A HUSBAND’S DEMANDS.
Mrs. Howard gazed at Prince Gonzaga in wonder and perplexity.
“You talk of winning your wife back, when you ought to be repenting the
sin you have committed,” she said rebukingly, adding: “Do you forget
that the officers of the law have been summoned to commit you for
shooting Bayard Lorraine?”
He laughed contemptuously, and answered:
“I am quite aware of that fact, but I do not fear any inconvenience
from it. For one thing, I have been told that Lorraine will not die
of his wound; and for another, you will remember that I did not shoot
him with malice. The shot was meant for the wife whom I believed to
be false, and he flung himself between us, and received the bullet
himself. For the rest, I must remind you that the law of Italy, as of
all other lands, is not hard on a man who seeks to avenge the honor
that had been outraged by a false wife.”
She found that his words were perfectly true, for, after having been
carried before a court of justice, he was almost immediately released
on his own bail.
He returned to the villa the next morning, triumphant, and sought Mrs.
Howard.
“I am released on my own bail,” he said. “I wish to see my wife.”
“I do not think you can see her. She was very ill all night, and no one
but her maid can be admitted into the room.”
“I am her husband, and I insist upon being admitted!” he replied
angrily.
“I will ask if she will see you. But what if she refuses?”
“I do not believe that she will refuse. Why should she?” he replied.
“She married me of her own free will, when she thought I was rich,
and only ran away from me when she found out I was poor and could not
give her the luxuries she craved. Now I can give her both wealth and a
title, and no doubt she will be only too glad to accept them.”
“And you?” she asked wonderingly. “Are you willing to devote yourself
to a wife who would value you only for those glittering externals?”
“I would take her on any terms,” he replied, and she foresaw that in
the event of Fair refusing his wish there would be sore trouble ahead
for the willful girl.
But she did not believe Fair would refuse her husband’s overtures of
peace. Why, as he very pertinently asked, should she do so? It had been
proved that she was mercenary and designing. The husband whom she had
deserted on the score of poverty was rich and powerful now. Of course
she would make up with him. Perhaps she would be glad of the way things
had turned out.
It made her very sad to think how cruelly she had been disappointed in
Fair. How earnestly she had declared that she was incapable of marrying
for money! Yet Mrs. Howard doubted not that her acceptance of Bayard
Lorraine’s suit had been based on mercenary principles. She thought of
the poor fellow lying wounded and near to the gates of death for the
false girl’s sake, and felt indignant and disgusted.
“I wash my hands of her, princess though she be through her marriage,
and I will never have anything more to do with her,” she mentally
decided; but just then there rose into her mind a thought of the dark
day when, sitting by her dead daughter, she had seen such a lovely
vision--a vision that had led her to adopt Fair into Azalia’s sacred
place. Her tears began to fall.
“I dreamed it all, for the dead see clearly, and Azalia would never
have wished me to take one so false and unworthy into her place,” she
sighed.
Dashing away the bitter tears, the deceived and indignant lady made her
way to the presence of Fair, whom she had not seen since last night,
when she had sent her away, abashed and weeping, from the presence of
Bayard Lorraine, after making her bitter confession.
Betty, the maid, had told her that her young mistress had been ill and
sleepless all night, that she had sobbed herself into a high fever; but
Mrs. Howard’s anger had hardened her heart, and, without going near
poor Fair, she had answered hastily:
“Let her suffer, then, for she richly deserves it.”
Betty was so devoted to her mistress that she angrily reported those
words to her, and Fair wept more than ever when she realized that her
friend and benefactress had hardened her heart against her.
She had not undressed all night, and when Mrs. Howard entered the room
she was lying on a sofa in the crushed and rumpled white silk tea
gown, with her magnificent, rippling, red-gold tresses falling to her
waist in rich disorder. Her face was very pale, and the light of the
beautiful brown eyes was dimmed by the rivers of tears she had shed.
“Oh, mother!” she exclaimed piteously, half extending her arms; but the
lady frowned, and said stiffly:
“Your husband, Prince Gonzaga, desires to see you.”
Instantly the beautiful face grew ghastly with fear, and Fair almost
shrieked out:
“I cannot see him! I will not!”
Mrs. Howard’s lip curled contemptuously as she answered:
“You need not look so frightened. Your husband does not contemplate
any further violence. He would not have attempted any last night only
that he had been led to believe you a wicked woman. Since I have taken
pains to disabuse his mind of that erroneous impression, he regrets his
actions of last night, and declares that he is ready and anxious to
forgive the past and make up his quarrel with you.”
But the wretched girl only cowered in more abject terror at those
words, moaning out:
“Oh, I wish you had let him go on thinking me wicked! I do not want to
make up my quarrel with him. I had rather have his hate than his love.”
“Was this acting?” Mrs. Howard asked herself. If so, it was very clever
indeed, and the lady scarce knew what to say in answer.
