Kitabı oku: «Dainty's Cruel Rivals; Or, The Fatal Birthday», sayfa 6

CHAPTER XVI.
THE GHOST ALARM

Mrs. Ellsworth turned from her task of chafing Dainty's cold hands, and glared scornfully at the black mammy, exclaiming:

"How can you listen to such silly lies, Love? The old woman is in her dotage!"

Love gave her a cold glance of rebuke and made no reply, motioning the old woman to continue.

With her big eyes rolling in her ashy-pale face, and her toil-worn black hands nervously clasping and unclasping each other, the old woman went on:

"I'se sorry, Massa Love, but I cudn't git up as quick as I ought to go ober to dat poor chile's aid, kase I was kinder struck dumb wif terror an' 'sprise; an' whiles I was settin' an' watchin' her, all to onct I seen a figger come glidin' from back o' me somewhar to de bedside, an' I seen 'twas dressed in a long black gownd, wif string o' beads down de side, an' a li'l black skull-cap on his haid, an' his face white like a corpse, an' glarin' eyes dat struck terror to my soul!"

"Nonsense!" Mrs. Ellsworth cried, testily; but mammy paid no heed; she only looked at Love, and went on with her story.

"When I seen dat figger all in black, I t'ought sure 'tis de debbil hese'f, an' I got to sabe Miss Dainty from his clutches. I seen him lean down, I seen him look in her pale face, an' I hear her low, stranglin' moan o' fear, an' I pray, 'Lord he'p us!' den I rise to my feet an' start to'ard de baid, dough shakin' lak a leaf; but jest den de brack vilyun swoop down lak a hawk on a li'l chick, an' grab her up in his arms an' run to de do', me a-follerin' an' screamin' at de top o' my voice. Out de do' we dash, de good Lord givin' strength to my laigs, so dat in de hall I catch holt o' dat black gownd, an' hang on a-screechin' an' henderin' de debbil, so dat he hab to let go and drap de honey-chile on de flo'. But de owdacious vilyun clapped me a lick onter my haid, an' I seen so many stars as I fell ober Miss Dainty, dat he got away safe enough befo' yo' all come rushin' out from yo' rooms—umme!" concluded mammy, groaning, for her old gray head ached with the force of the blow she had received in her plucky defense of her beautiful young charge.

At that moment the old physician, Doctor Platt, was ushered into the room, and Love turned to greet him, saying anxiously:

"Some one has played ghost and frightened Miss Chase into such a long spell of unconsciousness that I fear for her life."

The old doctor looked very grave when he saw his patient lying like one dead among the pillows, in spite of all that the women were doing to revive her, and he muttered in his irascible way:

"The person that was mean enough to frighten this sensitive young girl into such a state deserves lynching."

And having delivered this frank opinion, he turned all his attention to Dainty, and by his skill succeeded after some time in restoring her to consciousness again, though it was indeed a pale, woeful face that looked up at the anxious group around the bed.

"You are better, dear!" cried Love, gladly; and he took her little hand and kissed it before them all in his great joy, heedless of his step-mother's angry frown.

"Yes, she is better; but I shall stay and watch by her a little while," said Doctor Platt; and he did not go till the pale dawn glimmered through the windows.

By that time Dainty was vastly improved, and able to corroborate mammy's strange story of the abduction by the mysterious visitor that had appeared to her imagination no less a person than his satanic majesty.

Doctor Platt was most indignant; but he laughed at the idea of a supernatural visitant, and concurred in Love's belief of some malicious person in the house playing ghost.

When he started home, leaving Dainty in a deep sleep from the effect of a sedative he had administered for her nerves, he talked quite seriously to Love as they stood on the steps in the struggling light of early morn.

"It would seem as if Miss Chase has a malignant enemy who is trying to frighten her into death or insanity," he said. "Another such experience as this of to-night would probably effect her enemy's purpose. She is of a very nervous physique, and this shock told most terribly upon her. I warn you that the perpetrator should be discovered at once, and severe punishment meted out for the offense. If this proves impossible, why not send the young girl home to remain until her wedding-day?"

"I am loath to do so, because the weather in Richmond is so hot at this season," Love replied; adding: "I shall take such measures, however, that it will be impossible for this thing to occur again!"

The stern tone of his voice and the flash of his eyes assured Doctor Platt that he would keep his word, and he went away much comforted, for all his sympathies had been keenly enlisted by Dainty's misfortunes.

