For a long time there could be nothing heard but the ticking of the
clock, and the loud breathing of Nellie’s pet cat, in whose soft fur
the girl had entwined her fingers. The other hand was enclosed in Tom’s.
“I am not your cousin, Nellie,” he said deliberately after a while.
“Not my cousin? Then who are you, and who am I?” This startled
exclamation brought the tears to the man’s eyes.
“Oh, dear,” Nellie added as she saw that Tom was not answering, “I’ve
treated you just like my cousin, kissed you many times, and----”
“I hope you will kiss me many times again,” said Tom, his tones having
taken on a deepness which caused the tender face of the girl to flood
with color.
“But I want to be a relation to you, Tom, dear,” cried the girl sharply.
“And so you shall, darling,” said Tom.
“I’m glad of that,” was the satisfied reply. “Now go on with
the--the--fairy story, Tom.”
“Then once upon a time----”
And here Tom stopped. How was he going to describe that dreadful prison
without telling her all about it? His pride forbade that.
“Well, once upon a time,” answered Nellie impatiently.
“There was once a beautiful island----”
And again Tom paused.
“Oh, I remember it,” cried Nellie. “It was all ivy windows, with
shutters, iron shutters, and--and----” Here she rubbed her forehead and
added: “A great stone wall all about it; is that what the castle was,
Tom?”
Biddy had ventured back. By the terrible expression upon Tom’s face she
feared he would tell the whole story.
“That’s it, darling, that’s it. I remember the castle myself.”
Tom drew a long sigh as he had passed the only breaker safely thus far.
“It was a very hard castle to get into,” ventured Nellie as if
struggling for a better memory.
“But a worse place to get out of,” said Biddy with a poke at Tom’s ribs.
He gave her a dreadful look and he went on hastily.
“There was a beautiful little girl brought to this island, and that
child was you, my Helen.”
Tom was leaning over the table and looking into Helen’s eyes.
The startled expression hurt him much, for he feared the girl would
call to her mind what kind of a castle they were living in, but without
a word she put out her slender arms and drew the dark head down to her
lips.
“There’s a sweet kiss, Tom.”
Biddy smacked her lips suspiciously, as she always had to do something.
She did not want to cry, and Tom did look so solemn.
“Then I lived there in that island?” asked Helen.
“Yes.”
“Was there anybody living there beside us?”
The question was so innocent and sweet that Tom thought his heart would
break, and Biddy again came to his rescue.
“Anybody else? Well, I should think so. I was there half the time
myself. And there were more people on that beautiful island than you’d
ever expect to see in such a small island again.”
Tom looked reproachfully at Biddy.
“Yes,” said he slowly, “I lived there myself.”
“Oh, did you now?” laughed Nellie, “and I did, too. Wasn’t it romantic?”
“Very,” replied Tom, giving a dreadful look at Biddy.
“What did you do there, Tom?” asked the girl.
This was hard to get over, but Biddy, with her Irish wit, was not to be
stumped in such a matter.
“Sure, me darlint, he worked for the government.”
“Oh, I’m sure that was a lovely position, for I often see the soldiers
go by, and they work for the government, don’t they, Tom?”
This was too much. Tom groaned in spirit, but again Biddy came to the
rescue.
“Tom always groans when he thinks of how near you got killed over
there, don’t you, Tom?”
The man bowed his head. Biddy was a darling anyway.
“Then do hurry and tell me how I came with you, and who my father is
and my mother, for I will know, Tom.”
“And so you shall, my darling Helen, you shall know.”
“One dark night I left the island with another fellow----”
Tom could not go on, and Biddy took up the thread.
“And the bold, bad boy had you in his arms, and our Tom saw him trying
to throw you in the water, and when he did it Tom jumped in after----”
Nellie stood up with a cry.
“I remember it all,” said she slowly, “all about the island, a sick
woman, and you taking me from the water. That was nice, Tom, the way
you crawled up the rock with me clinging to your back.”
The man made no answer, and Nellie went around and took his hands in
hers.
“I’m your girl forever, ain’t I, Tom? I want to always be with you.
Are you telling me this story so as to send me away from you to my
relatives?”
