The foggy day had ended in a stormy night. Black clouds had hurried wildly over the troubled face of the sky; a dull peal of thunder, booming in the distance, had been its herald. Rain, and thunder, and lightning had it all its own way until about midnight, when the sullen clouds had drifted slowly, and the moon showed her fair, sweet face in her place. A day of brightest sunshine, accompanied by a high wind, had been the result; and in its morning refulgence, Captain Cavendish was sauntering along the Redmon road. Not going to the big brick house, surely: Nathalie had told him the picnic day of Mrs. Leroy's growing dislike to visitors, and the hint had been taken. Perhaps it was only for a constitutional, or to kill time; but there he was, lounging in the teeth of the gale, and whistling an opera air as he went. The Nettleby cottage, fairly overrun with its luxuriance of sweetbrier, and climbing roses, and honeysuckle, was a pretty sight, and well worth looking at, and perhaps that was the reason Captain Cavendish stood still to admire it. The windows, all wreathed with crimson and pink roses, were open; and at one sat Cherrie, in all her beauty, like a picture in a frame. The crimson July roses about her were not brighter than her cheeks at the sight of him, and her starry eyes flashed a welcome few men would not have coveted. How prettily she was dressed, too—knowing well he would come, the gypsy!—in pink muslin; her bare neck and arms rising plump and rounded out of the gauziness; all her shining jetty curls flashing about, and sprays of rosebuds twisted through them. How the pale, blue-eyed, snowy-skinned, fair-haired prettiness of Nathalie dimmed in the young officer's ardent imagination beside this tropical, gorgeous loveliness of the sunny South. He opened the little gate, and was at the window before she arose.
"My black-eyed fairy? You look perfectly dazzling this morning. Who is in?"
"No one," said Cherrie, showing her pearl-white teeth in her deepening smile. "The boys are off fishing; father's up working in Lady Leroy's garden, and Ann's gone to town for groceries."
"Allah be praised! I may come in, then, my darling, may I not?"
Cherrie's answer was to throw the door wide open; and the young officer entered and took a seat, screened from the view of passers-by by the green gloom of the vines. That green twilight of roses and honeysuckles was just the thing for lovers to talk in; and Captain Cavendish had a great deal to say to Cherrie, and to all he said Cherrie had nothing to give but rapturous assents, and was altogether in the seventh heaven, not to say a few miles beyond that lofty elysium. It was all arranged at last as the young gentleman wished, and, lolling easily on the sofa, he went off on another tack.
"Are you often up in Redmon House, Cherrie?" he asked, stringing the black ringlets about his fingers.
Cherrie, seated on a low stool beside his couch, nestled luxuriously, with her head on his knee.
"Pretty often, George." It had come to that, you see. "Why?"
"Because—because I think you might find out something for me. I have a fancy, do you know, that the old lady doesn't over and above like me."
"I know she don't," said Cherrie, decidedly. "She can't bear you, nor Midge either. They scold Miss Natty like sixty every time you go there."
"The deuce they do? Suppose she fancied—mind, I only say fancied—I wanted to marry Miss Natty, do you suppose she would consent?"
"Consent! She'd pack Miss Natty bag and baggage out of the house, more likely. She'd die before she'd give in, would Mrs. Leroy."
Captain Cavendish fell to musing, and mused so long that Cherrie glanced up from under her black lashes, wondering what made his handsome face look so grave.
"What are you thinking about?" she pouted; "Miss Natty, I suppose."
"No, my little black-eye. I was thinking how you could do something for me."
"What is it?"
"Couldn't you listen; couldn't you manage to hear sometimes what Mrs. Leroy says to Natty, when they are talking of me?"
Miss Nettleby was not at all shocked at this proposal; but I suppose the reader is. I know very well it is disgraceful in one calling himself a gentleman, and altogether dishonorable; but Captain Cavendish's ideas of honor, and yours and mine, are rather different. Had any one called him a liar or a swindler, or thrown a decanter at his head, or a tumbler of wine in his face, at the mess-table, or elsewhere, he would have considered his honor forfeited forever, if he did not stand up to shoot and be shot at by the offending party, as soon as possible afterward. In one word, not to mince matters, Captain Cavendish, handsome and elegant as he was, was an infidel and a villain, and you may as well know it first as last.
"I dare say I can," was Cherrie's reply to his proposal. "I am up there often enough, and I know all the ins and outs of the place. I'll do what I can."
Captain Cavendish rewarded her, as lovers do reward one another, I am told, and shortly after arose to take his leave. Miss Nettleby escorted him to the gate.
"You won't forget Tuesday night, Cherrie," he said, turning to go.
"It's not very likely," said Cherrie; "but I'll see you again before that—won't I, George?"
"Of course, my darling! Take care of yourself, and good-bye."
He sauntered up the road at an easy pace; and Cherrie lingered at the gate, admiring his tall and elegant figure, and thinking, with an exultant heart beating, what a happy and lucky girl she was. Forget Tuesday night! the night that was to make her his bride. She quite laughed aloud at the thought, in the glee of her heart. He was still in sight, this Adonis of hers, and she still lingered at the gate watching him. Lingering there, she saw something not quite so pleasant as she could wish. Miss Nathalie Marsh, in a dress of blue barege, a black silk mantle, and a pretty white hat trimmed with azure ribbon, its long white plume tipped with blue, and set jauntily on her flowing sunny curls; came down the avenue from the house, opened the gate, and stepped into the road, and confronted her (Cherrie's) beloved. Cherrie saw him start eagerly forward, but could not hear what he said, and perhaps for her peace of mind it was just as well.
"My darling Nathalie! the fortunate chance I have been wishing for has come then! Are you going to town?"
Nathalie, smiling and blushing, shyly held out her hand.
"Good morning, Captain Cavendish! I——" but he interposed reproachfully.
"Captain Cavendish, from you, Nathalie; I thought you knew my name."
"Perhaps I have forgotten it," she laughed. "What are you doing up here, George," a little hesitatingly, though, and with a vivid flush, not half so glibly as Miss Nettleby had uttered it ten minutes before. "Were you going to call?"
"Hardly—remembering the hint you gave me the other day. But though I could not storm the castle of my fairy-princess, it was pleasant, at least, to reconnoiter the outside, and I hoped, too, for the lucky chance that has arrived. Am I to have the happy privilege of escorting you into town?"
Nathalie cast a half-apprehensive glance behind, but Midge was not on the watch. Had she known how dearly she was to pay for that walk—for that escort, rather—she had hardly answered with that happy, careless laugh.
"Yes, you may have that happy privilege! What did you do with yourself all day yesterday in the fog?" Cavendish thought of what he had been doing in Val's office, but he did not tell Miss Marsh. Cherrie was still standing by the cottage gate, and they were passing it now, looking like a black-eyed queen, under the arches of scarlet runners and morning-glories.
"A pretty place," said Captain Cavendish, "and that girl at the gate has a beautiful face. They tell me she has turned half the heads in Speckport."
Nathalie's fair brow contracted; not in jealousy, she never thought of that, but at the recollection of Charley. She made no answer. Her attention was attracted by a lady who was coming toward them. A young lady, nicely dressed, who stepped mincingly along, with a sweet smile on her sullen face.
"What brings Catty Clowrie up this way, I wonder?" exclaimed Nathalie, bowing as she passed, while the captain lifted his hat. "It is ever so long since I have seen her on this road before. I hope she is not going to Redmon."
