Was she really quite as simple-minded as she seemed, or
could she be the "designing woman" of the novels? Yes, I admitted to her
cautiously that I possessed a maternal parent, who was at that moment
safely drinking her tea in a terrace at South Kensington. "_I_ have none," she said, with an emphasis on the personal pronoun, and
a sort of appealing look in her big eyes. "But you should take care of
yourself, for her sake. You really _must_ take my rug. _Hundreds_, oh,
_thousands_ of young Englishmen come out here, and kill themselves their
first winter by imprudence." Thus adjured, I accepted the rug with many thanks and apologies, and
wrapped myself warmly up in the corner, with a splendid view of my
_vis-à-vis_. Exactly at that moment, the ticket collector came round upon his
official tour. Now, on American and Canadian railways, you do not take
your ticket beforehand, but pay your fare to the collector, who walks up
and down through the open cars from end to end, between every station. I
lifted up my bag of silver, which lay on the seat beside me, and
imprudently opened it to take out a few dollars full in sight of my
enchanting neighbour. I saw her look with unaffected curiosity at the
heap of coin within, and I was proud at being able to give such an
unequivocal proof of my high respectability--for what better guarantee
of all the noblest moral qualities can any man produce all the world
over than a bag of dollars? "What a lot of money!" she said, as the collector passed on. "What can
you want with it all in coin?" "I'm going on a tour in the Southern States," I confided in reply, "and
I thought it better to take specie." (I was very proud ten or twelve
years ago of that word _specie_.) "And I suppose those are your initials on the reticule? What a pretty
monogram! Your mother gave you that for a birthday present." "You must be a conjurer or a clairvoyant," I said, smiling. "So she
did;" and I added that the initials represented my humble patronymic and
baptismal designations. "My name's Lucretia," said my neighbour artlessly, as a child might have
said it, without a word as to surname or qualifying circumstances; and
from that moment she became to me simply Lucretia. I think of her as
Lucretia to the present day. As she spoke, she pointed to the word
engraved in tiny letters on her pretty silver locket. I suppose she thought my confidence required a little more confidence in
return, for after a slight pause she repeated once more, "My name's
Lucretia, and I live at Richmond." "Richmond!" I cried. "Why, that's just where I'm going. Do you know the
rector?" "Mr. Pritchard? Oh yes, intimately. He's our greatest friend. Are you
going to stop with him?" "For a day or two at least, on my way to Montreal. Mrs. Pritchard is my
mother's cousin." "How delightful! Then we may consider ourselves acquaintances. But you
don't mean to knock them up to-night? They'll all be in bed long before
one o'clock." "No, I haven't even written to tell them I was coming," I answered. "They gave me a general invitation, and said I might drop in whenever I
pleased." "Then you must stop at the hotel to-night. I'm going there myself. My
people keep the hotel." Was it possible! I was thunderstruck. I had pictured Lucretia to myself
as at least a countess of the _ancien régime_, a few of whom still
linger on in Montreal and elsewhere. Her locket, her rugs, her eyes, her
chiselled features, all of them seemed to me redolent of the old French
_noblesse_. And here it turned out that this living angel was only the
daughter of an inn-keeper! But in that primitive and pleasant Canadian
society such things, I thought, can easily be. No doubt she is the
petted child of the house, the one heiress of the old man's savings; and
after spending a winter holiday among the gaieties of Quebec, she is now
returning to pass the Christmas season with her own family. I will not
conceal the fact that I had already fallen over head and ears in love
with Lucretia at first sight, and that frank avowal made me love her all
the more. Besides, these Canadian hotel-keepers are often very rich; and
was not her manner perfect, and was she not an intimate friend of the
rector and his wife? All these things showed at least that she was
accustomed to refined society. I caught myself already speculating as to
what my mother would think of such a match. In five minutes it was all arranged about the hotel, and I had got into
the midst of a swimming conversation with Lucretia. She told me about
herself and her past; how she had been educated at a convent in
Montreal, and loved the nuns, oh so dearly, though she was a Protestant
herself, and only French on her mother's side. (This, I thought, was
well, as a safeguard against parental prejudice.) She told me all the
gossip of Richmond, and whom I should meet at the rector's, and what a
dull little town it was. But Quebec was delightful, and Montreal--oh, if
she could only live in Montreal, it would be perfect bliss. And so I
thought myself, if only Lucretia would live there with me; but I
prudently refrained from saying so, as I thought it rather premature. Or
perhaps I blushed and stammered too much to get the words out. "Had she
ever been in Europe?" No, never, but she would so like it. "Ah, it would
be delightful to spend a month or two in Paris," I suggested, with
internal pictures of a honeymoon floating through my brain. "Yes, that
would be most enjoyable," she answered. Altogether, Lucretia and I kept
chatting uninterruptedly the whole way to Richmond, and the other
passengers must have voted us most unconscionable bores; for they
evidently could not sleep by reason of our incessant talking. _We_ did
not sleep, nor wish to sleep. And I am bound to say that a more frankly
enchanting or seemingly guileless girl than Lucretia I have never met
from that day to this. At last we reached Richmond Depôt (as the Canadians call the stations),
very cold and tired externally, but lively enough as regards the
internal fires. We got out, and looked after our luggage. A sleepy
porter promised to bring it next morning to the hotel. There were no
sleighs in waiting--Richmond is too much of a country station for
that--so I took my reticule in my hand, threw Lucretia's rug across her
shoulders, and proceeded to walk with her to the hotel. Now, the "Depôt" is in a suburb known as Melbourne, while Richmond
itself lies on the other side of the river St. Francis, here crossed by
a long covered bridge, a sort of rough wooden counterpart of the famous
one at Lucerne. As we passed out into the cold night, it was snowing
heavily, and the frost was very bitter. Lucretia took my arm without a
word of prelude, as naturally as if she were my sister, and guided me
through the snow-covered path to the bridge. When we got under the
shelter of the wooden covering, we had to pass through the long dark
gallery, as black as night, heading only for the dim square of moonlight
at the other end.