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HORACE CHASE

A Novel

by

CONSTANCE FENIMORE WOOLSON

AUTHOR OF "JUPITER LIGHTS" "EAST ANGELS" ETC.

NEW YORK

HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS

1894

Copyright, 1894, by HARPER & BROTHERS.

_All rights reserved._




HORACE CHASE



CHAPTER I


In a mountain village of North Carolina, in the year 1873, the spring
had opened with its accustomed beauty. But one day there came a pure
cold wind which swept through the high valley at tremendous speed from
dawn to midnight. People who never succumb to mere comfort did not
relight their fires. But to the Franklin family comfort was a goddess,
they would never have thought of calling her "mere"; "delightful" was
their word, and Ruth would probably have said "delicious." The fire in
Mrs. Franklin's parlor, therefore, having been piled with fresh logs at
two o'clock as an offering to this deity, was now, at four, sending out
a ruddy glow. It was a fire which called forth Ruth's highest
approbation when she came in, followed by her dog, Petie Trone, Esq. Not
that Ruth had been facing the blast; she never went out from a sense of
duty, and for her there was no pleasure in doing battle with things that
were disagreeable for the sake merely of conquering them. Ruth had come
from her own room, where there was a fire also, but one not so generous
as this, for here the old-fashioned hearth was broad and deep. The girl
sat down on the rug before the blaze, and then, after a moment, she
stretched herself out at full length there, with her head resting on her
arm thrown back behind it.

"It's a pity, Ruth, that with all your little ways, you are not little
yourself," remarked Dolly Franklin, the elder sister. "Such a whalelike
creature sprawled on the floor isn't endearing; it looks like something
out of Gulliver."

"It's always so," observed Mrs. Franklin, drowsily. "It's the oddest
thing in the world--but people never will stay in character; they want
to be something different. Don't you remember that whenever poor Sue
Inness was asked to sing, the wee little creature invariably chanted,
'Here's a health to King Charles,' in as martial a voice as she could
summon? Whereas Lucia Lewis, who is as big as a grenadier, always
warbles softly some such thing as 'Call me pet names, dearest. Call me a
bird.' Bird! Mastodon would do better."

"Mastodon?" Ruth commented. "It is evident, His Grand, that you have
seen Miss Billy to-day!"

Ruth was not a whale, in spite of Dolly's assertion. But she was tall,
her shoulders had a marked breadth, and her arms were long. She was very
slender and supple, and this slenderness, together with her small hands
and feet, took away all idea of majesty in connection with her, tall
though she was; one did not think of majesty, but rather of girlish
merriment and girlish activity. And girlish indolence as well. Mrs.
Franklin had once said: "Ruth is either running, or jumping, or doing
something in such haste that she is breathless; or else she is stretched
out at full length on the carpet or the sofa, looking as though she
never intended to move again!"

The girl had a dark complexion with a rich color, and hair that was
almost black; her face was lighted by blue eyes, with long thick black
lashes which made a dark fringe round the blue. The persons who liked
Ruth thought her beautiful; they asserted that her countenance had in it
something