There was a pathos in the girl’s voice that wrung the tears from her
listeners. Tom did not reply for a moment.
Nellie turned quickly to Biddy.
“Oh, Biddy, who is going to have me? I want to stay with you and Tom.”
She dropped upon a chair, and Tom Cooper regained his voice.
“God forbid, my darling,” cried he, “that you should ever be with any
one in the world but your own Tom and Biddy. No, little Helen Standish,
you have no relatives to whom Biddy and I will ever give you. You
belong alone to us.”
“Oh, I am so glad--oh, so happy,” and the girl rubbed her face against
the whiskers without which she had never known her Tom.
“And now I am going to place something about your neck which was yours
many years ago, this little locket which was your mother’s.”
Helen Standish took the trinket, and lifted it tenderly to her lips.
“I’ve never known another mother but you, Biddy, and no other friend
but Tom, but pardon me if I weep for my dead mother.”
She rose to her feet, and walked away toward the window, where the
night shadows were falling. Her heart beat gratefully for these two
good people who had taken her into their lives and home.
“Tom,” she began without looking at him, “I can remember many times I
have been naughty and seemed ungrateful to you, but will you believe
that all my life I have loved you better than any one else?”
There was the big Irishwoman waiting for her turn, and her little sob
drew Nellie’s attention.
“And you, too, my own Biddy. I do not deserve all you have done for
me. I have always meant to be a good girl, but have failed miserably.”
“Now, now, my pretty darlint,” sobbed Biddy, “don’t you go and make
your hearties cry. We both loves you, and there ain’t nothing to
forgive, is there, Tom?”
“No, indeed,” and then such a longing came over him that his heart
seemed suffocated, and he wanted to take the girl in his arms and press
her to his bosom, and something in his face seemed to tell the girl of
his wish.
“Say it, Tom,” whispered she, oblivious of Biddy’s presence.
“I love, I love you, my own darling, and I want you to be my own little
wife.”
They looked into each other’s eyes solemnly, and Biddy crept to a chair
and sat down.
Nellie walked to her lover and laid her hands in his.
“I shall count it one of the greatest honors of my life to be your
wife,” said she, “and I love you, Tom Cooper.”
Then they talked, Biddy leaving them alone, and Tom explained
everything save that the island was a prison. Her mother was given the
highest of eulogies.
“I knew her when she was a little girl, although she was older than I.
I loved her very dearly. Now then, you have one second cousin living,
but your mother did not want to have him ever see you, or to let him
know of your existence. He has the fortune which you ought to have.”
“My fortune?” asked Nellie wonderingly.
“Yes,” and slowly the girl understood why this same cousin should want
to get her out of the way and should want to kill the little child who
had never done him any harm.
As they were finishing their love-making Biddy came in with a great
noise.
“If you children won’t mind,” said she, giving Tom a wink, “I’m going
to bed; I’m so tired.”
“We won’t mind, will we, Tom?” put in Nellie; “I’ve a great deal to say
to Tom before I go to bed.”
Biddy, with a yawn, went to her room, saying, as she closed the door:
“Now, don’t sit up all night, my children.”
It amused Nellie to hear Biddy call Tom a child, for he was many years
her own senior, and there could not be over a few years between her
lover and Biddy.
“We’ll go to bed as soon as the sun goes down,” laughed Tom.
In fact it was dark, but Biddy had always had the habit of going to bed
so early and getting up at an unusual hour that Tom was always making
sport of her.
“I wanted to ask you something, Tom,” said Nellie, after Biddy’s door
was tightly closed. “What makes you wear those long whiskers? Most men
shave them off, don’t they?”
Tom thought a moment.
“Well, I guess it’s habit,” said he slowly. He wished he could take
them off and show her the handsome face beneath, but he could not, for
it would require an explanation about wearing the grizzly hair upon his
face.
“Oh, you know I do not care,” replied Nellie, “for I love you just the
same, but I just wondered; that’s all.”
For a long time they were silent. They were each whispering to their
own heart what a happiness had been found.
* * * * *
A man slouched along close to the river. His hat was on one side, and
his hands were in his pockets.
Every boathouse he came to he read the name upon the top, as evidently
he was looking for some one.
