A SURPRISE AT THE GRAND CENTRAL STATION.
"Will you help me?" Edith eagerly inquired, turning to her companion,
who had regarded her wonderingly while she repudiated the costly gifts
which Emil Correlli had showered upon her.
"How can I help you, lady?" Giulia inquired, with a look of surprise.
"Call me Edith--I am only a poor, friendless girl, like yourself," she
gently returned. "But I want to go away from this house immediately--I
must get out of it unobserved; then I can catch a train that leaves
Boston at three o'clock, for New York."
"Ah! you wish to run away from Emil!" exclaimed Giulia, her face
lighting with eagerness.
"Yes--I would never own myself his wife for a single hour. I was
planning, when you came in, to get away to-night when the house was
quiet; but doubtless they would lock my door if I continued to be
obstinate, and it would be a great deal better for me, every way, if I
could go now," Edith explained.
"Yes, I will help you--I will do anything you wish," said Giulia,
heartily.
"Then come!" exclaimed Edith, excitedly, "I want you to go down to
him; he is in one of the rooms below--in the library, I think--a room
under the one opposite this. He will be so astonished by your
unexpected visit that he will be thrown off his guard, and you must
manage to occupy his attention until you are sure I am well out of the
house--which will be in less than ten minutes after you are in his
presence--and then I shall have nothing more to fear from him."
"I will do it," said the Italian girl, rising, a look of resolve on
her handsome but care-lined face.
"Thank you! thank you!" returned Edith, earnestly. "I am going
straight to New York, to friends; but of course, you will not betray
my plans."
"No, indeed; but do you think your friends can help you break with
Emil--do you believe that ceremony can be canceled?" breathlessly
inquired Giulia.
"I hope so," Edith gravely answered; "at all events, if I can but once
put myself under the protection of my friends, I shall no longer fear
him. I shall then try to have the marriage annulled. Perhaps, when he
realizes how determined I am, he may even be willing to submit to it."
"Oh, do you think so?--do you think so?" cried Giulia, tremulously,
and with hopeful eagerness.
"I will hope so," replied Edith, gravely, "and I will also hope that I
may be able to do something to make you and this dear child happy once
more. What a sweet little fellow he is!" she concluded, as she leaned
forward and kissed him softly on the cheek, an act which brought the
quick tears to his mother's eyes.
Again she seized the girl's delicate hand and carried it to her lips.
"Ah, to think! An hour ago I hated you!--now I worship you!" she
cried, in an impassioned tone, a sob bursting from her trembling lips.
"You must go," said Edith, advancing to the door, and softly opening
it. "I have no time to lose if I am to catch my train. Remember, the
room under the one opposite this--you will easily find it. Now
good-by, and Heaven bless you both."
With a look of deepest gratitude and veneration, Giulia Fiorini, her
child clasped in her arms, passed out of the room and moved swiftly
toward the grand staircase leading to the lower part of the house;
while Edith, closing and locking the door after her, stood listening
until she should reach the library, where she was sure Emil Correlli
sat reading.
She heard the sweep of the girl's robes upon the stairs; then, a
moment later, a stifled exclamation of mingled surprise and anger fell
upon her ears, after which the library door was hastily shut, and
Edith began to breathe more freely.
She hastened to put on her jacket, preparatory to leaving the house.
But an instant afterward her heart leaped into her throat, as she
caught the sound of the hurried opening and shutting of the library
door again.
Then there came swift steps over the stairs.
Edith knew that Emil Correlli was coming to ascertain if she were safe
within her room; that he feared if Giulia had succeeded in gaining an
entrance there, without being discovered, she might possibly have
escaped in the same way.
She moved noiselessly across the room toward the dressing-case and
opened a drawer, just as there came a knock on her door.
"Is that you, Mrs. Goddard?" Edith questioned, in her usual tone of
voice, though her heart was beating with great, frightened throbs.
"No; it is I," responded Emil Correlli. "I wish to speak with you a
moment, Edith."
"You must excuse me just now, Mr. Correlli," the girl replied, as she
rattled the stopper to one of the perfumery bottles on the
dressing-case; "I am dressing, and cannot see any one just at
present."
"Oh!" returned the voice from without, in a modified tone, as if the
man were intensely relieved by her reply. "I beg your pardon; but when
can I see you--how long will it take you to finish dressing?"
Edith glanced at the clock, and a little smile of triumph curled her
lips, for she saw that the hands pointed to half-past two.
"Not more than fifteen or twenty minutes, perhaps," she returned.
"Ah, you are relenting!" said the man, eagerly. "You will come down by
and by--you will dine with us this evening, Edith?" he concluded, in
an appealing tone.
