The time passed slowly enough to the impatient Vinton while the boy-of-all-work was gone on his mission to Mrs. Bowers. He paced up and down impatiently, now and then casting surly looks of hatred and revenge upon the honest farmer who had dared to defy him and protect his trembling victim.
Mrs. Thorn, seeing that Queenie was better and did not need her attention, busied herself in setting the neglected breakfast upon the table. She put on the smoking coffee, the hot corn-cakes, the fried bacon and eggs, the fresh butter and milk, and invited her visitors to partake of the homely fare.
Leon Vinton declined the invitation by a surly nod, but Queenie, who had been watching her movements eagerly, readily signified her consent.
"I am very hungry," she declared, "for owing to the wickedness of yonder man, I have not tasted food for several days."
"Oh, my poor, demented little sister," exclaimed the hypocritical Vinton, "would to God your reason might be restored!"
Queenie only cast a look of scorn upon him as she took her place at the breakfast-table. Her heart was infused with fresh courage owing to the noble conduct of the farmer and his wife in repelling the persecutions of Leon Vinton.
She determined to get the farmer to go into town for her father, and she resolved that these kind people should be most liberally rewarded for the resolute course by which they had secured her happiness. So inspired was she by this brilliant hope, and so strengthened by the warm coffee, that a faint flush came into her cheek, and her blue eyes sparkled with excitement and animation.
"Your breakfast has set you up quite a bit, ma'am," exclaimed Mrs. Thorn, admiringly. "You don't hardly look like the same woman we took up for dead in the road."
"Your kindness has put new life in me, madam," answered Queenie, gratefully. "It is the hope of escape from this man that fills me with joy and lights up my face with gladness."
"Poor dear!" exclaimed the woman, turning a look of scorn on Vinton as he still moodily paced the floor.
"Ah, madam," exclaimed he, catching that look, "in a little while, when my sister arrives and corroborates my story, you will see how much you have wronged me in giving credence to the senseless ravings of this poor lunatic."
Even as he spoke there was a stir and a bustle at the door. The farmer hastened to open it, and Mrs. Bowers, elegantly dressed and visibly excited, rushed in. Leon Vinton sprang to meet her.
"Oh, my dear sister!" he exclaimed, "I have found our poor little one!"
Mrs. Bowers took the cue at once.
"Oh, brother!" she cried, theatrically, "you fill me with joy! What tortures, what agonies I have endured in the fear that she was dead!"
She rolled her eyes around the room, and seeing Queenie sitting near the fire, ran up and vigorously embraced her.
"Oh, my poor, unhappy darling," she cried, "how could you grieve your poor old sister so?"
Queenie pushed her off frantically like the mad creature they accused her of being.
"You are not my sister," she cried, angrily. "Go away Mrs. Bowers. You cannot impose on these good people with your shameless lies! They would not believe Leon Vinton and theywill not believe you. They are friends to me, and they will help me back to my husband."
Mrs. Bowers threw up her hands and looked at her coadjutor in villainy sadly.
"You see she is still as mad as a March hare," he answered, "and would you believe it, Alice, dear, our little sister has so imposed on these good people with her cunning insanity, that they actually believe her stories, and look upon me, her devoted brother, as a perjured villain seeking her destruction. They will not even permit me to remove my poor, demented sister home without proof of my assertion."
Mrs. Bowers looked around at the farmer and his wife with an air of indulgent pity.
"Oh, my good people, is it possible that you have been so weak as to let this cunning maniac deceive you? But no wonder—for insanity has baffled wiser heads than yours or mine. It is quite natural she should deceive you, as I do not suppose you ever saw a crazy person before. But now let me assure you that my brother has told you the simple truth. This is our own sister, and she has been a year insane. She escaped from us this morning before daylight, and he has been seeking her everywhere. I have come in the carriage, and I suppose you will not now raise any further objection to our removing her to her home."
"I will not go with you!" exclaimed Queenie, filled with terror lest the woman's specious acting should deceive the simple country people. "Every word you have uttered is a base falsehood! I am nothing to either of you—nothing! Go away and leave me in peace!"
In her wild excitement she sprang up and shook her hands violently at Mrs. Bowers. Her loose, disheveled hair, her flashing eyes, her waving hands made her look like a wild creature. Mrs. Bowers pointed at her triumphantly.
"You see for yourselves that she is mad," she said. "She is going off into one of her violent and dangerous fits, and she is just as apt as not to catch up a knife from the table there and kill one of you. Oh, for God's sake, brother, take her and put her in the carriage!"
Leon Vinton advanced to do her bidding, but Queenie fought him off like a young lioness at bay.
"Oh, good people!" she cried, "help me, for Heaven's sake! Do not suffer this villain to take me!"
"I have given you full proof now that this is my sister," exclaimed Leon Vinton to the farmer. "I warn you if you interfere with me further it will be at your peril!"
The farmer and his wife had been completely deceived by the spirited and natural acting of Mrs. Bowers. They began to believe that they had indeed been deceived into believing the artful ravings of a violent maniac.
Therefore, when Queenie called on them for help they only stood aloof, regarding her frightened, excited aspect with newly-awakened fear.
"Ha! so you are now convinced of the truth," exclaimed LeonVinton, triumphantly, seeing that they made no effort to molest him.
"Yes, sir, we are," said the farmer, in a conciliatory tone; "and I wish to make my apology to you for the trouble I've put you to. The young girl's acting was very nat'ral, but I see now that you told the truth about her."
"I told you so, father!" exclaimed Jennie, triumphantly.
"Tut, tut, Jen—hold your tongue, you impudent girl!" exclaimed Mrs. Thorn, sharply.