But she remembered that the impetuous husband was waiting most
impatiently to hear from Fair, so she said curtly:
“You are talking wicked nonsense, Fair, and you will find that Prince
Gonzaga is determined to enforce your wifely obedience. So you had
better make up your mind to live with him, and to be thankful that he
is willing to forgive your past bad conduct.”
She felt that she ought to say these precise words to the girl, yet she
felt abashed somehow by the big, pathetic eyes Fair fixed on her face.
She had stopped weeping, and her tearless misery was far more pitiful,
as she faltered:
“I will never live with him! He was the cause of my mother’s death. Her
grave lies between us.”
“He has explained all that to me. It is nonsense to accuse him of that.
She had heart disease, and her death was liable to occur at any time,”
Mrs. Howard returned coldly.
“If only you would let me explain everything, you would take my part
against this wretch,” Fair faltered, with some faint hope of pity; but
Mrs. Howard shook her head.
“I heard you explain it all to Bayard last night--heard Prince Gonzaga
go over the whole ground again to-day, and I wish to hear no more on
the subject. Your duplicity and deceit have planted in my trusting
heart a thorn that will never cease to rankle,” she answered bitterly.
Fair’s face went ghastly white, and her big, reproachful eyes made Mrs.
Howard feel uneasy, so she said jeeringly, to throw off the pity that
threatened to overcome her ideas of justice:
“Confess, now, that you are glad your husband is rich and titled. You
are the Princess Gonzaga. Did you think of that? It is a proud title,
and will make you equally honored and envied.”
But a moan of the bitterest pain came from Fair’s poor, blanched lips.
“Oh, madam, never call me by that name again!” she cried imploringly.
“I hate that man. I despise him and fear him. If he were a king, I
would not share his throne!”
“You are his wife, and you will be compelled to share his lot. I warn
you that he is desperate. Make up with him, and he will adore you. Deny
him, and I do not believe he would hesitate to kill you,” said Mrs.
Howard; but the obstinate creature only answered, as before:
“I would rather have his hate than his love.”
And suddenly lifting her anguished eyes, she exclaimed:
“Do you not know that I love Bayard Lorraine with my whole heart?”
“That is a sin,” reproved the good woman; but Fair answered:
“If it be a sin, it is one of which I never can repent so long as I
live, and I will be no man’s wife but Bayard Lorraine’s.”
“You are already another man’s wife,” severely.
“In name only,” Fair answered, in dreary exultation.
“And as for Bayard Lorraine, he would consider your words of just
now an insult,” continued Mrs. Howard coldly, and she added, after a
moment: “If he ever knows anything again--which is doubtful, as he has
lain in a deadly stupor since last night--I feel sure that he will
advocate the justice of Prince Gonzaga’s claim, and insist that you
return to your husband.”
“You really believe this?” Fair cried wildly, with dilated eyes.
“Yes.”
“And you, too--you take the part of this cruel prince against me?”
“Yes; for you have wronged him bitterly from the first, and you should
crave his pardon and try to atone to him for your unkindness in the
past,” said Mrs. Howard decisively, for Fair’s declaration of love for
Bayard Lorraine had alarmed her, and she saw in it a new element of
danger for all, so she advocated the prince’s cause most zealously.
But Fair only refused, in despairing defiance, to see or hold any
communication with her husband.
“Tell him I will never see him,” she reiterated, but Mrs. Howard
answered:
“That is rash, foolish! You are in his own house, and you are his own
wife. He will enter your presence by force, if you persist in this
silly refusal.”
Fair sprang to her feet with a horrified face.
“Do you mean to tell me that you will not protect me from that wretch?”
she panted wildly.
“I should have no right to interfere between man and wife.”
“But you would take the right--you would defend me?” breathlessly.
“No!” Mrs. Howard answered icily, and that refusal seemed to open the
floodgates of despair upon the wretched girl.
She fell back into her seat, crying out that the blackest hour of a
wretched life had come.
Mrs. Howard looked on, perplexed, appalled. What was to be the end of
all this?
She had not anticipated rebellion on the part of Fair against her
husband, and she could not understand it, save on the score of what she
had asserted just now--her love for Bayard Lorraine.
“She must forget it. There is nothing in it now but dishonor for all
concerned, and unless she returns to her husband there will be some new
tragedy enacted,” she thought, in terror; so she determined to take
Prince Gonzaga’s part against his willful wife.
“Your husband is desperate, Fair. Unless you yield him perfect
obedience hereafter, you will never have any more peace or security,”
she said, taking advantage of a momentary silence on the girl’s part to
speak.
Fair did not answer for several minutes. Her face was buried in her
hands, and she remained perfectly silent for an interval, after which
she lifted up her head, and said sadly:
“I yield! Tell Prince Gonzaga that I will grant him an interview here
one hour from now.”