Suddenly he stopped before an unusually pretty house, with the
boathouse below.
“Biddy Roan,” he read on the sign.
“The old dear lives here,” said he out loud. “Oh, I know she will be
glad to see me again after all these years for my mother’s sake, if not
for my own.”
Then he knocked at the door.
“Who is there, do you suppose, Tom?” asked Nellie softly; “it is late
for any one to come for boats.”
“Yes, but we will soon find out.”
He went to the door, and opened it, when a man stepped in, but halted
as he saw a beautiful girl standing there.
“Does Biddy Roan live here?” asked the stranger.
“Yes.”
“Well, may I see her? Tell her an old friend has come back from abroad
and wants to see her. Will you tell her, cove?”
“Let me,” whispered Nellie, and she went to the bedroom door. But
before she opened it she heard an ejaculation from Tom’s lips.
The stranger was staring at her lover with a crafty expression in his
eyes, while Tom was looking like death.
She did not say a word to Biddy, but ran back to Tom.
“What is it? Do you know this man, dear Tom?”
“I once knew him, Nellie,” said Tom, eyeing his former companion with
an expression of hatred.
Had not this same sneaky fellow almost killed his darling? Had he not
taken the dainty child fresh from its mother’s bosom and thrown it into
the water?
“Tom Cooper!” he was heard to mutter.
“Yes, I am Tom Cooper, and you are----”
“Jim Farren. Don’t bother to wake Biddy to-night, but tell her her
cousin called to see her, a cousin on our mother’s side.”
With this he gave a horrid laugh and sped out of the door, and Tom sank
down upon a seat, and his heart felt in his bosom like a lump of lead.
“Who is that man?” asked Nellie pointedly.
“He is the man who threw you from the boat, and, Nellie, if he should
come to-morrow while I am away and they ask you to go with them, would
you go? I knew he recognized you, for he looked hard at the locket on
your neck. He tried to steal it from you that night in the river.”
Helen Standish showed her force of character as she took Tom’s large
head in her hands and kissed him.
“I would no more think of leaving you, Tom, than I would to leave
Biddy, nor half as quick, for you are going to be my husband, are you
not?”
“Oh, Nellie, those words make me so happy, but what if they should
offer you a great fortune?”
“Without you, my darling, I would not take it, for I want only this
little family circle. Don’t worry about that, you cannot get rid of
your sweetheart so easy.”
“God forbid that anything like that should ever happen.”
Then they left each other, and little Nellie, with a happy, singing
heart, crawled in beside Biddy.
But not so with Tom Cooper. He could see close to him a great shadow
rising before him, and could feel the shiver of the cold bracelets
about his hands.
Of course, this fiend would tell George Benson where he was, and what
would there be left for him but to finish out a term in prison, but
there was a possibility that Biddy would know some way out of the
trouble.
He opened his bedroom door cautiously at the first peep of day, and
there stood Biddy in her night clothes.
“Biddy,” whispered Tom, “did Nellie tell you about the man that came
here last night?”
“No, sure she didn’t, I was asleep when she came to bed.”
“Jim Farren was here.”
“Bad cess to him,” cried Biddy, “what in the devil’s name did he want
now? I thought he was dead.”
“So did I,” commented Tom.
“But you needn’t be afraid of him,” said Biddy consolingly. “He won’t
dare peach on you, for that would bring him into trouble, too.”
“Oh, yes, he will,” replied the man, “for he did not get the reward
which was to have been his at the death of the child. Now if he can get
her into the villain’s hands he will get the amount which was coming to
him.”
“Now you are worrying over nothing, Tom. Be cheerful, and we will go to
some other place, for this ain’t the only home in the world.”
“But, Biddy,” argued Tom, “you cannot give up your home for my sake,
and you have spent the best of your days here.”
He had come near the woman then, and they were looking into each
other’s eyes.
“I don’t care fer that,” said she, “and if you think you and Nellie’s
a-going away and leave this poor Biddy Roan, then youse is mistaken.”
“God bless you, my own Biddy,” ejaculated Tom. “Then this morning we
three will pack our things and we’ll go away, and if Nellie has to know
the truth then will I tell her.”