But Miss Clowrie was going to Redmon. She had not started with that idea; it had never entered her head until she met the lovers; but she turned and looked after them with a smile of evil menace on her face.
"I hate her!" was her thought. "I hate her! But for her I might have had him once. Now he is that Nettleby girl's beyond hope. I wish Miss Marsh joy of her sister-in-law."
"That Nettleby girl" still stood at the gate. Miss Clowrie bestowed the light of her smile upon her in passing, still deep in thought. "They say in Speckport Lady Leroy has forbidden Captain Cavendish the house, and threatens to disinherit Natty if she keeps his company. Perhaps she does not know of this. I think I'll go up and tell her. One good turn deserves another."
Midge answered the young lady's knock, and admitted her to the presence of Lady Leroy. That mummy she found in her usual state of wrappings, and very ready for a little gossip.
"Why don't you go out more, Mrs. Leroy," insinuated Catty; "it would do you good, I am sure."
"No, it wouldn't!" snapped the old lady. "It does me harm. I hain't got over that picnic yet."
"But I should think you would find it very lonely here, with Nathalie away so much. I hear she spends most of her time in town of late."
"So she does," Lady Leroy screamed. "She will go in spite of me. If it ain't the school, it's a party or a picnic—something or other; but she's gallivanting all the time."
"I met her just now," remarked Catty, in a careless way, "with Captain Cavendish. He had been waiting for her, I think, at the gate."
"What?" shrieked Lady Leroy, "who with, or who did you say?"
"Captain Cavendish," repeated Miss Clowrie, looking surprised. "I thought you said they were engaged! At least, every one says they are."
Lady Leroy fell back, gasping, clawing the air in her struggle with her ten talon-like fingers. Catty, quite alarmed, started up to assist her. Lady Leroy grasped her by the wrist with a fierce grip.
"You're sure of this? You're sure of this?" she huskily whispered, still gasping. "You're sure she was walking with him? You're sure she is engaged to him?"
"I am sure she was walking with him," said Catty; "and every one says she is engaged to him; and what every one says must be true. It's very strange you did not know it."
Lady Leroy "grinned horribly a ghastly smile." "I do know it now! I told her not to go with him—I told her not to go with him—and this is the way she obeys me!"
She fell to clawing the air again, in a manner so very uncomfortable to look at, that Miss Clowrie arose, with some precipitation, to go.
"They say he is a fortune-hunter and very extravagant, and goes after her because she is your heiress; but I'm sure I don't know. Good morning, Mrs. Leroy. I am glad to see you looking so well."
With which the fair Miss Clowrie bowed herself out, smiling more than Midge had ever seen her before, and quite laughing, in fact, when she got out of doors.
"I think I have paid a little of my debt, Miss Natty," she thought. "I'll pay it all, my dear, I hope, before either of us die."
In the silent solitude of her lonely room, Lady Leroy had ample time to nurse her wrath before the return of her ward. It was nearly noon before that young lady reached home, her pretty face glowing with her rapid walk.
"Midge," was her first breathless question, "has Catty Clowrie been here this morning?"
Midge answered in the affirmative, and Nathalie's heart sank. All the way up-stairs she was preparing herself for a violent outburst of wrath; but, to her astonishment, Lady Leroy was quite tranquil. She glanced very hard at her, it is true, and her fingers were clawing empty air very viciously, but her voice was not loud nor angry.
"You're very late, aren't you?" she said. "What kept you?"
"I ran down to see mamma. Miss Rose told me she was not very well; but I hurried home as fast as I could. I'll make out those bills now."
"Let the bills wait awhile," said the old lady. "I have something to tell you."
This was an ominous commencement, and Nathalie looked at her in some dread.
"Who was it you walked into town with this morning?" she asked, glaring harder than ever.
Catty had told, then. All the blood in Nathalie's body seemed blazing in her face, as she answered:
"It was Captain Cavendish. I chanced to meet him near the gate, and I could not very well help his walking back to town with me."
"Didn't you promise me," said Lady Leroy, still speaking with astonishing calmness, but clawing the air fiercely with both hands, "when I forbade you going with him, that you would walk with him no more?"
"No," said Nathalie. "I said he would come here no more, and neither he shall."
"Until I am dead, I suppose," said the old woman, with a laugh that was very unpleasant to hear, "and you have all my money. Answer me one question, Natty. Are you engaged to him? Don't tell a lie."
"No," said Nathalie, proudly, "I am not in the habit of telling deliberate lies. I am!"
Lady Leroy gave a shrill gasp, her fingers working convulsively, but the spasm was over in a moment. She sat up again; and Nathalie, hurriedly and imploringly, went on:
"Dear Mrs. Leroy, don't be angry! Indeed, you misjudge Captain Cavendish; he is a good and honorable man, and respects you much. Dear Mrs. Leroy, consent to our engagement and I will be the happiest girl in the world!"
She went over and put her arms round the mummy's neck, kissing the withered face. The old woman pushed her away with another of her unpleasant laughs.
"There—there, child! do as you please. I knew you would do it anyway, only I won't have him here—mind. I won't have him here! Now, get to work at them bills. What's the matter with your mother?"
"Sick headache," said Nathalie, chilled, she scarcely knew why, by the old woman's manner. "She wanted me to stay with her this afternoon; but I told her I was afraid you could not spare me."
Mrs. Leroy mused a few moments, while Nathalie wrote, and then looked up.
"I'll spare you this afternoon, Natty, since your mother is sick. You can take the bills in with you and collect them. If you are back by nine, it will do."
Nathalie was so amazed, she dropped her pen and sat staring, quite unable to return a word of thanks, and not quite certain she was not dreaming.
"Get on, get on!" exclaimed Lady Leroy, in her customary testy tone. "You'll never have the bills done at that rate."
Nathalie finished the bills mechanically, and with a mind far otherwise absorbed. Then she went to her room, and put on her hat and mantle for another walk to Speckport; but all the time that uneasy feeling of doubt and uncertainty remained. Mrs. Leroy had acted so strangely, had been so ominously quiet and unlike herself, and had not consented. Nathalie came in dressed for town, and bent over her, until her long bright curls swept the yellow old face.
"Dear Mrs. Leroy!" she pleadingly said, "I cannot feel satisfied until you actually say you agree to this engagement. Do—do, if you love your Natty, for all my happiness depends upon it. Do say you consent, and I will never offend you again as long as I live?"
Lady Leroy glared up at her with green, and glittering, and wicked old eyes.
"If I don't consent, will you break off, Natty?"
"You know I cannot. I love him with all my heart. Oh, Mrs. Leroy! remember you were once young yourself, and don't be hard!"
Looking at that dry and withered old antediluvian, it was hard to imagine her ever young—harder still to imagine her knowing anything about the fever called love. She pushed Nathalie impatiently away.
"Get along with you, and don't bother!" was her cry. "I told you to have your way, and you ought to be satisfied. You won't give in to me, but you'd like me to give in to you—wouldn't you? Go along, and don't torment me!"
When Mrs. Leroy's cracked voice grew shrill and piercing, and her little eyes gleamed greenish flame, Nathalie knew better than to irritate her by disobedience. She turned to go, with a strange sinking of the heart.
"I will be back by nine," she said, simply, as she quitted the room.