The young girl herself slept on heavily till noon, when she awoke, refreshed by her long rest, and was able to meet the family at luncheon, though her pallid cheeks and wistful eyes were enough to strike remorse to the hearts of her bitter enemies, if they had not been hard and cold as stone.

But her lover's looks and smiles were warm enough to atone for the indifference of the rest, and the soft color flew to her cheeks again as he took her hand tenderly, saying:

"Get ready, darling, and I shall take you for a long drive into the country this evening."

Ah! how Olive and Ela envied her the bliss of the long tête-à-tête drive as they watched the lovers going away in the elegant phaeton behind the spirited gray ponies, the sunshine resting so lovingly on Dainty's curly locks beneath the simple white hat. When they returned, in the last rosy glow of sunset, Dainty seemed to have received a new baptism of beauty, she was so changed from the pale, nervous girl of a few hours ago. Now her cheeks and lips glowed rosy-red, and her eyes were bright with happiness—the happiness of loving and being loved. It made her cousins so angry they could have killed her in their jealous spite, for it lacked but two weeks to the wedding now, and it seemed as if nothing that spite or malice could invent had any power to break off the consummation of the engagement.

They were so furious they would willingly have poisoned her, but for fear of being found out.

No words could tell how they hated that fair face and golden hair, that rosy mouth, those blue eyes and dimples that had rivaled them in the prize they longed to win.

The sight of the happy lovers was gall and wormwood to their envious hearts.

They were indignant, too, because they could see, beneath the surface of Love's coldly courteous manner, that he vaguely suspected them of having a hand in the mysterious plot to frighten his timid betrothed.

To-day he had carried matters with a high hand, interrogating all the servants carefully, and offering a reward of a hundred dollars to any one who should discover the identity of the person playing ghost.

Their greed thus excited, every hireling was anxious to earn the reward, and it would certainly be dangerous for any one to attempt again the cruel role of ghost, for detection seemed almost certain.

The young man had also made some investigations that resulted in showing him how very easy it had been for the malicious enemy of Dainty to intrude on her whenever it seemed desirable to do so.

The room adjoining hers was an unused bedroom that communicated with hers by a narrow curtained door back of her bed. How easy it had been for the intruder to enter the vacant room, imitate the monk's cough there to the heart's content, then glide through the curtained door to the bedside, alarming the sleeping girl by a cold touch or hacking cough, and escaping before she could give any alarm!

Love even found that a small hole had been bored in the wall between the two rooms, thus affording an opportunity for the use of chemicals in displaying the grisly green light whose weird play upon the walls and about the room had so alarmed the victims of the cruel joke.

"How careless I have been! I should have discovered all this long ago if I had believed it was aught but a girl's nervous fancies; but mammy's corroboration assures me it was reality. Now I shall take such steps that she will never be annoyed again," he said, sternly; and suited the action to the word by giving up the room next his own, an airy dressing-room, to Dainty's use, making it perfectly safe by having in a carpenter to attach a wire to the young girl's bed, that, running along the ceiling, passed through into his own room, with a large bell at the end.

The whole household was made aware of this unique ghost alarm, and Love said, sternly:

"At the least disturbance in Miss Chase's room, she has but to touch the wire by her bed, and the communicating bell will ring close to me, so that I can fly to her rescue. I do not need to say that the practical joker will fare badly at my hands."

Poor, nervous, shaken black mammy had been sent home to rest.

Dainty would not need any one, now that she had her ghost alarm, the young man said, smilingly; and every one understood his determination to protect his love at every hazard. The guilty party must have felt rather disconcerted at the turn affairs had taken.

Black mammy had not told any one yet that she had a clew by which she hoped to win the reward Love had offered for the detection of the impostor; but after she had grappled with the wretch who was bearing off Dainty, she had found in the claw-like grasp of her fingers some bits of torn torchon lace that might have been clutched forcibly from the sleeve of a night-dress.

She kept the fragments carefully, determining to find the garment they matched.

CHAPTER XVII.
THE NIGHT BEFORE THE WEDDING

Apparently the Ellsworth ghost became disgusted with the prosaic means adapted to secure its identification.

From that horror-haunted night it ceased to invade Dainty's chamber with its grewsome cough and ghoulish presence.

It was true that in some of her occasional solitary moments, in some quiet twilight hour, she had been startled by the sound of that hateful cough, coming from apparently nowhere; but she fled at once in terror from the spot, and forebore to mention it to her lover, who was radiantly happy, deeming that the malicious ghost was exorcised forever.

The beautiful summer days flew past on wings of joy, bringing the fateful first of August that was to witness Dainty's bridal, as well as the twenty-sixth birthday of the handsome master of Ellsworth.

