"I do think it is a perfect shame those horrid Glenn girls are to be
invited up here to Rex's wedding," cried little Birdie Lyon, hobbling
into the room where Mrs. Corliss sat, busily engaged in hemming some
new table-linen, and throwing herself down on a low hassock at her
feet, and laying down her crutch beside her--"it is perfectly awful."
"Why," said Mrs. Corliss, smoothing the nut-brown curls back from the
child's flushed face, "I should think you would be very pleased. They
were your neighbors when you were down in Florida, were they not?"
"Yes," replied the little girl, frowning, "but I don't like them one
bit. Bess and Gertie--that's the two eldest ones, make me think of
those stiff pictures in the gay trailing dresses in the magazines. Eve
is nice, but she's a Tom-boy."
"A wh--at!" cried Mrs. Corliss.
"She's a Tom-boy, mamma always said; she romps, and has no manners."
"They will be your neighbors when you go South again--so I suppose
your brother thought of that when he invited them."
"He never dreamed of it," cried Birdie; "it was Miss Pluma's doings."
"Hush, child, don't talk so loud," entreated the old housekeeper; "she
might hear you."
"I don't care," cried Birdie. "I don't like her anyhow, and she knows
it. When Rex is around she is as sweet as honey to me, and calls me
'pretty little dear,' but when Rex isn't around she scarcely notices
me, and I _hate_ her--yes, I do."
Birdie clinched her little hands together venomously, crying out the
words in a shrill scream.
"Birdie," cried Mrs. Corliss, "you _must not_ say such hard, cruel
things. I have heard you say, over and over again, you liked Mr.
Hurlhurst, and you must remember Pluma is his daughter, and she is to
be your brother's wife. You must learn to speak and think kindly of
her."
"I never shall like her," cried Birdie, defiantly, "and I am sure Mr.
Hurlhurst don't."
"Birdie!" ejaculated the good lady in a fright, dropping her scissors
and spools in consternation; "let me warn you not to talk so again;
if Miss Pluma was to once hear you, you would have a sorry enough time
of it all your after life. What put it into your head Mr. Hurlhurst
did not like his own daughter?"
"Oh, lots of things," answered Birdie. "When I tell him how pretty
every one says she is, he groans, and says strange things about fatal
beauty, which marred all his young life, and ever so many things I
can't understand, and his face grows so hard and so stern I am almost
afraid of him."
"He is thinking of Pluma's mother," thought Mrs. Corliss--but she made
no answer.
"He likes to talk to me," pursued the child, rolling the empty spools
to and fro with her crutch, "for he pities me because I am lame."
"Bless your dear little heart," said Mrs. Corliss, softly stroking the
little girl's curls; "it is seldom poor old master takes to any one as
he has to you."
"Do I look anything like the little child that died?" questioned
Birdie.
A low, gasping cry broke from Mrs. Corliss's lips, and her face grew
ashen white. She tried to speak, but the words died away in her
throat.
"He talks to me a great deal about her," continued Birdie, "and he
weeps such bitter tears, and has such strange dreams about her. Why,
only last night he dreamed a beautiful, golden-haired young girl came
to him, holding out her arms, and crying softly: 'Look at me, father;
I am your child. I was never laid to rest beneath the violets, in my
young mother's tomb. Father, I am in sore distress--come to me,
father, or I shall die!' Of course it was only a dream, but it makes
poor Mr. Hurlhurst cry so; and what do you think he said?"
The child did not notice the terrible agony on the old housekeeper's
face, or that no answer was vouchsafed her.
"'My dreams haunt me night and day,' he cried. 'To still this wild,
fierce throbbing of my heart I must have that grave opened, and gaze
once more upon all that remains of my loved and long-lost bride, sweet
Evalia and her little child.' He was--"
Birdie never finished her sentence.
A terrible cry broke from the housekeeper's livid lips.
"My God!" she cried, hoarsely, "after nearly seventeen years the sin
of my silence is about to find me out at last."
"What is the matter, Mrs. Corliss? Are you ill?" cried the startled
child.
A low, despairing sob answered her, as Mrs. Corliss arose from her
seat, took a step or two forward, then fell headlong to the floor in a
deep and death-like swoon.
Almost any other child would have been terrified, and alarmed the
household.
Birdie was not like other children. She saw a pitcher of ice-water on
an adjacent table, which she immediately proceeded to sprinkle on the
still, white, wrinkled face; but all her efforts failed to bring the
fleeting breath back to the cold, pallid lips.
At last the child became fairly frightened.
"I must go and find Rex or Mr. Hurlhurst," she cried, grasping her
crutch, and limping hurriedly out of the room.
The door leading to Basil Hurlhurst's apartments stood open--the
master of Whitestone Hall sat in his easy-chair, in morning-gown and
slippers, deeply immersed in the columns of his account-books.
"Oh, Mr. Hurlhurst," cried Birdie, her little, white, scared face
peering in at the door, "won't you please come quick? Mrs. Corliss,
the housekeeper, has fainted ever so long ago, and I can't bring her
to!"