Miss Nettleby, seated at her cottage door, under the roses and sweetbrier, industriously stitching on some gossamer article to be worn next Tuesday evening, looked up in some surprise at sight of Miss Marsh on her way to Speckport, for the second time that day.
"Going back to town, Miss Natty?" she called out, familiarly.
Miss Natty's answer was a cold and formal bow, as she passed on. Cherrie dropped her work and started up.
"I'll go to the house and have a talk with Granny Grumpy herself before she comes back. Perhaps I may find out something. I wonder what sort of humor she is in."
Lady Leroy was in uncommonly serene humor for her. Before Nathalie had been ten minutes gone, she had shouted for Midge; and that household treasure appearing, with sleeves rolled up over her elbows, and in a very soapy and steamy state, had desired her to array herself in other garments, and go right away into Speckport.
"Go into Speckport!" cried Midge, in shrill indignation. "I'll see you boiled alive first, ma'am, and that's the long and short of it. Go into town, wash-day, indeed! What do you want in town, ma'am?"
"I want Mr. Darcy—that's what I want!" vehemently replied her mistress. "I want Mr. Darcy, you ugly little imp; and if you don't go straight after him, I'll heave this at your head, I will!"
"This" was a huge black case bottle, which trifle of glass the lady of Redmon brandished in a manner that made even Midge draw back a few paces in alarm.
"I want Mr. Darcy on important business, I do!" screamed Lady Leroy. "And tell him not to let the grass grow under his feet on the way. Be off, will you?"
"Why didn't you tell Miss Natty?" sulkily said Midge.
"Because she isn't coming back till nine o'clock, that's why; and I can't wait. Well, what do you want, young woman?"
This last polite interrogation was addressed to Miss Nettleby, who stood smiling in the doorway, in all the splendor of her charms.
"I just ran up to see how you were," said Cherrie. "If you want any errand done in the town, Mrs. Leroy, I'll go. I can walk faster than Midge, you know."
"So she can," cried Midge; "let her go, ma'am; I won't."
With which Midge waddled off, making the hall quake with her airy tread. Mrs. Leroy looked with unusual graciousness at the young lady.
"Will you go, Cherrie, and be quick about it. Tell Darcy to hurry; you can drive back with him, you know."
Cherrie wanted nothing better, and was off like a dart, scenting a secret, and determined to get at the bottom of it.
"What does she want with her lawyer, I wonder?" soliloquized Cherrie, on the road. "I'll find out. Miss Natty's out of the way, and Midge will be down in the kitchen. I'll find out."
Mr. Darcy was one of the best lawyers in the town, and was Lady Leroy's man of business ever since her advent in Speckport. Cherrie found him in his office—a handsome and gentlemanly old man, with gray hair, whiskers, and mustache, and a clear, bright eye.
"What can the old lady want?" he wondered, aloud, putting on his hat; "she didn't tell you, I suppose? Will you drive back with me, Miss Cherrie?"
Miss Cherrie consented, and they had a very pleasant drive together, the old gentleman chaffing her about her beaux, and wanting to know when she was going to stop breaking hearts, and get married. Cherrie did not say "next Tuesday," she only laughed, and desired to be set down at her own gate.
There she watched the lawyer out of sight, and then went deliberately after him. Not to the front door, however, but to a back window she knew of, easily lifted, through it, up-stairs on tiptoe, and into Nathalie's room, which she locked on the inside. Nathalie's room adjoined Lady Leroy's, and the wall being thin, the conversation of the lawyer and the old woman was distinctly audible. Cherrie sat down on the floor, with her ear glued to the wall, and listened. It was a prolonged and excited talk, the lawyer angrily protesting, Mrs. Leroy angrily determined; and it ended in Mr. Darcy's yielding, but grumblingly, and still under protest. Cherrie had fairly held her breath while listening—astonishment and delight pictured on her face.
There was a long silence; Mr. Darcy was writing. In half an hour his task was completed, and he read it aloud to the mistress of Redmon. "That will do," said Lady Leroy, "I'm glad it's over."
"Do you want that paper witnessed? Call Midge."
Mr. Darcy opened the door, and shouted through the darkness for Midge, as Captain Cavendish had once done before. Midge made her appearance, as soapy and steamy as ever.
"Write your name here," said Mr. Darcy, abruptly pointing to the place.
"What is it?" inquired Midge.
"That's no affair of yours, is it? Sign it, will you?"
Midge took the pen as if it weighed half a ton or so, set her head very much on one side, thrust her tongue a little out of one corner of her mouth, and with much labor and painstaking, affixed a blotted autograph—Priscilla Short.
"That will do," said Mr. Darcy; "we want another. Call in old Nettleby—he can write."
Midge, casting a parting look, of much complacence at her performance, departed on her errand, and old Nettleby coming in shortly after, affixed another blotted signature. Mr. Darcy dispatched him about his business, folded the document, put it in his pocket-book, and took his hat and cane to go. On the threshold he paused.
"This has been done under the influence of anger, Mrs. Leroy," he said; "and you will think better of it, and send me word to destroy it before long. I consider it most unjust—exceedingly unjust—altogether unjustifiable! Good afternoon, ma'am."
Cherrie waited in her hiding-place until she heard the hall door close after him, then stole noiselessly out, down-stairs, through the window, and gained her own home, unobserved.
What had she heard? Her face was flushed, her eyes bright, her whole manner strangely excited. She could not keep still—she walked ceaselessly to and from the gate, straining her eyes in the direction of Speckport.
"Why don't he come! Why don't he come!" she kept repeating, hurriedly. "Oh, what will he say to this?"
Ann Nettleby, busy in the culinary department, never remembered seeing her restless sister so exceedingly restless as on this afternoon. When the clock struck six, and old Mr. Nettleby plodded home from his day's work, and the two young Mr. Nettleby's came whistling from town, and tea was ready, Ann came out to call her to partake. But Cherrie impatiently declined to partake; and still waited and watched, while the sunset was burning itself out of the purple sky, and the cinnamon roses drooped in the evening wind. The last amber and crimson flush was paling behind the blue western hills, when he, so long waited for, came up the dusty road, twirling a cane in his hand, and smoking a cigar. The unspeakable beauty and serenity of the summer twilight was no more to him than to her who watched at the vine-wreathed gate. A handsome man and a pretty girl—each was far more to the taste of the other than all the beauty of sky and earth.
Right opposite the cottage were the dark, silent cedar woods. The moment he came in sight, Cherrie opened the gate, motioning him to follow, struck into the narrow footpath, winding among the woods. Captain Cavendish followed, and found her sitting on a little knoll, under the tree.
"I have been watching for you this ever so long," she breathlessly began; "I thought you would never come! I have something to tell you, and I daren't tell you in the house, for father and the boys are there."
Captain Cavendish leaned against a tree, puffed his cigar, and looked lazily down at her.
"Well, petite, what is it?"
"Oh, it's something dreadfully important. It's about Miss Marsh."
The young captain threw away his cigar, and took a seat beside Cherrie, interested at once. He put his arm round her waist, too, but this is by-the-way.
"About Miss Marsh? Have you been listening?"
Cherrie gave him an account how she had gone for Mr. Darcy, and hidden afterward in Nathalie's room.
"My clever little darling! And what did you hear?"
"You never could guess! O my goodness," cried Cherrie, clasping her hands, "won't Miss Natty be in a passion, when she finds it out."
"Will she, though? Let us hear it, Cherrie."
