CHAPTER XX.
“I am very grateful to you for the service you have rendered my little sister,” said Rex, extending his hand to the little veiled figure standing in the shade of the orange-trees. “Allow me to thank you for it.”
Poor Daisy! she dared not speak lest the tones of her voice should betray her identity.
“I must for evermore be as one dead to him,” she whispered to her wildly beating heart.
Rex wondered why the little, fluttering, cold fingers dropped so quickly from his clasp; he thought he heard a stifled sigh; the slight, delicate form looked strangely familiar, yet he could see it was neither Eve, Gerty, nor Bess. She bowed her head with a few low-murmured words he scarcely caught, and the next instant the little figure was lost to sight in the darkness beyond.
“Who was that, Birdie?” he asked, scarcely knowing what prompted the question.
Alas for the memory of childhood! poor little Birdie had quite forgotten.
“It is so stupid of me to forget, but when I see her again I shall ask her and try and remember it then.”
“It is of no consequence,” said Rex, raising the little figure in his arms and bearing her quickly up the graveled path to the house.
As he neared the house Rex observed there was great confusion among the servants; there was a low murmur of voices and lights moving to and fro.
“What is the matter, Parker?” cried Rex, anxiously, of the servant who came out to meet him.
“Mrs. Lyon is very ill, sir,” he answered, gravely; “it98is a paralytic stroke the doctor says. We could not find you, so we went for Doctor Elton at once.”
It seemed but a moment since he had parted from his mother in the gathering twilight, to search for Birdie. His mother very ill––dear Heaven! he could scarcely realize it.
“Oh, take me to mother, Rex!” cried Birdie, clinging to him piteously. “Oh, it can not, it cannot be true; take me to her, Rex!”
The sound of hushed weeping fell upon his ears and seemed to bring to him a sense of what was happening. Like one in a dream he hurried along the corridor toward his mother’s boudoir. He heard his mother’s voice calling for him.
“Where is my son?” she moaned.
He opened the door quietly and went in. Her dark eyes opened feebly as Rex entered, and she held out her arms to him.
“Oh, my son, my son!” she cried; “thank Heaven you are here!”
She clung to him, weeping bitterly. It was the first time he had ever seen tears in his mother’s eyes, and he was touched beyond words.
“It may not be as bad as you think, mother,” he said; “there is always hope while there is life.”
She raised her face to her son’s, and he saw there was a curious whiteness upon it.
The large, magnificent room was quite in shadow; soft shadows filled the corners; the white statuettes gleamed in the darkness; one blind was half drawn, and through it came the soft, sweet moonlight. A large night-lamp stood upon the table, but it was carefully shaded. Faint glimmers of light fell upon the bed, with its costly velvet hangings, and on the white, drawn face that lay on the pillows, with the gray shadow of death stealing softly over it––the faint, filmy look that comes only into eyes that death has begun to darken.
His mother had never been demonstrative; she had never cared for many caresses; but now her son’s love seemed her only comfort.
“Rex,” she said, clinging close to him, “I feel that I am dying. Send them all away––my hours are numbered––a mist rises before my face, Rex. Oh, dear Heaven! I can not see you––I have lost my sight––my eyes grow dim.”
A cry came from Rex’s lips.
“Mother, dear mother,” he cried, “there is no pain in this world I would not undergo for your dear sake!” he cried, kissing the stiffening lips.
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She laid her hands on the handsome head bent before her.
“Heaven bless you, my son,” she murmured. “Oh, Rex, my hope and my trust are in you!” she wailed. “Comfort me, calm me––I have suffered so much. I have one last dying request to make of you, my son. You will grant my prayer, Rex? Surely Heaven would not let you refuse my last request!”
Rex clasped her in his arms. This was his lady-mother, whose proud, calm, serene manner had always been perfect––whose fair, proud face had never been stained with tears––whose lips had never been parted with sighs or worn with entreaties.
It was so new to him, so terrible in its novelty, he could hardly understand it. He threw his arms around her, and clasped her closely to his breast.
“My dearest mother,” he cried, “you know I would die for you if dying would benefit you. Why do you doubt my willingness to obey your wishes, whatever they may be? Whatever I can do to comfort you I will surely do it, mother.”
“Heaven bless you, Rex!” she cried, feebly caressing his face and his bands. “You make death a thousand-fold more easy to bear, my darling, only son!”
“My dear sir,” said the doctor, bending over him gently, “I must remind you your mother’s life hangs on a thread. The least excitement, the least agitation, and she will be dead before you can call for help. No matter what she may say to you, listen and accede.”
Rex bent down and kissed the pale, agitated face on the pillow.
“I will be careful of my dearest mother. Surely you may trust me,” he said.
“I do,” replied the doctor, gravely. “Your mother’s life, for the present, lies in your hands.”
“Is it true, Rex, that I must die?” she gasped. The look of anguish on his face answered her. “Rex,” she whispered, clinging like a child to his strong white hands, “my hope and trust are in you, my only son. I am going to put your love to the test, my boy. I beseech you to say ‘Yes’ to the last request I shall ever make of you. Heaven knows, Rex, I would not mention it now, but I am dying––yes, dying, Rex.”