Basil Hurlhurst hurriedly arose and followed the now thoroughly
frightened child quickly to the room where the old housekeeper lay,
her hands pressed close to her heart, the look of frozen horror
deepening on her face.
Quickly summoning the servants, they raised her from the floor. It was
something more than a mere fainting fit. The poor old lady had fallen
face downward on the floor, and upon the sharp point of the scissors
she had been using, which had entered her body in close proximity to
her heart. The wound was certainly a dangerous one. The surgeon, who
was quickly summoned, shook his head dubiously.
"The wound is of the most serious nature," he said. "She can not
possibly recover."
"I regret this sad affair more than I can find words to express," said
Basil Hurlhurst, gravely. "Mrs. Corliss's whole life almost has been
spent at Whitestone Hall. You tell me, doctor, there is no hope. I can
scarcely realize it."
Every care and attention was shown her; but it was long hours before
Mrs. Corliss showed signs of returning consciousness, and with her
first breath she begged that Basil Hurlhurst might be sent for at
once.
He could not understand why she shrunk from him, refusing his
proffered hand.
"Tell them all to leave the room," she whispered. "No one must know
what I have to say to you."
Wondering a little what she had to say to him, he humored her wishes,
sending them all from the room.
"Now, Mrs. Corliss," he said, kindly drawing his chair up close by the
bedside, "what is it? You can speak out without reserve; we are all
alone."
"Is it true that I can not live?" she asked, eagerly scanning his
face. "Tell me truthfully, master, is the wound a fatal one?"
"Yes," he said, sympathetically, "I--I--am afraid it is."
He saw she was making a violent effort to control her emotions. "Do
not speak," he said, gently; "it distresses you. You need perfect rest
and quiet."
"I shall never rest again until I make atonement for my sin," she
cried, feebly. "Oh, master, you have ever been good and kind to me,
but I have sinned against you beyond all hope of pardon. When you hear
what I have to say you will curse me. Oh, how can I tell it! Yet I can
not sleep in my grave with this burden on my soul."
He certainly thought she was delirious, this poor, patient, toil-worn
soul, speaking so incoherently of sin; she, so tender-hearted--she
could not even have hurt a sparrow.
"I can promise you my full pardon, Mrs. Corliss," he said, soothingly;
"no matter on what grounds the grievance may be."
For a moment she looked at him incredulously.
"You do not know what you say. You do not understand," she muttered,
fixing her fast-dimming eyes strangely upon him.
"Do not give yourself any uneasiness upon that score, Mrs. Corliss,"
he said, gently; "try to think of something else. Is there anything
you would like to have done for you?"
"Yes," she replied, in a voice so hoarse and changed he could scarcely
recognize it was her who had spoken; "when I tell you all, promise me
you will not curse me; for I have sinned against you so bitterly that
you will cry out to Heaven asking why I did not die long years ago,
that the terrible secret I have kept so long might have been wrung
from my lips."
"Surely her ravings were taking a strange freak," he thought to
himself; "yet he would be patient with her and humor her strange
fancy."
The quiet, gentle expression did not leave his face, and she took
courage.
"Master," she said, clasping her hands nervously together, "would it
pain you to speak of the sweet, golden-haired young girl-bride who
died on that terrible stormy night nearly seventeen years ago?"
She saw his care-worn face grow white, and the lines of pain deepen
around his mouth.
"That is the most painful of all subjects to me," he said, slowly.
"You know how I have suffered since that terrible night," he said
shudderingly. "The double loss of my sweet young wife and her little
babe has nearly driven me mad. I am a changed man, the weight of the
cross I have had to bear has crushed me. I live on, but my heart is
buried in the grave of my sweet, golden-haired Evalia and her little
child. I repeat, it is a painful subject, still I will listen to what
you have to say. I believe I owe my life to your careful nursing, when
I was stricken with the brain fever that awful time."
"It would have been better if I had let you die then, rather than live
to inflict the blow which my words will give you. Oh, master!" she
implored, "I did not know then what I did was a sin. I feared to tell
you lest the shock might cost you your life. As time wore on, I grew
so deadly frightened I dared not undo the mischief my silence had
wrought. Remember, master, when you looked upon me in your bitterest,
fiercest moments of agony, what I did was for _your_ sake; to save
your bleeding heart one more pang. I have been a good and faithful
woman all my life, faithful to your interests."
"You have indeed," he responded, greatly puzzled as to what she could
possibly mean.
She tried to raise herself on her elbows, but her strength failed her,
and she sunk back exhausted on the pillow.
"Listen, Basil Hurlhurst," she said, fixing her strangely bright eyes
upon his noble, care-worn face; "this is the secret I have carried in
this bosom for nearly seventeen years: 'Your golden-haired young wife
died on that terrible stormy night you brought her to Whitestone
Hall;' but listen, Basil, '_the child did not!_' It was stolen from
our midst on the night the fair young mother died."