An Oregon Girl: A Tale of American Life in the New West

“Thou perfect flower! To express the fullness of my heart would be impossible,” he joyfully exclaimed.

And thus, while pressing her hand on his shoulder and feeling a ring on her finger, he gently removed it.

“Oh! that’s Virginia’s ring; that is, I got it from her,” she protested feebly, her head pillowed on his breast.

“It shall be a ‘Mizpah’ of trust, dearest, and shall come back to you with an engagement ring,” he softly replied, as he slipped it into his vest pocket.

In one of Virginia’s happy girlish moments, she had picked up the ring from Constance’s dressing table, and admiring its beauty, smilingly slipped it upon her own finger, with the owner’s permission to wear it awhile, but with the injunction to “be careful not to lose it, dear, for I value it very highly. It was John’s gift to me before we were married” – and then later, on that same day, with Hazel’s arm clasping her waist and her own arm clasping Hazel’s, the two happy girls strolling through the grounds – to have Hazel remove it in the same admiring fashion and slip it on her own finger, Virginia yielding to her young cousin, just as Constance, in perfect trust, yielded to her. And then in the morning, all forgetful of the ring, she left for the Valley farm.

And now, on her sudden return, she beheld that same ring taken by Corway as a size for Hazel’s engagement ring, and heard him declare “it shall be a Mizpah of trust, dearest.”

A sigh unconsciously escaped her; a sigh freighted with the blood of fibers as love tore itself away from her heart.

Hazel heard it, and in alarm said to Corway: “What is that? Did you hear it? So like a moan?”

He looked around. “You were mistaken, dearest; there is none here but you and me.”

“Oh, yes, I heard it” – and with a timidity in which a slight sense of fear was discernible, said: “Let us go out in the open.”

But he held her firm, loath to release the beautiful being clasped close to his heart.

“This is for truest love” – and he kissed her again, as she looked up through eyes of unswerving fidelity. “This for never-faltering constancy” – and again their lips met – “And this, a sacred pledge of life’s devotion, God helping me, forever more” – and their lips met yet once again.

Then they passed out to join Mrs. Thorpe and Rutley.

Virginia had witnessed the pledge that meant the blighting of her life’s fond hopes, and she had heard his passionate declaration.

With straining eyes and a very white face, she watched them depart, till there welled up and gathered thick-falling tears that mercifully shut him out from her sight. She sat down on a bench.

She thought of the honeyed words and eager attention with which he wooed her, and made captive her young heart’s deepest, most ardent passion, and now his perfidy was laid bare.

With an effort she became more composed, and exclaimed aloud: “So, the almighty dollar is the object of Joseph Corway’s devotion.” And as her indignation increased, she sprang from her seat, and with quivering voice, said: “Oh, God! and I did confide in him so fondly, trusted him so guilelessly, and now our engagement is ended and all is over between us – forever.” And notwithstanding her effort to suppress them, sob after sob burst forth.

Strong-minded and of powerful emotions, Virginia Thorpe was a queenly woman, a woman whose friendship was prized by her acquaintances, and whose wealth of intellect was a charm to a strikingly graceful figure; and the love that was in her nature once awakened, grew and intensified day by day till at last a steadfast blaze of trust and confidence glorified her personality.

Such she bore for Corway – until she discovered he loved Hazel. Oh, what a change then came over her, as her heart yielded up its dearest desire in tears of scalding bitterness.

“Oh, Joe! tenderly I loved you, passionately I adored you, and you led me to believe that you loved none but me, yet all the time your heart had gone out to another, and this is no doubt the real reason you wanted our engagement to be kept a secret, and my love, which no woman had greater, was but a plaything!” she thought to herself.

She looked at the roses she had unconsciously held in her hand, with infinite tenderness, then crushed them, and broke them.

“Farewell, sweet emblems of truth and love.” And throwing the flowers, which she had so fondly kissed but a few moments before, among dead leaves on the ground, said in a voice that trembled with the pathos of the death of love’s young dream:

“Thus perish all my young life’s happy hopes. Gone! Gone among the things that are dead.” Sobs of bitterest disappointment again burst from her lips.

Suddenly she brushed her hand across her eyes – it was then that Virginia’s transformation took place.

