Afternoon Tea Mysteries, Volume Two: A Collection of Cozy Mysteries

by Marion Bryce

  “If you have decided upon buying the shares I have mentioned,” said the former, “you had better get your money in a position to handle at once. I shall wish to present you to Mr. Stuyvesant tomorrow, and I should like to be able to mention you as a future stockholder in the bank.”

  “Mr. Stuyvesant!” exclaimed Bertram, ignoring the rest of the sentence.

  “Yes,” returned his uncle with a smile, “Thaddeus Stuyvesant is the next largest stockholder to myself in the Madison Bank, and his patronage is not an undesirable one.”

  “Indeed—I was not aware—excuse me, I should be happy,” stammered the young man. “As for the money, it is all in Governments and is at your command whenever you please.”

  “That is good, I’ll notify you when I’m ready for the transfer And now come,” said he, with a change from his deep business tone to the lighter one of ordinary social converse, “forget for a half hour that you have discarded the name of Mandeville, and give us an aria or a sonata from Mendelssohn before those hands have quite lost their cunning.”

  “But the ladies,” inquired the youth glancing towards the drawingroom where Mrs. Sylvester was giving Paula her first lesson in ceramics.

  “Ah, it is to see how the charm will act upon my shy country lassie, that I request such a favor.”

  “Has she never heard Mendelssohn?”

  “Not with your interpretation.”

  Without further hesitation the young musician proceeded to the piano, which occupied a position opposite to my lady’s picture in this anomalous room denominated by courtesy the library. In another instant, a chord delicate and ringing, disturbed the silence of the long vista, and one of Mendelssohn’s most exquisite songs trembled in all its delicious harmony through these apartments of sensuous luxury.

  Mr. Sylvester had seated himself where he could see the distant figure of Paula, and leaning back in his chair, watched for the first startled response on her part. He was not disappointed. At the first note, he beheld her spirited head turn m a certain wondering surprise, followed presently by her whole quivering form, till he could perceive her face, upon which were the dawnings of a great delight, flush and pale by turns, until the climax of the melody being reached, she came slowly down the room, stretching out her hands like a child, and breathing heavily as if her ecstacy of joy in its impotence to adequately express itself, had caught an expression from pain.

  “O Mr. Sylvester!” was all she said as she reached that gentleman’s side; but Bertram Mandeville recognized the accents of an unfathomable appreciation in that simple exclamation, and struck into a grand old battle-song that had always made his own heart beat with something of the fire of ancient chivalry under its breastplate of modern broadcloth.

  “It is the voice of the thunder clouds when they marshal for battle!” exclaimed she at the conclusion. “I can hear the cry of a righteous struggle all through the sublime harmony.”

  “You are right; it is a war-song ancient as the time of battle-axes and spears,” quoth Bertram from his seat at the piano.

  “I thought I detected the flashing of steel,” returned she. “O what a world lies in those simple bits of ivory!”

  Say rather in the fingers that sweep them,” uttered Mr. Sylvester. “You will not hear such music often.”

  “I am glad of that,” she cried simply, then in a quick conscious tone explained, “I mean that the hearing of such music makes an era in our life, a starting-point for thoughts that reach away into eternity; we could not bear such experiences often, it would confuse the spirit if not deaden its enjoyment. Or so it seems to me,” she added naively, glancing at her cousin who now came sweeping in from the further room, where she had been trying the effect of a change in the arrangement of two little pet monstrosities of Japanese ware.

  “What seems to you?” that lady inquired. “O, Mr. Mandeville’s playing? I beg pardon, Sylvester is the name by which you now wish to be addressed I suppose. Fine, isn’t it?” she rambled on all in the same tone while she cautiously hid an unfortunate gape of her rosy mouth behind the folds of her airy handkerchief. “Mr. Turner says the hiatus you have made in the musical world by leaving the concert room for the desk, can never be repaired,” she went on, supposedly to her nephew though she did not look his way, being at that instant engaged in sinking into her favorite chair.

  “I am glad,” Bertram politely returned with a frank smile, “to have enjoyed the approval of so cultivated a critic as Mr. Turner. I own it occasions me a pang now and then,” he remarked to his uncle over his shoulder, “to think I shall never again call up those looks of self-forgetful delight, which I have sometimes detected on the faces of certain ones in my audience.”

