A SUDDEN BEREAVEMENT.
Neither Fair nor her mother had heard any footstep at the door, and
the loud, sudden rap startled them so that Mrs. Fielding fell back on
her pillow with a cry of alarm, and Fair dropped the little brown hat
she was about to place on her curly head, and started violently as she
called out:
“Who is there?”
No answer came, but a hand grasped the handle of the door and shook it
rudely. It was locked, however, and Fair made no motion to open it, but
called out as before:
“Who is there? Is it Sadie Allen?”
A loud, angry voice answered sharply:
“It is I--your husband! Open the door, and let me in.”
“I will not!” the girl answered defiantly, although her slight frame
trembled, and she instinctively glanced at the bed.
To her horror and distress, she heard her mother gasp despairingly:
“Oh, I remember all! Fair is married to that wretch! There is nothing
but misery and despair in store for my darling,” and, with the last
words, she fell back and lay still and white, as she had done the night
before.
“Come, none of your airs, madam! I am your master, and I command that
you open the door at once!” sounded the angry, threatening voice
outside, ending with a bitter oath.
Springing to the door, the hunted, desperate girl answered hoarsely:
“Oh, go away, I beg of you! My mother is ill, and she will die of
excitement unless you cease your persecutions.”
George Lorraine began to coax and wheedle, but she interrupted him in
impatient wrath:
“You are wasting your breath. I hate you, and will never recognize any
tie you may claim to exist between us. The door is locked, and I will
never admit you, so go away and leave me to care for my poor, sick
mother.”
She heard an oath, coupled with a threat to break the door down,
but she paid no heed. She had darted to her mother’s side, and was
anxiously bending over the silent form.
“Mother!” she shrieked aloud, in fear and terror, for the aspect of her
mother filled her with wild foreboding.
Mrs. Fielding’s eyes were wide open, and her lower jaw had fallen,
while her face and hands already had a cold, clammy feeling that forced
the truth on the almost distracted daughter. The poor, feeble heart had
given way under the shock of fear and grief, and she was dead.
While Fair was making this awful discovery, George Lorraine, who had
fortified himself for this occasion by a copious libation of whisky,
was trying what brute strength could do toward forcing an entrance to
the presence of his obdurate bride.
With a few vigorous kicks, he forced the lock of the frail door, and
precipitated himself into the room, boldly followed by several of the
inmates of the house, who had been attracted by the uproar he made.
And what a sight met their curious eyes!
The dead woman lay extended on the bed, and at their entrance poor Fair
lifted a wild, white, agonized face from her mother’s breast, and,
seeing George Lorraine’s flushed, triumphant face, she advanced toward
him, screaming wildly:
“Arrest him! Arrest that fiend, for he has killed my mother!”
There was a wild hubbub of cries in the room, and George Lorraine saw
lying on the pillow, in all the awful majesty of death, the face that
only yesterday had smiled upon him with a mother’s pride. The change
was so swift and sudden that his limbs shook beneath him, and a cold
sweat started out upon his forehead. Like one dazed, he heard Fair
going on wildly:
“He came to the door and ordered me to open it, and I begged him to
go away, because mamma was sick with her heart, and I feared the
excitement would kill her. But he only cursed me, and when I ran to
look at her she was dead.”
George Lorraine, recovering somewhat from the first shock of his
surprise, answered sullenly:
“Why didn’t you open the door, then, without making such a fuss? You
are my wife, and I had a right to come in,” and, turning to the gaping
group in the room, he added: “We were married last night, and she ran
away from me because she found out I wasn’t as rich as she expected,
and I came this morning to take her home with me--and, by Heaven, I
will, for I mean to tame the little shrew.”
It had suddenly occurred to him that it was a good thing for him that
Mrs. Fielding was dead. It would be easier to cope with her daughter.
But the bereaved daughter was glaring at him with the rage of a tigress
bereaved of her young, and still crying madly:
“Won’t some one bring a policeman and take him to prison? He has killed
my mother.”
A big, stout Irishwoman, who was looking in at the door called out
lustily:
“Arrah, my poor lamb, that will I bring a policeman this minute if
sumbuddy will howld the spalpeen till I gits back,” and she stumped
out into the hall on her coarse brogans, while George Lorraine, with
his senses half stupefied by drink, gave way to a maudlin terror, and,
dashing by the astonished group, made good his escape.
A motherly old woman led the half-crazed orphan from the scene, and
soothed her tenderly, while others cared for the mortal remains of the
dead woman.
Some one had brought in a passing physician, and he had told them that
Mrs. Fielding had died of heart failure.
Fair’s first request, as soon as she could think coherently, was for
her dearest friend, Sadie Allen, to be sent for. She came at once, full
of surprise and grief, and Fair threw herself into those sympathizing
arms with an outburst of passionate grief.
“Oh, Sadie, I am too poor even to bury her!” she sobbed. “We spent the
last penny buying those wretched clothes. Do you think that we could
sell them? Yes, and the furniture, too? I had rather sleep upon the
bare boards than that my mother should be buried in Potter’s field.”
“She shall not be buried there, Fair. Leave everything to me,” answered
her friend consolingly; and she kept her word, although to accomplish
it Fair’s wedding dress and hat, and also the furniture, had to be sold.
“But she will not need the furniture, for she can come and room with
me, and as for clothes, I would have tried to save them if she had
prized them; but she said she would always hate the sight of that hat
and dress,” Sadie said to the girls at the factory, among whom she took
up a small collection to defray the expenses of the funeral.
The girls contributed willingly, for Fair was a favorite with the
majority of them, and had no enemies except those who envied her for
her lovely face. Even Belva Platt, rather abashed by the tragedy that
had followed on the heels of her wicked plot, offered Sadie a dollar;
but the gift was indignantly refused, and Sadie remarked bitterly:
“You helped to dig her grave, Miss Platt, so we will excuse you from
any further contribution.”
“Don’t be a fool, Sadie Allen!” was the sharp and rude retort, and the
embroiderer tossed her head and returned to her work, although a slight
chill ran over her, for she knew that Sadie’s words were true. In a
metaphorical way, she had, indeed, helped to dig a grave for the poor
woman, who might have lived many years but for last night’s work.
Belva had not counted on such an end as this when she had planned her
clever revenge on Fair Fielding. She had expected that Fair would live
with the husband who had deceived her, and that her mother’s pride
and ambition would be brought low. Also that Waverley Osborne would be
cured of his passion for Fair and return to her side. But, though her
plot had worked well, the ending did not please her.
Mrs. Fielding’s pride had been brought low, it was true--low as the
grave. But Fair had refused to live with her ignoble husband, and
Waverley Osborne, far from returning to his old allegiance, had tacitly
espoused Fair’s side, for, having heard from the sewing girls of her
shameful plot, he had passed Belva that morning without speaking, and
his contempt had rankled bitterly in her heart all day.