The Bride of the Tomb, and Queenie's Terrible Secret
by Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller · English · Gutenberg #42100 · 822,923 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Bride of the Tomb, and Queenie's Terrible Secret
Author: Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller
Release date: February 17, 2013 [eBook #42100]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/42100
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Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (Images courtesy
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BRIDE OF THE TOMB, AND QUEENIE'S TERRIBLE SECRET ***
CONTENTS
The Bride of the Tomb; or, Lancelot Darling's Betrothed
Chapter I.
Chapter II.
Chapter III.
Chapter IV.
Chapter V.
Chapter VI.
Chapter VII.
Chapter VIII.
Chapter IX.
Chapter X.
Chapter XI.
Chapter XII.
Chapter XIII.
Chapter XIV.
Chapter XV.
Chapter XVI.
Chapter XVII.
Chapter XVIII.
Chapter XIX.
Chapter XX.
Chapter XXI.
Chapter XXII.
Chapter XXIII.
Chapter XXIV.
Chapter XXV.
Chapter XXVI.
Chapter XXVII.
Chapter XXVIII.
Chapter XXIX.
Chapter XXX.
Chapter XXXI.
Chapter XXXII.
Chapter XXXIII.
Chapter XXXIV.
Chapter XXXV.
Chapter XXXVI.
Chapter XXXVII.
Chapter XXXVIII.
Chapter XXXIX.
Chapter XL.
Queenie's Terrible Secret; or, A Young Girl's Strange Fate
Chapter I.
Chapter II.
Chapter III.
Chapter IV.
Chapter V.
Chapter VI.
Chapter VII.
Chapter VIII.
Chapter IX.
Chapter X.
Chapter XI.
Chapter XII.
Chapter XIII.
Chapter XIV.
Chapter XV.
Chapter XVI.
Chapter XVII.
Chapter XVIII.
Chapter XIX.
Chapter XX.
Chapter XXI.
Chapter XXII.
Chapter XXIII.
Chapter XXIV.
Chapter XXV.
Chapter XXVI.
Chapter XXVII.
Chapter XXVIII.
Chapter XXIX.
Chapter XXX.
Chapter XXXI.
Chapter XXXII.
Chapter XXXIII.
Chapter XXXIV.
Chapter XXXV.
Chapter XXXVI.
Chapter XXXVII.
Chapter XXXVIII.
Chapter XXXIX.
Chapter XL.
Chapter XLI.
Chapter XLII.
Chapter XLIII.
EAGLE SERIES No. 426
THE BRIDE OF THE TOMB
AND
QUEENIE'S TERRIBLE SECRET
[Illustration]
BY
MRS. ALEX. M^cVEIGH MILLER
STREET & SMITH × PUBLISHERS × NEW YORK
_The Eagle Series_
_OF POPULAR FICTION_
_Principally Copyrights._ _Elegant Colored Covers_
This is the pioneer line of copyright novels. Its popularity has
increased with every number, until, at the present time, it stands
unrivaled as regards sales and contents.
It is composed, mainly, of popular copyrighted titles which cannot be
had in any other lines at any price. The authors, as far as literary
ability and reputation are concerned, represent the foremost men and
women of their time. The books, without exception, are of entrancing
interest, and manifestly those most desired by the American reading
public. A purchase of two or three of these books at random, will make
you a firm believer that there is no line of novels which can compare
favorably with the EAGLE SERIES.
PUBLISHED EVERY WEEK
=To be Published During May=
466--Love, the Victor By a Popular Southern Author
=To be Published During April=
=465--Outside Her Eden= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
=464--The Old Life's Shadows= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
=463--A Wife's Triumph= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
462--A Stormy Wedding By Mary E. Bryan
=To be Published During March=
461--Above All Things By Adelaide Stirling
=460--Dr. Jack's Talisman= =By St. George Rathborne=
459--A Golden Mask By Charlotte M. Stanley
=458--When Love Meets Love= =By Charles Garvice=
=To be Published During February=
=457--Adrift in the World= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
=456--A Vixen's Treachery= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
=455--Love's Greatest Gift= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
454--Love's Probation By Elizabeth Olmis
=To be Published During January=
453--A Poor Girl's Passion By Gertrude Warden
452--The Last of the Van Slacks By Edward S. Van Zile
=451--Helen's Triumph= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=450--Rosamond's Love= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
=449--The Bailiff's Scheme= =By Mrs. Harriet Lewis=
* * * * *
448--When Love Dawns By Adelaide Stirling
=447--A Favorite of Fortune= =By St. George Rathborne=
446--Bound with Love's Fetters By Mary Grace Halpine
=445--An Angel of Evil= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
444--Love's Trials By Alfred R. Calhoun
443--In Spite of Proof By Gertrude Warden
442--Love Before Duty By Mrs. L. T. Meade
441--A Princess of the Stage By Nataly von Eschstruth
=440--Edna's Secret Marriage= =By Charles Garvice=
439--Little Nan By Mary A. Denison
=438--So Like a Man= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
437--The Breach of Custom By Mrs. D. M. Lowrey
=436--The Rival Toreadors= =By St. George Rathborne=
435--Under Oath By Jean Kate Ludlum
434--The Guardian's Trust By Mary A. Denison
=433--Winifred's Sacrifice= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
432--Breta's Double By Helen V. Greyson
=431--Her Husband and Her Love,= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
430--The Honor of a Heart By Mary J. Safford
429--A Fair Fraud By Emily Lovett Cameron
428--A Tramp's Daughter By Hazel Wood
=427--A Wizard of the Moors= =By St. George Rathborne=
426--The Bride of the Tomb and Queenie's Terrible Secret,
By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller
425--A College Widow By Frank H. Howe
=424--A Splendid Man= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
423--A Woman's Way By Capt. Frederick Whittaker
422--Lady Kildare By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
421--Her Sweet Reward By Barbara Kent
420--A Sweet Little Lady By Gertrude Warden
=419--The Other Woman= =By Charles Garvice=
418--An Insignificant Woman By W. Heimburg
=417--Brave Barbara= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
=416--Down in Dixie= =By St. George Rathborne=
=415--Trixy= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
414--A Girl's First Love By Elizabeth C. Winter
413--Were They Married? By Hazel Wood
412--The Love That Lives By Capt. Fred'k Whittaker
411--Fettered and Freed By Eugene Charvette
410--Miss Mischief By W. Heimburg
=409--A Girl's Kingdom= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands=
408--On a False Charge By Seward W. Hopkins
=407--Esther, the Fright= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=406--Felipe's Pretty Sister= =By St. George Rathborne=
405--The Haunted Husband By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
404--The Captive Bride By Capt. Fred'k Whittaker
403--The Rival Suitors By J. H. Connelly
402--A Silent Heroine By Mrs. D. M. Lowrey
401--The Woman Who Came Between Effie Adelaide Rowlands
400--For Another's Wrong By W. Heimburg
=399--Betsey's Transformation= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
398--Cupid's Disguise By Fanny Lewald
397--A Gilded Promise By Walter Bloomfield
=396--Back to Old Kentucky= =By St. George Rathborne=
395--Wooing a Widow By E. A. King
394--A Drama of a Life By Jean Kate Ludlum
393--On the Wings of Fate By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
392--A Resurrected Love By Seward W. Hopkins
=391--Marguerite's Heritage= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
390--A Mutual Vow By Harold Payne
389--Sundered Hearts By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
388--Two Wives By Hazel Wood
387--A Heroine's Plot By Katherine S. MacQuoid
386--Teddy's Enchantress By St. George Rathborne
385--A Woman Against Her By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
384--Yet She Loved Him By Mrs. Kate Vaughn
383--A Lover From Across the Sea By Mary J. Safford
=382--Mona= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
381--The Sunshine of Love By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
380--Her Double Life By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
379--Blinded by Love By Nataly Von Eschstruth
378--John Winthrop's Defeat By Jean Kate Ludlum
377--Forever True By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
=376--The Red Slipper= =By St. George Rathborne=
375--Transgressing the Law By Capt. Fred'k Whittaker
374--True Daughter of Hartenstein By Mary J. Safford
=373--A Thorn Among Roses= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=372--A Girl in a Thousand= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
371--Cecil Rosse By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
370--Edith Trevor's Secret By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
369--At a Great Cost By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
=368--The Pride of Her Life= =By Charles Garvice=
367--Hearts and Coronets By Jane G. Fuller
=366--Comrades In Exile= =By St. George Rathborne=
365--Under a Cloud By Jean Kate Ludlum
364--A Fool's Paradise By Mary Grace Halpine
363--The Opposite House By Nataly Von Eschstruth
=362--Stella Rosevelt= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=361--The Ashes of Love= =By Charles Garvice=
360--An Only Daughter By Hazel Wood
359--The Spectre's Secret By Sylvanus Cobb, Jr.
358--Beryl's Husband By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
=357--Montezuma's Mines= =By St. George Rathborne=
356--Little Kit By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
355--Wife and Woman By Mary J. Safford
=354--A Love Comedy= =By Charles Garvice=
353--Family Pride, Vol. II. By Mary J. Holmes
352--Family Pride, Vol. I. By Mary J. Holmes
=351--The Churchyard Betrothal= =By Mrs. G. Sheldon=
350--A Wronged Wife By Mary Grace Halpine
349--Marion Grey By Mary J. Holmes
=348--My Florida Sweetheart= =By St. George Rathborne=
=347--The Eyes of Love= =By Charles Garvice=
346--Guy Tresillian's Fate By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
345--Tresillian Court By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
344--Leah's Mistake By Mrs. H. C. Hoffman
343--Little Sunshine By Adah M. Howard
342--Her Little Highness By Nataly von Eschstruth
341--Bad Hugh, Vol. II. By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
340--Bad Hugh, Vol. I. By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
=339--His Heart's Queen= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=338--A Daughter of Russia= =By St. George Rathborne=
337--Dear Elsie By Mary J. Safford
336--Rose Mather By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
335--We Parted at the Altar By Laura Jean Libbey
334--Miss McDonald By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
=333--Stella's Fortune= =By Charles Garvice=
(The Sculptor's Wooing)
332--Darkness and Daylight By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
331--Christine By Adeline Sergeant
330--Aikenside By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
=329--My Hildegarde= =By St. George Rathborne=
=328--He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not= =By Charles Garvice=
(Valeria)
327--Was She Wife or Widow? By Malcolm Bell
326--Parted by Fate By Laura Jean Libbey
325--The Leighton Homestead By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
324--A Love Match By Sylvanus Cobb, Jr.
323--The Little Countess By S. E. Boggs
322--Mildred By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
321--Neva's Three Lovers By Mrs. Harriet Lewis
=320--Mynheer Joe= =By St. George Rathborne=
319--Millbank By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
=318--Staunch of Heart= =By Charles Garvice=
(Adrien Le Roy)
317--Ione By Laura Jean Libbey
316--Edith Lyle's Secret By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes
315--The Dark Secret By May Agnes Fleming
314--A Maid's Fatal Love By Helen Corwin Pierce
313--A Kinsman's Sin By Effie Adelaide Rowlands
=312--Woven on Fate's Loom= =By Charles Garvice=
(And Farmer Holt's Daughter)
=311--Wedded by Fate= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
310--A Late Repentance By Mary A. Denison.
309--The Heiress of Castle Cliffe By May Agnes Fleming.
308--Lady Ryhope's Lover By Emma Garrison Jones.
=307--The Winning of Isolde= =By St. George Rathborne=
306--Love's Golden Rule By Geraldine Fleming.
=305--Led by Love= =By Charles Garvice=
=304--Staunch as a Woman= =By Charles Garvice=
(A Maiden's Sacrifice)
303--The Queen of the Isle By May Agnes Fleming.
302--When Man's Love Fades By Hazel Wood.
301--The False and the True By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
=300--The Spider and the Fly= =By Charles Garvice=
(Violet)
=299--Little Miss Whirlwind= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
298--Should She Have Left Him? By William C. Hudson.
297--That Girl from Texas By Mrs. J. H. Walworth.
=296--The Heir of Vering= =By Charles Garvice=
295--A Terrible Secret By Geraldine Fleming.
=294--A Warrior Bold= =By St. George Rathborne=
293--For Love of Anne Lambart By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
=292--For Her Only= =By Charles Garvice=
(Diana)
=291--A Mysterious Wedding Ring=, =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
290--A Change of Heart By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
289--Married in Mask By Mansfield T. Walworth.
=288--Sibyl's Influence= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=287--The Lady of Darracourt= =By Charles Garvice=
286--A Debt of Vengeance By Mrs. E. Burke Collins.
285--Born to Betray By Mrs. M. V. Victor.
=284--Dr. Jack's Widow= =By St. George Rathborne=
=283--My Lady Pride= =By Charles Garvice=
(Floris)
=282--The Forsaken Bride= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
281--For Love Alone By Wenona Gilman.
=280--Love's Dilemma= =By Charles Garvice=
(For an Earldom)
279--Nina's Peril By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
278--Laura Brayton By Julia Edwards.
=277--Brownie's Triumph= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=276--So Nearly Lost= =By Charles Garvice=
(The Springtime of Love)
275--Love's Cruel Whim By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
274--A Romantic Girl By Evelyn E. Green.
=273--At Swords Points= =By St. George Rathborne=
=272--So Fair, So False= =By Charles Garvice=
(The Beauty of the Season)
271--With Love's Laurel Crowned By W. C. Stiles.
270--Had She Foreseen By Dora Delmar.
269--Brunette and Blonde By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
=268--Olivia; or, It Was for Her Sake= =By Charles Garvice=
=267--Jeanne= =By Charles Garvice=
(Barriers Between)
266--The Welfleet Mystery By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon.
265--First Love is Best By S. K. Hocking.
264--For Gold or Soul By Lurana W. Sheldon.
=263--An American Nabob= =By St. George Rathborne=
262--A Woman's Faith By Henry Wallace.
261--A Siren's Heart By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
260--At a Girl's Mercy By Jean Kate Ludlum.
259--By a Golden Cord By Dora Delmar.
258--An Amazing Marriage By Mrs. Sumner Hayden.
=257--A Martyred Love= =By Charles Garvice=
(Iris; or, Under the Shadow)
256--Thy Name is Woman By F. H. Howe.
=255--The Little Marplot= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=254--Little Miss Millions= =By St. George Rathborne=
253--A Fashionable Marriage By Mrs. Alex. Frazer.
252--A Handsome Sinner By Dora Delmar.
251--When Love is True By Mabel Collins.
=250--A Woman's Soul= =By Charles Garvice=
(Doris; or, Behind the Footlights)
249--What Love Will Do By Geraldine Fleming.
248--Jeanne, Countess Du Barry By H. L. Williams.
247--Within Love's Portals By Frank Barrett.
246--True to Herself By Mrs. J. H. Walworth.
245--A Modern Marriage By Clara Lanza.
=244--A Hoiden's Conquest= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
243--His Double Self By Scott Campbell.
=242--A Wounded Heart= =By Charles Garvice=
(Sweet As a Rose)
241--Her Love and Trust By Adeline Sergeant.
=240--Saved by the Sword= =By St. George Rathborne=
239--Don Cæsar De Bazan By Victor Hugo.
238--That Other Woman By Annie Thomas.
237--Woman or Witch? By Dora Delmar.
=236--Her Humble Lover= =By Charles Garvice=
(The Usurper; or, The Gipsy Peer)
235--Gratia's Trials By Lucy Randall Comfort.
234--His Mother's Sin By Adeline Sergeant.
=233--Nora= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
232--A Debt of Honor By Mabel Collins.
=231--The Earl's Heir= =By Charles Garvice=
(Lady Norah)
230--A Woman's Atonement, and A Mother's Mistake, By Adah M. Howard.
229--For the Sake of the Family By May Crommelin.
228--His Brother's Widow By Mary Grace Halpine.
227--For Love and Honor By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
226--The Roll of Honor By Annie Thomas.
225--A Miserable Woman By Mrs. H. C. Hoffman.
224--A Sister's Sacrifice By Geraldine Fleming.
=223--Leola Dale's Fortune= =By Charles Garvice=
=222--The Lily of Mordaunt= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
221--The Honorable Jane By Annie Thomas.
220--A Fatal Past By Dora Russell.
=219--Lost, A Pearle= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon.=
218--A Life for a Love By Mrs. L. T. Meade.
217--His Noble Wife By George Manville Fenn.
216--The Lost Bride By Clara Augusta.
=215--Only a Girl's Love= =By Charles Garvice=
214--Olga's Crime By Frank Barrett.
213--The Heiress of Egremont By Mrs. Harriet Lewis.
212--Doubly Wronged By Adah M. Howard.
211--As We Forgive By Lurana W. Sheldon.
=210--Wild Oats= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
209--She Loved but Left Him By Julia Edwards.
=208--A Chase for a Bride= =By St. George Rathborne=
207--Little Golden's Daughter By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
206--A Daughter of Maryland By G. Waldo Browne.
205--If Love Be Love By D. Cecil Gibbs.
204--With Heart So True By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
=203--Only One Love= =By Charles Garvice=
202--Marjorie By Katharine S. MacQuoid.
201--Blind Elsie's Crime By Mary Grace Halpine.
200--In God's Country By D. Higbee.
=199--Geoffrey's Victory= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
198--Guy Kenmore's Wife, and The Rose and the Lily,
By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
197--A Woman Scorned By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
=196--A Sailor's Sweetheart= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
195--Her Faithful Knight By Gertrude Warden.
194--A Sinless Crime By Geraldine Fleming.
193--A Vagabond's Honor By Ernest De Lancey Pierson.
192--An Old Man's Darling and Jacquelina, By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
191--A Harvest of Thorns By Mrs. H. C. Hoffman.
190--A Captain of the Kaiser By St. George Rathborne.
189--Berris By Katharine S. MacQuoid.
=188--Dorothy Arnold's Escape= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
187--The Black Ball By Ernest De Lancey Pierson.
186--Beneath a Spell By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
185--The Adventures of Miss Volney By Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
184--Sunlight and Gloom By Geraldine Fleming.
183--Quo Vadis By Henryk Sienkiewicz.
182--A Legal Wreck By William Gillette.
181--The Baronet's Bride By May Agnes Fleming.
180--A Lazy Man's Work By Frances Campbell Sparhawk.
179--One Man's Evil By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
178--A Slave of Circumstances By Ernest De Lancey Pierson.
=177--A True Aristocrat= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
176--Jack Gordon, Knight Errant By William C. Hudson.
(Barclay North)
175--For Honor's Sake By Laura C. Ford.
=174--His Guardian Angel= =By Charles Garvice=
=173--A Bar Sinister= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=172--A King and a Coward= =By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.=
171--That Dakota Girl By Stella Gilman.
170--A Little Radical By Mrs. J. H. Walworth.
169--The Trials of an Actress By Wenona Gilman.
168--Thrice Lost, Thrice Won By May Agnes Fleming.
167--The Manhattaners By Edward S. Van Zile.
=166--The Masked Bridal= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
165--The Road of the Rough By Maurice M. Minton.
164--Couldn't Say No By the author of Helen's Babies.
163--A Splendid Egotist By Mrs. J. H. Walworth.
162--A Man of the Name of John By Florence King.
=161--Miss Fairfax of Virginia= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
160--His Way and Her Will By Frances Aymar Mathews.
159--A Fair Maid of Marblehead By Kate Tannatt Woods.
158--Stella the Star By Wenona Gilman.
157--Who Wins? By May Agnes Fleming.
156--A Soldier Lover By Edward S. Brooks.
=155--Nameless Dell= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
154--Husband and Foe By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
153--Her Son's Wife By Hazel Wood.
152--A Mute Confessor By Will N. Harben.
151--The Heiress of Glen Gower By May Agnes Fleming.
150--Sunset Pass By General Charles King.
149--The Man She Loved By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
148--Will She Win? By Emma Garrison Jones.
=147--Under Egyptian Skies= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
146--Magdalen's Vow By May Agnes Fleming.
145--Country Lanes and City Pavements By Maurice M. Minton.
=144--Dorothy's Jewels= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
143--A Charity Girl By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
=142--Her Rescue from the Turks=, =By the author of Dr. Jack=
141--Lady Evelyn By May Agnes Fleming.
140--That Girl of Johnson's By Jean Kate Ludlum.
139--Little Lady Charles By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
138--A Fatal Wooing By Laura Jean Libbey.
137--A Wedded Widow By T. W. Hanshew.
136--The Unseen Bridegroom By May Agnes Fleming.
135--Cast Up by the Tide By Dora Delmar.
=134--Squire John= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=133--Max= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
132--Whose Was the Crime? By Gertrude Warden.
131--Nerine's Second Choice By Adelaide Stirling.
