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The Bird of Paradise

Chapter V. Guinevere Catherine Hood at the Altar

page 24

Chapter V. Guinevere Catherine Hood at the Altar.

"At length the bell.
 With booming sound,
Sends forth, resounding round,
 Its hymeneal peal, o'er rock and down the dell."

The quality of Guinevere Catherine Hood lay not alone in the fulsome wealth of her bountiful heart: she was gifted with a high type of intellectuality, as well as a strong desire to acquire a knowledge greater than that of her superiors in social rank, and with a firm purpose she devoted herself to its acquisition. She acquitted herself at the expiration of her career in the ladies' college at Rosemary Point at the matriculation examination with great credit and distinction, and triumphed over many of her male confreres in the university examination hall.

She entered the alma mater as a matriculated student, and child of Nature that she was, she joined the classes addicted to the study of natural science and history. For two years she remained at the university, and among its lady habitués she was the observed of all. The square black university cap, with its long silk tassel, adorned the fine chiselled contour of her pale classical face in more becoming contrast than her white and fleecy Gainsborough hat, and the black flowing gown formed an admirable back-ground to the loose white robes beneath.

No infirmity harassed her healthy and vigorous frame; no spectacles spoilt the beauty of her violet eyes, whereas among the other lady students they were quite the indispensable fashion, and lent to them quite a sage and elderly appearance. No counterfeit show of wisdom: no affected indifference to the outside world; no sacrifice of her supernal nature, was ever observed in Guinevere. Love of the science of Nature, and a remarkable adaptation for it, required no distorting auxiliary aids to make it appear genuine.

In her nonchalant ways, as at the close of her term she surpassed the more assiduous ladies of the school, she incurred the tacit but bitter envy of all her inferiors. In classical studies as well she showed the light of her rare intellect, and in her rambles around Parnassus she often came in contact with Eugene. The paths from the affiliated college to the university, were lined in places with orange and pomegranate trees, and in any dilemma she would bend her steps along those shady walks and meet Eugene as he came down from the college.

The light zephyrs amongst the orange tress mingling with the sound of her voice, meeting him one fresh April morning she said, "Oh! what an awful man was this Euripides! What is the meaning of this, and this, page 25and that, and that?" pointing with her finger to the text of Shilleto. "The text is corrupted," said Eugene; "but the purport of it is that the heaven of woman is love: throw it away, Guinevere, and keep to the birds."

Then and there she threw the work of the great tragedian away, but Eugene picked it up and put it into his bag. Time after time had he sat on the seats below the orange trees translating and re-translating the choicest gems of English and the golden treasury of classical poetry for the delectation of Guinevere, till now, the following morning, he pressed the petals of the flowers which she had brought him when he was ill into the leaves of the the outcast Euripides and, writing upon its last page—

"Go, lovely rose,
Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows
"Whene'er I liken her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be"

—he handed her back the book and smiling walked away.

Her angelic stately form he often saw in the precincts of the university; he sometimes met her on the paths around the museum, and, now and then, as she was on her way home he accompanied her as far as the entrance-gates.

"Who was that lady with you when you first came into the library?" enquired Eugene one evening as she was saying goodbye.

"Marvel Gould," she replied. "She was at the ladies' college last year, but she is at home now. Marvel and I are old friends, but the other girls quarreled with Marvel and spoke what I am certain were untruths about her. They said her father took her out of the college for flirting with a married man after school hours, and they used to say she had a most abominable temper; but I always liked Marvel, and I think the other girls were jealous of her and slandered her. Marvel is a brilliant pianiste, and I am sure she is very pretty—don't you think so?"

"Yes," said Eugene, "remarkably attractive and pretty;" when, shaking hands with Guinevere, he slowly returned to the sombre affiliated college.

The memory of the black flashing eyes, the wreathed smiles, and the expressive pouts—vivid, bewitching, and alluring—haunted the mind of Eugene for years.

Guinevere came in the morning and Guinevere departed in the evening month after month, but Eugene could not leave the grounds. Often towards the close of the year he had seen her in deep conversation with Marmaduke Payne, sometimes sitting on the green knolls by the lawn together, sometimes walking by his side on her way home, for he lived in one of the suburbs and so did Guinevere. The year was fast drawing to a close and the honour examinations fast approaching when, ail at once, she became very uncertain in her attendances, and finally ceased to come.

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When the academical year ended, and the lists were posted in the endowed ceremonial hall, first again in the honour lists appeared the name of Eugene Whitworth as winner of another science scholarship, the gold medal of the university, and the degree of Master of Arts; while in another list stood the name of his friend Marmaduke Payne as having attained to the degree of Bachelor of Laws. In the honour lists for lady students there were no names in the first class, and that of Guinevere did not appear anywhere. She had not presented herself for examination at all.

It was by a mere chance that Marmaduke had obtained his degree. Dreamy and negligent of his duties, during the latter part of the year he had spent most of his time outside the gates of the University, and when he did come, it was to saunter about listlessly on the lawn in amorous resignation with the gentle Guinevere.