"Well," said Cherrie, "you know Miss Natty was to be heiress of Redmon, and have all Lady Leroy's money when she dies?"
"Yes! well?"
"Well, she isn't to be any longer! Lady Leroy made a new will this afternoon, and Miss Natty is disinherited!"
Captain Cavendish started with something like an oath.
"Cherrie! are you sure of this?"
"Certain sure!" said Cherrie, with a look and tone there was no doubting. "I heard every word of it—her telling him so first, and him reading the will afterward and father and Midge signed it!"
"The—devil!" said Captain Cavendish between his teeth; "but what put such a freak in the old hag's head?"
"You!" said Cherrie.
"I!"
"Yes—just you! She told Mr. Darcy Natty was engaged to you, and would not give you up, all she could say; so she meant to disinherit her. She said Nathalie should never know, unless she married you before she was dead—if she didn't, she shouldn't find it out until she was in her grave, and then you would desert her when you found out she was poor, and Nathalie would be rewarded for her disobedience!"
Captain Cavendish's handsome face wore a scowl so black, and the oath he swore was so dreadful, that even Cherrie shrank away in something like terror.
"The old hag! I could throttle her if I had her here! Cherrie, who did she leave her money to?"
"To her brother—or, in case of his death, to his heirs; and five pounds to Natty to buy a mourning ring."
"Did you hear her brother's name?"
"Yes, but I forget! It was Harrington, or Harrison, or something like that. Mr. Darcy scolded like everything, and said it was unjust; but Lady Leroy didn't seem to mind him. Isn't it good I listened?"
"Cherrie! Cherrie! Cherrie!" called Ann Nettleby, "Where are you, Cherrie? There's somebody in the house wants you!"
"I must go!" said Cherrie, rising. "You stay here, so Ann won't see you. Will you be up to-morrow?"
"Yes," said Captain Cavendish; and Cherrie flitted away rapidly in the growing dusk. For once he was glad to be rid of Cherrie—glad to be calm and think, and the late-rising moon was high in the sky before he left the wood, and walked back to Speckport.
Cherrie's visitor turned out to be Charley Marsh, who received the reverse of a cordial welcome from his fickle-minded lady-love, who was more than a little provoked at his shortening her interview with one she liked better. She seated herself by the window, with her eyes fixed on the cedar wood, rapidly blackening now, waiting for her lover to emerge; but when his tall dark figure did at length stride out through the dark path, night had fairly fallen, and it was too late to see what expression his face wore.
Whatever the young Englishman's state of mind had been on leaving the wood that night, it was serene as mood could be when, next morning, Sunday, Miss Nettleby,en grande tenue, gold chain and all, made her appearance in Speckport, and met him as she turned out of Redmon road. Miss Nettleby was going to patronize the cathedral this morning, confirmation was to take place, with all the magnificent and poetical ceremonies of the Catholic Church, and Cherrie would not have missed it for the world. Neither would Captain Cavendish, who went partly from curiosity, partly to kill time, partly to show himself in full uniform, and partly to hear Nathalie Marsh play and sing. Out of the great organ she was drawing such inspiring strains as Captain Cavendish thought he had never heard before; rolling out in volumes of harmony over the ears of people below, and grand and grateful were the notes the instrument gave forth to her master-hand. In front of the altar all the youthful aspirants for confirmation were seated, the girls robed in snowy white, and wearing vails and wreaths on their bowed heads, like young brides. But now the bishop, in mitre and chasuble, with a throng of attendant priests, in splendid vestments, preceded by a score of acolytes in scarlet soutanes, and white lace surplices, bearing candles and crozier, are all on the altar, and the choir have burst forth as with one voice, into the plaintive cry "Kyrie Eleison," and pontifical high mass has begun. High over all that swelling choir, high, clear and sweet, one soprano voice arises, the voice of the golden-haired organist: "Gloria in Excelsis!" Something in the deep solemnity of the scene, in the inspiring music, in the white-robed and flower-crowned girls, in the silent devotion of the thousands around him, stirred a feeling in the soul of the man, that he had never felt since, in early boyhood, before he knew Eton or Voltaire, he had knelt at his mother's knee, and learned there his childish prayers. He forgot, for a brief while, his wickedness and his worldliness, forgot the black-eyed girl by his side, and the blue-eyed girl whose voice vibrated through those lofty aisles, and, with dreamy eyes, and a heart that went back to that old time, listened to the sermon of the aged and white-haired priest, grown gray in the service of that God whom he, a poor atom of the dust, dared deride. It was one of those moments in which the great Creator, in his infinite compassion for his lost sheep, goes in search of us to lead us back to the fold, in which our good angel flutters his white wings about us, and tries to lift us out of the slime in which we are wallowing. But the sermon was over, the benediction given, the last voluntary was playing, and the vast crowd were pouring out. Captain Cavendish took his hat and went out with the rest; and before he had fairly passed through the cathedral gates was his old, worldly, infidel self again, and was pouring congratulations and praise into the too-willing ears of Nathalie Marsh, on her admirable performances, while Charley went home with Cherrie.
All that day, and the next, and the next, Captain Cavendish never came near Redmon, or the pretty cottage where the roses and sweetbriers grew; but Mr. Johnston, a pleasant-spoken and dapper young cockney, without an h in his alphabet, and the captain's confidential valet, came back and forth with messages, and took all trouble and suspicion off his master. Neither had Miss Nettleby made her appearance in Speckport; she had spent the chief part of her time about the red-brick house, but had learned nothing further by all her eavesdropping. In a most restless and excited state of mind had the young lady been ever since Monday morning, in a sort of inward fever that grew worse and worse with every passing hour. She got up and sat down, and wandered in and out, and tried to read, and sew, and net, and play the accordion, and threw down each impatiently, after a few moments' trial. She sat down to her meals and got up without eating anything; her cheeks burned with a deep, steady fever-red, her eyes had the unnatural brightness of the same disease, and Ann stared at her, and opined she was losing her wits.
In rain and gloom the wedding-day dawned at last. Cherrie's fever was worse—she wandered from room to room of the cottage all day long, the fire in her eyes and the hectic on her cheek more brilliant than ever. The sky was like lead, the wind had a warning wail in its voice, and the rain fell sullenly and ceaselessly. But the rain could not keep the girl in-doors; she went out and wandered around in it all, returning dripping wet, three or four times, to change her drenched clothes. The girls had the cottage to themselves; old Nettleby was out in the shed, mending his gardening-tools, and the boys were in Speckport. The dull day was ending in a duller and rainier twilight, and Ann Nettleby was bustling about the tidy kitchen, getting tea, and wondering if Cherrie had gone to bed in her room up-stairs, she had been so quiet for the last half-hour. She did not go up to see; but set the tea to draw, laid the table, and lit the lamp. The wet twilight had now closed in, in a black and dismal night, when Ann heard a carriage stop at the gate, and, a moment after, a loud knock at the front door. Before she could open it, some person without did so, and Ann saw Mr. Val Blake, wrapped in a mackintosh, and waiting at the gate a cab, with a lighted lamp.
"How are you, Ann?" inquired Mr. Blake. "Is Cherrie in?"
"Yes, here I am!" a voice called out, and Cherrie herself came running down stairs, her heart beating so fast and thick she could hardly speak.
"I thought you would like a drive this evening, Cherrie," said Val; "it's wet, but you won't mind it in the cab, and I'll fetch you back before ten. Run and wrap up and come along."
