Madelon | Page 3

of her father.
Now she filled up the doorway before Burr Gordon with her majestic,
palpitating bulk, her great black face stiffened back with obstinacy. It
was said that she had been born in Africa, and had been a princess in
her own country; and, indeed, she bore herself like one now, and held
up her orange-turbaned head as if it were crowned, and bore her candle
like a flaming sceptre which brought out strange gleams of color and
metallic lustres from her garments and the rows of beads on her black
neck.
Burr Gordon made an impatient yet deferential motion to enter. "I
would like to see her a few minutes if she is at home," said he.
The woman muttered something which might have been in her native
dialect, the words were so rolled into each other under her thick tongue.
Her small, sharp eyes were fairly malicious upon the young man's
handsome face.
"I don't know what you say," he said, half angrily. "Can't I see her?"
"She's in the north parlor, I s'pose," muttered the black woman; and she
stood aside and let Burr Gordon pass in, following him with her hostile
eyes as he opened the north-parlor door. Dorothy Fair sat with her
embroidery-work at the mahogany table, whereon a whole branch of

candles burned in silver sticks. She was working a muslin collar for her
own adornment, and she set a fine stitch in a sprig before she rose up,
either to prove her self-command to herself or to Burr Gordon. She had
also held herself quiet during the delay in the hall.
Dorothy Fair came of a gentle and self-controlled race of New England
ministers; but now her young heart carried her away. She stood up; her
embroidery, with her scissors and bodkin, slid to the ground, and she
came forward with her fair curls dropping around a face pink and
smiling openly with love like a child's, and was, seemingly half of her
own accord, in Burr Gordon's arms with her lips meeting his; and then
they sat down side by side on the north-parlor sofa.
Dorothy Fair's face was very sweet to see; her blue eyes and her soft
lips were innocent and fond under her lover's gaze. Her little white
hand clung to his like a baby's. There was a sweet hollow under her
chin, above her fine lace collar. Her soft, fair curls smelt in his face of
roses and lavender. The utter daintiness of this maiden Dorothy Fair
was a separate charm and a fascination full of subtle and innocent
earthiness to the senses of a lover. She appealed to his selfish delight
like a sweet-scented flower, like a pink or a rose.
Lot Gordon had been only half right in his analysis of his cousin's
wooing. When Burr sat with his arm around this maiden's waist, with
his face bent tenderly down towards the soft, pink cheek on his
shoulder, this sweetness near at hand was wellnigh sufficient for him,
and Dorothy's shy murmur of love in his ear overcame largely the
memory of the other's wonderful song. A bee cares only for the honey
and not for the flower, therefore one flower is as dear to him as another;
and so it is with many a lover when he gets fairly to tasting love. The
memory of the rose before fades, even if he never wore it. Then, too,
Burr Gordon had a sense of approbation from his shrewder self which
sustained him. This Dorothy Fair, the minister's daughter, of gentle
New England lineage, the descendant of college-learned men, and of
women who had held themselves with a fine dignity and mild reserve
in the village society, the sole heiress of what seemed a goodly
property to the simple needs of the day, appealed to his reason as well

as his heart. He remained until near midnight, while the old black
woman crouched with the patience of a watching animal outside the
door, and he wooed Dorothy Fair with ardor and delight, although her
softly affectionate kisses were to Madelon Hautville's as the fall of
snow-flakes to drops of warm honey. And although after he had gone
home and fallen asleep his dreams were mixed, still when he waked
with the image of Madelon between himself and Dorothy, because
sleep had set his heart free, it was still with that sense of approbation.
Madelon Hautville was not considered a fair match for a young man
who had claims to ambition. The Hautville family held a peculiar place
in public estimation. They belonged not to any defined stratum of the
village society, but formed rather a side ledge, a cropping, of quite
another kind, at which people looked askance. One reason undoubtedly
was the mixture of foreign blood which