=130--A Passion Flower= =By Charles Garvice=
(Madge)
129--In Sight of St. Paul's By Sutton Vane.
128--The Scent of the Roses By Dora Delmar.
127--Nobody's Daughter By Clara Augusta.
=126--The Girl from Hong-Kong= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
125--Devil's Island By A. D. Hall.
124--Prettiest of All By Julia Edwards.
123--Northern Lights By A. D. Hall.
=122--Grazia's Mistake= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
121--Cecile's Marriage By Lucy Randall Comfort.
120--The White Squadron By T. C. Harbaugh.
=119--'Twixt Smile and Tear= =By Charles Garvice=
(Dulcie)
118--Saved from the Sea By Richard Duffy.
=117--She Loved Him= =By Charles Garvice=
116--The Daughter of the Regiment By Mary A. Denison.
=115--A Fair Revolutionist= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
114--Half a Truth By Dora Delmar.
113--A Crushed Lily By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
112--The Cattle King By A. D. Hall.
=111--Faithful Shirley= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
110--Whose Wife Is She? By Annie Lisle.
=109--Signa's Sweetheart= =By Charles Garvice=
(Lord Delamere's Bride)
=108--A Son of Mars= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
107--Carla: or, Married at Sight By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
106--Lillian, My Lillian By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
105--When London Sleeps By Chas. Darrell.
104--A Proud Dishonor By Genie Holzmeyer.
103--The Span of Life By Sutton Vane.
=102--Sweet Cymbeline= =By Charles Garvice=
(Bellmaire)
=101--A Goddess of Africa= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
100--Alice Blake By Francis S. Smith.
=99--Audrey's Recompense= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=98--Claire= =By Charles Garvice=
(The Mistress of Court Regna)
97--The War Reporter By Warren Edwards.
96--The Little Minister By J. M. Barrie.
=95--A Wilful Maid= =By Charles Garvice=
(Philippa)
94--Darkest Russia By H. Gratton Donnelly.
93--A Queen of Treachery By T. W. Hanshew.
92--Humanity By Sutton Vane.
91--Sweet Violet By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
90--For Fair Virginia By Russ Whytal.
89--A Gentleman from Gascony By Bicknell Dudley.
=88--Virgie's Inheritance= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
87--Shenandoah By J. Perkins Tracy.
86--A Widowed Bride By Lucy Randall Comfort.
=85--Lorrie: or, Hollow Gold= =By Charles Garvice=
=84--Imogene= =By Charles Garvice=
(Dumaresq's Temptation)
83--The Locksmith of Lyons By Prof. Wm. Henry Peck.
82--Captain Impudence By Edwin Milton Royle.
81--Wedded for an Hour By Emma Garrison Jones.
=80--The Fair Maid of Fez= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=79--Out of the Past= =By Charles Garvice=
(Marjorie)
78--The Yankee Champion By Sylvanus Cobb, Jr.
=77--Tina= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
76--Mavourneen From the celebrated play.
75--Under Fire By T. P. James.
74--The Cotton King By Sutton Vane.
=73--The Marquis= =By Charles Garvice=
72--Wilful Winnie By Harriet Sherburne
=71--The Spider's Web= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=70--Sydney= =By Charles Garvice=
(A Wilful Young Woman)
69--His Perfect Trust By a popular author.
68--The Little Cuban Rebel By Edna Winfield.
67--Gismonda By Victorien Sardou.
=66--Witch Hazel= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
65--Won by the Sword By J. Perkins Tracy.
64--Dora Tenney By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
63--Lawyer Bell from Boston By Robert Lee Tyler.
62--Stella Stirling By Julia Edwards.
61--La Tosca By Victorien Sardou.
=60--The County Fair= =From the celebrated play=
59--Gladys Greye By Bertha M. Clay.
=58--Major Matterson of Kentucky= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
57--Rosamond By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
56--The Dispatch Bearer By Warren Edwards.
=55--Thrice Wedded= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
54--Cleopatra By Victorien Sardou.
53--The Old Homestead By Denman Thompson.
52--Woman Against Woman By Effie Adelaide Rowlands.
51--The Price He Paid By E. Werner.
=50--Her Ransom= =By Charles Garvice=
(Paid For)
49--None But the Brave By Robert Lee Tyler.
48--Another Man's Wife By Bertha M. Clay.
=47--The Colonel by Brevet= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
46--Off with the Old Love By Mrs. M. V. Victor.
45--A Yale Man By Robert Lee Tyler.
=44--That Dowdy= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
43--Little Coquette Bonnie By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
42--Another Woman's Husband By Bertha M. Clay.
=41--Her Heart's Desire= =By Charles Garvice=
(An Innocent Girl)
=40--Monsieur Bob= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
39--The Colonel's Wife By Warren Edwards.
=38--The Nabob of Singapore= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
37--The Heart of Virginia By J. Perkins Tracy.
36--Fedora By Victorien Sardou.
=35--The Great Mogul= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
34--Pretty Geraldine By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
=33--Mrs. Bob= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
32--The Blockade Runner By J. Perkins Tracy.
31--A Siren's Love By Robert Lee Tyler.
=30--Baron Sam= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
29--Theodora By Victorien Sardou.
=28--Miss Caprice= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
27--Estelle's Millionaire Lover By Julia Edwards.
=26--Captain Tom= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
25--Little Southern Beauty By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
=24--A Wasted Love= =By Charles Garvice=
(On Love's Altar)
=23--Miss Pauline of New York= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=22--Elaine= =By Charles Garvice=
21--A Heart's Idol By Bertha M. Clay.
20--The Senator's Bride By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
19--Mr. Lake of Chicago By Harry DuBois Milman.
=18--Dr. Jack's Wife= =By the author of Dr. Jack=
=17--Leslie's Loyalty= =By Charles Garvice=
(His Love So True)
16--The Fatal Card By Haddon Chambers and B. C. Stephenson.
=15--Dr. Jack= =By St. George Rathborne=
14--Violet Lisle By Bertha M. Clay.
13--The Little Widow By Julia Edwards.
=12--Edrie's Legacy= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
11--The Gypsy's Daughter By Bertha M. Clay.
10--Little Sunshine By Francis S. Smith.
9--The Virginia Heiress By May Agnes Fleming.
8--Beautiful But Poor By Julia Edwards.
=7--Two Keys= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
6--The Midnight Marriage By A. M. Douglas.
5--The Senator's Favorite By Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller.
4--For a Woman's Honor By Bertha M. Clay.
3--He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not By Julia Edwards.
=2--Ruby's Reward= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
=1--Queen Bess= =By Mrs. Georgie Sheldon=
The Bride of the Tomb
AND
Queenie's Terrible Secret
BY
MRS. ALEX. McVEIGH MILLER
AUTHOR OF
"A Crushed Lily," "Brunette and Blonde," "Nina's Peril," etc.
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
STREET & SMITH, PUBLISHERS,
79-89 SEVENTH AVENUE
Copyright, 1883
By Norman L. Munro
The Bride of the Tomb
Queenie's Terrible Secret
THE BRIDE OF THE TOMB;
OR,
Lancelot Darling's Betrothed.
By MRS. ALEX. McVEIGH MILLER.
CHAPTER I.
Sweet Lily Lawrence had committed _suicide_!
Oh! impossible! A girl so young, so gifted, so lovely, the darling of
her father's heart, the idol of her brilliant lover, the heiress of a
splendid fortune--what had she to do with the grim king of terrors?
Death to her was an enemy to be shunned and dreaded rather than a lover
to be courted.
And to-morrow was her bridal day!
Yet there she lay prone on the velvet carpet, with its delicate pattern
of myosotis, and the soft light of the June morning shining through the
open window on the still form, robed in creamy white satin and priceless
lace, the fair hair streaming across the floor, the turquoise blue eyes
wide-open with a look of unutterable horror frozen in their upward
stare, the small and dimpled white hand clinching tightly a tiny jeweled
dagger whose murderous thrust had left a ghastly, gory, crimson stain on
the snowy satin lace above her heart. By that crimson stain death
claimed her for his own--the fairest bride the grim monarch ever took to
his icy arms.
A thrill of universal horror ran through the great city where she had
been known and loved, not more for her beauty and wealth than for her
sweet and gentle character. Friends came and went through the portals of
Banker Lawrence's splendid brown stone mansion on Fifth avenue for a
sight of the beautiful suicide who had been expected to appear so soon
as a happy bride. Mr. Lawrence, the bereaved and sorely stricken father,
appeared like one dazed with grief and horror. Ada, his younger and only
remaining daughter, was confined to her room in strong hysterics,
attended by the maids. Mrs. Vance, the beautiful widow of a second
cousin of Mrs. Lawrence, a lady who made her home at the banker's, was
the only one in the house who retained sufficient calmness to attend to
anything at all. It was she who kept back the curious throng of the
news-seekers who would fain have invaded the mansion. It was she who
talked with sympathizing friends, breaking now and then into a
heart-wrung sob, and hiding her eyes in her damp lace handkerchief.
"Oh, doctor," she cried, as the physician who had been hastily summoned
after the shocking discovery, bent over the pale form trying to see if
any spark of life remained--"oh, doctor, she is not really dead, is she?
Surely our darling Lily is not gone from us forever!"
The physician looked up curiously at the dark, beautiful face of the
speaker now convulsed with grief and horror. He bent again over the
recumbent form, closely examining the beautiful white features of the
girl, touched her wide-open eye-lids, felt her tightly clenched hands
carefully, and laid his ear over the still breast whose crimson blood
had stiffened the bridal robe above the tender heart so lately bounding
with the joyous pulses of youth and hope and perfect happiness.
"I am sorry to say," he answered, rising and looking down with a pale
face and trembling hands, "that Miss Lawrence is, indeed, no more. Life
has been extinct for hours."
A few hours later a coroner's inquest was held over the remains. Mrs.
Vance, Miss Ada Lawrence, and the deceased girl's waiting-maid were the
three who had seen Lily Lawrence last in life. Their testimony was
accordingly taken.
The maid deposed that on the night on which the fatal event had
transpired her mistress had kept her in her room until about eleven
o'clock, for the purpose of making some trifling alterations in the fit
of the elegant white satin bridal robe.
While thus engaged Miss Ada Lawrence and Mrs. Vance had come in for a
chat with Miss Lawrence. Miss Ada, a young school-girl, and fond of
finery, had persuaded her sister to don the beautiful dress and veil.
After staying awhile and admiring the loveliness of Miss Lawrence, the
maid had been dismissed, her young mistress saying that she would
herself remove the dress, having already laid aside the veil and wreath
of orange blossoms.
She (the maid) had accordingly bidden the ladies good-night. The next
morning, as usual, she had gone at eight o'clock to call her young
mistress. She had found the door locked on the inside.
In response to repeated knocks and calls no answer had been elicited,
and becoming frightened she had repeated the fact to the family, who
were just assembling at breakfast. Mr. Lawrence had caused the door to
be forced immediately. On entering they had found Miss Lawrence lying
dead upon the floor, arrayed in her bridal dress, and clutching in her
right hand a small, jeweled dagger.
She was asked here by the coroner if the dagger had belonged to Miss
Lawrence. She answered in the affirmative, saying that Mrs. Vance had
presented it to her a few days before as a bridal present, and that it
had lain on the dressing-table ever since as an ornament.
Being asked why they had supposed it to be suicide instead of murder,
the affectionate girl burst into tears, and replied that her sweet young
mistress had not an enemy on earth, so that no one could have murdered
her for malice; and that none of her splendid jewelry or bridal presents
had been touched, so that no one could have murdered her for gain; and
that the natural inference was that Miss Lawrence had taken her own life
with her own weapon.
The young lady had seemed much as usual in her manner when she last saw
her, had betrayed no undue agitation of mind and was only anxious about
the fit of the bridal robe in which she was to appear on the morrow. The
maid was suffered to leave the stand, on which Miss Ada Lawrence,
dreadfully nervous and agitated, was led in and took her place.
Her testimony was merely a corroboration of the maid's. She had left the
room in Mrs. Vance's company shortly after the maid's dismissal. Both
had kissed her good-night and left her standing at the mirror smiling at
her lovely reflection. Lily had seemed in good health and spirits. She
did not know of any reason for her sister's committing suicide; but as
she had no enemies, and nothing had been touched in the room, it was the
natural inference. She had not seen her sister again until the next
morning, when she lay cold and dead in the middle of her room.
Mrs. Vance gave substantially the same testimony, with the addition that
she had heard Miss Lawrence lock her room door after their departure.
She knew of no cause that could have driven the young girl to take her
own life. For a few months past she had noticed that Lily had strange
fits of depression and abstraction. She had thought then that some
secret sorrow preyed on the mind of her cousin, but she did not know of
what nature. She was suffered to retire, her agitation growing
uncontrollable, while many admiring glances followed her graceful form
as she swept from the room.
Dr. Pratt was next called to the stand. He was a tall, dark,
sinister-looking man, with restless black eyes and nervous manner. He
gave his testimony briefly and to the point.
He was not Mr. Lawrence's family physician. He was riding past the house
on his way to visit a patient when he had been suddenly called in by the
summons of a domestic who rushed frantically into the street after him.
He had gone into Miss Lawrence's room, where he found the family
assembled and indulging in the wildest grief. The young bride-elect lay
dead upon the floor, grasping a small dagger in her right hand. Upon
examination he found that life had been extinct for eight or nine hours.
He thought that death must have been instantaneous with the
dagger-thrust. From the pose of the body and the position of the right
arm and hand, together with the direction of the deadly weapon, all the
probabilities pointed to an act of self-destruction.
A few more witnesses were examined, but nothing new was elicited, and
the jury retired to consult.
The verdict was given to the effect that "Miss Lawrence came to her
death by a dagger-thrust inflicted by her own hand--probably under a
temporary aberration of mind."
CHAPTER II.
Doctor Pratt attended the funeral of Miss Lawrence, looking grave and
sad, and dignified as the mournful occasion demanded. His restless eyes
took in every detail, noted the grief of the mourners and friends,
peered beneath the heavy crape veil of handsome Mrs. Vance, noted the
absence of the bereaved bridegroom-elect; he even entered the gloomy
vault and stood by the open coffin among the friends who were taking
their last look at the pallid features of the beautiful suicide whose
golden hair strayed over the white satin pillow, mingling with fragrant
rosebuds and lilies.
After the funeral was over he drove to a fashionable street, and
stopping at a fine hotel, sent up his card to a person whom he
designated as Mr. Colville.
After a brief delay he was shown up to that gentleman's room.
Mr. Colville was a rather handsome but dissipated-looking man, of
perhaps forty years. He was dressed in the extreme of fashion, and the
elegance of his apparel, his costly diamonds, as well as the
luxuriousness of the furniture about him, betokened a man of wealth and
ease.
He removed his cigar from his dark mustached lips, and said, with a
light laugh:
"Ah, Pratt, what deviltry are you up to now?"
"I have just come from attending a funeral," Doctor Pratt answered
sedately, as he seated himself in a satin-cushioned arm-chair.
"A funeral!" Mr. Colville started and grew pale. "Was it that of--of
Miss Lawrence?"
"The same," was the calm reply.
"Ah! beautiful Lily--so you are gone to be the bride of death--to be
clasped to her icy heart! Well, better so," said Colville, bitterly.
"I wonder at your coldness," said Doctor Pratt, eying him keenly. "I
thought you loved her to desperation."
"Man, man--I did, I did!" cried out Colville, starting up and pacing the
floor wildly, "but what of that? She would not have my love. She laughed
it to scorn, and was about to give herself to my haughty rival. Great
Heaven! I was nearly crazed by the knowledge. It was a happy madness
that armed her hand against her own life! I am glad she is dead. I would
rather she were the prey of the worm than given to the arms of another."
"Sit down, sit down," said the physician, shortly. "Calm yourself, or
you will fall in a fit as did your horror-struck rival on hearing the
dreadful news of her death."
"Fell in a fit, did he?" said Colville, stopping short in his hurried
walk. "I wish he had died. But, no! he might have rejoined her then in
some better land than this."
"If there be a better land, which I doubt," said Pratt, with a cold
sneer.
Colville threw himself down into an arm-chair and looked moodily across
at the physician.
"Well, what have you come after?" he asked, abruptly and testily. "You
have put me up to so many devilish schemes that I always expect some
villany when I see your satanic countenance."
"I have put my freedom in jeopardy this week for the sake of your
happiness," Doctor Pratt answered with assumed indifference, "but if you
take such a high tone I can leave with my secret untold."
"A secret!" said Colville, looking up with some interest; "your secrets
are always worth hearing, doctor. Let me have it, I beg you."
"This one is worth hearing, any way," said Doctor Pratt grimly, and,
rising, he turned the door-key in the lock, after looking out
suspiciously into the wide hall. Returning, he drew his chair close to
Colville's and continued, calmly: "I cannot afford to give you this
secret, Colville, I will sell it to you for the pretty little sum of ten
thousand dollars--a mere bagatelle, that, to a man of your wealth."
"Ten thousand dollars! is the man mad?" muttered Colville. "Why, man
alive, there is not a secret under the sun I would pay that much for!"
"Is there not?" smiled the other, and bending a little nearer he
whispered in low, impressive accents: "What would you give me, Harold
Colville, if I could take Lily Lawrence from her coffin to-night, cheat
the grave-worm of its prey, and give her to your arms, warm, living,
beautiful--dead to all the world, alive only to you?"
"Great Heaven! the half of my fortune were not too great a price for
such a miracle," breathed Colville, excitedly. "But, Pratt, you are
raving! Even your skill, great though I own it to be, could not
accomplish that, unless you are leagued with the devil, as I have often
suspected you are."
"Thanks," said the grim physician, curtly, then interrogated calmly: "So
ten thousand dollars would not weigh much in the scale against Lily
Lawrence living?"
"Not a feather's weight! I would give it to you freely, gladly, but,
Pratt, you cannot do it!"
"I _can_ do it! Listen to me, Colville," he whispered breathlessly.
"Lily Lawrence lies in her coffin to-night, to all the world dead: but
to me she is a living woman, and as such may be resurrected."
"But how--why----"
"Be calm, I will explain all. When her lifeless form was discovered I
was hastily called in. I went; I carefully examined the body, which lay,
to all appearance, cold and dead. I found an almost imperceptible warmth
about her heart, a tinge of color in the palms of her hands, and a
vacant stare in the eyes resembling death, but which might be only
produced by that rare and strange disease known to medical men as
'catalepsy.' There was a slight flesh-wound about the heart; but the
blow had been struck by such a trembling hand that it had failed to
penetrate a vital part, and the dreadful shock of the attempted murder
(for I do not believe in the sapient jury's verdict of suicide) threw
the poor girl into a state of syncope, or catalepsy, so closely
resembling death that it deceived all but my professional eyes."
"Yet you suffered them to entomb a living woman?"
"For your sake, remember, Colville; for as I knelt by the beautiful
creature, half stunned by my startling discovery, the thought of you
darted into my head like an inspiration. I remembered what you must
suffer if she lived to bless your rival with her love. I said to
myself--It will be several days, most likely, before she rouses from
this trance of death. Let them bury her, and make to themselves other
idols. In the meantime I will resurrect her, give her to Colville's
eager arms, and earn his eternal gratitude as well as a more substantial
fee for myself."
"Pratt, you are a demon!"
"Is that the way you thank me for my friendship?"
"No, oh, no; you have done well--you have done right, and you shall have
your reward. But, Heavens! to think of her lying there in her living
beauty among the skeletons and the worms--perhaps even now she is waking
amid those gloomy shades! Ugh!" he shuddered, and started from the
chair.
"No danger, I think," said the dark physician, smiling contemptuously;
"I observed her closely this evening, and there were no signs of
reviving. Patience, my friend, I bribed the old sexton, I have the key
to the vault. In a few hours it will be night, and then we will bear
away your drooping Lily to revive beneath the sunshine of your love."
"But where can we take her? If the theft is discovered there will be a
hue and cry raised about the body."
"I know of a safe place. You remember the old couple in the suburbs? the
same who kept poor Fanny till her ravings ended in her death?"
"Oh, God! do not remind me of such horrible things--let the dead past
lie! Yes, I remember!"
"We will take her _there_. I have been to see them, and prepared them
for our coming. You will have to pay heavily, of course, but you will
not mind that in such a cause. Now, then, will you go with me to the
graveyard to-night?"
"I will, and may the devil, who certainly helps you in your evil deeds,
doctor, aid us both in this precarious scheme, and restore my living
love to my devoted arms!"
"Amen!" breathed Doctor Pratt piously.
CHAPTER III.
It was the day following the funeral of sweet Lily Lawrence--a sunny
day, fragrant and bloomy with the wealth of summer. Outside of Mr.
