CHAPTER XXVI.AT BAY.
“I am here, my darling Violet, eagerly awaiting the summons to your presence!” exclaimed Harold Castello, quickly entering the room.
She sprang from the sofa and stood up like an indignant queen to receive him.
“Ah, how lovely you are, my fair bride, among these congenial surroundings!” he continued, his eyes gloating on her lovely face and form, set off so exquisitely by the white silk robe.
“A truce to compliments, sir,” Violet answered, coldly, and he started with surprise.
He had expected tears, upbraiding hysterics, and threats from the lovely girl he had tricked into becoming his wife.
Yet how calmly she spoke!
Was it possible she was going to take it coolly, after all—to resign herself to the inevitable?
He devoutly hoped so, and with a smile he answered:
“I can no more help telling you of your beauty, Violet, than I can help breathing. You are the most beautiful woman in the world, and I rejoice that you are my bride!”
He saw a spasm of despair move the beautiful face and added, quickly:
“Ah, my adored one, forgive me for the treachery that won you! Think how I love you, remember how rich I am and what a luxurious life you can have as my wife. Can I not teach you to forget my rival, and to love me?”
He threw himself at her feet, and was proceeding with his passionate protestations, but, with a queenly gesture, she interrupted him:
“Rise, Harold Castello. I did not send for you here to listen to your abhorred love. I summoned you to tell me how I was entrapped into this unholy marriage.”
The calmness of despair breathed in the low, musical voice, the pallor of despair was on the exquisite face. She was no longer the simple girl, Violet, moved to tears or laughter at a breath; she was a woman who had lost her love, whose life lay in ruins, whose soul quailed in secret at its terrible betrayal.
She realized the despotic power of the man who had cheated her into this union, she knew as well as if he had already told her that this gilded cage was her prison, that she was surrounded by his minions, that nothing remained to her but submission or—death. That would be her only escape from her loathed husband.
So, with a calmness that she could not understand, she faced him:
“It’s too late for recriminations, too late for entreaties. I know your flinty heart too well. I realize my fate too thoroughly. Only tell me why Cecil did not come; tell me who detained him; tell me who plotted this terrible thing?”
“Suppose I answer that it was all my own doing, Violet?”
“All your own? Then, how did you keep Cecil away? It seemed to me that nothing but death could have kept my beloved from my side in our bridal hour! Did you—did you”—her face blanching to yet more deadly pallor—“meet him and murder him on his way to me?”
“Good heavens, no! Cecil Grant is alive and well.”
“And loves me still,” she cried, suddenly lifting her hand on which the magnificent oriental opal glowed in rainbow hues. Then she saw above it a plain gold band, and wrenching it off, flung it far from her in disgust. “How dare you?” she half sobbed, in sudden, futile passion.
Harold Castello laughed lightly.
“As for his loving you still, that is doubtful. He believes you false to him, and your cunning rival will perchance catch his heart on the rebound.”
“Rival? I have no rival!” she panted, wildly.
“Do you forget your cousin, beautiful Amber Laurens?”
“My cousin Amber, my best friend—you are mad!”
Harold Castello laughed again harshly, significantly.
“Ah, Violet, what an innocent baby you are! Can you dream that an angry, jealous rival can be turned into a friend?”
Something came into her throat, and seemed to choke her like a murderous hand.
“Do you not remember,” he continued, “that Amber once loved Cecil Grant, and was angry because you won him? She only duped you when she pretended forgiveness. All the while she was working against you. It was Amber who helped her grandfather in his pet scheme of making you my bride. It was her revenge.”
“Revenge?” echoed Violet’s pale, writhing lips.
“Yes, she wanted you out of the way, that she might have another chance with Cecil. She has told him you were false, that you married me willingly, out of resentment at his delay—the delay that she planned so cunningly.”
Her intent blue eyes invited further confidence, and without hesitation he told her all that he knew, eager to divert her wrath against himself to Amber.
She did not doubt one word of his story, false and wicked as she knew him to be.
But the past rushed over her in dizzy waves—Amber’s rivalry, Amber’s jealousy, Amber’s hate, with later looks and tones that had wounded, although scarcely understood. Now she realized all their dreadful import.
“She was false to your trust and plotted against you, Violet. Can you wonder that I took advantage of the situation to win you for my own? I loved you madly, and love is my excuse. Forgive me dearest,” pleaded Harold Castello.
“Leave me!” she answered, with a look of proud disdain, pointing to the door.
“You forget you are my own now. My place is by your side.”
With cold, scornful lips she replied:
“I acknowledge no right over me given by that fraudulent marriage ceremony. I will never be your wife save in name.”
“Nonsense, Violet. These lofty airs do not become you. You had better reconcile yourself at once to circumstances. I may as well tell you that you are virtually a prisoner, and will remain so until you give yourself to me with a wife’s obedience. As for your last lover, why grieve for him? He has not a roof to shelter his poverty-stricken head to-night, since Bonnycastle has been wrested from him by Amber’s arts. But doubtless she will find means to console him and to make herself his bride.”
“That is enough. Now go,” the stricken girl answered,with icy calmness, but he laughed mockingly and answered:
“Forgive me for disobeying you, sweet one, but I should be desolate without your company. Come Violet, one kiss, and let us get reconciled to each other.”
He advanced a step, but her outstretched white hands waved him back.
“No nearer, as you value your life!” she cried, wildly.
He halted in consternation.
“What do you mean, Violet? Have you a hidden dagger about you?” he demanded.
“No, I have no weapon to defend myself, Harold Castello, and yet I solemnly swear that your life shall pay the forfeit if you force your love upon me. Do not stare, for I will find a way to kill you unless you leave me. I am desperate, maddened. I am your prisoner, but I shall never be more to you than I am now! So go and leave me to my misery!” she answered, in such a voice and with such a face, that he deemed it politic to obey, momentarily awed by the contact with a desperate woman at bay.