Ishmael | Page 9

rushed out in a body, all the worse for a cask of old rye whisky that had been broached, and began to search for eligible stands from which to witness the exhibition of the evening.
Reuben conducted the sisters to a high knoll at some distance from the disorderly crowd, but from which they could command a fine view of the fireworks, which were to be let off in the lawn that lay below their standpoint and between them and the front of the dwelling-house. Here they sat as the evening closed in. As soon as it was quite dark the whole front of the mansion-house suddenly blazed forth in a blinding illumination. There were stars, wheels, festoons, and leaves, all in fire. In the center burned a rich transparency, exhibiting the arms of the Brudenells.
During this illumination none of the family appeared in front, as their forms must have obscured a portion of the lights. It lasted some ten or fifteen minutes, and then suddenly went out, and everything was again dark as midnight. Suddenly from the center of the lawn streamed up a rocket, lighting up with a lurid fire all the scene--the mansion-house with the family and their more honored guests now seated upon the upper piazza, the crowds of men, women, and children, white, black, and mixed, that stood with upturned faces in the lawn, the distant knoll on which were grouped the sisters and their protector, the more distant forests and the tops of remote hills, which all glowed by night in this red glare. This seeming conflagration lasted a minute, and then all was darkness again. This rocket was but the signal for the commencement of the fireworks on the lawn. Another and another, each more brilliant than the last, succeeded. There were stars, wheels, serpents, griffins, dragons, all flashing forth from the darkness in living fire, filling the rustic spectators with admiration, wonder, and terror, and then as suddenly disappearing as if swallowed up in the night from which they had sprung. One instant the whole scene was lighted up as by a general conflagration, the next it was hidden in darkness deep as midnight. The sisters, no more than their fellow-rustics, had never witnessed the marvel of fireworks, so now they gazed from their distant standpoint on the knoll with interest bordering upon consternation.
"Don't you think they're dangerous, Reuben?" inquired Hannah.
"No, dear; else such a larned gentleman as Mr. Brudenell, and such a prudent lady as the old madam, would never allow them," answered Gray.
Nora did not speak; she was absorbed not only by the fireworks themselves, but by the group on the balcony that each illumination revealed; or, to be exact, by one face in that group--the face of Herman Brudenell.
At length the exhibition closed with one grand tableau in many colored fire, displaying the family group of Brudenell, surmounted by their crest, arms, and supporters, all encircled by wreaths of flowers. This splendid transparency illumined the whole scene with dazzling light. It was welcomed by deafening huzzas from the crowd. When the noise had somewhat subsided, Reuben Gray, gazing with the sisters from their knoll upon all this glory, touched Nora upon the shoulder and said:
"Look!"
"I am looking," she said.
"What do you see?"
"The fireworks, of course."
"And what beyond them?"
"The great house--Brudenell Hall."
"And there?"
"The party on the upper piazza."
"With Mr. Brudenell in the midst?"
"Yes."
"Now, then, observe! You see him, but it is across the glare of the fireworks! There is fire between you and him, girl--a gulf of fire! See that you do not dream either he or you can pass it! For either to do so would be to sink one, and that is yourself, in burning fire--in consuming shame! Oh, Nora, beware!"
He had spoken thus! he, the poor unlettered man who had scarcely ever opened his mouth before without a grievous assault upon good English! he had breathed these words of eloquent warning, as if by direct inspiration, as though his lips, like those of the prophet of old, had been touched by the living coal from Heaven. His solemn words awed Hannah, who understood them by sympathy, and frightened Nora, who did not understand them at all. The last rays of the finale were dying out, and with their expiring light the party on the upper piazza were seen to bow to the rustic assembly on the lawn, and then to withdraw into the house.
And thus ended the f��te day of the young heir of Brudenell Hall.
The guests began rapidly to disperse.
Reuben Gray escorted the sisters home, talking with Hannah all the way, not upon the splendors of the festival--a topic he seemed willing to have forgotten, but upon crops, stock, wages, and the price of tea and sugar. This did not prevent Nora from dreaming on the interdicted