From the guileless, joyful, winsome maid, emerged a woman – beautiful, but alas, subtle, alert and avenging. With a stamp of her foot she said, with sudden determination:

“Away with these tears. What have I to do with human feelings now? I will conquer this weakness, though in the process my heart be changed to stone.

“Now, Corway, beware of me, for you shall know that the love you have toyed with has changed to hate, an unappeasable, undying hate, and you shall learn, too, that a woman’s revenge will pause at nothing that will help to gratify it.” Then she slipped out of the conservatory, with the intention to get to her room, if possible, unobserved, but was halted by hearing Constance say: “Virginia, dear! I wish to make you acquainted with Lord Beauchamp.”

There was no chance for evasion or escape. Virginia had not noticed them as she passed, for they were hidden by the angle of the conservatory, and she was quite close to them when addressed by Constance.

Quick of wit, the girl realized that some excuse was necessary to account for the appearance of her tear-stained face. Halting in her flight, she drew her handkerchief and commenced to rub her eyes, and speaking with faltering lips, for the wound in her heart was yet raw and tender, she said: “Your Lordship finds me at an awkward moment – something has gotten into my eye, and causes me acute pain, but please believe, I esteem it an honor to number Your Grace among my acquaintances.”

“Dear heart!” exclaimed Constance, at once proceeding to examine the girl’s eye. “Let me try to relieve you!”

As Virginia felt the touch of loving fingers on her eyelids, she felt powerless to restrain her emotion, and great tears welled up. Her weary head fell forward upon her friend’s shoulder, and she sobbed: “Oh, Constance, dear, the world to me is one black charnel house.”

The gentle nature of Constance leaped out in sympathy which, for the moment, smothered her surprise. She threw her arms around Virginia and kissed her on the temple.

That Virginia suffered was enough, she felt instinctively that such an outburst of grief was from a far deeper source than that produced by the mote in her eye.

Virginia always had confided in Constance. That desire to communicate, so natural in youth, was strong in the girl. In Hazel, she had been met with a sort of pity, till she ceased to touch upon girlish secrets with her altogether, but in Constance she found one who would not chide even folly, and so these two were, by the nature of things, very close friends.

“There, dear heart,” soothingly said Constance, “rest awhile, for I know the pain must be severe.”

Rutley was an involuntary witness to this bit of feminine sympathy, and, no doubt, recalled it to memory in the events that were to come. His immediate concern, however, expressed itself in a cold, matter-of-fact manner. “Oftentimes,” he said, “the protection supplied by nature to the human eye seems insufficient, and consequent suffering must be endured. I trust Miss Thorpe will soon find relief.”

“Oh! I am sure the pain is only temporary,” half rebelliously replied Virginia, drawing away from Constance, and rapidly recovering her self-possession, as she brushed the tears from her eyes. “There,” she said, “it is passing away now, and I can see quite distinctly already. Why, how like your lordship resembles a past acquaintance,” she remarked, as she eyed him critically.

“Indeed, if the acquaintance you mention was not consigned to the gallows, it might be no sin to resemble him,” responded Rutley, stroking his Vandyke beard.

“Oh! his offense was quite serious, poor fellow! Some shady bond transaction with an investment association, in which he, and one Jack Shore, were the officers. I have heard that the directors agreed not to prosecute them on condition that they left the city and never returned.”

“In England, were it not for the color of my hair, I should have been taken often for the Marquis of Revelstoke,” and to the girl’s dismay, he stiffened up and directed on her a most austere and frigid look, then deliberately fixed the monocle to his eye, and remarked, as his frame faintly quivered, as with a slight chill – “It’s deuced draughty, don’t-che-know!”

He then removed the monocle, and suddenly resumed his habitually suave manner. Picking up a binocle, which lay on the table, he turned to look toward Mt. Hood – “Sublime!” he exclaimed.

“It is very beautiful and white today,” remarked Constance.

“Indeed,” assured Rutley, “it seems close enough to touch with my outstretched hand.”

“My lord’s arm would need to be thirty miles long,” smiled Mrs. Thorpe, who was then ascending the steps.

“A long reach,” responded Rutley, lowering the glass.

“The illusion is due to our clear atmosphere,” replied Mrs. Thorpe.

“I presume so,” agreed Rutley.