Lawrence's stately mansion in the handsome grounds enclosing it, flowers
blossomed, the fountain threw up its diamond spray, and birds twittered
and chirped.
But within the house all was silence and gloom. Mr. Lawrence was shut up
in the library alone with his grief; Ada Lawrence lay ill of a low,
nervous fever, induced by her poignant sorrow, and Mrs. Vance sat in the
drawing-room alone, nervous and ill, and starting at every trivial
sound.
The stately-looking widow was very handsome this morning. She wore a
dress of thin black grenadine, relieved by creamy old lace at throat and
wrists, and delicate ribbons of heliotrope color. Her wavy black hair
was braided about her small head like a coronet, and a cluster of
heliotrope blossoms nestled in its silken darkness.
A faint roseate bloom tinted her lips and cheeks, and hightened by
contrast the restless brightness of her full, dark eyes, and the
whiteness of her low brow. She was fully thirty-five years old, but
nature and art had combined so gracefully in her make-up that she did
not appear twenty-five.
A sudden peal of the door-bell made her spring up suddenly in nervous
terror of she scarce knew what. She had hardly reseated herself when an
obsequious servant ushered in a tall, exceedingly distinguished-looking
young man. It was Lancelot Darling, the betrothed lover of the dead
girl.
He was a splendidly handsome and imposing gentleman, but his elegant
dress was disordered, his face was pale, almost to the verge of
ghastliness, his large, brilliant dark eyes were so wild in their
expression of grief that they almost seemed to glare upon the lady who
advanced toward him with extended hands.
"Mr. Darling," she murmured in a low tone of surprise and pleasure. "You
are better, you are able to be out."
He pressed her hand speechlessly, and tottered to a sofa, falling
heavily upon it while his eyes closed for a minute. In a fright at the
look of exhaustion on his white face, Mrs. Vance darted from the room,
soon returning with a glass of cordial.
She lifted his head on her arm and pressed the goblet to his lips,
trembling excessively the while. In a moment he revived, and rising on
his elbow looked up while a faint flush mounted to his white forehead.
"Pardon me," he said, in a broken voice. "This is unmanly, I know, but I
have been very ill, Mrs. Vance, and I am weak still--and it is hard, oh!
so hard to come here like this!" He sat up, pushing the dark locks back
from his brow, while a shudder ran through his strong frame.
"Believe me, I sympathize with you, I grieve with you," murmured the
lady in silvery tones. "Our poor, lost Lily!" and her face was hidden in
her handkerchief while a sob seemed to shake her graceful form.
"They say she died by her own hand," he cried, excitedly. "My God! what
mystery is here, Mrs. Vance? What hidden cause drove the girl who was
almost my wife to that fearful deed?"
"Did you suspect no cause?" asked she, looking at him sadly.
"None--there could be none. Young, beautiful, loving and beloved, she
had no cause for sorrow."
"So it seemed to _you_," she answered, in low, soft tones, looking down
as if she could not bear the anguish written on his features; "but
strange as it may seem, Lily had some trouble unknown to us all, but
which I suspected months ago. She had strange moods of deep depression
and abstraction, followed by a feverish, unnatural gaiety. My suspicion
of some mysterious trouble weighing on her heart was only confirmed by
her sad and tragic death."
"Of what nature did you suspect her mysterious trouble to be?" asked the
young man, looking at her in surprise and anxiety.
"I had nothing but conjecture to build on," said she, reluctantly. "It
would be cruelty to harrow your soul with suspicions that may be
baseless."
"But I insist on your telling me," said he, with unconscious
imperiousness of tone and look.
"I fancied--mind, I only _fancied_," said she, deprecatingly, "that
Lily, though betrothed to you, had conceived an unrequited attachment
for another, or that perhaps she was the victim of some boarding-school
entanglement which threatened to mar her happiness."
"Oh, impossible!" he answered, decisively. "Lily had no silly
school-girl entanglements. She told me so. And she loved me alone--loved
me as devotedly as I loved her--I am perfectly certain of that. No, Mrs.
Vance, you are mistaken. The theory of the jury is the only one I can
accept. The fatal deed must have been committed under a temporary
aberration of mind."
The sudden entrance of Mr. Lawrence checked the mournful expression that
rose to her lips.
As the two men shook hands in silence, each noted the ravages grief had
made in the other.
Mr. Lawrence's portly form was bowed feebly, his genial face was seamed
with lines of grief and care, while premature silver threads shone amid
his chestnut-brown hair.
The ghastly pallor of Lancelot Darling, his wild eyes, his trembling
hands, attested how maddening and soul-harrowing was his despair.
"Lance, my poor boy, you have been ill," said the banker, in a gentle
tone of sympathy.
"Yes, I have been ill," said Lancelot, brokenly; then almost crushing
the banker's hand in his strong, unconscious grasp, he broke out wildly:
"Mr. Lawrence, I have come here to beg a favor of you."
"Name it," said Mr. Lawrence, kindly.
"I want the key of your vault. I want to see my Lily's face once more,"
he answered, in an imploring tone.
"Would it be well? Would it be wise?" asked the other in a tone of
surprise and pain.
"I do not know, I do not ask," said Lancelot, impetuously. "I only know
that my soul hungers for a sight of my darling's face. Do not refuse me,
my friend. Let me see her once more before death has obliterated all her
beauty!"
"Better think of her, Lance, as when you last saw her in life and
health," said the banker uneasily. "She is already changed. You are too
weak to bear the agitation that would ensue if I granted your request."
"You refuse me, then," said the young man in a voice of passionate
grief. "She was to have been my wife ere now, yet you will not suffer me
to press one last, long kiss on the cold lips of my darling."
"Oh, do not refuse him," cried Mrs. Vance, gliding forward and laying a
persuasive little hand on the banker's arm. "Think of his bleeding heart
and blighted hopes. Remember how fondly he loved her. Go with him to the
vault, and show him our broken Lily lying asleep in the deep rest she
coveted."
Lancelot's heavy, dark eyes flashed a look of gratitude upon the
beautiful pleader as she ceased to speak.
The banker paused irresolutely.
"If I thought he could bear it," he murmured.
"I _can_ bear it, I _will_!" said Lancelot, firmly. "Only grant my
request."
"The sexton has the key of the vault," said Mr. Lawrence, yielding
reluctantly. "I will go with you, Lance."
"Let it be at once then. My carriage is at the gate," said the half
frenzied young lover, moving off after a slight bow to Mrs. Vance.
Mr. Lawrence followed him, the door was closed, and the handsome widow
stood alone in the center of the splendid drawing-room. She took one or
two turns up and down the room, her black dress trailing its gloomy
folds over the rich carpet.
"Let him go," she said at last, pausing and clenching her delicate hands
together. "Let him go! That marble mask of his beautiful love can but
disenchant him. I have already dropped a suspicion of her love into his
heart. He does not heed it yet, but no matter, it shall take root, it
shall grow, it shall bear fruit an hundredfold! He shall turn to me yet.
I love him with a love passing everything, and I will stop at nothing
till I call him mine!"
She laughed aloud as the thought of her future triumph swept through her
heart. It was a strange, eerie laugh--It sounded as if a beautiful fiend
had laughed in Hades.
* * * * *
The elegant carriage, with its high stepping, spirited gray horses,
bowled rapidly along the busy streets of New York, and at length paused
before the beautiful cemetery in which Mr. Lawrence's vault was
situated. The banker then stepped into the sexton's house where he
called for the key of the vault. The sexton gave it to him with some
surprise at the request, and the gentleman returned to Lancelot Darling
who was impatiently pacing a graveled path in the "fair Necropolis of
the dead."
The banker paused and laid his hand on the young man's arm.
"I have the key, Lance," he said, "but even now I wish I could persuade
you not to enter the vault; I dread the effect on your already weak
nerves. Remember what a difference there must be between the blooming
Lily you last looked upon and the poor, faded flower in yon gloomy stone
vault."
"Mr. Lawrence, you do but torture me," said the young man, with a
gesture of wild despair. "However she may be changed let me see her. Yet
I cannot believe that that beautiful face can be altered so soon. Cruel
death would stay his defacing hand when he looked on such loveliness."
With a sigh of regret the elder man turned and walked on down the shady
path. Lancelot followed him, taking no note of the beautiful day and the
song of the birds and the fragrance of the rare flowers all around him.
Over the low mounds everywhere gentle hands of affection had planted
lovely flowers and shrubs, trying to make grim death beautiful. But he
heeded them not as he stopped in front of the marble vault, guarded by a
marble angel, and followed Mr. Lawrence into its dim recesses.
They walked down the echoing aisle, between rows of moldy, decaying
coffins, and paused with beating hearts and labored breath beside a new
casket, loaded with wreaths and crosses of fragrant white hot-house
flowers.
The murky air of the charnel house was heavy with the scent of
tube-roses, violets and pale white roses. With trembling hands they
removed these tokens of affection, until the lid of the coffin was
disclosed. With a shudder Lancelot read the inscription on the silver
plate:
"LILY LAWRENCE.
"_Aged eighteen._"
Mr. Lawrence drew out the silver screws and removed the lid.
"My God!" he cried, as he gazed within.
The costly casket was empty. The white satin cushioning that love had
devised to make the bed of death a soft one, held the impress of her
form, the pillow was lightly dented where her golden head had lain, but
the cold form that rested there yesterday with white hands folded over
the quiet heart, with pale lips shut over the woful secret of her death,
that loved form was gone from their gaze.
CHAPTER IV.
Go with me, kind reader, to the outskirts of the great city; enter with
me an humble house; we pass invisibly inside the locked door, we glide
unseen up the staircase, and into a plainly furnished, low-ceiled room.
Our acquaintance, Doctor Pratt, is there--also his co-conspirator,
Harold Colville, is there. Both are bending anxiously over a low, white
bed where a girlish, recumbent form lies extended.
At the foot of the bed stands an old crone with gray elf-locks floating
under a tawdry black lace cap. Wrinkled, and bent, and witch-like, with
beady black eyes and parchment-like skin, she is frightful to look at as
she peers curiously into the beautiful white face lying on the pillow.
"Pratt, you have deceived me," Colville breaks out sternly; "all your
restoratives have failed, all your potent art is at fault. Look at that
marble face, those breathless lips. It is death, not life, we look
upon."
"Bah!" said Doctor Pratt. Rising and going to the young lady's head, he
gently turned it on one side: at the same time he changed the position
of one arm. _Both retained for a short time their new position_ then
slowly resumed their former place. He raised her eyelids and they
remained open a brief interval, then gently closed again. The beautiful
blue eyes they disclosed were neither glassy nor corpse-like, though
fixed in a vacant, unnatural stare. The physician resumed his seat and
said, calmly:
"You see, Colville, it is life, not death. I tell you it is that rare,
mysterious affection we call _catalepsy_--a state fearfully blending the
conditions of life and death--a seeming life in death, or death in life.
It is true that all my remedies have failed: but it is equally true that
life is not extinct, though the spark may perish from exhaustion if she
does not soon revive. It is now four days since the cold steel entered
her side and this mysterious unconsciousness fell upon her. But the
horrid spell must soon be broken, or death will ensue as a consequence
of loss of blood and vitality."
They withdrew a little further from the bed, Pratt still keeping a
watchful eye upon the patient, while Colville tried to keep his roving
glance away from the death-like face that sent a shudder of fear now and
then along his frame. It seemed fearfully like death despite the learned
theory of the case which Doctor Pratt was patiently explaining to him.
"You said the first time we talked of this that you believed Miss
Lawrence had been murdered," said Colville, suddenly. "Why did you form
that opinion despite the contrary evidence?"
"There was no evidence to the contrary," said the dark physician,
complacently. "I formed it on the evidence of my own eyes. True, Miss
Lawrence's door was locked on the inside; but"--he paused a moment to
give effect to his words--"but a heavy, luxuriant honeysuckle vine was
trained from the ground up to her window in the second story. The
murderer, or murderess, entered her room by the door, turned the key,
perpetrated the dreadful deed, and escaped by sliding down the
thickly-twisted vine to the ground."
"That is only your theory, doctor, I suppose."
"It is a fact, not theory, monsieur. I furtively examined the vine
myself. It was broken in places, bruised in its tender parts, and
quantities of leaves and flowers were strewn upon the ground. It plainly
showed that a heavy body had slid down upon it and injured it. I wonder
that it escaped the dull eyes of the jury."
"You are an astute man, doctor. Who, then, was the assassin of one so
young and fair?"
"I do not know, but I half suspected the beautiful woman who lives at
Lawrence's--a sort of cousin, I think--a Mrs. Vance by name. Her
evidence went a little further than the rest. She asserted that she
heard the young lady lock her door that night--she seemed to favor the
idea of suicide also by pressing a theory of her own, that Miss Lawrence
had a secret trouble--was subject to fits of abstraction and depression.
Yes, decidedly, I suspect the beautiful widow."
"What motive could she have had?"
"That I do not know. I could find out though if I set my wits to work.
But I have no interest in knowing."
"I have it," said Colville, suddenly; "I am acquainted with Mrs. Vance.
When I used to visit the Lawrences I found out--no matter how--that Mrs.
Vance was in love with Lancelot Darling. If she did the deed it was
jealousy that goaded her to its commission."
"Very probably," said the doctor.
They had talked on, forgetful or regardless of the old woman who sat at
the foot of the bed. She was listening eagerly, with twitching fingers,
and muttered inaudibly, "Gold, gold."
"What are you muttering about, old hag?" said Pratt, overhearing her.
"None of your jargon now. And don't repeat what we have been saying to
your old man. If you do I will send your black soul to its doom sooner
than it would go of its own accord! Do you hear me, old witch?"
"Yes, I hear; I will never repeat it, never," whined the old wretch,
grinning horribly.
"See that you don't, then," said Colville.
The evening hours wore on to midnight, and the three watchers in the
quiet room kept their places, undisturbed by even a breath from the pale
form on the bed. The old crone sat wide awake and on the alert: Doctor
Pratt leaned back and watched the patient through half-closed lids;
Colville dozed in a large arm-chair. Surely there never was a patient
who gave so little trouble to the nurses. No querulous complaint came
from the pale lips, no restless hands tossed aside the bed-clothes, no
fever-parched tongue cried out for the cooling draught of ice-water.
Still and pale she lay through the panting summer night, taking no note
of time or aught earthly.
Hark! the midnight hour tolled solemnly and sharply. Mysterious hour
when crime stalks abroad under shelter of darkness, when disembodied
spirits re-visit the haunts of men! Colville started from his uneasy
dozing, then settled himself again as the last loud stroke died away in
hollow echoes. But he did not sleep again, for a simultaneous cry from
the physician and the old woman turned his glance toward the bed. Ah!
what was that?
The awful spell of death was _broken_. The patient presented a ghastly
appearance. Her large, blue eyes were wide open, and staring an
indescribable look of horror at the witch-like face of the old woman.
Her lips were slightly apart, and a thin stream of blood was trickling
from her mouth and nostrils.
"Begone," said the physician, sharply. "Bring warm water and sponges."
She quickly returned with the necessary articles. Doctor Pratt gently
sponged away the blood with warm water so as not to entirely check the
bleeding. A long, deep sigh quivered over the patient's lips, and
turning her head she looked languidly about her. Doctor Pratt made a
sign to Colville and he hastily drew aside out of range of her vision.
"Drink this wine, Lily," said the physician, putting a wine-glass to her
lips. She feebly swallowed the contents, then closing her eyes with a
languid sigh fell into a deep, refreshing sleep, breathing softly and
audibly. He turned to Colville with a triumphant smile.
"What about my theory _now_?" said he.
Colville was trembling with excitement. He came forward, and looked at
the face sleeping calmly on the pillow, its rigid lines softening into
natural repose.
"Surely, Pratt, you are in league with the devil," said he,
half-fearfully. "An hour ago I could have sworn that it was grim death
we looked upon, but now----"
"But now," said Doctor Pratt, "she is doing well--she will soon recover.
And then you can set about your wooing."
"Ah!" said Colville, doubtfully. "I wish that your potent art could
insure me her love as skillfully as you insured me her life!"
The patient's deep slumber lasted till the rosy dawn of the summer morn
began to break over the earth. Then the blue eyes opened with a look of
bewilderment in their beautiful depths.
"Where am I?" she languidly interrogated, sweeping her small white hand
across her brow.
Colville had gone, but the unwearied physician sitting by the bedside
answered, calmly:
"You are in good hands, Miss Lawrence. I am your physician. You have
been very ill, and must not agitate yourself by asking questions yet."
CHAPTER V.
"You say I have been very ill?" said Lily, looking up into the dark face
bending over her.
"Yes, you have been near to death's door; but indeed you must not talk;
you will exhaust yourself."
"But I must talk," said the patient, willfully. "Why am I here? This is
not my home," glancing round the poor, ill-furnished room. "Where are my
father, my sister, my maid? Oh, God!" and a piercing shriek burst from
her lips. "I remember everything--the murderous dagger-thrust, the
horrid spell that bound me hand and foot and tongue. I could not speak,
I could not move; but I heard them weeping round me; I heard----"
"For Heaven's sake, cease! You will kill yourself indeed, Miss
Lawrence!" cried the physician in alarm.
But she waved him off, and sitting upright in bed continued wildly:
"I heard your voice telling them that I was dead. I heard the horrid
inquest held over me. I heard the funeral service while I lay in the
open coffin, unable to stir, unable to comfort my weeping loved ones.
They bore me away. They locked me--me, a living, agonized human
creature--into the dreadful vault with the horrible dead for companions.
Ah! then, indeed, I became unconscious. I knew no more. Oh! oh! what
torture, what agonies I have endured!" cried the girl, waving her white
hands over her head and screaming aloud in her terrified recollection of
the dreadful agonies she had borne while in her cataleptic state.
"She will kill herself indeed," muttered Pratt, hastily forcing a
composing draught between her writhing lips.
She continued to rave wildly until the potent drug took effect on her
overwrought system and produced a deep, unnatural slumber.
He went away and left her to the care of the witchlike old woman. She
awoke toward evening and found the old woman knitting away by her
bedside. The beautiful girl looked at her in wonder and fright.
"Are you a vision from another world or only a fevered phantom of my
brain?" she inquired in a weak voice.
The creature only scowled at her in reply, but she rose and brought a
bowl of fresh arrowroot and fed the patient, who found it very
refreshing after her protracted fasting.
Old Haidee, as she was called, left the room with the empty bowl, and
Lily lay still, looking about her with a vague dread creeping into her
heart. Had she indeed died in that horrible vault, and was she now in
another world inhabited by such hideous beings as the one who had just
left her? She shuddered and closed her eyes. The sound of a footstep
aroused her. A man was entering the room. It was Harold Colville. He
came and stood by the bed-side, looking down at her pale face with
passionate tenderness shining in his eyes.
Her white cheeks turned crimson.
"Mr. Colville!" she cried, angrily, "what means this unwarrantable
intrusion?"
"Oh, Lily! this from you!" he cried in sorrowful reproach. "Lily, I have
saved your life, my darling, and this is my reward; when all others
deserted you and left you in your coffin my love could not rest without
one more look at your dear face. Yes, the love you spurned in happier
days clung to you then and sought you amid the horrors of the dreadful
charnel-house. I entered the vault; I opened the coffin; I kissed the
lips that were dearer to me dead than those of any living woman. And
then I discovered faint signs of life! In my rapture at the discovery I
bore you away in my carriage and placed you under the care of a splendid
physician. You revived; you lived--yes, dead to all the world beside,
you live alone for me, my fair, my peerless Lily!"
He smiled triumphantly, while a look of horror dawned in her eyes.
"You--you will restore me to my friends?" she gasped in breathless
agitation.
"Lily, can you ask it? Can I bear to give you up, long and truly as I
have loved you? When death, in compassion for my sorrow, has given you
up from the very tomb itself to my loving arms could I give you back to
your less devoted lover and live my life without you, my peerless
darling? Lily, do not ask me for such a sacrifice."
"I am never to see father, sister, friends, again?" asked she, with
whitening lips.
"Yes, yes, Lily. Only consent to reward my fidelity with your dear hand,
and you shall see them all again."
"I cannot," she moaned, faintly; "I am betrothed to another."
"Death has broken the bond," said he; "your lover has torn you from his
heart ere this in angry resentment at your supposed suicide. He believes
that you loved another and chose death in preference to a loveless
marriage with him. Give yourself to me, Lily, and that will confirm his
belief."
"Oh, never, never! I do not love you," she cried, vehemently.
"Love would come in time, darling. Gratitude to the savior of your life
would create love. I could make you happy, Lily; I have wealth,
position, influence--all the things that woman values most."