Everything was in readiness for the wedding when the last day of July brought Mrs. Chase to her daughter's arms again, and Dainty's happiness seemed complete.

Everything seemed to be going on so propitiously that Dainty cast her dismal forebodings to the winds.

Surely nothing could part her from her lover now! The malice of her enemies had fallen harmless to the ground.

Mrs. Ellsworth and her two favorite nieces were playing propriety with perfect ease. Indeed, the former had persuaded Olive and Ela to act as bridemaids, and provided them with elegant gowns of sheer white organdie over rich white silk. Mrs. Chase had brought with her Dainty's pretty, simple traveling gown and hat, and she had yielded to her lover's wish that the marriage vows should be spoken in the same beautiful white robes that had graced his mother at her wedding, twenty-eight years before.

They had been folded away in linen and lavender many years—the lace veil and satin gown—and the owner would never need them more, for she was wearing the robe of righteousness in the great procession of angels before the Great White Throne. While Love was yet in his babyhood she had passed gently away to heaven like a lily fading on its slender stem.

Love cherished her memory as something holy, and his heart ached with silent grief when, five years later, his father gave him a step-mother, a handsome, stately woman, who had been uniformly kind to him until now, when her imperious nature overstepped the mark in her anxiety to have him marry Olive or Ela.

But thwarted in her will, the lady was bearing her disappointment with what appeared to be graceful resignation, and she spared no efforts in preparing for the grand wedding, that it might do honor to the proud master of Ellsworth. A magnificent banquet was ready, and the floral decorations of the mansion were superb. It was to be a morning wedding, followed by a summer fete on a magnificent scale, and that evening the bride and groom would leave for a Northern tour, and thence to Europe.

Sweet, shy Dainty, so like a lovely, modest violet, gazed in wonder at all the preparations for the magnificent wedding, scarcely able to realize that it was to do honor to her, the simple girl with whom her rich and noble lover had seen fit to choose to share his heart, and name, and wealth. She said to herself that she was surely the happiest, most fortunate girl in the whole world, and that her love story read like some romantic fairy tale, with Lovelace Ellsworth as the grand Prince Charming.

Oh, how proud and happy Mamma Chase was, too, in her daughter's good fortune! The years seemed to fall from her like a cast-off garment, and on her gentle face, Mrs. Ellsworth, who had wondered so where Dainty got her radiant beauty, read the traces of what had once been rare loveliness before time and sorrow had faded her flower-like bloom. Mrs. Ellsworth could not help being courteous to the gentle lady who was her half-brother's lonely widow, so that last day passed away busily and happily, crowded with excitement, and that night the guest-chambers of Ellsworth were full to overflowing with visitors who had been bidden from a distance to their kinsman's wedding.

Until far into the moonlit summer night the halls and parlors of Ellsworth echoed with music and laughter, for the gay young people crowded together could scarcely be persuaded to retire even for "a beauty sleep" to enhance their charms to-morrow.

But at length all went to their rooms, and the weary servants closed the great house, darkened the lights, and everything sank into silence, broken only now and then by the call of a night bird in the shrubbery, or the whistle of a far-away locomotive. The full moon sailed high in the deep blue heaven, brooding over the sleeping world in its mystery, its beauty, its joy and sorrow.

Love and Dainty had gone along the corridors hand in hand like happy children, pausing to say good-night before their own doors.

"Mamma will share my room to-night—we have so much to say to each other this last night," Dainty said to her lover, with a fleeting blush like the sunset glow.

They were quite alone, with no envious eyes peering in the dim night light, and Love took his charming sweetheart in his arms and clasped and kissed her many times in passionate love.

"'This last night!' how solemn it sounds!" he echoed, then laughed. "Oh, my love, my love! what rapture to know that after to-night we never shall be parted again!"

"Never, never!" she cried, joyfully, and clasped her white arms around his neck, laying her soft cheek to his, whispering: "Oh, how glad I am that you love me, that you chose me for your very own, life of your life, heart of your heart! I thank God for His goodness to me, and I will try always to deserve my great happiness."

Sweet, shy Dainty had never spoken to her lover with such ardor and eloquence before, and his reply was such a shower of kisses that she could hardly tear herself away to enter her own room, where her mother waited, and said, laughingly:

"Darling, I thought you and Love were not going to say good-night till the morning dawned!"

CHAPTER XVIII
THE WEDDING MORN

Love retired into his room and sat down beside the window to brood over his great happiness.

Something like humility blended with his grateful thoughts.

