For an instant their eyes met--his blazing dark and stormy in the clear,
bright moonlight, and his face white and wrathy; even his hands were
clinched fiercely.
All in an instant the old fire and pride blazed up in Dorothy Glenn's
heart.
"You shall not coerce me as if I were your very slave!" she said,
smiting her little hands together and pushing him from her, forgetting
in her great anger whether or not her action accorded well with her
dignity. "They cheered me, and I shall respond!" and before he could
utter one word of protest she had sped like a swallow down the graveled
path and out through the great arched gateway into the very midst of the
throng of merry maidens and young men who were gathered with hilarious
glee around the roaring bonfire.
The great stacks of burning barrels and boxes sent forth a glare of red
light and columns of flame shooting skyward, lighting up the scene with
a grand, weird beauty that lent a splendor to the night.
Great sparks flew heavenward, and the crackling sounds mingled with the
rousing cheers that rent the air.
They all saw Dorothy, the village favorite, flying toward them, and the
great throng parted to make way for her. Then the sport of the evening
went on with renewed vigor.
"Pile on the barrels!" cried one enthusiastic fellow. "Whether the
election is going Democratic or Republican, let's all give three cheers
for the incoming governor!" and a loud huzza that made the old town ring
broke from a couple of hundred throats, but mingled with it sounded a
wild cry of mortal terror in Dorothy's agonizing voice.
"Oh, my God! my eyes--my eyes! the sparks--the sparks have flown into
them! They are burning! Oh, God!"
And with that agonizing cry she fell backward in a dead faint in the
midst of the dazed crowd.
In an instant the greatest confusion prevailed, and the shouts of
laughter were turned to sobs of wailing.
Kind hands quickly raised her and bore her to the house. We will pass
gently, dear reader, over the two weeks that followed, for Gray Gables
was buried in the deepest sorrow.
One of the most pitiful calamities that ever could have befallen a human
being had happened to beautiful, hapless Madcap Dorothy. Poor child! she
was blind!
Never again would she see the light of the golden sunshine--never again
see the green, waving grass and the budding flowerets--never see the
blue sky, with its fleecy clouds, or the heavens at night blazing with
the soft, pale light of the twinkling stars--never again look upon a
human face. But while her life lasted she would grope through a world of
darkness--blind!
The shock had been terrible to both Mrs. Kemp and Harry Kendal, and oh!
in her pitiful condition how she clung to them!
"You will not throw me off now because I am blind, Harry?" she wailed,
laying her head against his bosom and weeping as she had never before
wept in all her young life.
"No!" he said, huskily; and that promise reassured her.
She clasped her white arms around his neck and clung to him in the
abandonment of her pitiful woe.
She was wild and willful Madcap Dorothy no longer.
During the first days of her trial friends flocked to see her, but as
they grew used to the situation they dropped off, and she was left with
only the old housekeeper, and her lover, and the servants of Gray Gables
for her companions.
At first she grieved over the terrible calamity with all the bitterness
of her soul, then by degrees she became reconciled to it.
But the one great anxiety of her life was in regard to her lover. He had
promised to love her still and be true to her; but would he--would he?
The very thought alarmed her soul and became the one terror of her life.
The blind are always acute in other senses.
She felt intuitively, as the days wore on, that he was growing cold
toward her. It was pitiful to see her grasp the hands of the little maid
that had been engaged to take care of her, and hear her beg her to dress
her prettily, and to see that every curl was in place, and the lace at
her throat and sleeves fresh and white.
"Oh, Katy, do I look very horrible?" she would whisper, in a breath of
intense agony, over and over again a hundred times during the day. "Are
there not cruel scars on my face? Oh, God! the terrible fire burned my
eyes to their sockets--dry. Surely I must be a thing so horrible to the
sight, that people who see me turn away quickly, suppressing a cry on
their lips. Is it not so?"
"Oh, no, miss! Believe me, there is not a scar on your pretty face. Your
cheeks have lost a little of their bloom, that is all, and the white
lids gently cover your poor eyes, and the long lashes sweep your cheeks.
You look as though you were walking in your sleep."
"But tell me, Katy," sobbed Dorothy, "do you think Harry does--do you
think Harry could love me as well as before?"
