Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/488

 . 26, 1861.] true love, and constancy; muttered complaints at her son’s unaccountable delay, and devout prayers for his speedy return, being invariably the key notes of the strain. But Nelly’s eloquence could not elicit word or sign from Coral; who, if she heard the speeches addressed more at her than to her, gave no more symptoms of doing so, than if she belonged to the dead; and sometimes when, after standing silent and motionless for an hour at the door of the shanty, she walked slowly away through the woods, her eyes vaguely cast on the ground, and a mute helplessness in her whole aspect, utterly heedless of all Nelly’s efforts to attract her attention, the woman’s rage was sobered by a dim feeling half of pity, half of fear, and she muttered to herself:

“I guess she ain’t long for this world, and it’s my belief she never rightly belonged to it; the saints between us and harm!”

The morning she left Long Arrow, she and Keefe stood together on the wharf, waiting till Mrs. Brady had finished bidding farewell to a group of her friends and gossips, who had come to see her on board the schooner. He held her hand in his, and talked to her kindly and encouragingly; she was not crying, she was too much excited to shed tears; she tried to listen to Keefe, but she could not understand his words; her thoughts would wander away to the time when she should be far from him; when she should hear his voice and touch his hand no more.

“Now, I know how people feel when they are going to die,” she exclaimed at last. “I, too, am going from the warm sun, the blue sky, the green woods, the shining water, to a strange land, dark and dreary, full of cold mists and gloomy shadows, where the day has no sun, and the night no moon or stars,”

“Coral, you must promise me something.”

“Yes, what is it?”

“Promise me that for six months you will keep yourself from fretting after your old home and your old friends, and will try to make yourself happy with your new ones.”

“Keefe, do you mean that I am to forget Long Arrow?”

“No, not to forget, I hope you won’t forget; but I want you not to be sad or melancholy. Promise me that for six months you will try to be happy and gay; just for six months.”

She looked at him with a passionate, imploring entreaty, which spoke in every line of her fair young face. He had not seen the change the last fortnight had made in her so clearly before; her cheek was pale and wasted, her lips had lost their rich crimson hue, and round her eyes the dark circles, that are so sure an index of mental or physical sufferings, were deeply traced; above all, in the eyes themselves, there was an expression of settled mournfulness more touching than tears.

“And when those six months are over, will you come to see me?” she asked with trembling eagerness.

Keefe could not resist the intense earnestness of her voice, the pleading of her sad wistful eyes.

“In six months she will not care much about seeing me,” he thought; “it will not do her any harm to see me then, so I may as well make her the promise she wishes, poor child.”

She was watching him, as if on his answer depended her escape from death.

“At the end of those six months will you come to see me, Keefe?”

“Yes, Coral, I will.”

“Then I will not fret, I will try to be happy —I will hope”—and hope was not in the tone of her voice—“are you satisfied?”

“Not yet, you must promise me another thing —that you will try to love your father. You must not be cold and shy with him, but you must try to make him happy, and to trust him, and open your heart to him. Do you hear, Coral, promise me that you will love him?” Her head had drooped again, and she squeezed her fingers hard together in the effort to preserve her calmness.

“I hear you, Keefe; I will try.”

“Hallo! Keefe Dillon!” cried the rough voice of the skipper of the little schooner, “don’t be keeping the girl there all day, talking soft music to her. If you’re so loth to part you’d better come along with her. Bring her on board, will you? Mrs. Brady, come aboard, or I’ll leave you behind.”

“Coral, you must go.”

She did not answer, but suffered him to lead her to the side of the schooner, and help her on board. Heedless of the hustle and noise going on round them, Nelly’s orders and counter-orders to her husband—who received them with his usual indifference, his composure always becoming more marked and imperturbable as his wife’s excitement and irritability became more violent, and her wrath growing hotter and hotter at the sight of his coolness—and all the confusion preparatory to the schooner’s departure, Keefe stood beside Coral, who pale as death, leant against the side of the boat, and desperately struggled to keep down the agony she felt.

“Good bye, Coral,” and he stooped and kissed her tenderly.

She held his hand with a wild clasp.

“Say it once more, say again that in six months you will come!”

“In six months, if I live, I’ll see you again, Coral.”

“Now then, go!” She pressed her lips passionately on his hand, dropped it, and hid her face.

As Keefe sprang away, some one touched his shoulder.

“Mr. Dillon, sure you won’t forget to hurry off Denis after us, if he comes while we are away. Make him sensible that there’s no knowing what may happen if he lets her forget him, I depend on you, Mr. Dillon.”

Neither knowing nor caring what the woman had said, Keefe broke from her hold with a fierce vehemence, that for a minute frightened even Mrs. Brady into silence; and leaping on shore, he was soon beyond reach of the explosion of rage which had followed her first astonished quietude. Finding Keefe already out of hearing, she tried to relieve her mind by abusing him to Coral, who