  And he relapsed without pause into a solemn anthem, the very reverse of the stirring tones which he had previously accorded them.

  “Now we are in a temple!” whispered Paula, subduing the sudden interest and curiosity which this young man’s last words had awakened. And the awe which crept over her countenance was the fittest interpretation to those noble sounds, which the one weary-hearted man in that room could have found.

  “I have something to tell you, Ona,” remarked Mr. Sylvester shortly after this, as the music being over, they all sat down for a final chat about the fireside. “I have received notice that the directors of the Madison Bank have (his day elected me their president. I thought you might like to know it tonight.”

  “It is a very gratifying piece of news certainly. President of the Madison Bank sounds very well, does it not, Paula?”

  The young girl with her soul yet ringing with the grand and solemn harmonies of Mendelssohn and Chopin, turned at this with her brightest smile. “It certainly does and a little awe-inspiring too;” she added with her arch glance.

  “Your congratulations are also requested for our new assistant cashier. Arise, Bertram, and greet the ladies.”

  With a blush his young nephew arose to his feet.

  “What! are you going into the banking business?” queried Mrs. Sylvester. “Mr. Turner will be more shocked than ever: he chooses to say that bankers, merchants and such are the solid rock of his church, while the lighter fry such as artists, musicians, and let us hope he includes us ladies, are its minarets and steeples. Now to make a foundation out of a steeple will quite overturn his methodical mind I fear.”

  Mr. Sylvester looked genially at his wife; she was not accustomed to attempt the facetious; but Paula seemed to have the power of bringing out unexpected lights and shadows from all with whom she came in contact.

  “A clergyman who rears his church on the basis of wealth must expect some overturning now and then,” laughed be.

  “If by means of it he turns a fresh side to the sun, it will do him no harm,” chimed in Paula.

  Seldom had there been so much simple gaiety round that fireside; the very atmosphere grew lighter, and the brilliance of my lady’s picture became less oppressive.

  “We ought to have a happy winter of it,” spoke up Mr. Sylvester with a glance around him. “Life never looked more cheerful for us all, I think; what do you say, Bertram my boy.”

  “It certainly looks promising for me.”

  “And for me,” murmured Paula.

  The complacent way with which Mrs. Sylvester smoothed out the feathers of her fan with her jewelled right hand,—she always carried a fan winter and summer, some said for the purpose of displaying those same jewelled fingers—was sufficient answer for her.

  At that moment there was a hush, when suddenly the small clock on the mantelpiece struck eleven, and instantly as if awaiting the signal, there came a rush and a heavy crash which drew every one to their feet, and the brilliant portrait of my lady fell from the wall, and toppling over the cabinet beneath, slid with the various articles of bronze and china thereon, almost to the very chair in which its handsome prototype had been sitting.

  It was a startling interruption and for an instant no one spoke, then Paula with a look towards her cousin breathed to hers
elf rather than said, “Pray God it be not an omen!” And the pale countenances of the two gentlemen standing face to face on either side of that fallen picture, showed that the shadow of the same superstition had insensibly crossed their own minds.

  Mrs. Sylvester was the only one who remained unmoved. “Lift it up,” cried she, “and let us see if it has sustained any injury.”

  Instantly Bertram and her husband sprang forward, and in a moment its glowing surface was turned upward. Who could read the meaning of the look that crossed her husband’s face as he perceived that the sharp spear of the bronze horseman, which had been overturned in the fall, had penetrated the rosy countenance of the portrait and destroyed that importunate smile forever.

  “I suppose it is a judgment upon me for putting all the money you had allowed me for charitable purposes, into that exquisite bit of bronze,” observed Mrs. Sylvester, stooping above the overturned horseman with an expression of regret she had not chosen to bestow on her own ruined picture. “Ah he is less of a champion than I imagined; he has lost his spear in the struggle.”

  Paula glanced at her cousin in surprise. Was this pleasantry only a veil assumed by this courtly lady to hide her very natural regret over the more serious accident? Even her husband turned toward her with a certain puzzled inquiry in his troubled countenance. But her expression of unconcern was too natural; evidently the destruction of the picture had awakened but small regret in her volatile mind.

  “She is less vain than I thought,” was the inward comment of Paula.