It was not the first time Ann Nettleby had heard such impromptu invitations given and accepted, and it was none of her business to interfere. Cherrie was off like a flash, and down again directly, in out-door dress, her vail down, to hide her flushed and excited face.
Ann Nettleby, standing in the cottage-door, watched the cab drive away through the rainy night, and then, closing the door, went back to the kitchen, to give her father his tea. She took her own with him, setting the teapot back on the stove, to keep hot for her brothers. Old Nettleby fell asleep immediately after tea, with his pipe in his mouth, and Ann went back to her netting, wondering once more what Cherrie was about, and wishing she could have such fine times as her elder sister. Could she only have seen in some magic mirror what was at that moment going on in a humble little Wesleyan chapel in a retired street of the town! The building dimly lighted by one flickering candle; a minister, or what looked like one, in white neckcloth and clerical suit of black; the tall and distinguished man, wearing a shrouding cloak, and the little girl, who trembled and quivered so fearfully, standing before him, while he pronounced them man and wife; and that other tall young man, with his hands in his coat-pockets, listening and looking on! Could Ann Nettleby only have seen it all, and known that her pretty sister was that very night a bride!
Val Blake was certainly the soul of punctuality. As the clock on the kitchen-mantel was striking ten, the cab stopped once more at the cottage-door, and she heard his unceremonious voice bidding Cherrie good-night. Ann opened the door, and Cherrie, her vail still down, brushed past her without saying a word, and flitted up the staircase to her own room.
It was half an hour later when Ann Nettleby's two brothers came, dripping like water-dogs, home from town; and Ann having admitted them, went yawningly up-stairs to bed.
"I say, father," said Rob Nettleby, pulling off his wet jacket, "was there company up at Redmon to-day?"
"No," replied the old man. "Why?"
"Oh, because we met a carriage tearing by just now, as if Old Nick was driving. I wonder what it was about?"
Miss Cherrie Nettleby was not a young lady of very deep feeling, or one likely to be long overcome by romantic emotion of any sort. Therefore, before a week stood between her and that rainy July night, she was all her own self again, and that night seemed to have come and gone out of her life, and left no trace behind it. She was Cherrie Nettleby still, not Mrs. Captain Cavendish; she lived in the cottage instead of the handsome suite of apartments the elegant young officer occupied in the best hotel in Speckport. She flaunted in the old gay way through her native town, and held her usual evening levee of young men in the cottage-parlor as regularly as the evening came round. It did seem a little strange to her at first that marriage, which makes such a change in the lives of other girls, should make so little in hers. She never doubted for a single second that she was really and legally his wife, and Val Blake kept his own counsel. The captain told her that he would resign his commission or exchange into the first homeward-bound regiment; and meantime she was to be a good girl and keep their secret inviolably. She was to encourage Charley Marsh, still—poor Charley! while he every day played the devoted to Nathalie.
Cherrie's wedding night had been nearly the last of July. The crimson glory of an August sunset lay on the climbing roses, the sweetbrier and honeysuckle arches of the cottage, and was turning its windows into sheets of red gold. The sun, a crimson globe, was dropping in an oriflamme of indescribable gorgeousness behind the tree-tops; and at all this tropical richness of light and coloring, Cherrie, leaning over her father's garden-gate, looked.
There were not many passers-by to look at that hot August evening; but presently up the dusty road came a young man, well-dressed and well-looking. Cherrie knew him, and greeted him with a gracious smile, for it was Mr. Johnston, Captain Cavendish's servant. Mr. Johnston, with a look of unqualified admiration at her dark, bright face, took off his hat.
"Good-evening, Miss Nettleby. Ain't it shocking 'ot? Been to the picnic to-day?"
Cherrie nodded.
"'Ad a good time, I 'ope. Weren't you nearly melted with the 'eat?"
"Yes, it was warm," said Cherrie; "got anything for me?"
"A letter," said Mr. Johnston, producing the document, "which he'd 'ave come himself honely hold Major Grove hinvited 'im to dinner."
Cherrie eagerly broke open the envelope and read:
"Dearest:—Meet me to-night, at half-past eight, in the cedar dell, without fail. Destroy this as soon as read."G. S."
"Dearest:—Meet me to-night, at half-past eight, in the cedar dell, without fail. Destroy this as soon as read.
"G. S."
Cherrie tore the note into atoms, and strewed them over the grass.
"There was to be a hanswer," insinuated Mr. Johnston.
"Tell him yes," said Cherrie; "that is all."
Mr. Johnston took off his hat once more, and himself immediately after. Ann Nettleby, at the same moment, came to the door to tell Cherrie tea was ready; and Cherrie went in and partook of that repast with her father, sister, and brothers.
"Did you hear, boys," said old Nettleby, "that Lady Leroy has sold Partridge Farm?"
"Sold Partridge Farm!" repeated Rob. "No! has she, though? Who to?"
"To young Mr. Oaks, so Midge tells me; and a rare penny she'll get for it, I'll warrant you."
"What does Oaks want of it, I wonder?" said his other son. "He isn't going to take to farming."
"Oaks is the richest fellow in Speckport," said Rob Nettleby; "he has more money a great deal than he knows what to do with, and he may as well lay it out in property as at the gaming-table."
"Does he gamble?" asked Cherrie, helping herself to bread and butter.
Her brother laughed significantly.
"Doesn't he, though? You may find him and that Captain Cavendish all hours of the day and night in Prince Street."
"Is Captain Cavendish a gambler?" said Ann; "that's bad for Miss Natty. They say they're going to be married."
Cherrie smiled to herself, and Rob went on speaking.
"It's bad for Miss Nathalie, for that Cavendish is a villain, for all his fine airs and graces, and is leading her brother to the devil. I met him and young McGregor coming from Prince Street last night, and they hadn't a leg to put under them—either one."
"Drunk?" said Cherrie, stirring her tea.
"Drunk as lords, the pair of 'em. I helped them both home, and found out afterward how it was. They had gone with Cavendish to the gaming-house as usual, had lost heavily also, as usual, and, excited and maddened, had drank brandy until they could hardly stand. Young McGregor will fleece his father before he stops; and where Marsh's money comes from, I can't tell."
"You ought to tell Miss Natty, Rob," said his father. "I should not like to see her throw herself away on such a man, such a handsome and pleasant-spoken young lady as she is."
"Not I," said his son, getting up; "she wouldn't thank me, and it's none of my business. Let Charley tell her, if he likes—a poor fellow like me has no call to interfere with fine ladies and gentlemen."
Cherrie, with a little disdainful toss of her black curls, but discreetly holding her tongue, went into the front room and seated herself with a novel at the window. She read until a quarter past eight, and it grew too dark to see; then, rising, she wrapped herself in a plaided shawl and crossed the deserted road unobserved. Cedar dell, the place of tryst, was but a few yards off—the green hollow in the woods where Cherrie had told the captain of the result of her eavesdropping; a delightful place, shut in by the tall, dark trees, with a carpet of velvet sward, and a rustic bench of twisted boughs. Cherrie sat down on the bench and listened to the twittering of the birds in their nests, the restless murmuring and swaying of the trees in the night-wind, and watched the blue patches of sky and the pale rays of the new moon glancing in and out of the black boughs. All the holy beauty of the pale summer night could not lift her heart to the Creator who had made it—she was only waiting for the fall of a well-known step, for the sound of a well-known voice. Both came presently. The branches were swept aside, a step crashed over the dry twigs, a pale and handsome face, with dark eyes and mustache, under a broad-brimmed hat, looked in the white moonlight through the opening, and the expected voice asked:
"Are you there, Cherrie?"
