Part 2 — CHAPTER II.

"Harry," said Mrs. Castleton, in her prettiest and most winning manner, "I am going to call on your friend, Miss Dawson, and invite her for Thursday evening."

Harry looked up very much astonished, hardly knowing whether to be pleased or not, and said,

"What put that in your head?"

"I want to know her," continued Mrs. Castleton. "They tell me you admire her, Harry; and if she is to be my future sister, as people say—"

"People say a great deal more than they know," said Harry, hastily.

"Well," rejoined his sister, playfully, "be that as it may, Harry, I should like to see the young lady; and beside, I want as many pretty girls as I can get, they always make a party brilliant—and you say she is pretty, don't you, Harry?"

"Beautiful," he replied, with an earnestness that startled Mrs. Castleton. "You'll have no prettier girl here, I promise you that, Laura," he added, presently, more quietly. "But what will Emma say," he continued, bitterly. "She'll never give her consent, depend upon it, to your calling."

"It's not necessary that she should," said Mrs. Castleton, good humoredly; "so perhaps I had better not ask her."

"Emma gives herself airs," continued Harry, angrily. "She thinks that all the world are just confined to her one little clique; that there's neither beauty, nor sense, nor any thing else out of her particular set. Now I can tell her that there's more beauty among those who don't give themselves half the airs, and who she looks down upon, than there is to be found among her 'fashionables.' But Emma is perfectly ridiculous with her 'exclusive' nonsense," he continued, with much feeling, evidently showing how deeply he resented his sister's reflections upon the style and stamp of his present admiration, Miss Dawson.

"Oh," said Mrs. Castleton, soothingly, "it's a mistake all very young girls make, Harry. They know nothing out of one circle. Of course, they disparage all others."

But Harry was not to be quieted so easily. He was not satisfied until he had poured forth all his complaints against Emma; and Mrs. Castleton found it best not to take her part, but trust to the result of her experiment of the next week with putting him in good humor with her again.

"Will you call with me?" she continued, presently. "I have ordered the carriage at one."

He looked pleased, and said he would. But after a little while he seemed to grow nervous and fidgetty—walked about the room—asked a good many questions, without seeming to attend much to the answers, and at last said, hurriedly,

"Well, Laura, it's rather late, and I have an engagement down town—do you care about my calling with you? You know it's only necessary for you to leave your card. You need not go in even, if you don't care about it."

"Oh, certainly," she replied. "No, don't wait for me."

And he took his hat and darted off like light, as if he had made an escape from he hardly knew what.

Mrs. Castleton could not but laugh as she heard him shut the hall-door, almost before she was aware he had left the room, well pleased with this indication of susceptibility on his part, which she took as a good omen of the future, fully believing that "future events cast their shadows before." "If Harry were nervous already, what would he be on Thursday evening."

The call was made. Miss Dawson was out. A card was left, with an invitation, which, in due time, was accepted.

"Are you going to ask the Hazletons," inquired Emma.

"No," said Mrs. Castleton; "I don't want to have too large a party. I want just enough to fill my rooms prettily, so that you can see everybody, and how they are dressed—just one of those small, select, pretty parties, where everybody is noticed. I have hardly asked a person—I don't know one—who is not in some way distinguished for either dress, manner, air, or beauty. I have taken pains to cull the most choice of my acquaintance. The rooms will be beautifully lighted—and I expect it to be a brilliant affair."

"If it were not for that Miss Dawson to spoil all," said Emma, dejectedly—for she had never liked the scheme, though she did not oppose it. "I declare, Laura, I wonder at your moral courage in having her. I don't think I could introduce her among such a set, even to be sure of breaking it off. You will be terribly ashamed of her. You don't know, I think, what you have undertaken."

Mrs. Castleton could not but laugh at the earnestness, not to say solemnity, of Emma's manner.

