Tales of College Life/A Long-Vacation Vigil/Chapter 4
CHAPTER IV.
DEEPER AND DEEPER STILL.
When my sister and I went out for our morning's walk, Nelly was very curious to know who the arrival of the previous day might be; so I confided to her all that Mrs. Rummell had told me about Amy.
Yes! Amy; for I could not call her Miss Spencer. No! when a man is really in love (and I felt that I was) it is the lady's Christian name that always leaps to the lips, and hangs lovingly upon the tongue.
And even while we were speaking we met her with her mother. They were coming up from the sands, and Amy had evidently been bathing, for her long, damp, dishevelled hair was streaming from under her plain cottage bonnet, and was lost in all its luxuriant richness under the folds of her shawl. She glanced towards us, and looked confused (at least, I thought so) as she met my earnest gaze. She sees that I love her, I whispered to myself. I was in hopes that, for the slight courtesy I had shown them on the previous day, the lady-mother might vouchsafe to recognise my existence, but she passed on to the hotel, and "made no sign."
Later in the day we were out, far away on the cliffs, when, at an angle in the narrow path, we suddenly came upon Amy, walking with her father and mother. Of course she saw us, and—she smiled! smiled—there was no mistaking that agreeable fact!—but the paternities put on the similitudes of Dragons guarding a priceless treasure, and they hustled her past us, and got out of sight as rapidly as possible.
Three days passed in this (to me) most unsatisfactory manner. Amy bathed in the mornings, and walked out in the afternoons, but was always under strict surveillance. And the same mysterious dragon-ship was maintained over her in-doors—so Mrs. Rummell informed me: none, except her parents, had interchanged a word with her since she had been in the house. But hers were eyes which had a dumb language of their own, far more expressive than even the words of some people's lips; and, when we met her in our walks, those pleading eyes seemed to say to us "I am persecuted and helpless; oh! be my friends!" And her sad, touching look of melancholy would so work on my excited feelings that I many times asked Trap if I should be justified in laying violent hands upon the Dragons, and delivering the unfortunate Amy from their thraldom. But my sage attendant would not commit himself to an opinion on this delicate subject.
Of course, while my mind was in this excited state, it was impossible to settle down to hard reading. I tried to do so one morning, and opened my Thucydides; but I could see nothing in the Greek characters but "Amy, Amy;" and her calm face and deep blue eyes swam between me and the page. I must "cram" at the last, I said, and make a shot for my degree. I was a bachelor, in danger, not only of losing my heart, but my B. A. also.
The fourth day came. I had inspected Mr. Spencer's carriage, in the coach-house; but the coat of arms had been so completely painted over that I was unable to make out anything. The carriage was nearly new—why should the arms have been obliterated? I rubbed off some of the paint with my thumb, and I discovered that the arms were surmounted by an Earl's coronet. Stranger still! Was Mr. Spencer travelling under false colours? or, was he a parvenu who had bought the carriage at a sale, and therefore painted out the heraldry? But the appearance of the whole party was against this supposition. There was an air about the Dragons which showed them to be Dragons of gentle blood, while, as for Amy, she was every inch a lady! The mystery was increasing; and to all appearance, was as far from being solved as ever—at any rate by me.
What with the heat of the weather, and the fervency of my passion, I should have been completely prostrated with the oppression of this mystery, if the burden had much longer remained upon my mind; but, that same afternoon it was destined to be removed in a very unexpected manner.