Queenie had dropped into a chair at the farmer's renunciation of her claims, and, hiding her face in her hands, burst into a passionate fit of weeping. Mrs. Bowers stood by her making a pretended effort at consoling her, but her pretended brother paid no heed to the wretched girl. He looked at Jennie's bright, pretty face, and then turned to her father.
"I think you said your daughter was out of a place, at present," he said, blandly. "Do you wish to secure another one for her?"
"Yes, we do," was the ready answer. "We have to put her out to service, for we cannot afford to keep her at home. She must earn her clothes and a bit more to help us along at home."
"I think my sister needs just such a girl about the house, to help her with the housekeeping," said Leon Vinton; and, turning to Mrs. Bowers, he said: "Do you think Miss Jennie would suit you?"
The woman stared at him in surprise for a moment, but he gave her a significant glance, and she answered with apparent frankness:
"Yes, I think I should like to have her very much."
"Very well, then," and, turning to the farmer he inquired if his sister could have Jennie, naming a liberal, but not too large compensation, for fear of exciting suspicion. He did not ask the girl, herself, for he had already read her consent in her beaming eyes. She was perfectly fascinated by the handsome stranger, and was ready to go anywhere that she might daily see him and hear his voice.
Before the farmer could speak, Queenie sprang to his side, and laid her delicate white hand, all sparkling with jewels, on his coarse sleeve, lifting her blue eyes pleadingly to his face.
"Oh! sir," she said, "you think me mad, but for Heaven's sake be warned by me! Do not suffer your pretty, simple girl to stray into the snare this man and woman are setting for her. If you give your consent you will rue it in dust and ashes, when you see her innocence betrayed and her virtue lost."
Leon Vinton glared at her fiercely as the farmer hesitated.
"Come, decide, at once," he said. "The carriage is waiting, and she can accompany us if you are willing. Of course you need pay no attention to the ravings of that poor maniac."
Mr. Thorn looked at his daughter. Her face was bright with smiles, for the artful villain, with his tender glances, had made her believe that he was deeply enamored of her charms.
"Do you want to go, Jennie?" he asked, doubtfully.
"Oh, yes, father, if you'll let me," she said.
"She may go for a month, then, and if she don't like the place she may come home again," said the farmer.
Queenie said no more. She saw that her enemies had triumphed over her this time, and her heart was almost broken. She made an ineffectual struggle to escape through the door, but was captured and borne struggling to the carriage, followed by her pretended sister and the pretty Jennie, who was falling so unconsciously into the pit spread for her unwary feet.
Jennie Thorn was delighted with the beautiful furnishing and elegant ease of the cottage by the river.
Mrs. Bowers proved to be one of the most indulgent of mistresses, and the girl's position speedily became a sinecure as far as work was concerned.
At first she was given a few light tasks to avert suspicions, and lead her to think that everything was right. Then Mrs. Bowers began to flatter her, and one day she said:
"You are too pretty and refined, Jennie, to stay in the kitchen with that vulgar cook. You shall stay in the parlor and be my companion."
Nothing could have pleased the vain little creature better, for she thought that her master would respect her more in her new situation, and also that she would have more frequent opportunities of seeing him than had fallen to her lot in her menial position. She accordingly consented with ill-concealed delight.
Leon Vinton had played his cards very cleverly to win the farmer's pretty daughter.
She saw him very seldom at first, as he spent the greater part of his time in town, only visiting the cottage two or three times in the space of a week.
On the occasion of these visits Jennie saw but little of him, but some glance of his eye or tender smile made her heart beat fast and kept him in her thoughts when he was away.
But when the little maid was promoted to the parlor, Leon Vinton began to appear at home more frequently.
He lounged about the parlor with his cigar and newspaper, and chatted a great deal with his pretended sister and her pretty little companion.
Very often Mrs. Bowers would leave the room, and remain away for hours, leaving the handsome man and susceptible girl alone together.
On one of these occasions he threw away his cigar, and took a seat by Jennie. She looked up from a trifle of sewing in her hand, and then, with a deep blush, let her glance fall to the rich velvet carpet.
Mr. Vinton looked at her admiringly. Mrs. Bowers had presented her with a fine dark-blue cashmere dress, and with soft, white laces at throat and wrists, and a few bright-colored ribbons, the little country girl looked quite the lady. Leon Vinton confessed to himself that she was wonderfully pretty in her newsurroundings. They suited her beauty much better than the homely, humble farm-house had done.
"Jennie," he said abruptly, "do you know that the probationary month which your father allowed you with us is at an end to-day?"
She started, and looked at him, the pretty pink color fading from her cheeks, a look of alarm in her dark eyes.
"Yes, I know," she faltered, "and you—you're not pleased with me, and you're going to send me home to father, I suppose."
He smiled at the piteous quiver in the girl's voice.
"I'll send you if you want to go," he said, laughing.
"I don't want to go. I like to stay here with—with your sister," she answered, quickly.
"Well, I don't blame you," he said. "This kind of life is better suited to you than that. You're too pretty and dainty, by George, to be working around in people's kitchens!"
She did not answer, save by a blush and a smile of gratified vanity.
"Little Jennie," he said after a moment, "how would you like to live here always, and never have any work to do—nothing to do but adorn your beauty with silks and laces, and jewels, and ride and walk and amuse yourself!"
She clasped her toil-worn little hands, and looked at him with beaming eyes, and a happy smile on her red lips.
"Oh, I should like it above anything!" she breathed, gladly.
He took her hand in his, then dropped it with a slight frown. It was hardened and enlarged by honest toil, and not pretty like her face. He was used to velvet hands, white as the lily, for he seldom descended to women in her station of life. She did not see the slight curl of his lip, for he turned his head away, and when he looked back he was smiling, and there was a beam of tenderness in his eyes.
"Jennie, dearest," he said, "you can have all that, and what is better, you can have one fond, devoted heart to adore you if you will only speak the word."
