Perhaps of the three conscious ones, Jessica was the first to recover
herself.
A sort of fear that seemed to turn her cold from feet to brow oppressed
Mrs. Chalmers, and she stood there white-lipped, stunned, in presence
of that unnamed terror, while her daughter went forward, a smile that
was almost playful making her treacherous lips beautiful.
"Leith, really Leith!" she cried sweetly. "What man but you ever could
turn up in this most unexpected fashion, or this most welcome one? Was
it your sudden coming that has upset Carlita? These Southern women are
so easily affected. Mamma, can't you ring for Carlita's maid? Here is
poor Leith holding her in his arms as if she were a china doll, which
he feared to drop lest it should break. Has she really fainted, or
is it only one of her pretty affectations because of the picturesque
comfort of the position?"
"I am afraid I was a little abrupt in breaking some startling news to
her," answered Leith, quietly, thankful for once for the incessant flow
of Jessica's words. "Poor little girl! I am very sorry for her."
"Really? What was it?"
"Wait a moment."
Carlita had stirred ever so slightly in his embrace but he was
painfully alive to every movement. It seemed to him that it would be
impossible for him to look into her clear eyes then, eyes lighted with
hatred and loathing for his despicable act, and it was with a feeling
of absolute relief that he resigned his precious burden to her maid,
who, with the assistance of Mrs. Chalmers, took her from the room.
"Do tell me!" cried Jessica, making not the slightest pretense of
interest in her mother's ward. "I am consumed with curiosity. Is it
about Olney?"
"Yes."
"He is ill?"
"Worse than that."
"Worse! Not--dead?"
"Yes."
"Good heavens!"
There was a desperate sort of silence that lasted she could never quite
remember how long, but her mother's touch aroused her, her mother's
voice speaking in her ear in a low, strained tone, which seemed unreal
and ghastly to her.
"Olney is dead, Jessica. Do you hear me, child? Olney Winthrop is dead."
The girl shook off the hand and lifted her white face.
"Yes, I know," she answered, hoarsely, almost gruffly. "What is
the good of making a scene about it? Many of--of our friends have
died suddenly who appeared less like it than he. What was it,
Leith--typhoid? Mexico is such a beastly hole for typhoid."
Her mother heard and understood all the bravado in the tone, and a
shiver passed over her that added to her pallor under all the ghastly,
artificial red. But she forgot it in listening to Leith's reply.
"No," he said, heavily, "it was not fever."
"Then what?"
He glanced away from her, even shot a half-nervous glance in the
direction of the door, which was something he had never done before in
his life.
"What was it?" she repeated, unable to control her impatient
excitement. "Not--"
"Yes, murder!"
There was none of the old, graceful nonchalance in the voice as he
spoke that word. It was strained, husky, tense, like that of a man who
is putting the most violent restraint upon some wild passion.
Mrs. Chalmers uttered a little cry, a cry that could not be described
in its terror, suspense, she knew not what, of horrible presentiment;
but Jessica's head was flung up, her nostrils dilated, her eyes wild
and filled with a curious expression which her mother could not fathom,
even had she been in a mental condition to try.
And then Jessica repeated that awful word, repeated it in a voice which
contained a note of triumph--hideous triumph--that shot through her
mother's weaker soul with renewed terror:
"Murder!"
There were volumes in the mere utterance. She stood looking at him for
just a moment, then deliberately sat down and crossed her hands between
her knees, looking up at him curiously. Mrs. Chalmers leaned against
the mantel-shelf for needed support.
"How horrible!" exclaimed Jessica. "And that it should be some one we
all know--actually engaged to Carlita! It reads quite like a story
book, doesn't it? Do sit down and tell us all about it."
But Leith did not sit. He passed his hands across his brow as if his
head ached.
"I can't," he answered, heavily. "It is getting late, and I am worn
out. I haven't slept for--I can't remember just how long, but I
feel seedy and in need of rest. I think I'll go now, and come again
tomorrow, if you'll let me."
"But at least you'll tell us the main facts!" cried Jessica. "It won't
take a minute. Who murdered him?"
She seemed to delight in the mere utterance of the grewsome word, and
Leith shivered, though his answer was filled with passion:
"I wish to God I knew!"
"Then you don't?"
"No."
The words were uttered so peculiarly that even Jessica was silent for a
moment, then said, with sudden, swift meaning:
"Then you were not with him?"
"No."
"And there was no inquiry made, no effort to discover the murderer?"
Leith lifted his shoulders wearily.
"Oh, yes," he answered. "But what does inquiry amount to in a place
like that? There is no law, and a man's importance is measured by the
value of his hat and saddle, and the number of men he has slain."
