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THE OLD COUNTESS;
OR,
THE TWO PROPOSALS.
BY
MRS. ANN S. STEPHENS.
AUTHOR OF "LORD HOPE'S CHOICE," "THE REIGNING BELLE," "MARRIED
IN HASTE," "MABEL'S MISTAKE," "DOUBLY FALSE," "WIVES AND
WIDOWS," "MARY DERWENT," "THE REJECTED WIFE," "THE SOLDIER'S
ORPHANS," "THE OLD HOMESTEAD," "FASHION AND FAMINE," "THE
HEIRESS," "RUBY GRAY'S STRATEGY," "THE CURSE OF GOLD," "SILENT
STRUGGLES," "THE WIFE'S SECRET," "PALACES AND PRISONS," "THE
GOLD BRICK," "A NOBLE WOMAN."
A SEQUEL TO "LORD HOPE'S CHOICE."
PHILADELPHIA:
T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS;
306 CHESTNUT STREET.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by
T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
CONTENTS.
Chapter PAGE
I.--LOVE LIGHTS IN TWO HEARTS. 23
II.--CLARA APPEALS TO HER STEPMOTHER. 30
III.--LOVERS' QUARREL. 40
IV.--THE ITALIAN TEACHER. 48
V.--THE MOTHER AND DAUGHTER IN OPPOSITION. 57
VI.--SOME OLD ACQUAINTANCES GET INTO A CONJUGAL
DIFFICULTY. 68
VII.--THE OPERATIC SUPPER. 77
VIII.--BEHIND THE SCENES. 86
IX.--THE FIRST PERFORMANCE. 91
X.--THE TWO FOSTER-CHILDREN MEET. 96
XI.--LADY CLARA QUARRELS WITH HER STEPMOTHER. 101
XII.--THE OLD PRISONER. 107
XIII.--THE OLD COUNTESS. 116
XIV.--THE OLD COUNTESS AND HER SERVANT. 122
XV.--THE EARL'S RETURN. 133
XVI.--THE WIFE AND THE DAUGHTER. 143
XVII.--HUSBAND AND WIFE. 152
XVIII.--THE STORMY NIGHT AND SUNSHINY MORNING. 159
XIX.--AFTER THE FAILURE. 167
XX.--LORD HILTON TAKES SUPPER WITH OLYMPIA. 176
XXI.--ON THE WAY TO HOUGHTON CASTLE. 184
XXII.--THE OLD COUNTESS. 191
XXIII.--EXPLANATIONS AND CONCESSIONS. 197
XXIV.--DOWN BY THE BROOK AMONG THE FERNS. 203
XXV.--HOW LADY CLARA GOT HER OWN WAY. 208
XXVI.--THE QUARREL AND THE LETTER. 214
XXVII.--MAGGIE CASEY MEETS HER OLD LOVER. 220
XXVIII.--JUST FIFTY POUNDS. 224
XXIX.--OLYMPIA'S DEFEAT. 232
XXX.--THE FAMILY MEETING AT HOUGHTON. 240
XXXI.--DOWN AMONG THE FERNS AGAIN. 247
XXXII.--OUT AMONG THE TREES. 253
XXXIII.--THE BALL AT HOUGHTON. 263
XXXIV.--THE OLD WOMAN WANDERS BACK AGAIN. 269
XXXV.--LADY HOPE IN THE CASTLE. 274
XXXVI.--DEATH IN THE TOWER-CHAMBER. 280
XXXVII.--THE NEMESIS. 289
THE OLD COUNTESS; OR, THE TWO PROPOSALS.
CHAPTER I.
LOVE-LIGHTS IN TWO HEARTS.
During fourteen years Hepworth Closs had been a wanderer over the earth.
When he was carried out from the court-room after Mrs. Yates' confession
of a crime which he had shrinkingly believed committed by another, he
had fainted from the suddenness with which a terrible load had been
lifted from his soul.
In that old woman's guilt he had no share. It swept the blackness from
the marriage he had protested against as hideously wicked. The wrong he
had done was divested of the awful responsibilities which had seemed
more than he could bear. The revelation had made him, comparatively, an
innocent and free man. But a shock had been given to his whole being
which unfitted him for the common uses of society.
After all that had passed through his mind he could not bear to think of
joining his sister or husband. The keen feelings of a nature, not in
its full development wicked or dishonorable, had been startled into
life, when he saw into what a gulf he had almost plunged. He saw the sin
and the wrong he had done in its true light, and not only repented of
it, but abhorred it from the very depths of his soul. He longed to make
atonement, and would have given ten years from his life for a chance by
which he could have sacrificed himself to any one that poor murdered
lady had loved.