She looked up blushing and smiling.
"You mean," she said, and then paused.
"I mean," he answered, "that I will lavish every luxury and pleasure upon you if you will only accept my love."
The simple, untutored country girl did not for a moment comprehend his meaning. She turned to him with clasped hands and a face full of joyful emotion.
"Oh, sir," she said, fervently, "you know that I shall only be too happy and thankful to be your wife!"
"The devil!" exclaimed the villain to himself. "The little simpleton thinks I meant marriage."
It suddenly dawned on him that there could be no question of love with this honest little country girl without marriage.
He determined to humor her fancy.
"So you will be my wife, my sweet one?" he inquired.
"Yes," she replied, "I will marry you if father is willing."
Mr. Vinton suddenly assumed an expression of deep concern.
"Ah! my little darling," he said, as he bent down and kissed her ruby lips, "that is just where the trouble comes in. If I marry you now, as my ardent love prompts me to do, I cannot ask your father to give you to me, for our marriage must be a secret, unknown to any but ourselves."
"Why so?" she inquired, looking disappointed.
"I cannot tell you the reason now, Jennie," he replied, evasively. "There are several things which would prevent our marriage if I declared our intention beforehand; but there is one reason I can give you. My sister, though she is fond of you in her way would never consent to it. She is very proud, and she wishes me to marry a rich woman of her choosing. If I openly defy her she has the power to keep me out of my fortune and make me a poor man."
Jennie was too simple and innocent to be undeceived by that transparent lie.
"Darling, after this explanation you will surely consent to a private marriage—will you not? Remember how well I love you," pleaded the wretch.
"How could we manage a secret marriage?" asked Jennie, blushing with delight at his fond words.
"Easily enough. You can tell my sister that you wish to go home and spend a week with your parents. Then I can take you to the city right away and marry you. We can spend a week traveling about and enjoying our honeymoon, after which I can send you back here, and Mrs. Bowers will think that you have been at the farm the whole time. By-and-bye, when my affairs get straight, we will declare our marriage to everybody. By George, how surprised they will be then! Now, my dear little wife that is to be, will you consent to my plan?"
Jennie hesitated a moment, then murmured a timid and joyful "yes."
The summer sunshine waned, the summer roses faded, and the "melancholy days—the saddest of the year," hurried swiftly on. The chilling winds howled drearily about the river cottage, but long ere the last autumn leaf was whirled from the tall trees standing round about like giant sentinels, the fickle fancy that Leon Vinton had felt for the farmer's dark-eyed daughter had perished like the frailest flower of the summer.
"The illusion was soon over," he said to himself. "It was the briefest fancy I ever had. But that was her own fault. She was too easily won. The game was not worth the candle."
Simple little Jennie had been living in a "Fool's Paradise" ever since the mock-marriage which the deceiver had duly caused to be celebrated. Ostensibly she remained as the companion of Mrs. Bowers, and that kind lady appeared to be perfectly blind and deaf to all the strange things that went on around her.
If Jennie had not been the most innocent of women she could not have failed to know that Mrs. Bowers was perfectly cognizantof her secret, and was only laughing in her sleeve all the while that she appeared so stupid and good-natured to the new victim of her employer.
"I am heartily tired of the little fool," he said to her one day in confidence, when the autumn days had given place to the freezing ones of winter; "I wish I could get rid of her."
"Your fancy was soon over this time," remarked Mrs. Bowers.
"Her own fault," grumbled the wretch. "In the first place she was too lightly won. In love more than half the pleasure lies in the pursuit, and 'lightly won is lightly lost.' She is changed now, also. How rosy and bright she was at first—how pale, how altered, how plain she is now!"
"She isill," said Mrs. Bowers, in a significant tone.
"The deuce!" exclaimed Leon Vinton, angrily. "Why, then, I surelymustget rid of her. But how to do it—that's the question!"
"Tell her the truth—that she is not married at all—and send her home to her parents," said the woman, heartlessly.
He did not reply for a moment, but paused to light a cigar and place it between his lips. Then he threw himself back on the lounge where he sat, and remarked indifferently:
"Yes; I suppose I shall have to do that. There will be a scene, I suppose."
Mrs. Bowers merely laughed in reply, as if he had uttered the most harmless jest. She was thoroughly wicked and heartless, and cared not a jot for the miseries of the whole world.
"Well, the sooner the better," went on Vinton, heartlessly. "I believe I'll go and have it out with her now."
He arose as heartlessly and indifferently as if he were going about a mission of happiness instead of being about to strike the cold steel of despair into the young heart that trusted him so fondly.
Jennie was sitting by a window in the parlor looking out at the great, blinding flakes of snow that whirled through the air and covered the ground with a pure white carpet.
She looked pale, but very pretty in a black dress with scarlet trimmings, and a scarlet shawl was draped about her shoulders, partly concealing her form.
As Mr. Vinton entered the room her dark eyes turned from the window and rested on him with a very fond and loving smile.
"You've come at last," she said, in a tone of joy and relief. "Where have you been all this long week?"
"In town," he answered, laconically, as he dropped into a chair near her.
A look of disappointment came into her eyes. She rose and went to his side, winding her arms about his neck, and pressing her lips on his brow.
"I've missed you so much," she said, lovingly. "I sha'n't let you leave me so long again."
"I shall not ask your leave!" he answered, sharply, and muttering an oath between his teeth as he rudely pushed her off.
The movement was so sudden that she nearly fell. It was only by catching the back of a convenient chair that she steadied herself. She turned a white, frightened face toward him.
"What's the matter?" she said. "Are you angry with me, Leon?"
"I'm sick of your baby fondness," he answered brutally. "Have done with it."
Jennie fell back into her chair as if shot, and looked at him with reproachful eyes.
"You're angry with me," she said, plaintively; "and I had something to tell you—something very particular."