"Yes, George," said Cherrie composedly, "Come in."
Captain George Cavendish came in accordingly, embraced her in very husbandly fashion, and sat down beside her on the bench. The gloom of the place and the hat he wore obscured his face, but not so much but that the girl could see how pale it was, and notice something strange in his voice and manner.
"Is there anything the matter?" she asked. "Did you want anything very particular, George?"
"Yes," he said, in a low, impressive voice, taking both her hands in his, and holding them tightly. "I want you to do me the greatest service it may ever be in your power to render me, Cherrie."
Cherrie looked up at his white, set face, feeling frightened.
"I will do whatever I can for you, George. What is it?"
"You know you are my wife, Cherrie, and that my interests are yours now. Wouldn't you like I should become rich and take you away from this place, and keep you like a lady all the rest of your life?"
Yes—Cherrie would decidedly like that, and gave him to understand accordingly.
"Then you must take an oath, Cherrie—do you hear?—an oath to obey me in all things, and never reveal to living mortal what I shall tell you to-night."
Now, Cherrie, thinking very little of a falsehood on ordinary occasions, held an oath to be something solemn and sacred, and not to be broken, and hesitated a little.
"Perhaps it is something hard—something I can't do. I feel afraid to take an oath, George."
"You must take it! It is not a matter of choice, and I will ask nothing you can't do. You must only swear to keep a secret."
"Well, I'll try," said Cherrie, with a sigh, "but I hate to do it."
"I dare say you do!" he said, breaking into a slight smile; "it is not in your line, I know, to keep secrets, Cherrie; but at present there is no help for it. You know what an oath is, don't you, Cherrie?"
"Yes."
"And you swear never to reveal what I am about to say to you?"
"Yes," said Cherrie, her curiosity getting the better of her fear. "I swear! What is it?"
Was it the gloom of the place, or some inward struggle, that darkened so his handsome face. The silence lasted so long after her question, that Cherrie's heart began to beat with a cold and nameless fear. He turned to her at last, holding both her hands in his own, and so hard that she could have cried out with the pain.
"You have sworn, Cherrie, to help me. Say you hope you may die if you ever break that oath. Say it!"
The girl repeated the frightful words, with a shiver.
"Then, Cherrie, listen, and don't scream. I'm going to rob Lady Leroy to-morrow night."
Cherrie did not scream; but she gave a gasping cry, and her eyes and mouth opened to their widest extent.
"Going to rob Lady Leroy," repeated Captain Cavendish, looking at her fixedly, and magnetizing her with his powerful glance, "to-morrow night; and I want you to help me, Cherrie."
"But—but they'll put you in prison for it," gasped Cherrie, all aghast.
"No, they won't, with your help. I mean they shall put somebody else in prison for it; not through any dislike to him, poor devil, but to avert suspicion from myself. Will you help me, Cherrie? Remember, you have sworn."
"I will do what I can," shivered poor Cherrie, "but oh! I am dreadfully scared."
"There is no need—your part will be very easy, and to-morrow afternoon you shall leave Speckport forever."
Cherrie's face turned radiant.
"With you, George! Oh, I am so glad! Tell me what you want me to do, and see if I don't do it."
"That is my good little wife. Now then for explanations. Do you know that Lady Leroy has sold Partridge Farm?"
"To Mr. Tom Oaks—yes, and that he is coming up to-morrow to pay her eight thousand pounds for it."
"Who told you?"
"Father and the boys were talking about it at tea. George, is that the money you're going to steal?"
"It is. I am deucedly hard-up just at present, Cherrie, and eight thousand would be a godsend. Now, my dearest, you must be up at the house when Oaks comes, and find out where the money is put."
"I know where she always keeps the money," said Cherrie; "and she's sure to put this with the rest. It is in that black japanned tin box on the stand at the head of her bed."
"Very well. You see, I must do it to-morrow night, for she never would keep so large a sum in the house; it will go into the bank the day after. The steamer for Halifax leaves to-morrow night at eleven o'clock, and I shall go to Halifax in her."
"And take me with you?" eagerly asked Cherrie.
"No; you must go in another direction. Until our marriage is made public, it never would do for us to go together, Cherrie. Let me see. You told me once you had a cousin up in Greentown, who wanted you to visit her, did not you?"
"Yes—Cousin Ellen."
"Well, there is a train leaving Speckport at half-past five in the afternoon. You must depart by that, and you will be in Greentown before nine. Take care to make your departure as public as possible. Go into Speckport early in the morning, and bid everybody you know good-bye. Tell them you don't know how long you may be tempted to stay."
"Yes," said Cherrie, with a submissive sigh.
"All but one. You must tell Charley Marsh a different story."
"Charley! Why, what's Charley Marsh got to do with it?"
"A good deal, since I mean he shall be arrested for the robbery. I hate to do it, but there is no help for it, Cherrie. You told me the other day that he was getting desperate, and wanted you to elope with him."
"So he did," said Cherrie. "He went on dreadfully; said he was going to perdition, and you were dragging him down, but he would take me from you if he could. He wanted me to go with him to the United States, and we would be married in Boston."
"And you—what is this you told him, Cherrie?"
"I told him I would think about it, and give him his answer in a day or two."
"Very well. Give him his answer to-morrow morning. Call at the office, and tell him you consent to run away with him, but that, to avoid suspicion for a few days, you are going to give out you are off on a visit to your cousin in Greentown. That you will actually start in the cars, but will step quietly out at the first station, which is only three miles from town, and that you will walk back and get to Speckport about dark. You understand, Cherrie? You are not really to do this, only to tell Marsh you will."
"Yes," said Cherrie, looking hopelessly bewildered.
"Tell him to come to Redmon between eight and nine, to call at your cottage first, and if you are not there, to go to Lady Leroy's and wait there as long as he can. If you are not there before the house is closed, he is to wait in the grounds for you in front of the house until you do come. I will enter by that back window you showed me, Cherrie, and the probability is Charley will wait all night, and, of course, will be seen by several people, and actually suspected of the robbery."
"It seems a pity, though, don't it?" said Cherrie, her woman's heart touched for poor Charley.
"If he is not suspected, I will be," said Captain Cavendish, sternly. "Remember your oath."
"I remember. Is there anything else?"
"Yes; you must send him a note in the afternoon. Ann will fetch it for you. To-morrow is Thursday, and at eight in the morning the steamer leaves for Boston."
"Here," said the young man, putting his hand in his pocket and producing a slip of paper, "is a draft of the note you are to send him, written in pencil. Copy it word for word, and then tear this up. Listen, and I will read it."
More from memory than the pale moon's rays glancing through the woods, Captain Cavendish read:
"Dear Charley:—I forgot to tell you this morning, when I consented to elope with you, that you had better go down to the steamboat office to-day and secure staterooms, so that we may conceal ourselves as soon as we go on board. You can pay for this out of that money; it will do us more good than it ever would do that miser of a Lady Leroy. Ever yours,"Cherrie Nettleby."
"Dear Charley:—I forgot to tell you this morning, when I consented to elope with you, that you had better go down to the steamboat office to-day and secure staterooms, so that we may conceal ourselves as soon as we go on board. You can pay for this out of that money; it will do us more good than it ever would do that miser of a Lady Leroy. Ever yours,
"Cherrie Nettleby."
