THE FALSE STORY AND THE FORGED LETTER.
Early in the morning, Cora sent a note to Clarence Brooks, full of
regrets that she had not been able to receive him the day before. Her
aunt was better, she said, and she wished very much to see Mr. Brooks as
soon as possible. An affair, which she could not speak of except to a
very particular friend, who had been her father’s friend also, was
troubling her greatly; indeed, it had been the cause of her aunt’s
illness. Would Mr. Brooks come prepared to give her his most serious
attention and some little sympathy? She was so young, the trouble that
had come upon her seemed worse than it might appear to his experienced
judgment.
In reply to this letter, Mr. Brooks wrote that he had intended to call
that day, and would be most happy to give her aid or counsel in any
difficulty which beset her. Indeed, as the daughter of his old friend,
he had an especial interest in her tranquillity and welfare which no
time or circumstance could destroy. He only hoped that it would prove
his good fortune to remove any little unpleasantness that had for a
moment distressed her.
Cora read the letter eagerly.
“That is well,” she muttered; “before night he shall share my troubles,
I will pledge myself to that. If my sweet cousin will only oblige me by
going out now, she will serve a double purpose; I must find those
jewels. Where can she keep them? Not a drawer, wardrobe or desk that I
have not searched. If she once gets the money for that wretch I am lost.
Let me think; a sharp intellect and prompt action might turn even that
to account. If one could only be in two places at once now. In her
conversation with that little hunchback she will be sure to betray the
hiding-place of those jewels, but I cannot spend my time there. He might
call at any minute.”
Brooks did not call till afternoon, when Cora went down to receive him
in the little reception room, which looked towards the woods. The
curtains were all drawn back this time, and the blinds open. She was
determined to give no chance for listeners in that interview.
“My aunt is better, thank you, but not quite able to come down,” she
said, answering his polite inquiries and seating herself on the sofa he
occupied. “You must think it strange that I should send that note,
but—but—”
Here Cora’s fine eyes filled with ready tears, and her speech gave way
for a moment. Brooks was surprised and touched. It was not often that
Miss Lander gave way in this fashion. He reached forth his hand, laying
it upon hers, and felt the quiver that ran through her frame stirring
that.
“I trust it is nothing serious; do not agitate yourself so. Tell me what
the trouble is and I may be of use.”
“I tried to keep it from you—I tried to keep it from everybody, but now
it is impossible; I must confide in some one. So young and
inexperienced, how can I help it? It is cruel, so cruel in my cousin to
drive me to this strait.”
“Your cousin, Miss Lander—is all this agitation about your cousin?” said
Brooks, struck with sudden amazement.
“Yes, Mr. Brooks, you never will know all that I am suffering on her
account. It is impossible for any one to understand it who has not loved
her as I did—and do, for, with all her faults, I _cannot_ help loving
her.”
“Pray, explain,” said Brooks, a little coldly, “I do not understand.”
“How can you—oh, Mr. Brooks? But I will tell you from the beginning. You
know that my cousin and I were educated together—that my father made no
difference between us. He was one of the most liberal men you ever
knew—”
“I am aware of that.”
Brooks was arming himself against this girl, and she saw it. A stern,
angry fire came into his eyes—he withdrew his hand from the trembling
fingers that clung to it, and sat more upright, like a judge listening.
He remembered what Virginia had told him regarding the enmity of her
cousin, and took up her cause warmly in his heart. Cora saw this with
one of her side glances, and went on confident of the result.
“We were at school in Paris and in Brussels, and went to Florence
afterward to study Italian there. In this place, attended by a governess
and faithful old courier, we joined a party of Americans and travelled
over Italy some five or six months before my poor father came to bring
us home. Up to this time, Mr. Brooks, Virginia and I had been like twin
sisters. We loved each other dearly, trusted each other in thought and
word—she was everything to me.”
Here Cora broke off with a sob in her throat. That creature would have
made a magnificent actress; she really half believed the story she was
telling, and wept as artists shed real tears in their imaginary
characters.
