CHAPTER XLI.THE BURGLAR.

It was the 19th; the very day before the bridal. All the city guests had arrived, and there was a grand dinner at Oakwood, where the three long tables were set upon the lawn beneath the maples, the bright silver, and the gay flowers showing well through the surrounding shrubbery, and seeming to curious passers-by, who stopped a moment to look on, more like a fairy scene than a reality. And Georgie, in her elegant white dress, was queen of the banquet, and quite overshadowed Maude in her simple muslin, with a few flowers in her hair. As some beautiful rose, which has drooped and pined beneath the fervid heat of a hot summer day, revives again after a refreshing rain, and seems fairer than ever; so Georgie, with her mind at ease, blossomed with new grace and beauty, looking so well and appearing so well that none ever forgot her as she was on that afternoon, the last she was to know in peace.

Anticipating the festivities of the next night, the guests did not tarry late, but dispersed soon after dinner was over, each making some pleasant remark to the brides-elect, and wishing them as bright a to-morrow as to-day had been. Roy was not feeling well, and he, too, went early, telling Georgie that he should not come again until he came to claim her.

There was a moon that night, but occasionally a rift of fleecy clouds obscured its brightness, and it was just as it had passed into one of these misty ridges that Roy met in the avenue with two men, one carrying a bundle, a little in advance of the other, who was walking slowly toward Oakwood.Without a thought as to who they were, Roy bade them a civil good-evening, as was his custom with every one, and then went on his way, while the two men did the same. One was a man sent with some work which had been done for Georgie in town, the other a stranger, who eyed the house curiously as he approached it, and who hesitated a moment when he saw his neighbor go round to a side door and ring the bell. Standing in the shadow, he waited until the ring was answered, and he heard the man say: “A bundle for Miss Burton, from Slosson’s, and the bill.”

Taking them both, the servant bade the young man wait a moment while he carried them to Miss Burton, who had gone to her room. The bill was paid, and the messenger from Slosson’s departed, while the stranger stepped to the door, and asked for “Miss Georgie Burton.”

“Gone to her room,” was the reply, as had been anticipated, while the stranger added: “Please hand her this—other bill,” and he held out a sealed envelope, addressed to Miss Georgie Burton, adding, when the servant asked if an answer was required: “Not to-night; to-morrow will do as well.”

The next moment the stranger had disappeared under the dense shadow of the trees; and the servant was on her way to Georgie’s room.

Georgie was very tired, and had signified to Maude her intention of retiring early. The arrival of the Slosson bill had retarded her movements somewhat, and she had just locked her door and let down her long flowing hair, when a second knock interrupted her, and she looked out a little impatiently to see what was wanted.

“Another bill, which the man said could wait till to-morrow,” was the girl’s laconic remark, as she handed her mistress the note, and then walked away.

“Another bill? I did not know there was another,” Georgiethought, as she relocked her door, and went back beneath the gas to open the envelope.

But what was it which made her turn so white, and reel like a drunken creature, while her heart gave such violent bounds that she felt as if it were forcing itself into her throat. There could be but one handwriting like that, and she stood for a moment perfectly rigid, with her eyes glued to the name, “Miss Georgie Burton;” then with fingers from which all the blood had receded, leaving no feeling in them, she tore open her letter and read:

“Dear Lu:

“If you wish to avoid exposure, meet me to-night at twelve o’clock in the woodbine arbor at the foot of the garden. I have no desire to harm you, or spoil the fun to-morrow,but money I must have, so bring whatever you have about you, or if your purse chances to be empty, bring jewelry. I saw you with some superb diamonds on one night at the opera last winter. Don’t go into hysterics. You’ve nothing to fear from me if you come down generous and do the fair thing. I reckon you are free from me, as I’ve been gone more than seven years.

“Yours, H. M.”