  Ah simple child of the woods and streams, it is the extent of her vanity not the lack of it, that has produced this effect. She has begun to realize that ten years have elapsed since this picture was painted, and that people are beginning to say as they examine it, “Mrs. Sylvester has not yet lost her complexion, I see.”

  A break necessarily followed this disturbance, and before long Bertram took his leave, not without a cordial pressure from his uncle’s hand and a look of kindly interest from the stranger lassie, upon whose sympathetic and imaginative mind the hints let fall as to his former profession, had produced a deep impression. With his departure Mrs. Sylvester’s weariness returned, and ere long she led the way to her apartments up stairs. As Paula was hastening to follow Mr. Sylvester stopped her.

  “You will not allow this unfortunate occurrence,” he said, with a slight gesture towards the picture now standing with its face against the wall, “to mar your first sleep under my roof, will you Paula, my child?”

  “No, not if you say that you think Cousin Ona will not be likely to connect it with my appearance here.”

  “I do not think she will; she is not superstitious and besides does not seem to greatly regret the misfortune.”

  “Then I will forget it all and only remember the music.”

  “It was all you anticipated?”

  “It was more.”

  “Sometime I will tell you about the player and the sweet young girl he loves.”

  “Does he—” she paused, blushing; love was a subject upon which she had never yet spoken to any one.

  “Yes he does,” Mr. Sylvester returned smiling.

  “I thought there was a meaning in the music I did not quite understand. Good night, uncle,”—he had requested her to address him thus though he was in truth her cousin, “and many, many thanks.”

  But he stopped her again. “You think you will be happy in these rooms,” said he; “you love splendor.”

  She was not yet sufficiently acquainted with his voice to detect the regret underlying its kindly tone, and answered without suspicion. “I did not know it before, but I fear that I do. It dazzled at first, but now it seems as if I had reached a home towards which I had always been journeying. I shall dream away hours of joy before each little ornament that adorns your parlors. The very tiles that surround the fireplace will demand a week of attention at least!”

  She ended with a smile, but unlike formerly he did not seem to catch the infection. “I had rather you had cared less,” said he, but instantly regretted the seeming reproach, for her eyes filled with tears and the tones of her voice trembled as she replied,

  “Do you think the beauty I have seen has made me forget the kindness that has brought me here? I love fine and noble objects, glory of color and harmony of shape, but more than all these do I love a generous soul without a blot on its purity, or a flaw in its integrity.”

  She had meant to utter something that would show her appreciation of his goodness and the universal esteem in which he was held, but was quite unprepared for the start that he gave and the unmistakable deepening of the shadow on his sombre face. But before she could express her regret at the offence, whatever it was, he had recovered himself, and it was with a fatherly tenderness that he laid his hand upon hers while he said, “Such a soul may yours ever continue, my child,” and then stood watching her as she glided up the stairs, her charming face showing every now and then as she leaned on her winding way to the top, to bestow upon him the tender little smile she had already learned was his solace and delight.

  It was the beginning of happier days for him.

  BOOK II.

  LIFE AND DEATH.

  XIV. MISS BELINDA HAS A QUESTION TO DECIDE.

  “I pray you in your letters,

  …

  Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate.

  Nor set down aught in malice.”

  —OTHELLO.

  Miss Belinda sitting before her bedroom fire on a certain windy night in January, presented a picture of the most profound thought. A year had elapsed since, with heavy heart and moistened eye, she had bidden good-bye to the child of her care, and beheld her drift away with her new friend into a strange and untried life. And now a letter had come from that friend, to which with the truest appreciation for the feelings of herself and sister, he requested their final permission to adopt Paula as his own child and the future occupant of his house and heart.

  Yes, after a year of increased comfort, Mrs. Sylvester, who would never have consented to receive as her own any child demanding care or attention, had decided it was quite a different matter to give place and position to a lovely girl already grown, whose beauty was sufficiently pronounced to do credit to the family while at the same time it was of a character to heighten by contrast her own very manifest attractions. So the letter, destined to create such a disturbance in the stern and powerful mind of Miss Belinda, had been written and dispatched.

  And indeed it was matter for the gravest reflection. To accede to this important request was to yield up all control over the dear young girl whose affection had constituted the brightness of this somewhat disappointed life, while to refuse an offer made with such evident love and anxiety, was to bring a pang of regret to a heart she hesitated to wound. The question of advantage which might have swayed others in their decision, did not in the least affect Miss Belinda. Now that Paula had seen the world and gained an insight into certain studies beyond the reach of her own attainments, any wishes a which she might have indulged on that score, were satisfied, and mere wealth with its concomitant of luxuriant living, she regarded with distrust, and rather in the light of a stumbling-block to the great and grand end of all existence.