“But in Italy, Mr. Brooks, all this changed. She kept away from me,
insisted on having a room to herself, went out alone for hours and hours
together, was unsettled in her spirits—in short here she gave the first
wound to a love that had united us from the cradle. Some weeks after,
the old courier explained all this to me. Virginia had made an
acquaintance and formed an attachment, which she kept from me and every
one. Some strange young man, travelling for pleasure or in pursuit of a
calling I did not dream of at the time, had won her heart from us. How
or where she first met him I do not know, but her first letter was
written from Florence.”
“To whom and where was it directed?” asked Brooks, sternly.
“I do not know. The courier spoke no English, and could not pronounce
the name intelligibly. Besides, I was a mere school girl then and shrunk
from prying into my cousin’s secrets. I only know that several letters
passed between these two persons before my father came.”
“Did you tell him of this?”
“It would have seemed like treason to my cousin. Thank Heaven he was
spared the misery of knowing how his generosity had been wasted.”
“Go on, I am listening,” said Brooks, in a cold, hard voice.
Cora looked at him timidly, as if so ashamed of her cousin’s conduct
that it weighed her eyelids down, and went on:
“We sailed in that fatal steamer. The fire broke out when my cousin and
I were in the cabin; we both rushed on deck, I to my father. She plunged
overboard, abandoning us both to perish, and was taken up, swimming for
her life, by one of the boats. I cannot describe the scene to which she
left us—the fire raging under our feet, the passengers driven closer and
closer together like wild animals in the heart of a prairie fire. My
father and I together; he begged me to leap overboard alone and thus
save myself, knowing how well I could swim. But I would not do it.
Clinging to each other, we made the fearful leap together. Others
pressed upon us, tore us apart—I never saw my father again. Around and
around that burning hulk I swam in search of him. At last the hot flames
drove me away. The boat in which Virginia had found shelter was still in
sight, lying motionless: I made for it, fighting the waves with
desperate energy. She saw me—I know that Virginia saw me, but the boat
never stirred. At last the men seemed to rebel against the cruelty of
seeing a poor girl sink before their eyes and came toward me. I was
sinking, senseless, almost dead, when they picked me up. In the boat
with my cousin, was a little hunchbacked creature who had fastened on
her in the water and thus saved herself. This girl, Ellen Nolan, became
warmly attached to her from that time, and has ever since been the
creature of her will. I think, at this moment, she would work, sin or
die for the girl who saved her life. I consented that this girl should
come with us to America when we were at last rescued by a passing
vessel. The secrecy she maintained and her course in the shipwreck had
disturbed my confidence in her, but I loved her in spite of all and
resolved to deal generously by her and her mother, as my father had
done.
“We reached home—my aunt had taken possession of the property under a
will found in my father’s desk: she believed us all lost, and we took
her by surprise. Mr. Brooks, something transpired then which I will not
dwell upon; you would hardly believe me if I did. It has no bearing on
the point I wish to consult you about, and I have little wish to
prejudice you unnecessarily against my cousin. But it created
estrangements between us which have, I fear, destroyed all my influence
over her—a sad, sad conviction when she stands so much in need of a firm
trusted friend.”
“Go on,” said Brooks, still sitting upright, resolute in his trust of
the woman he loved. “Let me hear all—then I _will_ speak.”
“Mr. Brooks, that man, the person she met in Italy, has followed her
here.”
Brooks started; that shot told upon his armor, and Cora knew it. She
went on in a low and seemingly reluctant voice:
“He is in this neighborhood; she goes out to meet him.”
Again Brooks started, a flash of joy swept his face. She had mistaken
him for the Italian lover, who probably never had an existence.