There was a gurgling sound in Georgie’s throat, as her first impulse was to scream, while a prickly sensation ran like lightning all through her right side, and she felt as if her mouth was twitching and turning toward her right ear; but she did not stop to question the meaning of these strange symptoms. She only thought of the fatal letter and its signature, and howshewas ruined forever. The evil she had so much dreaded, and from which she had thought to escape, had come upon her at last.He was not dead; he still walked the earth; he lived and breathed not very far away, and had summoned her to meet him, and she must go. Shehad no thought of doing otherwise, and with the fearful agony gnawing at her heart, she consulted her watch to see how long before twelve. Nearly one hour and a half, and she clasped her hands together so tightly that the nails broke the skin in more than one place. But she did not feel it, or know that the blood was trickling from her nose until she saw the stains upon her white dressing-gown and on her long black hair. Mechanically she walked to the marble basin and washed and bathed her face until the flow had ceased; then she took up the letter again and read it a second time, while every fibre quivered and throbbed, and her eyes felt as if protruding from their sockets. And all this time she had uttered no sound; but when by chance she saw upon her table Roy’s picture, which, since her engagement she had kept in her room, the magnitude of the calamity which had overtaken her, burst upon her at once, and with a low moan she fell prostrate upon her face, whispering to herself, “Roy is lost,—lost,—and so am I.”

She knew that was so; knew there was no help, no escape for her now, and again that prickly sensation ran through her side, and a keen pain like a knife cut through her temples, where the veins were swelling and growing purple with the pressure of blood. Fortunately for her, unconsciousness came at last to her relief, unconsciousness which lasted until half-past eleven, and everything and everybody in the house was still. Then she roused herself, looked at her watch again, and prepared for action. He had written:

“Bring jewels if you have no money:” and knowing his rapacious disposition, she took her costly diamonds, necklace and all, her emeralds and pearls, and placing them in a little box, hunted up her purse, and laughed a kind of delirious laugh to find there were one hundred dollars in it.

She had no hope of Roy; it was impossible now that sheshould be his wife; there was a bar between them,—a living bar,—raised, as it were, from the dead; and, though possibly, nay, probably, silence with regard to the past could easily be bought, and Roy need never know her secret even now, she was not bad enough at heart to let him take her to his arms while that man waiting for her outside lived and roamed through the world.

She had given Roy up when she lay upon her face, with the prickling sensation in her side, and the terrible pain in her heart; had buried forever that dream of happiness, and now the worst she would ever endure was past. No phase of suffering could come to her like what she had already felt, unless, indeed, Roy should hear the story of her shame, and that he must never do. She could guard against that; she knew the nature she had to deal with, and so she took her richest jewels,—thousands of dollars in value,—and throwing around her the same water-proof she had worn to Annie’s bedside, went noiselessly out into the hall, and down the stairs, and on through another hall, the outer door of which communicated with the garden, and was far removed from the sleeping apartments of the family.

The night was a glorious one, and the moonlight lay like waves of silver upon the green-sward, and the shrubs, and the beds of bright June flowers, while the perfume of the roses filled the air with sweetness. But Georgie saw nothing of all this, and the night might have been one of thick darkness, so little she recked of it, or knew of the beauty around her. The woodbine arbor was all she thought about, and she sped swiftly down the broad, gravelled path, uttering a low scream as she saw the figure of a man rising to meet her.

One quick, searching glance she gave him to make sure it was he, then with a gasp she staggered forward, and would have fallen at his feet, had he not caught her by the arm and held her firmly up.

“Sit down, Lu,” he said, not unkindly, and he drew a chair for her. “Don’t take it so hard,” he continued, as he saw how white she was, and how rapidly her heart was beating. “I do not mean to harm you; upon my word, I do not; though I’ve no special reason for doing you a favor except that you are a woman, and I once loved you too.”

Georgie shuddered then, and pushed her chair a little farther from him, as if afraid he might touch her. But he had no such intention. However much he might have loved her once, he was well over the feeling now. He had summoned her to a purely business interview, and seating himself upon a stool not very far from her, he continued:

“I see I am to do all the talking. You do not even ask me how I chance to bealiveinstead of dead.”

“It does not matter. I know you are alive, and that is sufficient,” Georgie said, her words coming painfully, and her black eyes flashing upon him a look of bitter scorn.

“It was a mean thing to do, I know,” he continued, without heeding her indifference; “but it made you happier thinking I was dead,—made you what you are, a grand lady,—the finest I have ever seen. Had you thought yourself tied to me, you could hardly have held your head so high as Miss Georgie Burton. Confess, now, that I have given you some years of happiness.”

