There, then, the typhoid aftermath, which had been predicted would develop in time in Constance some strange and serious ailment, had found a lodgement, and now, bursting into life, lay siege to nature’s most wonderful creation, the human brain. A moment of terrifying consternation followed.
“What shall I do now?” Virginia distractedly exclaimed.
“Paddle, paddle, paddle,” feebly responded Constance.
Unmindful of the reply, Virginia stood as if transfixed with despair. She racked her brain for a way out. The situation was fast verging on the tragic.
“I will barricade the door!” she determined. “No, he may smash in the roof or sink us; I must get them away somehow.”
“Oh, Constance, dear, try to be strong. Fight down this weakness. The boat is waiting. We must escape. Help me! Oh, God, help! Help!”
Her voice began in a subdued, frantic appeal, and ended in a sob of heart-rending despair for succor.
Like a shaft of sunshine bursting through a rift in the dark, lowering clouds of dismay, came the answer from Constance:
“I will! I will! Let me think! Oh, yes, we had better go now. Lead on! Hasten!” And she arose from the seat.
“Thank Heaven. The dark spot has gone,” Virginia fervently exclaimed. “Her brain has cleared again.”
How joyfully she struck another match further to accelerate their passage.
“Keep close to me, dear. Are you tired? Let me help you.” And she placed her right arm about the waist of Constance, the match held forward in her left hand lighting the way. They had proceeded a few steps when the door opened. She drew back with a slight, terrified exclamation: “Oh!”
Jack Shore stood in the doorway.
The men had been ashore, had found the rope cut in several places, and the dog gone. The circumstances were so suspicious and frought with so much danger to them, that they decided upon the immediate removal of the child. On their return toward the cabin, Rutley discovered a faint glimmer of light within, and in a whisper, called Jack’s attention to it.
“I am sure I blew it out,” Jack whispered, alarmed.
“Do you think the child awakened and struck a match?” again whispered Rutley.
“No; no matches within her reach. Perhaps Virginia has come. Hello! A strange boat here.”
“The light moves,” continued Rutley, in a whisper.
“I will get out here,” whispered Jack, and he sprang out of the boat quietly onto the platform. “Take the boat to the other end of the cabin.”
As he opened the door, the profile of the women and child appeared, dimly outlined by the match light held in Virginia’s hand.
As she staggered back, surprised and terrified, for the moment, Jack pushed his way in, closed the door, bolted and locked it, and put the key in his pocket. Then he struck a match and lighted the lamp.
“Virginia drew back with a slight terrified exclamation, ‘Oh!’ Jack Shore stood in the doorway.”“Virginia drew back with a slight terrified exclamation, ‘Oh!’ Jack Shore stood in the doorway.”
“Virginia drew back with a slight terrified exclamation, ‘Oh!’ Jack Shore stood in the doorway.”
After surveying the group, he gruffly laughed.
“Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, Signora make a da bold a break in a da house, eh? Ha, ha, ha, ha. Eesa try tak a Daize from a da nicey home, eh? Ha, ha, ha, ha.”
“Yes,” she replied, without hesitation or a qualm of fear in her voice. “That was my intention, but the devil’s emissary has blocked it.”
Without a trace of fear, quietly and strangely free from agitation, Constance made her way to the door, and laid her hand on the bolt to unfasten it.
Jack took hold of her small, round wrist, turned her about and pushed her back a few paces. “Note a beez in a da hurry, Signora.”
“Who are you?” she timidly asked.
“Ha, ha, ha, hic, Eesa compan-e-on say I beez a da devil,” Jack laughed jeeringly.
“Oh, very well,” she replied, mildly. “The devil is always hungry for someone. Who do you want now?”
“A Daize, a da Daize. Yous a lak a me, eh, a Daize?”
“No, no; the devil shall not have my heart. My precious darling now.” And Constance shrank from him, pressing the little form tighter to her breast.
“But you may have money,” she indifferently added.
Jack smiled and bowed obsequiously.
“Ten-na years eesa sella da banans, turnoppsis, carrottsis, cababbages—mak a da mon, naw! Now eesa steal a da kid, do anyting for a mak a da mon. Da mon, da mon,” he repeated slowly three times, with deep-toned Dago emphasis. “Then eesa-go back a da sunny Italia,” a phrase that escaped his lips as though shot from a rapid firer.
In the meantime Rutley had entered from the other door, locked it, and softly crept to the partition door, where he stood listening and noting, through the small glass panel, the situation within.
Scorning preliminaries, Virginia said:
“I have brought you all that I could get. Take it!” And she laid a package of crisp banknotes on the table. Jack’s eyes bulged and glistened at the sight of so much money within his grasp. He eagerly picked up the package, which was fastened in the middle by a band of paper, flipped the ends of the banknotes back and forth with his finger, then proceeded to count the money. His action was business-like.
Without unfastening the band, he held one end of the package firmly down on the table with the knuckles of his left hand, doubled the other end back, and held it with his fingers and let each note slip back separately to a flat position on the table, until he counted them all.
Meanwhile Virginia had gently pushed Constance to the seat, and as she watched him she muttered, as though speaking to herself: “I could get no more than ten thousand dollars. If that will not satisfy him, then let fate come to the rescue, for a life hangs on the issue tonight.”
“Turnoppsis, Carrottsis, Ca-babbages, Ta-rah-rah. Eesa fat a da pack,” said Jack, as he thrust the package of money inside his vest. “Saw da ood, hic”—But it appearing loose and risky to keep it there, he took it out, rolled it up and forced it in his trousers’ back pocket. “Black a da boots, hic.” Still feeling dissatisfied with the security of either pocket he at last put it in the inside pocket of his coat, hanging near the lamp over the table. And then he turned to Virginia.
“Eesa part a da mon? Hic. Much a beez a da tanks, Signora.”
“You will now liberate the child?” she pleaded, in faltering speech.
“Ta-rah-rah! You sa fetch a me only a da half!” exclaimed Jack, feigning surprise at her request.
“Yousa da rich. Gotta da mon a plent. Go, Signora, get a moores a da mon. Leave a Daize a da here.”
“Mr. Golda, I’ll not stay. I am going home with mamma!” and Dorothy pouted indignantly.
Seeing him obdurate, and fearing the effect of a forcible separation from her mother now so fondly clasped in her arms, Virginia resolved to try persuasion once more, before putting into execution the plans she had matured as a last and desperate resort. With blanched face, its very seriousness compelling attention, she said, in a faltering voice:
“If your heart is human you cannot look upon that stricken mother without feeling that in the last great day the Judge of all will judge you as you now deal with her.”
He turned from her without a word, derision betrayed in his face, contempt in his action. It, however, placed Jack in a dilemma. There the mother, for whom he felt a kindly interest, quietly resting with her lost darling in her arms, yet ever and anon a scared, haunted look flitted from her eyes.
He looked at the girl a moment, then broke into low, derisive laughter.
“Ha, ha, ha, ha. Eesa fine a da lady. He, he, he, he. Signora beez a da accomplice ova da conspirator to break a up a da brodder’s home, eh? Signora good a da lady.”
