Bressant | Page 9

old gentleman first shuffled up to the
fireplace, flapping the heels of his slippers behind him as he went, and
deposited his pipe on the mantel-piece. Next, he put on his straw hat,
and, turning to the engraving of the Transfiguration, which had served

him as a looking-glass almost ever since it had hung there, he put
himself to rights, with his usual fierce scowlings, liftings of the chin,
and jerkings at collar and stock. When every thing seemed in proper
trim, he took his ivory-headed cane from its place in the corner, and
made his way along the entry to the front door.
"Bless me!" ejaculated the professor, as he emerged upon the porch,
shading his eyes from the white dazzle of the road; "how hot it is, sure
enough!" Scarcely had he spoken, however, when the sun, which had
been coquetting for the last half-hour with the majestic white cloud
which Cornelia had idly watched from the balcony, suddenly plunged
his burning face right into its cool, soft bosom, and immediately a clear,
gray shadow gently took possession of the landscape.
"Humph!" grunted the professor again, turning a sharp, wise eye to the
westward, "we shall have a thunder-shower before long. I must take the
covered wagon. But how's this? I declare I've forgotten to change my
slippers! I'm growing old--I'm growing old, that's certain!"
As the old gentleman stood, shaking his head over this new symptom
of approaching senility, he happened to turn his eyes in the direction of
the village, and descried a figure approaching rapidly from the turn in
the road, which at once arrested his attention.
"Who can that be?" muttered he to himself, frowning to assist his vision.
"None of the town boys, that's certain. Never saw such a figure but
once before! If any thing, this is the better man of the two. By-the-way,
what if it should be--! Humph! I believe it is, sure enough."
By this time the stranger, a very tall and broadly built young man, with
a close brown beard, and quick, comprehensive eyes, had arrived
opposite the house, and stood with one hand on the gate.
"Is this the parsonage?" demanded he, speaking with great rapidity of
utterance, and turning his head half sideways as he spoke, without,
however, removing his eyes from the professor's face.
The old gentleman nodded his head, "It is known by that name, sir!"

said he.
With the almost impatient quickness which marked every thing he
did--a quickness which did not seem in any way allied to slovenliness
or inaccuracy, however--the young man pushed through the gate, which
protested loudly against such rough usage, and walked hastily up to the
porch-steps. He paused a moment ere ascending.
"Are you Professor Valeyon?" he asked.
Again the professor bowed his head in assent. "And are you--?" began
he.
The young man sprang up the steps, and grasping the other's
half-extended hand, gave it a brief, hard shake.
"I'm Bressant," said he.


CHAPTER III.
SOPHIE AND CORNELIA ENTER INTO A COVENANT.
When Cornelia left her father on the balcony, she danced up-stairs, and
chasséed on tiptoe up to the door of Sophie's room. There she stopped
and knocked.
Somehow or other, nobody ever went into that room without knocking.
It never entered any one's head to burst in unannounced. The door was
an unimposing-looking piece of deal, grained by some village artist
into the portraiture of an as yet undiscovered kind of wood, and
considerably impaired in various ways by time. It could not have been
the door, therefore. Nor was the bolt ever drawn, save at certain hours
of the morning and night. Sophie was not an ogre, either. Cornelia, who
was very trying at times, would have found it hard to recall an occasion
when Sophie had answered or addressed her sharply or crossly. If she

exerted any influence, or wielded any power, it was not of the kind
which attends a violent or morose temper. But no vixen or shrew, how
terrible soever she may be, can hope at all times or from all people to
meet with respect or consideration; while to Sophie Valeyon the world
always put on its best face and manner, secretly wondering at itself the
while for being so well-behaved.
As to the affair of knocking, Sophie herself had never said a word
about it, one way or another. She always took it as a matter of course;
indeed, had she been loquacious on the subject, or insisted upon the
observance, Cornelia for one would have been very likely to laugh to
scorn and disregard her, therein acting upon a principle of her own,
which prompted her to measure her strength against any thing which
seemed to challenge her, and never to give up if she could help