Edgar Poe sat easily upon a high stool in the little shop.  His dress was handsome and, as always, exquisite in its neatness and taste.  His whole appearance and bearing were marked by an “air” which deeply impressed the young printer who had promptly fallen under the spell of his personal charm.  He had laid his hat upon the desk, baring the glossy brown ringlets that clustered about his large, pale brow.  His clear-cut features were mobile and eager; his dark grey eyes full of life.  His voice had a wonderful musical quality, becoming passionate when, as at present, his feeling was deeply aroused.

His poetry, recited thus, gained much of distinction.  Its crudities would have been lost, to a great extent, even upon a critic.  But Thomas was no critic.  He was simply a dreamy, half-educated youth with a mind open to the beautiful and the romantic.  The flights of the poet’s fancy did not seem to him obscure or too fantastic.  They admitted him to a magic world in which he sat spell-bound until silence brought him back to his tiny bare shop which seemed suddenly to have been glorified.

“It is wonderful—­wonderful!” he breathed.

He began to picture himself as not only sharing the wealth, but the fame which the publication of these gems was bound to bring.  But he had to explain that he was poor, and that he could not bring out the poems without financial aid.  The money which had been given Edgar to set out in the world with, was already dwindling, but he managed to subscribe a sum which Thomas declared would be sufficient, with the little he himself could add, for the printing of a modest edition, in a very modest garb.

CHAPTER XIV.

In the Allan mansion, in Richmond, there was a stillness that was oppressive.  No young foot-falls sounded upon the stair; no boyish laughter rang out in rooms or hall.  There were handsome and formal dinners occasionally, when some elderly, distinguished stranger was entertained, but there were no more merry dancing parties, with old Cy playing the fiddle and calling the figures.

Frances Allan, fair and graceful still, though looking somewhat out of health and “broken,” as her friends remarked to one another, trod softly about the stately rooms with no song on her lip, no gladness in her step.  Her husband was grown suddenly prematurely old and his speech was less frequent and harsher than before.  He was more immersed in business than ever and was prospering mightily, but the fact seemed to bring him no satisfaction.  Even the old servants had lost much of their mirth.  Their black faces were grown solemn and their tread heavy.  They looked with awe upon their mistress when, as frequently happened, they saw her quietly enter “Marse Eddie’s” room and close the door behind her.

In that room and there alone, the fair, gentle, woful creature gave free reign to the grief of her stricken mother-heart.  The room was kept just as her boy had left it, for she constantly hoped against hope that he would return.  Hers was the aching, pent-up grief of a mother whose child is dead, yet she is denied the solace of mourning.