“You need not doubt it, mother,” he replied, earnestly, “I can not refuse anything you may ask! Why should I?”
But, as he spoke, he had not the faintest idea of what he would be asked to do. As he spoke his eyes caught the gleam of the moonlight through the window, and his thoughts traveled100for one moment to the beloved face he had seen in the moonlight––how fair and innocent the face was as they parted on the night they were wed! The picture of that lonely young girl-wife, going home by herself, brought tears to his eyes.
“Was there ever a fate so cruel?” he said to himself. “Who ever lost a wife on his wedding-day?”
Surely there had never been a love-dream so sweet, so passionate, or so bright as his. Surely there had never been one so rudely broken.
Poor little Daisy––his wife––lying cold and still in death. Even his mother was to be taken from him.
The feeble pressure of his mother’s hands recalled his wandering thoughts.
“Listen, Rex,” she whispered, faintly, “my moments are precious.”
He felt his mother’s arms clasp closely round his neck.
“Go on, mother,” he said, gently.
“Rex, my son,” she whispered, gaspingly, “I could not die and leave the words unspoken. I want my race to live long generations after me. Your poor little lame sister will go unmarried to the grave; and now all rests with you, my only son. You understand me, Rex; you know the last request I have to ask.”
For the first time a cry came to Rex’s lips; her words pierced like a sword in his heart.
“Surely, mother, you do not mean––you do not think I could ever––”
The very horror of the thought seemed to completely unman him.
“You will marry again,” she interrupted, finishing the sentence he could not utter. “Remember, she whom you loved is dead. I would not have asked this for long years to come, but I am dying––I must speak now.”
“My God, mother!” he cried out in agony, “ask anything but that. My heart is torn and bleeding; have pity on me, have pity!”
Great drops of agony started on his brow; his whole frame shook with agitation.
He tried to collect himself, to gather his scattered thoughts, to realize the full import of the words she had spoken.
Marry again! Heaven pity him! How could he harbor such a thought for a single instant, when he thought of the pale, cold face of little Daisy––his fair young bride––whom he so madly loved, lying pale and still in death, like a broken lily,101down in the dark, bottomless pit which never yielded up its terrible secrets!
“Rex,” wailed his mother, feebly, gazing into his eyes with a suspense heart-breaking to witness, “don’t refuse me this the first prayer I had ever made. If you mean to refuse it would be kinder far to plunge a dagger into my heart and let me die at once. You can not refuse.” One trembling hand she laid on his breast, and with the other caressed his face. “You are good and gentle of heart, Rex; the prayers of your dying mother will touch you. Answer me, my son; tell me my proud old race shall not die with you, and I will rest calmly in my grave.”
The cold night-wind fanned his pallid brow, and the blood coursed through his veins like molten lead. He saw the tears coursing down her pale, withered cheeks. Ah, God! was it brave to speak the words which must bring despair and death to her? Was it filial to send his mother to her grave with sorrow and sadness in her heart? Could he thrust aside his mother’s loving arms and resist her dying prayer? Heaven direct him, he was so sorely tried.
“Comfort me, Rex,” she whispered, “think of how I have loved you since you were a little child, how I used to kiss your rosy little face and dream what your future would be like. It comes back to me now while I plead to you with my fast-fleeting breath. Oh, answer me, Rex.”
All the love and tenderness of the young man’s impulsive heart was stirred by the words. Never was a man so fearfully tried. Rex’s handsome face had grown white with emotion; deep shadows came into his eyes. Ah, what could it matter now? His hopes were dead, his heart crushed, yet how could he consent?
“Oh, Heaven, Rex!” she cried, “what does that look on your face mean? What is it?”
The look of terror on her face seemed to force the mad words from his lips, the magnetic gaze seemed to hold him spellbound. He bent over hie mother and laid his fresh, brave young face on the cold, white face of his dying mother.
“Promise me, Rex,” she whispered.
“I promise, mother!” he cried. “God help me; if it will make your last moments happier, I consent.”
“Heaven bless you, my noble son!” whispered the quivering voice. “You have taken the bitter sting from death, and filled my heart with gratitude. Some day you will thank me for it, Rex.”
They were uttered! Oh, fatal words! Poor Rex, wedded102and parted, his love-dream broken, how little he knew of the bitter grief which was to accrue from that promise wrung from his white lips.
Like one in a dream he heard her murmur the name of Pluma Hurlhurst. The power of speech seemed denied him; he knew what she meant. He bowed his head on her cold hands.
“I have no heart to give her,” he said, brokenly. “My heart is with Daisy, my sweet little lost love.”
Poor Rex! how little he knew Daisy was at that self-same moment watching with beating heart the faint light of his window through the branches of the trees––Daisy, whom he mourned as dead, alas! dead to him forever, shut out from his life by the rash words of that fatally cruel promise.
CHAPTER XXI.