"I can never love anyone but Lancelot Darling," she said, while a blush
tinged her cheek at the sweet confession.
His brow grew dark as night.
"Speak not the name of my hated rival," he cried, angrily. "I saved your
life, not he! Yet this is your gratitude!"
"Oh, indeed I am grateful if indeed you saved my life," she cried. "But
ask me for some other reward. Take my eternal gratitude, my undying
friendship, take the last penny of my fortune, but spare me my
happiness!"
"You rave, Lily," he answered, coldly. "Nothing you have offered me has
any value in my eyes except yourself. I will never, never resign you.
You are in my power here. To all the world you are dead. You shall
remain so until you marry me!"
"I will never, never marry you!" she cried, with passionate defiance.
"We shall see," he answered, angrily; but his words fell on deaf ears.
She had fallen back in a deep swoon. He went out and sent Haidee to
assist her while he hurriedly left the house.
The swoon was a deep one. Lily lay quite exhausted after she revived,
and was still and speechless for some hours. Doctor Pratt came that
night and gave her another sleeping potion. She took it quietly without
remark, and slept heavily all night. The sun was high in the heavens
next day when old Haidee, sitting by her pillow, started to find those
large blue eyes fixed thoughtfully upon her. She ran and brought a
nourishing breakfast up-stairs to her patient.
"You are better," said she, in her cracked voice, seeing that Lily ate
with an appetite.
"I am stronger," said she, as Haidee removed the tray.
She was quiet a while after the old crone had taken her seat and resumed
her knitting. Presently she asked, abruptly:
"What is your name?"
"They call me Haidee," said the old woman, shortly.
"Do you live here alone, Haidee?"
"My old man lives with me," said she.
"You are very poor, I suppose," said Lily, letting her eyes rove over
the poorly furnished bedroom.
"Miserably poor, honey," said old Haidee, while an avaricious light
gleamed in her small black eyes.
"Is this place in New York?" asked the patient.
"Thereabouts," answered old Haidee.
"Would you like to earn some money--heaps of shining gold?" asked the
girl, timidly.
The old woman's beady eyes sparkled. "Aye, that I would," said she.
"If you will carry a little note to my father for me, I'll give you
plenty of money," said Lily, tremblingly.
"Where is your money?" asked Haidee, cautiously.
"I have no money with me," said Lily, "but my father will give you some
when you take him this note."
"The pay must be in advance," said Haidee, provokingly, "I can't trust
your promise."
Lily looked about her despairingly. There was nothing valuable about her
except a diamond ring on her finger. Her eyes fell upon that.
"I will give you my diamond ring if you will carry the note to my
father."
"Aye, aye, but your captors would miss it from your finger," said
Haidee, watching the sparkling jewel with greedy eyes. "They would
suspect you had bribed me, and they would kill old Haidee."
"That is true," murmured the patient, sadly. She lay a little while lost
in thought, then her face grew bright.
"I will tell you what I will do," said she. "See, there are five
diamonds in my ring. Each one is worth a hundred dollars. I will loosen
one of the stones and give it to you if you will help me to escape from
here. They will not miss one single stone from the ring, or if they do
they will think it had become loosened from the setting and lost. Come,
what do you say?"
"It is a risky undertaking, and the reward is small," muttered the old
creature.
"My father shall give much more if you help me. Haidee, will you do it?"
asked Lily, imploringly.
"Yes, I will," said the old woman, greedily.
"Now?" asked Lily.
"Yes, now, before the doctor or Mr. Colville comes back. My old man can
take care of you until I return."
Lily shuddered at the mention of the old man, but hastily begged for
writing materials.
There were none to be had except the stub of an old pencil and some
light brown wrapping-paper. The old crone brought her these with a
muttered apology for her poverty, and sitting up in bed, Lily wrote a
few feeble, incoherent lines to her father.
"Dear papa," she wrote, "I am not dead, though you put me in a
coffin and locked me in the vault with all the dead and gone
Lawrences. I was stolen from the vault, and a doctor brought me to
life again. I am kept a prisoner here by Harold Colville, who
swears he will not release me until I marry him. I have hired the
old woman who takes care of me to take you this letter. You must
give her money, papa dear, for her kindness. She will conduct you
here where I am. Oh! hasten, papa, and release me from this
horrible prison.
"Your loving daughter,
"LILY."
Taking the old woman's knitting needle she carefully pryed out one of
the diamonds from her ring, and putting it with the note into Haidee's
hand bade her hasten.
"It is a long way from here. It will take me several hours to go," was
the answer.
"I shall count the minutes till you return," said Lily. "God bless you,
Haidee, for your goodness to me at this trying time."
The old woman chuckled as she went out, and locked the door after her.
At the foot of the stairs she paused and carefully reread the
superscription of the letter.
"Number 1800 Fifth avenue," said she, gloatingly. "Ah! the outside of
this letter is all I want to see."
She hobbled into her room, set her old man on guard to watch her
prisoner, and blithely wended her way cityward.
CHAPTER VI.
"Mrs. Vance, there is an old woman down-stairs says she has brought the
laces you wished to see," said a trim little serving maid at Mrs.
Vance's door.
Mrs. Vance looked up impatiently from her book.
"I have not ordered any laces at all," said the lady, sharply. "Send the
lying old creature away, Agnes."
The trim maid hesitated.
"You ought to look at them, Mrs. Vance," said she, timidly; "such lovely
laces I never saw. They are as delicate as sea-foam and very cheap. I
expect they are smuggled goods."
"Well, well, let her come up then, but I do not need any of her wares."
Agnes went away and presently reappeared a moment at the door, and
ushered in old Haidee with a basket on her arm. The maid then left them
together.
"Now, then," said the lady, sharply, "what did you mean by saying I had
ordered your laces?"
"Oh! pretty lady, forgive an old woman's lie to the maids for the sake
of getting in. I have bargains, lady--lovely laces smuggled through the
Custom House without any duty--I can sell them to you much cheaper than
the merchants can afford to do."
"Let me see them, then," said the lady, with apparent indifference.
Old Haidee unpacked her wares and exhibited a small but fine assortment
of real laces. Her prices were extremely low, and Mrs. Vance, though she
pretended indifference, was charmed with their elegance, and the small
sum asked by the vender. After a good deal of haggling she selected
several yards, and paid for them in gold pieces taken from a silken
netted purse through whose interstices gleamed many more pieces of the
same kind. Old Haidee's eyes gleamed greedily at the sight.
"Gold-gold!" she muttered, working her claw-like fingers. "Give me the
purse, pretty lady."
Mrs. Vance withdrew a step in amazement.
"Old woman, you are crazy. Go, leave the room this very instant!"
"Give me the gold," still pleaded the miserly old hag.
"I will have you turned out of the house this minute, miserable old
beggar!" cried Mrs. Vance, moving toward the bell.
"Stop one moment, lady, I have something to say to you--a secret to tell
you. You would not have me tell it before the servants, would you?" said
the old woman, in such a meaning tone that Mrs. Vance actually
hesitated, with her hand on the bell-rope.
"Say on," said she, haughtily, and thinking to herself that the old
lace-vender was insane.
"Bend closer, lady, the walls have ears sometimes. This is a terrible
secret," said Haidee, with a solemn air.
Mrs. Vance moved a step nearer, impressed in spite of herself by the
eerie, witch-like gestures and sepulchral air of the speaker.
"Lady, a few nights ago a fair young girl was murdered within these
stately walls. Ah! you tremble; she trembled too when the jealous woman
stole into her room, turned the key in the lock, and struck her down as
she stood looking at her sweet reflection in her bridal dress--yes,
struck her down with a brutal dagger-thrust in her heart. The wicked
murderess stooped to see if her guilty work was done, then escaped down
the ladder of vines that climbed up to the window. The jury said that
the poor girl committed suicide; but we know better--do we not,
beautiful lady?"
"You are a fiend," cried Mrs. Vance, from the chair where she had sunk
down, still clutching the heavy purse of gold coins in her cold hand.
"You lie! no one murdered her--she died by her own hand."
"Lady, I shall not tell my secret to any one but you," said Haidee, with
a low and fiend-like laugh. "Now, will you give me the gold?"
"Never! You have come here to blackmail me! you wish to frighten me by
trumped up suspicion; I will not buy your silence!" cried Mrs. Vance,
passionately.
"Very well, lady, I will go to Mr. Lawrence, I will go to Mr. Darling, I
will tell them what I have told you," said the lace-vender, rising to
leave.
"Stay--who knows this lying tale besides yourself?"
"No one, lady. I, Haidee Leveret, am the only witness of your crime, and
you can buy my silence with that purse of gold," said the old crone,
sepulchrally.
"Take it, then," said Mrs. Vance, flinging it down at her feet "and keep
the secret till your dying day! you need not return to blackmail me
again. That is all the gold I have. I am a poor woman. I can get no more
to give you!"
The old woman gathered up the purse of coins, hid it in her bosom, and
trotted out, mouthing and mumbling to herself. Mrs. Vance fell down upon
the floor writhing in terror. "My sin has found me out," she cried,
wringing her white hands helplessly. "Oh, Lancelot, Lancelot, it was all
for you!"
* * * * *
"A lucky day," said old Haidee to herself as she trotted down the
street. "A fine piece of work, and well paid for! A purse of gold and a
diamond! Well, well!"
She stopped and took poor Lily's note from her pocket where it had lain
concealed, and tearing it into minute fragments threw it into the
street. A gentleman passing by observed the action curiously. It was Mr.
Lawrence. Ah! if he had but known whose hand had written the note whose
coarse, brown fragments lay under his feet, if he had but turned and
followed that hideous old witch, what months of sorrow might have been
spared him. But he did not know, and he went on to his home, bowed and
heart-broken, while old Haidee trotted quickly past, crooning a low tune
in the pride of her gratified avarice and cunning.
As she went into the door of her home, Doctor Pratt came in suddenly
after her.
"Now where have you been, Haidee?" he asked, suspiciously.
"Only to market, doctor," said she, trembling, sidling past him with the
basket on her arm.
He found his patient restless and excited. She was tossing uneasily from
side to side of the bed, and her cheeks were flushed and feverish. He
took the small hand, and found the pulse bounding rapidly beneath his
touch.
"This will not do," said he, "you must not excite yourself unduly."
The door opened, admitting Haidee with a bowl of fresh arrowroot. Lily
looked wistfully beyond her, but she was quite alone. She saw in
Haidee's cautious, negative shake of the head that her mission had
failed. She fell back, crushed with her disappointment.
"Come, take your nourishment," said Pratt, kindly.
She shook her head. A choking sensation arose in her throat, and she
could not swallow. She determined to make one appeal to this
grim-looking man.
"Doctor," she said, clasping her hands imploringly, "I appeal to your
honor, to your generosity, to your humanity, to restore me to my home
and father!"
Doctor Pratt shook his head decisively.
"It is impossible for me to do that," he answered; "you are in the power
of Mr. Colville; I am merely employed by him to attend you in your
illness. You must make your appeal to him."
"He is a villain, a designing wretch!" she broke out, indignantly. "I
will make no appeal to him. But, doctor, if you will go and tell my
father where to find me, I will give you five thousand dollars the day I
am liberated from this prison-house."
He laughed and drew a newspaper from his pocket. Putting it in her
hands, he directed her attention to a marked paragraph. She read it with
streaming eyes. It ran simply:
"Much sympathy has been excited for the Lawrence family in the painful
discovery that the body of Miss Lily Lawrence has been stolen from the
vault of her father. The well-known wealth of the great banker makes it
seem probable that the foul deed was committed with a view to a heavy
ransom. It will be seen in our reward column that Mr. Lawrence offers
ten thousand dollars for the return of the corpse."
"So your father offers more for the repose of your dead body than you do
for your living one," he said, laughing. "No, Miss Lawrence, I cannot
accept your munificent bribe. My duty to Mr. Colville forbids. And _au
revoir_. I must be going. I leave you some medicine and will see you
again to-morrow. Take the best care of her, Haidee."
He went away, and they heard the hall door clang behind him. Lily turned
to her silent attendant.
"Haidee, you did not go," she murmured, in a reproachful tone.
"Oh! yes, I did, miss, but your father was not there," readily answered
the treacherous old woman.
"Oh! then you left the note for him, and also your address?" said Lily
in a more hopeful tone.
"Aye, that I did, miss," said old Haidee, lying glibly; "I gave it to a
very pretty lady."
"It was my sister Ada, then," said Lily.
"No, miss; your sister lies ill of a fever. I gave it to a lady called
Mrs. Vance," lied Haidee, watching the patient's face keenly.
A startling change swept over the girl's white features. Fear, terror,
resentment--all were blended in that look.
"Oh!" she cried, "then indeed I have no hope of release! She will not
give the letter to my father. She is my murderess--she tried to kill me.
She will come here and make her fatal work sure! Watch for her,
Haidee--do not allow her to enter here. She will kill me, indeed she
will kill me!"
"Oh, me, honey, I am so sorry that I gave her the note," said Haidee,
artfully; "but do not be afraid, she shall not come here to finish her
devil's work--no, not she, my poor deary."
Alas! alas! poor Lily! Doctor Pratt's opiates could not bring oblivion
of her troubles that night. She raved and tossed through the long and
weary night, while Haidee, thoroughly alarmed, was very glad to see the
physician's face quite early the next morning.
CHAPTER VII.
"Come home and dine with me, Lance," said Mr. Lawrence, meeting
Lancelot Darling amid the bustle and stir of Wall street.
Poor Lance had been strolling carelessly up and down with a care-worn,
wretched look upon his handsome face. Time went very slowly with him
now. He turned about and, shaking hands with his friend, walked on by
his side.
"Is there any news?" he asked, his mind reverting instantly to the
painful event which occupied all his waking thoughts.
"None," answered the banker, sadly. "Some of the sharpest detectives in
the city are trying to trace it, but as yet there is not the faintest
clew."
He sighed and Lancelot echoed the sigh. Both walked silently on. At
length the banker signaled a car and, entering it, they became at once
the cynosure of all the eyes within it. Their recent terrible affliction
was so well known that sympathy shone on them from every eye. But little
was said to them even by the friends they encountered. The mute trouble
of their faces seemed to repel the mere trivialities of conversation,
and no one wished to speak of the mournful tragedy whose impress was
written so legibly on the faces of both the sufferers.
"You are looking very ill," Mrs. Vance said, in a gentle tone of
sympathy, when the banker had left the guest in the drawing-room while
he went up to see Ada, whose illness had not as yet taken any favorable
turn.
"I am quite well, thank you," he answered, absently, and with an
unconscious, heart-wrung sigh. He was looking about him sadly, seeing in
fancy the graceful, girlish form that had so often flitted through this
grand room. She saw the turn his mind had taken, and instantly diverted
it to the present.
"Has anything been heard from our poor Lily yet?" she asked, in low,
mournful tones.
"Nothing, nothing. Oh! Mrs. Vance, this suspense is very hard to bear,"
said he, impetuously, won by the gentle sympathy in her face and voice
to an outburst he had not intended. "It is almost killing me!"
"Poor Lance," said she, in a broken voice; "your features show the
traces of your great suffering. It is hard for us all to bear, but
harder still for you."
Her delicate hand fluttered down upon his own with a pressure of mute
sympathy, while she buried her face in her handkerchief, sobbing softly.
"I should not have brought my gloomy face here to sadden you still
more--forgive me for my reckless outburst," said he, pained by the sight
of her womanly grief, which always goes to a man's heart.
"Do not regret it," she answered, through her sobs. "Let me grieve with
you, poor boy, in your trouble. Believe me, sympathy is very sweet."
"Thank you," he answered, gently. "Ah! this indeed is a house of
mourning. Is Ada any better to-day, Mrs. Vance?"
"I am sorry to say she is not," answered the lady, making a pretence of
drying her eyes, which, however, had not been wet by a single tear. "She
has a low, intermittent fever, which does not as yet yield at all to the
physician's treatment. God grant we are not to lose our lovely Ada,
too. Ah! that would indeed be a sad consequence of poor Lily's rash
suicide."
He shuddered through all his strong young frame at that concluding word.
"Oh, God!" he groaned, "the mystery of it! Suicide! Suicide! If God had
taken her from us, I could learn to say, 'It is well'--but that she
should weary of us all, that she should rush out of this life that I
thought to make so fair and beautiful to her in our united future! I
cannot understand it--it is horrible, maddening!"
Musingly she murmured over a few lines from Tom Hood's mournful poem,
"The Bridge of Sighs:"
"Mad from Life's history,
Swift to Death's mystery,
Glad to be hurled
Anywhere, anywhere, out of the world!"
The words seemed to madden him. Impatiently he strode up and down the
floor.
"She never loved me as I loved her!" he broke out, passionately. "I
could not have done aught to grieve her so. If earth had been a desert,
it must still have been Paradise to me while she walked upon it. Oh!
Lily, Lily, you were very cruel!"
"Do not grieve so, I beseech you," said the widow's gentle voice.
Timidly she took his hand and led him to a seat. "You will make yourself
ill. We cannot afford to lose you, too. You were so near becoming one of
the family that you seem almost to take the place of our dear one who
has left us."
"You think me almost a madman," said he, remorsefully. "I startle you
with my wild words. I should not have come here."
"Yes, you should," she answered, kindly. "You should come oftener than
you do and let me sympathize with you in your trouble. Who can grieve
with you so well as I who knew and loved your dear one? Promise to come
every day, dear Lance, and let us share our trouble together."
"I will try," he answered, moved by her gentle friendliness, and
thinking as he looked up that she was a very handsome woman. Not with
the beauty of his lost Lily. _Her_ angelic, blonde fairness typified the
highest beauty to him. But handsome with a certain queenliness that was
very winning. How dark and soft her eyes were--how beautiful the sweep
of the long, dark lashes. And her cheeks--how rich and soft was the
color that glowed upon them and deepened to crimson tints upon her full
lips. And when that dark, bright face glowed with tenderness and feeling
how very fascinating it became. When she took on herself the _role_ of
comforter how softly she could pour the oil of healing on the troubled
waves of feeling. She had Lance soothed and quieted before Mr. Lawrence
came down, with a pale and troubled face, from Ada's sick room.
Dinner went off rather soberly and solemnly. The array of silver and
cut-glass was dazzling, the edibles costly and dainty, but Lance
scarcely made a pretence of eating. Mr. Lawrence merely trifled with the
viands, and Mrs. Vance was the only one whose appetite was equal to the
demands of the occasion. Conversation lagged, though the beautiful
widow tried to keep it up with all the consummate art of which she was
mistress. But the gentlemen did not second her efforts, and she was
relieved when the formal ceremony was over and they went out to smoke
their cigars.
"I will go in and see Ada a little," thought she. "The nurse says the
fever is not infectious."
She tripped lightly up the steps and into the room where poor Ada lay
tossing in her burning fever. She was very much like her sister in
appearance, but the luxurious chamber where she lay was in great
contrast with that in which poor suffering Lily was now immured. True,
Lily had all the comforts her sickness needed, but here the capricious
eyes of an invalid found everything to charm and soothe the weary eye.
Here delicate curtains of silk and lace shut out the too dazzling light
of day; here dainty white hangings delighted the eye with their coolness
and purity. Here and there were set vases of freshly-cut flowers filling
the air with sweetness, and rare and costly paintings looked down from
the softly tinted walls.
An expression of annoyance swept over the girl's fair, ingenuous face as
Mrs. Vance bent airily over her and touched her feverish brow with her
delicately rouged lips.
"You should not kiss me," said she, pettishly, "this fever may be
infectious."
"The doctor said it was not infectious, my dear," murmured the lady
sweetly. "I asked him myself this morning."
"Oh! you did, eh? I suppose wild horses could not have dragged you in
here to see me if it had been," said Ada, sarcastically.
"Is there anything I can do for you, my love?" asked Mrs. Vance,
gracefully ignoring the spoiled girl's incivility.
"Nothing--only do not talk to me--talking hurts my head," replied the
invalid, turning her face away.
"Ah, then, if I only disturb you I will take my leave," said the
handsome widow, tripping out of the room.
"You were rather rude, my dear," said the nurse, surprised at her gentle
patient's sudden petulance.
"I don't care," said Ada vehemently, "I hate that woman! I cannot tell
why it is, but I have hated her ever since she came here to live, nearly
two years ago. She knows I do not like her, but she affects
unconsciousness of it. Keep the door locked, nurse, and do not let her
come in here again--tell her I am too ill to see anyone. When she kissed
me just now I felt as if a great slimy snake had crawled over me--ugh!"
she said, shuddering at the recollection.
CHAPTER VIII.