“He must have come about the time that we did, for I know that she has
met him, from time to time, in the house where he lives, or it may he
boards. Yesterday, just before you called, a youth came here from the
city with a letter for Virginia. I was anxious about her, and went down
to question him. I wore a black dress, as she does invariably, and
people say that I and my cousin are so much alike that a stranger might
mistake one for the other. I think the boy did take me for Virginia, for
he gave me a note, directed to her, and went on to state the urgent need
there was for action regarding a sum of money that was wanted and must
be obtained. He spoke of jewels which were to be turned into money, and
said, if everything else failed, the rich cousin was to be applied to as
a last resort. All this was said as I stood with the note in my hand.
The lad was earnest and a good deal excited. I found out afterward that
it was his own brother he was pleading for, and that both were the
brothers of Ellen Nolan.”
Brooks suppressed a start of surprise, and seemed to listen as he had
before; but there was a burning red on his cheeks, and even his forehead
grew dusky. He lifted his eyes, that had a strange glow in them, and was
about to say, “Go on,” firmly, as he had before, when his voice faltered
and his hand fell nervelessly down from the back of the sofa, where it
had been resting. Directly before the window, and half way through the
flower garden, he saw Virginia Lander and Ellen Nolan, conversing
earnestly together and walking towards the woods. There in his bosom was
the note, so modestly tender, which told him that they were both going
to the city early that morning. Cora glanced out of the window, saw what
it was that had disturbed him, and said, very naturally:
“There is my cousin now, and Ellen Nolan with her. You have never seen
either of them, I believe.”
Brooks made no answer to this, but leaned back and prepared to listen;
she observed that his face had taken a dead whiteness, and all around
his mouth seemed chiselled from marble.
“I went away, as he thought, I suppose, to read the note alone—”
“And did you?” asked Brooks, with sudden impetuosity.
She smiled faintly and shook her head.
“I could not have forced myself to obtain information in that way.”
“True—very true.”
“I sent the note to Virginia by a servant, and told him to bring the
answer back to me; but she came down herself and gave her reply to the
lad, with some whispered message, which I did not hear. I have no idea
what his reason was, but this messenger, who seemed as much interested
in the affair as a principal, did not leave the house as another person
would have done, but went across the lawn, through the thick wet grass,
into the woods yonder. It was raining hard, and I stood by the window a
long time, wondering what could take him in that direction, when I saw
him come out from among the trees, accompanied by another person, who
probably had been waiting there.”
“Did you get a full view of this person?” asked Brooks, quickly. “Was he
tall or short, light or dark?”
“He was above the middle height and seemed young, but a large Mackintosh
concealed his figure, and I was not near enough to distinguish his
features. They went down toward the road in company, and that was all I
saw of them.”
“And what conclusion do you draw from all this?” asked Brooks.
“I am unable to draw conclusions, Mr. Brooks, or decide on what ought to
be done; one thing is certain, my cousin is in a dangerous position; she
has been led into some entanglement which will be her ruin. The brother
of Ellen Nolan can be no proper match for Virginia Lander, and if he
were, why this secrecy? She is under no guardianship; my aunt loves her
devotedly, and would interpose no objections to a proper marriage. I
stand ready—and she knows it—to bestow the portion my father intended
for her—more, even. Why does she have concealments, then, from her best
friends? How am I to protect her? What can I do? My aunt has fretted
herself into a pitiable state of nervous weakness since she obtained a
knowledge of this trouble, and looks to me for counsel and help. I have
tried to gain Virginia’s confidence in every way, but she avoids me,
scarcely recognizes her mother, and is only intimate with this strange
hunchback, _his_ sister.”
Brooks shrunk from the recollection this speech brought to his mind. Had
not Virginia repudiated her mother even to him? Had she not refused to
recognize the maternal right of consent to his proposal of marriage? He
arose, and, taking his hat, would have left the house without speaking a
word.
“Have you no counsel to give me? Remember how young I am,” pleaded Cora,
following him. “Have I done wrong in telling you this?”
“Wrong! who says you have done wrong? I have a right to know.”
“Can you give me neither comfort nor advice, Mr. Brooks?”