She would not answer him save by a moan of pain, and he went on:

“When I wrote that letter to you, Will, my cousin, was sick, and going to die, and I was taking care of him among the mountains of Pennsylvania. By some chance, we had changed names; he was Henry Morton, I was Will Delong; and it occurred to me that here was a chance for my life. I’d throw the hounds off my track, and breathe again a free man; so I wrote that I was dying, and after Will was deadI caused to be published in several papers the notice that Henry Morton, the man who was arrested for burglary, and tried asJohn Sand, and broke from his prison, had recently died. I saw the notice copied into other papers, and felt that I was safe so long as I staid away from those who knew me, and would recognize my blind eye. To remedy this defect, I took to wearing glasses, which answered very well. I travelled West and South, and crossed finally to England, then to Scotland, where I got me a little home among the heather hills, and tried to be a decent man.”

“Why didn’t you stay there?” Georgie asked; and he replied:

“I wanted to know if you were living or dead.”

“Me!” she exclaimed, and for the first time since she had been there alone with him, a fear of him crossed her mind.

“Did you think me dead?” she asked; and he replied:

“I dreamed so; dreamed it three times in succession, and so I came to see, and found you surrounded with every luxury that money can procure. Young still and beautiful, a belle and an heiress, your old name of Louise Heyford changed for Georgie Burton, your old self all put out of sight, and you engaged to marry Mr. Leighton. Do you know it was his house I robbed in New York that night?”

“No, no; oh, heaven, no! I never dreamed of that; and I must have heard the name too, but forgot it again, everything was so horrible.Roy’shouse, and I was to be his wife to-morrow!”

She rocked to and fro in her anguish, while the man confronting her began at last to pity her; to wish vaguely that he had staid among the heather hills of Scotland, or at least had not shown himself to her. But anon, another woman’s face arose before his mind, the woman for whom he had risked this interview, and he ceased to careso much for wounding Georgie, though his manner was conciliatory, and he spoke kindly and respectfully as he went on:

“I wondered at the engagement if youdidknow; and wondered too if he had ever heard of me as connected with you.”

“Never, never! and Henry, oh Henry!” she stretched her hands toward him now, and the expression of her white face was pitiful in the extreme; “whatever you do or make me suffer, don’t subject me to that; don’t let him know. I have lost him, but I cannot lose his esteem. Roy must not despise me. I wronged you once; I know I wronged you in the tenderest point where a woman can wrong a man, but I meant to be a good wife, and would have been if you had forgiven and tried me. You would not do that; you thrust me from you, and though I have seen much of prosperity, there has been a skeleton in every joy. I have been fearfully punished every way. Annie is dead, did you know that?”

She said the last humbly, beseechingly, and a flush of red crept into her white face.

“I supposed she was. I saw the name of Annie Heyford on a stone in Greenwood, close by Le Roy’s grave. And Mr. Leighton never knew of her either, I suppose?”

“Not what she was to me. Nobody knows but Jack and you,” she answered mournfully, while a sudden flame of passion leaped into the one sound eye of the man beside her, as he said:

“Up to your old tricks again, I see; marrying with a lie on your soul, just as you came to me.”

She did not resent the taunt at all. She was too thoroughly crushed for that, and she answered gently, “Yes, I was going to do the same thing again. I am everything that is bad, I confess; but, oh, how could I tell, when allthese years nobody has known, and I was so different, and the old life lay far behind, and I did love Roy. Oh, if I’ve sinned deeply, I am cruelly punished at the last. Think, Henry, to-morrow, ay, to-day, for it is to-morrow now, I was to have been his wife; everything is in readiness, the guests are here, and now it cannot be, and I,—oh, what reason can I give to Roy for holding back at the very altar?”

“What reason? No reason. Why should you hold back? Marry him just the same. I shall not interfere. I did not come for that. I came for money, and took this time in order to get what I want. I thought I hated you, but upon my soul, I don’t. I am sorry for you, to see you feel so bad, but there’s no cause for it. Swallow your conscience a little lower down. Act a bigger lie, and all will be right; for I tell you I am not here to claim any right I may have had in you. I dreamed you were dead. I’ll be honest and say I hoped it was true, for over the sea among the heather hills is a little blue-eyed, brown-haired Scotch lassie whom I call Janet, and who thinks she is my wife. There are also two children in the home-nest;mine, too, as well ashers,” he added, and again that red flush of shame crept into Georgie’s face, while the stranger continued; “I tried to reform over there for her sake. She is pure and good, and she loves me, and the fraud I practise upon her cuts me sometimes to the quick, and when I dreamed you were dead so many times I got to hoping you were, for then I’d doherjustice. So I came to see, and tracked you out, and found you on the topmost pinnacle, and felt angry when I saw your silks and satins and jewels and remembered Janet’s two dresses, one for every day and one for Sunday, and thought of my little boy Johnnie, who might be cured if I had the money. We are poor, very poor, and Janet thinks I am making my fortune here in America, for I told her it was for her sakeand the bairns’ I came, and she is waiting for me so anxiously, and I am going to her soon; within a week at the farthest, but cannot go empty-handed. I did not enter that house on the mountain-road, as you probably think I did. I know nothing of the robbers. I quit such things after my escape from prison, and since I have known Janet I have tried to be honest and decent. I have been hanging about in this neighborhood for two weeks or more, trying to make up my mind whether to seek an interview with you and risk detection or not. I saved your life and Mr. Leighton’s too, but did not know when I seized the horses who was in the carriage. If I had, I should have done the same, though your death would make Janet an honest woman, for by finding some flaw in our first marriage ceremony I should coax her to go through with it again over the border in England.”