"What money?" inquired Cherrie. "What money is he to pay for the staterooms out of?"
"Oh, I forgot. When you see him in the morning, give him this," producing a bank note. "I know he has not a stiver, and I got this from Oaks myself yesterday. It is for ten pounds, and Oaks's initials were scrawled on it, as he has a fashion of doing with all his bills. Tell him Lady Leroy gave it to your father in payment, and he presented it to you. Charley will take it; he is too hard up to be fastidious. Your note will, no doubt, be found upon him, and convict him at once."
"There's another thing," said Cherrie. "When Charley's arrested and my name found to that note, they'll think I knew about the robbery, and come up to Greentown after me. What should I do then?"
"That is true," said the captain, thoughtfully. "Perhaps, after all, then, you had better not go to your cousin's. Go on to Bridgeford; it is thirty miles further up, and a quiet out-of-the-way place, where no one ever stops, hardly. There is one hotel there, where you can stay quietly for a few days, and then slip off and get board in some farmer's house. Call yourself Miss Smith, and write to me when you are settled, telling all the particulars. Disguise your hand in writing the address, and I will run up and see you as soon as I safely can, and settle our future plans. Now, you are sure you remember and understand all I have been saying?"
"Yes," said Cherrie; "but, oh, dear me! I feel just as nervous and as scared! What will they do to Charley? Maybe they'll hang him!"
"Not the least fear of it. If they put him in prison, I'll try and get him clear off. You say they always go to bed for certain at nine o'clock at Redmon house?"
"At nine to a minute; but Lady Leroy always locks her door, nights. How will you get in?"
Captain Cavendish smiled.
"If it all was as easy as that, it would be a simple affair. Don't look so discouraged, my darling black eyes. With eight thousand pounds in my pocket, and the prettiest little girl in wide America as my wife, I will be off to merry England, and you and I will forget this land of fog and fish. I'm off now, Cherrie and perhaps it may be two or three weeks before I shall see you again, so take care of yourself. Here are eight sovereigns to pay your expenses; and be sure you write to me from Bridgeford."
He got up, but Cherrie clung to him, crying:
"Oh, I am afraid! O George, I am afraid I will never see you again."
"Little simpleton," he said, giving her a parting caress, "what can happen if you do your part bravely? If you fail, then, indeed, we will never meet again."
Cherrie's tears were falling fast now.
"I will not fail; but—but——"
"But what, my darling?"
"When you go to Halifax, perhaps you will never come back; perhaps you will never come to Bridgeford."
"Cherrie, you are a goose! Don't you know I am in your power, and that I must come back? Come, stop crying now, and give me a kiss, and say good-bye. It won't be long, you know."
One other parting caress, and then he was gone.
Cherrie listened until the echo of his footsteps died out in the distance, and then she threw herself on her face in the wet grass, heedless of her white dress, and cried like a spoiled child whose doll has been taken away. She was frightened, she was excited, she was grieved, but she was not remorseful. There was little compunction in her heart for the part she was to play—betraying the man who loved her and trusted her. It was the old story of Delilah and Samson over again.
The clocks of Speckport striking ten, and clearly heard this still summer night, had ceased before she came out, her cheeks pale, her eyes red with weeping. There was a dull circle round the moon, foreboding a coming storm; but what was there to give warning to poor Charley Marsh of the storm about to burst upon him?
Ann Nettleby was at the door waiting patiently for Cherrie. She turned crossly upon her when she appeared.
"I wish you would learn to come home earlier, and not keep folks out of their beds all night. What were you doing in the woods?"
"Crying," said Cherrie, quite as crossly as her sister. "I'm tired to death of this dull place. I'll go off to Greentown to-morrow."
"I wish to mercy you would; the rest of us would have some peace then. Did you expect Charley Marsh to-night?"
"No; why?"
"He's been here, then, and only just gone. Come in, and let me lock the door."
Cherrie went up to her room, but not to sleep. She sat by the window, looking out on the quiet road, the black woods, and the moon's sickly, watery glimmer, while the long hours dragged slowly on, and her sister slept. She was thinking of the eventful to-morrow—the to-morrow that was to be the beginning of a new life to her.
When Mr. Robert Nettleby informed his family circle that Charley Marsh was going to—well, to a certain dark spirit not to be lightly named in polite literature, he was about right. That young gentleman, mounted on the furious steed of extravagance, was galloping over the road to ruin at the rate of an express train.
Not alone, either; young McGregor, Tom Oaks, Esquire, and some dozen more young Speckportians, were keeping him company—and all ran nearly abreast in the dizzy race.
The terrible terminus—Disgrace, Misery, and Sudden Death—looked very near to some of them, very near, indeed, to the brother of Nathalie. He had taken to hard drinking of late, as a natural sequence of the other vice; gamblers must drink to drown remorse, and it was no unusual thing now for him to be helped home by pitying friends, and carried up-stairs to bed. How the mother cried and scolded; how the sister wept in passionate shame and sorrow in the silence of her own room; how he, the prodigal, suffered after, Heaven only knows, but it never came to anything.
Next day's splitting headache, and insuperable shame and remorse, must be drowned in brandy; that fatal stimulant brought the old delusive hopes—he must go back, he must win.
He was over four hundred dollars indebted to Captain Cavendish now, without possessing one dollar in the world, or the hope of one, to pay him. He had ceased to ask money from Nathalie—she had no more to give him, and Alick McGregor and Tom Oaks found enough to do to foot their own bills.
Strange to say, the primary mover of this mischief, the arch-tempter himself, George Percy Cavendish, remained unsuspected, save by a few, and went altogether unblamed. Captain Cavendish seldom lost his money, never his temper; never got excited, was ever gentlemanly and cool, though half the men about him were mad with liquor and losses, and ready to hold pistols to their heads and blow their miserable brains out.
Nathalie, humbled to the very dust with shame for Charley, never suspected her betrothed lover—never for one second; in her eyes he was the incarnation of all that was honorable and good.
It was in one of his fits of rage and remorse that Charley had asked Cherrie to fly with him. Not that he expected to atone by that; but, far from Speckport, which enchanting town was fast becoming hateful to him, and with her as his wife, he hoped to begin a new life, away from those he had disgraced. He hated Captain Cavendish with a furious and savage hatred, and it would be a demoniac satisfaction to tear Cherrie from him. For, with the eyes of jealousy, Charley saw his game, though all Speckport was blind. Miss Nettleby, at her old game of fast and loose, had put him off indefinitely. And, casting bitter reproaches to Fate, after the manner of Dick Swiveller, Charley Marsh let himself drift with the rapid current, bearing him along to a fearful end.
The day that came after the night spent by Cherrie and Captain Cavendish in the cedar dell was one of scorching, broiling heat and sunshine. The sun was like a wheel of red flame, the sky of burnished brass, the bay a sea of amber fire.
Through all the fiery glare of this fierce August morning, went Charley Marsh to the office of Dr. Leach. No longer the Charley Marsh who had been the life of Mrs. McGregor's party, that foggy May evening when Captain Cavendish had first appeared in Speckport, but a pale, sunken-cheeked, hollow-eyed vision, with parched and feverish lip, and gaze that shrunk from meeting that of his fellow-men, his temples seemed splitting, his eyes ached with the blinding gleam, and he could have cursed the heat in his impious impatience and suffering. He glanced down toward the shining bay, and thought, if it had only looked blue and cool, instead of being a lake of fire, he could have gone and lain down in its pleasant waters, and escaped forever from the miseries of this life, at least.