He laid one hand on her arm and stood smiling on her for at least a
minute, but the smile upon a face so white made her shrink.
“In a few days, Miss Lander, I shall be better prepared to advise you.
It is a delicate matter, and must not be rashly handled. Good
afternoon.”
He seemed firm, but the hat which he had taken shook in his hand.
“This has been a painful conversation, believe me. I tried to avoid it.
If there had been any other person with whom the family honor could be
entrusted, I would not have troubled you.”
“There is no other person—there must be no confidences with strangers on
a subject like this.”
“No, I felt that, oh! how forcibly.”
She clasped her hand on his arm, thus mutely claiming his sympathy.
Tears stood in her eyes; she closed those long silken lashes and crushed
them back as if ashamed of the sweet feminine impulse which had sent
them from a kind heart.
“My father would have been so sorry,” she faltered.
Brooks put her hand gently from his arm and turned away; for the heart
in his bosom began to swell, and he was afraid of the passion that had
well nigh outmastered his manhood.
Cora watched Clarence Brooks as he went down the carriage drive; her
features did not change, she had acted her part so well that it seemed
absolutely real to her.
“What a grand heart is there—how good and kind he is.”
She stood awhile by the window with those false tears on, her eyelashes,
wondering if he would follow Virginia to the woods or go directly to the
hotel. He went down the terrace steps and took the railway track, which
curved in a circuitous bend there, making his walk twice as long as it
would have been by the carriage drive.
“He will go there—it is only because he thinks that some of us may see
him. Ah! there they come; I shall have time.”
Virginia and Ellen came across the lawn, walking slowly and with an air
of depression. Cora watched them impatiently.
“Will they never go in?” she cried, stamping her foot on the carpet.
“Twenty minutes, I only ask twenty minutes.”
She ran up stairs, put on the shawl which was so nearly the color of
dead leaves, and went down the back way. Once out of doors, she took a
path, well sheltered by shrubbery, which led around the stables, and
skirting the grounds, mostly under the protection of a stone wall,
entered the ravine a little below the cataract. Here she took the
footpath, treading it like a panther, and sheltering herself behind a
clump of wild spruce trees, took an observation. No one was in sight.
The ravine was a solitude; by this time the leaves were almost swept
from the trees, giving deeper gloom to the evergreens, which grew
thickly along the brook. After making sure that she was not observed,
Cora darted down below the bridge, dipped a letter, which she took from
her bosom, in the brook, and climbed the bank again. Just where the path
was broken up by the roots and stones which formed an embankment for the
log cabin, Cora threw the wet paper down among the leaves, partly
unfolded as if it had opened in falling. The leaves all around it were
still moist and sodden from the storm; she trailed a torn oak leaf half
across it, and made her way up the ravine, swiftly as she had entered
it, and went home, sheltering herself, as before, back of the stone wall
and in the thick shrubbery.
She was right, ten minutes after Clarence Brooks came, with long,
powerful strides, up the ravine, searching for Virginia Lander. His
strong spirit was determined to throw off the doubts that oppressed it
or learn the worst at once. He had not seen her return from the woods,
and felt an almost savage wish to find her where he could wrest the
secret from her heart and crush her with scorn, or hear the vindication
which he still hoped, and almost believed that she would be enabled to
make.
But the woods was solitary as a grave; the foliage had been so
completely swept from the trees that he could command a full view up the
ravine from the stone bridge to the cataract, that mocked him with a
sharp pang of memory, and he thought of that pic-nic on the ledge with a
sudden rush of feeling which absolutely brought hot tears to his eyes.
Virginia was not anywhere in sight; the whole ravine was a solitude, all
the hollows were full of dank leaves, the forest turf was carpeted with
them, not as they had been, rich and gorgeous only a week before, but
with the colors all washed out, broken and sodden, decaying refuse of
the autumn. The naked boughs rose drearily against a dull sky, sending
forth that low metallic chiming which is the winter music of the woods.