"Not I, Emma—why should I be ashamed of her. If she were Harry's wife, or if even he were engaged to her, the case would be different—I should blush for her then, if she is vulgar. But merely as a guest, how can her dress or manners affect me. My position is not to be altered by my happening to visit a girl who dresses vilely, and flirts à discretion."

But still Emma looked very dubious, and only said, "Well, don't introduce me."

"Don't be alarmed," replied her sister. "I don't mean to. Come, come, Emma," she continued, laughing, "I see you are nervous about it, but I think you may trust me for carrying it off well," to which her sister replied,

"Well, Laura, if any one can get out of such a scrape gracefully, you will."

Mrs. Castleton laughed, and the subject dropped.

What Emma had said was true. There was an airy grace, a high-bred ease about Mrs. Castlelon, that could carry her through any thing she chose to undertake.

Thursday evening arrived at last. Mrs. Castleton's rooms were lighted to perfection, and she herself dressed with exquisite taste, looking the fitting priestess of the elegant shrine over which she presided. Emma, with her brothers, came early—and one glance satisfied Mrs. Castleton. The simplicity and elegance of Emma's toilette were not to be out-done even by her own. Tom looked at them both with great pride; and, certainly, two prettier or more elegant specimens of humanity are not often to be met with.

He made some playful observation to his sister, expressive of his admiration of her taste, and looking about, said,

"Your rooms are very well lighted. There's nothing like wax, after all."

"They are too hot," said Harry, pettishly.

"Bless you, man," replied Tom, "how can you say so. I am downright chilly; but as there is to be dancing, it is better it should be so."

"If you find this room warm, Harry," said Mrs. Castleton, "you had better go in the dancing-room—there is not a spark of fire there."

Harry walked off, and Emma said,

"I don't know what is the matter with him—he's so cross. He has been so irritable all day that I have hardly dared to speak to him."

Tom only laughed.

Mrs. Castleton gave him a quick look of intelligence, but before she had time to speak, she was called upon to receive her guests, who began to come.

At every fresh arrival Harry's face was to be seen peeping in anxiously from the dancing-room, and it wore something of a look of relief as he turned off each time to resume his restless wanderings in the still empty apartment.

Miss Dawson, meaning to be very fashionable, came late. The bride for whom the party was ostensibly given had arrived; and Mrs. Castleton was about giving orders to have the dancing-room thrown open, and just at the pause that frequently precedes such a movement in a small party, the door was thrown open, and Miss Dawson entered, leaning on the arm of a gentleman whom she introduced as Mr. Hardwicks. Now this Mr. Hardwicks was something more than Mrs. Castleton had bargained for; and Harry hastened forward with a look of some embarrassment and vexation as he perceived the mistake his fair friend had made in taking such a liberty with his high-bred sister. Miss Dawson had often taken him to parties with her, and somehow it had not struck him then as strange. Perhaps it was because he saw it was the style among those around him. But these were not the "customs of Branksome Hall;" and Harry was evidently annoyed. Moreover, this Mr. Hardwicks was a forward, under-bred looking individual, with a quantity of black whisker, and brass buttons to his claret-colored coat, altogether a very different looking person from the black-coated, gentlemanly-looking set that Mrs. Castleton had invited. She received him with a graceful but distant bow, somewhat annoyed, it is true; but as she never allowed trifles to disturb her, she turned calmly away, and never gave him a second thought during the evening.

Miss Dawson she received with empressement. She was dressed to her heart's delight, with a profusion of mock pearl and tinsel; her hair in a shower of long curls in front, with any quantity of bows and braids behind, and a wreath!—that required all Mrs. Castleton's self-possession to look at without laughing. Her entrance excited no little sensation—for she was a striking-looking girl, being tall, and full formed, with a very brilliant complexion. Simply and quietly dressed, and she would have been decidedly handsome; but as it was, she was intensely showy and vulgar.

