H.P. Lovecraft - Sweet Ermengarde

H.P. LOVECRAFT
WRITING AS PERCY SIMPLE

SWEET ERMENGARDE
OR "THE HEART OF A COUNTRY GIRL"

Written in 1917
First published in Beyond The Wall Of Sleep, Arkham House, Sauk City, WI, 1943

CONTENTS

1. A Simple Rustic Maid
2. And The Villain Still Pursued Her
3. A Dastardly Act
4. Subtle Villainy
5. The City Chap
6. Alone In The Great City
7. Happy Ever Afterward
CHAPTER I
A SIMPLE RUSTIC MAID

Ermengarde Stubbs was the beauteous blonde daughter of Hiram Stubbs, a poor
but honest farmer-bootlegger of Hogton, Vt. Her name was originally Ethyl
Ermengarde, but her father persuaded her to drop the praenomen after the
passage of the 18th Amendment, averring that it made him thirsty by reminding
him of ethyl alcohol, C2H5OH. His own products contained mostly methyl or wood
alcohol, CH3OH. Ermengarde confessed to sixteen summers, and branded as
mendacious all reports to the effect that she was thirty. She had large black
eyes, a prominent Roman nose, light hair which was never dark at the roots
except when the local drug store was short on supplies, and a beautiful but
inexpensive complexion. She was about 5ft. 5in. tall, weighed 115.47 lbs. on
her father's copy scales—also off them—and was adjudged most lovely by all the
village swains who admired her father's farm and liked his liquid crops.

Ermengarde's hand was sought in matrimony by two ardent lovers. 'Squire
Hardman, who had a mortgage on the old home, was very rich and elderly. He was
dark and cruelly handsome, and always rode horseback and carried a riding-crop.
Long had he sought the radiant Ermengarde, and now his ardour was fanned to
fever heat by a secret known to him alone—for upon the humble acres of Farmer
Stubbs he had discovered a vein of rich GOLD!! "Aha!" said he, "I will win the
maiden ere her parent knows of his unsuspected wealth, and join to my fortune a
greater fortune still!" And so he began to call twice a week instead of once as
before.

But alas for the sinister designs of a villain—'Squire Hardman was not the
only suitor for the fair one. Close by the village dwelt another—the handsome
Jack Manly, whose curly yellow hair had won the sweet Ermengarde's affection
when both were toddling youngsters at the village school. Jack had long been
too bashful to declare his passion, but one day while strolling along a shady
lane by the old mill with Ermengarde, he had found courage to utter that which
was within his heart.

"O light of my life," said he, "my soul is so overburdened that I must speak!
Ermengarde, my ideal [he pronounced it i-deel!], life has become an empty thing
without you. Beloved of my spirit, behold a suppliant kneeling in the dust
before thee. Ermengarde—oh, Ermengarde, raise me to an heaven of joy and say
that you will some day be mine! It is true that I am poor, but have I not youth
and strength to fight my way to fame? This I can do only for you, dear
Ethyl—pardon me, Ermengarde—my only, my most precious—" but here he paused to
wipe his eyes and mop his brow, and the fair responded:

"Jack—my angel—at last—I mean, this is so unexpected and quite unprecedented!
I had never dreamed that you entertained sentiments of affection in connexion
with one so lowly as Farmer Stubbs' child—for I am still but a child! Such is
your natural nobility that I had feared—I mean thought—you would be blind to
such slight charms as I possess, and that you would seek your fortune in the
great city; there meeting and wedding one of those more comely damsels whose
splendour we observe in fashion books.

"But, Jack, since it is really I whom you adore, let us waive all needless
circumlocution. Jack—my darling—my heart has long been susceptible to your
manly graces. I cherish an affection for thee—consider me thine own and be sure
to buy the ring at Perkins' hardware store where they have such nice imitation
diamonds in the window."

"Ermengarde, me love!"

"Jack—my precious!"

"My darling!"

"My own!"

"My Gawd!"

[Curtain]

CHAPTER II
AND THE VILLAIN STILL PURSUED HER

But these tender passages, sacred though their fervour, did not pass
unobserved by profane eyes; for crouched in the bushes and gritting his teeth
was the dastardly 'Squire Hardman! When the lovers had finally strolled away he
leapt out into the lane, viciously twirling his moustache and riding- crop, and
kicking an unquestionably innocent cat who was also out strolling.

"Curses!" he cried—Hardman, not the cat—"I am foiled in my plot to get the
farm and the girl! But Jack Manly shall never succeed! I am a man of power—and
we shall see!"

Thereupon he repaired to the humble Stubbs' cottage, where he found the fond
father in the still-cellar washing bottles under the supervision of the gentle
wife and mother, Hannah Stubbs. Coming directly to the point, the villain spoke:

"Farmer Stubbs, I cherish a tender affection of long standing for your lovely
offspring, Ethyl Ermengarde. I am consumed with love, and wish her hand in
matrimony. Always a man of few words, I will not descend to euphemism. Give me
the girl or I will foreclose the mortgage and take the old home!"