“Oh, if you had let me die then,” Georgie moaned faintly, and her companion rejoined, “Nonsense; you are making too much of the matter. There’s no reason in the world why you should not marry just the same. I shall not trouble you, provided you do the fair thing by me. I want money. You want silence. It is a fair bargain. Did you bring anything with you?”

“Ye-es,” Georgie said slowly, clasping her hands to her head. “I brought my diamonds and emeralds, worth thousands of dollars, but—don’t—don’t think they are to cover my marriage. I am not so bad as that. I have given Roy up, but I must keep his respect at any cost. Oh Henry, by the love you bear this Janet and the little ones, I beseech of you, leave the country at once, and never let my name be on your lips again. I’ve brought the jewels, enough to make you rich. Look at this—and this—and this!”

She opened the box, and held up one by one her diamond pin, and ear-rings, and necklace; and the man’s eyes sparkledwith eagerness as he saw them flash in the moonlight, and thought how valuable they must be. He had not expected so great a price, and he was generous enough to say so, and gave her back her pearls and emerald pin.

“The diamonds will do,” he said, “and the hundred dollars will take me home. Thank you, Lu; there is something good about you after all; but how are you to get out of the scrape if you refusein tototo take the man, and how will you account for the loss of your diamonds?”

“Leave that to me,” she said. “Only I warn you, thatyoumust not be found near here, or anywhere, when the alarm is given.”

“Yes, I see; aburglargot into your room,” and he nodded knowingly. “I shall cross the river in a little skiff which is anchored just below here. Once on the other side I fear no one. I know your room; its windows look out on the river; watch for the boat, and when it is fairly across, do what to you seems best! only screen me, as I will screen you, now and forever.”

“You swear it,” Georgie asked, and he replied, “Yes, I swear by the love I bear Janet, and the little ones, and the hope I have of seeing them again, never to breathe a word to any living being, that I ever heard of you save as the belle and heiress.”

He offered her his hand, and loath as she was, she took it, and the compact between them was sealed.

“One o’clock, and I must be off,” he said. “Good-by, Lu. Take my advice; marry Roy, and be as happy as you can.”

She did not reply, and he walked rapidly down the garden across the road, and out into the field-path, which led to the river. Slowly, as if all the life had gone from her body, Georgie dragged herself back to her room, leaving the outer door unfastened and open, the better to answer the end shehad in view. Her own door too was left ajar, and then drawing a chair by the window overlooking the river, she watched until a boat shot out into the stream, and by the moonlight she recognized the form of her late visitor as he bent to his oars and rowed the skiff swiftly across the water.

An hour went by; it was nearly half-past two, and before very long the early summer morning would be breaking in the east. What she did must be done quickly, and with a calmness born of utter despair she made her preparations. The box in which her diamonds were kept was laid empty in her drawer, which stood open, its contents tossed up promiscuously, and her empty purse lying upon the table. The emeralds and pearls were put carefully away unharmed, as were some smaller articles of jewelry. Then with trembling, ice-cold hands she made herself ready for bed, and laid her throbbing head upon her pillow just as the clock struck three. She had taken from a shelf, and looked at a bottle of laudanum, and thought how easy it would be to end it all, but she dared not do it when she thought seriously about it. She believed in a hereafter; in the Heaven where Annie had gone, and she could not deliberately throw away all chance of ever entering there.

“I may repent; the thief did at the last hour,” she said, as she drew the bedclothes about her, and felt that she was ready for the first scene in the strange drama about to be acted.

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