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Page 2
He entered the house; kicked the door to; pulled off his overcoat;
wrenched off his outer 'kerchief; slammed them on a branch of the
clothes-tree; banged his hat on top of them; wheeled about; pushed in
the door of his library; strode in, and, leaving the door ajar, threw
himself into an easy-chair, and sat there in the fire-reddened dusk,
with his white brows knit, and his arms tightly locked on his breast.
The ghost had followed him, sadly, and now stood motionless in a corner
of the room, its spectral hands crossed on its bosom, and its white
locks drooping down!
It was evident Dr. Renton was in a bad humor. The very library caught
contagion from him, and became grouty and sombre. The furniture was
grim and sullen and sulky; it made ugly shadows on the carpet and on
the wall, in allopathic quantity; it took the red gleams from the fire
on its polished surfaces in homoeopathic globules, and got no good from
them. The fire itself peered out sulkily from the black bars of the
grate, and seemed resolved not to burn the fresh deposit of black coals
at the top, but to take this as a good time to remember that those coals
had been bought in the summer at five dollars a ton,--under price, mind
you,--when poor people, who cannot buy at advantage, but must get their
firing in the winter, would then have given nine or ten dollars for
them. And so (glowered the fire), I am determined to think of that
outrage, and not to light them, but to go out myself, directly! And
the fire got into such a spasm of glowing indignation over the injury,
that it lit a whole tier of black coals with a series of little
explosions, before it could cool down, and sent a crimson gleam over
the moody figure of its owner in the easy-chair, and over the solemn
furniture, and into the shadowy corner filled by the ghost.
The spectre did not move when Dr. Renton arose and lit the chandelier.
It stood there, still and gray, in the flood of mellow light. The
curtains were drawn, and the twilight without had deepened into
darkness. The fire was now burning in despite of itself, fanned by the
wintry gusts, which found their way down the chimney. Dr. Renton stood
with his back to it, his hands behind him, his bold white forehead
shaded by a careless lock of black hair, and knit sternly; and the same
frown in his handsome, open, searching dark eyes. Tall and strong, with
an erect port, and broad, firm shoulders, high, resolute features, a
commanding figure garbed in aristocratic black, and not yet verging
into the proportions of obesity,--take him for all in all, a very fine
and favorable specimen of the solid men of Boston. And seen in contrast
(oh! could he but have known it!) with the attenuated figure of the
poor, dim ghost!
Hark! a very light foot on the stairs,--a rich rustle of silks.
Everything still again,--Dr. Renton looking fixedly, with great
sternness, at the half-open door, whence a faint, delicious perfume
floats into the library. Somebody there, for certain. Somebody peeping
in with very bright, arch eyes. Dr. Renton knew it, and prepared to
maintain his ill-humor against the invader. His face became triply
armed with severity for the encounter. That's Netty, I know, he thought.
His daughter. So it was. In she bounded. Bright little Netty! Gay little
Netty! A dear and sweet little creature, to be sure, with a delicate
and pleasant beauty of face and figure, it needed no costly silks to
grace or heighten. There she stood. Not a word from her merry lips,
but a smile which stole over all the solitary grimness of the library,
and made everything better, and brighter, and fairer, in a minute. It
floated down into the cavernous humor of Dr. Renton, and the gloom began
to lighten directly,--though he would not own it, nor relax a single
feature. But the wan ghost in the corner lifted its head to look at
her, and slowly brightened as to something worthy a spirit's love, and
a dim phantom's smiles. Now then, Dr. Renton! the lines are drawn, and
the foe is coming. Be martial, sir, as when you stand in the ranks of
the Cadets on training-days! Steady, and stand the charge! So he did.
He kept an inflexible front as she glided toward him, softly, slowly,
with her bright eyes smiling into his, and doing dreadful execution.
Then she put her white arms around his neck, laid her dear, fair head
on his breast, and peered up archly into his stern visage. Spite of
himself, he could not keep the fixed lines on his face from breaking
confusedly into a faint smile. Somehow or other, his hands came from
behind him, and rested on her head. There! That's all. Dr. Renton
surrendered at discretion! One of the solid men of Boston was taken
after a desperate struggle,--internal, of course,--for he kissed her,
and said, "Dear little Netty!" and so she was.
The phantom watched her with a smile, and wavered and brightened as
if about to glide to her; but it grew still, and remained.
"Pa in the sulks to-night?" she asked, in the most winning, playful,
silvery voice.
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