One thought only was uppermost in Daisy’s mind as she sped swiftly down the flower-bordered path in the moonlight, away from the husband who was still so dear to her.
“He did not recognize me,” she panted, in a little quivering voice. “Would he have cursed me, I wonder, had he known it was I?”
Down went the little figure on her knees in the dew-spangled grass with a sharp little cry.
“Oh, dear, what shall I do?” she cried out in sudden fright. “How could I know she was his sister when I told her my name?” A twig fell from the bough above her head brushed by some night-bird’s wing. “He is coming to search for me,” she whispered to herself.
A tremor ran over her frame; the color flashed into her cheek and parted lips, and a startled, wistful brightness crept into the blue eyes.
Ah! there never could have been a love so sweetly trustful and child-like as little Daisy’s for handsome Rex, her husband in name only.
Poor, little, innocent Daisy! if she had walked straight back to him, crying out, “Rex, Rex, see, I am Daisy, your wife!” how much untold sorrow might have been spared her.
Poor, little, lonely, heart-broken child-bride! how was she to know Rex had bitterly repented and come back to claim her, alas! too late; and how he mourned her, refusing to be comforted, and how they forced him back from the edge of the treacherous shaft lest he should plunge headlong down the terrible depths. Oh, if she had but known all this!
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If Rex had dropped down from the clouds she could not have been more startled and amazed at finding him in such close proximity away down in Florida.
She remembered he had spoken to her of his mother, as he clasped her to his heart out in the starlight of that never-to-be-forgotten night, whispering to her of the marriage which had been the dearest wish of his mother’s heart.
She remembered how she had hid her happy, rosy, blushing face on his breast, and asked him if he was quite sure he loved her better than Pluma Hurlhurst, the haughty, beautiful heiress.
“Yes, my pretty little sweetheart, a thousand times better,” he had replied, emphatically, holding her off at arm’s-length, watching the heightened color that surged over the dainty, dimpled face so plainly discernible in the white, radiant starlight.
Daisy rested her head on one soft, childish hand, and gazed thoughtfully up at the cold, brilliant stars that gemmed the heavens above her.
“Oh, if you had only warned me, little stars!” she said. “I was so happy then; and now life is so bitter!”
A sudden impulse seized her, strong as her very life, to look upon his face again.
“I would be content to live my weary life out uncomplainingly then,” she said.
Without intent or purpose she walked hurriedly back through the pansy-bordered path she had so lately traversed.
The grand old trees seemed to stretch their giant arms protectingly over her, as if to ward off all harm.
The night-wind fanned her flushed cheeks and tossed her golden curls against her wistful, tear-stained face. Noiselessly she crept up the wide, graveled path that led to his home––the home which should have been hers.
Was it fancy? She thought she heard Rex’s voice crying out: “Daisy, my darling!” How pitifully her heart thrilled! Dear Heaven! if it had only been true. It was only the restless murmur of the waves sighing among the orange-trees.
A light burned dimly in an upper window. Suddenly a shadow fell across the pale, silken curtains. She knew but too well whose shadow it was; the proud, graceful poise of the handsome head, and the line of the dark curls waving over the broad brow, could belong to no one but Rex. There was no one but the pitying moonlight out there to see how passionately the poor little child-bride kissed the pale roses on which that shadow had fallen, and how she broke it from the stem and104placed it close to her beating heart––that lonely, starved little heart, chilled under the withering frost of neglect, when life, love and happiness should have been just bursting into bloom for her.
“He said I had spoiled his life,” she sighed, leaning her pale face wearily against the dark-green ivy vines. “He must have meant I had come between him and Pluma. Will he go back to her, now that he believes me dead?”
One question alone puzzled her: Had Birdie mentioned her name, and would he know it was she, whom every one believed lying so cold and still in the bottomless pit? She could not tell.
“If I could but see Birdie for a moment,” she thought, “and beseech her to keep my secret!”
Birdie had said her brother was soon going away again.
“How could I bear it?” she asked herself, piteously.
It was not in human nature to see the young husband whom she loved so well drifting so completely away from her and still remain silent. “I will watch over him from afar; I will be his guardian angel; I must remain as one dead to him forever,” she told herself.
Afar off, over the dancing, moonlighted waters she saw a pleasure-boat gliding swiftly over the rippling waves. She could hear their merry laughter and gay, happy voices, and snatches of mirthful songs. Suddenly the band struck up an old, familiar strain. Poor little Daisy leaned her head against the iron railing of the porch and listened to those cruel words––the piece that they played was “Love’s Young Dream.”
Love’s young dream! Ah! how cruelly hers had ended! She looked up at the white, fleecy clouds above her, vaguely wondering why the love of one person made the earth a very paradise, or a wilderness. As the gay, joyous music floated up to her the words of the poet found echo in her heart in a passionate appeal:
“No one could tell, for nobody knew,Why love was made to gladden a few;And hearts that would forever be true,Go lone and starved the whole way through,”
Oh, it was such a blessed relief to her to watch that shadow. Rex was pacing up and down the room now, his arms folded and his head bent on his breast. Poor, patient little Daisy, watching alone out in the starlight, was wondering if he was thinking of her.