"Then you have no suspicion?"
"None." But he stooped to pick up a handkerchief he had dropped as he
spoke the word. "I really must go now," he said when he had regained
it. "I am dead tired, and--"
"But you saw him after he was dead?" she persisted, observing that his
hand trembled, in spite of his efforts to prevent it.
"Yes, I saw him," he stammered.
"Was he shot?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"Directly through the heart."
"Ah! then he did not suffer much. You should be glad he was killed at
once, and--"
But it seemed to Pierrepont that he could bear it no longer. His
accustomed indifference had already deserted him, and he felt that all
his courage was as rapidly following. He cried out passionately, more
passionately than she believed possible for him, even after the kiss
she had seen him press upon Carlita's lips:
"Glad! Glad, when it left not a moment for preparation to meet that God
whom he feared! when it left not a moment for a word of farewell to the
girl whom he loved! Glad! Good God! I had rather suffer a life-time of
anguish than to die like that--a rat in a trap!"
"And you buried him down there?" his pitiless interlocutor continued.
"Yes," he answered, half sullenly. "What else was there to do?"
"Why not bring him home to the girl he loved, and who loved him?"
"Like that! It were a thousand times, ten thousand times, better that
she never saw him again. Besides," managing by a superhuman effort
to control himself somewhat, "there was no way. It was awful getting
through, myself, and it would have been impossible with him. There
were miles and miles that had to be done on mule-back, and miles and
miles more, even after we reached the railroad, that had to be done on
a hand-car. Then there were land-slides that had to be walked over and
the car carried. Oh, it would have been impossible, quite impossible,
even if--if--"
"If what?"
"If I had desired to," he blurted out, hastily, hoarsely. "I will come
again tomorrow--tomorrow--when, I hope, Miss de Barryos will be better.
Good-night."
He bolted from the room, snatched up his hat and coat in the hall, and
rushed into the street.
Already the lamps were lighted, flickering brilliantly in the deadened
gray of the gloaming that was so rapidly fading into night. Pedestrians
were hurrying homeward, their faces cut to crimson by the sharp, frosty
air.
The sting of it was pleasant to Pierrepont. He opened his mouth and
drank it into his lungs with the same relish that a thirsty man drinks
water.
"God, what a relief!" he exclaimed, his step growing more elastic.
"She knew how she was torturing me, saw it in every word that I spoke;
and I, fool that I was, was betrayed into weakness and cowardice by
a woman whom I despise! I felt myself a criminal striving to avoid
the accusation of my crime. I think if she had cried out: 'You are
the guilty one! 'Twas your hand fired the shot that killed poor Olney
Winthrop!' I would have sunk upon my knees and begged for mercy.
Pouf! how all this cursed affair has upset me! I wonder if I shall
ever be myself again? I wonder if I shall ever be able to shake off
the influence of all these lies I have been forced to tell, and shall
be forced to tell from this time henceforth? God! it's the old story
retold of Adam and Eve, without the Garden of Eden. A woman's beautiful
face makes cowards of us all. And I, who so despise a liar, who never
told a lie in my life until--"
He did not complete the sentence, but flung up his head with a gesture
of repugnance and abhorrence.
A slow, pitiless, scornful, malignant laugh fell from Jessica's lips
as she heard the outer door close upon him. She got up, went to the
window, and watched him as he disappeared down the street; then, quite
as calmly as she had moved the day before, returned to the mantel and
laid one hand upon it, while with the other she lifted her dress and
placed her foot upon the fender before the fire. Then, after a pause:
"Why do you look at me in that uncanny sort of way?" she exclaimed,
half fretfully to her mother, without even glancing in her direction.
"You make me feel creepy all up and down my back. Why don't you say it
out and have done with it?"
"Say--what out?" stammered Mrs. Chalmers, her voice as stiff, as
heavy, as full of terror as her face.
"What you are thinking."
"I--I don't believe I--could. It seems to--me that I--must have
been asleep--and had a--horrible nightmare. I--think I must have
been--wondering--what you--thought."
Jessica lifted her head. In the mirror she saw leaning against the
door-jamb a figure clothed all in black, the white hands crossed upon
its breast as if to hush the wild throb of the passionate heart. The
beautiful face looked deathly in its pallor. It was Carlita.
Jessica turned her eyes upon her mother as if she had not seen, then
answered slowly, her voice vibrating with intense meaning:
"What I think of the murder of Olney Winthrop? You mean whom do I
believe to be the murderer? I am quite sure there can not be two ideas
upon that score. The ball that entered Olney Winthrop's heart was fired
by the hand of Leith Pierrepont, none other!"