"But, Sir," pleaded the distracted Stubbs while his stricken spouse merely
glowered, "I am sure the child's affections are elsewhere placed."

"She must be mine!" sternly snapped the sinister 'squire. "I will make her
love me—none shall resist my will! Either she becomes muh wife or the old
homestead goes!"

And with a sneer and flick of his riding-crop 'Squire Hardman strode out into
the night.

Scarce had he departed, when there entered by the back door the radiant
lovers, eager to tell the senior Stubbses of their new-found happiness. Imagine
the universal consternation which reigned when all was known! Tears flowed like
white ale, till suddenly Jack remembered he was the hero and raised his head,
declaiming in appropriately virile accents:

"Never shall the fair Ermengarde be offered up to this beast as a sacrifice
while I live! I shall protect her—she is mine, mine, mine—and then some! Fear
not, dear father and mother to be—I will defend you all! You shall have the old
home still [adverb, not noun—although Jack was by no means out of sympathy with
Stubbs' kind of farm produce] and I shall lead to the altar the beauteous
Ermengarde, loveliest of her sex! To perdition with the crool 'squire and his
ill- gotten gold—the right shall always win, and a hero is always in the right!
I will go to the great city and there make a fortune to save you all ere the
mortgage fall due! Farewell, my love—I leave you now in tears, but I shall
return to pay off the mortgage and claim you as my bride!"

"Jack, my protector!"

"Ermie, my sweet roll!"

"Dearest!"

"Darling!—and don't forget that ring at Perkins'."

"Oh!"

"Ah!"

[Curtain]

CHAPTER III
A DASTARDLY ACT

But the resourceful 'Squire Hardman was not so easily to be foiled. Close by
the village lay a disreputable settlement of unkempt shacks, populated by a
shiftless scum who lived by thieving and other odd jobs. Here the devilish
villain secured two accomplices—ill-favoured fellows who were very clearly no
gentlemen. And in the night the evil three broke into the Stubbs cottage and
abducted the fair Ermengarde, taking her to a wretched hovel in the settlement
and placing her under the charge of Mother Maria, a hideous old hag. Farmer
Stubbs was quite distracted, and would have advertised in the papers if the
cost had been less than a cent a word for each insertion. Ermengarde was firm,
and never wavered in her refusal to wed the villain.

"Aha, my proud beauty," quoth he, "I have ye in me power, and sooner or later
I will break that will of thine! Meanwhile think of your poor old father and
mother as turned out of hearth and home and wandering helpless through the
meadows!"

"Oh, spare them, spare them!" said the maiden.

"Neverr... ha ha ha ha!" leered the brute.

And so the cruel days sped on, while all in ignorance young Jack Manly was
seeking fame and fortune in the great city.

CHAPTER IV
SUBTLE VILLAINY

One day as 'Squire Hardman sat in the front parlour of his expensive and
palatial home, indulging in his favourite pastime of gnashing his teeth and
swishing his riding-crop, a great thought came to him; and he cursed aloud at
the statue of Satan on the onyx mantelpiece.

"Fool that I am!" he cried. "Why did I ever waste all this trouble on the girl
when I can get the farm by simply foreclosing? I never thought of that! I will
let the girl go, take the farm, and be free to wed some fair city maid like the
leading lady of that burlesque troupe which played last week at the Town Hall!"

And so he went down to the settlement, apologised to Ermengarde, let her go
home, and went home himself to plot new crimes and invent new modes of villainy.

The days wore on, and the Stubbses grew very sad over the coming loss of their
home and still but nobody seemed able to do anything about it. One day a party
of hunters from the city chanced to stray over the old farm, and one of them
found the gold!! Hiding his discovery from his companions, he feigned
rattlesnake-bite and went to the Stubbs' cottage for aid of the usual kind.
Ermengarde opened the door and saw him. He also saw her, and in that moment
resolved to win her and the gold. "For my old mother's sake I must"—he cried
loudly to himself. "No sacrifice is too great!"

CHAPTER V
THE CITY CHAP

Algernon Reginald Jones was a polished man of the world from the great city,
and in his sophisticated hands our poor little Ermengarde was as a mere child.
One could almost believe that sixteen-year-old stuff. Algy was a fast worker,
but never crude. He could have taught Hardman a thing or two about finesse in
sheiking. Thus only a week after his advent to the Stubbs family circle, where
he lurked like the vile serpent that he was, he had persuaded the heroine to
elope! It was in the night that she went leaving a note for her parents,
sniffing the familiar mash for the last time, and kissing the cat
goodbye—touching stuff! On the train Algernon became sleepy and slumped down in
his seat, allowing a paper to fall out of his pocket by accident. Ermengarde,
taking advantage of her supposed position as a bride-elect, picked up the
folded sheet and read its perfumed expanse—when lo! she almost fainted! It was
a love letter from another woman!!

