The House Behind the Cedars | Page 6

thought she might be some young lady from the upper part of
the town, bound on some errand of mercy, or going, perhaps, to visit an
old servant or look for a new one. Once she threw a backward glance at
Warwick, thus enabling him to catch a second glimpse of a singularly
pretty face. Perhaps the young woman found his presence in the
neighborhood as unaccountable as he had deemed hers; for, finding his
glance fixed upon her, she quickened her pace with an air of startled
timidity.

"A woman with such a figure," thought Warwick, "ought to be able to
face the world with the confidence of Phryne confronting her judges."
By this time Warwick was conscious that something more than mere
grace or beauty had attracted him with increasing force toward this
young woman. A suggestion, at first faint and elusive, of something
familiar, had grown stronger when he heard her voice, and became
more and more pronounced with each rod of their advance; and when
she stopped finally before a gate, and, opening it, went into a yard shut
off from the street by a row of dwarf cedars, Warwick had already
discounted in some measure the surprise he would have felt at seeing
her enter there had he not walked down Front Street behind her. There
was still sufficient unexpectedness about the act, however, to give him
a decided thrill of pleasure.
"It must be Rena," he murmured. "Who could have dreamed that she
would blossom out like that? It must surely be Rena!"
He walked slowly past the gate and peered through a narrow gap in the
cedar hedge. The girl was moving along a sanded walk, toward a gray,
unpainted house, with a steep roof, broken by dormer windows. The
trace of timidity he had observed in her had given place to the more
assured bearing of one who is upon his own ground. The garden walks
were bordered by long rows of jonquils, pinks, and carnations,
inclosing clumps of fragrant shrubs, lilies, and roses already in bloom.
Toward the middle of the garden stood two fine magnolia-trees, with
heavy, dark green, glistening leaves, while nearer the house two mighty
elms shaded a wide piazza, at one end of which a honeysuckle vine,
and at the other a Virginia creeper, running over a wooden lattice,
furnished additional shade and seclusion. On dark or wintry days, the
aspect of this garden must have been extremely sombre and depressing,
and it might well have seemed a fit place to hide some guilty or
disgraceful secret. But on the bright morning when Warwick stood
looking through the cedars, it seemed, with its green frame and canopy
and its bright carpet of flowers, an ideal retreat from the fierce sunshine
and the sultry heat of the approaching summer.
The girl stooped to pluck a rose, and as she bent over it, her profile was

clearly outlined. She held the flower to her face with a long-drawn
inhalation, then went up the steps, crossed the piazza, opened the door
without knocking, and entered the house with the air of one thoroughly
at home.
"Yes," said the young man to himself, "it's Rena, sure enough."
The house stood on a corner, around which the cedar hedge turned,
continuing along the side of the garden until it reached the line of the
front of the house. The piazza to a rear wing, at right angles to the front
of the house, was open to inspection from the side street, which, to
judge from its deserted look, seemed to be but little used. Turning into
this street and walking leisurely past the back yard, which was only
slightly screened from the street by a china-tree, Warwick perceived the
young woman standing on the piazza, facing an elderly woman, who
sat in a large rocking-chair, plying a pair of knitting-needles on a
half-finished stocking. Warwick's walk led him within three feet of the
side gate, which he felt an almost irresistible impulse to enter. Every
detail of the house and garden was familiar; a thousand cords of
memory and affection drew him thither; but a stronger counter-motive
prevailed. With a great effort he restrained himself, and after a
momentary pause, walked slowly on past the house, with a backward
glance, which he turned away when he saw that it was observed.
Warwick's attention had been so fully absorbed by the house behind the
cedars and the women there, that he had scarcely noticed, on the other
side of the neglected by-street, two men working by a large open
window, in a low, rude building with a clapboarded roof, directly
opposite the back piazza occupied by the two women. Both the men
were busily engaged in shaping barrel-staves, each wielding a
sharp-edged drawing-knife on a