The great agitation of poor imprisoned Lily Lawrence culminated in a
severe fit of illness, and Doctor Pratt found need for all his skill
before convalescence set in again. Mr. Colville prudently kept himself
in the background now, so she was not troubled by the sight of the
villain's face for several weeks. Haidee proved herself a careful and
efficient nurse, and in three weeks' time poor Lily rose from her
sick-bed pale, weak and weary, her girlish heart filled with heaviness
and despair. She had again and again entreated old Haidee to go to her
father, but in vain. The old woman stubbornly turned a deaf ear to all
her entreaties. The old crone's husband Lily had not yet seen, though
she frequently heard his gruff and brutal tones in the next room to
hers, which appeared to be his sleeping-apartment.
She was sitting up one day in the great arm-chair puzzling her brain
over some plan of escape. She looked very lovely still, though wasted by
illness and sorrow. Haidee had provided her with a neat blue wrapper,
and her fairness was almost dazzling by contrast with its becoming hue.
Her rich golden hair was gathered in a loose coil at the back of her
graceful little head, showing the whiteness of her neck, and the rosy
tinting of her small, shell-like ears. A fancy seized her to look out of
the window which was always covered with thick curtains. It was warm and
sultry and she longed for a breath of the sweet and balmy air outside
her gloomy-looking room.
Rising with feeble steps she went to the window, and pulled aside the
curtain.
Horrors! the window was barred with great, heavy iron bars!
Some vague, indefinite plan of escape through that window had been
forming in her mind. She almost screamed in her despair as she saw the
futility of her plan.
"Hateful prison-bars!" said she, angrily, and clenching one in her small
hand she shook it with angry violence. To her surprise the rotten
wood-work yielded, and the bar fell from its place and remained in her
hand. Very cautiously she looked through the aperture just formed.
She saw that she was in an old and weather-beaten house set in the midst
of a large garden whose overgrown shrubs and bushes had grown wild and
tangled, and over-run the paths. There was not another house within half
a mile of this one. She was far out on the suburbs, she comprehended at
once.
A noise below startled her from her reconnoissance. Hastily fitting the
heavy bar back to its place, she dropped the curtains and tottered back
to her seat, assuming an air of indifference and weariness.
The door opened and Harold Colville entered.
"Good-evening, Miss Lawrence," said he, coolly; "I trust you find
yourself improving."
Lily vouchsafed him no answer save a look of scorn and contempt.
"Come--come, fair lady," said he, seating himself near her, "have you no
kinder greeting for your devoted admirer?"
"Leave the room, if you please," said she, while the indignant crimson
suffused her cheeks. "I have nothing to say to you, sir!"
"Nothing? surely it were wiser, Lily, to try to make terms with me than
to bandy angry words. Remember you are in my power. I love you, and I
want your love in return. But, proud girl, beware how you change my love
into hate."
"Mr. Colville," said she, "it is cruel, it is unmanly thus to persecute
a defenseless girl. I beseech you, restore me to my home and my father.
Think of my poor father, my suffering sister. There are other women who
will love you, women who have not given away their hearts as I have
done."
"There is but one woman on earth to me, Lily, and I have sworn to make
her my own. You cannot move me by all you say--as well try to topple a
mountain from its base as to move me from my firm will. Better, far
better were it for you, Lily Lawrence, to waive all this useless
pleading, make yourself as charming as you well know how to do, and
become my wife. If you still persist in refusing there may be worse
things in store for you."
She could not misunderstand the insulting meaning of his angry speech.
The hot blood flushed into her face, then receded and left her pale as
death. In bitter shame at his rudeness she bowed her face in her hands.
"You understand me," said he with a low, malignant laugh; "so much the
better! Now listen to reason, Lily. I love you, and you are in my power!
you are dead to the world, dead to the father who reared you, the sister
who loved you, the man you would have wedded. Consent to marry me, and
within an hour after I call you my wife you shall see your friends
again, and tell them the romantic story of my love, and how it saved
your life; you can tell them that such devotion won you to reward my
fidelity with your hand. All this I offer you in good faith and honor,
and give you time for decision. But refuse--and--well, you know you are
still in my power!"
She rose and stood confronting him in all the pride and dignity of
outraged and insulted purity. She was rarely, peerlessly beautiful with
that scarlet tide staining her cheeks, that lightning flash in the
violet eyes.
"Villain, coward, dog!" she cried, in the white heat of passionate
resentment, "how dare you threaten me thus? Know that I defy you! I
spurn you! I will never be your wife! I will die first, do you hear me?
I will die by my own hand rather than be so disgraced."
"Rave on, my beauty," he answered, laughing tauntingly. "Flap your
pretty wings against your prison bars, my little bird, you will only
ruffle your feathers in vain. By Jove, you only make me more determined!
I never saw you so beautiful, so utterly fascinating! I did not think
you had so queenly a spirit, my fair one! you would make your fortune on
the tragic stage!"
"Oh! go, go," she gasped, lifting her hand with a wild gesture toward
the door, "go, leave me, unless you wish to see me dying!"
He paused irresolute an instant; then her flashing eye and dauntless air
cowed his craven spirit into submission. With a slight bow he turned and
went out of the door.
Face downward on the bed, Lily wept and sobbed unrestrainedly. She was
determined, if release did not come ere long, to die by her own hand.
"Better than dishonor," thought she with another burst of anguished
tears.
She looked about her for some instrument to secrete in case she should
be driven to the last stronghold of honor. There was nothing to secure.
Old Haidee had made sure of that. "Well," she thought, "if there is
nothing else I can strangle myself with my handkerchief."
The hours wore on to twilight. Old Haidee brought her supper, grumbled
because she did not eat it, and scowlingly withdrew. Lily was left alone
with her sad thoughts for companions. She went to the window, pulled
aside the curtain, and looked out. The twilight had faded, a few pale
stars glimmered in the cloudy sky, a crescent moon gave forth a weak and
watery light. A wild thought darted into her mind. "Oh! if I could
escape through these broken bars. Ah! why not?"
She stood still and listened. Familiar sounds from the adjoining room
informed her that the Leverets were retiring. She crouched down and
waited perhaps half an hour. Then a dual chorus of snores announced that
her lynx-eyed guardians slept.
Breathlessly she stole to the window and removed the iron bar. It left
an aperture large enough to admit her slight form. She tried the other
bars, but they seemed more firmly fixed than the first one she had
tried. They resisted her strongest efforts.
"If I only had a strong rope," she thought to herself, "I could secure
it to these bars and slide down it to the ground."
She leaned her head through the aperture and looked down to see how far
she would have to descend. The distance appeared to be about thirty
feet.
"If I only had a rope," she thought again, "I could certainly gain my
freedom--freedom! that means home again, papa, Ada, Lancelot!"
She sat down, her heart beating wildly at the thought. They believed her
dead. She pictured their wild, incredulous joy at first when she burst
in among them, their own living darling. What a story she would have to
tell, and how swiftly the vengeance of papa and Lancelot would descend
on Mrs. Vance and Harold Colville. Her breath came quick and fast, her
courage mounted high within her.
"I must escape," she murmured with passionate vehemence; "surely there
must be some way out of this horrible prison."
She thought of all the stories she had heard and read of the escape of
prisoners--she remembered that she had read of one man who had torn his
bed-clothes into strips and made a rope of them by which he descended
from the window. Why could not she do the same?
Cautiously, so as not to awaken the sleepers in the next room, she
removed the bed-covers. There were not many, for the sultry summer
weather precluded the possibility of their use, but there were two
strong linen sheets.
"These would do, I think," she murmured to herself. "I am so light it
would not need a very strong rope to bear my weight. I will tear these
sheets into four long strips each. That will make eight strips. I will
tie them together in knots, fasten the rope thus formed to a bar, and
lower myself from the window. If the rope is not long enough I must jump
the remainder of the distance. Then, free from this dreadful prison, I
must trust in Providence to find the way home."
She set to work diligently. She was obliged to be very cautious for fear
the sound of her work should penetrate the ears of her jailers. She had
nothing with which to cut the cloth, and it was strong and difficult to
tear. But by dint of hard labor with teeth and fingers she at length
accomplished it, and set to work tying the slips of linen together.
It took some time to make these knots secure. When that was done she
secured the end of her impromptu rope to the lowest bar of the window,
and looked out to see how far the end escaped the ground. Joy, joy! it
was only about ten feet.
"I can easily jump that distance," she thought, with a thrill of triumph
at her success.
She looked about for some wrapping to put over her thin blue dress. A
long dark cloak with hood attached hung conveniently against the wall.
"They must have put that around me when I was brought here," she said,
"so I will wear it to go away in," and, taking it down, she rolled it
into a compact bundle and threw it out of the window.
Nothing now remained but to follow the bundle. She stood still a moment
with streaming eyes raised to Heaven while with clasped hands she
invoked the divine mercy and protection on her perilous undertaking.
Then shuddering, she climbed into the window, forced her body through
the narrow opening, and, catching to the rope, swung herself downward.
Hark! there was a swish in the shrubbery in the garden below as if some
heavy body had dashed through them. Her heart leaped into her throat,
her clasp on the rope grew unconsciously looser, and she slipped much
lower; so low that she heard distinctly on the ground beneath a deep,
low, hurried breathing.
In an agony of dread and fear she clung tightly to the rope and waited
for some demonstration from below. Some unexpected peril had intervened
between her and freedom.
Hush! Hark! Suddenly, as if all Hades had broken loose, there rose a
fearful, blood-curdling sound on the soft warm air of the summer night.
Louder and deeper still it grew, and Lily, hanging there by the clasp of
her frail little hands, midway between the window and the ground, knew
that it was the cruel, hungry, relentless baying of a deep-mouthed
blood-hound.
A scream of terror burst from her lips as she heard the dangerous
creature at work beneath her wreaking its vengeance on the cloak she had
thrown down--tearing it and rending it with fangs and paws. Thus, she
thought, with a gasp of agony, the terrible beast would soon be rending
her warm, living body.
Its vengeance sated on the cloak, the blood-hound began to make hungry
leaps into the air towards Lily's body, at the same time uttering
murderous yelps that froze the blood in the poor young creature's veins.
She felt herself growing weak and faint, and knew that she could hold on
but a few minutes longer ere she must faint and fall into the devouring
jaws of the blood-thirsty animal. Oh! God, she thought, what a horrible
death, to be torn limb from limb by that hungry brute! Papa and Lancelot
would never know all she had suffered.
She had escaped death by steel, death by living entombment, to be rent
in twain by this awful blood-hound!
Suddenly, with a cry of rage, a night-capped head was thrust out of a
window above. The Leverets had been awakened by the noise, and now
hastened to the rescue. Lily heard them coming and tried to hold on yet
a little longer; but her strength was spent, her bruised hands relaxed
their hold, and with a shriek of horror she was hurled downward into the
hungry jaws that were waiting for her. She heard the wild, prolonged
howl of joy given by the dog, felt its hot breath on her face, then
unconsciousness supervened and she knew no more.
At that moment when her death would have been but the work of an
instant, a powerful hand grasped the dog's collar and dragged him,
howling and yelping away to his kennel, while old Haidee raised the
unconscious girl carefully up and looked at her limp form in the
moonlight.
"Is she dead?" muttered the old witch. "Has the hound killed her? Here,
Peter," as the old man came back from fastening the dog into his kennel,
"carry the girl up-stairs--I believe the dog has killed her."
They carried her back and laid her down upon the bed whose coverings she
had stripped and rent with such high hope an hour ago.
White and cold she lay there as if indeed life had been driven from its
beautiful citadel forever. Old Haidee carefully examined her face and
limbs. There was no sign of any wound from the animal's fangs.
"He has not bitten her. If she be dead, it is sheer fright that has
killed her," said she. "Peter, you ugly brute, stand aside. If she were
to revive, the sight of you would be enough to frighten her to death!"
Peter removed his homely countenance to one side, while old Haidee
pursued her task of bringing the unconscious girl out of her swoon. Cold
water, camphor, burnt feathers and ammonia were successively tried by
the old crone before faint breath began to flutter again over the pale
lips. Her eyes opened and she looked up in bewilderment.
"Where am I?" she moaned. "What is the matter--oh! what is that?"
Her wandering gaze had fastened on old Peter Leveret, and she regarded
him with looks of horror. And no wonder, for old Peter was hump-backed
and deformed, and had a countenance so wicked it resembled that of a
brute more than a human being. A shock of bristly, unkempt red hair
surmounted his visage, and his straggling beard was of the same fiery
hue. He leered maliciously at her looks of terror.
"Pshaw! that is only my old man, miss," said Haidee, shortly. "You need
not put on so many airs at sight of him, for I do assure you that if he
had not pulled old Nero off you just in the very nick of time, the
hound would have torn you to pieces long before this."
"I thank you," said Lily, timidly, forcing herself to look gently at the
repulsive old creature. "Oh, where did the dreadful dog come from?"
"We keeps it chained up all day in the garden, and at night we lets him
loose to purwent you from escaping, miss," answered old Peter, doggedly.
"Strange that I never heard him before," mused Lily, reflectively.
"He never had occasion to make himself heard before," said Haidee,
grimly.
Lily shuddered and remained silent.
"Pray, miss," said old Peter, who had been examining the window
curiously, "how did you get the iron bar out of this here window? You
don't look strong enough to have wrenched it out."
"The woodwork was rotten," she answered, quietly. "I pulled the bar out
at the first effort."
"Peter," said old Haidee, "go into the third room from this and see if
the bars are strong in that window."
Old Peter hobbled out on his errand, and Haidee said, shortly:
"I did not think you would try to give us the slip, miss, or I would
have warned you long ago about old Nero. There is no use trying to
escape from here--you are as secure in this house as if you were in your
grave. Grave perils await you the moment you step over this threshold.
Old Nero was but a foretaste of what you may meet with, so I advise you
to marry Mr. Colville, and content yourself."
"I will never, never marry him, Haidee," said the young girl, sadly, yet
dauntlessly. "And you need not try to frighten me from trying to escape,
for I shall use every endeavor to that end. I can but die, and death is
preferable to what I must endure in this house."
She lay back and closed her eyes wearily.
Peter Leveret entered and reported the bars as strong and tight in the
third room.
"You may sit here by the patient, then, while I go and prepare that room
for her reception," said his wife.
"You will not put her in _that_ room," said Peter, with vague surprise
and doubt.
"Yes, in that very room--there is no other where the windows are barred.
She must occupy that until we can get this window fixed. Nothing will
hurt her. I dare say she is not afraid of ghosts," said Haidee, grimly,
as she passed out.
She was absent half an hour or more. Lily lay still with closed eyes all
the while, dreading to see again the villanous countenance of old Peter,
for hideous as Haidee had appeared to her startled eyes, her aspect was
beauty in comparison with that of her husband. It was with feelings of
relief, therefore, that Lily welcomed her return.
"Come," said the old crone, shortly, "I will conduct you to a more
secure apartment, miss."
She led Lily along a dark passage, thrust her rudely into a
dimly-lighted room, and locked the door upon her.
CHAPTER IX.
Thus rudely disposed of, Lily stood still a moment in the center of the
floor whither the old woman's rude push had landed her, and looked about
her with a swelling heart full of grief and indignation.
She found herself in a meagerly furnished, low-ceiled room, very similar
to the one she had just quitted. The single window was barred with iron
strongly and securely fitted in. The low, white bed had a very
refreshing look to her worn and agitated frame, and throwing herself
upon it, dressed as she was, Lily fell into a deep and weary slumber,
broken now and then by a sob that welled up from her heart.
It was probably midnight when she was awakened by the peal of thunder
overhead, and the patter of heavy rain upon the roof. A violent summer
storm was in progress, and Lily lay still awhile and listened in awe to
the raging elements warring furiously together. In a temporary lull of
the storm, she fancied she heard groans of pain arising from beneath the
floor, and sprang up in bed, trembling violently. She listened again,
but the sound was not repeated, and the girl smiled as she said to
herself:
"It was only my nervous fancy, giving a human voice to the winds and
rain. There can be no one in this old house save my cruel jailers and
myself."
She laid her head down again upon the pillow, and as the ominous sounds
were not repeated, and the wild thunder-storm decreased in violence, she
fell asleep and did not wake until the sun was high in the summer
heavens.
Haidee, entering with her breakfast and fresh water for her ablutions,
scowled at her suspiciously.
"Did you sleep well?" interrogated she.
"Very well," answered Lily, coldly and briefly.
"Did nothing disturb you through the night?" said the old witch,
watching the young girl keenly from beneath her shaggy, over-hanging
eyebrows.
"Thunder awakened me," replied Lily, calmly, "and once, in a pause of
the storm, it seemed to me I heard a human voice groaning; but I became
satisfied afterward that it was only the wind in the trees."
"Most likely," said Haidee. "I'm glad you were not frightened. But they
do say this room is haunted. A woman died in here, and they do say she
walks about and wrings her hands and groans. I know nothing about it
myself, but I will own that I have heard strange sounds here."
The long, lonely day wore on while she sat absorbed in her painful
thoughts. Colville, with "malice prepense," had denied her the solace of
books, work, or music, thinking that the unutterable weariness and
stagnation of her life would drive her sooner into his eager arms.
Time passed on leaden footsteps to the impatient young creature whose
life hitherto had held every pleasure that love and wealth combined
could lavish on its beautiful idol.
Noon brought Haidee and her dinner. Wearied by the length of the sultry
day and her own vexing thoughts, Lily scarcely tasted the food brought
her.
"Take it away," she said, indifferently, "I have no appetite, Haidee."
Haidee obeyed in silence, and left her walking up and down the floor in
passionate impatience. Now and then she shuddered with fear at
remembering her escape of the previous night.
"I shall have to die," she thought, despairingly. "There is no hope of
escape from this house. But, oh! may it not be by such a dreadful method
as that."
Her meditations were suddenly interrupted by a horrible sound. It was
the far-off clank of a heavy chain mingled with the anguished wail of an
unearthly voice. It broke so suddenly on the stillness that Lily started
in affright, the very hairs on her head seeming to stand erect in her
over-mastering horror.
She had never been a believer in the supernatural, but what was that,
she asked herself, with a wildly beating heart. The sounds continued,
muffled by distance, yet distinctly horrible and realistic. They seemed
to rise from the floor beneath her feet. She covered her ears with her
hands, but the sounds penetrated to her whirling brain in spite of her
efforts not to hear--dreadful sounds of woe from the suffering lips of
some human or inhuman creature. All the while the heavy chain seemed
clanking in unison with the voice.
Was Haidee's ghost-story true after all, Lily asked herself, in doubt
and bewilderment. No, she would not believe it. Only the narrow-minded
and superstitious believed in such things. Suddenly the solution of the
mystery broke on her mind like the light of an inspiration. She
understood Haidee's anxiety that she should believe in the unearthly
nature of the sound she was likely to hear.
"It is nothing supernatural," she said to herself, firmly. "I am not the
only prisoner in this house. Some poor being, more wretchedly treated
even than myself, perhaps driven to madness, as they will probably drive
me, is confined in some loathsome dungeon below me, and Haidee does not
wish me to know it."
"Poor soul, poor soul!" murmured Lily in divine pity and compassion for
the unknown prisoner.
As she sat musing sadly her eyes fell absently on the carpet beneath her
feet. It had evidently been laid down the night before in a great hurry,
for it was unevenly spread, and was not tacked down. There was no carpet
in the room she had occupied before. Why had old Haidee been so
particular about placing one here?
"It is rather strange," she thought to herself. "Haidee had something to
conceal. I will look under that carpet."
She glanced toward the key-hole, fearing that argus eyes might be
watching her. No one was there. She rolled up a piece of wrapping paper
that lay carelessly upon the floor and pushed it into the opening.
"Now I will see what that carpet hides," said the brave girl to herself.
She advanced to the corner of the room and slowly turned back the
corners of the gay flowered carpet as far as the middle. She was
rewarded by more than she expected. The carpet had been drawn over a
trap-door in the center of the room. It had recently been used, too,
thought the girl, for it was free from dust and a small crevice appeared
at one end. She inserted her fingers in the opening thus found, and
cautiously pushed against it. The door slid back under the flooring
lightly and easily, and disclosed below Lily's room a long and narrow
winding stairway. It looked gloomy and dark, as if the footsteps of the
wicked alone trod over its hidden way, and with a shudder Lily pushed
the door back into its place, carefully replaced the carpet, removed the
paper from the key-hole, and sat down with a wildly-beating heart and
trembling limbs.
"That stairway evidently leads to the dungeon of that poor chained
prisoner," was her inward comment. "Who can it be that Haidee has
immured there? Perhaps another victim of Dr. Pratt and Harold Colville.
Oh! God, that such infamous villany should go unpunished beneath the sky
of heaven!"