No thought occurred to her of being discovered there with105her arms clasped around that marble pillar watching so intently the shadow of that graceful, manly figure pacing to and fro.
No thought occurred to her that a strange event was at that moment transpiring within those walls, or that something unusual was about to happen.
How she longed to look upon his face for just one brief moment! Estrangement had not chilled her trusting love, it had increased it, rather, tenfold.
Surely it was not wrong to gaze upon that shadow––he was her husband.
In that one moment a wild, bitter thought swept across her heart.
Did Rex regret their marriage because she was poor, friendless, and an orphan? Would it have been different if she had been the heiress of Whitestone Hall?
She pitied herself for her utter loneliness. There was no one to whom she could say one word of all that filled her heart and mind, no face to kiss, no heart to lean on; she was so completely alone. And this was the hour her fate was being decided for her. There was no sympathy for her, her isolation was bitter. She thought of all the heroines she had ever read of. Ah, no one could picture such a sad fate as was hers.
A bright thought flashed across her lonely little heart.
“His mother is there,” she sighed. “Ah, if I were to go to her and cry out: ‘Love me, love me! I am your son’s wife!’ would she cast me from her? Ah, no, surely not; a woman’s gentle heart beats in her breast, a woman’s tender pity. I will plead with her on my knees––to comfort me––to show me some path out of the pitiful darkness; I can love her because she is his mother.”
Daisy drew her breath quickly; the color glowed warmly on her cheek and lips; she wondered she had not thought of it before. Poor child! she meant to tell her all, and throw herself upon her mercy.
Her pretty, soft blue eyes, tender with the light of love, were swimming with tears. A vain hope was struggling in her heart––Rex’s mother might love her, because she worshiped her only son so dearly.
Would she send her forth from that home that should have sheltered her, or would she clasp those little cold fingers in Rex’s strong white ones, as she explained to him, as only a mother can, how sadly he had misjudged poor little Daisy––his wife?
No wonder her heart throbbed pitifully as she stole silently106across the wide, shadowy porch, and, quivering from head to foot, touched the bell that echoed with a resounding sound through the long entrance-hall.
“I would like to see Mrs. Lyon,” she said, hesitatingly, to the servant who answered her summons. “Please do not refuse me,” she said, clasping her little white hands pleadingly. “I must see her at once. It is a question of life or death with me. Oh, sir, please do not refuse me. I must see her at once––and––all alone!”
CHAPTER XXII.
In the beautiful drawing-room at Whitestone Hall sat Pluma Hurlhurst, running her white, jeweled fingers lightly over the keyboard of a grand piano, but the music evidently failed to charm her. She arose listlessly and walked toward the window, which opened out upon the wide, cool, rose-embowered porch.
The sunshine glimmered on her amber satin robe, and the white frost-work of lace at her throat, and upon the dark, rich beauty of her southern face.
“Miss Pluma,” called Mrs. Corliss, the housekeeper, entering the room, “there is a person down-stairs who wishes to see you. I have told her repeatedly it is an utter impossibility––you would not see her; but she declares she will not go away until she does see you.”
Pluma turns from the window with cold disdain.
“You should know better than to deliver a message of this kind to me. How dare the impertinent, presuming beggar insist upon seeing me! Order the servants to put her out of the house at once.”
“She is not young,” said the venerable housekeeper, “and I thought, if you only would––”
“Your opinion was not called for, Mrs. Corliss,” returned the heiress, pointing toward the door haughtily.
“I beg your pardon,” the housekeeper made answer, “but the poor creature begged so hard to see you I did feel a little sorry for her.”
“This does not interest me, Mrs. Corliss,” said Pluma, turning toward the window, indicating the conversation was at an end––“not in the least.”
“The Lord pity you, you stony-hearted creature!” murmured the sympathetic old lady to herself as the door closed between them. “One word wouldn’t have cost you much, Heaven knows, it’s mightly little comfort poor old master107takes with you! You are no more like the bonny race of Hurlhursts than a raven is like a white dove!” And the poor old lady walked slowly back to the dark-robed figure in the hall, so eagerly awaiting her.
“There was no use in my going to my young mistress; I knew she would not see you. But I suppose you are more satisfied now.”
“She utterly refuses to see me, does she,” asked the woman, in an agitated voice, “when you told her I wished to see her particularly?”
The housekeeper shook her head.
“When Miss Pluma once makes up her mind to a thing, no power on earth could change her mind,” she said; “and she is determined she won’t see you, so you may as well consider that the end of it.”
Without another word the stranger turned and walked slowly down the path and away from Whitestone Hall.
“Fool that I was!” she muttered through her clinched teeth. “I might have foreseen this. But I will haunt the place day and night until I see you, proud heiress of Whitestone Hall. We shall see––time will tell.”
Meanwhile Mrs. Corliss, the housekeeper, was staring after her with wondering eyes.