The brook, bereft of half its brightness, crept along, saddened, like a
criminal going to judgment. The chestnut tree was studded with brown
burs, open like stars, from which all the nuts had fallen. A few long,
ragged leaves fluttered on the branches and from the topmost boughs two
crows called to each other gloomily.
“I will go up to the cabin,” that unhappy man muttered to himself.
“Possibly they are among the evergreens and I can see them from the
window.”
As he turned to mount the eminence that paper fell under his
observation. He stooped, picked it up almost mechanically, and was about
to throw it down again, when something in the writing fixed his
attention. The paper was wet but not much blotted; with a little trouble
he read it from beginning to end, and, strange to say, a sensation of
relief succeeded the reading; that dead certainty which follows
suspense, though it amounts to despair, is always a relief, for the
tension of nerves gives way and a species of rest follows.
“It is true! She loves some other man—she never loved me. This beautiful
creature, with her innocent looks and frank speech, is one mass of
deception. Amos Lander’s letter warned me of this clearly as his
generous nature could warn the friend he loved against a creature of his
bounty. But I was wilfully blind, worse than blind, a willing idiot.
Still there was some excuse for me; a lovelier creature than she seemed
never possessed a man’s heart.”
Brooks did not enter the cabin but turned drearily, as men prepare to
leave a grave newly filled, and walked slowly toward the hotel, so
wretched that he scarcely cared to live, for if ever man loved a woman
on this earth he had loved Virginia Lander.
Meantime Virginia and Ellen had returned home from a dreary walk
disappointed; Ellen had been writing hard since the first break of day,
writing as only one whose genius is inspired by a noble purpose can
write. Sheet after sheet of manuscript she had flung from her, eager for
the next, panting to complete the work which would redeem her brother
from the peril that threatened him. But, with the best of us, the spirit
is sometimes willing when the flesh is weak. Virginia saw that Ellen
grew pale as she wrote, that her little hand trembled to and fro on the
paper, leaving blots and erasures behind it. She went up to the desk and
leaned caressingly on the writer’s shoulder.
“Come, Ellen, stop writing a little while.”
Ellen shook the arm from her shoulder and went on with her work.
“No, no; God has given me these hours to finish in. Do let me alone!”
“But I am so anxious to go out. He will be regretting our absence and go
up to the cabin—I feel sure of it!”
“_He!_ oh, he cannot come here till my work has set him above all fear.”
“I was not speaking of your brother, Ellen.”
Ellen took her mind, with a wrench, from its subject, and tried hard to
understand what was wanted of her. She had that essential qualification
for an author, and that rare thing among women, a power of strong
concentration, and it possessed her then entirely.
“What—what is it?” she questioned, while the pen quivered in her hand.
“Afraid this will hurt me?—Not at all. Fresh air?—We can have plenty of
that by-and-by.”
“But it is for myself I am so anxious to go out,” said Virginia, partly
in her own behalf, and partly because the pallor on that thin face
terrified her.
“You, yourself?” Ellen flung down her pen. “Well, what is it you would
like, lady? I—I am ready. A walk? Of course, nothing better, only don’t
let us stay out long. You see, I am close upon the ending, and—and—my
things? Oh yes, I will have them on in a minute.”
In this state of bewilderment, Ellen went out, following Virginia almost
in silence to the woods. She had not entirely gained command of her own
mind, which would keep turning back to the creation it had left with
such reluctance. They found the ravine solitary, and so changed, that
Virginia felt oppressed by everything she saw.
“He is not here. He will not come to-day. Why should he, thinking us in
the city?”
With these words, she wandered on up to the little cataract, which had
lost all its crystal brightness, and was swollen by the rains into a
great outgush of muddy water. Here she lingered about awhile, looking
anxiously down the ravine for the person who was listening with a
burning heart to Cora Lander’s falsehood.
“He is not here! It is of no use waiting; the storm has made everything
so dreary that it chills one. Shall we go back, Ellen?”