She walked to the iron-barred window, and looked out through the
grating.
The sun was shining in the blue heavens--the tangled old garden,
refreshed by the storm of the previous night, was a wilderness of bloom.
Untrimmed, the roses spread their wild, loving arms over the ground, or
climbed heavenward by whatever frail support they could reach. Vines
broken down from their frames blossomed luxuriantly on the ground, and
ran across the winding path. A high stone wall ran around the whole
place, shutting out all the bloom and sweetness from the curious gaze of
any who might chance to pass. Poor Lily inhaled the fragrant air that
rose to her window with a heart-wrung sigh. What sunshine and sweetness
and beauty were outside of her horrible prison--what grief, what
desolation, perhaps even madness, within.
The fresh pure air infused new courage into her fainting heart; the
memory of those mournful, anguished wails became less dreadful as her
courage rose.
"I will go down that winding stairway to-night," was the resolve taking
shape in her mind. "I will try and find that poor soul imprisoned
beneath me. Ah! can I, dare I? Who knows what awful shape of idiocy or
madness may affright me thence? No matter; after enduring the dread
companionship of the dead in the charnel house, I can bear that chained
creature also."
The day wore on. Twilight came with its dusky shadows and passed. Old
Haidee entered with supper and a freshly trimmed lamp. Lily could
scarcely eat, she was so excited by the thought of her projected night
adventure.
"I suppose you are trying to starve yourself to death, miss," said she
grimly; "I shall send word to Dr. Pratt and he will give you some stuff
to stimulate your appetite."
Lily made no reply.
"I suppose you'll not try to escape to-night," continued Haidee
maliciously. "If you do old Nero will be on the watch for you. He never
sleeps at night."
"I will make my next attempt at daylight then," replied Lily coolly.
"You'll not find another loose bar," retorted the old woman angrily, as
she went out with the scarcely touched dishes.
Lily waited a long while in perfect silence for the sound of the old
people going up-stairs. At length she heard their harsh footsteps
creaking up the stairs. As she had expected old Haidee's course was
straight towards her room. She sprang into bed, drew the covers up to
her chin, and feigned slumber. The key grated in the lock and the old
woman's fiendish visage peered in.
"Ah! there you are safe in your nest, pretty bird," croaked she; "well,
happy dreams to you." So saying, she turned the key again and went away,
satisfied that her charge was safe for that night.
CHAPTER X.
Lily lay perfectly still, but quite sleepless for more than two hours.
During that time she heard several groans from below, accompanied by the
ominous clank of the chain. At length, as the cries grew louder and more
frequent, she determined at all hazards to seek the poor, suffering
creature.
She rose and removed the carpet, slid back the trap-door, and gazed down
into the gloomy pit below. All was blackness and darkness, but the
harsh, wailing sounds arose more distinctly than before. She took up the
lamp in her hand, and with an irrepressible shudder, began to descend
the winding stair. Presently she stood at the foot of the stairs in a
narrow passage-way.
At the further end was a door. Trembling so that she could scarcely hold
the lamp, Lily advanced and tried the handle. It yielded to her touch
and swung open. She found herself in an empty, dismal room, its walls
festooned with cobwebs, its cold flooring formed of solid stone.
As she looked about by the dim light of the lamp she saw another door,
and resolutely advancing she caught the knob and swung it open. Another
instant and she had stepped across the threshold and stood in the
presence of the mystery.
It was an empty, cobwebbed room like the first, its only furniture
consisting of a narrow cot-bed. Close beside it an iron staple was
driven into the stone floor. A long and heavy iron chain was fastened to
this staple. At its opposite end it was linked to a strong leathern belt
wound about the frame of a poor creature lying at full length on the bed
and wasted to a living _skeleton_!
In all her speculations regarding the mysterious prisoner, Lily had not
imagined aught as dreadful as the reality. There lay the poor frame upon
the bed, its tattered dress scarce covering its bony knees, its
claw-like hands twisted wildly together. The limbs presented the
appearance of bones with parchment-like skin drawn tightly over them.
Masses of long, black hair, tangled and unkempt, strayed over the coarse
pillow, and fierce, dark eyes, sunken and dim, peered from their hollow
orbits in a face shriveled simply to skin and bone, the cheeks fallen
in, the temples hollow, the purple lips drawn away from the glistening
white teeth. This dreadful creature stopped its frenzied cries at Lily's
entrance, and crouching into a frightened heap wailed out submissively:
"I will hush, I will hush! Do not beat me again!"
"Poor creature, I will not harm you," answered Lily, gently.
She stood in the center of the room, holding the lamp in her shaking
hand, its light streaming over her lovely face and golden hair. The poor
creature turned suddenly at the sound of her compassionate voice and
looked at her with an expression of awe in her great, hollow eyes.
"Are you an angel?" she asked, abruptly.
"No, poor soul; I am a wronged and unhappy prisoner like yourself!"
"Another one of _his_ victims?" queried the living skeleton, sitting up
on the cot and folding her emaciated arms around her skinny knees.
Lily came forward and seated herself on the foot of the bed, and set her
lamp on the floor.
"Of whom are you speaking?" asked she.
"Of Harold Colville, to be sure," said the poor woman, shuddering as the
name writhed over her blanched lips. "Has he married you, too, eh?"
"God forbid," ejaculated her visitor with a strong shiver of disgust. "I
am a poor girl whom he is trying to force into a marriage with him. He
has stolen me away from my friends and is keeping me locked up here
until I consent to be his wife. But I will never, never do so!" she
cried, passionately.
"You do not love him?" said the poor frame beside her.
"No, I hate him! But who are you?" asked Lily, her interest deepening in
the poor creature whose mind it was evident still burned clearly in her
wrecked frame.
"I am Fanny Colville," was the answer, in a low and bitter tone. "I am
Harold Colville's lawful wife--I was married to him four years ago."
"Is it possible?" cried Lily, with a violent start. "Then why are you
here?"
"My husband wearied of me," said poor Fanny, her dark eyes burning like
coals. "He stole me away from my friends, too, lady, but I went
willingly because I loved him--yes, I loved him then! He married me and
I hid away the certificate the good minister gave me. We traveled for a
year or so, and lived very happily. Then he wearied of me and brought me
here. He told me our marriage ceremony was a farce--that we had not been
lawfully married--he demanded the certificate the minister had given me.
But I was not a fool, I knew he lied to me, and I would not give up the
paper for the sake of the little child that was soon coming to me. I
kept it hidden away, and he raved and swore at me, then went away and
left me. He hired the Leverets to kill me and the child also when my
hour should arrive. The day came--my child was born--a healthy, living
boy. They took it away from me and said that it died. I knew they had
killed it. But they were not merciful enough to kill me. They drove me
mad with their cruelty. I became a raving, dangerous maniac for awhile,
and they chained me down here like a dog. Here I have remained nearly
two years, fed on a scanty supply of bread and water. You see what they
give for a week's subsistence," said she, pointing to a half-eaten loaf
of bread and a jug of water, both upon the floor.
Lily looked and shuddered.
"Does your husband ever come to see you?" she inquired.
"No, no; he thinks me dead--he paid old Peter Leveret to murder me. But
they are slowly starving me to death instead of thrusting a knife into
my heart. And I am so strong, it takes me a long while to die!"
She paused a moment, catching her breath painfully, then continued:
"Dreadful deeds have been committed here--murder's red right hand has
been lifted often. Look down into that pit, lady."
She pointed to a trap-door near the iron staple.
Lily pushed it aside and looked down, but saw only thick darkness, while
a noisome smell rushed out of the pit. She closed it hurriedly.
"I see nothing," she said, "but darkness."
"Because it is night," said Fanny Colville. "You should come when it is
daylight, lady. You would see horrible, grinning skeletons then. I look
at them sometimes. They are the only companions I have."
"Poor Fanny, I wish you could escape out of this horrible place. Would
you like to do so?"
"Oh! so much," said the living skeleton, clasping her bony hands. "I
have dear friends far away from here whom I love so much. They know
nothing of my whereabouts. How gladly they would welcome me back."
"My case is the same," said Lily, mournfully. "I have tried to escape,
but was near losing my life through falling into the clutches of the
blood-hound they keep here. But I am going to try again, Fanny, and I
will try to help you out of your prison also. I will come and see you
again," said she, taking up her lamp and turning to go.
"Do not go yet, sweet lady," cried the prisoner, imploringly; "I love to
look at you and hear you speak. I have not heard a kind word for more
than two years until you came in like an angel to-night."
"I must go now," replied Lily, gently. "I am afraid old Haidee will miss
me and trace me here. Keep up a brave heart--I will come again to-morrow
night if nothing happens. Good-night, now, Fanny."
"Good-night, miss," said the unfortunate creature, seizing Lily's hand
and kissing it. "I am happier for your coming, and I shall expect you
again to-morrow night!"
The young girl took up her lamp and went away, leaving the poor creature
alone in her dreadful solitude once more. But hope, like a brightly
beaming star, had penetrated that gloomy dungeon and beamed into Fanny
Colville's lacerated heart. She lay awake all night, thinking feverishly
of the beautiful girl who had visited her, and building bright
air-castles on the slight hint of escape she had thrown out.
And Lily, too, tossed on a feverish bed which gentle slumber refused to
visit with its benign influence. Fear, horror and indignation filled her
heart against Harold Colville and the Leverets, mixed with deep sorrow
and pity for the injured Fanny. She understood now the depth of villany
of which her would-be suitor was capable, and the wickedness of Haidee
and Peter appeared more dreadful than before. No wonder Haidee found her
tossing on a bed of pain the next morning, racked by a nervous headache.
Colville called to see her, but went away when he heard she was ill, and
sent Doctor Pratt instead, who prescribed a sedative and left her
sleeping heavily and profoundly.
CHAPTER XI.
Late in the evening she awoke, feeling rested and refreshed by her long
sleep. Her headache was quite gone, and Haidee found her sitting in the
arm-chair when she came in with supper.
She drank a cup of tea, ate a few mouthfuls of food, and declared
herself much better. Old Haidee, however, brought in her knitting and
pertinaciously sat out the evening with her, with the intention, no
doubt, of listening for sounds from below and marking their effect on
her captive. But no sound, no groans, broke the stillness. Fanny
Colville, in the new hope that had dawned upon her, had refrained all
day from the groans and cries that usually gave vent to her despair. She
was impatiently waiting for the return of her visitor of the night
before.
Haidee had not visited the poor chained captive since the night she had
incarcerated Lily in her new lodging. In fact, there was no entrance to
the dungeon except through the trap-door in this room. Haidee had taken
her a week's rations that night, and scowlingly bade her to abstain from
her noise or it would be worse for her. She now concluded that the
captive had obeyed her mandate, or that death had at last removed her
out of her power. It was with a feeling of relief at the last thought
that she left Lily's room, telling her with a malicious grin that old
Nero was loose in the garden as usual.
It was almost midnight before Lily ventured to seek poor Fanny Colville
again. Long before she descended the stairs she could hear the sound of
the rusty chain as the poor woman tossed restlessly on her bed of pain.
Her wild eyes lighted glaringly at the young girl's entrance.
"I thought you were not coming," she said pathetically.
"I dared not come earlier," Lily answered, relating the cause of her
detention.
"Old Haidee is a fiend," said Fanny, briefly and comprehensively.
"I have been revolving in my mind a plan of escape for us both," said
Lily, proceeding to detail it to her eager listener.
But Fanny sighed and looked down at her skeleton limbs and the heavy
chain.
"That would do for you, but not for me," she said; "I am too weak. It is
a long way from here to the city. We have no money--we have to walk
several miles to your father's house. You see I know the distance--I
came here in daylight. I can tell _you_ the way to go, but my wasted
limbs would not carry me a mile. I should only fall by the way, and be a
hindrance to you."
Lily sighed as her clear-headed companion thus presented the
difficulties in their way.
"I had forgotten your exceeding weakness in the ardor of my hopes," said
she.
"Besides," continued Fanny, "look at this chain. We have nothing with
which to cut the leather or file the iron. I cannot get away from this
staple."
"Can I, then, do nothing to help you, my poor creature?" cried Lily, in
great distress as she saw how futile was the plan she had proposed.
"Of course there is," answered Fanny, hopefully. "The plan you spoke of
is quite feasible for you. Put it into operation as soon as possible. I
feel almost assured of your success. Then as soon as you have told your
story to your father, tell him mine also, and entreat him to send a
force of police out here to arrest the Leverets and liberate me."
"Certainly, I could do that," said Lily, brightening, "that would be the
better plan after all--but still I cannot bear to leave you here alone,
poor soul, in your wretchedness. Who can tell what may happen ere relief
can reach you? Perhaps this slow starvation may finish its dreadful work
upon you."
"Never fear," was the hopeful reply. "I have subsisted like this for two
long years, yet I feel the flame of life still brightly burning in my
wasted frame. And, think you, I cannot endure a few more days'
confinement when you have given me such hope to feed upon?"
Her eyes were brightly burning in her wasted face, and her parched lips
tried to smile. She took her visitor's little white hand caressingly
between her own bony members and looked at it in fond admiration.
"You are a beautiful girl," she said. "Ah, would you believe that I was
once a pretty girl, and that I am young still--but little older than
you, perhaps, for I am only twenty, though, trouble and starvation have
made me prematurely old!"
Lily looked the astonishment she felt, for indeed that poor face with
all the curves and lines of flesh stricken out of it by the sharp pangs
of starvation, had indeed no mark to discern whether she were young or
old. True, the matted locks of black hair were too thick for those of
age, but they were thickly streaked with silver threads. Harold
Colville's wretched victim retained now no trace of either youth or
beauty.
Lily remained with her several hours, feeling all the while that she ran
a great risk in remaining, yet still unwilling to leave the unhappy
woman who showed such pitiful pleasure in seeing once more the friendly
face of a human being. But she was forced to go at length, having
listened to the story of Fanny's life, and exchanged a like friendly
confidence.
"I may not see you again, Fanny," she said, "for I may make the attempt
to-morrow. It must be made in the day-time, you know, when Nero is
chained up. But you may rest assured that if I succeed in escaping I
shall lose no time in having you liberated, and your guilty captors
brought to punishment."
"May God help you," said the prisoner, fervently. "I will pray for your
success."
And with a sigh she kissed the white hands and looked lovingly after the
slight form as it glided away.
Lily went back to her room half apprehensive that the old witch might be
waiting for her there. But all was safe; the room was vacant of all but
her own sweet presence. She disrobed herself, extinguished the lamp, and
lying down upon the bed fell into a light slumber, broken by many fitful
and strangely-troubled dreams.
She awakened only when the summer sun was shining high in the heavens.
Haidee was waiting with her breakfast, and seemed even more petulant
than usual.
"It seems to me you require more sleep than anyone I ever saw," she
said, tartly. "After sleeping all day yesterday, you cannot even get
awake for your breakfast this morning."
"I dare say you would sleep heavily yourself, Haidee, if you had been
drugged as I was yesterday," retorted the young girl, good-humoredly.
"And really, I am feeling ill and weary this morning. This warm weather
and close confinement begin to tell on my health sadly. Perhaps I may
escape you yet through the welcome gates of death."
"No danger of that," was the quick reply. "Youth and health can bear
much more than you have had to stand yet, my fine lady."
She went out and did not return until noon. Her prisoner lay dressed
upon the bed with flushed and burning cheeks and strangely glittering
eyes.
"Haidee," she said, "I cannot eat my dinner. I am feeling very
strangely. I have a dreadful feeling here." She pressed her hand upon
her heart and seemed to gasp for breath. "Go, send for the doctor as
quickly as possible. Perhaps I am about to die!"
Haidee looked at her in doubt a moment. The suffering aspect of the
captive reassured her. She was evidently ill.
"I will send at once for Doctor Pratt," said she, leaving the room in
haste, but not forgetting to lock the door.
"I have sent old Peter for the doctor," said she, returning "but it may
be several hours before he returns. It is a long way to the city."
"Sit down and stay with me, then, Haidee. I am afraid to remain alone
when I feel so strangely."
Ten, fifteen minutes elapsed, then the patient said, faintly:
"Haidee, for the love of Heaven, try and get me a glass of wine! Perhaps
it may relieve this wild fluttering and palpitation of my heart!"
Again Haidee went out, locking the door as before. The patient sprang up
and stood waiting when the witch returned. The key grated, the door
swung open--but at that instant Haidee received a dexterous push that
sent her sprawling into the middle of the room, the wine glass crashing
on the floor. Before she could rise, Lily sprang past her, into the
hall, slammed and locked the door, removed the key and ran wildly down
the stairs.
The outer door was fastened, but the key was in the lock. As she paused
to remove it, she could hear the old woman's frenzied shrieks of anger
and despair on realizing her situation. She flung the door open, flew
down the path, pushed open the heavy iron gate, and ran wildly down the
lonely country road, the afternoon sun beating hotly down on her
unprotected head, the dust flying thick and fast beneath the rapid
pit-a-pat of her small, slippered feet.
CHAPTER XII.
She was free, she was free! that happy thought beat time in Lily's heart
to her wildly rushing feet. She was outside of that horrible prison, old
Haidee was locked in, and could not pursue her, old Peter could not
return for several hours. She had that much time in advance of them.
Only a few miles lay between her and her loved home. Surely, surely,
with the start she had she could distance her enemies and reach the
haven of rest for which she yearned and prayed.
She ran on and on, her brain reeling, her heart beating almost to
suffocation, the perspiration running down her face in streams.
Sheer exhaustion at last caused her to slacken her pace and look behind
her at the lonely stretch of road over which her flying feet had swiftly
carried her. The old house in which she had passed such awful hours was
out of sight; a turn in the road had hidden it from view. No baleful
pursuer was on her track yet. She turned and looked before her. A long
stretch of country road, dotted here and there with poor-looking houses,
lay ahead. She wet her handkerchief in a rill that trickled by the side
of the road, bound it about her throbbing head, and set forward again,
steadily, but at a less swinging pace than she had used before.
Exhausted nature could not hold out at the rapid rate with which she had
begun.
On and on she went through the blistering sunshine. Her head ached, the
hot road burnt her feet, the warm wind blew the dust into her strained
and weary eyes. No matter--she did not heed these trifling things. She
was free! That was the glad refrain to which her bounding heart kept
time. She was so happy she could not realize her great physical weakness
and weariness.
It seemed to her at last that hours had passed since she had set forth
on her journey, carefully following some directions Fanny Colville had
given her. The houses and lots began to stand nearer together. She was
getting nearer to the great city. She began to be afraid that she would
meet old Peter Leveret returning to his home after his errand to Doctor
Pratt.
At last she came to a little house standing apart from the others. She
peeped in and saw an elderly woman sitting at the open door sewing on a
coarse garment, and singing blithely at her task. She opened the gate
and went up to her.
"Will you let me come in and rest, and have a drink of water?" said she,
gently. "I am very tired!"
The woman looked up in surprise. God knows what she thought of the poor
girl standing there bareheaded and dusty, in her blue morning dress,
looking so drooping and weary, but she moved aside and said kindly:
"Yes! dear heart, come in and rest, and have a bit and a sup--you look
as if you needed all three."
The kind words and gentle smile went to the lonely girl's heart. Tears
started into her eyes as she took the offered glass of water and drained
it thirstily.
"I thank you, I do not wish anything to eat," she answered wearily, "but
if you will give me an old bonnet I will be glad--I have no bonnet, you
see--and an old dress, for I do not wish to go into the city with this
morning-dress--I will pay you well, indeed I will. See, I will give you
my diamond ring."
The woman started in surprise as her strange visitant turned the costly
ring upon her finger.
"Here is some strange mystery," she thought within herself. "The girl is
running away, mayhap, and wants a disguise."
She went to a closet, and brought out an old straw hat and thick veil,
and a long, light sack somewhat worn.
"I will not take your ring, my dear," she said kindly. "You may take
these things, though, and welcome. Maybe I am doing wrong in helping you
to run away, but then again I may be doing you a great kindness. You
look very forlorn, my poor dear."
Lily went to work in a dazed kind of way putting on the long sack over
her dress and the hat on her head. This done she wound the thick veil
tightly over her face and turned to go.
"I thank you for your kindness, my good woman," she said. "I will come
back here some time and reward you richly, I will indeed. Now I am
going. If anybody comes here to ask about me be sure and tell them I
have not been here. Do not let them know----"
Whatever else she was going to say died unuttered on her pale lips.
Exhausted nature was giving away. She threw up her hands wildly,
staggered forward a step, and fell fainting on the floor.
"Poor soul," said the good woman, kneeling down on the floor, and
loosening the hat and veil from her head, "she is dead tired-out."
