A Visit [pp. 262-266]

A Visit.
A VISIT.
Miss VAN GRABEN was gifted, happily or
otherwise, with a romantic and imaginative
temperament. She was sure to clothe with
roseate hues any triviality susceptible of such
endowment; she was given to idealizing even
the most commonplace of her acquaintance.
"Freddy's geese are all swans," Miss Van
Graben's elder sister was wont to say, half in
deprecation, half in admiration; for Frederica was a perpetual source of marvel to her
kin, they possessing excessive phlegm and
stolidity, so that her enthusiasm awakened in
them the liveliest sentiments of wonder not
unmixed with dismay.
Miss Van Graben had a letter one morning when its receipt was most opportune;
for life at the moment was a burden to the
young woman, who had exhausted every
available resource of diversion. The missive,
from a friend and schoolmate, conveyed to
Miss Van Graben an urgent invitation to
visit the frontier military post where Ethel
Dunning's husband.was stationed. It was
natural and consistent that Frederica should
hail with delight and intense appreciation the
opportunity to take flight for the remote fort;
but that the clan Van Graben should have
consented to a step so uncertain, so irregular, and so heterodox was altogether out of
the natural order of things, and even to Frederica herself well nigh incomprehensible.
' I have to thank nothing else in the world
but my own force of will and determination,"
Miss Van Graben said, with complacent selfgratulation, sweeping out upon the narrow
porch of Lieutenant Dunning's quarters;
"Charlotte would say, my pig-headed Dutch
obstinacy; for Charlotte despises the Dutch
blood I amn so proud of possessing. My love
she is a prig. I hate prigs."
"Still the same impetuous Freddy."
"And why not, pray? You don't mean to
say one could improve on the original article?
What a hideous, barren parade-ground!
Ethel, why don't you make Everett decorate
it? Present your commanding officer-what
did you say his name is?-and I'll beguile
him until this desert waste shall blossom like
the rose."
"For once you can find no words to express your raptures," satirized Everett Dunning, coming in from first guard-mount.
"Now, what a shame! I made sure you'd
like our picturesque position."
"Like it! I do like it. This is the apotheosis of desolation. The place is like the
preacher's hunchback-perfect, of its kind.
It reminds me of some graphic lines on the
Australian desert:
"'And never a man and never a beast they met on
their desolate way,
But the bleaching bones in the hungry sand said
all that the tongue could say.'"
In very truth, Miss Van Graben did enjoy,
most keenly the situation; she had a queer
trick of putting herself, as it were, upon the
outside of her experiences, and regarding
them with all the dispassionate, judicial contemplation of a critical spectator. She was
charmed with the topography of the country;
habited as she was to the careful cultivation
and prolific yield of the Eastern States, the
dry ingratitude of the soil here had all the
charm of novelty. The monotonous mechanism of the post was grateful to her overwrought nerves and senses, yet she grasped
with avidity at any excitement that offered.
Now and then a party rode out from the
post, bound for some one of the neighboring small towns or mining camps; sometimes
they scaled the heights of Pinos Altos, or
roamed among the deserted landmarks of the
ancient copper mines. The country was full
of pseudo traces of the Aztec and Toltec
tribes. Miss Van Graben reveled in eager
exploration and speculative research into
such meager and dubious historical records
as were accessible. Much to her regret,
these excursions were restricted, both as to
frequency and extent, by the danger of attack
4
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[Sept.