“Ha, ha, ha, ha,” and suddenly lowering his voice, said:
“Turnoppsis, Carrottsis, Ca-babbages,” then paused and picked up the bottle to take a drink. “If the child goes home now,” he thought, “Phil gets no reward; no,” and he set the bottle down on the table with a bang, without taking the premeditated drink.
“No, Ma sees a Daize a beez a da safe. Ma sees no a da harm come a Daize.”
“I have brought you all the money I could obtain, and now I demand that you release the child,” Virginia said, firmly.
“Eesa be damn! Yous a fetch a me a da mon, a da rest, ten a thous, an an—a Daise beez a da liber. Eesa da late a now, Signora. Much a bet for a youse a da go home, hic.”
Virginia’s blanched but resolute face indicated that the critical moment had arrived. Then her voice quivered slightly, as with suppressed, quiet dignity, she said: “I shall give you no more.”
The declaration aroused Constance. She looked up. “Yes, oh, yes; give him more!” she exclaimed, in plaintive alarm. “He shall have a million, two million; I will get it for him.”
The extravagant offer, the soft, troubled, pensive stare, caused Jack to straighten up and gaze directly at her.
Virginia’s alert eyes at once caught the superstitious fear that had suddenly betrayed itself in his face.
“Don’t you see her mind is giving way!” she exclaimed, and while he stood staring at Constance, she seized the occasion as one favorable for escape.
“Come dear,” she urged, “he will not stop us now.”
“It is dangerous,” was the soft, helpless reply. “The clouds are thickening, and the storm will soon burst.”
“Courage, dear, the clouds will soon roll by. Come,” Virginia urged, half lifting her to her feet.
“Oh, very well, we must go,” was the indifferent response.
A step forward, and again that timid, startled, fawn-like terror overcame her. “Oh, dear,” she plaintively exclaimed, “the boat rocks; hold fast to me, sweetheart.” And she halted with a swinging motion, as though her limbs were incapable of firmly sustaining her.
With distended eyes. Jack stared at her. “Heavens!” he thought; “I cannot separate that poor mother from her child. I cannot do it. If Phil wants the reward he must take the child home himself.”
The thought was scarcely developed when the voice of his partner rang out from the other room, hoarse, disguised, and peremptory:
“What’s the matter with you? Separate them! Take the kid and turn the woman out.”
Then it was Virginia realized that she had two men to deal with instead of one.
Undaunted, her courage arose to the occasion. She had come prepared for trouble of a most serious nature, and in her determination to succeed, it mattered little, now that she had shaken off the first trembling of fear, whether one or more men stood in her way.
She stepped over close to Jack, bent forward and looked up sideways in his face, a magnetic fire scintillating from her eyes that seemed to pierce his inmost thought, and slowly drew his gaze to her. Under the spell Jack forgot his assumed character, for once he forgot to use the Dago dialect.
“Don’t look at me in that way; it was not all my work,” he said, apologetically.
He had spoken in plain English. Yet in Virginia’s tensely excited frame of mind it passed unchallenged.
“You acknowledge a share in it. And if you lay a hand on her child, I’ll call down upon you the blasphemy of a madhouse.”
The art she employed to play upon his heightened imagination was intensely eloquent, and exquisitely enacted. On the impulse of the moment the threat served to unnerve him completely and had Jack been the only one to deal with, their escape at that moment would have been certain.
A prey to his own secret superstition, though openly ridiculed theosophy, Jack stood spellbound, his fear distorted by the influence of the liquor he had drunk.
True, Rutley had braced him some, but Virginia threw about him a glow of such awesome consequences that he again weakened and unconsciously repeated under his breath: “The curse of a madhouse! Oh, I can’t do it! I’m a bit human yet.”
Then came a second roar from Rutley, impatient and contemptuous.
“Separate them, you chicken-hearted knave! Separate them, damn you, and be quick about it, too!” A slight jar at that moment struck the cabin.
Jack came out of his semi-trance with a shudder and, recovering his nerve, seemed to be disgusted at his momentary weakness, and forthwith he attempted to get between the women and the cabin door, addressing the child:
“A Daize a mus stay a dare. Yous a lak a me, eh a Daize?”
“Wretch, stand back!” Virginia commanded. She realized that the supreme moment had come.
Jack leered at her. Without further heed he addressed the child:
“A Daize, yous a da know I beez a kind to you,” and he took hold of her arms. “Let a da go Eesa say hic. Let a da go da kid.”
“No, no!” Constance cried, as she resisted his effort to separate them. “You shall not have my darling! You shall not take her again.”
“Take your villainous hands off!” ordered Virginia, and at the same time she dealt him a stinging blow in the face, which caused him to loose his hold on Dorothy and stagger back.
At that moment, too, he was startled by footsteps on the roof. He paused with a confused idea whether the sound on the roof had not really emanated from Rutley in the other room. Concluding in favor of the latter, he continued: “Yous a da defy a me eh, hic, sacramente! Eesa mak a da let a go da kid, or eesa break a da arm.”
Meanwhile Virginia had placed herself between Constance and Jack and, drawing a revolver from under her jacket, leveled it at him.
Utterly reckless of her own danger, and her eyes ablaze with daring she exclaimed in a voice low and thrilling with intense determination, “Stand where you are, you vile epitome of a man! Dare try to bar our way out, and witness heaven, I’ll rid the earth of a scoundrel too long infesting it!”
A quaking pause followed, more trying to her nerves than the peril of the situation itself, and she backed toward the door.
Her action provoked an exclamation from Jack. “God, the girl’s game!” He stood mentally measuring the space that separated them, while a cunning leer developed on his face. He was about to spring, when Sam’s shuffling on the roof became distinct.
“Another accomplice! God protect the child!” murmured Virginia. And then in the moment of her dismay, Jack sprang forward and grasped her pistol hand. She fired, but the excitement had unnerved her, and the bullet went wide of its mark.
In the struggle that ensued he forced her down on her knees, wrenched the weapon from her hand. As he was placing it in his pocket, it slipped from his grasp and slid along the floor, where it lay beyond his reach, near the partition door. Then he leered at her, and pinioned her hands behind her. “Now kiss a da me.”
Notwithstanding the danger of her position, she managed to suppress her terror, and she exclaimed defiantly, “Never!” and with one concentrated desperate effort in which all the suppleness, strength and agility of youth were called into action, succeeded in breaking his grasp, and sprang to her feet.
Deprived of her revolver, yet she had foreseen such a contingency, and had provided a last means of defense. She produced a small dagger from her corsage. Her fingers tightened convulsively around the handle, and she said in a trembling voice:
“Back, you ruffian! The point is poisoned! Beware!”
The action was so quick, and the blade glittered aloft with such deadly intent, that Jack leaped back.
Meanwhile Rutley’s attention had been absorbed by the struggle going on between Jack and Virginia, but when he heard the footsteps on the roof his alarm became manifest. “I must get the child at once, or all will be lost,” he muttered.
Hastily taking a handkerchief from his pocket, he tied it about the lower part of his face, then he swung open the partition door and entered, the same instant that Jack had forced Virginia to her knees.
Without a pause, he promptly made for Constance, grasped the child and tried to tear her from her mother.