"Tell it, then," he answered, with a frown as black as night on his handsome face.
The trembling young creature before him remained silent for a few minutes, so utterly confounded was she by the unaccountable change in her husband. His manner had always been the perfection of gentlemanly refinement before. This sudden change to coarse brutality amazed and frightened her. When she spoke her voice was low and broken, and her eyes rested on the carpet.
"I waited to tell you, Leon," she said, with a scarlet blush, "that—that we will have to make some change soon. You'll be obliged to tell Mrs. Bowers that we are married, or take me to some other place. If you don't she'll find out our secret pretty soon. We are compelled to make a change!"
"I have been thinking so myself," he answered, coolly.
"You have," she said, with an accent of gladness. "Then what do you think we had better do?"
"I think you had better go home to your mother," he answered, brutally.
She looked up at him in surprise and doubt.
"You mean to own our marriage, then, do you?" she asked, and there was a faint suggestion of hope in her tone.
"No, by George! I don't," he answered quickly.
"You don't," she exclaimed. "Then how can I go home? They would—they would think I had disgraced myself. Father would turn me out of doors!"
"I'm very sorry for you, then," he answered, coolly. "I see no other resource for you."
"Leon, I don't know what you mean!" exclaimed Jennie, in surprise and pain at his careless words and utterly indifferent manner; "you are not one bit like yourself. What makes you talk so strange to your own wife?"
She looked up at the handsome man with the tears of wounded feeling starting into her eyes, but all unconscious of the terrible blow that was to fall upon her defenseless head.
"You are not my wife!" he replied, with a dark and threatening frown.
"Not your wife!" she cried, turning as white as death. "Oh, Leon, you surely are going mad! What do you mean?"
"I mean what I say," he answered, curtly. "It's time you knew the truth, Jennie. You are not my wife—never have been! The marriage ceremony was read over us, to be sure, but it was only a mock-marriage to quiet your scruples. The pretended preacher was a friend of mine—the wickedest blade in town—with a soul as black as the devil!"
She sat still and looked at him, her eyes wild and frightened, her face as white as the snow which whirled past the window. At last she spoke, but her voice was low and thick, and did not seem like her own.
"You're joking with me, Leon—youcan'tmean it?"
"Idomean it—it's the truth," he replied, coolly; "come, now, Jennie, don't take it hard. We've had a pleasant time—have we not? And now you can go home to your mother. I am tired of you, I confess it; and I'm going away myself—to Europe, I think. So of course you can't stay here. My sister would turn you out of doors as soon as she found you out. Go home to the farm, and there's a hundred dollars to help you through your trouble."
He tossed a roll of bank-notes into her lap with a complacent air as if his munificent generosity condoned everything.
The girl had been sitting quite still, looking at him with a terrible pain frozen on her pretty young face, but at his concluding words she sprang up and tossed the roll of notes into the fire as if it had been a serpent. Her dark eyes blazed with passion and her voice shook with rage as she wildly confronted her base betrayer.
"Oh, you devil!" she cried, "I would not touch one cent of that money to save your soul from the torments of hell! My curses be upon your head! May the Lordneverforgive you for this cruel sin! May you die by the hangman's rope!"
The handsome villain laughed mockingly, and turning on his heel walked out of the room.
As he passed through the hallway he heard the sound of a heavy fall. Glancing over his shoulder he saw that his victim had fallen senseless upon the floor.
He walked on and entered the room of Mrs. Bowers, his housekeeper, and not his sister, as he had pretended.
"I have told her," he said, "and she has fainted—as they mostly do. I am going away now, and I shall be absent a week. You must try and get her away from here before I come back!"
"Oh! you wicked man," said Mrs. Bowers, laughing, and shaking a finger at him. "Where shall I send her?"
"To the devil for aught I care!" said the gentleman, smarting with the recollection of Jennie's curse and the burning of his hundred dollars. "I care not where she goes so that I am rid of her. But take good care of the other one. Do not suffer her to escape."
He tossed a roll of bills into her lap and walked away humming a tune. In a few minutes after she heard him riding off down the road to the city. She locked her money carefully away in a drawer, then went up to the parlor where poor Jennie lay insensible upon the floor, and sitting down in an easy-chair, carelessly regarded the poor girl whom she had pitilessly helped to ruin.
It was a long time before the unhappy girl revived from her deep swoon, but the housekeeper made no effort to restore her to life though the thought crossed her mind more than once as she sat there that she might die without assistance.
"And no matter if she does," said the heartless woman toherself. "It would be all the better for her and for all parties concerned."
But it was not to be as Mrs. Bowers thought and almost wished. Life came back to the poor girl with a long, fluttering sigh, and the first thing she saw when she looked up was the angry face of the woman glaring down upon her.
"So you're alive, are you?" she said fiercely. "Why didn't you die and hide your shame and disgrace in the grave?"
"Ma'am?" faltered poor Jane, blankly.
"I say why didn't you die and hide your shame and disgrace in the grave?" repeated the housekeeper, angrily. "Ah! I've found you out, Jennie Thorn! I took you in my house for an honest girl, but you've ruined yourself and disgraced your poor old parents; I'll not keep such trash in my respectable home. Out of my house you go before night!"
The poor girl rose and looked out of the window. The cold winter twilight was already falling and the great, white flakes of snow still filled the air.
"Oh! Mrs. Bowers," she said, piteously, "it is night already, and where could I go?"
"You should have thought of that sooner," said the pitiless woman. "It's too late now. Go get your cloak and hat and put them on."
Almost stunned by her sorrow Jennie mechanically obeyed her imperious command.
"Now, leave here!" said the housekeeper.
