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ZOE; Or, SOME DAY.
A NOVEL.
BY MAY LEONARD.
AUTHORESS OF "TRIXIE'S INHERITANCE; OR, WHICH SHALL WIN."
SAINT JOHN, N. B.:
PRINTED BY GEO. W. DAY, COR. PRINCESS AND PRINCE WM. STS.
1888.
CONTENTS.
I.--AN INVITATION
II.--"I SHALL SNUB HER"
III.--A YACHTING PARTY
IV.--A STRANGER
V.--FORTUNE TELLING
VI.--"YOUR SISTER, DOLORES"
VII.--AT NICE
VIII.--YOU NEVER CAN TELL
IX.--"SHALL WE NOT BE FRIENDS?"
X.--"I WONDER WHO SHE CAN BE?"
XI.--TROUBLE OVERTAKES THE BEST OF MEN
XII.--TOO CONFIDING. "YES, IT IS MY HUSBAND"
XIII.--THE CONVENT OF ST. MARGUERITE
XIV.--TRYING TO BE ECONOMICAL
XV.--AN ACCIDENT. A WILD HOPE
XVI.--"TRULY, VENGEANCE IS MINE"
XVII.--BLONDINE GAINS THE VICTORY
XVIII.--"A WOMAN ONE DOES NOT MEET EVERY DAY"
XIX.--A REVELATION
XX.--REA'S ATONEMENT. THE NEW MOTHER SUPERIOR
XXI.--NED CRANE. "THE ONE AND THE SAME,"
XXII.--LORD STREATHMERE'S SIT. SIR BARRY'S HEART'S DESIRE
XXIII.--ZOE'S SOME DAY
PREFACE.
Just a few words to my readers, with regard to the book before them. The
story of a girl's ambition; a novel certainly, but containing many
incidents that have lately happened. It is most certainly very difficult
to attempt to please every one, when there are so many different tastes
to please. The many readers of my first novel, "Trixie's Inheritance;
or, Which shall Win?" were kind enough to remember that the story had
not come from the pen of a woman who had lived to realize the many
changes that happen during years of personal experience, but that it had
all been composed and written by a girl sixteen years old. They
pardoned, overlooked the many flaws and mistakes, and remembered that we
are not to be condemned for our first efforts. It was a very pleasant
remembrance for me of my first book, that Her Majesty, Queen Victoria,
on receipt of a copy, sent me the following recognition for my letter
and book:
"General Sir Henry T. Ponsonby is commanded by the Queen to
thank Miss May Leonard for her letter of the 20th March, and
for the book she sends."
Buckingham Palace.
18th May, 1887.
A copy was sent to Lord Lansdowne, Governor General of Canada, who also
sent a pleasant note of thanks.
In conclusion, I wish to thank the many ladies and gentlemen who so
heartily, willingly and kindly have assisted me in making this, my
second book, so successful.
MAY LEONARD.
ZOE; Or, SOME DAY.
CHAPTER I.
AN INVITATION.
"Dark is her hair, her hand is white,
Her voice is exquisitely tender;
Her eyes are full of a liquid light,
I never saw a waist so slender."
--Praed.
"Dolores, will he ever come?"
The hammock, slung between the two sturdy old apple trees, swings gently
to and fro, the scorching rays of an August sun beat fiercely down, the
bees hum lazily in the dense heat, the flowers droop their pretty heads,
as if inviting a refreshing shower to brighten their fainting spirits.
"Dolores, I believe you are asleep. Do you think he will soon be here?"
"Who?" comes the lazy enquiry from the young lady of the hammock.
"Why, the postman, of course. How stupid of you not to remember. I never
saw any one so indifferent in my life."
Zoe's red lips form themselves into as near a pout as her ever ready
smiling mouth will allow.
"Who could be anything else than indifferent on a day such as this?" is
the half sleepy reply.
"Dolores, like my own sweet sister, sit up and talk to me."
The bees hum on, the butterflies light here and there, now on this
flower, now on that. Then sweet, gentle, pretty Dolores Litchfield
stretches her white arms over her pretty head, yawns, and slips from the
hammock.
"Now Zoe, you little worry, what is the trouble?"
Dropping into a garden chair, Dolores folds her white hands, to await
further developments from her wilful, impulsive, harum-scarum sister
Zoe.
"How handsome you are, Dolores. Do you think I shall ever be as
beautiful as you, do you, Dolores?" the girl cries eagerly.
Dolores brushes a fly off her white dress and laughs softly.
"Ah, Zoe, what a little flatterer. One of those days I will be no
comparison to my little sister; you will eclipse me in every respect."
And Miss Litchfield smiles fondly at the troubled, eager face before
her.
"Oh, I could never be like you, Dolores. I have a wicked temper, and a
quick tongue; were I not to speak out what I think, why I should choke
to death. I may have a pretty face and nice figure, but I can never be
good, unselfish, forgiving, like you, never."
The girl shakes her head; she feels herself far from perfect. Since
Dolores has come home from her foreign tour she has been her sister's
ideal of all women.