Constance, too affrighted to scream, resisted with all her might.
“Let go, damn you—let go, or I’ll drown her!” and with savage hands he wrenched Dorothy away from her. Trying to escape with Dorothy in his arms, Rutley confronted Virginia.
“Release her!” she demanded.
He looked at the dagger, quivering ominously in her hand, and Dorothy dropped from his nerveless hands and he jumped back beside Jack, hoarsely exclaiming, “God, she’s a tartar!”
“Run to your mother, Dorothy! To the boat, Constance, quick!” urged Virginia, as she stood erect, fearless and tragic between the men and their prey.
“Are we curs to be daunted by this Oregon girl, this slip of a woman?” exclaimed Rutley hoarsely.
“Beware! The edge is sharp, the poison deadly!” cautioned Virginia, in a voice that thrilled and which left no doubt as to her determination to use the weapon to the limit of her ability.
Jack laughed—laughed low, hoarse and sarcastically. “He, he, he, he, he. Scarce da fine a lady—wid a da white a nice a hand. Mak-a eem all a da carmine, eh? He, he, he, he, he, he.”
She made no reply, yet there darted from her eyes a lightning flash of desperate purpose.
Rutley clearly understood the sign and, leaning over close to Jack, whispered: “We must get the knife from her at all hazards.”
“Signora, good a da lady, eh! Mak a da bloody fista, eh!” Jack leered as he concentrated his gaze upon the girlish form drawn up to her fullest height before him.
Again he laughed low and hoarsely:
“Ha, ha, ha, ha! Eesa know a da way to fix ’em!”
Swiftly opening the partition door, he thrust in his hand, pulled a covering off from the bunk, then after closing the door, he proceeded rapidly to tie the corners together, muttering meanwhile, “Eesa mak a da loop, lak a da bag. See! Ha, ha, ha, ha!”
To Virginia the trap appeared so simple and ingenious, its application so promising of success, that as she watched its preparation her heart leaped to the opportunity presented as a last chance.
“Attack them now—attack them now!” urged her judgment with startling force. Louder it seemed to grow, till at last, maddened by the very repugnance of its conception, a sickening sense of fear overpowered her, her nerves suddenly collapsed, and she seemed to lose the power of action.
Having completed the snare, which had taken only a few moments to prepare. Jack bent forward, showing the white of his teeth as a wolf of its fangs when about to spring on its prey.
“Now together!” he whispered.
Virginia saw her danger and realized the crisis of all her efforts to make atonement for the wrong she had caused Constance was at hand.
Again the affrighted despairing cry burst in an audible whisper from her lips.
“Help! Help! Oh, God in heaven, help!” Just what Jack would have done in his fury it is impossible to say, for the liquor had frenzied him, and Virginia’s stubborn resistance had aroused in him a latent devil. His intention, whatever it may have been, was frustrated by Sam, who at that moment smashed in the window, covered him with his revolver and shouted, “Throw up your hands!”
The crash of broken glass arrested Jack’s attention, and upon looking around he discovered the muzzle of a large caliber revolver thrust through the broken window and leveled straight at him.
So sudden was the surprise, so unexpected and imminent the danger, that he automatically flung up his hands.
Upon crossing the island, after leaving Thorpe and the detective at the edge of the wood, Sam had immediately boarded the launch, and stowing the dog in a comfortable position on cotton waste in the “fo-castle,” directed the engineer to proceed to the north end of the island.
On arriving at the point agreed upon, aside from the cabin’s range of city lights, Sam got into a small boat, provided for the occasion, and pushed ashore, after having conveyed Thorpe and the detective on board the launch.
A consultation was held, and it was arranged that the detective and Smith, who had remained in the launch, should go in the small boat, assail the south door and cut off escape in that direction, while Thorpe and Sam in the launch would take a position at the main door of the cabin.
After securing an axe from the launch, the detective and Smith proceeded as quickly as possible on their mission. Instead of rowing, they paddled along, Indian fashion, the dip of the blades scarcely disturbing the silence that enveloped them. The launch steamed slowly along in the boat’s wake, and just as noiselessly, and was the first to touch one of the logs which supported the cabin.
They heard voices within that seemed feminine and familiar to both Sam and Thorpe, though uncertain on account of the low tone.
As prearranged, Sam stealthily clambered up on the roof and crawled to the starboard side, where he lay flat on his stomach, and peered head down, in through the loose curtained four-paned window. What he saw prompted him to instantaneous action, and the crash of broken glass followed.
Rutley immediately grasped the situation as one fraught with the gravest peril. He saw that Sam’s revolver covered Jack, and saw, too, that a few feet nearer the partition door would place him in a position out of line of Sam’s aim, as the small cupboard, beside the window, formed an angle that sheltered that part of the room. On the instant, therefore, he leaped toward the partition door. As he sprang toward the door, his eyes fastened on Jack’s coat. To secure the package of money from its pocket was, for his deft fingers, but the work of a moment; then into the sleeping room he darted and closed the door.
While Jack’s hands were up, Thorpe called from the outside to open the door. At the same time he shook it violently, and began to batter it with the axe.
During this time Constance stood with her back to the wall, her arms straight down by her side, with the palms of her hands flattened against the boards, as one seeks support at times on a ship at sea. She appeared insensible alike to fear or position. Yet the horror of the affair shone in her distended eyes.
“The boat rocks, the storm is upon us,” she muttered.
At the moment Smith commenced to batter the other door of the cabin, Jack took the chance, and sprang to one side, out of line of Sam’s revolver.
“It’s the police!” he exclaimed wildly, and in the panic that seized him he quite forgot his assumed character.
He picked up the revolver that he had wrenched from Virginia, and which lay upon the floor, and his attitude became so threatening and malignant as to cause her to utter a slight terrified scream.
Even Dorothy’s large innocent eyes blazed, and she struck at him in defense of Virginia. “Mr. Golda, you’re a bad, bad man.”
The child’s voice raised in Jack a “forlorn hope,” for he muttered, “Dorothy shall be my guarantee of escape.”
Simultaneously the door flew open under Thorpe’s blows, and he stood in the entrance.
“Oh, papa, papa!” cried Dorothy, as she ran toward him.
Seeing his opportunity, Jack desperately clutched the child with his left hand. Swinging Dorothy in front of him, and before her father, he pointed the revolver at her head, and in that position addressed him in a sort of screeching yell, “Stop!”
Thorpe stood horror-stricken. His heart leaped to his throat. “My God! madman, what will you do?” he hoarsely exclaimed, and motioned as if to rescue the child.
With a tighter clutch, and a more maddening menace, Jack again addressed him, “Stop, not a step nearer!” And to emphasize his purpose, he placed the muzzle of the revolver close to her head.
Observing the desperate peril in which Dorothy was placed, and with a courage born of horror and despair, Virginia stole to Jack’s back, and with a wild frantic scream of “Save her!” seized his pistol hand between both her own, and in the struggle that immediately ensued, and in which all her strength was exerted, the weapon fell to the floor.
And then Sam tore open the broken window, swung himself through to the floor, and instantly grappled with Jack.
