Shenandoah Herald

JUST FOR AMUSEMENT

"Out again this evening, Nettie."
Aunt Mary looked up from her sewing at the bright little brunette, who was unusually brilliant in an evening dress of scarlet tissue, with white feather, flowers looping in the overskirt, and clusters of the same in the heavy jetty braids of her lustrous hair.
"I might as well have a good time while I can," Nettie said, twirling herself around before the long mirror, to admire her bright skirts, and her tiny slippered feet. "Only two weeks more here, and I must go back to Wheaton, and bury myself."
"Nettie!"
"There, auntie, don't look so shocked! I know you think my future husband is perfection, and, between ourselves, so do I. But, a country parson's wife cannot expect much gayety, and I mean to crowd all I can into these two weeks of liberty."
"Where are you going to-night?"
"To Mrs. Hunt's. Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds will call for me and Count Lodoski."
"Again!" Aunt Mary's voice was stern, and there was an unusual severity in her blue eyes. "You know how strongly I disapprove of you accepting the escorts of Count Lodoski."
"But he is not my escort," said perverse Nettie. "Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds will call in their carriage. I don't believe in the count any more than you do, auntie; and all his dear pathetic wails over his dear Poland fall upon most unbelieving ears when confided to me. Notwithstanding, he is most entertaining company, dresses perfectly, is handsome as Adonis, and waltzes like a dancing-master. So, because he amuses me, I allow him to be my escort during the absence of the Rev. Alfred Martin, who will hold me soon, fast and firm, in the chain of matrimony. Hark! the carriage is here. Good night! don't sit up for me!"
And wrapping herself in a large cloak of softest white cashmere, Nettie kissed her aunt, and sped with dancing feet from the room.
In the carriage she found the young couple who had offered her the spare seat there; and she found there the Polish count, who was the last society lion in the city of B...., and who was decidedly attracted by the witching beauty of the gay brunette. Whether it had been whispered in his ear that she was heiress to Wheaton and five thousand a year, can only be conjectured but he was a most devoted adorer, and Nettie carelessly encouraged his attentions.
She had inherited Wheaton from her grandfather—when she was a little child, and her father being dead, her mother had shared the guardianship of the little heiress with her uncle Joshua, so that summer at Wheaton was followed each year by winter in the city, where school-days were succeeded by all the pleasures of society after Nettie passed her eighteenth year. It must be confessed that the bright little beauty was a petted, spoiled child—a willful girl, whose life had been one long sunshine, with every whim indulged, every caprice gratified.
Serious thoughts had found little place in her giddy head and pleasure-loving heart, till the Rev. Alfred Martin accepted a call to the village of Morton, near which Wheaton was situated. He was not a handsome man, not a fascinating man in any sense that Nettie had ever thought of the word, but he had one gift that embraces many others in a truly Christian minister—he was earnest. To him, the vocation of his life was one that absorbed heart and brain to the exclusion of all effort to be attractive in society, or win worldly praise. Yet the very sincerity of this man, fully ten years his senior, proved a charm Nettie could not resist. From the careless ease of her petted life, like trumpet-calls roused her to a sense of the responsibility resting upon her as a woman holding in her hand the gifts of perfect health, energy and wealth. Like a butterfly she had tasted sweets here and there, thinking little of the bitter cups given to the less fortunate, till the earnest appeals of the new preacher stirred her to considering the stewardship entrusted to her care.
She had no thought of pleasing the minister when she took up a share of parish duty, sewed for the Dorcas and visited the sick and poor. Admiration and attention had been offered her too freely for her to dream of courting them, but, impulsive in everything, she threw the whole force of her ardent, generous nature into the new path of duty Mr. Martin's eloquence had pointed out to her.
A large portion of her income was drawn from a large cotton factory in Morton, and among the operatives there Nettie soon found employment for leisure hours and avenues for all spare dollars. It was in the spring, that Mr. Martin came to Morton, and in the summer a contagious fever broke out in the settlement where the mill operatives dwelt in small cottages and large, crowded tenement houses. It was impossible for Nettie to enter into any undertaking with lukewarm interest and at once engaged in trying to aid the sufferers, she devoted time and money with an unsparing hand. Her own glorious health bore her through the dangers of the contagion unharmed, and her cheerful, buoyant disposition was like sunlight among the sick children, who were her special care. Yet when the death film gathered over childish eyes, no voice could soften the dark passage with sweeter, more earnest words of comfort and promise than Nettie.
Seeing her thus, through the long weeks of toil and danger, asking her aid where money was urgently needed, finding her at her post where the air was thick with fever and the danger frightfully near, Alfred Martin grew to consider the beautiful dark face as fairer than his ideal of angels, and to think there was no music like Nettie's clear, melodious voice. By the magnetism of his own true, earnest words, he had led her from frivolity to the seeking of higher aims and duties, and by the power of the strong love wakened in his own he drew hers into his keeping. She loved, as she followed all other impulses, with fervent and deep affection, while she was daily meeting her lover, and the guide to all the noble pursuits of her life.
Mrs. Wheaton, a meek little widow was only too glad to think of her child's future intrusted to the care of a truly good man, as she believed the Rev. Alfred Martin to be, and gave glad consent to an engagement. And while autumn winds were sweeping the fever from Morton, Nettie was learning the sweet lesson of loving submission to a stronger will, was conquering many a life long selfishness and folly to please her betrothed, and believing that she had lost all relish for the frivolities of the past.