She straightened Lily out upon the floor, and dashed cold water into her
white face, but with no success. The swoon was a deep one, and it was
fully an hour before the girl was sufficiently revived to be lifted up
by the woman's strong arms and laid upon a clean white bed.
"A beauty and no mistake," thought the warm-hearted creature, smoothing
back the damp, golden ringlets from the marble white brow on the pillow.
Lily's large, blue eyes opened and looked up at her in amaze.
"Am I sick? Have I been here long?" she inquired, struggling up to a
sitting posture and looking out through the window anxiously. "Why, the
sun is setting," said she, turning her bewildered face on her kind
attendant.
"Yes, you fainted and were a long time coming to," was the answer: "you
have been here more than an hour."
Lily slipped down from the bed and began to put on her hat and veil with
trembling hands.
"I must be going," she said; "I have far to go yet, and it is growing so
late."
Before the astonished woman could remonstrate, she was out of the house,
going slowly on her way. She was so weak she could not walk very fast.
Her impetuous will alone sustained her dragging footsteps. Thick
twilight had fallen before she entered the busy, bustling city. Sorely
frightened at finding herself alone in the gathering darkness, yet
afraid that the glare of the gaslights would reveal her shrinking form
to her pursuers, she shrank along in the friendly shadows, drawing back
nervously from the hurrying forms that brushed past her, and trembling
at every footstep behind her. But in spite of her nervousness she at
length entered the elegant street where her father resided.
All was gaiety and life in the brilliant houses as she hurried past
them. The light from the drawing-rooms streamed out upon her shrinking
form.
Wild and entrancing strains of music filled the night air. Long lines of
carriages were drawn up in front of some of the houses whose owners were
holding balls and receptions. She knew them all; they were all friends
of hers: but she flitted past them like a spirit, pausing not in her
frightened yet happy course until she stood before the windows of her
father's handsome mansion.
These windows were lighted, too, but not so brightly as some; music,
too, stole through them, but it was soft and subdued. Death had been
there so recently they had not the heart to be gay, she thought.
Wild with her joy she threw off her disguising hat and veil and running
up the broad, marble steps rang the bell. It was opened by the stately
old servitor whom she had been accustomed to from childhood. But instead
of welcoming her home, the gray-haired old man fled wildly down the hall
after one glance into her lovely white face.
"He takes me for a ghost," she thought, laughing and running after him
down the wide hall till she reached the drawing-room door which stood
open for coolness that sultry night.
She stopped in the doorway, framed like a picture in the hall gaslights,
and looked into the room.
They were all there before her--her dear ones! The piano stood in the
center of the room, its back towards her, with Mrs. Vance on the
music-stool, directly facing her. Her white hands strayed over the pearl
keys, and Lancelot Darling stood beside her, and turned the leaves of
her music.
A low divan was drawn near them, and Ada rested upon it, looking very
fair and ethereal in her deep mourning dress. Her father sat beside her
looking very grave and sad.
"Papa, papa!" cried poor Lily in a choking voice.
The passionate cry, low as it was, was distinctly heard by the
quartette. They all looked up and saw her standing there in the light
with her wild, white face and streaming golden hair.
CHAPTER XIII.
The group in the drawing-room gazed at Lily for a moment in mingled awe
and consternation, but suddenly, before word or sound broke the trance
of silence, the beautiful picture was wholly blotted out and obliterated
by a blackness of darkness that filled and flooded the wide hall.
Then the sound of women's screams filled the grand drawing-room.
"Lily, Lily!" screamed Ada, throwing herself into her father's arms,
while Mrs. Vance fell writhing upon the floor, shrieking in abject
terror.
Lancelot Darling paused a moment to extricate himself from the clinging
hands of the kneeling woman, then bounded out into the hall.
Darkness met him only as he ran excitedly up and down its length. There
was no one there. The front door, standing wide open, attracted his
attention. He went out on the porch and looked up and down. Just then
Mr. Lawrence came out and joined in the search. There was no one
passing. They went in and found Willis, the aged servitor, who had
returned to his post, and was lighting up the gas again.
"Willis, what is the meaning of this?" he asked, sharply. "The hall door
open, the gas out, and you absent from your post!"
"On my soul, Mr. Lawrence. I could not help it! I saw a ghost," said the
man, looking about him in visible trepidation.
"Explain yourself," said his master, sternly.
"I went to answer the door-bell," said Willis, trembling, "and when I
opened the door there stood a ghost, all in white, looking at me and
smiling. I was so frightened I let go the door-handle and ran away; I
beg your pardon for neglecting my duty, sir, and leaving the door ajar,"
concluded the man, humbly.
"What sort of a ghost did you see?" asked Mr. Darling.
The man's eyes grew large and wild.
"Perhaps I ought not to tell you," said he, "but, begging your pardon,
Mr. Lawrence, and yours, Mr. Darling, it was the spirit of our poor lost
Miss Lily!"
Mr. Lawrence grew pale as he looked at the man.
"Come, Lance; come, Willis," he said, "we will search the house from top
to bottom. There is some mystery here which we may penetrate."
They looked into every room and closet, they neglected no hiding place
from garret to cellar, but no one, either ghost or being, was
discovered. Mr. Lawrence went up to Ada's room to see if she were
recovering from her agitation.
She was lying in bed pale, but very quiet, attended by her maid. He sent
the girl away, and told his daughter what Willis had seen, and how
vainly they had searched the house.
"Papa, what do you think?" asked she, in low, awe-struck tones. "Was it,
indeed, as the man asserts, the restless spirit of my sister? It was
like her, only paler and more shadowy, as a spirit well might be."
"Ada, I do not know what to think," said her father in low, moved tones,
"I am lost in a maze of doubt and conjecture. Can it be that my
daughter's soul cannot rest while her poor desecrated body remains
uncoffined?"
"It may be so," said Ada, weeping. "What a mournful tone was in that
voice as it breathed your name!"
He started up, pacing the floor in wild agitation.
"I must go down to Lance," he said. "We will go and see the detective
again to-night, and learn if any clew has been found. We must find her
body if skill and money combined can accomplish it; I cannot bear for
her restless soul to be seeking its body at my hands!"
Mrs. Vance had retired to her room in a state of abject terror.
She believed that she had seen and heard the veritable spirit of the
girl she had murdered, instigated thereto by jealousy.
Her bold and venturesome spirit had never yet felt the promptings of
remorse for her dreadful deed. She rejoiced that Lily was dead, and that
the shameful stigma of suicide lay upon her memory; though she was the
daily witness of the bereaved family's sorrow, though she saw that
Lancelot Darling was aged as if ten years had passed over his head in
the past few weeks, still she felt no grief for her sin, and kept on her
resolute way, swearing in her secret soul to win the young man whom she
passionately adored, and whose wealth and position made him the most
eligible _parti_ in the whole city. Love and ambition alike spurred her
on to the attainment of her cherished object.
But the dreadful revelation of old Haidee had struck a lightning flash
of terror to her guilty soul.
She had believed herself secure in her sin; she had thought it known
only to herself of all the world, and the knowledge that her secret
belonged to another had almost crazed her with the fear of its betrayal.
She regretted that she had not followed the old witch home that day and
struck another secret blow that would have sealed the old woman's lips
forever.
She who had struck down so ruthlessly the fair and blooming life of Lily
Lawrence would have felt no compunction in ending prematurely the old
and sin-blasted existence of Haidee Leveret. All that she lacked was the
chance.
Now another scathing monition had been hurled against her guilty
conscience. In the hour when old Haidee's continued silence and absence
had begun to inspire her with confidence again, when the wooing tones
had brought Lancelot Darling to her side, when she could almost feel his
breath upon her cheek as he bent to turn the pages of her music--in that
supreme hour the image of the woman she hated had risen to blast her
sight, and to come between her and the love she sought. It was horrible,
it was maddening.
She sought her solitary apartment and flung herself face downward on the
bed, afraid to lift her heavy eyes lest they should be blasted by the
sight of the restless spirit which her guilty hand had driven forth a
wanderer from the fair citadel it once inhabited.
"Do the dead walk?" she said to herself, in fearful agitation, "do they
revisit the haunts of life and love? Do they ever return and denounce
their murderers? Oh! God, why do I ask myself these fruitless questions?
Do I not know? Have I not looked upon the face of the dead this night?
Ah! what if she had pointed a ghostly finger at me, and said before them
all, 'Thou art my murderess!'"
Shivering as if with the ague she buried her head in the bed-clothes.
A sudden rap at the door caused her to start violently.
"Enter," said she, almost inaudibly.
It was only one of the neat housemaids. She looked concerned at the
ghastly white face the widow lifted on her entrance.
"Are you ill, Mrs. Vance?" she inquired.
"No--yes--that is, my head aches badly," was the confused answer.
The maid had heard the story of the ghostly visitor from Willis, and
rightly attributed the agitation of the lady to that cause.
She did not allude to it, however, as Mrs. Vance did not. She simply
said:
"I found this trinket in the hall as I was passing through it, Mrs.
Vance. I have shown it to Miss Lawrence, but she does not know anything
about it, so I came to ask if it belonged to you?"
She held the piece of gold in her hand. Mrs. Vance arose and examined it
by the light.
It was the broken half of a golden locket such as gentlemen wear on
their watch-chains. It was of costly workmanship, richly chased, with a
delicate monogram set in minute diamonds. The intertwined letters were
"H. C."
"It does not belong to me, Mary," answered Mrs. Vance. "It has probably
broken off from some gentleman's watch-chain, and dropped as he was
passing through the hall. But I do not know to whom it can belong. We
have had no visitors to-day, and indeed I cannot recollect any
acquaintance we have with the initials, 'H. C.' What do you intend to do
with it?"
"I shall ask Mr. Lawrence to take charge of it as soon as he returns,"
replied Mary. "It may be that he can find the owner. It is quite
valuable, is it not, ma'am?"
"Yes, it has some value, Mary--the monogram is set with real diamonds,
though they are very small. It evidently belongs to a person of some
means," said Mrs. Vance, returning the trinket to Mary's hand.
The trim little maid said a polite good-night and tripped away with the
jewel carefully wrapped in a handkerchief. Mrs. Vance, with her thoughts
turned into a new channel, sat musing thoughtfully over the little
incident. The longer she thought it over the more mysterious it
appeared.
"To whom can it belong?" said she to herself. "No gentlemen at all have
called here to-day. Can it have any connection with our mysterious
visitation to-night?"
CHAPTER XIV.
Mr. Lawrence detailed to the special detective, Mr. Shelton, the
particulars of his daughter's appearance that evening. He was listened
to with the closest attention.
When he had concluded his story, the detective said, respectfully:
"I am a very practical man, Mr. Lawrence, and my profession only makes
me more so. When I am brought in contact with a mystery I invariably
suspect crime. And I must tell you that I do not believe in the
visionary nature of the girl you saw in your hall this evening. I am not
a believer in the supernatural."
"What then, is your opinion of the phenomenon?" inquired Mr. Lawrence.
"That it was no phenomenon at all," answered Mr. Shelton, smiling. "It
was palpably an attempt at robbery. Some girl with a resemblance to your
lost daughter was employed to frighten off the man at the door, while
her accomplices entered the hall, turned off the light and perpetrated a
burglary."
"But there was nothing stolen," objected Mr. Lawrence. "The house was
searched immediately, for I had an idea rather similar to yours at
first. But nothing had been taken nor was there any person concealed in
the house."
The detective smiled blandly in the comfortable knowledge of his own
superior wisdom.
"The thieves were only frightened off that time," said he; "they will
come again, feeling secure in the belief that the girl played the ghost
to perfection. The next time do not be frightened but make an instant
effort to capture her, and she can soon be forced to reveal her
accomplices."
"You have learned nothing yet about the grave-robbers?" asked Mr.
Lawrence, dismissing the first subject, thinking it quite possible that
Mr. Shelton's exposition of the case was a very correct one.
"I have found the first link in the chain," said the detective
brightening up.
"You have?" said the banker, gladly.
"It is a very slight clew, though," said Mr. Shelton. "I would not have
you build your hopes on it, Mr. Lawrence, for it may not lead to
anything. The case is a very mysterious one, and so far has completely
baffled thorough investigation."
"But that you have discovered anything at all is an earnest of hope,"
said the banker. "Slight things lead to great discoveries sometimes.
Will you give us the benefit of your discovery?"
"It must be held in the strictest confidence," said Mr. Shelton, looking
from Mr. Lawrence to Mr. Darling, who had sat quite silent throughout the
interview. "Of course you know that if suffered to get abroad it would
put the guilty party on their guard."
Both gentlemen promised that they would preserve inviolable secrecy.
"Briefly, then, I have learned that the sexton was bribed to lend out
the key of your vault the night of the funeral, Mr. Lawrence."
"The villain!" said Mr. Lawrence, hotly.
"Softly," said the detective; "he is not so bad as you think. His error
lay in the possession of a soft heart unfortunately abetted by a soft
head."
"I fail to catch your meaning," said the banker.
"I mean," said the detective, "that poor old man had no thought or dream
of abetting a robbery. His consent was most reluctantly forced from him
by the sighs and protestations of a pretended lover, who only desired
that he might be permitted to look once more on the beloved face of the
dead. The sighing Romeo prevailed over the old man's scruples with his
frantic appeals and obtained the key, rewarding the sexton with all a
lover's generosity. It was returned to him in a short while, and so
implicit was his faith in the romantic lover that he never even looked
in the vault to see if all was secure. The shocking discovery made the
following day by Mr. Darling and yourself so appalled him with its
possibilities of harm to himself, that he feared to reveal the fact of
his unconscious complicity in the theft."
"Yet he revealed it to you," said Mr. Lawrence.
"The detectives are a shrewd lot for worming secrets out of people,"
said Shelton, with one of his non-committal smiles. "I used much
_finesse_ with the old man before I made my discovery. I suppose I may
feel safe in supposing that you will not molest him at the present
critical time? Much depends on secrecy."
"The case is in your hands--rest assured I shall not make any disastrous
move in it," returned Mr. Lawrence, reassuringly.
"One thing further," said Mr. Shelton. "I learned that the man who
enacted the hypocritical _role_ of the despairing lover was tall and
dark, but have not succeeded in identifying him yet. That is the meager
extent of my information at present."
"I hope and trust it may soon lead to an entire elucidation of the
mystery," said the banker, rising to leave.
"I will report all discoveries tending that way immediately, sir,"
answered the detective, bowing his visitors out of the office.
"How are you impressed with Mr. Shelton's powers as a detective, Lance?"
asked Mr. Lawrence as they walked on a few blocks before hailing a car.
"I believe he is an able man, but--I am not prepared to subscribe to his
theory of the event which happened to-night," was the somewhat
hesitating reply of the young man.
"You are not? What, then, is your opinion?" asked the banker, in some
surprise.
"Mr. Lawrence, I believe that it was really and truly our lost Lily whom
we beheld to-night," said Lancelot, earnestly.
"Really and truly our Lily! Come, Lance, you talk wildly. Has your
affliction turned your brain, poor boy? Recollect that Lily is dead."
"I know--I know. Who could realize that fact more forcibly than I do?
But, my dear friend, I did not mean that it was Lily in the flesh. What
I meant was that Lily's spirit, the better part of her which is
imperishable, really and truly appeared to us to-night," said the young
man, who was of a very impressive and imaginative cast of mind.
Mr. Lawrence regarded him curiously.
"But why should you persist in this belief, Lance, when the clever Mr.
Shelton has so clearly shown us the fallacy of the idea?"
"He has not shown us the fallacy of the idea at all," answered Lancelot
Darling earnestly, as before. "He has only given us his practical theory
regarding it."
"Have you any conjecture regarding her object in so appearing to us--if,
indeed, you take the right view of the matter, Lance?" asked the banker,
impressed by the serious manner of his young friend.
"I have not thought of it, Mr. Lawrence. I have no distinct or tangible
impression at all except this one, which is indelibly fixed on my mind.
I believe that the pure, white soul of Lily Lawrence looked out visibly
upon us to-night from the eyes of the girl whom we saw in the hall. I
cannot be mistaken. My soul leaped forth to meet hers as it could not
have done for any other woman, mortal or immortal," replied the loyal
lover earnestly.
"Well, here is my car," said the banker, hastening to signal it.
"Good-night, sir," said Lance, turning a corner and going down the
street toward his hotel to pass the weary night in restless tossing and
sleeplessness, while visions of his beautiful lost love haunted his
feverish brain until he was well-nigh driven to madness.
Mr. Lawrence went back to the detective next day with the costly broken
jewel that Mary, the housemaid, had found in the hall. He explained to
Mr. Shelton that no gentleman had called at the house the day previous
except Mr. Darling, who said he had never seen it before.
"This confirms my view of the case," said Mr. Shelton, triumphantly "Did
I not say that the girl had one or more accomplices? This was probably
dropped by the man in his hurried flight. Yet it would seem to have
belonged to a person of taste and wealth. Such a one would not be
engaged in burglary. The mystery only deepens."
"But may not this be a clew by which to discover the perpetrators of the
dastardly act?" inquired the banker.
"It ought to do so," said the detective, frankly.
He remained lost in thought a few moments then inquired:
"Have you any acquaintance who can claim these initials, Mr. Lawrence?"
"Let me think. My circle of acquaintance is large, but I cannot recall
anyone claiming H. C. as his monogram. My memory may not serve me
correctly, though."
"Perhaps your card-receiver may do better, Mr. Lawrence. Will you
examine that and let me know?"
"Certainly. Suppose you accompany me, and let us find out at once? I do
not feel disposed to let this vexing matter rest."
"With pleasure, as I have a leisure hour at my disposal."
They returned to the house together and entered at once upon their
quest.
It was not long before their labors were rewarded with success The
detective looked up with a small square of pasteboard in his hand, from
which he read aloud triumphantly.
"Harold Colville!"
"'H. C.' Harold Colville!" exclaimed the banker. "Why, really I had
forgotten Mr. Colville."
"He visits here then, of course," said the detective.
"He did--at one time--frequently. Latterly he has discontinued his
visits. Indeed, it has been four or five months since he called upon
us."
"Had he any reason for the cessation of his visits?"
"Yes," said the banker, promptly. "He was a suitor for the hand of my
daughter, Lily. She rejected him--being already engaged to Mr. Darling."
"I have seen Mr. Colville," said Shelton. "He is a man of wealth and
leisure--dissipated and fast, I have heard."
"You have been correctly informed," was the reply.
"Indeed?" said Mr. Shelton. He laid the card back as he spoke, and rose
to take leave.
"Does this discovery throw any light on the mystery?" said the other.
"I will be frank with you, Mr. Lawrence. It does not. The case seems
complicated at present, but it is my business to unravel the crooked
skein, and I hope to do so. You will suffer me to retain this bit of
jewelry for the present. I wish to see if Mr. Colville can furnish the
missing half."
"You suspect him, then--" said the banker, breaking off his sentence
because perplexed how to end it.
"I suspect him of nothing at present," was the reply. "This trinket may
have been stolen from him and lost by another, I have that to find out.
If it be proved that Mr. Colville lost this locket in your hall last
night, my theory of a projected theft will not hold water. A gentleman
of his wealth and position would not need to descend to that phase of
crime. Some other object must have actuated him."
He paused, drawing on his gloves.
"There is one thing more," he resumed. "Keep this mutual discovery we
have made a dead secret until I give you leave to reveal it. Do not even
mention it to your daughter or to Mr. Darling. He does not believe the
theory I advanced last night. I read it in his expressive features. He
thinks he really saw a spirit. Let him think so still; I am gathering
the tangled ends of a fearful mystery in my hands. But if human skill
can unravel it I will not fail to do so. Good-day, Mr. Lawrence."
He tripped airily away down the street with the air and manner of a
well-bred gentleman. Few who saw the well-dressed man swinging his natty
little cane so jauntily and wearing that supremely indifferent air would
have supposed him to be the most daring and accomplished detective in
the State of New York. So thought Mr. Lawrence as he watched him walk
away.
CHAPTER XV.
The rage of old Haidee Leveret at finding herself duped and outwitted by
such a weak girl as Lily Lawrence was frightful to witness and
impossible to describe. She raved, she stormed, she tore her scanty gray
locks and blasphemed in the most frightful and blood-curdling terms.
In vain she tried the door-handle, in vain she shook the iron bars in
the window. They resisted her most vigorous efforts.
In her terrible rage she fell to breaking and tearing everything in her
room that could be destroyed. She threw down the dishes containing
Lily's untasted dinner and shivered them into fragments. She tore off
the bed-covers and rent them in pieces in the hight of her insane fury.
If Lily had fallen into her cruel hands just then she would have killed
her remorselessly.