Virginia’s attack forced Jack to release Dorothy, who was immediately gathered in her father’s arms.
“Safe, my blessed child, safe!” he fervently exclaimed.
And then poor Virginia, courageous, strong-minded, kind-hearted, passionate Virginia, having sustained the frightful nervous strain till the last moment, swayed, and sank to the floor in a swoon.
Meanwhile Constance stood beside the cabin door, staring at the men in a dazed and vacant manner. She had heard Virginia, and repeated mechanically, “Save Dorothy!” and now repeated after Mr. Thorpe, in tones as though a very dear voice had kindled a spark calling back loving recollections. She drew her hand across her brow, as though trying to clear away some web that obscured her memory, and stared at her husband like one suddenly awakened from a dream. A moment after and she whispered with awe in her voice, “John! John!”
Almost immediately Rutley had returned to the room without the child, but with Jack’s money, the door near him was being battered. He at once concluded that the game was up, and his own safety necessitated an immediate escape. How? He must decide at once.
How many surrounded the cabin? Ha! If he only knew, and then the hatch occurred to him.
He knew the big logs upon which the cabin was built raised it some ten or twelve inches above water. There lay his way—out—quick. He lifted the cover, and silently sank beneath the floor between the logs.
Then he let the trap door fall back in position above him, just as the cabin door gave way and the detective entered, followed by Smith, who handled an axe.
It was then that Constance seemed to recover suddenly her reason, for she rushed toward her husband with outstretched arms, exclaiming in a voice fraught with rapturous thanksgiving, “John! John and Dorothy!” An inexpressible joy shone in her eyes.
But her advance was met with a cold, stern frown and a backward wave of the hand. Not a word escaped him.
For a moment she stood irresolute; then she passed the tips of her fingers across her brow again and again—“Oh, this horrible dream that I cant’ shake off!” Again she seemed to recover her reason and her voice, soft and sobbing, said, “John, you don’t believe me shameless and debased, do you? You can’t believe it, for it is false, false, I say! and the boat won’t clear from it! Let me help”—and her voice hardening, she went on—“Give me a paddle. We must escape. Save Dorothy!” and she threw out her hands to him appealingly.
A swift compassionate look swept across Thorpe’s face. The first doubt of his wife’s guilt had seized upon his brain, and he said chokingly, “My God, is it possible my wife is innocent?”
He had half turned around to her, but on remembering the ring, his face again set stern, then without another word he waved her back with a single motion of his hand.
But the sound of his voice had once more stirred up a filament of intelligence and she sobbed, “John! John!” She got no further. She saw him turn away and, placing her hand to her side, trembled, and with a moan on her lips, sank down beside Virginia.
And at that moment the detective appeared in the partition doorway and was followed closely by Smith, who, upon seeing the prostrate woman, senseless on the floor, at once concluded a foul crime had been committed, and exclaimed, with horror and rage on his face:
“Oh, the murtherin’ blackguard!”
In the struggle Jack broke from Sam and stooped to pick up the revolver. But Sam, coached in Texas, had him covered with his own revolver in a twinkling, and with the characteristic side movement of his head, said with a grin of satisfaction, “If you touch it, I’ll send a bullet through your brain!”
After Jack Shore had been securely handcuffed, and after a hasty but bootless search for his partner in crime, Detective Simms hustled him into the launch, and desiring to get him behind the prison bars without delay, ordered the engineer to run the boat across the river at once so as to avoid any attempt at release by possible confederates.
A hasty examination of both Constance and Virginia convinced Mr. Thorpe that they were not seriously hurt, and were rendered senseless only by a shock of great mental excitement.
To remain until after their recovery would only add torture to a painful situation; he therefore made them as comfortable as the limited means at hand would allow, and then taking Dorothy with him, boarded the launch, leaving Sam and Smith to watch over and care for his wife and sister until the arrival of a physician, whom he intended to dispatch to their aid as quickly as possible. Dorothy objected to leaving her mother, but was sternly overruled and awed into submission by her father.
Ten minutes after her rescue the boat was speeding toward Madison Street landing with John Thorpe and Dorothy, Jack Shore and Detective Simms, taciturn and grave.
As the boat drew away, both Sam and Smith silently contemplated the two insensible women on the floor. For some moments neither spoke a word, profoundly absorbed in a grave contemplation of the questionable necessity of the two women undertaking so dangerous a mission.
To Sam it appeared plain they had very recently learned of Dorothy’s place of captivity; but why they had not imparted the information to some of their male friends, why they had kept her place of concealment secret, and why, also, they had undertaken her release just prior to the arrival of her father on the scene, was a mystery. It only resulted in a suspicion that they had somehow heard of John Thorpe’s premeditated attempt at rescue, and were alarmed lest Dorothy should fall into his hands.
Smith’s mind was not of an analytical nature; in fact, he did not think their presence was attributable to anything other than a mother’s natural heart-breaking longing to recover her darling as swiftly as possible, and in the enterprise Virginia had joined her.
And as he thought of the indifference and cruel desertion of John Thorpe with her child, for whom she had made such a sacrifice, a solemn, serious look of sadness gathered on his face and deepened into contempt and anger. And the compassion in his heart welled up and at length broke from between his lips, in unconscious mutterings. “Sure, he tuk her darlint from her an’ left her lyin’ there, too, so he do, on the hard flure, wid her sinses gone out from her hid complately. The heartless man!”
“The trouble between them is serious,” Sam replied, as he knelt down beside Virginia and commenced to chafe her hands.
“Sure, don’t I know it, so I do!” rejoined Smith, as he followed Sam’s example and set to chafing Constance’s hands between his own. “An’ he’s broke her heart entirely, so he ave,” he went on, “an’ her hands do be numb wid no life in thim at all.”
Then he was silent for a time and worked industriously to bring back into her hands the warmth that had fled.
Suddenly he asked Sam in an eager, anxious whisper, “Do yees belave she’d do wrong?”
“No!” Sam promptly replied.
“Naither do I. Indade she’s as swate an’ innocint a lady as wan ave hivin’s angels. Sure, she cudn’t do wrong at all, at all.”
“Not at all!” responded Sam gravely.
“An’ the mister shud ave better sinse than to trate her so unkind, don’t yees think so now?”
“Thorpe is a damned fool, I guess!” Sam answered gloomily.
“Indade, I do belave it, too, so I do!”
Again there was silence. Again it was broken by Smith, who said in a low, confidential tone: “I’ll tell yees, I belave it do be some attracious divil ave come betwain thim.”
“You do!” Sam snapped at him, as though he interpreted Smith’s allusion a direct reference to Virginia.
“Indade I do, so I do!”
“Why do you think so?” Sam asked, a tinge of annoyance at Smith’s persistence still appearing in the manner of asking.
“Isn’t she an angel? An’ it’s only the divil cud sipporate an angel from her husband. Sure, man, dear, what more do yees want to prove it?”
A twitching of Virginia’s eyelids at that moment caught Sam’s attention. It was nature’s first harbinger of approaching consciousness. He held up his hand for Smith to be silent. The twitching, however, ceased, and her eyelid remaining closed, again became motionless.