There was again a moment of hesitation on Edith's part, as if she were
debating the question with herself; but if he could have seen her
eyes, he would have been appalled by the look of fire and loathing
that blazed in them.
"Mr. Correlli," she said at last, in a tone which he interpreted as
one of timid concession, "I--I wish to do what is right and--I think
perhaps I will come down as soon as I finish dressing."
His face lighted and flushed with triumph.
He believed that she was yielding--won over by the munificent gifts
with which he had crowded her room.
"Ah! thank you! thank you!" he responded, with delight. "But take your
own time, dear, and make yourself just as beautiful as possible, and I
will come up for you in the course of half an hour."
He flattered himself that he would be well rid of Giulia by that time;
and having assured himself that Edith was safe in her room, and, as he
believed, gradually submitting to his terms, he retraced his steps
downstairs, the cruel lines about his mouth hardening as he went, for
he had resolved to cast off forever the girl who had become nothing
but a burden and an annoyance to him.
Edith did not move until she heard him enter the library again and
close the door after him.
Then, hurriedly buttoning her jacket and pinning on her hat, she took
from her trunk the package which she had made up an hour before, stole
softly from her room and down the back stairs to the area hall.
The outer door was closed and bolted--the gas-man having long since
finished his errand and departed--and she could hear the cook and one
of the maids conversing in the kitchen just across the hall.
Evidently no one had attempted to go upstairs since Giulia's entrance,
consequently the key had not yet been missed nor the door discovered
to be unlocked.
Cautiously slipping the bolt to the street door, Edith quickly passed
out, closing it noiselessly after her.
Another moment she was in the street, speeding with swift, light steps
across the park.
Then, bending her course through Dartmouth street, she came to a
narrow, crooked way called Buckingham street, which led her directly
out upon Columbus avenue, when, turning to the left, she soon came to
the station known by the same name.
Here she had ten minutes to wait, after purchasing her ticket, and the
uneasiness with which she watched the slowly moving hands upon the
clock in the gloomy waiting-room may be imagined.
Her waiting was over at last, and, exactly on time, the train came
thundering to the station.
Edith quickly boarded it, then sank weak and trembling upon the
nearest empty seat, her heart beating so rapidly that she panted with
every breath.
Then the train began to move, and, with a prayer of thankfulness over
her escape, the excited girl leaned back against the cushion and gave
herself up to rest, knowing that she could not now be overtaken before
arriving in New York.
This feeling of security did not last long, however, and she was
filled with dismay as she thought that Emil Correlli would doubtless
discover her flight in the course of half an hour, if he had not
already done so, when he would probably surmise that she would go
immediately to New York and so telegraph to have her arrested upon her
arrival there.
This was a difficulty which she had not foreseen.
What should she do?--how could she circumvent him? how protect herself
and defy his authority over her?
A bright idea flashed into her mind.
She would telegraph to Royal Bryant at the first stop made by the
train, ask him to meet her upon her arrival, and thus secure his
protection against any plot that Emil Correlli might lay for her.
The first stopping-place she knew was Framingham, a small town about
twenty miles from Boston.
The first time the conductor came through the car she asked him for a
Western Union slip, when she wrote the following message and addressed
it to Royal Bryant's office on Broadway:
"Shall arrive at Grand Central Station, via. B. & A. R. R.,
at nine o'clock. Do not fail to meet me. Important.
"EDITH ALLANDALE."
When the conductor came back again, she gave this to him, with the
necessary money, and asked if he would kindly forward it from
Framingham for her.
He cheerfully promised to do so. Then, feeling greatly relieved, Edith
settled herself contentedly for a nap, for she was very weary and
heavy-eyed from the long strain upon her nerves and lack of sleep.
She did not wake for more than three hours, when she found that
daylight had faded, and that the lamps had been lighted in the car.
At New Haven she obtained a light lunch from a boy who was crying his
viands through the train, and when her hunger was satisfied she
straightened her hat and drew on her gloves, knowing that another two
hours would bring her to her destination.
Then she began to speculate upon possible and impossible things, and
to grow very anxious regarding her safety upon her arrival in New
York.
Perhaps Royal Bryant had not received her message.
He might have left his office before it arrived; maybe the officials
at Framingham had even neglected to send it; or Mr. Bryant might have
been out of town.
What could she do if, upon alighting from the train, some burly
policeman should step up to her and claim her as his prisoner?
She had thus worked herself up to a very nervous and excited state by
the time the lights of the great metropolis could be seen in the
distance; her face grew flushed and feverish, her eyes were like two
points of light, her temples throbbed, her pulses leaped, and her
heart beat with great, frightened throbs.
The train had to make a short stop where one road crossed another just
before entering the city, and the poor girl actually grew faint and
dizzy with the fear that an officer might perhaps board the train at
that point.
