“She hadn’t,” said Gabriel, breaking in, impetuously. “She had a beautiful blue ribbon, and lilies of the valley inside, and a white lace vail, and—”
Gabriel stopped and turned very red, for he caught Abel Newt’s eyes fixed sharply upon him.
“Oh ho! the text was there, was it?” asked Mr. Gray, smiling.
But Abel Newt only said, quietly:
“Oh well! I guess it was a blue ribbon after all.”
CHAPTER VI. — EXPERIMENTUM CRUCIS.
“The truth is, Gyles;” said Abel to Blanding, his chum, “Gabriel Bennet’s mother ought to come and take him home for the summer to play with the other calves in the country. People shouldn’t leave their spoons about.”
The two boys went in to tea.
In the evening, as the pupils were sitting in the dining-room, as usual, some chatting, some reading, others quite ready to go to bed,
“Mr. Gray,” said Abel to Uncle Savory, who was sitting talking with Mrs. Gray, whose hands, which were never idle, were now busily knitting.
“Well, Abel.”
“Suppose we have some game.”
“Certainly. Boys, what shall we do? Let us see. There’s the Grand Mufti, and the Elements, and My ship’s come loaded with—and—well, what shall it be?”
“Mr. Gray, it’s a good while since we’ve tried all calling out together. We haven’t done it since Gabriel Bennet came.”
“No, we haven’t,” answered Mr. Gray, as his small eyes twinkled at the prospect of a little fun; “no, we haven’t. Now, boys, of course a good many of you have played the game before. But you, new boys, attend! the thing is this. When I say three—one, two, three!—every body is to shout out the name of his sweet-heart. The fun is that nobody hears any thing, because every body bawls so loud. You see?” asked he, apparently feeling for his handkerchief. “Gabriel, before we begin, just run into the study and get my handkerchief.”
Gabriel, full of expectation of the fun, ran out of the room. The moment he closed the door Mr. Gray lifted his finger and said,
“Now, boys! every body remain perfectly quiet when I say three.”
It was needless to explain why, for every body saw the intended joke, and Gabriel returned instantly from the study saying that the handkerchief was not there.
“No matter,” said Mr. Gray. “Are you all ready, boys. Now, then—one, two, three!”
As the word left Mr. Gray’s lips, Gabriel, candid, full of spirit, jumped up from his seat with the energy of his effort, and shouted out at the top of his voice,
“Hope Wayne!”
—It was cruel. That name alone broke the silence, ringing out in enthusiastic music.
Gabriel’s face instantly changed. Still standing erect and dismayed, he looked rapidly around the room from boy to boy, and at Mr. Gray. There was just a moment of utter silence, and then a loud peal of laughter.
Gabriel’s color came and went. His heart winced, but not his eye. Young hearts are tender, and a joke like this cuts deeply. But just as he was about to yield, and drop the tell-tale tear of a sensitive, mortified boy, he caught the eye of Abel Newt. It was calmly studying him as a Roman surgeon may have watched the gladiator in the arena, while his life-blood ebbed away. Gabriel remembered Abel’s words in the play-ground—“There’s more than one kind of fagging.”
When the laugh was over, Gabriel’s had been loudest of all.
CHAPTER VII. — CASTLE DANGEROUS.
The next day when school was dismissed, Abel asked leave to stroll out of bounds. He pushed along the road, whistling cheerily, whipping the road-side grass and weeds with his little ratan, and all the while approaching the foot of the hill up which the road wound through the estate of Pinewood. As he turned up the hill he walked more slowly, and presently stopped and leaned upon a pair of bars which guarded the entrance of one of Mr. Burt’s pastures. He gazed for some time down into the rich green field that sloped away from the road toward a little bowery stream, but still whistled, as if he were looking into his mind rather than at the landscape.
After leaning and musing and vaguely whistling, he turned up the hill again and continued his walk.
At length he reached the entrance of Pinewood—a high iron gate, between huge stone posts, on the tops of which were urns overflowing with vines, that hung down and partly tapestried the columns. Immediately upon entering the grounds the carriage avenue wound away from the gate, so that the passer-by could see nothing as he looked through but the hedge which skirted and concealed the lawn. The fence upon the road was a high, solid stone wall, along whose top clustered a dense shrubbery, so that, although the land rose from the road toward the house, the lawn was entirely sequestered; and you might sit upon it and enjoy the pleasant rural prospect of fields, woods, and hills, without being seen from the road. The house itself was a stately, formal mansion. Its light color contrasted well with the lofty pine-trees around it. But they, in turn, invested it with an air of secrecy and gloom, unrelieved by flowers or blossoming shrubs, of which there were no traces near the house, although in the rear there was a garden so formally regular that it looked like a penitentiary for flowers.
These were the pine-trees that Hope Wayne had heard sing all her life—but sing like the ocean, not like birds or human voices. In the black autumn midnights they struggled with the north winds that smote them fiercely and filled the night with uproar, while the child cowering in her bed thought of wrecks on pitiless shores—of drowning mothers and hapless children. Through the summer nights they sighed. But it was not a lullaby—it was not a serenade. It was the croning of a Norland enchantress, and young Hope sat at her open window, looking out into the moonlight, and listening.
Abel Newt opened the gate and passed in. He walked along the avenue, from which the lawn was still hidden by the skirting hedge, went up the steps, and rang the bell.
“Is Mr. Burt at home?” he asked, quietly.
“This way, Sir,” said the nimble Hiram, going before, but half turning and studying the visitor as he spoke, and quite unable to comprehend him at a glance. “I will speak to him.”
Abel Newt was shown into a large drawing-room. The furniture was draped for the season in cool-colored chintz. There was a straw matting upon the floor. The chandeliers and candelabras were covered with muslin, and heavy muslin curtains hung over the windows. The tables and chairs were of a clumsy old-fashioned pattern, with feet in the form of claws clasping balls, and a generally stiff, stately, and uncomfortable air. The fire-place was covered by a heavy painted fire-board. The polished brass andirons, which seemed to feel the whole weight of responsibility in supporting the family dignity, stood across the hearth, belligerently bright, and there were sprays of asparagus in a china vase in front of them. A few pictures hung upon the wall—family portraits, Abel thought; at least old Christopher was there, painted at the age of ten, standing, in very clean attire, holding a book in one hand and a hoop in the other. The picture was amusing, and looked to Abel symbolical, representing the model boy, equally devoted to study and play. That singular sneering smile flitted over his face as he muttered, “The Reverend Gabriel Bennet!”
There were a few books upon the centre-table, carefully placed