“A false alarm!” he muttered, and proceeded to chafe her hands more industriously than before. It was evident that Sam liked the occupation; for this young lady had unconsciously woven a mesh of enthralling servitude about his heart, and his idolizing; passionate fondness had at last been rewarded by unexpectedly finding himself permitted to caress her at will; to stroke her hair, to contemplate her fair face, to press her hands between his own.
Sam shrewdly suspected that Virginia was somehow the cause of Thorpe’s estrangement from his wife, but wherefore and why, were parts that she alone could explain, and her lips were sealed.
That she was also mysteriously connected with the abduction of the child, he felt was a moral certainty. And her meeting with the Italian in the lonely park at dead of night could have offered no other solution. It had acted as a temporary restraining factor upon the ardor of his love and admiration. But now, as she lay so still and insensible in his care and protection; now, as he gazed on her fair features, all his doubts of her chastity and loyalty to those she loved vanished, and an all conquering fondness suddenly burst in a flood of radiance upon him, sweeping away all his misgivings before it, irresistible and impetuous as the flight of an avalanche.
It was very quiet at that moment; so still that the rippling water, as it lapped along the logs which supported the cabin, sounded very distinct. Smith imagined he heard a splash, and assuming a listening attitude, said cautiously, “Phwat may that mane?”
After a pause, Sam alertly remarked, “We have not kept a lookout. What if the dago’s partner should steal in on us?”
Smith’s eyes blazed with anger. Laying Constance’s hand down, he sprang to his feet. “Be the power ave justice,” he exclaimed between his teeth, “sure, an’ it do be a divil ave a bad job the rogue’ll take on, to boord us now.”
“If you see anybody lurking near, call me,” said Sam.
“Niver yees moind! Just lave the thavin’ blackguard to me! I’ll attind to him!” Smith answered, a savage joy betrayed on his face, and, seizing hold of the axe, he crept softly to the door. After listening a moment, he opened it and stepped out, closing the door behind him.
Again there was silence. Again Sam tenderly smoothed away Virginia’s abundant silky black hair from her face, and fondly chafed her temples. And as he thought of her swift recovery, a recovery that would place a great gulf between him and this one girl who could make him the happiest being on all God’s green earth, he muttered; “Oh, for one touch of those ruby colored lips—even if it be stolen.”
Virginia’s face was very close to him, and as he looked at her he detected a faint warmth in her cheeks; noted the fine mold, the delicate tracery of blue veins through her clear white skin—the temptation was very great. His heart thumped wildly and then—unmindful of the impropriety, or unwilling to resist the natural inclination of his arm to slip under her full, round, snowy neck—raised her head and touched her lips with his. The contact germinated a magnetic spark that raced through her veins and instantly awoke her to life.
She sprang to her feet, the red blood of active youth flushing her face to crimson. For one moment she looked indignant, fully conscious of the liberty he had taken. Sam bent his head abashed, and said apologetically—said in tones and manner that left no mistake as to his honest love and deep respect for her—“You looked so beautiful that—really now—I could not help it—forgive me!”
Her mobile face, that had set in a shock of alarm, indignation and scorn, softened and, as the events of the night flooded her memory, changed to a smile. For one moment it loitered in her eyes and on her lips, and then again changed to a grave, serious look that developed tears in her beautiful blue eyes. She held out her hand to him. Were his eyes deceiving him? Could he believe it? Yes, and he stood dazed with overpowering joy that she was not offended at the liberty.
He took her hand and gently carried it to his lips. Then she turned to the aid of Constance, knelt beside her, felt her hands, her face, her neck, and asked him. “Who was so mean to strike her down?”
For answer he sadly shook his head, and replied gravely, “She sank to the floor after John Thorpe refused her.”
Then bitter tears trickled down Virginia’s face as she continued to chafe her hands; but finding her efforts to restore warmth were unavailing, the same gripping at her heartstrings again possessed her. She raised her eyes to him, a frantic pleading in her voice, “Help me, Sam; oh, help me bring back the life that has nearly fled!”
“Help you!” he repeated proudly, as he stood in front of the girl who had for the first time asked of him a favor in her distress, the favor of a “good samaritan.”
And then, looking straight at her, he said, very seriously, as he knelt and took Constance’s other hand, “The strength that God has given me is at your service, now and forever!”
She understood, and he noted with pleasure that no swift questioning glance of anger, no look of weariness and turning away, as once before, followed his magnanimity.
At that moment Smith, who stood on the platform just outside the cabin door, was heard to say in a loud voice:
“Move on there! The channel be over beyant, in the middle ave the water! Kape yees head more sout be aste!” Then he was heard muttering indistinctly, with only such disjointed words as “blackguard,” “whillip” and “divilish rat,” clearly audible.
It was soon, however, followed by angry words delivered in an aggressively belligerent voice: “Be hivins, don’t yees come near us! Kape off, sure, d’yees moind, yees blackguards, or I’ll put a hole through yees bottom that’ll sink yees down to the place where yees do belong, so ye do!”
Suddenly changing his voice to an anxious tone, said, “Phwat d’yees want? Phwat’s that? Doctor, sure! Praise be to God! Oh, we’ve been waitin’ for yees, doctor dear, till our hearts do be broken entirely. Be me soul, it’s the thruth; not wan bit more nor less. Come, dear, yees do be wanted quick!”
A lurch at the cabin told that the launch had arrived. The door was hastily opened and Smith pushed the doctor in.
“There they be, sure, lyin’ en the flure wid no sinse in thim at all, at all. Do yees be quick, doctor, and hivin’ll reward yees!”
Skillful application of proven restoratives, however, failed to produce sensibility, and the doctor considered the case so grave that he ordered Constance be removed to her home as quickly as possible.
She was, therefore, tenderly taken on board the launch and conveyed home.
The sun’s rays had burst through and dispersed the early morning mists before Constance recovered from the shock, but, alas! with the shadow of a wreck enveloping her.
The next morning Sam determined upon a personal interview with the prisoner. Upon arrival at the County jail, where the prisoner had been transferred, Sam encountered Smith, who was standing on the curb talking to a policeman.
“How dy yus do, Sor?” was Smith’s greeting.
“Getting along as fast as could be expected,” he answered.
“It do be surprisin’ the number ave blackguards there do be infesting the straits ove Portland after dark these days. Houldups, an’ ‘break-o-day Johnnies’ an’ ‘shanghoin’ an’—an’ kidnappin’—an’ what bates me, all the worrk to be had at good wages the while—whill wan ave the rogues do be off his bait for a time, so he do!”
“Sure, Smith, no mistake about that,” Sam laughed. “We slipped it over him in fine shape last night. Have you seen him this morning?”
“Indade oi ’ave, Sor, and he’s the very wan that run the soule ave his plexis ferninst me hand the other day for spakin’ disrespectful ave a lady.”
“I came to see him,” Sam said, with a smile at Smith’s chivalry.
“Indade! Sure yees’ll not recognize him as the wan we tuk last night at all, fir the color ave hair do be turnin’ from black to a faded straw, so it do.”
“Through terror of his position, I suppose.”