"Oh! Mrs. Bowers," cried the wretched girl, "let me stay at least until morning! Indeed I am not what you think me! I was deceived by a mock-marriage, and I thought myself an honest wife until Mr. Vinton told me just now how cruelly he had betrayed me. Oh! for God's sake have pity on me, and don't turn me out to-night in the cold and the darkness!"
For all answer Mrs. Bowers caught her by the arm and rudely dragged her along the hall to the front door.
"You can't deceive me with your trumped up lies, you shameless thing!" she said. "Go now, and never let me see your face here again."
She opened the door and pushing the poor, weeping, betrayed and deserted girl out into the blinding storm, slammed and locked the door.
Over the broad, dark river, and the snow-covered earth the cold winter moonlight lay in great, silvery bars of light.
The terrible snowstorm of two days before was over. The sky was clear and starry, and no trace remained of the storm save the deep, white carpeting of the beautiful snow.
Midnight was tolling from the great bell in the city, but Queenie Ernscliffe sat at her window staring out at the night with wide, sleepless eyes.
On a couch at the opposite side of the room lay Mrs. Bowers snoring audibly. She had slept in Queenie's room ever since thenight she had effected her escape and her constant vigilance had entirely frustrated any other attempt of the kind.
While Jennie Thorn had been dwelling in her Fool's Paradise, our heroine had been suffering all the horrors of imprisonment and despair.
She had heard very little of the farmer's pretty daughter since the day she came to live there, but she knew she had remained with them, for she had seen her a few times walking in the garden beneath her window, prettily, even richly dressed, and she knew too well what that meant. She felt very sorry for the poor girl who had been so deaf to her words of friendly warning.
Queenie was sadly altered for the worse since these long months of imprisonment and wretchedness. Her garments hung loosely about her attenuated form, her cheeks were thin and hollow, and her once bright eyes were dim with weeping, and looked too wild and large for her small, pathetic, white face. Her days and nights were passed in sleepless wretchedness, much to the annoyance of the housekeeper, who declared that she could not rest well while her refractory charge kept the light burning as she did the long nights through, for she could not bear to have darkness add its additional gloom to the horror of her thoughts.
While she sat and stared wearily out at the midnight scene, the housekeeper snored herself awake and began to complain.
"Mercy's sake, girl, go to bed, and put the light out. I declare I cannot sleep a wink with the gas shining in my eyes!"
"You have beensnoringuninterruptedly for several hours!" answered Queenie, coldly. "How do you suppose I can sleep when you keep up such a noise with your breathing?"
"Well, I never!" exclaimed Mrs. Bowers. "This is the first time I was ever accused of snoring!"
Queenie did not speak for a moment. Presently she turned her head around and said, abruptly:
"Mrs. Bowers!"
Mrs. Bowers, who was falling asleep again, gave a grunt in token that she heard.
"What has become of that pretty girl you brought home from Farmer Thorn's?"
"She went away two days ago," was the sleepy reply.
"With Leon Vinton, I presume," said Queenie, scornfully.
"No, she went alone."
"Betrayed and abandoned, no doubt," said Queenie, bitterly.
"Something like that, certainly," answered the housekeeper, carelessly, and with that she turned over and went to sleep again, leaving Queenie to her own reflections.
They were not pleasant ones, certainly. The room was chilly, and she took up a shawl, wrapped it about her shoulders, and went back to her lonely vigil, pressing her forehead against the pane while she looked out into the cold winter night.
"Oh, to be out there in the night, and the cold, and the darkness," she murmured. "Oh, to feel the breath of freedom on my brow once more, and hope within my heart!
"How lonely, how dreary everything seems," she went on. "How dark and dreary the river looks except where the bars ofmoonlight touch it with brightness; how ghostly and skeleton-like the trees appear, tossing their naked arms in the breeze; how weird and melancholy the silent, deserted earth looks at midnight!"
Suddenly she started and uttered a low cry.
She fancied that she had seen a dark form darting cautiously about the garden beneath the windows.
She looked out again, and for a moment she thought herself mistaken, but directly the dark form of a man appeared from behind a tree, and skirting a strip of moonlight with cautious footsteps, disappeared in the shadows.
"What can that man be after?" she thought. "It is not Leon Vinton. Whom, then, can it be? Perhaps a burglar."
She continued to watch for him, and presently she saw him take up his station under a tree near the gate as if watching or waiting for someone.
"It must be a burglar," she said to herself. "He is waiting for his accomplice to come that they may rob the house. Shall I wake Mrs. Bowers and tell her?"
She mused a moment, still watching the dark, mysterious form lurking under the shadow of the trees near the gate.
"No, I will not tell her," she concluded. "What does it matter to me? I care not what they do. Perhaps they may enter this room, and by some means I may effect my escape."
Her heart began to beat at the thought, and the light of hope came into her beautiful eyes, brightening her whole face.
She continued to watch the mysterious figure, expecting every minute to see his accomplice appear on the scene; but the hours passed slowly by and the man still remained at his post alone.
At the first peep of dawn he went away, leaving Queenie perplexed and doubtful.
"Who can it be?" she asked herself. "It seems quite evident that he is not here for the purpose of robbery. What, then, is he after? Can it be some friend of mine?"
The thought overpowered her with joy.
"Oh, why did I not raise the window and give him some signal?" she thought.
Then she remembered that the windows had been tightly fastened down by Leon Vinton's orders, so that she could not raise them.
"I have suffered my hopes to lead my reason astray," she thought then, with sudden despair. "Of course it is not anyone to help me. No one knows that I am living except Leon Vinton and the wicked woman sleeping yonder. Papa, Lawrence—all of them, think my body lies at this moment moldering in the grave. Oh, Lawrence—oh, papa! what would I not give to see you again!"
She little dreamed that the father she loved so fondly had died of a broken heart over her loss.
She thought of him every day and longed to see him almost as she longed to see the husband from whose side she had been torn at the very altar by the vindictive malice of Leon Vinton.