“I have heard that voice and seen that face somewhere,” she ruminated, thoughtfully; “but where––where? There seems to be strange leaks in this brain of mine––I can not remember.”
A heavy, halting step passed the door, and stopped there.
“What did that woman want, Mrs. Corliss?”
She started abruptly from her reverie, replying, hesitatingly.
“She wanted to see Miss Pluma, sir.”
“Was Pluma so busily engaged she could not spare that poor creature a moment or so?” he inquired, irritably. “Where is she?”
“In the parlor, sir.”
With slow, feeble steps, more from weakness than age, Basil Hurlhurst walked slowly down the corridor to the parlor.
It was seldom he left his own apartments of late, yet Pluma never raised her superb eyes from the book of engravings which lay in her lap as he entered the room.
A weary smile broke under his silver-white mustache.
“You do not seem in a hurry to bid me welcome, Pluma,” he said, grimly, throwing himself down into an easy-chair opposite her. “I congratulate myself upon having such an affectionate daughter.”
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Pluma tossed aside her book with a yawn.
“Of course I am glad to see you,” she replied, carelessly; “but you can not expect me to go into ecstasies over the event like a child in pinafores might. You ought to take it for granted that I’m glad you are beginning to see what utter folly it is to make such a recluse of yourself.”
He bit his lip in chagrin. As is usually the case with invalids, he was at times inclined to be decidedly irritable, as was the case just now.
“It is you who have driven me to seek the seclusion of my own apartments, to be out of sight and hearing of the household of simpering idiots you insist upon keeping about you,” he cried, angrily. “I came back to Whitestone Hall for peace and rest. Do I get it? No.”
“That is not my fault,” she answered, serenely. “You do not mingle with the guests. I had no idea they could annoy you.”
“Well, don’t you suppose I have eyes and ears, even if I do not mingle with the chattering magpies you fill the house up with? Why, I can never take a ramble in the grounds of an evening without stumbling upon a dozen or more pair of simpering lovers at every turn. I like darkness and quiet. Night after night I find the grounds strung up with these Chinese lanterns, and I can not even sleep in my bed for the eternal brass bands at night; and in the daytime not a moment’s quiet do I get for these infernal sonatas and screeching trills of the piano. I tell you plainly, I shall not stand this thing a day longer. I am master of Whitestone Hall yet, and while I live I shall have things my own way. After I die you can turn it into a pandemonium, for all I care.”
Pluma flashed her large dark eyes upon him surprisedly, beginning to lose her temper, spurred on by opposition.
“I am sure I do not mean to make a hermit of myself because you are too old to enjoy the brightness of youth,” she flashed out, defiantly; “and you ought not to expect it––it is mean and contemptible of you.”
“Pluma!” echoed Basil Hurlhurst, in astonishment, his noble face growing white and stern with suppressed excitement, “not another word.”
Pluma tossed her head contemptuously. When once her temper arose it was quite as impossible to check it as it was when she was a willful, revengeful, spoiled child.
“Another man as rich as you are would have taken their daughter to Washington for a season, and in the summer to Long Branch or Newport––somewhere, anywhere, away from109the detestable waving cotton-fields. When you die I shall have it all set on fire.”
“Pluma!” he cried, hoarsely, rising to his feet and drawing his stately, commanding figure to its full height, “I will not brook such language from a child who should at least yield me obedience, if not love. You are not the heiress of Whitestone Hall yet, and you never may be. If I thought you really contemplated laying waste these waving fields that have been my pride for long years––and my father’s before me––I would will it to an utter stranger, so help me Heaven!”
Were his words prophetic? How little she knew the echo of these words were doomed to ring for all time down the corridors of her life! How little we know what is in store for us!
“I am your only child,” said Pluma, haughtily; “you would not rob me of my birthright. I shall be forced to submit to your pleasure––while you are here––but, thank Heaven, the time is not far distant when I shall be able to do as I please. ‘The mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine,’” she quoted, saucily.
“Thank Heaven the time is not far distant when I shall be able to do as I please.” He repeated the words slowly after her, each one sinking into his heart like a poisoned arrow. “So you would thank Heaven for my death, would you?” he cried, with passion rising to a white heat. “Well, this is no better than I could expect from the daughter––of such a mother.”
He had never intended speaking those words; but she goaded him on to it with her taunting, scornful smile, reminding him so bitterly of the one great error of his past life.
He was little like the kind, courteous master of Whitestone Hall, whom none named but to praise, as he stood there watching the immovable face of his daughter. All the bitterness of his nature was by passion rocked. No look of pain or anguish touched the dark beauty of that southern face at the mention of her mother’s name.
“You have spoken well,” she said. “I am her child. You speak of love,” she cried, contemptuously. “Have you not told me, a thousand times, you never cared for my mother? How, then, could I expect you to care for me? Have you not cried out unceasingly for the golden-haired young wife and the babe you lost, and that you wished Heaven had taken you too? Did I ever hear my mother’s name upon your lips except with a sneer? Do you expect these things made that mother’s child more fond of you, were you twenty times my father?”