Not a month had passed, when one cloudless Wednesday morning, over the city and the grounds of the university the tuneful melodies of chiming and pealing marriage-bells in the Sacred Heart Cathedral Tower burst forth in ecstasy as a prologue to the wedding. Fifteen hundred students filled the front portion of the cathedral, and a thousand of the populace the back. Carriage after carriage drew up at the gates, and discharging their occupants, passed out of the thoroughfare. More richly caparisoned than the others came four white horses in silver-mounted harness, with streamers of primrose and white from their bridles, careering before a superb victoria carriage, and coming to a halt at the gate, where the footman unfastened the door for the bride and her brother inside.

Nervous, inside the cathedral waited Eugene beside his friend before the the altar. In agitation he trembled, for the angel of his soul was near. After the great cathedral organ had pealed forth the grand tones of 'O Salutaris,' and while the choir sang 'Tantum Ergo,' like Juno, of whom Virgil sang as pacing the heavens, amongst a sea of admiring faces down the long aisle came the ethereal Guinevere, attended by four bridesmaids in faun crépon and brown straw hats trimmed with yellow roses. The glorious ceremony of the Roman Catholic Church was soon concluded, and Guinevere Hood was the wife of Montague Payne. She wore a dress of ivory white satin, draped around the bodice with Brussels lace, the long court train attached to her shoulders by diamond brooches and she carried a bouquet of yellow and white roses, and white lilac fringed with maidenhair.

Thoughtful, sad, and forgetful of his duties as groom's man at the wedding, Eugene retraced his slow steps back to the cloistered halls of science. Was not the good angel who had watched over him, as he lay at the entrance into the valley of the shadow of death, and the rare girl who scattered roses before his paths in the university,—his belle ideále, his loved and only companion amongst women, cut off from Eugene for ever?

How saddens at first the heart at the loss of one whom we have for long accompanied! How terrific the loss when it is the loss of one whom we page 27loved and cherished! How appalling the anguish when that loss will last for ever; leaving nothing but the sick pain of absence behind! The long avenue of years which he had passed through in those sombre scientific palaces, and those orange-tree fringed and shady groves, had brought alone one star to shine from its ethereal dome over the dull firmament of his life. To him that brilliant star had set for ever. No other woman had embellished his life since he left the home of Miriam. No sister's voice was ever heard by Eugene. No gentle tone but that of the benign Guinevere ever shed its mellowing irradiating influence over his being.

The following year took Eugene in the Cunard Maritime Steamship Company's s.s. "Venetia" back to the land of his birth and the medical schools of Great Britain, Ireland, and the Continent of Europe, where, with the same unremitting application he attained to the degrees of Bachelor of Medicine, and Master of Surgery of the University of London, and Member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. He had won the principal scholarships of the University of Philadelphia. These entitled him to emoluments of great financial assistance, and largely supplemented the bank drafts received from his father. Before leaving England he obtained the degrees of Doctor of Medicine and Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, and became the gold medallist of the University of London. After which he studied for short periods at the leading hospitals of Paris, Berlin, and Vienna. He was also made a surgeon in the Imperial army, and served for a short campaign in the Afghan War.

These events marked an important epoch in the historiette of Eugene Whitworth. No student had scorned delights or lived laborious days more so than he had done. None was more upright or purer in thought and in deed. None more exemplary in character,—never a whisper was heard to disparage his name. With a strong constitution, a host of scientific and medical degrees, and a good face, he seemed to be a type of a coming successful surgeon, and ready and willing he was to undertake the boldest work in the annals of surgery.

The millstone of university life was now thrown off his neck. He was a man fitted and well armed for the great battle of life that through all the rolling ages waged outside. Prepared he was to take his place amongst the noblest, the bravest, and the best. His condescension knew no bounds. If he saw any meritorious principle in the poorest and worst of his fellows, his practice was to cultivate, cherish and make a close companion of its promulgator. To be respected by man was not his aim; but to put rich and poor, the prince and the pauper, the curled and befrilled darling lolling in the lap of luxury, and the homeless waif and stray upon the one universal plane, was ever one of the guiding principles of his life.

How different, Eugene Whitworth, your future condition of life would have been if you had not neglected and despised the rich, and assimilated so much with the poor! His prolonged university career, where he had page 28breathed the atmosphere of the noblest, the best, and the greatest, had not eliminated this cardinal law of his mind. He would have preferred to sit and listen to the songs and dreams of old Adam Quain again to escorting a bejewelled princess to the opera.

His friend and fellow-student, Marmaduke, was of an obverse character, Marmaduke never forgot Marmaduke, and would no more associate in his successful days with an inferior than he would make up his mind to lie down in the gutter. On the other hand, he would desert his friends and hurry himself off to new ones, if he fancied the new ones were better than the old—the longing of the moth for the star. For years, these two characters had existed in shoulder to shoulder attrition; but their angular incongruity was never effaced. "Like repels like, and like attracts unlike," is an axiom as applicable to moral philosophy as it is to electricity. Eugene was a counterpart of Marmaduke, and Marmaduke was an antithesis of Eugene.

There was but one respect in which these two opposite characters merged into one another; in which for a short period in the one case, and a long period in the other, they ran a parallel course, side by side, soon again to diverge; the one at that point of divergence to exhaust itself in that one particular similarity, the other to pursue its way alone till Fate herself had cut its thread. This it is that will haul down your flying pennons, Eugene Whitworth; this it is Marmaduke Payne, that will hurl you into an early, a watery, and an ignominious grave.