“Not wan bit, sor. It came out in the wash. It do be this way. Yees see, the orficers cudn’t get him to spake wan worrd an’ no sweatbox or other terror ave the force did he fear, at all, sure! So they turned the water on him, after takin’ off his clothes with the aid of two ‘trustys,’ and it was raymarked by the jailer that his skin do look uncommon fair, an the hair on his limbs was a sandy color, an’ not black, like the hair on his hid, and his mustache oily black, too, so it do.”
“Artificial coloring,” suggested Sam.
“Sure, that’s jist phat the jailor sid, the very same worrds, although do yees naw the color blend av his nick from the color bone up was a beautiful bit of worrk, as nate an’ natural as anything yees would want to see.”
“He is possibly an Italian artist.”
“Sure, he’s no Italian at all, fir the trustys soaped an’ lathered an’ scrubbed all the Dago off ave him. He raysisted loike a madman, but it was no use, and whin they held him under the shower bath his heavy black mustache fell off onto the floor. Wan ave the trustys picked it up and said, says he: ‘By jimminy, he’s no Dago at all; he’s a scoogy.’ An’ I say so, too, so I do. And the jailer raymarked it was just as he expected, and then he tould them to get the scoogy into his duds.”
“I will try and get permission to see him.”
Sam then entered the office, followed by Smith. They were readily allowed to see the prisoner, and upon approaching his cell, Sam recognized him at once, and the Sheriff wrote on the record, opposite the name of George Golda—“Alias, Jack Shore.”
An hour later Sam Harris was closeted with Detective Simms, in his office.
“I believe the fellow who escaped from the cabin last night,” said Sam, “was Jack Shore’s partner Philip Rutley, otherwise known as ‘Lord Beauchamp’.”
“Why do you suspect the lord to be Philip Rutley?” inquired the detective.
“Because they were partners in business, and inseparable chums socially,” replied Sam. “And where one was to be found, the other was not far away.”
“You say he got ten thousand dollars from the bank on your uncle’s indorsement?” inquired the detective.
“Yes,” replied Sam, “and tomorrow afternoon he is to be uncle’s guest at Rosemont.”
“Well, tonight my lord will attempt to leave the city, but he will find it impracticable,” remarked the detective, dryly. “I desire you to keep strictly mum on this matter for twenty-four hours, and I promise you positive identification of his lordship.”
Later, Detective Simms, smoking a cigar, sauntered carelessly into the “sweatbox,” where Jack Shore was still confined, and dumb as a stone statue on the question of kidnapping.
After silently looking at Jack for a time, he said with a smile: “If you had been shrewd you would not be here. You were sold.”
“Then I am either a knave or a fool?” interrogated Jack, carelessly.
“To be frank,” laughed Simms, “you are both. A knave for trusting Rutley, and a fool for doing his dirty work. I suppose you will think it is a lie when I say he ‘tipped’ us to the cabin for the ten thousand dollars reward offered by Mr. Thorpe for recovery of the child, and a promise of immunity from imprisonment.”
“Who is Rutley?” nonchalantly asked Jack.
“Why, your partner; that fellow who has been masquerading as a lord.”
“Lord who?”
“Come, now,” Simms laughed. “Why, me Lord Beauchamp! Surprised, eh?” and again Simms laughed and looked at Jack questioningly. “Well,” he continued at length, “you must be a cheap guy to believe that fellow true to you. See here, he gave the whole thing away. Don’t believe it, eh? Well, I’ll prove it. We knew the time Miss Thorpe was to be at the cabin. We knew the dog was on watch and removed it. We knew the exact time Rutley was to be with you, and arranged for him to get away without your suspicion. Why, our man was waiting with a boat as soon as he got out of the cabin.”
“Did he get away?” It was the first question that Jack had asked, though non-committal, in which Simms detected a faint anxiety. Simms was the very embodiment of coolness and indifference. “Not from us, no; but he is out on bail.”
That assertion was a masterstroke of ingenuity, and he followed it up with the same indifference. “Would you like to know who his sureties are?”
Jack maintained a gloomy silence.
“Just to convince you that I am not joking, I will show you the document.” And Simms turned lazily on his heel and left him. Returning a few moments later with a document, he held it for Jack to look at.
“Do you note the amount? And the signatures?—James Harris, John Thorpe. You must be familiar with them,” and the detective smiled as he thought of the trick he was employing to fool the prisoner, for he had himself written the signatures for the purpose.
“Jack’s breathing was heavier and his face somewhat whiter, yet by a superhuman effort he still maintained a gloomy frown of apparent indifference.
“The reward was paid to him this morning,” continued the detective, between his puffs of smoke.
“How much?” asked Jack, unconcerned.
“Ten thousand dollars!”
“Quite a hunk!” Jack said, carelessly. For he thought of the package that Rutley had deftly abstracted from his pocket in the cabin, and he was glad of it, for it would be used in his defense. And then he muttered to himself: “This ‘duffer’ is slick and thinks he can work me, but I’ll fool him.”
“The fellow is pretty well fixed,” continued the detective, as he eyed Jack inquisitively.
“Clear of this case with twenty thousand dollars in his pocket.”
“What!” exclaimed Jack, for the first time amazed, and then checking himself, said negligently:
“I understood you to say the reward was ten thousand dollars?”
“So I did. Ten thousand reward and that ransom money of Miss Thorpe’s.”
“The devil he has!”
Jack was beginning to waver. He thought of Rutley holding back the “tip” that he was shadowed, and also about the dog not barking at his approach, for some time after he had entered the cabin. Either of which incidents, had it been mentioned immediately upon entry, would have made escape possible. It seemed to corroborate the detective’s assertion—that he was sold. His jaws set hard.
“Can you prove that to me?”
“Sure!”
On the afternoon of the second day following the rescue of Dorothy, Mr. Thorpe, accompanied by his child, visited Mr. Harris by urgent invitation. The trees were still dressed in their leafy glow of autumn glory and, with the luxuriant green velvety grass of the lawn, invited a pause for contemplation of the entrancingly serene and happy condition earth intended her children to enjoy. Above was a clear, infinitely beautiful blue sky, through which the radiant orb of day poured down its golden shafts of light in masses of exuberant splendor and warmth.
It was an environment singularly touching and persuasive in its appeal to human nature for “Peace on earth and good will toward men.”
As John Thorpe and his child walked up the path toward the house and arrived near the spot where his quarrel with Mr. Corway had taken place, just one week previous, he could not but halt, sensitive to the insidious influence so softly streaming about him—so gentle, yet so powerful in contra-distinction to the unhappy change that had so recently come into his life. Oh, for something to banish the bitter memories conjured up as his gaze riveted on the “damned spot” where his wife’s inconstancy had been told to him.
And as he looked, a far-off dreamy stare settled in his eyes, as there unrolled before his vision the sweet bliss of happy years fled—gone, as he thought, never to return.
“Oh, God!” he exclaimed, overwhelmed with sudden emotion, and he clapped his hand to his forehead as an involuntary groan of anguish welled up from his heart.
His composure slowly returned to him, but the eroding effect of his smothered anguish would not obliterate, and he found himself thinking, “It was unwise to come to this place—here where memory is embittered by recollections of what has been. Terrible revelation! Terrible! Yet—I could not have been brought to credit it but for the evidence of my eyes.”