These feelings rose up like a barrier between him and his sister. Her
influence over his youth had been so powerful that his own better nature
never might have asserted itself but for the tragedy which followed his
first plunge into deception and wrong-doing. He loved this beautiful
young woman yet, as few brothers of any age or class ever did; but the
shock of that tragedy was on him, and his impulse was to flee from her
and the man for whose sake all this trouble had come.
Hepworth Closs was not the first youth whose life has opened with evil
thoughts and evil deeds, from which his manhood shrank appalled.
The unformed intellect and quick passions of youth have wrecked many a
noble soul, by the sin of an hour or a day, beyond the redemption of a
toiling and regretful after-life. The man who does redeem himself must
have a powerful nature, which will force its strength to be recognized,
and make its regeneration felt. But to the sins of youth much should be
forgiven, which, in the mature man, justice might utterly condemn.
Hepworth Closs arose from that fainting fit humbled and grateful. That
moment his resolve was taken. He would not share the benefits which
might come to him through his sister's marriage, nor in anything partake
of a reward for the evil he had, in mercy, been saved from. The world
was before him. He would work his way into prosperity, if possible; if
not, bear his fate like a man who had deserved suffering, and could
endure it.
One act of restitution was in his power. The property of the unfortunate
person, whom he knew as Lady Hope, had fallen into his possession, for
the house had been purchased in his name, and, in like manner, her
deposits had been made. He had never intended to claim this money as his
own, and invested it now, holding himself as the trustee. This done, he
threw himself upon the world, quite alone.
During fifteen years he had asserted the honorable manhood that had
sprung out of his erring youth. That fearful tragedy had sickened him
with deception, and with all ambition which did not spring out of his
own honest exertions. He went forth, with all his energies on the alert,
and his intellect free from the suspicions that had for a time
enthralled it. He had craved riches, and hoped to obtain them through
Rachael's marriage. This had been a temptation. He had ambition still,
but it took a far more noble direction. With wealth he would gather
knowledge; with both, mental force and moral power.
He went. Men saw him in the gold mines of California, in Australia, and
among the traders of India and Japan. Then he came back to New York, and
was honorably known upon the exchange. Then came a yearning wish to see
his sister, the only relative he had on earth; and we find him at the
gate of Oakhurst Park, just as Lady Clara dashed through it, as bright a
vision of joyous, happy girlhood as ever crossed the path of any man.
That moment I think that Hepworth Closs fell in love with the girl. If
so, it was absolutely his first love. The boyish and most unprincipled
passion he had felt for that murdered lady had no similitude with the
feelings that possessed him now. It was a wicked, insane desire,
springing out of his perverted youth--a feeling that he would have
shuddered to have recognized as love, in these, his better days.
Yes, it is certain Closs loved the girl at first sight, but was
unconscious of it, as the nest is when a dove settles down to its
brooding.
As for the girl, she had seen but few men in her life calculated to
disturb the repose of a creature so gifted and rich in imagination. At
first Hepworth had seemed rather an old person to her, notwithstanding
the gloss of his black hair, and the smooth whiteness of his forehead.
With a trust in this, which gradually betrayed her, she accepted him
frankly as a relative, and in less than three weeks, grew restless as a
bird. She wondered what had made the world all at once so gloriously
beautiful, and why it was so difficult for her to keep the tears out of
her eyes when the soft purple evening came down, and divided the day
which had been spent with him, from the night, when she could only hope
to see him in shadowy dreams.
Rachael Closs saw all this, and it filled her with bitter rejoicing. How
would her powerful old enemy receive the intelligence that a brother of
hers had won the heart of the future Lady Carset? that he would be lord
of the proud old castle, which must go with the title, and mingle the
blood she had so often denounced as base with that which had turned
against her, with such hot scorn, ever since she entered England as Lord
Hope's wife?
The very thought of that haughty old peeress so humiliated was
wonderfully pleasant to the wounded pride of Rachael Closs. But far
beyond this was the yearning, almost passionate fondness she felt for
her brother and the beautiful girl who had been to her at once a Nemesis
and an infatuation.
This was what Lady Hope had hinted at when Hepworth first came. The
great wish of her heart had grown to be the union of these two persons,
next to one supreme object of love, the dearest beings to her on earth.
