by T. S. Arthur
New Year’s day at last came, and the mother, who had looked forward so anxiously for its arrival, that she might see her boy once more, felt happier in the prospect of meeting him than she had been for a long time. Since his departure, she had not heard a single word from him, which caused her to feel painfully anxious. But this day was to put an end to her mind’s prolonged and painful suspense, in regard to him. From about nine o’clock in the morning, she began to look momently for his arrival. But the time slowly wore on, and yet he did not come. Ten, eleven twelve, one o’clock came and went, and the boy was still absent from his mother, whose heart yearned to see his fair face, and to hear his voice, so pleasant to her ear, with unutterable longings. But still the hours went by—two, three, four, and then the dusky twilight began to fall, bringing with it the heart-aching assurance that her boy would not come home. The tears, which she had restrained all day, now flowed freely, and her over-excited feelings gave way to a gush of bitter grief. The next day came and went, and the next, and the next—but there was no word from Henry. And thus the days followed each other, until the severe month of January passed away. So anxious and excited did the poor mother now become, that she could remain passive no longer. She must see or hear from her child. Doctor R—had obtained him his place, and to him she repaired.
“But haven’t you seen your little boy since he went to Lexington?” the doctor asked, in some surprise.
“Indeed, I have not; and Mr. Sharp promised to bring him home on New Year’s day,” replied the mother.
“Mr. Sharp! Mr. Sharp!” ejaculated the doctor, thoughtfully. “Is that the name of the man who has your son?”
“Yes, sir. That is his name.”
Doctor R—arose and took two or three turns across the floor at this, and, then resuming his seat, said—
“You shall see your son to-morrow, Mrs. Gaston. I will myself go to Lexington and bring him home. I had no idea that the man had not kept his promise with you. And, as I got Henry the place, I must see that his master is as good as his word in regard to him.”
With this assurance, Mrs. Gaston returned home, and with a lighter heart.
CHAPTER XI.
PERKINS ANXIOUSLY SEEKS LIZZY GLENN.
ONE Morning, a few days after the young man named Perkins had related to his friend the history of his attachment to Miss Ballantine and his subsequent bereavement, he opened a letter which came by mail, among several relating to business, postmarked New Orleans. It was from an old friend, who had settled there. Among other matters, was this paragraph:—
“I heard something the other day that surprised me a good deal, and, as it relates to a subject in which no one can feel a deeper interest than yourself, I have thought it right to mention it. It is said that, about a year and a half ago, a young woman and her father suddenly made their appearance here, and claimed to be Mr. and Miss Ballantine. Their story, or rather the story of the daughter (for the father, it is, said, was out of his mind), was that the ship in which they sailed from New York had been burned at sea, and that a few of the passengers had been saved in a boat, which floated about until all died but herself and father; that they were taken up almost exhausted, by a Dutch East Indiaman, and that this vessel when near the Cape of Good Hope, encountered a gale, and was blown far off south, losing two of her masts; and that she was finally wrecked upon an uninhabited island, and the few saved from her compelled to remain there for nearly two years before being discovered and taken off. This story was not believed. Mr. Paralette, it is said, who has retained possession of all Mr. Ballantine’s property since his absence, was waited upon by the young woman; but he repulsed her as an impostor, and refused to make the least investigation into her case. He had his own reasons for this, it is also said. Several of Mr. Ballantine’s old friends received notes from her; but none believed her story, especially as the man she called her father bore little or no resemblance to Mr. Ballantine. But it is now said, by many, that loss of reason and great physical suffering had changed him, as these would change any man. Discouraged, disheartened, and dismayed at the unexpected repulse she met, it is supposed by some, who now begin to half believe the story, that she died in despair. Others say that the same young woman who called upon Mr. Paralette has occasionally been seen here; And it is also said that two of our most eminent physicians were engaged by a young woman, about whom there was to them something singular and inexplicable, for nearly a year and a half to attend her father, who was out of his mind, but that they failed to give him any relief. These things are now causing a good deal of talk here in private circles, and I have thought it best to make you aware of the fact.”
From that time until the cars left for New York, Perkins was in a state of strong inward excitement. Hurriedly arranging his business for an absence of some weeks, he started for the South late in the afternoon, without communicating to any one the real cause of his sudden movement. After an anxious journey of nearly two weeks, he arrived in New Orleans, and called immediately upon Mr. Paralette, and stated the rumor he had heard. That gentleman seemed greatly surprised, and even startled at the earnestness of the young man, and more particularly so when he learned precisely the relation in which he stood to the daughter of Mr. Ballantine.
“I remember the fact,” was his reply. “But then, the young woman was, of course, a mere pretender.”
“But how do you know?” urged Mr. Perkins. “Did you take any steps to ascertain the truth of her story?”
“Of course not. Why should I? An old friend of her father’s called upon them at the hotel, and saw the man that was attempted to be put off by an artful girl as Mr. Ballantine. But he said the man bore no kind of resemblance to that person. He was old and white-headed. He was in his dotage—a simple old fool—passive in the hands of a designing woman.”
“Did you see him?”