"Charley!"
The voice at his elbow made him bound. He turned and saw Cherrie Nettleby, her shining ebon ringlets freshly curled, her black eyes dark and dewy, her rosy cheeks bright and unwilted, her dress airy and cool—unflushed, unheated; basking, like a little salamander, in the genial sunlight, and wearing the smile of an angel. Charley could scarce believe his eyes.
"You here, Cherrie!" he cried, "this blazing day. Have you been in Speckport all night?"
"No, I got a drive in this morning, and, Charley," dropping her wicked eyes, "I came to see you!"
They were near the office. The surgery looked cool and shady, and Charley opened the door and ushered the young lady in. The shopboy had the place to himself, and he retreated to a distant corner, with a knowing grin, at sight of the pair. Dr. Leach was rarely at home. People would persist in devouring new potatoes, and green peas, and cucumbers, and string-beans, and other green stuffs, and having pains, and cramps, and cholera afterward, and the doctor was fairly run off his legs—that is to say, his horse was.
"How nice and cool it is in here," said Cherrie; "it's the hottest day came this summer, I think. What a hurry you were in leaving, last night, Charley."
"Hurry! It was past ten."
"Well, I came in a few minutes after, and was so mad when I found you were gone. I got such a jawing for being out! I won't stand it," cried Miss Cherrie, flying out in an affected temper; "I just won't!"
"Stand what?"
"Why, being scolded and put upon the way I am! It's dreadful dull, too, and I am getting tired of the place altogether; and so, I am going to leave it."
"With me, Cherrie?"
"I don't care if I do! I'm off this very day; I'll not stand it a minute longer—so, if you want me to go with you, you haven't much time to spare!"
Charley grasped both her hands, his pale face lighting with ecstasy; and the shopboy behind the pestle-and-mortar grinned delightedly at the scene, although he could not hear a word.
"My darling Cherrie!" Charley cried, "you have made me the happiest fellow alive! Wait until to-morrow, and we will be off in the boat to Boston."
Miss Nettleby fell to musing.
"Well, I don't care if I do," she said, at length. "I should like to see Boston, and the trip in the steamboat will be nice. But, look here, Charley, I've gone and told our folks and everybody else that I was going to Greentown, in this afternoon's train, and it won't do to back out."
"But you must back out, Cherrie! You cannot go to Greentown and to Boston, both."
Cherrie put on her considering-cap again, only for a moment, though, and then she looked up with a sparkling face.
"I have it, Charley! The nicest plan! This evening, at half-past five, I'll go off in the cars, and every one will think I've gone to Greentown, so my absence to-morrow won't be noticed. I'll get out at the first station, three miles off, and walk back home, but won't go in. About eight to-night you call at our house, pretending you don't know about my being off, you know; and when our Ann tells you I have gone, you go up to Lady Leroy's and stay till bed-time. Then wait around the grounds in front of the house, and I'll come to you about ten. I can stop in one of the hotels here, where they don't know me. I'll wear a thick vail until morning, and then we will hide on board the boat. Isn't it a splendid plan, Charley? They'll think I'm in Greentown, and never suspect we have gone off together!"
No poor fly ever got entangled in a spider's web more readily than did Charley Marsh in that of Captain Cavendish. He thought the plan was capital, and he told her so.
"You must be sure to wait in front of the house until I come," said the wicked little enchantress, keeping her black eyes fixed anywhere but on his face. "And here, Charley—now don't refuse—it is only a trifle, and I won't go with you, if you don't take it. I don't suppose you have much money, and father made it a present to me after Lady Leroy paid him. I must go now, because I have ever so much to do before evening. Good-bye, Charley, you won't forget anything I've said?"
Forget! That face, fair in spite of its haggardness, was radiant. Bad as Cherrie was, she had not the heart to look at him as she hurried out of the shop and down the street. If he had only known!—if he had only known!—known of the cunning trap laid for him, into which he was falling headlong—if he had only known what was to take place that fatal night!
Charley Marsh did not go home to his dinner; he had dinner enough for that day. All that long sweltering afternoon he sat in the smothering little back-office, staring out at the baked and blistered backyard, and weaving, oh! such radiant dreams of the future. Such dreams as we all weave; as we see wither to shreds, even in the next hour. Visions of a home, far, very far from Speckport, where the past should be atoned for and forgotten—a home of which Cherrie, his darling little Cherrie, should be the mistress and fireside fairy.
It was some time past five, when, awakening from these blissful day-dreams, Charley Marsh found that the little back office was so insufferably hot as not to be borne any longer, and that a most extraordinary change had come over the sky, or at least as much of the firmament as was visible from the dirty office-window. He took his hat and sauntered out, pausing in the shop-door to stare at the sky. It had turned livid; a sort of ghostly, greenish glare, all over with wrathful black clouds and bars of blood-red streaking the western horizon. Not a breath of air stirred; the trees along the streets of Speckport and in its squares hung motionless in the dead calm, and feathers and bits of paper and straw lay on the sidewalk. The sea was of the same ghastly tinge as sky and air, as if some commotion in its watery bowels had turned it sick. And, worst of all, the heat was unabated, the planked sidewalks scorched your feet as you walked, and you gasped for a mouthful of air. Speckport declined taking its tea; its butter was butter no longer, but oil; its milk had turned sour, and the water from the street-hydrants nearly warm enough to make tea of, without boiling at all. There were very few out as Charley walked down Queen Street, but among these few he encountered Mr. Val Blake, striding in the direction of Great St. Peter Street.
Val nodded familiarly.
"Hot day, Charley. Going to be a thunder-storm, I take it. By the way, she'll have an ugly night for her journey."
"Who will?"
"Little Cherrie, of course; she's off to Greentown, man! Didn't you know it? I was down at the station ten minutes ago, and saw her off. How's the mother?"
"Getting better. Good afternoon, Val," said Charley, passing on, and smiling at the news Mr. Blake had told him.
"What a clever head the little darling has to put them off the scent! Hallo, what do you want?"
Some one had shouted after him; and turning round, he saw Master Bill Blair, his hands in his pockets, his hat cocked on one side of his head, following at an extremely leisurely pace.
"I want you to hold on. I'll go part of the way with you, for I'm going home to tea," replied Mr. Blair, not hurrying himself. "It's hot enough to roast an ox, it is. You don't suppose the sky has got the jaundice, do you; it is turned as yellow as a kite's claw."
"You had better send up and inquire," said Charley, shortly, preferring his own thoughts to this companionship.
"I say, Marsh," said Bill, grinning from ear to ear, "Cherrie's gone, hasn't she? Good riddance, I say. What took her streaking off to Greentown, and whatever will you do without her?"
Mr. Marsh came to a sudden stand-still—they were in a quiet street—and took Mr. Blair by the collar.
"Look you here, Master Bill," said Charley, emphatically, "you see the water down there! Well, now take warning; the next time I find you making too free use of that tongue of yours, I'll duck you! Mind! I've said it!"
With which Mr. Marsh released him, and stalked on. Mr. Blair, pretty well used to being collared, took this admonition so much to heart, that he leaned against a lamp-post, and went off with a roar of laughter that awoke all the sleeping echoes of the place.