"Harry, the music is just beginning; you will find a place for Miss Dawson in the dancing-room," and so, whether he would or no, he had to ask her to dance. Probably he would have done so if his sister had let him alone; but as it was, he felt as if he had to.

She danced very badly. Harry had not been aware of it before; but she jumped up and down—and if the truth must be told, with an air and spirit of enjoyment not just then the fashionable style.

"How in earnest your fair friend dances," said a young man, with a smile, to Harry, as they passed in the dance.

Harry colored.

"Who on earth have you there, Harry?" asked another, with rather a quizzical look. "Introduce me, wont you?" But Harry affected not to hear the request.

"Who is the young lady your brother is dancing with, Mrs. Castleton?" he heard asked several times; to which his sister answered in her sweetest and most winning manner, "Miss Dawson—a friend of Harry's;" and to some of her brother's particular friends, he heard her say, "Oh, that's Harry's belle. Don't you know Miss Dawson—let me introduce you."

Harry felt quite provoked, he did not know why, at hearing his sister couple him always with Miss Dawson; and if he thought the room hot at the beginning of the dance, he did not feel it any cooler before it was over.

Mrs. Castleton introduced a gentleman just as the dance finished, who asked her for the next, when Harry said quickly,

"You are fatigued, are you not? Perhaps you had better go with me and get an ice."

"Do you go and bring Miss Dawson one," said his sister. "I hope," she continued, "you are not fatigued already?"

"Oh, no," replied the young lady, with an animation and energy that proclaimed she had a dancing power within not to be readily exhausted. "Oh, no, indeed; I could dance all night."

"I am glad to hear it," said Mrs. Castleton, graciously, as if she felt her dancing a personal compliment. And before the dance was over she had introduced half a dozen young men to her.

Feeling herself a decided belle, Miss Dawson was in high spirits (that trying test to an unrefined woman.) She considered Mrs. Castleton's visit and invitation as a marked compliment, (as she had every right to do,) and her attentions now, and the admiration she received, excited her to even more than her ordinary animation, which was always, to say the least of it, sufficient. She laughed, and she talked, and shook her long curls about, and flirted in a style that made the ladies look, and the gentlemen smile. Moreover, Mr. Hardwicks, who knew no one else, (for Mrs. Castleton had no idea of forcing him on any of her friends,) never left her side; and the easy manner in which he spoke to her, and took her fan from her hand while she was talking, and even touched her sleeve to call her attention when her head was turned away, all of which she seemed to think quite natural, made Harry color, and bite his lip more than once with mortification and vexation.

"You are not going to waltz?" he said, justly distrusting the waltzing of a lady who danced so.

"Yes," she said, "with Mr. Hardwicks;" and in a moment they were whirling round in a style quite peculiar, and altogether new to the accomplished waltzers then and there assembled.

People looked, and some smiled—and then couple after couple paused in the dance to gaze on the strangers who had just taken the floor—and soon they had it all to themselves, and on they whirled like mad ones. Harry could not stand it—he left the room.

Presently some of his young friends followed him, who seemed excessively amused, and one of them exclaimed,

"Harry, where on earth did you pick up those extraordinary waltzers. Mrs. Castleton tells me they are friends of yours?"

Harry muttered something, and said,

"Hardwicks should not ask any woman to waltz. He did not know how; no man should, if he could not waltz himself."

"Are you dancing, Francis?" asked another, of a fashionable looking young man standing near.

"No," he replied, languidly, "I am exhausted. I danced with Harry's fair friend the last dance, and it requires no small degree of physical power to keep pace with her efforts."

Harry was excessively annoyed. He heartily wished he had never seen her; and was quite angry with Mrs. Castleton for having invited her. And just then, irritated and cross as he was, Mrs. Castleton met him with,

"Harry, Miss Dawson says you have carried off her bouquet."

"I have not got her bouquet," he answered, angrily.