“No.”
“Strange that you should not!” Perkins replied, looking the man steadily in the face. “Bearing the relation that you did to Mr. Ballantine, it might be supposed that you would have been the first to see the man, and the most active to ascertain the truth or falsity of the story.”
“I do not permit any one to question me in regard to my conduct,” Mr. Paralette said, in an offended tone, turning from the excited young man.
Perkins saw that he had gone too far, and endeavored to modify and apologize: but the merchant repulsed him, and refused to answer any more questions, or to hold any further conversation with him on the subject.
The next step taken by the young man was to seek out his friend, and learn from him all the particular rumors on the subject, and who would be most likely to put him in the way of tracing the individuals he was in search of. But he found, when he got fairly started on the business for which he had come to New Orleans, that he met with but little encouragement. Some shrugged their shoulders, some smiled in his face, and nearly every one treated the matter with a degree of indifference. Many had heard that a person claiming to be Miss Ballantine had sent notes to a few of Mr. Ballantine’s old friends about two years previous; but no one seemed to have the least doubt of her being an impostor. A week passed in fruitless efforts to awaken any interest, or to create the slightest disposition to inquiry among Mr. B.’s old friends. The story told by the young woman they considered as too improbable to bear upon its face the least appearance of truth.
“Why,” was the unanswerable argument of many, “has nothing been heard of the matter since? If that girl had really been Miss Ballantine, and that simple old man her father, do you think we should have heard no more on the subject? The imposition was immediately detected, and the whole matter quashed at once.”
Failing to create any interest in the minds of those he had supposed would have been most eager to prosecute inquiry, but led on by desperate hope, Perkins had an advertisement inserted in all the city papers, asking the individuals who had presented themselves some eighteen months before as Mr. Ballantine and his daughter, to call upon him at his rooms
in the hotel. A week passed, but no one responded to the call. He then tried to ascertain the names of the physicians who, it was said, had attended an old man for imbecility of mind, at the request of a daughter who seemed most deeply devoted to him. In this he at length proved successful.
“I did attend such a case,” was at last replied to his oft-repeated question.
“Then, my dear sir,” said Perkins, in a deeply excited voice, “tell me where they are.”
“That, my young friend, is, really out of my power,” returned the physician. “It is some time since I visited them.”
“What was their name?” asked the young man.
“Glenn, if I recollect rightly.”
“Glenn! Glenn!” said Perkins, starting, and then pausing to think. “Was the daughter a tall, pale, slender girl, with light brown hair?”
“She was. And though living in the greatest seclusion was a woman of refinement and education.”
“You can direct me, of course, to the house where they live?”
“I can. But you will not, I presume, find them there. The daughter, when I last saw her, said that she had resolved on taking her father on to Boston, in order to try the effects of the discipline of the Massachusetts Insane Hospital upon him, of which she had seen a very favorable report. I encouraged her to go, and my impression is that she is already at the North.”
“Glenn! Glenn!” said Perkins, half aloud, and musingly, as the doctor ceased. “Yes! it must be, it is the same! She was often seen visiting Charlestown, and going in the direction of the hospitals. Yes! yes! It must be she!”
Waiting only long enough in New Orleans to satisfy himself that the persons alluded to by the physician had actually removed from the place where they resided some months before, and with the declared intention of going North, Perkins started home by the quickest route from New Orleans to the North. It was about the middle of February when he arrived in Boston. Among the first he met was Milford, to whom he had written from New Orleans a full account of the reason of his visiting that place so suddenly, and of his failure to discover the persons of whom he was in search.
“My dear friend, I am glad to see you back!” said Milford, earnestly, as he grasped the hand of Perkins. “I wrote you a week ago, but, of course, that letter has not been received, and you are doubtless in ignorance of what has come to my knowledge within the last few days.”
“Tell me, quickly, what you mean!” said Perkins, grasping the arm of his friend.
“Be calm, and I will tell you,” replied Milford. “About a week ago I learned, by almost an accident, from the transfer clerk in the bank, that the young woman whom we knew as Lizzy Glenn had, early in the fall, come to the bank with certificates of stock, and had them transferred to the Massachusetts Insane Hospital, to be held by that institution so long as one Hubert Ballantine remained an inmate of its walls.”
“Well?” eagerly gasped Perkins.
“I know no more. It is for you to act in the matter; I could not.”
Without a moment’s delay, Perkins procured a vehicle, and in a little while was at the door of the institution.
“Is there a Mr. Ballantine in the asylum?” he asked, in breathless eagerness, of one of the attendants who answered his summons.
“No, sir,” was the reply.
“But,” said Perkins in a choking voice, “I have been told that there was a man here by that name.”
“So there was. But he left here about five days ago, perfectly restored to reason.”
Perkins leaned for a moment or two against the wall to support himself. His knees bent under him. Then he asked in an agitated voice—
“Is he in Boston?”
“I do not know. He was from the South, and his daughter has, in all probability, taken him home.”
“Where did they go when they left here?”
But the attendant could not tell. Nor did any one in the institution know. The daughter had never told her place of residence.