“Back?” answered Ellen, eagerly. “Oh, certainly; this air has done me so
much good.”
So the two girls went home again, one sad and out of spirits, the other
eager for work. They saw nothing of Brooks, who had just left the house,
but went at once to the parlor up stairs, where Ellen fell to her
writing again and Virginia sat down by the window, wondering why
Clarence Brooks had not yet come to the house as he proposed.
It was getting dark, when Eunice came into the room, carrying an ottoman
in her arms.
“Here,” she said, setting it on the floor, “take out what there is in it
quick! She’s gone down to tea, and I must have it back again afore she
comes up. The critter has got eyes like a hawk.”
Virginia started from the window, touched a spring in the wood-work and
flung back the top of the ottoman, revealing a miscellaneous heap of
papers, jewel-boxes, pen-holders and loose ornaments.
Eunice snatched Ellen’s shawl which had fallen back from her chair,
spread it on the carpet and emptied all these things into it. Then she
closed the ottoman with a snap, and carried it away, muttering:
“The Lord knows they’re your own property, and you’re welcome to ’em.”
Ellen wrote on, she had neither heard nor seen anything of this. Away in
a world of her own, she was working out a brother’s freedom. Once more
Virginia aroused her.
“Ellen! Ellen! we have got the jewels! See here! these pearls most be of
great value—and these, and these!”
Ellen started and looked up, holding her pen suspended.
“What is it? Pearls, and such pearls!” she cried, as Virginia laid the
necklace of large strung pearls, with seven pear-shaped pendants, on the
paper before her. “And diamonds too! We shall go to the city now. No
more delay. God bless you, dear, dear lady, for this! I am so tired that
thanks struggle in my bosom without utterance; but I feel them. I wonder
why Eunice don’t bring in the tea, my throat is parched and my eyes
burn—why don’t she bring in the tea?”
“She brought it an hour ago, Ellen, and you drank two cups.”
“Did she? I knew nothing about it, a glass of water will do just as
well. These things, how beautiful they are! Your mother’s too! It is
cruel, but you shall have them back again. I feel it in my heart that
these sheets of paper will redeem your mother’s jewels. Strange, isn’t
it, that these blotted pages should have gold in them? I cannot
comprehend it.”
Here this strange girl fell to her work again, while Virginia carried
her treasures into the next room, where she lay down on the bed, sad at
heart and weeping softly because of the loneliness brought on by two
days’ absence from the man she loved so devotedly.
Between eight and nine o’clock that night, Virginia was aroused by the
tread of a horse passing by the house, and going to a window, looked
out. The clouds had all rolled themselves away in billows of fiery gold
at sunset that night, and the broad, silvery radiance of a full moon
fell upon the earth. Virginia saw nothing, but she still heard, the
cautious footfall of a horse falling upon turf near the house.
“It is one of the servants going on some errand,” she thought, and went
back to her half darkened room again. Ellen wrote on, made restless for
an instant by the strange sound, but unconscious of it the next moment.
Joshua Hurd, who had gone to bed very early that night, heard a strange
noise in the stables just as he was falling asleep. He got up, opened
the window and looked out. The front of the stables was flung into deep
shadow by the drooping elm trees, but he distinctly saw a white horse
come out from the open door with a lady on his back.
“What on arth does it mean?” he muttered. “That is Snowball; but which
of the wimmen folks is it, and what is she up to?”
That moment the horse came into the moonlight and he saw the lady’s
face, clearly as any face could be seen, with a soft hat drawn over the
forehead and shaded by a long feather.
“That long feather belongs to her, sure enough; that she sarpent never
wears one. What can she want a horseback this time o’ night? If ’twas
t’other, I shouldn’t wonder, but her! Well, it’s all right, I haint no
doubt. She’s a good gal, if ever one lived, and I ain’t a going to tell
nothing about her even to our Eunice. Least said is soonest mended. But
where on arth can she be a going?”