"How I do wish he would come," the youngest Miss Litchfield says
impatiently. "He is like the policemen in town, never around when they
are wanted. Well," defiantly, "I don't care a snap of my finger if he
comes or stays."
Dolores smiled in her lazy fashion; she is too much accustomed to Zoe's
"ways," to say anything.
"Dolores, talk to me; tell me a story, anything to put in the time,
something you saw on your visit abroad; it must be an Italian story;
dear, beautiful, sunny Italy! Oh, Dolores! what would I not give to be
there! What pictures I could paint! I did not for one moment begrudge
your going, but if I could have had the chance, I would have painted
pictures which would have made me famous. Oh, Dolores, think what it is
to be famous. Some day, it may be far off or it may be near, but the
time will surely come, when you will be proud to own me as your sister.
I want--my ambition is--to be great, grand, noble."
Dolores laughs. "And good, my sister; that is better than all," she
says, smiling. "My ambitious little one, do not be too eager, you have
all your life before you yet; fame will not be caught easily; she
demands much chasing, and those who pursue her have many slips and
tumbles before they achieve their end, so be patient. And now for the
story."
"Well, once upon a time there was a castle in Italy, a beautiful,
costly, grand structure. The lord of the castle was a brave, generous
gentleman, honorable and true. His lady was lovely, proud, and intensely
jealous of her very charming husband; she had a gentle serving maid,
Christina, a girl as pure in thought and deed as the lily; they had
grown up as playfellows. The Countess was very fond of her, for she was
not like her other friends. The Countess would quarrel with any and
every one, on account of her fiery temper; with Christina she never
quarreled. The maid was fond of solitude, and passed her spare time in
wandering alone among a grove of beautiful trees, her white dress could
often be seen as she paced back and forth among the dark trees, and
gained for her, among the people, the name of the White Lady. The
Countess' room was costly and elegant, the toilet table was of massive
silver, covered with a profusion of everything handsome. Her chair was
placed in front of the glass, and one day, so the legend runs, she was
sitting there, while Christina was combing her mistress's golden hair;
the Count was called away on urgent business, and as he passed through
the door she saw, as she believed, a smile, a glance at parting, given
and answered, that turned her heart almost to stone. That night, ere the
moon was up, Christina was led forth; no instrument of death was used,
not one hair of her head was harmed. In all the full glow of life and
health, fair, gentle, good Christina was walled up within the castle
walls, in a vault under the chapel. And now, every night, at the same
hour, a figure stands, with eyes uplifted, and hands clasped in prayer,
then it vanishes, and the hunter meets her on his hunting track, and the
shepherd on the heath starts and exclaims, 'It is the White Lady!'"
Dolores' voice sinks to a whisper; there are tears in her dusky eyes.
Surely one would think the sad story of poor Christina awakened more
than a passing feeling of sadness for her in Dolores' kind heart. Zoe
was too much interested to notice her sister's silence.
"And you really walked in the Countess' own room, saw the grove where
Christina walked and spent her lonely hours of solitude, and the vault
which she never came out of?"
"Yes, dear, it was all very lovely, sad and beautiful," the eldest Miss
Litchfield replies. "But look! your patience is rewarded; there comes
the postman in at the gate."
Zoe darts off in quest of the daily post. Before many minutes she is
back again, her face wreathed in smiles, for there actually was a letter
addressed to Miss Zoe Litchfield, from an affectionate girl friend; and
soon Zoe is deep in its contents. Dolores languidly scans the
handwriting on the large square envelope addressed to herself, then
breaks the seal, and reads; and as she reads a gleam of satisfaction,
quickly followed by one of sorrow, passes over her ever changing face.
"What's in yours, Dolores?" Zoe asks, putting her own epistle in the
pocket of her white frilled apron.
"There is to be a yachting party, and I have been invited to join it,"
Dolores answers, absently gazing at a rose bush stirred by the breeze.
"Oh!" Zoe ejaculates. "Will you go? Who asked you? Won't it be sublime?"
Zoe's eyes dilate, and a wish, not altogether unnatural in a girl
fifteen years old, arises in her mind, to be Dolores. Now, however,
Dolores smiles faintly, and says slowly,
"I shall think it over. The Hon. Jeremiah Hopkins sent the invitation,
and as to its being sublime, I suppose so."
Then Dolores arises and goes across the lawn towards the house, with her
white dress trailing over the green grass behind her. Pretty, graceful,
sweet Dolores. What was the reason no one cared to be seen talking to
her? And in crowded parlors or assemblies, if her name happened to be
mentioned, why did virtuous mammas look at the person who spoke her name
with such a shocked expression? Surely gentle Dolores could not have
wronged any one by word or deed. A gentleman once said, speaking of Miss
Litchfield, "That if ever a true, pure woman lived, a woman on whom any
man might stake his life and honor, it was a woman like Dolores
Litchfield whom he might trust." And it is quite safe to say, that this
praise did not make Dolores any more of a favourite with the roomful of
ladies of all ages, where the remark was made.