"Well, go and make your own apology," and before he had time to know what she was about, she had her arm in his, and had taken him up to Miss Dawson, saying,

"Here is the culprit, Miss Dawson—but he pleads not guilty;" whereupon the young lady tapped him with her fan, and declared he was a "sad fellow," and shook her curls back, and looked up in his face, and flirted, as she thought, bewitchingly, while he with pleasure could have boxed her ears.

"Your carriage is at the door," Mrs. Castlelon heard him say soon after.

"Why, Harry!" exclaimed his sister, looking almost shocked at his evident desire to hurry away her guest. "You surely don't think of going yet. Miss Dawson?" said she, in her most persuasive manner. "You will dance this polka."

A polka! Harry was in despair. He would have preferred dancing on hot ploughshares himself.

"The scheme works to admiration," said Mrs. Castleton to Emma, as they met for a moment in the crowd.

"But it has spoiled your party," replied the other.

"Not at all," she answered, laughing, "what it has withdrawn in elegance, it has made up in spirit. The joke seems to take wonderfully."

But Emma did not like such "jokes." Mrs. Castleton's hauteur was of a more flexible kind. To spoil a match she was willing to spoil her party.

"Was I right?" she said to Tom, toward the close of the evening.

He nodded and laughed, and said, "I congratulate you."

Harry had in vain attempted to persuade Miss Dawson that she was heated and tired, and had better not polka; but the young lady thought him over-careful, and chose to dance.

"A willful thing!" muttered Harry, as he turned off. "Trifles show the temper—preserve me from an unamiable woman."

Now Miss Dawson was not unamiable, but Harry was cross. If he were ashamed of her, she was hardly to be expected to know that. At any rate he walked off and left her to take care of herself. Mr. Hardwicks took her home as he had brought her—and Harry hardly looked at her again.

He was thoroughly out of humor. Mrs. Castleton had discretion enough not to follow up her victory. She saw she was successful, and so left things to their own course.

Never was a "dissolving view" more perfect. Harry had really imagined Miss Dawson not only very beautiful, but thought she would grace any drawing-room in Europe. He now saw her hoydenish, flirty, and ungraceful, with beauty of a very unrefined style—in fact, a different person. Such is the power of contrast, and the effect of a "new light."

The spell was broken—for when a lover is mortified, ashamed of his choice, the danger is over.

Fortunately, his honor was no deeper pledged than his heart. Miss Dawson had not flirted more with him than with two or three others; and though she would have preferred him, one of the others would do.

"What did Harry say of my party last night?" asked Mrs. Castleton of her sister.

"He merely said 'it was a great bore, this going out,' and seemed quite cross, and took his light and walked off to his room immediately; and, in fact, it seemed such a delicate point with him, that I did not dare to make any allusion to it this morning."

"Poor fellow! I don't wonder," said Mrs. Castleton, laughing. "How she did look beside the Claverings and Lesters."

"Like a peony among moss rose-buds," said Emma.

"Laura," said Harry, a few days after, "I am going to New Orleans for the rest of the winter."

"Are you?" she said, in surprise.

"Yes. My father is anxious about that business of his, and I am going for him."

"I thought you had declined, and that he was going to send Tom," she said.

"I've changed my mind," he replied. "In fact it is very dull here, and as Tom don't want to go, I think I shall like the trip."

"I've no doubt you will find it very pleasant," she said, cheerfully, amused at his proposing himself the very thing they had all been so anxious to have him do, and which he had negatived so decidedly some weeks back.

"Ah, Tom," said Mrs. Castleton, laughing, "that was a bright idea of yours. There's nothing like a new light for bringing out new colors. I think that party of mine finished Miss Dawson."

"You need not crow too much, Laura," replied Tom, "for, in all probability, if you had left Harry alone in the beginning, the party never would have been required. You women never learn not to thwart and oppose a man until it is too late. Then, you'll move heaven and earth to undo your own work. If you would only govern that 'unruly member' in the beginning, you would have required no 'dissolving views, in the end."