Who was he, what had he done, that Heaven should be so good to him, giving him the fairest, truest, sweetest girl in the world for his adored and loving bride?

He lifted his dark, dreamy eyes to the moonlit heavens and prayed reverentially:

"God make me worthy of the prize I have won!"

From the next room he could hear the low murmur of voices, as Dainty conversed with her mother in happy tones; but by and by all grew silent, as the fair girl sank to sleep, nestling against her mother's heart for the last time, for to-morrow would give her to her husband's arms.

Love heard the clock in the tower chime the midnight hour, and retired to dream of the happiness that would be his to-morrow.

And never came fairer dreams of the future to any lover's heart, as surely no lover's heart had ever been so bound up in its beauteous idol.

 
"Love thee? So well, so tenderly
Thou'rt loved, adored by me,
Fame, fortune, wealth, and liberty
Were worthless without thee.
Though brimmed with blessings pure and rare
Life's cup before me lay,
Unless thy love were mingled there,
I'd spurn the draught away.
 
 
"Without thy smile the monarch's lot
To me were dark and lone,
While, with it, even the humblest cot
Were brighter than his throne.
Those words for which the conqueror sighs
For me would have no charms;
My only world thy gentle eyes,
My throne thy circling arms."
 

Wrapped in blissful dreams, he slumbered on till the night passed away. The morning dawned and the sun rode high in the heavens ere he started, broad awake, remembering that this was his wedding-day, and that he had overslept himself.

Indeed, at that moment, some one tapped on the door, and the voice of Harry Chilton, his cousin and best man, called out, gayly:

"Heavens, man! what can you mean by sleeping to within two hours of your wedding?"

"Is it possible?" cried Love, looking at his clock, and finding that the assertion was quite true.

He opened the door to his cousin, and they became immediately immersed in preparations for the ceremony which was to take place in the large parlor at nine o'clock, to be followed by the splendid wedding-breakfast.

The great house was in a hubbub of excitement with the final preparations and the dressing of the guests; but the bride's door had never opened yet, though no one thought strange of that, for she had gently declined all offers of assistance at her toilet, saying that mamma would do all that was necessary.

Never had there been a fairer morn for a birthday bridal. Not the slightest cloud marred the deep-blue sky; the sun shone in radiant splendor on the dewy flowers and the green earth, and the little birds seemed almost to know that there was to be a wedding, they warbled so persistently in the joy of their little hearts.

Time wore on till it lacked but fifteen minutes to the ceremony. The house was thronged with the wedding-guests, and the bishop of the diocese had arrived to perform the ceremony. The musicians were getting ready to play the wedding-march.

Love was all ready, looking faultlessly handsome in his wedding-suit, and he began to grow impatient because he had received no message from his darling that morning.

"How strange if she and her mother have overslept themselves! I will go and knock on the door," he said, suiting the action to the words.

He could not hear the least sound in the room, and he received no answer to his knock. He rapped impatiently again.

"Dainty! Mrs. Chase!" he called, anxiously, several times.

But there was no reply.

He bent his ear to the key-hole, but there was not a sound within the bride's room—all was still as the grave.

The handsome bridegroom grew pale and alarmed, crying out to his best man, who stood by his side:

"Surely something has happened, for I have heard not a sound from the room. We must force the door."

They put their shoulders against it; the lock yielded, it flew open, and they stood within the room.

The curtains and the shutters were closely drawn, and the night-lamp flickered dimly behind a screen. At one end of the room several chairs were littered with the wedding finery—the tiny white silken hose and slippers, the satin gown, the misty thread-lace veil.

In the midst of it all, Mrs. Chase lay on the bed, sleeping heavily, but Dainty was nowhere to be seen.

Love stood looking about him, pale and alarmed, but it was Harry Chilton who first caught sight of a note pinned on the pillow, and drew Love's attention to it.

"She is gone. Perhaps that may explain," he said.

Love caught up the note from the pillow, and read with staring eyes:

"Dear Mr. Ellsworth,—I have deceived you, and I can not keep the farce up any longer. I never loved you, never; but mamma always told me to get a rich husband if I could, and I was going to marry you for your money, knowing I would be a wretched wife, because all my heart was given to another.

"But last evening I met my lover in the grounds, and he persuaded me to go away with him. When this reaches you, I shall be his happy bride. We will be poor, but we shall have love to cheer us. Forgive me, and don't let the wedding be spoiled. Marry Olive or Ela.

"Dainty."

Once in a lifetime a man may excusably swoon. Lovelace Ellsworth fell heavily to the floor like an insensate log.