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She stood up before him, proudly defiant, like a beautiful tragedy queen, the sunlight slanting on the golden vines of her amber satin robe, on the long, dark, silken curls fastened with a ruby star, and on the deep crimson-hearted passion-roses that quivered on her heaving breast. There was not one feature of that gloriously dark face that resembled the proud, cold man sitting opposite her.
He knew all she had said was quite true. He had tried so hard to love this beautiful queenly girl from her infancy up. He was tender of heart, honest and true; but an insurmountable barrier seemed ever between them; each year found them further apart.
Basil Hurlhurst lived over again in those few moments the terrible folly that had cursed his youth, as he watched the passion-rocked face before him.
“Youth is blind and will not see,” had been too bitterly true with him. It was in his college days, when the world seemed all gayety, youth and sunshine to him, he first met the beautiful face that was to darken all of his after life. He was young and impulsive; he thought it was love that filled his heart for the beautiful stranger who appeared alone and friendless in that little college town.
He never once asked who or what she was, or from whence she came, this beautiful creature with the large, dark, dreamy eyes that thrilled his heart into love. She carried the town by storm; every young man at the college was deeply, desperately in love. But Basil, the handsomest and wealthiest of them all, thought what a lark it would be to steal a march on them all by marrying the dark-eyed beauty then and there. He not only thought it, but executed it, but it was not the lark that he thought it was going to be. For one short happy week he lived in a fool’s paradise, then a change came over the spirit of his dreams. In that one week she had spent his year’s income and all the money he could borrow, then petulantly left him in anger.
For two long years he never looked upon her face again. One stormy night she returned quite unexpectedly at Whitestone Hall, bringing with her their little child Pluma, and, placing her in her father’s arms, bitter recriminations followed. Bitterly Basil Hurlhurst repented that terrible mistake of his youth, that hasty marriage.
When the morning light dawned he took his wife and child from Whitestone Hall––took them abroad. What did it matter to him where they went? Life was the same to him in one part of the world as another. For a year they led a weary111life of it. Heaven only knew how weary he was of the woman the law called his wife!
One night, in a desperate fit of anger, she threw herself into the sea; her body was never recovered. Then the master of Whitestone Hall returned with his child, a sadder and wiser man.
But the bitterest drop in his cup had been added last. The golden-haired young wife, the one sweet love whom he had married last, was taken from him; even her little child, tiny image of that fair young mother, had not been spared him.
How strange it was such a passionate yearning always came over him when he thought of his child!
When he saw a fair, golden-haired young girl, with eyes of blue, the pain in his heart almost stifled him. Some strange unaccountable fate urged him to ever seek for that one face even in the midst of crowds. It was a mad, foolish fancy, yet it was the one consolation of Basil Hurlhurst’s weary, tempest tossed life.
No wonder he set his teeth hard together as he listened to the cold words of the proud, peerless beauty before him, who bore every lineament of her mother’s dark, fatal beauty––this daughter who scornfully spoke of the hour when he should die as of some happy, long-looked-for event.
Those waving cotton-fields that stretched out on all sides as far as the eye could reach, like a waving field of snow, laid waste beneath the fire fiend’s scorching breath! Never––never!
Then and there the proud, self-conscious young heiress lost all chances of reigning a regal queen, byfairmeans, of Whitestone Hall.
CHAPTER XXIII.
The servant who opened the door for Daisy looked earnestly at the fair, pleading young face, framed in rings of golden hair, so pure and spiritual that it looked like an angel’s with the soft white moonlight falling over it.
“You will not refuse me,” she repeated, timidly. “I must speak to Mrs. Lyon.”
“You have come too late,” he replied, gently; “Mrs. Lyon is dead.”
The man never forgot the despairing look of horror that deepened in the childish blue eyes raised to his.
“Rex’s mother dead!” she repeated, slowly, wondering if she had heard aright. “Oh, my poor Rex, my poor Rex!”
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How she longed to go to him and comfort him in that terrible hour, but she dared not intrude upon him.
“If there is any message you would like to leave,” said the kind-hearted Parker, “I will take it to Mr. Rex.”
“No,” said Daisy, shaking her head, “I have no message to leave; perhaps I will come again––after this is all over,” she made answer, hesitatingly; her brain was in a whirl; she wanted to get away all by herself to think. “Please don’t say any one was here,” she said, quickly; “I––I don’t want any one to know.”
The sweet, plaintive voice, as sweet as the silvery note of a forest bird, went straight to his heart.
Whatever the mission of this beautiful, mysterious visitor, he would certainly respect her wishes.
“I shall not mention it if you do not wish it,” he said.
“Thank you,” she replied, simply; “you are very kind. My life seems made up of disappointments,” she continued, as she walked slowly home under the restless, sighing green branches.
It seemed so indeed. She was so young and inexperienced to be thrown so entirely upon the cold, pitiless world––cut off so entirely from all human sympathy. She entered the house quite unobserved. Eve––bright, merry, dashing Eve––was singing like a lark in the drawing-room, making the old house echo with her bright young voice.