Almost as the thought flashed through her brain, the car door opened
and a man entered, when a thrill of pain went quivering through every
nerve, prickling to her very finger-tips.
A second glance showed her that it was a familiar form, and she almost
cried out with joy as she recognized Royal Bryant and realized that
she was--safe!
He saw her immediately and went directly to her, his gleaming eyes
telling a story from his heart which instantly sent the rich color to
her brow.
"Miss Allandale!" he exclaimed, in a low, eager tone, as he clasped
her outstretched hand. "I am more than glad to see you once again."
"Then you received my telegram," she said, with a sigh of relief.
"Yes, else I should not be here," he smilingly returned; "but I came
very near missing it. I was just on the point of leaving the office
when the messenger-boy brought it in. I suppose our advertisement is
to be thanked for your appearance in New York thus opportunely."
"Not wholly," Edith returned, with some embarrassment. "If it had been
that alone which called me here, I need not have telegraphed you. I
saw it only yesterday; but my chief reason for coming hither is that I
am a fugitive."
"A fugitive!" repeated her companion, in surprise. "Ah, yes, I
wondered a little over that word 'important' in your message. It
strikes me," he added, smiling significantly down upon her, "that you
left New York in very much the same manner." "Yes," she faltered,
flushing rosily.
"From whom and what were you fleeing, Edith? Surely not from one who
would have been only too glad to shield you from every ill?" said the
young man, in a tenderly reproachful tone, the import of which there
was no mistaking.
She shot one swift glance into his face and saw that his eyes were
luminous with the great love that was throbbing in his manly heart,
and with an inward start of exceeding joy she dropped her lids again,
but not before he had read in the look and the tell-tale flush that
flooded cheek, brow, and neck, that his affection was returned.
"I will forgive you, dear, if you will be kind to me in the future,"
he whispered, taking courage from her sweet shyness and bashfulness.
"And now tell me why you are a fugitive from Boston, for your telegram
was dated from that city."
Thus recalled to herself, and a realization of her cruel situation,
Edith shivered, and a deadly paleness banished the rosy blushes from
her cheeks.
"I will," she murmured, "I will tell you all about the dreadful things
that have happened to me; but not here," she added, with an anxious
glance around. "Will you take me to some place where I shall be safe?"
she continued, appealingly. "I have no place to go unless it is to
some hotel, and I shrink from a public house."
"My child, why are you trembling so?" the young man inquired, as he
saw she was shaking from head to foot. "I am very glad," he added,
"that I was inspired to board the train at the crossing, and thus can
give you my protection in the confusion of your arrival."
"I am glad, too; it was very thoughtful of you," said Edith,
appreciatively; "but--but I am also going to need your help again in a
legal way."
He started slightly at this; but replied, cheerfully:
"You shall have it; I am ready to throw myself heart and hand between
you and any trouble of whatever nature. Now about a safe place for you
to stay while you are in the city. I have a married cousin who lives
on West Fortieth street; we are the best of friends and she will
gladly entertain you at my request, until you can make other
arrangements."
"But to intrude upon an entire stranger--" began Edith, looking
greatly disturbed.
"Nellie will not seem like a stranger to you, two minutes after you
have been introduced to her," the young man smilingly returned. "She
is the dearest, sweetest little cousin a man ever had, and she has an
equal admiration for your humble servant. She will thank me for
bringing you to her, and I am sure that you will be happy with her.
But why do you start so?--why are you so nervous?" he concluded, as
she sprang from her seat, when the train stopped, and looked wildly
about her.
"I am afraid," she gasped.
"Afraid of what?" he urged, with gentle persistence.
"Of a man who has been persecuting me," she panted, the look of
anxious fear still in her eyes. "I ran away from him to-day, and I
have been afraid, all the way to New York, that he would telegraph
ahead of the train, and have me stopped--that was why I sent the
message to you."
"I am very glad you did," said the young man, gravely. "But, Edith,
pray do not look so terrified; you are sure to attract attention with
that expression on your face. Calm yourself and trust me," he
concluded, as he took her hand and laid it upon his arm.
"I do--I will," she said; but her fingers closed over his with a
spasmodic clasp which told him how thoroughly wrought up she was.
"Have you a trunk?" he inquired, as they moved toward the door, the
train having now entered the Grand Central Station.
"No; I left everything but a few necessary articles--I can send for it
later by express," she responded.
The young man assisted her from the train, then replacing her hand
upon his arm, was about to signal for a carriage when they were
suddenly confronted by a policeman and brought to a halt in the most
summary manner.
"Sorry to trouble you, sir," said the man, speaking in a business-like
tone to Mr. Bryant, "but I have orders to take this lady into
custody."