“At times the air is phenomenally clear. One day this past Summer I fancied I could make out the ‘Mazamas,’ who were then ascending the mountain,” quietly remarked Virginia.

“Aw, indeed, very likely; quite so,” continued Rutley, handing the glass to Constance, and then turning to Virginia with an alluring smile, added: “And then, the ladies – are so bewitchingly entertaining.”

“Presumably your idea of American girls has suggested the art of flattery.”

“No, no!” he replied. “It’s no flattery, I assure you.”

Just then Hazel and Mr. Corway approached the group standing on the piazza.

Virginia saw them, and with an affected sigh, she turned to John Thorpe, who was standing at the head of the piazza steps, and who also was looking at the approaching couple, and taking him aside, said in a low voice: “John, has it occurred to you that Corway is a handsome man?”

“He certainly is good looking and well proportioned, too,” replied Thorpe, with a quizzical stare at his sister, and his stare developed a smile, as he added, pleasantly: “But why? – are you, too, becoming enamored of this handsome man?”

With downcast eyes, and sudden flushed cheeks, that betrayed the shame she felt at the part she had elected to assume, her answer was given in a low, serious voice: “I have reason to warn you as my cousin’s guardian, that his intentions are not of the best.”

Thorpe felt a strange gripping sensation creep into his heart, and then he, too, looked serious, but his seriousness quickly passed, as he thoughtfully muttered: “No, no, ’tis impossible!” and then, in a more unperturbed manner, said slowly: “His reputation for honor and rectitude is above reproach.”

Though his muttering was scarcely audible, Virginia heard him. “Are you sure?” she replied, in a voice equally subdued, and with a flash of anger in her meaning glance. “You may find that he will bear watching. And you also may find that his attention to Hazel is an insult to our family honor.”

The possibility of Hazel, his guileless orphan niece, of whom he was so proud, could be the victim of a base deception, had never entered his mind, and so it happened that the first shadow that had darkened the serenity of his trust, was, strangely enough, projected by his sister.

As his eyes again fell upon Hazel’s sweet, sensible face, then lifted to the manly, honest countenance of her companion, he at once banished the fear from his mind, and impatiently exclaimed: “Oh, this is nonsense!” Then he turned on his heel, hesitated, and again turned, and looked furtively at Corway, muttering: “Yet I cannot banish the thought. I wonder what causes Virginia – no, I have never suspected him of vice.” Then he slowly disappeared through the vestibule.

As Corway and Hazel approached the steps, Virginia seemed to stiffen and slightly shudder. She felt like ice, and disdained the slightest recognition which he made to her. She turned away with a look of ineffable contempt, and moved slowly over to Rutley and Constance.

Corway instinctively felt that she had been a witness to his scene with Hazel, but he affected unconcern, and allowed the incident to pass without comment.

During the brief time this significant episode was being enacted, Hazel’s attention was attracted to Sam and Dorothy approaching on the drive, so she was unaware of the change that had come over her cousin.

“You must come in, Sam, ’cause I like you, and you haven’t been to see us for a long time – Oh, mamma, we have had such fine fun, Sam and I” – and there appeared from around the corner of the piazza Dorothy Thorpe pulling Sam Harris along by the sleeve.

“Well, Sam,” said Mrs. Thorpe, overlooking him from the piazza, “we thought you had forgotten us.”

“No, indeed,” replied Sam, and as he discovered Virginia, he added under his breath: “At least not while that fair party is around.”

“Of course, you have acted as Mrs. Harris’ escort?”

“My aunt is on the lawn,” he answered, and then as he ascended the steps, greeted Virginia. “Miss Thorpe will permit me to congratulate her upon her safe return.”

“I have had quite a journey,” replied Virginia coldly.

“Well, you have enjoyed it?” ventured Sam, and then he noted a swift questioning glance of anger.

In his dilemma, he felt an awkwardness creeping over him and grinned broadly, and then stupidly faltered: “That is, I guess so!”

“You guess wide of the mark.”

“Aha,” replied Sam, with a roguish twinkle of the eye, “my eyes do not deceive me, eh?”

“Flattery is embarrassing to me. I beg of you to avoid it.” And she thereupon, with a look of weariness, turned and disappeared through the vestibule.

“I guess so! I guess so!” exclaimed Sam, abashed, and a flush of mortification overspread his face.