These words seemed to startle him with a new light, for he paused, and then in a voice almost reduced to a whisper, fruitful with eager doubt, said, “What have my eyes proved to me? Is there room for a possibility of a mistake? No, no! The ring is evidence of her guilt. Oh, Constance, when I needed you, the world owned no purer or more perfect woman; but now—fallen, fallen, fallen!”
While deeply absorbed in sad reflection, Dorothy stole to his side and, looking up, wistfully, in his face, said:
“Dear papa, isn’t mama here, either?”
The question from the child, uppermost in her mind, aroused him from his heart-aching reverie. He looked at her sternly. “Mama,” he repeated; “child, breathe that name no more! Banish it from your memory! Oh, no, no, no! I did not mean that!” and he turned his head aside with downcast eyes, shocked and ashamed at his passionate outburst in the presence of his little child.
He sat down on a bench and put her on his knee, and as he did so became conscious of the child again looking wistfully in his eyes.
“Well, you are sorry for leaving mama in that old cabin, aren’t you?”
It forced him to turn his eyes away from her, and with a tremor of pain in his voice, muttered: “Twenty times the child has said that to me today,” and, turning to her, he said gently and with infinite compassion:
“Dorothy, you are too young to comprehend. It is my intention to remove you from the home of your birth, to take you East, and educate you there. Now, don’t trouble me with questions, dear,” and he kissed the fair young brow and, looking into her sweet innocent brown eyes, he saw reflected in them her mother’s.
Then he turned his head aside and muttered: “So much like her mother! Oh, Constance! Constance! My judgment condemns you, but my heart—my heart will not leave you!”
Down from the house leisurely strolled Mr. Harris and Hazel.
“His Grace has just communicated to me the most amazing information about Virginia. It is so absurd that I felt quite angry with him for mentioning it,” Hazel said quite seriously.
“And what did he tell you?” inquired Mr. Harris. “If it is no secret?”
“He told me that it is common talk that she was found in the cabin with Constance at the time of Dorothy’s rescue by her father, having just rewarded the Italian for abducting the child, and that they both swooned when uncle found them there.”
“Lord Beauchamp must have been misinformed,” broke in Mr. Harris, with a grave face. “If such were the case Sam would have told me. All idle tattle—mischievous gossip!”
“Ah! Mr. Thorpe and Dorothy!”
“Oh, darling!” exclaimed Hazel, and she gathered the child in her arms, kissed her, and flew off to the house with her.
“Well, John, I am glad to meet you again,” shaking his hand, “though to tell the truth, I did not expect you.”
“It has cost me bitter memories, Mr. Harris.”
“I have long since discovered,” continued Mr. Harris, “that while time cannot heal a deep-rooted sorrow, it softens many of its asperities. When do you depart for the East?”
“I have made arrangements to leave tomorrow.”
“You are doing just what would prompt any man in like position to do. I trust we shall hear from you occasionally.”
“It is now my purpose, after arranging for Dorothy’s education, to travel abroad for an indefinite period, but I shall endeavor to keep in communication with you.”
Linking his arm in that of his guest, Mr. Harris said: “Come, John, let us join Mrs. Harris on the piazza. She is anxious to have a chat with you.”
Turning in the direction of the house, to their surprise they confronted Virginia. Mr. Thorpe at once withdrew his arm from that of Mr. Harris, and stepping aside with an offended dignity, remarked reproachfully:
“I was not aware of having merited the honor you do me.”
Mr. Harris threw up his hands deprecatingly. He understood the purport of the allusion and was dumb. He had been quite unaware of the presence of Virginia, and knowing of the estrangement between brother and sister, felt embarrassed. He was rescued from his dilemma by Virginia, who addressed him in a grave voice.
“Please leave us, Mr. Harris.”
His respect and esteem for her was sincere and great. Her good sense and becoming modesty had often impressed him as a woman of sterling qualities. Utterly disbelieving and discrediting the insinuations and innuendoes which Rutley had set afloat to his own advantage concerning her antagonistic relation with her brother, he conceived her to be the unhappy subject of a combination of circumstances over which she had no influence. A prey to anxiety, she retained little of the color and less of the vivacity formerly so conspicuously her heritage; yet her broad brow glistened white with an intellectuality that beautified her with spiritual chastity.
He was struck, too, with her very serious and pallid face, and his heart went out to her. He bowed low in answer to her request, and without a word gravely turned away and left them.
John Thorpe saw that Virginia was suffering from some great mental strain, nevertheless he chose to appear icily indifferent. He attributed her contrite appearance to the fact that he had surprised her and Constance in the cabin with the abductor of his child. He could conceive of no reason for them being there other than collusion with the Italian, for he believed they were cognizant of Dorothy’s place of imprisonment all the time, and while it was possible the Italian held the child for ransom, they kept her place of concealment secret, under the belief that she was safer from seizure by Thorpe than at home or with friends, and also that it would draw the sympathy of acquaintances to Constance, and though Dorothy told him in her childish way that Virginia had given George Golda money, a minute search of his clothes and about the cabin failed to disclose it, and John Thorpe interpreted her defense of Dorothy as an unexpected contingency arising from the frenzied fury of the Italian to save himself from capture when he found escape cut off.
When Virginia swooned, it mercifully relieved her from a most embarrassing and painful position.
Such were his thoughts as he directed a stony stare of freezing haughtiness upon her—the woman, his sister, whom he now regarded as beyond the pale of blood relationship.
“I did not expect to meet you here,” he said in a voice grave with a sense of the worry from which he was suffering and from which wrong he could not, no matter how he reasoned, disassociate the name of his sister.
“I have tried to find you—to meet you—to—in short, to demand an explanation of this affair; but until now I have been unsuccessful.”
She spoke hesitatingly and with a slight tremor in her voice, otherwise there was no indication of the great emotion that she was laboring under. In short, her demeanor, while firm and of simple dignity, was of the gravest character imaginable.
“You have broken all ties between us,” he answered slowly.
“John, John! Don’t turn away! Stop!” and she held up a warning finger as, stepping in front of him, she barred his way.
“You shall hear me. For I believe what I have to tell you is of the utmost importance. But first, what cause have you for divorcing Constance?”
“You ask that question?” he slowly emphasized.
“Yes, I ask that question,” as steadily and definitely she regarded him.
“If on my return from China you had not concealed from me her infatuation for that man—that fellow Corway—this unhappy trouble would have been over long ago.”
“I have concealed nothing from you! John, I am sure it is all a mistake.”
“All a mistake?” he angrily repeated. “You concealed nothing from me! When her notoriety was of such common gossip that strangers were familiar with details!”
“If you had not degraded Constance by so meanly believing the palpable artifice of a—a stranger,” quietly and gravely replied Virginia—“if you had but given her an opportunity to defend herself, you would have found no cause for divorce; no cause even to fear the tainted breath of scandal could ever attach to Constance. Oh, John, it is all wrong! Constance is innocent! She has never been untrue to you!”
