DESERTED.
A year after the fatal tournament in the City of Mexico, a grand
masquerade ball was being held in a salon in New Orleans, and thither
had flocked the beauty and the chivalry of the Crescent City.
Among the cavaliers present who had attracted much attention by his
elegance of form and gorgeous attire was one in Mexican costume.
He had flirted with many of the fair belles, and was always in demand
for a waltz, so gracefully did he dance, and a favored maiden present
was envied by all the others as the Mexican seemed to devote more of
his attention to her than to any one else present. At last he said to
her:
“Though unknown to you, señorita----”
“How do you know that I am a señorita?” was the low query, in the
sweetest of voices.
“My heart tells me that you have never loved, that you are not a
wife; but though unknown to you, let me beg that you take a stroll
with me in the moonlight. Will you go?”
“Yes.”
The word was hardly audible, but the Mexican drew the tiny hand into
his arm and led her from the salon, out upon the piazza, and thence
into the moonlit garden, halting at an arbor.
“Do you know that I can tell who you are, señorita?” the man asked.
He saw the start that she gave at his words, and then she asked:
“Who am I?”
“The beautiful Miss De Latour, whom all the men in the city are
wildly in love with.”
“How do you know?”
“Because from the first moment I saw you I loved you, and I have time
and again sought to win a glance from you, and only yesterday did you
favor me with a smile, as I rode by your house; or was I mistaken,
and the smile but the reflex of some pleasant thought?”
“Señor Marvin, you are mistaken, for I am not Celeste de Latour, the
loveliest and richest girl in the city.”
“Not Miss De Latour? Surely you are not deceiving me?”
“No, you are deceiving me, señor, in telling another that you love
her, _for I am your wife, Austin Marvin_!”
With dexterous hand, she unmasked the man and herself at the same
instant, revealing the faces of the Cavalier of the Rio Grande and
Nina de Sutro.
“My God! Nina, you here?” gasped the man, his face turning livid in
the moonlight.
“Yes, Austin Marvin, I am here on your track. I loved you, my hero
among men, with all my heart and soul. Believing you an honorable
man, I fled from the convent with you, to become your wife, though a
mere girl.
“After a few short months you tired of me, because you knew that I
would not get my fortune until I was twenty-one. Then you deserted
me in a strange land; but I followed you, after reading your cruel
note, and I have found you here after a long and weary search, here,
breathing words of love, as you supposed, to another woman.
“But, Austin, my husband, I will forgive all if you will go with me
from here, for in a few short years I will be in possession of my
riches.”
Quickly came the answer of the man:
“You have conquered, Nina, and if you will forgive me I will go with
you.”
“Come, for I forgive all,” was the happy answer.
One week later Nina de Sutro wrote the following letter, addressed
to an army officer who was her guardian, and who had married her
kinswoman:
“I have given you great distress of mind and heart, and yet love
was my guide, and I believed I acted for the right in leaving the
convent to wed the man whom I met under strange circumstances, and
who once more crossed my path to command me as he might a slave.
“I have lived in a few short months my romance, burned the candle
to the end, and am a deserted wife, finding that I married one
who was a villain, one who sought me alone for my riches, and
finding that I could not, until twenty-one years of age, control my
fortune, fled from me, leaving me alone in a strange city.
“I tracked him, found him making love to another, forgave him all,
and lo! once more he deserted me, this time taking my money and my
jewels, and in my despair I wish to hide the grave in my heart from
all except you, to whom I now make this confession, and the Mother
Superior of the convent, to whom I shall at once return, begging
her to receive me once more as a pupil, as my elopement was not
known, it being said that I had been called suddenly home to the
United States.
“She will take me back, for well I know her kind heart, and when I
have finished my education, if you, my sweet cousin, will allow me,
I will come to you, still known as Nina de Sutro--your name, which,
as my guardian, you gave to me, for I wish not to have the world
know of my unhappy wedded life and the sorrow I have brought upon
myself.
“As for the man who was my husband, I will not care what his fate
may be, nor will I breathe his name even to you or the Mother
Superior, for my past of misfortune, my dream of bliss that ended
almost in despair, shall be as a sealed book.”
The letter was addressed to an officer of the United States Army, who
was stationed at a frontier post of the Northwest.
And back to the convent went the unhappy girl, made her confession,
was forgiven and received as before, for the good Mother Felicite,
the superioress, loved her as her own child, and wept bitter tears of
regret when, two years after, she finished her school-days and went
to join her guardian and his wife in the United States.