At length, having sated her rage momentarily by wreaking it on those
poor inanimate things, she began to quiet down somewhat and to consider
the situation.
The enemy had worsted her, that was self-evident. Stratagem had
succeeded against brute force and power.
Lily Lawrence had freed herself from captivity, and there was no one to
pursue her and bring her back. Old Peter was not likely to return for
several hours. If Lily's strength held out she would be safe in her home
ere the old man could get back to town and carry the tidings to Doctor
Pratt and Harold Colville.
Harold Colville had promised the old couple a most extravagant reward
for the safe-keeping of his beautiful prisoner.
Not only did the loss of this trouble the old crone's mind, but also the
fact that Lily would betray them all into the hands of the police and
that exposure and punishment would follow on the discovery of the
nefarious works which she and her husband had wrought for years. A
species of abject terror filled her quaking frame at the thought. She
thought of the miserly accumulations of her wicked life secreted beneath
the roof of the old house, and dreaded lest her greedy eyes should never
again be permitted to gloat over that golden hoard.
In the hight of these woful cogitations her thoughts suddenly recurred
to the prisoner in the gloomy dungeon beneath her.
Poor Fanny Colville, whose hearing had been strained all day to detect
the faintest sound from above, had been a frightened listener to old
Haidee's fearful explosion of wrath.
She knew by the violence of the witch's rage that Lily had succeeded in
her stratagem and effected her escape. The knowledge filled her with
joy, even while she feared that rage would instigate Haidee to yet
further cruelties against herself. The desire for life was yet strong in
the breast of the poor starving creature, and she shrank in terror while
she thought it was probable that old Haidee would kill her in her
frantic desire to wreak vengeance upon something. Even while she
shivered over her fear she heard the heavy footsteps lumbering down the
stairs toward the dungeon.
"What! are you not dead yet, you she-devil?" was the fierce salutation
that greeted her ears.
Her enemy advanced, and seizing hold of her crouching body as it lay
upon the bed, shook it with the fury of a wild-cat until it seemed as if
the poor bones must rattle. "What do you mean by living in this way?
Must I kill you at last with my own hands?"
"Spare me," moaned the poor victim between her chattering teeth, "spare
me yet a little longer, I am so young, and life is so sweet!"
"Sweet, you fool!" cried the old hag, desisting from sheer weariness,
and letting go of the poor skeleton to glare fiercely at her. "What!
Life is sweet, chained in a dungeon, in rags, on a crust of bread and a
sup of water?"
"Yes, oh, yes!" faltered the poor creature, hoping to gain a little time
so that deliverance from her bonds might come.
"Live then, you worm!" cried the old witch, throwing life at her poor
victim with a curse. "Live as long as you can since you find it such a
luxury!"
The shivering heap of rags and bones did not answer. Stamping about the
floor, glaring at the frightened Fanny, her mood changed. She said
retrospectively:
"After all you are not such a devil as she! You have not the spirit in
your poor, crushed, beaten body! You have never even tried to escape
from me and bring me to punishment! Why should I tread on you when you
will not even turn like the worm? No, live, live! Never fear but you
shall have your crust of bread and sup of water while Haidee remains
here to bring it to you."
So saying she went out again, and Fanny wept tears of joy at her
departure. But a little while now, she thought gladly, and Lily would be
at home. Then to-morrow at the farthest her own deliverance would
arrive. She thought of the loved ones she had never expected to see
again, of the dear old mother and father in their old home in the
country, and the affectionate girl's tears flowed like rain for very joy
at the blissful hope of reunion.
Alas! poor Fanny!
It seemed many hours to Haidee before her husband and Doctor Pratt
returned. It was very near sunset, for Doctor Pratt had been absent
visiting a patient, and Peter had been forced to await his return.
When at last they came and knocked at the door she had to inform them,
with a curse for every word, of Lily's escape. Then they were compelled
to force the door open, for the brave girl had taken the key with her
and thrown it away in the road.
As soon as Doctor Pratt heard her story he sprang into the buggy and
drove into the city with furious haste in search of Colville. It was
late before he found him, so that Lily was almost home before he learned
the story.
"I suppose it is all up with us now," said Colville, after swearing an
oath or two. "And we had better be getting away from town before we are
arrested. I suppose she is at home by now."
"There is only one chance in ten that she is not," was the reply. "Her
excessive weakness may have caused her to fall by the way. It seems
impossible that one so debilitated by sickness should take so long a
walk without resting."
"You think there is a chance of her recapture, then?" inquired Colville
eagerly.
"There may be," was the cautious reply. "You see, if she is yet on the
road we can watch for her near her home; and as it is getting dark it
would be very easy to seize her and put her into a waiting carriage.
After that there would be no difficulty. Chloroform would stifle her
screams while we drove back to Leveret's with her."
"But the carriage driver, doctor. Might he not betray us?"
"I will drive my own carriage," answered Pratt. "We will stop near the
corner of Mr. Lawrence's house. You will then get out and watch for her.
If she should appear you will hastily throw a cloak over her head and
carry her to the carriage."
"Well planned, doctor! Let us be going at once. Every moment is precious
in this extremity."
"We must first purchase a bottle of chloroform, a sponge, and a long,
water-proof cloak in which to envelope her form," said the doctor,
recollecting precautions which Colville in his impetuosity was about
forgetting.
These purchases were hastily made, and the two worthies stepped into the
doctor's light carriage and drove rapidly away on their mission of evil.
They were not a minute too soon. As the carriage stopped at the corner a
slight form hurried past, plainly visible in the light of the
street-lamp.
"It is she!" said Pratt in a hasty whisper. He recognized her graceful
form in spite of the disguising veil and sack.
Colville was stung to madness by the sight.
"I will have her," he declared with a terrible oath, "if I have to tear
her from the arms of her lover!"
He sprang out and followed her. She had gone up the steps and rung the
bell. Just as he came opposite the steps he saw old Willis open the
door, and witnessed his headlong flight from the supposed spirit of his
young mistress. As she glided into the house he ran lightly up the steps
and followed her. She heard the footsteps of her pursuer and faintly
moaned:
"Papa! papa!"
But in that moment, ere assistance could reach her, the gaslights were
turned out by a steady hand; she was plucked backward by the skirt of
her dress, and fell into Colville's arms, so muffled by the heavy cloak
he threw over her that she could not breathe. Hardly clogged by the
light burden in his arms he ran through the hall and down the steps
before Lancelot Darling reached the door. It was but the work of a
moment to reach the carriage and give his captive into the doctor's
ready arms. He then sprang in himself and drove rapidly away with their
beautiful captive.
CHAPTER XVI.
Lily awakened from the temporary stupor induced by chloroform and found
herself a prisoner again in the old familiar room. She was lying on the
bed, and Doctor Pratt, grim, and satanic-looking as usual, sat by the
side.
Harold Colville was also an occupant of the room, and Haidee Leveret,
from the foot of the bed, gave her a fiendish scowl in answer to the
glance she cast upon her.
"How do you feel after your journey this evening?" inquired the
physician, with a sarcastic smile.
A glance of scorn from Lily's eyes fell upon him. She did not vouchsafe
him any reply.
"I think you must begin to realize by this time that it is quite
impossible for you to escape from us," continued Doctor Pratt. "You have
now made two attempts which have resulted in nothing except to make us
more vigilant than before in keeping you safely secured. Hereafter you
will be doubly guarded by Haidee and Peter. He will accompany her and
stand outside the room door whenever she has any business within. You
are aware that the window is too heavily and strongly barred for you to
tamper with it. You now see that there is no possible chance for you to
make a third attempt to elude us."
There was no reply. Lily still regarded him with a flashing gaze full of
scorn and contempt; but the villain went on, in no-wise disconcerted by
her anger:
"It seems to me, Miss Lawrence, that your best and wisest course would
be to thankfully accept Mr. Colville's proposals of marriage. Surely
that cannot be such a terrible thing to do. There are many ladies who
would be proud of the honor which he seeks to force upon you. Your
former home is forever lost to you; you are as one dead to your family.
They have seen you laid away in the tomb. If you went to them now they
would not believe that you belonged to them; they would scout your story
as impossible and yourself as an impostor. There remains, therefore, but
one possible chance of restoration to your friends and to liberty, and
that is to appear before them in the character of Mrs. Harold Colville."
"Mr. Colville has already had an answer to his proposals," answered
Lily, firmly. "I will die before I accept liberty on these terms!"
"Do not allow any scruples in regard to Mr. Darling to influence your
decision," interrupted Colville, speaking for the first time, "for I can
assure you, on the honor of a gentleman, Miss Lawrence, that he has
transferred his fickle affections to the wily widow who tried to murder
you in order that she might steal into his heart and win his hand and
fortune."
"It is false; Lancelot has not forgotten me so soon," cried Lily,
warmly.
But though she defended her lover's loyalty so bravely, there flashed
over her mind a remembrance of the scene she had momentarily witnessed
last night--Mrs. Vance at the grand piano, playing and singing softly,
her lover--her handsome, kingly Lancelot--bending over her as he turned
the pages of her music.
She had thought nothing of it then; but in the light of Harold
Colville's bold assertion it seemed to her terribly significant.
"I do not wonder that my assertion taxes your credulity," returned
Colville, with a maddening smile. "It seemed almost beyond belief when
it first came to my knowledge. Not yet three months from your supposed
death, I can scarcely understand how the man who lacked but a few hours
of being your husband could console himself with the smiles of another
so soon. But he is young and impressible, and I grant you she is rarely
beautiful, and gifted with consummate art."
"I can add my testimony to Mr. Colville's assertion," said Doctor Pratt.
"Your lover has, indeed, been beguiled into forgetfulness of his grief
by the fascination of the charming widow. They are now acknowledged
lovers!"
"I do not believe it," answered Lily, proudly. "Do you think I would
take your word, Harold Colville, or yours, Doctor Pratt, for the truth?
You have proved yourselves villains, and I do not place the least
confidence in your assertions. You tell me these things believing I will
the more readily yield to your wishes. But you are mistaken--sadly
mistaken! I tell you now that if Lancelot Darling should marry Mrs.
Vance to-morrow it would not make any difference in my rejection of a
villain's suit!"
Both the worthies glared at her with fierce wrath.
"So be it," said Colville, angrily. "But remember, you will remain a
prisoner until you accede to my wishes, no matter how long you hold out.
Haidee, you need not provide so sumptuously for so contumacious a
captive. Let bread and water be her portion until her rebellious spirit
is broken. I will see her again in a month's time. Come, doctor; come,
Haidee; let us leave her to the pleasures of solitary contemplation."
All three retired; the door, which had been provided with another key,
was securely locked, and she was left again in her loneliness and bitter
sorrow.
Weak and weary with her long journey and unbroken fast she lay still,
her limbs aching with fatigue and her heart almost broken with sorrow.
Her momentary glimpse of her dear ones had filled her heart with a wild
flood of new tenderness for them. She had come back to them from the
dead, and she felt that they would have been filled with the deepest joy
in receiving her again.
She had been so cruelly torn from them in the very moment when they
first caught sight of her! She wondered what they would think.
"Perhaps they will share old Willis' delusion that it was a spirit,"
thought she, with a flood of tears.
She had almost forgotten Fanny in the bitter anguish of being retaken
thus in the very moment of impending re-union with her family.
But presently she heard the clank of the poor captive's chain, as she
turned restlessly on her hard bed, and caught the sound of her groans.
"Poor Fanny," she thought, "how will she bear this sad disappointment
when she hoped so much from my escape!"
Weak and trembling she rose from the bed, and taking the lamp in her
hand staggeringly descended the stairs in quest of her poor companion in
captivity and sorrow.
Fanny lay extended on the cot, moaning piteously. She cried out in
surprise and terror, fearing that Haidee had returned to threaten and
abuse her. But she soon saw that it was the sweet face of the captive
girl that beamed upon her.
"My God, Miss Lawrence, is it you?" she said. "I thought, I hoped that
you had escaped!"
Lily threw herself down upon the hard stone floor and wept piteously.
The trial was hard upon herself, as affecting her own individual
welfare.
Now the burden of this poor creature's sorrow added to the weight of her
own made it almost insupportable. It was some time before she could
summon sufficient calmness to relate her mournful story to the suffering
creature.
"It is all over," she said in conclusion. "There is no hope of escape
from our prison, and death is before us."
Fanny lay still, moaning now and then in pain. She made no attempt to
rise, and at last Lily noticed the fact.
"What is the matter with you, my poor soul?" said she. "Are you worse?
Are you unable to rise?"
"I cannot raise my head," answered the poor girl patiently, "my poor
bones have been shaken and beaten terribly by old Haidee. I am very
stiff and sore."
As well as she could she related the story of old Haidee's rage at her
captive's escape, her descent into the dungeon and her wild onslaught on
her starving captive. Lily wept at the recital of Fanny's sufferings.
"She was wreaking her rage at my escape, upon you, poor Fanny," said
she. "Oh! God, why dost thou allow the wicked thus to triumph over the
weak and the innocent?"
"Are you much hurt? Do you think you can survive it?" she asked
presently in anxious tones.
"I don't know. I am very sore at present. There seems very little life
left in me. Perhaps it would be better if I should die," said the poor
creature despondently. The little spark of hope awakened in her breast
by Lily's escape was dead now, and despair had claimed her for its own.
Lily knelt by the cot and felt her hands. They were cold and clammy, and
chilly dews stood upon the wasted brow. Lily started. Could this be
death that was stealing over the poor captive? She feared it was, but
she was afraid to linger longer lest old Haidee should find her out. She
rose reluctantly.
"I wish I could stay with you, Fanny," said she. "It seems hard to leave
you suffering thus alone. But if old Haidee should find me, she might
kill you for fear I should betray her. So it seems that I must go.
Good-night."
Lily took the poor, wasted hand and pressing it gently, went away,
fearing that the few sands of life remaining to Harold Colville's
injured wife were fast running out.
CHAPTER XVII.
About a month subsequent to the events which have been related in the
last chapter, Mrs. Vance and Ada Lawrence sat alone in the drawing-room
of their splendid home. Ada had been reading, but the volume seemed to
have little interest, for it had fallen from her hands to the floor, and
she was reclining on a luxurious divan, looking bored and sad, while now
and then a low sigh rippled across her coral lips.
She was very lovely, being a pure blonde with red and white complexion
and hair of golden tint. Her face looked flower-like in its delicacy,
gleaming out from the somber folds of her mourning dress.
Mrs. Vance, sitting opposite, absorbed in a voluminous billow of crimson
crochet work, looked over at her, and started as if she had only just
begun to realize the girl's exceeding fairness.
"How pretty she is," she thought apprehensively, "and how startling her
likeness to her dead sister! Good Heavens! what if Lance should see the
resemblance as plainly as I do, and fall in love with her for Lily's
sake."
The thought which now presented itself for the first time was startling
in its probability. She began to think that it was time for Ada to be
going back to school. It was dangerous to keep that fair flower-face in
Lancelot Darling's vicinity.
"Ada," said she, abruptly, "how old are you?"
"Sixteen," answered the girl sleepily, without lifting her drooping,
golden-brown lashes.
"Almost old enough to come out in society," said the lady. "You will
have to hurry and finish your education--you mean to graduate, of
course. When are you going back to school?"
"I do not expect to go back at all," was the startling reply.
"Not go back," said Mrs. Vance, affecting extreme astonishment.
"Papa is so lonely now that Lily is gone," said Ada, choking back a sob,
"that I have not the heart to leave him. I will stay with him and
comfort him."
"But, my dear--you so young, so unformed in your manners--surely you
will not sacrifice yourself thus! Let me advise you to go back to
college another year at least," urged Mrs. Vance.
A little annoyed at her persistence, Ada sat up and looked across at
her.
"Mrs. Vance," said she, coldly, "do you happen to know that if I took
your advice and returned to my boarding-school this house could no
longer be a home for you?"
"Why not?" asked the lady, a little fluttered.
"Do you not see?" said Ada, pointedly. "You are not related to papa at
all. You are a young and handsome woman. If you and he were living here
alone together, with no one but the servants, people would couple your
names unpleasantly. So you comprehend that it is better for me to stay
and play propriety."
"Ada, I do not believe you care whether I have a shelter over my head or
not," said the widow, stung into anger by the pointed speech of the
girl.
"I should be sorry to see any one houseless," answered Ada, calmly; "but
to own the truth, Mrs. Vance, I must say that I am sorry that the same
roof has to shelter us both. I do not like you, and I am honest enough
to tell you so!"
"Because I am poor and you are rich," said Mrs. Vance, affecting to
weep.
"It is not that," said the young girl. "It is not that you are no
relation to papa, except by marriage, and that you forced yourself here
and claimed a support when you might have earned one for yourself, as
many another widow has done. No, it is not for these things, Mrs. Vance,
for I might still like you in spite of them, though I might pity your
lack of true independence. But I dislike you because I believe you are a
false, deceitful, unprincipled woman, scheming for some secret end of
your own."
"What have I ever done to you, Ada, that you should denounce me thus?"
sobbed the widow.
"Nothing--you would not dare to, for my papa would turn you out of the
house if you did," replied the girl, spiritedly. "But do you think, Mrs.
Vance, I cannot see your present drift? Do you think I do not see how
shamelessly you are courting Lance Darling, and trying to win him from
poor Lily who has been dead these four months scarcely?"
"Perhaps you want him for yourself," Mrs. Vance was beginning to say
sarcastically, when they were interrupted by a slight rap on the door.
"Enter," called out Ada.
It was a servant with a message for the widow.
"There's an old woman out in the hall, Mrs. Vance, who says she has
brought the samples of lace you desired."
Ada, who was watching her curiously, wondered why the angry woman grew
so ghastly white under her rouge at the reception of so commonplace a
visitor.
"Say that I am coming," said the widow to the domestic.
In a moment she arose with a muttered apology and followed him into the
hall. Old Haidee stood there patiently waiting with her basket of laces
on her arm.
"Bring the laces up to my apartment," said the lady, with as indifferent
an air as she could assume.
When they were once safe within the locked room, Mrs. Vance turned
furiously on the old lace-vender.
"Did I not tell you not to come here again?" she said. "I have nothing
else to give you."
"Oh, Mrs. Vance, don't say that," whined the old crone, piteously; "I
did not mean to come back, I did not indeed, but I am so poor and the
gold you gave me is all gone."
"Liar! there was enough to last you a year," said Mrs. Vance, angrily.
"Oh, no, ma'am--not with my old man down with the rheumatism, and all my
starving children around me. The money all went for medicine, food and
clothes. It melted away like the new-fallen snow," whined Haidee. "So I
said to myself, I will go back, I will tell the kind lady how poor I am
and she will give me more money."
"I told you I had no more to give," almost shrieked Mrs. Vance in her
desperation. "The money I gave you was presented to me by Mr. Lawrence,
and he expected it would last me a long while. I am a poor woman, living
here on the rich man's bounty, and I have nothing more for
you--absolutely nothing!"
"Oh! but the pretty lady is mistaken," said Haidee, doggedly. "She has
money, or if not she has jewels."
"Would you rob me of my few jewels, you base old wretch?"
"Necessity knows no law," retorted the old creature, grinning hideously.
"I must have help for my sick husband and starving children. If you will
not help me I must go to Mr. Lawrence or to Mr. Darling."
These sly words had their intended effect of frightening Mrs. Vance into
compliance.
She went to her jewel box and began hurriedly to toss over its
glittering contents.
"Here," she said, turning round with a handsome brooch in her hand,
"will this satisfy your cupidity?"
But old Haidee's eyes roved greedily over the sparkling gems in the
casket. She shook her head.
"I could not sell it for a quarter of its value," said she. "It would
not relieve my necessities. Add some other trifle to it, lady--that
bracelet for instance."
The bracelet was a very handsome one in the form of a serpent with
glistening emerald eyes. With a groan Mrs. Vance put it into the greedy,
working fingers.
"You will strip me of every valuable I possess," she said, "and then
when I have nothing else to give you will betray me to my enemies, for
the sake of gaining a reward from them."
"Lady, you do me cruel injustice," was the hypocrite's meek reply. "I
will never betray you while you so generously divide your all with me."
"But if you keep coming with such demands as this I shall soon have
nothing to divide with you," said Mrs. Vance.
"Aye, but the rich man will soon supply you with more gold," said the
harpy, cunningly, as she turned to take leave.
"It will be a good while before I get any more money from Mr. Lawrence,
so you need not be in a hurry to return for it," said the widow, letting
her unwelcome visitor out of the door, and shaking her fist after her
departing form.
As soon as her heavy footsteps ceased lumbering on the stairs, she
hurriedly changed her house-dress for a walking costume of plain
material and simple make. She then put on a s
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