"Perfidious deceiver!" she whispered at the sleeping Algernon, "so this is all
that your boasted fidelity amounts to! I am done with you for all eternity!"

So saying, she pushed him out the window and settled down for a much needed
rest.

CHAPTER VI
ALONE IN THE GREAT CITY

When the noisy train pulled into the dark station at the city, poor helpless
Ermengarde was all alone without the money to get back to Hogton. "Oh why," she
sighed in innocent regret, "didn't I take his pocketbook before I pushed him
out? Oh well, I should worry! He told me all about the city so I can easily
earn enough to get home if not to pay off the mortgage!"

But alas for our little heroine—work is not easy for a greenhorn to secure, so
for a week she was forced to sleep on park benches and obtain food from the
bread-line. Once a wily and wicked person, perceiving her helplessness, offered
her a position as dish-washer in a fashionable and depraved cabaret; but our
heroine was true to her rustic ideals and refused to work in such a gilded and
glittering palace of frivolity—especially since she was offered only $3.00 per
week with meals but no board. She tried to look up Jack Manly, her one-time
lover, but he was nowhere to be found. Perchance, too, he would not have known
her; for in her poverty she had perforce become a brunette again, and Jack had
not beheld her in that state since school days. One day she found a neat but
costly purse in the park; and after seeing that there was not much in it, took
it to the rich lady whose card proclaimed her ownership. Delighted beyond words
at the honesty of this forlorn waif, the aristocratic Mrs. Van Itty adopted
Ermengarde to replace the little one who had been stolen from her so many years
ago. "How like my precious Maude," she sighed, as she watched the fair brunette
return to blondeness. And so several weeks passed, with the old folks at home
tearing their hair and the wicked 'Squire Hardman chuckling devilishly.

CHAPTER VII
HAPPY EVER AFTERWARD

One day the wealthy heiress Ermengarde S. Van Itty hired a new second
assistant chauffeur. Struck by something familiar in his face, she looked again
and gasped. Lo! it was none other than the perfidious Algernon Reginald Jones,
whom she had pushed from a car window on that fateful day! He had survived—this
much was almost immediately evident. Also, he had wed the other woman, who had
run away with the milkman and all the money in the house. Now wholly humbled,
he asked forgiveness of our heroine, and confided to her the whole tale of the
gold on her father's farm. Moved beyond words, she raised his salary a dollar a
month and resolved to gratify at last that always unquenchable anxiety to
relieve the worry of the old folks. So one bright day Ermengarde motored back
to Hogton and arrived at the farm just as 'Squire Hardman was foreclosing the
mortgage and ordering the old folks out.

"Stay, villain!" she cried, flashing a colossal roll of bills. "You are foiled
at last! Here is your money—now go, and never darken our humble door again!"

Then followed a joyous reunion, whilst the 'squire twisted his moustache and
riding-crop in bafflement and dismay. But hark! What is this? Footsteps sound
on the old gravel walk, and who should appear but our hero, Jack Manly—worn and
seedy, but radiant of face. Seeking at once the downcast villain, he said:

"'Squire—lend me a ten-spot, will you? I have just come back from the city
with my beauteous bride, the fair Bridget Goldstein, and need something to
start things on the old farm." Then turning to the Stubbses, he apologised for
his inability to pay off the mortgage as agreed.

"Don't mention it," said Ermengarde, "prosperity has come to us, and I will
consider it sufficient payment if you will forget forever the foolish fancies
of our childhood."

All this time Mrs. Van Itty had been sitting in the motor waiting for
Ermengarde; but as she lazily eyed the sharp-faced Hannah Stubbs a vague memory
started from the back of her brain. Then it all came to her, and she shrieked
accusingly at the agrestic matron.

"You—you—Hannah Smith—I know you now! Twenty-eight years ago you were my baby
Maude's nurse and stole her from the cradle!! Where, oh, where is my child?"
Then a thought came as the lightning in a murky sky. "Ermengarde—you say she is
your daughter.... She is mine! Fate has restored to me my old chee-ild—my tiny
Maudie!—Ermengarde—Maude—come to your mother's loving arms!!!"

But Ermengarde was doing some tall thinking. How could she get away with the
sixteen-year-old stuff if she had been stolen twenty-eight years ago? And if
she was not Stubbs' daughter the gold would never be hers. Mrs. Van Itty was
rich, but 'Squire Hardman was richer. So, approaching the dejected villain, she
inflicted upon him the last terrible punishment.

"'Squire, dear," she murmured, "I have reconsidered all. I love you and your
naive strength. Marry me at once or I will have you prosecuted for that
kidnapping last year. Foreclose your mortgage and enjoy with me the gold your
cleverness discovered. Come, dear!" And the poor dub did.

THE END