“How happy she is!” thought Daisy, wistfully. “She has home, friends, and love, while I have nothing that makes life worth the living.”
Like a shadow, she flitted on through the dim, shadowy hall, toward her own little room. She saw Gertie’s door was ajar as she passed it, and the sound of her own name caused her to pause voluntarily.
It was very natural for Daisy to pause. How many are there who would have passed on quietly, with no desire to know what was being said of themselves, when they heard their own names mentioned in such a sneering manner? Daisy certainly meant no harm by it; she paused, thoughtfully and curiously, as any one would have done.
“I am sure I don’t like it,” Gertie was saying, spitefully. “It is an actual shame allowing Daisy Brooks to remain here. Uncle Jet was a mean old thing to send her here, where there were three marriageable young ladies. I tell you he did it out of pure spite.”
“I believe it,” answered Bess, spiritedly. “Every one of113my beaus either hints for an introduction or asks for it outright.”
“What do you tell them?” questions Gertie, eagerly.
“Tell them! Why, I look exceedingly surprised, replying: ‘I do not know to whom you refer. We have no company at the house just now.’ ‘I mean that beautiful, golden-haired little fairy, with the rosy cheeks and large blue eyes. If not your guest, may I ask who she is?’ I am certainly compelled to answer so direct a thrust,” continued Bess, angrily; “and I ask in well-feigned wonder: ‘Surely you do not mean Daisy Brooks, my mother’s paid companion?’”
“What do they say to that?” asked Gertie, laughing heartily at her elder sister’s ingenuity, and tossing her curl papers until every curl threatened to tumble down. “That settles it, doesn’t it?”
“Mercy, no!” cried Bess, raising her eyebrows; “not a bit of it. The more I say against her––in a sweet way, of course––the more they are determined to form her acquaintance.”
“I don’t see what every one can see in that little pink-and-white baby-face of hers to rave over so!” cried Gertie, hotly. “I can’t imagine where in the world people see her. I have as much as told her she was not expected to come into the parlor or drawing-room when strangers were there, and what do you suppose she said?”
“Cried, perhaps,” said Bess, yawning with ennui.
“She did nothing of the kind,” retorted Gertie. “She seized my hand, and said: ‘Oh, Miss Gertrude, that is very kind of you, indeed! I thank you ever so much!’”
“Pshaw!” cried Bess, contemptuously. “That was a trick to make you believe she did not want to be observed by our guests. She is a sly, designing little creature, with her pretty face and soft, childish ways.”
“But there is one point that seriously troubles me,” said Gertie, fastening the pink satin bow on her tiny slipper more securely, and breaking off the thread with a nervous twitch. “I am seriously afraid, if Rex were to see her, that would be the end of our castle in the air. Daisy Brooks has just the face to attract a handsome, debonair young fellow like Rex.”
“You can depend upon it he shall never see her,” said Bess, decidedly. “Where there’s a will there’s a way.”
“I have never been actually jealous of anyone before,” said Gertie, flushing furiously, as she acknowledged the fact; “but that Daisy has such a way of attracting people toward her they quite forget your presence when she is around. ‘When one rival leaves the field, another one is sure to come to the114fore.’ That’s a true saying,” said Gertie, meditatively. “You see, he did not marry the heiress of Whitestone Hall. So he is still in the market, to be captured by some lucky girl.”
“Well, if I am the lucky one, you must forgive me, Gertie. All is fair in love and war, you know. Besides, his wealth is too tempting to see slip quietly by without a struggle.”
Before she could reply Eve popped in through the long French window that opened out on the porch.
“Oh, I’m so tired of hearing you two talk of lovers and riches!” she cried, throwing herself down on the sofa. “I do hate to hear love weighed against riches, as if it were a purchasable article. According to your ideas, if a fellow was worth a hundred thousand, you would love him moderately; but if he was worth half a million, you could afford to love him immensely.”
“You have got a sensible idea of the matter,” said Bess, coolly.
“For shame!” cried Eve, in a hot fury. “It’s an actual sin to talk in that way. If a handsome young man loves you, and you love him, why, you ought to marry him if he hadn’t a dollar in the world!”
Gertie and the worldly-wise Bess laughed at their younger sister’s enthusiasm.
“Now, there’s Rex Lyon, for instance,” persisted Eve, absolutely refusing to be silenced. “I would wager a box of the best kid gloves either one of you would marry him to-morrow, if he were to ask you, if he hadn’t a penny in his pocket.”
“Pshaw!” reiterated Gertie, and Bess murmured something about absurd ideas; but nevertheless both sisters were blushing furiously to the very roots of their hair. They well knew in their hearts what she said was perfectly true.
“Eve,” said Bess, laying her hand coaxingly on the young rebel’s arm, “Gertie and I want you to promise us something. Come, now, consent that you will do as we wish, that’s a good girl.”
“How can I promise before I know what you want?” said Eve, petulantly. “You might want the man in the moon, after you’ve tried and failed to get his earthly brethren, for all I know!”
