Mr. Egerton, "I should have hurried on even sooner. The steamer was late getting in, yesterday, and we stopped over-night in Washington, to see my family."

"Yes," interrupted Mr. Smith, "and thereby hangs a tale. We came on together, as you know, and nothing would do for this young man," putting his hand on Mr. Egerton's shoulder, "but that I should stop all night at his brother's, and he gave up his apartments to me. I found—"

"Oh, they were not actually mine," interposed Mr. Egerton. "I had not occupied them for a couple of years."

"But his effects were all there," Mr. Smith informed the others. "I can prove it. No doubt, you think, young woman," he said, turning to Val, "this young man's fancy for a flibberty-gibbet, fly-away kitten like you is something of recent date, but when I tell you that I saw upon the wall of his room a certain portrait of a certain damsel, painted some years ago by Miss Talcott, you may know how long your image has been before him."

"Oh!" cried they all, to Mr. Egerton's discomfiture. "So that accounts for it; that is where Nan's picture went. We wondered and wondered."

Val looked up, having recovered some of her sauciness. "Oh, you fraud!" she said. "You never told me."

"I was afraid, at first, that you would think me presumptuous," he made answer, "and after, I was afraid—"

"Of what?" asked Val.

"That you would know how long I had been in your power," he confessed.

"She is a little tyrant, as you may perhaps have found out," he said, smilingly, to her friends.

"And you have no shipwreck of which to tell us, no exciting experiences to relate. How disappointing," observed Val. "When I saw you, I at least expected you had been washed ashore lashed to a board, or were picked up clinging to a spar, and you came over in a commonplace way like anybody else."

"She has recovered," said Archie, laughingly. "You couldn't have been so flippant yesterday, Val."

Val turned a serious face to her lover. "I was wrong," she said, "to jest about it. I have been taught many things these last few days, and, most of all, I have learned how an unkind, bitter word can haunt one. That I had taunted you for staying away a little longer from me, made it hard, oh, so hard," and Val, whose joy and sorrow had unnerved her, burst into tears.

"What under heaven does the girl want now!" said Mr. Smith, to alter her mood. "Is there anything you haven't, Val? If you had wanted something to cry for, we could have stayed away longer."

"Colonel," said Val, "you are as mean as can be. You understand, don't you, Fred? Don't you, Theo?" And she appealed to the two of whose sympathies she felt most sure.

"Of course we do," replied they.

"I shall never, never do so again," whispered Val.