“Do you like auntie, Sam?” abruptly questioned the child.

She had softly stolen to his side, unperceived, and her voice sounded so close as to startle him.

“Ea, ah! – well, I should think so,” he unconsciously muttered.

“Mercy!” exclaimed Mrs. Thorpe, who could ill repress a smile – “Dorothy, dear! I think the robins are calling for you out in the sunshine.”

“Come, little one,” said Sam, glad of an opportunity to escape from an awkward position. “And while you are listening to the feathered songsters, I’ll keep a sharp lookout for the fair party you call auntie. Come,” and he took the child’s hand and the two ran down the steps. Darting around the corner, they almost collided with John Thorpe and Mrs. Harris, who were approaching to join the company on the piazza.

“Ha – democratic Hazel in the role of ‘noblesse oblige,’ is something new – congratulations, my lord, on the conquest!” said Mrs. Harris.

“I am proud of the acquaintance of so fair a a democrat,” and confronting Mrs. Harris, he continued: “England’s nobility lays homage at the feet of your fair democrats, for they are the golden links in the chain of conquest.”

“And it is my hope that soon one of the golden links will bear the distinguished title, Lady Beauchamp,” replied Mrs. Harris, while her eyes flashed a merry twinkle in the direction of Hazel.

“Of course,” remarked Mr. Corway, who, flushed with jealousy resented the allusion. “His lordship doubtless since his arrival in the country has been overwhelmed with offerings of the youth and beauty of America.”

“It seems to me that you are talking in mysteries,” remarked Hazel.

Mr. Corway moved toward her. “I appeal to the shrine of beauteous Hebe for vindication.”

“Ha! ha! ha! ha!” laughed the girl. “Wouldn’t it be a surprise if the appeal should be negative?”

“But the shrine of Hebe is not often invincible,” rejoined Constance. “You must remember there is hope and there is perseverence – but this is irrelevant,” and, turning to Mrs. Harris, continued: “Have you left Mr. Harris at Rosemont?”

“Oh, no! James is out in the flower garden, discussing rose culture with Virginia.”

“Then I propose that we join them,” said Mrs. Thorpe.

“And I suggest a stroll through the lovely lawn, under the glory of Autumn foliage,” added Rutley, who immediately turned and offered Constance his arm, and the two passed down the steps.

Hazel and Corway were following Rutley, when John Thorpe attracted the girl’s attention by quietly exclaiming: “Hazel!”

She at once turned to Corway: “I shall be with you directly – uncle has something to say to me.”

As Mr. Corway and Mrs. Harris passed down the steps, John Thorpe and Hazel entered the house.

“You have something to say to me, Uncle?”

“Yes, Hazel,” and as they passed into the drawing room he bit his lip in an endeavor to appear unperturbed.

With a girl’s intuition, she scented something unpleasant, and with a timid and startled look, she faltered: “What – is it Uncle?”

“Hazel,” he began, and his eyes rested on his beautiful niece – very beautiful just then, her eyes bright and clear and “peach-bloom” of health, the famed Oregon coloring so becoming to the sex, and as he looked at her he became suddenly conscious of a struggle raging in his breast. A struggle between doubt and confidence – but he stumbled on slowly – “I think – you show more – concern for – a – the company of Mr. Corway than prudence – I mean – Hazel!”

At that moment Virginia pushed aside the portiere and silently stepped into the room.

John Thorpe paused, for he saw the girl’s face whiten, and her eyes look into his with an expression of wonderment, and then his heart seemed to leap to his throat, and choke him with a sense of shame at his implication.

He put his arm gently about her, looked into the depths of her blue eyes, and said, kindly: “As you love the memory of your father and your mother, Hazel, beware that you do not make too free in the society of Corway. Let your conduct be hedged about with propriety” —

“Uncle!” she interrupted, drawing away from him like a startled fawn hit from ambush.

Virginia saw her opportunity to sever the friendship between her brother and Corway.

Before her transformation she would have been shocked beyond measure at so wicked a falsehood, as she then decided to launch. Impelled by a consuming desire for revenge, no blush of shame checked her mad course, and “no still small voice” warned her of her sin.

She said: “John, if our family honor is to be protected from scandal, you will prevent your niece from having further to do with Mr. Corway.”

Both John and Hazel turned toward her. A deep silence ensued.