The next day from her position at the window she saw thesame dark figure of a man pass up and down before the cottage at intervals at least a dozen times. A broad, slouch hat was pulled over his brows, effectually concealing his features from Queenie's sight.
"The mystery deepens," she thought, "the man, whoever he is, evidently is watching this house. But with what object, I wonder?"
At night he appeared again, and passed the long, cold hours pacing up and down the garden until dawn.
Every day for four days the man kept up this restless espionage. It seemed to Queenie that he neither ate nor slept, so constantly did he appear at his post. She became greatly interested in the mysterious watcher.
"Mrs. Bowers," she said one night, "where is Leon Vinton?"
"In town, I suppose," said the housekeeper.
"When is he coming back?"
"To-morrow, I suppose. He has been gone a week and he said that he would return in that time. Do you want to see him?"
"No, indeed—I hope I shall never see him again!" said Queenie, shortly, turning back to the window.
The next day while she was watching the mysterious man as he paced up and down the snowy road opposite the house, she saw Leon Vinton ride up to the gate, dismount and tie up his horse.
Involuntarily she looked over at the mysterious stranger. He was rapidly crossing the road toward Leon Vinton.
A gust of wind blew off his broad, slouch hat, and a startled cry broke from Queenie's lips.
She had instantly recognized the man!
It was Farmer Thorn!
She instantly comprehended the object of his daily and nightly espionage.
He was watching for Leon Vinton that he might avenge the wrongs of his daughter.
Clasping her hands in breathless agitation, Queenie waited for thedenouement.
Leon Vinton opened the gate and passed inside. Farmer Thorn, having replaced his hat, walked in behind him.
The next moment Leon Vinton felt a grasp of steel upon his arm.
He was whirled violently around face to face with the enraged man whom he had wronged, and felt the muzzle of a pistol pressed against his breast.
"Accursed villain!" shouted the farmer, in a voice of thunder, "thus do I avenge a daughter's wrongs!"
Queenie heard the terrible words, followed by a loud report, saw a wreath of blue smoke curling upward, and Leon Vinton fell like a log on the snowy path. With a terrible shudder she saw his life-blood spurting out, dyeing the pure snow with a terrible scarlet stain.
Farmer Thorn looked down at his victim, spurned him with his foot, and replacing the pistol in his breast, walked rapidly away. At the same moment the front door opened hurriedly, and Mrs. Bowers ran out, followed by a servant. Both of them ran screaming down the path to the side of their master.
Weakened and shocked by the terrible scene she had witnessed, Queenie hid her face in her hands and fell back on her sofa. She lay there trembling and agitated, and musing on the sudden end of the wicked Leon Vinton.
Presently the door was pushed open and Mrs. Bowers entered in such high excitement that she forgot to lock the door behind her.
"Oh!" she cried out, "did you hear the pistol shot? Leon Vinton is dead!"
A sudden impulse decided Queenie to conceal her knowledge of the fact.
She sprang up in apparent wild excitement.
"Is it possible?" she cried. "I heard a pistol-shot a moment ago. Who killed him?"
"I cannot tell you," said Mrs. Bowers. "I heard a shot, and ran to the window just in time to see a man going out of the gate. He had a wide hat on, and I couldn't make out his features."
"You shall never learn his name from me," thought Queenie to herself, for her whole sympathies were with the wronged father of the poor, betrayed Jennie.
"But there laid poor Mr. Vinton, stone dead, in the path," continued Mrs. Bowers, excitedly. "Look out of the window there, and you can see it all for yourself."
Queenie glanced out of the window and drew back with a shudder.
"Oh! it is horrible," she said. "What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to send for the coroner," said Mrs. Bowers. "That's the proper thing to do. I must go right away and do it. Dear, dear, who was that murderous man, I'd like to know? I'd have followed after him, and, mayhap, caught him, only I was so flustrated I didn't know what to do first. The mean, murderous villain!"
She bustled out so full of excitement that she forgot to lock her prisoner's door.
Queenie started up full of joyful emotion.
"Now is my chance!" she exclaimed, "Leon Vinton is dead, and Mrs. Bowers has no right to detain me. I will leave this dreadful place at once."
She opened the wardrobe and took out a long waterproof cloak and hood, putting them on with trembling hands.
Then she exchanged her thin shoes for thick walking boots, and doubled a dark-brown barege veil over her face.
Thus equipped she opened the door and ran down the steps to the hall with her heart beating almost to suffocation.
In the doorway she paused. Mrs. Bowers was standing in the path by the side of the dead man, and Queenie was afraid she would attempt to detain her.
"I must make a run for it," she thought, and suiting the action to the word, she flitted down the steps and ran at break-neck speed down the path, past her living and dead persecutors, and sprang through the gate and out into the road.
Mrs. Bowers heard the patter of her feet and the rustle of her garments as she rushed past her, and looking up she recognized the girl, and recollected instantly that she had forgotten to lock the door after her.
"Come back, you jade!" she screamed, "come back this instant!"
But the fugitive hurried on without looking back, and Mrs. Bowers in a rage set out in a headlong pace after her.
But the good lady was not as young as she had once been, and she found herself rather heavy on her feet. But panting and blowing she raced on in the useless pursuit, until suddenly both her feet slipped from under her, and she measured her length on the icy ground.
Muttering some words rather spirited in their meaning, and not often heard on feminine lips, the wicked woman rose from the cold earth, and shaking her fist after the fast retreating figure of her whilom prisoner, began to retrace her steps to the house, rubbing sundry bruises on her person as she went.
"The keen-witted little wretch!" she thought, "how quick she was to take advantage of my momentary forgetfulness. But after all, Vinton is dead, and what do I want to keep her for? I shall have to leave here, anyway. Mayhap, it's better as it is."