  Suddenly with that energy which characterized all her movements, she rose from her seat, and first casting a look of somewhat cautious inquiry at the recumbent figure of her sister, asleep in the heavy old fashioned bed that occupied one corner of the room, she proceeded to a bureau drawer and took out a small box which she unlocked on the table. It was full of letters; those same honest epistles, which, as empowered by Mr. Sylvester, she had requested Paula to send her from week to week. Some of them were a year old, but she read them all carefully through, while the clock ticked on the shelf and the wind soughed in the chimney. Certain passages she marked, and when she had finished the pile, she took up the letters again and re-read those passages. They were necessarily desultory in their character, but they all had, in her mind at
least, a bearing upon the question on hand, and as such, I give them to my readers.

  “O aunty, I have made a friend, a sweet girl friend who I have reason to hope will henceforth be to me as my other eye and hand. Her name is Stuyvesant—a name by the way that always calls up a certain complacent smile on Cousin Ona’s countenance—and she is the daughter of one of the directors of Mr. Sylvester’s bank. I met her in a rather curious way. For some reason Ona had expressed a wish for me to ride horseback. She is rather too large for the exercise herself, but thought it looked well, she said, to see a lady and groom ride from the front of the house; moreover it would keep me in color by establishing my health. So Mr. Sylvester who denies her nothing, promised us horses and the groom, and as a preparation for acquitting myself with credit, has sent me to one of the finest riding academies in the city. It was here I met Miss Stuyvesant. She is a small interesting-looking girl whose chief beauty lies in her expression which is certainly very charming. I was conscious of a calm and satisfied feeling the moment I saw her. Her eyes which are raised with a certain appeal to your face, are blue, while her lips that break into smiles only at rare moments, are rosy and delicately curved. In her riding-habit she looks like a child, but when dressed for the street she surprises you with the reserved and womanly air with which she carries her proud head. Altogether she is a sweet study to me, alluring me with her glance yet awing me by her dainty ladyhood, a ladyhood too unconscious to be affected and yet so completely a part of her whole delicate being, that you could as soon dissociate the bloom from the rose, as the air of highborn reserve, from this sweet scion of one of New York’s oldest families.

  “I was mounting my horse when our eyes first met, and I never shall forget her look of delighted surprise. Did she recognize in me the friend I now hope to become? Later we were introduced and by Mr. Sylvester who had been so kind as to accompany me that day. The way in which he said to her, “This is Paula,” proved that I was no new topic of conversation between them, and indeed she afterwards explained to me that she had been forewarned of my arrival during an afternoon call at his house. There was in this first interview none of the unnecessary gush which you have so often reprobated as childish; indeed Miss Stuyvesant is not a person with whom one would presume to be familiar, nor was it till we had met several times that any acknowledgement was made of the mutual interest with which we found ourselves inspired. Cousin Ona to whom I had naturally spoken of the little lady, wished me to cultivate her acquaintance more assiduously, but I knew that if I had excited in her the same interest she had awakened in me, this would not be necessary; our friendship would grow of itself and blossom without any hot-house forcing. And so it did. One day she came to the riding-school with her eyes like stars and her cheeks like the oleanders in your sitting-room. Her brightness was so contagious. I stepped up to her. But she greeted me with almost formal reserve, and mounting her horse, proceeded to engage in her usual exercise. I was not hurt; I recognized the presence of some thought or feeling whit h made a barrier around her sensitive nature, and duly respected it. Mounting my own horse, I rode around the ring which is the somewhat limited field of my present equestrian efforts, and waited. For I knew from the looks which she cast me every now and then, that the flower of cur friendship was outgrowing its sheath and would soon burst into the bud of perfect understanding. At the end of the lesson we approached each other. I do not know how it was done, but we walked home together, or rather I accompanied her to the stoop of her house, and before we parted we had exchanged those words which give emphasis to a sentiment long cherished but now for the first time avowed. Miss Stuyvesant and I are friends, and I feel as though a new stream of enjoyment had opened in my breast.