Implicit trust and confidence, the confidence begotten in perfect domestic peace and contentment, had followed John Thorpe – but now, for the first time, he found a tinge of shame and indignation had crept into his heart – and he could not banish it.

At last he gravely broke the silence – “Have you no answer to this, Hazel?”

The girl’s eyes flashed resentment, but she refrained from angry expression, for to her uncle she always showed the greatest deference, yet her voice trembled a little as she said, with girlish dignity: “I decline to reply to such an absurdity.”

“Hazel!” warned Virginia, “you are dangerously near ruin when in the company of that man, for his reputation is anything but clean.”

Again a painful silence followed, Hazel, appearing incapable of clearly understanding just what it was all about, stood dumb with astonishment, while John’s varied emotions were seen plainly through the thin veneer of tranquility he tried to maintain.

John Thorpe was jealous of the honor of his house. The mere thought of its possible violation bruised and lacerated him.

Proud of his high position in society; proud of his high rectitude; proud of his father’s untarnished life; proud of the fact that not the faintest shadow of scandal could ever attach to his house or name – the hinted criminations of his his orphan niece, maintained in his home as one of the family, beat upon him with much the same effect as the horrifying wings of a bat upon the face of a frightened child.

Virginia saw and felt that the crisis of her ruse was near. Again a flush of daring sprang into her eyes, ominous of deeper sin, but John unconsciously spared her from further commitment. Doubt was master at last, for he chose to lean toward Virginia.

“Hazel!” he exclaimed, his white, grave face betraying a keen sense of his shame. “Your rash fondness for that man is a sacrifice of affection, and I shall forbid him visiting our house.”

“A wise precaution,” commented Virginia.

At last Hazel’s indignation broke through all restraint.

“I am astonished at your implications,” she retorted, her voice becoming pathetic with the sense of her wounded honor. “My ‘rash fondness’! Uncle!” and she drew her slight form up erect, her eyes flashing defiance: “If to believe in Mr. Corway’s preferment is a sacrifice of affection, then that sacrifice is to me an exalted honor, for I have consented to become his wife!”

“Hazel!” gasped John Thorpe, amazed and dismayed at her declaration.

“I have suspected such a calamity would happen – but even now it is not too late to prevent it!” exclaimed Virginia, sharply.

“Why, Virginia,” reproached Hazel, with a stamp of her foot. “You insult me!” and she turned away to conceal the tears that arose.

During a short, impressive silence, Mrs. Harris abruptly entered the room, followed by Corway and Sam. “Dear me!” she exclaimed, as she smilingly surveyed the trio, “James has often gone into raptures over the domestic cooing of the Thorpes, but I was quite unaware that it made them careless of the wishes of their guests.

“Thorpe, your arm” – and she swept down the room and seized his arm. “Hazel, I have brought you an escort,” and with a smile at Virginia, “I don’t think that Sam is far away. You cannot refuse to come now.”

Hazel proudly accepted Corway’s arm. Then they turned to leave the room. As they neared the door, Virginia exclaimed, with low but startling irony: “Il. cavalier is careful to make it appear he is delighted with the society of his affianced. No doubt feeling an honorable justification for his mercenary felicity. Ho, ho,” Virginia laughed, her lips quivering with scorn. “The situation is charming. Ha, ha, ha, ha.”

The principals to this little drama understood its meaning perfectly, but while Mrs. Harris paused for an instant in wonderment, her easy nature forbade worry – and so the incident quickly passed out of her memory, and Sam was too shrewd to show that he heard it, and with his round face beaming with unquenchable admiration, bowed and offered his arm to her, accompanied by the characteristic side movement of his head – “Ea, ha, I guess so – eh, Auntie?”

The joyous manner of utterance was like a shaft of sunshine bursting through the dark, tragic clouds of impending storm.

Virginia’s first attack fell short of accomplishing the purpose intended, yet the seed of doubt, of suspicion and fear of family disgrace had been grounded in her brother’s mind, and it would be strange, indeed, if Corway’s position proved invulnerable to more carefully-planned attacks.

It must be remembered that an opportunity had come at an unexpected moment, and she impulsively seized upon it. Through it all, however, Virginia must be credited with a sincere belief that Corway’s intentions toward Hazel were as insincere and mercenary as they had been to her.