Thus consoling herself, she returned to her watch over the dead man who lay in a crimson pool of his life-blood across the snowy path, his eyes glaring glassily, his handsome face set in the expression of fear and horror that had settled on it when Mr. Thorn's terrible denunciation had been thundered in his ears.
Meanwhile Queenie ran on in her headlong flight until her limbs began to tremble beneath her. Throwing a glance over her shoulder, she saw that she had outrun her pursuer so far that she was no longer visible. She slackened her pace then, and began to walk at a slower and more reasonable gait.
"I may take my time now," she thought. "Mrs. Bowers is too old and slow to overtake me. Besides she can have no interest in keeping me a prisoner since Leon Vinton is dead. She will have enough to do to take care of herself."
She pushed back her veil, showing a face so bright with hope and happiness, that it was hardly recognizable for the pale and dejected countenance that had looked from the window of the river cottage an hour ago. Joy had fairly transfigured it.
She walked along unconscious of the keen, cold, wintery air in the rush of happy thoughts that crowded over her.
She would go home to her father first. She would tell him everything—he should break the news of her return to her husband.
"I cannot tell Lawrence thewholetruth," she said, shuddering. "I would rather die than that he should know the terrible secret! He is so proud and he told me once he would not marry a woman with the faintest shadow of disgrace upon her name.I have deceived him, and I must never let him know now, for I love him, and it would kill me to have him put me away! I will tell him something plausible, though I will not tell a direct lie if I can help."
Poor little Queenie!—once so innocent and transparent that her very thoughts could be read in her eyes—her terrible misfortunes had taught her strange subterfuges and deceit.
"I wonder if there will be any trouble about proving my identity," she thought; "I have heard of such things, and itwillappear very strange to them at first. Papa will take me for a ghost, as he did the night I went and looked at him through the window when he thought I was traveling in Europe. Poor Uncle Rob! I wonder if he was sorry much when he heard I was dead."
She passed the farm-house where the Thorns lived, but the doors and windows were both closed, and the only sign of life was a faint blue smoke curling up from the chimney.
"I should like to stop and see what has become of that poor, willful girl," she said to herself, "but I am so impatient I cannot spare the time."
She walked on faster as she neared the great city. Her impatience redoubled by the thought that every step brought her nearer to her loved ones.
"I wonder if they will be glad to see me," she thought wistfully; "I know papawill! Poor old darling, I could never doubthim! I do not know about Georgie and mamma.They, perhaps, were relieved that I and my terrible secret were buried together—they may be sorry to see me resurrected. But of one thing I am certain. Sydney was glad when she thought I was dead. She will hate me more than ever when I go back. But I shall not trouble any of them, I shall have my husband—he is all I want. He shall take me away from here to some other place where I can forget all the terrible past in my new happiness."
All the while she was thinking she was walking quickly on, buoyed up by the joyous anticipations. At last, foot-sore and weary, she entered the great city and walked on until she stood in front of her father's handsome residence.
Trembling with passionate joy, and with her heart beating so that she could hear it in her ears, she went up the steps and rang the bell.
The door was opened to her by a strange man in livery instead of the female servant who had formerly answered the bell.
Her first sensation of surprise and disappointment was succeeded by an amusing thought.
"Mamma and Sydney are grander than ever. They have set up a man-servant."
"Is Mr. Lyle at home?" she timidly inquired.
The man stared at her a moment in blank surprise; then getting his wits together, replied respectfully:
"The Lyles don't live here now, miss."
"Where have they removed? Can you tell me?" she inquired, thinking that perhaps her mother's and sister's extravagance hadcaused her father's failure at last, and that they had taken a cheaper house.
"Mrs. Lyle and Miss Lyle, and Lady Valentine are all in Europe, ma'am," he answered, wondering what made the bright, pretty face turn so pale as he gave her the information.
"And Mr. Lyle—you can tell me where I can findhim?" she inquired, eagerly.
The polite servant looked as if he thought the girl was out of her mind. After a blank stare into her lovely, eager face, he said, surprisedly:
"Mr. Lyle—why, ma'am—he's dead, you know!"
If the man had struck her the cruelest blow in the face she could not have recoiled more suddenly. She stepped backward so quickly, and with such a wild, low cry of pain that she would have fallen down the steps if the man had not thrown out his arm and caught her.
"Oh, ma'am, don't take it hard," he said, in a voice of respectful sympathy. "Was he any relation of yours?"
She turned her beautiful face toward him with the whiteness of death upon it.
"When did he die?" she asked, unheeding his question.
"The same night that his daughter died—you've heard of that, ma'am, have you?" asked the man, who seemed rather of a gossiping turn.
"Yes, I've heard of that," she said, in a hollow voice totally unlike her own.
"Well, Mr. Lyle, he died that same night of a broken heart, folk said. She was his youngest daughter, and his favorite. They were both buried the same day."
"Dead, dead!" she murmured.
"What did you say, ma'am?" asked the man, not hearing the low words.
"Nothing," she answered. "I thank you for your information," and staggered down the steps into the street again.
"Dead, dead!" she kept moaning to herself as she staggered along the street in white, tearless despair. "Papa is dead! and died of a broken heart for me. Oh, I was not worth such devotion!"
Her mind was so full of this terrible blow that had fallen upon her that she could think of nothing else, until suddenly she saw that the brief winter twilight was settling fast over everything. Then a terror of the night and cold took hold of her. She thought of her husband.
"They are all gone—papa and the rest," she murmured; "I have no one but Lawrence now. I will go to him."
The thought seemed to invest him with added tenderness and dearness. She hastened her footsteps, and before long she stood in front of the splendid mansion where Captain Ernscliffe lived, and which he had refurnished in splendid style for his fair young bride. The windows were closed as if the house was deserted, but she went up the steps and rang the bell. A woman servant answered the summons.