Had the marriage followed at once upon the wooing, I think there would have been happiness at the parsonage, where the influence of the earnest minister would have deepened till Nettie no longer needed any earthly guide or support. But Mrs. Wheaton decided that the bride's trousseau must come from B--, and when the new year opened Nettie went to her Aunt Mary's to remain till milliners and dressmakers completed her outfit. The wedding day was to be in March, and, while Aunt Mary shopped and stitched Nettie took farewell of the gayeties of her city home. She did not mean to be inconsistent, or to break any of the good resolutions of the past few months but old friends welcomed her with festive gatherings, and before she realized it she was dancing, flirting and flitting from party to party with all her old zest and enjoyment.
Then, just for amusement, she allowed the new lion, Count Lodoski, to pay her marked attention; She told herself she was safe in her happy engagement, and that he was too much a man of society to have any serious intentions. It was a mere flirtation for both of them, and it served to pass away time to listen to the stories of the Polish exile, to waltz with him, drive, walk, ride with him, and yet, with a woman's skill and a coquette's ingenuity, keep him from any compromising offer that would end the amusement.
The term of Nettie's visit was nearly over, when the entertainment at Mrs. Hunt's called together a large number of her old friends and new admirers. Count Lodoski was more ardent than usual in his expressions of admiration, and Nettie was uncomfortably conscious that he was presuming upon the encouragement he had received. The evening passed quickly, and it was near supper time when the count, with a courteous bow, offered his arm to Nettie, for a stroll through the conservatory, where a number of couples were enjoying the cool, fragrant air, after a dizzy waltz. They were chatting gayly of the pleasures of the past few weeks, of the coming festivities before Lent, when Nettie, looking up, found they were the sole occupants of the conservatory. The strains of the newest galop fully explained the absence of their former companions, and the girl was moving quickly toward the door, when the count gently but firmly held her back. She realized in an instant the position into which her own folly had brought her, but tried to affect unconsciousness still.
"I am engaged for this galop, Count," she said, with her usual sweet smile, "so you must not detain me now."
"Yet for a little you will stay, with me," said the handsome foreigner, in his strongly accented English. "I must say a few words with you."
"Another time!"
"Now!"
The man's voice had a ring of authority that Nettie resented instantly.
"Let me pass!" she said, haughtily. "You forget yourself strangely, sir."
"I forget all but love when I am near you," he cried, and broke into a stream of eloquence, an unmistakable offer of heart and hand, more than hinting that he was sure of a return of his ardently-expressed devotion.
In vain Nettie endeavored to check the flow of words, every one of which she felt was an insult to the man she really loved, in spite of her foolish vanity, and to whom she had promised faithful affection. The count spoke so rapidly that not until he paused for his reply, could Nettie find an opportunity even to speak.
Then, in a faltering voice, half choked by her contending emotions, she declined the honor of an alliance with the Polish nobleman.
"You cannot mean to refuse me?" he cried, in genuine astonishment; "you cannot mean that you have been coquetting so heartlessly!"
"I mean that I must decline your proposal," she answered, more firmly, "and request you to allow me to pass."
"But, Miss Wheaton—Nettie, you love me. Surely you would not let me so deceive myself. You love me! There is some bar, perhaps, to our marriage; but you love me,"
"I am already betrothed," the girl said, desperately, not conscious of the interpretation her words admitted of until a third voice spoke:
"Consider yourself free, Miss Wheaton, if you love this man," said Mr. Martin, stepping into the room, "Pardon my intrusion. I came unexpectedly to the city, and your aunt told me you were here. Mrs. Hunt kindly directed me to this room, where I find my coming most opportune. I have the honor to bid you good evening and farewell."
And, not seeing Nettie's piteous, pleading face, he turned and left the conservatory. A moment later Mrs. Hunt was hurrying to the room, where Nettie had fallen senseless, overcome, the anxious hostess said, by the heat and the perfume of the flowers.
Aunt Mary was sitting up when the little white-cloaked figure came in, and Nettie threw herself into the kind embrace, sobbing bitterly. She did not see a tall figure near the window, half hidden by the curtain folds, as she sobbed out her story.
"And Alfred will never forgive me," she said, in conclusion. "I saw it in his face."
"Do you deserve that he should"
Aunt Mary asked, still holding the girl close in her arms.
"No. I ought never to have allowed the count to pay me so much attention. But it was a mere flirtation, auntie. He cares nothing for me, though Wheaton is a golden prize; and I never gave him a thought even of friendship. And I had tried to be good—I had, indeed: I meant to go back to Morton and help Alfred in every good work. I meant to use my money for charity, for useful aims only, and it is only my silly head that has drawn me into these last few weeks of frivolity and foolishness."
"Do you love Alfred, then?"
"Love Alfred! Auntie, do you suppose I would have promised to marry him if I had not loved him."
"But when the count asked if you loved him, you only said you were betrothed."
"Do you suppose I would even mention Alfred to him?" Nettie asked indignantly.
"Then if Alfred would forgive you now, would you be quite happy"
"If he really forgives me, knowing all my folly and my sincere penitence. Oh! auntie, to lose him now would drive me away from all I hoped to be. I could not go back to Wheaton and work as I had promised myself to work if he turned coldly from me. I need his counsel, his protection—auntie, I need his love."
. The tall figure came from the shadow of the window curtains, and in the eyes of the Rev. Alfred Martin there was a mist of tears as he bent over Aunt Mary's chair and took Nettie's hand.
"It was tearing my heart from my bosom to give you up, Nettie," he said as she sprang up, with a cry of joyous surprise; "but you must make your choice now, darling. I cannot take my wife from such a scene as that I witnessed to-night."
"I am all yours if you forgive me" she said, humbly. "We will go back to Morton to-morrow, if you wish."
Aunt Mary discreetly left the room but, returning very soon, found Nettie alone, tearful but happy, sure of forgiveness, and very sure she would never again trifle with hearts Just FOR AMUSEMENT.