Excited beyond measure, Perkins returned to Boston, and went to see Berlaps. From him he could learn nothing. It was two months or so since she had been there for work. Michael was then referred to; he knew nothing, but he had a suspicion that Mrs. Gaston got work for her.
“Mrs Gaston!” exclaimed Perkins, with a look of astonishment. “Who is Mrs. Gaston?”
“She is one of our seamstresses,” replied Berlaps.
“Where does she live?”
The direction was given, and the young man hurried to the place. But the bird had flown. Five or six days before, she had gone away in a carriage with a young lady who had been living with her, so it was said, and no one could tell what had become of her or her children.
Confused, perplexed, anxious, and excited, Perkins turned away and walked slowly home, to give himself time to reflect. His first fear was that Eugenia and her father, for he had now no doubt of their being the real actors in this drama, had really departed for New Orleans. The name of Mrs. Gaston, as being in association with the young woman calling herself Lizzy Glenn, expelled from his mind every doubt. That was the name of the friend in Troy with whom Eugenia had lived while there. It was some years since he had visited or heard particularly from Troy, and therefore this was the first intimation he had that Mrs. Gaston had removed form there, or that her situation had become so desperate as the fact of her working for Berlaps would indicate.
CHAPTER XII.
PERKINS FINDS IN LIZZY GLENN HIS LONG LOST EUGENIA.
AFTER Eugenia Ballantine, for she it really was, had removed to the humble abode of Mrs. Gaston, her mind was comparatively more at ease than it yet had been. In the tenderly manifested affection of one who had been a mother to her in former, happier years, she found something upon which to lean her bruised and wearied spirits. Thus far, she had been compelled to bear up alone—now there was an ear open to her, and her overburdened heart found relief in sympathy. There was a bosom upon which she could lean her aching head, and find a brief but blessed repose. Toward the end of January, her father’s symptoms changed rapidly, indicating one day more alarming features than ever, and the next presenting an encouraging aspect. The consequence was, that the mind of Eugenia became greatly agitated. Every day she repaired to the Asylum, with a heart trembling between hope and fear, to return sometimes with feelings of elation, and sometimes deeply depressed.
On the day after Dr. R—had promised to go to Lexington to look after Mrs. Gaston’s little boy, the mother’s anxious desire to see her child, from whom she had heard not a word for nearly three months, became so strong that she could with difficulty compose herself so far as to continue her regular employments. She counted the hours as they slowly wore away, thinking that the moment would never come when her eyes should rest upon her dear boy. As the doctor had not said at what hour he would return from Lexington, there was no period in the day upon which she could fix her mind as that in which she might expect to see her child; but she assumed that it would not be until the after part of the day, and forward to that time she endeavored to carry her expectations.
When Doctor R—parted with her, as has been seen, on the day previous, he was exquisitely pained under the conviction that the child he had met with in Lexington in so deplorable a condition was none other than the son of Mrs. Gaston, who had been put out to Mr. Sharp at his instance. Hastily visiting a few patients that required immediate attention, he, very soon after parting with Mrs. Gaston, started in a sleigh for the town in which Henry had been apprenticed. On his arrival there, and before he had proceeded far along the main street, he observed the child he had before met, toiling along under a heavy burden. His clothes were soiled and ragged, and his hands and face dirty—indeed, he presented an appearance little or nothing improved from what it was a short time before. Driving close up to the sidewalk upon which the boy was staggering along under his heavy load, he reined up his horses, and called out, as he did so—
“Henry!”
The lad stopped instantly, and
turned toward him, recognizing him as he did so.
“Don’t you want to see your mother, Henry?” asked the doctor.
The bundle under which he was toiling fell to the ground, and he stood in mute surprise for a moment or two.
“What is your name?” Doctor R—asked.
“Henry Gaston,” replied the child.
“Then jump in here, Henry, and I will take you to see your mother.”
The boy took two or three quick steps toward the doctor, and then stopped suddenly and looked back at the load which had just fallen from his shoulders.
“Never mind that. Let Mr. Sharp look after it,” said Doctor R—.
“But he will—,” and Henry hesitated.
“Jump in, quick, my little fellow; and say good-bye in your heart to Mr. Sharp! You shall never go back there again.”
The child sprang eagerly forward at this, and clambered into Doctor R—’s sleigh. A word to the horses, and away they were bounding toward Boston. When Doctor R—arrived there, his mind was made up, as it had been, indeed, before he started, not to take Henry home to his mother that day. He saw that it would be too cruel to present the child to her in the condition he was; and, besides, he felt that, after having procured for him the situation, he could not look the mother in the face with her abused child in all the deformity of his condition before them. He, therefore, took Henry to his own home; had him well washed, and dressed in a suit of comfortable clothing. The change produced in him was wonderful. The repulsive-looking object became an interesting boy; though with a pale, thin face, and a subdued, fearful look. He was very anxious to see his mother; but Doctor R—, desirous of making as great a change in the child’s appearance and manner as possible, kept him at his house all night, and until the afternoon of the next day. Then he took him to his eagerly expectant mother.