It seemed to her that those long, weary intervals, which grew more and
more frequent, when Lord Hope left her alone in the desolate splendor of
that great house, would be more endurable if she were certain that these
two persons would always be near her. She was not ambitious for her
brother. That feeling had died out years ago; but her love sprang to
him, like a freshly-kindled flame.
With Lady Hope, as with Rachael Closs, there was no moderation in her
feelings, which were tenacious as they were powerful and exacting. But
Rachael, with all her impetuosity, had strong contradictory qualities.
She was sagacious, and could rein in her passion of love or hate as an
Arab controls his desert steed. That which her soul most desired she
could wait for.
One night, when the moonbeams lay like silver on the stone terrace, and
the shadow of the peacock fell from the balustrade like a second bird,
Lady Hope complained of fatigue, and retreated into her own room,
leaving Hepworth and Clara sitting upon a flight of steps which led down
to a flower-garden, somewhat neglected of late years, which lay beneath
the stone terrace and brightened the grounds nearest to the lady's
apartments. Not far from these steps was a noble old cedar of Lebanon,
rooted deep, where the drawbridge had been hundreds of years before.
Beneath it was a rustic seat, and in its branches innumerable birds were
sleeping.
There never was, perhaps, a finer contrast of silver light and black
shadow in any landscape than surrounded these two persons, as they sat
together side by side, both thinking of the same thing, and both
reluctant to break the delicious silence.
At last Hepworth spoke--it was but a single word, which made his
companion start and hold her breath.
"Clara!"
She did not answer him; that one word frightened her. She had half a
mind to start up and hide herself in the shadows, for he was looking in
her face, and the moonlight fell like a glory over his features, which
she now saw were grave even to sadness.
"Clara, do you know that I must go away soon?"
"Oh, no! no!"
The girl had not expected this. The infinite tenderness in his voice had
led her completely astray, and she broke forth in an eager protest.
"I must, dear child."
"Dear child!" repeated the girl, half crying. "Yes, yes, you treat me
like a child--as if I could help being young--as if I could not feel and
think and be miserable like other people. It's hard, it's cruel,
it's--it's--"
Here Clara burst into a flood of tears, and leaping to her feet, would
have run into the room where Lady Hope was sitting, but Closs caught her
in his arms.
"What are you crying for, Clara? Why do you wish to run away? It is
wrong to say this, but I must go, because of loving you as no man ever
loved a woman before."
"A woman?" said Clara, and gleams of mischief peeped out from behind her
tears. "You called me a child just now."
"Woman or child, Clara, you are the dearest thing to me on earth."
Clara struggled in his arms, and tried to push him from her.
"I--I don't believe you. There!"
"Don't believe me?"
Hepworth released the girl, and allowed her to stand alone. On any
subject touching his honor he was peculiarly sensitive.
"Because--because men who love people don't run away from them. It--it
isn't reasonable."
All the mischief in her eyes was drowned in fresh tears. She thought
that he was offended, and the estrangement of a moment seems eternal to
first love.
"Honorable men do not permit themselves to speak of love at all where
they have reason to think it unwelcome," was his grave reply.
"Unwelcome? Oh, Mr. Closs!"
Clara held out both her hands and came nearer to Hepworth, like a child
that wants to be forgiven. He drew her close to his side, but spoke a
little sadly.
"You see how much I must love you, Clara, to forget all that a guest in
your father's house should remember."
"I--I don't know; I can't understand what it is that you have done
wrong. I'm sure I'm ready to forgive you."
She might have said more, but he took the breath from her lips, and held
her so close to his heart that she could feel its tumultuous beatings.
"But I can never forgive myself, darling."
"Oh, yes you will!"
The creature pursed up her lips and offered them for his kiss--thus, as
she thought, tempting him into self-forgiveness.
"Is it that you really--really love me?" questioned Hepworth, searching
the honest eyes she lifted to his with a glance half-passionate,
half-sorrowful, which brought a glow of blushes to her face.
"Can you ask that now?" she questioned, drooping her head. "Will a good
girl take kisses from the man she does not love?"
"God bless you for saying it, darling! Oh, if it could be--if it could
be!"
"If what could be, Mr. Closs?"
"That you might be my wife, live with me forever, love me forever."
"Your wife?" answered Clara, pondering over the sweet word in loving
tenderness. "Your wife? Are you asking me if I will be that?"
"I dare not ask you, Clara. What would your father say? What would he
have a right to say?"
"I'm sure I don't know," answered Clara, ruefully, for she could not
honestly say that her father would consent.
"You see, Clara, I have nothing to do but say farewell, and go."