“Eve, you are actually absurd!” cried Bess, sharply. “This is merely a slight favor we wish you to do.”
“If you warn her not to do a thing, that is just what she will set her heart upon doing,” said Gertie, significantly.
By this time Eve’s curiosity was well up.
“You may as well tell me anyhow,” she said; “for if you115don’t, and I ever find out what it is, I’ll do my very worst, because you kept it from me.”
“Well,” said Gertie, eagerly, “we want you to promise us not to give Daisy Brooks an introduction to Rex Lyon.”
A defiant look stole over Eve’s mischievous face.
“If he asks me, I’m to turn and walk off, or I’m to say, ‘No, sir, I am under strict orders from my marriageable sisters not to.’ Is that what you mean?”
“Eve,” they both cried in chorus, “don’t be unsisterly; don’t put a stumbling-block in our path; rather remove it!”
“I shall not bind myself to such a promise!” cried Eve. “You are trying to spoil my pet scheme. I believe you two are actually witches and guessed it. What put it into your heads that I had any such intentions anyhow?”
“Then you were actually thinking of going against our interest in that way,” cried Gertie, white to the very lips, “you insolent little minx!”
“I don’t choose to remain in such polite society,” said Eve, with a mocking courtesy, skipping toward the door. “I may take a notion to write a little note to Mr. Rex, inviting him over here to see our household fairy, just as the spirit moves me.”
This was really more than Gertie’s warm, southern temper could bear. She actually flew at the offending Eve in her rage; but Eve was nimble of foot and disappeared up the stairway, three steps at a bound.
“What a vixen our Gertie is growing to be!” she cried, pantingly, as she reached the top step.
She saw a light in Daisy’s room, and tapped quietly on the door.
“Is that you, Eve?” cried a smothered voice from the pillows.
“Yes,” replied Eve; “I’d like very much to come in. May I?”
For answer, Daisy opened the door, but Eve stood quite still on the threshold.
“What’s the matter, Daisy, have you been crying?” she demanded. “Why, your eyelids are red and swollen, and your eyes glow like the stars. Has Gertie or Bess said anything cross to you?” she inquired, smoothing back the soft golden curls that clustered round the white brow.
“No,” said Daisy, choking down a hard sob; “only I am very unhappy, Eve, and I feel just––just as if every one in the world hated me.”
“How long have you been up here in your room?” asked116Eve, suspiciously, fearing Daisy had by chance overheard the late conversation down-stairs.
“Quite an hour,” answered Daisy, truthfully.
“Then you did not hear what I was talking about down-stairs, did you?” she inquired, anxiously.
“No,” said Daisy, “you were playing over a new waltz when I came upstairs.”
“Oh,” said Eve, breathing freer, thinking to herself, “She has not heard what we said. I am thankful for that.”
“You must not talk like that, Daisy,” she said, gayly, clasping her arms caressingly around the slender figure leaning against the casement; “I predict great things in store for you––wonderful things. Do not start and look at me so curiously, for I shall not tell you anything else, for it is getting dangerously near a certain forbidden subject. You know you warned me not to talk to you of love or lovers. I intend to have a great surprise for you. That is all I’m going to tell you now.”
Eve was almost frightened at the rapture that lighted up the beautiful face raised to her own.
“Has any one called for me, Eve?” she asked, piteously. “Oh, Eve, tell me quickly. I have hoped against hope, almost afraid to indulge so sweet a dream. Has any one inquired for me?”
Eve shook her head, sorely puzzled.
“Were you expecting any one to call?” she asked. She saw the light die quickly out of the blue eyes and the rich peachlike bloom from the delicate, dimpled cheeks. “I know something is troubling you greatly, little Daisy,” she said, “and I sympathize with you even if I may not share your secret.”
“Every one is so cold and so cruel to me, I think I should die if I were to lose your friendship, Eve,” she said.
Eve held the girl’s soft white hand in hers. “You will never die, then, if you wait for that event to happen. When I like a person, I like them for all time. I never could pretend a friendship I did not feel. And I said to myself the first moment I saw you: ‘What a sweet littly fairy! I shall love her, I’m sure.’”
“And do you love me?” asked Daisy.
“Yes,” said Eve; “my friendship is a lasting one. I could do almost anything for you.”
She wondered why Daisy took her face between her soft little palms and looked so earnestly down into her eyes, and kissed her lips so repeatedly.
Poor Daisy! if she had only confided in Eve––reckless, impulsive,117warm-hearted, sympathetic Eve––it might have been better for her. “No matter what you might hear of me in the future, no matter what fate might tempt me to do, promise me, Eve, that you, of all the world, will believe in me, you will not lose your faith in me.” The sweet voice sounded hollow and unnatural. “There are dark, pitiful secrets in many lives,” she said, “that drive one to the very verge of madness in their woe. If you love me, pray for me, Eve. My feet are on the edge of a terrible precipice.”
In after years Eve never forgot the haunted look of despair that crossed the fair face of Daisy Brooks, as the words broke from her lips in a piteous cry.