"Is Captain Ernscliffe at home?" asked Queenie, in a faint and trembling voice.
The woman whom Queenie had addressed, and who had the appearance of being the housekeeper, stood still and looked at the young girl a moment without replying.
"Is Captain Ernscliffe at home?" repeated Queenie, in a tone of wistful eagerness.
"What do you want of Captain Ernscliffe?" asked the woman, rudely, as she stared suspiciously into the troubled, white face of the beautiful questioner.
Queenie drew her slight figure haughtily erect.
"My business is with Captain Ernscliffe," she said, in a cool, firm tone that rebuked the woman's impertinent curiosity. "Can I see him?"
"Oh, yes, certainly," said the housekeeper, with a palpable sneer. She was offended because Queenie had failed to gratify her curiosity.
"Show me in at once, then," said Queenie, making a motion to step across the threshold.
But the woman held the door in her hand and placed herself in front of it.
"You'll have to travel many a mile from this to see him," she said, maliciously.
"What do you mean?" exclaimed Queenie, turning pale. "Is he not at home? I will wait here until he comes then."
"You'll wait many a month then," was the grim reply of the offended woman.
"I do not understand you," Queenie answered, passing her small hand across her brow with a dim presentiment of coming evil. "Will you please tell me where I can find Captain Ernscliffe?"
"You'll find him across the Atlantic Ocean, somewhere in Europe, ma'am!"
She fired the words off like a final shot and looked at Queenie, prepared to enjoy her chagrin and amazement, but she was almost frightened by the expression of terrible despair that came over the beautiful, young face.
"In Europe," she said in a voice so low and heart-broken the woman could scarcely hear it. "Are youquitesure?"
"Quite sure, ma'am. He went away to travel a week after his wife's death, and may not return for years."
She made a motion to shut the door, intimating that the conference was ended, but Queenie leaned up against it so that she was compelled to desist.
"Can you give me his address that I may write to him?" she said.
"Well, I never!" ejaculated the housekeeper, staring at her in amazement.
Queenie only repeated her words more plainly.
"I know no more of his whereabouts than the dead!" was the answer. "He expected to be traveling all the time."
A smothered moan of pain came from the white lips of the listener.
"Have you done with me?" asked the woman, impatiently.
Queenie looked out into the street. It was almost dark, and a sleety mist was beginning to fall. The lamp-lighters were going their rounds lighting up the gas-lamps at the corners of the streets, and belated pedestrians were hurrying homeward.
With a shiver she turned back to the portly, comfortable figure of the woman rustling on the door-sill in her black silk dress, quite unconscious that she was holding the door against her mistress, and the mistress of that elegant brown stone mansion on whose threshold she stood.
"You are Captain Ernscliffe's housekeeper?" said Queenie.
"Yes, and I am left in charge of the house during his absence," answered the woman, bridling with a sense of her importance.
"I am a friend of Captain Ernscliffe," said Queenie, timidly. "Will you let me stay here to-night? I am homeless and penniless!"
The housekeeper favored her with a stare of scornful incredulity.
"Captain Ernscliffe's friends are all rich people," she said, with a toss of the head. "He don't have any acquaintance withtramps!"
"I assure you that I am not a tramp," answered the young girl, quickly. "I have been very unfortunate in arriving in this city and finding my friends all dead or away. If your master were here he would certainly give me shelter this wintery night."
"It's more than I'll do, then," said the housekeeper sharply; "come, young woman, don't tell no more lies! Captain Ernscliffe don't know you, but Ido! You're a burglar's accomplice, and you want to get into the house that you may open it to your friends in the night and rob the house."
"Indeed you are mistaken," said Queenie earnestly. "Oh!dolet me stay! If you don't I shall perish of cold in the streets to-night and my death will be on your hands. You may lock me into a room if you are afraid of me—only give me shelter."
It had been on her mind to declare herself the wife of Captain Ernscliffe, and force the woman to admit her into the house that was virtually her own. But a moment's reflection showed the utter futility of such a course. No one except those who loved her would give credence to such a wild, improbable tale; no one would believe that the grave had given back its dead unless she could offer more substantial proof than she had at command. This woman before her would have laughed such an assertion to scorn.
"Come, move on," she said roughly, at the same time seizing the girl by the shoulder and pushing her from her position against the door. "I can't shelter the likes of you, and I won't stand here in the cold wasting breath on you a minute longer."
Queenie turned as the woman pushed her toward the steps and looked her in the eyes.
"You may be sorry for this some day," she said.
"Ha, ha," laughed the heartless housekeeper, "sorry indeed! Sorry that I didn't take a tramp into the house to rob my master."
"Will you let me stay?" said Queenie, once more looking over her shoulder as she was wearily descending the marble steps.
If the woman's heart had not been made of stone it must have melted at the anguish in that sweet, white face, but she only reiterated her refusal more angrily.
"I am friendless and penniless," pleaded Queenie, still hoping to melt that icy heart. "Think what may happen to me in the streets at night!"
"Go! go!" exclaimed the hard-hearted creature, fiercely.
"I will go," said Queenie, drawing her cloak about her, and preparing to breast the wintery storm. "I will go, but remember, madam, that you may one day repent this! It is quite, quite possible that I may one day turn you from these doors as you have turned me to-night."
For all answer the woman slammed the door in her face, and fiercely locked it.
Queenie was left alone standing on the wet pavement in the wintery night, locked out of her husband's house like a thief, a waif and a stray by night, while over her loomed the great brown-stone palace that a few months ago had been splendidly refitted and furnished in velvets, tapestries, gildings and bronzes, for her pleasure. It was hers—her husband's—therefore her own. Yet she turned away from its inhospitable doors, homeless, friendless, penniless—worse than all,hopeless!