"And why not, miss?" returned the little maid. "Surely, with your
affliction, he should love you doubly more than he ever did before. You
needn't fear about my not dressing you in your prettiest, Miss Dorothy.
Sure, I'm always making little bows and fancy things for your dresses,
and twining the loveliest of flowers in your pretty golden hair!"
Dorothy would smile faintly, piteously, and sigh ever so gently.
Oh, God! the pity of groping around those rooms day in and day out! What
mattered it if she sat by the open window, as she had been wont to do?
She could not see her lover strolling under the maple-trees, even though
she heard his voice and knew he was there.
She would look upon his darkly handsome face never again in this world;
and at times Dorothy's soul grew so bitter over her terrible misfortune
that she wished she could die. As for Harry Kendal, after the first
shock of intense pity over Dorothy's unhappy fate was past, he grew
morose and taciturn.
It was bad enough to wed a maiden whom he did not love with all his
heart and soul--such as he had heard it expressed in the burning,
eloquent words of authors and poets--but to go through life with a blind
woman at his side! The very thought made his soul shudder and grow sick
within him.
He dared not make any attempt to break their engagement just then, for
public sentiment was strongly with the girl; but the chains that bound
him to her began to grow very heavy.
Surely she ought not wish to hold him in thraldom now. It was irksome
for him to go where she was, to passively receive her caresses as well
as attempt to stay her burning tears, and to be obliged to assure her
over and over again, with every breath, that he would be sure to be true
to her.
Alas! what a slender thread of circumstances in this world changes our
fate for weal or for woe!
Ever since the accident had happened, and the doctors had all pronounced
the terrible decree that poor Dorothy would go through life totally
blind, the poor old housekeeper had been maturing a plan in her head
which she thought would be a world of comfort to the poor girl.
Mrs. Kemp had a niece whom she had kept at boarding-school all the
girl's life, for she was an orphan, and she said to herself: "How grand
a plan it would be to bring the girl to Gray Gables to be a companion to
Dorothy until she marries!"
Her niece was a bright, gay creature, and would be just the one to cheer
Dorothy up.
Mrs. Kemp concluded to put this plan into execution at once, as there
was no one to say nay in regard to it, and she wrote to her niece to
come on without delay, little dreaming that this one action would prove
the curse of three lives--aye, the bitterest curse that ever wrung a
human heart, and that heart poor, hapless Dorothy's.
Ah, me! how often in this world that which we mean for the greatest good
turns out the source of the cruelest woe.
Dorothy heard of the plan, and agreed to it eagerly.
"Oh, thank you--thank you for the happy thought, Mrs. Kemp!" she cried;
"for I am lonely--so pitifully lonely. Yes, I would give the world for a
girl of my own age to be a companion to me until--until I marry Harry."
Kendal received the intelligence with a look of interest in his eyes.
"When does your niece come, Mrs. Kemp?" he inquired.
"I expect Iris to come to-morrow," she replied. And on the following
afternoon Iris Vincent arrived.
The carriage met her at the depot. Harry went for her himself. Dorothy
stood at the window, with Katy, her faithful little maid, awaiting Iris'
coming with the greatest impatience.
At last the carriage stopped before the arched gateway, and she heard
the sound of voices, then a peal of light, girlish laughter ringing out
above all the rest.
"Has she come?" whispered Dorothy.
"Yes, miss," murmured the little maid, in a low voice.
"What is she like?" questioned Dorothy, eagerly.
Faithful little Katy looked out of the window, then at Dorothy, a sudden
lump rising in her throat and a great fear at her heart.
She dared not tell her that the strange young girl was as beautiful as a
poet's dream--slim as a young willow, dressed in the height of fashion,
and, worse still--oh, a thousand times worse!--she was bringing all her
charms to bear upon handsome Harry Kendal, who was walking up the
graveled walk with her.
"Why don't you answer me?" cried Dorothy, impatiently.
"She--she is about your height," stammered Katy, "and--and she is very
plain, and--and not so fair as you;" and Katy lifted up her face to
heaven, clasping her hands, whispering to herself: "May God forgive me!
It is my first lie!"