Excitedly he turned to her, his face ablaze with the fervor of his amazement, as he repeated:
“Innocent—Constance! Constance innocent!”
“Yes,” promptly responded Virginia. “I who know it, swear it is true—swear it is the truth in the sight of that high throne before which we shall all stand in the Judgment Day.
“It was I who originated the dreadful insinuations against Mr. Corway.”
“Yes, yes! That may be true—but—” and Thorpe’s manner again relapsed to a heart-aching resignation, as he sadly added: “He wore my wife’s ring!”
“Yes, that is true, John, but unknown to her and most assuredly without her consent,” eagerly asserted Virginia, and she related the manner Corway obtained the ring, and how she subsequently had indiscreetly informed Beauchamp it was “your gift to Constance.”
Those of poor wayward humanity who, in moments of great passion have done a great wrong, know what torture is silently endured as day and night, in moments awake and in dreams asleep, the crime haunts them, and knocks, knocks, knocks, without ceasing, upon the soul’s door for release of the secret.
Such were Virginia’s feelings, and the sweet happiness experienced when she confessed her sin shone in her face with convincing truthfulness.
John listened to her with ever increasing amazement, and when she had concluded, his cold, austere demeanor had perceptibly softened. Yet Thorpe breathed hard.
“You vilified Corway’s character and I have heard recently of his—of her mad infatuation for him and of his frequent visits to our home while I was away in China.”
“The source of your information was a lie. You received it gratuitously from Beauchamp, did you not?”
“I have not mentioned the source of my information. Why do you think he was my informant?”
“Because he hated Corway.”
“And you conspired with him to ruin my home,” quickly interrupted Thorpe, and again coldly turned from her.
“You shall hear me!” and Virginia insistently gripped his coat sleeve and turned him toward her. “I have sought you too long to explain this unhappy affair, and now that I have found you, you must hear me out.”
Smothering his impatience, Thorpe said: “Well!”
“I loved Corway, oh, so fondly!—but, alas, too well, and I allowed myself to cherish the belief that in his endearing manifestations he reciprocated my love. But on my premature return from the farm, I unexpectedly heard him declare his passion for Hazel. Then an all absorbing desire for revenge possessed me.
“I resolved to break their engagement and first endeavor to estrange him—from your friendship. To accomplish that end I traduced his character and created a suspicion that his attention to Hazel was insincere and mercenary, expecting that after Corway was denied access to your home, I could smooth over the unpleasantness between you and Hazel and eventually annul his betrothal to her. But your informant juggled the names, made Constance the subject of Corway’s affection instead of Hazel, and led you to believe the ring was a love token from her to him.”
“He insisted and repeated that Constance was the guilty one and not Hazel,” dubiously commented Thorpe.
“I understand now, it was out of revenge,” she laconically replied.
“Revenge! What wrong have I done Lord Beauchamp?” questioned Thorpe, amazed at Virginia’s disclosures.
“You will understand when I disclose, as I have recently learned that he is Philip Rutley, masquerading as Lord Beauchamp.”
“God of our fathers!” exclaimed Thorpe, clapping his hand to his white forehead, to still the pain of sudden doubt of his wife’s inconstancy, that had seized him.
“What punishment is this inflicted on me?”
Then turning to Virginia with fierce light in his eyes, he sprang at her. In one bound he clutched her by the wrist, glared in her eyes, and said:
“And you, my only sister, have known all this and permitted him to wreak his vengeance upon my innocent wife, who never bore him malice, or did him wrong by thought, word or deed.”
“I did not think that harm would fall on Constance.” Yet even before she had finished speaking, a change came over Thorpe, and his grip on her wrist loosened. A victim of doubt and suspicion, his moods were as changing and variable as the coloring of a chameleon. Apparently he was not yet satisfied of the complete innocence of his wife or of the truthfulness of his sister, for he said, in a voice saddened by reflection: “That does not explain your connection with the abduction of Dorothy.”
“I have them with me,” she muttered, appreciating the importance of clearing herself. “Yes, they are here,” and she hastily produced from her corsage an envelope having had the foresight to preserve them as most precious testimony in case of need.
The moment had come and found her prepared. Handing him the two notes, with a winsome expression of thankfulness, she said:
“Read them, John, this one first, and you will know why I was in the cabin.”
She had handed to him the two notes received from George Golda, though in reality they had been penned by his colleague, Rutley. The first note asked for a meeting in the City park. The second demanded the amount of ransom that night on penalty of removal of Dorothy.
“The time was urgent in the extreme,” she continued. “Unable to secure the amount of ransom demanded, I resolved to go alone to the cabin, determined to rescue Dorothy.”
“You entered then.”
“But you were not alone; Constance was with you,” he corrected.
“When I told her my purpose, she pleaded so hard. Oh, so hard to go with me, that I could not deny her. I have told you all.”
John Thorpe was not the only listener to Virginia’s pleading. Intensely interested, neither of them noticed Sam Harris approach, and with him the little Scotch terrier, which had completely recovered from its painful experience on the launch at Ross Island. When he first caught sight of them confronting each other, he gave a low whistle of surprise, and then, as he drew near to address them, involuntarily he heard her last words. His eyelids twitched with pleasure as he listened to the idol of his heart vindicate Constance. Smothering a cry of joy, he turned and at once withdrew, muttering to himself: “Lord, how light my heart feels! Virginia is doing the right thing now, I guess. Come, Doctor”—the name he had given to the dog—“we’ll leave them for awhile, eh?” And the brown eyes of the grateful canine looked up at him with almost human intelligence and affection.
John Thorpe’s demeanor had undergone a great change in the few minutes he had listened to Virginia. His frigid haughtiness had softened, through successive stages, to a gentleness bordering on compassion.
“I will take care of these,” said he, in a voice of tenderness, as he placed the notes in his pocket. “But, oh, God in Heaven! What shall I say to my beloved wife?”
“You believe me, John?” Virginia cried, in a tone of heartfelt thankfulness—her eager gaze fastened on his face. Her pleading touched him deeply. He took her in his arms, gently kissed her fair brow, and in a broken voice, said:
“Virginia, we are only human, with human failings; but in your honor and truthfulness of this dreadful affair, God bear witness to my faith!”
A devout joy flushed the pallor of her beautiful face, as she responded with a thankful heart, purified as gold with fire: “My prayers are answered, and my brother is himself again.”
“Yes, Virginia,” he continued, with the fervor of family pride, as he thought of the part she had taken in Dorothy’s rescue—“And in that book which shall be opened in the last great day, there will be pointed out by the Recording Angel—my sister’s atonement.” Then, without releasing her, he went on in an altered, anxious voice: “And my darling wife! Where is Constance? Tell me, Virginia, that I may go to her at once and plead her forgiveness.”
“What shall I say?” she whispered, awestruck, caught in a moment of forgetfulness of the woman who suffered for it all. “I must not tell him where she is. No, no, no! Not yet!” and she battled to subdue her agitation that she might invent some plea to postpone the meeting with his wife. “Not now; not now, John,” and drawing away from him, unconsciously put out her hand as though to ward off some impending evil.
“Why not?” he asked in surprised tones. “I must see her. I must know where my darling wife is at once!”