The long weeks that had passed since the never-to-be-forgotten steamboat
incident on Labor Day passed like a nightmare to poor Jack Garner.
Slowly but surely the knowledge had come to him that Dorothy, his little
sweetheart, had faded like a dream from his life; and as this became a
settled fact in his mind, his whole nature seemed to change.
He grew reckless, morbid, and gay by turns, until his old mother grew
terrified, fearing for his reason. His whole heart had been in his work
before and his one aim in life had been to make money.
He had saved quite a snug little sum, which he very prudently placed in
the bank.
Now, to his mother's horror, his recklessness lost him his position, and
he did not have enough ambition to try and secure another place, but
commenced to draw his little hoard from the bank, and his money was
disappearing like snow before a summer's sun.
He began coming in late at nights, as well, and the widow, who listened
for his footsteps, cried out in anguish: "Would to God that I had died
ere I had lived to see this horrible change take place in my idolized
son!"
His cousin Barbara keenly felt the change in him. It was she who
comforted the poor old mother, and who pleaded with Jack to try and take
up the duties of life again, and to forget faithless Dorothy.
But he would only shake his head, and answer that he would never cease
to love Dorothy and search for her while life lasted. But troubles never
seem to come singly. One day, as Jack was pacing restlessly up and down
Broadway--the vantage-ground which he always sought at six o'clock each
evening, to scan the faces of the working-girls as they passed, with the
lingering hope in his heart that some day, sooner or later, his
vigilance would be rewarded by seeing Dorothy--a terrible accident
happened which almost cost him his life.
An old sign on one of the corner buildings, which had done service many
a year, suddenly fell, and Jack--poor Jack, was knocked senseless to the
pavement.
Surely it was the workings of Providence that Jessie Staples happened
along just at that critical moment.
With a wild, bitter cry she sprang forward, flinging herself upon the
prostrate body, shrieking out as she saw his handsome, white face with
the stains of blood upon it:
"Oh, Heaven have mercy! It is Jack--Jack Garner!"
Kindly hands raised him. No, he was not dead--only stunned, and terribly
bruised.
A cab was hastily summoned, and, accompanied by Jessie, he was taken
home.
The girl broke the sad news gently to Jack's mother and to Barbara. It
was many and many a day before Jack left his couch; the accident had
proved more dangerous than had been at first anticipated, for brain
fever had set in.
Every day on her way home from the book-bindery Jessie would go several
blocks out of her way to see how Jack was getting along, and Barbara and
his mother soon discovered that it was something more than mere
friendship that actuated the girl's visits. Although against their
expostulations, every cent that she could scrape together, over and
above the cost of the bare necessities of her living, she would expend
for fruit to bring to Jack.
"I feel such a great pity for him," she would say; "for he has never,
never been the same since Dorothy disappeared so suddenly." And they
would look at the girl with wistful eyes, realizing that in her case,
surely, pity was akin to love.
They guessed Jessie's secret long before she knew it herself, and they
felt sorry for her; for they knew her hopes were useless--that Jack
could never return the girl's love.
Jack's mother and Barbara talked the matter over carefully, and
concluded that it was best for the girl's peace of mind to break up this
infatuation, if they could, at once.
At this epoch an event happened which turned the tide of affairs into a
strange channel.
By the death of a relative Jack suddenly found himself possessed of a
fortune.
He heard the startling news with a white, calm, unmoved face, while his
mother and Barbara almost went wild with joy over it.
"It matters little to me now," he said. "Wealth has no charms for me."
And they well knew why.
The intelligence came like a thunderbolt to Jessie Staples.
It was Mrs. Garner who told about it while the family were gathered
about the tea-table.
The girl's face grew white as death, and she looked over at Jack with
startled eyes.
Before she could ask the question that sprang to her lips, Mrs. Garner
added:
"Of course this will make a great change in Jack's prospects. He says
that we shall soon leave the little cottage and go out West
somewhere--Barbara and I and himself--and that we will leave New York
City far behind us, as there is no tie that binds him here now."
Jessie tried to speak, but the words refused to come to her icy lips.
She made an effort to raise her eyes to Jack's face, with a careless
smile; but it was a failure--a dire failure.
The table seemed to suddenly rise and dance before her.
She rose hastily, with a wild prayer that she might get quickly out of
the room, for she felt her throat choking up with great sobs, and
realized that in an instant more she would have burst into tears.
Poor Jessie Staples took one step forward, then fell unconscious at
Jack's feet.
"Why, what in the world can be the matter with Jessie?" he cried,
raising her in his strong arms. "Is she ill? Let us send for a
physician--quick!"
"Stay!" said his mother, as he deposited Jessie on the sofa and turned
quickly to put this last thought into execution. "Jessie's trouble is
one which no physician can alleviate. It is an affair of the heart."
Jack looked at his mother in amazement.
"An affair of the heart?" he repeated. "Surely not, mother. Why, I have
known Jessie ever since I can remember, and I never knew her to have a
beau."
"Perhaps she has given her heart to some one who does not return her
love--who may not even know of it," suggested Mrs. Garner, quietly.
"Impossible," declared Jack. "I have known her for years, I say, and if
there was an affair of the heart between Jessie and any of the young men
at the bindery, I should have known something of it."
Mrs. Garner came nearer and laid her hand on her son's arm.
"Are you _sure_, Jack?" she asked, in a low voice.
He gave a great start.
"I know of one whom she loves, and who, she knows, never thinks of her.
When his life hung in jeopardy her secret was revealed to me."
"Surely you _do not_--you _can not_ mean, mother--that she--that I--"
"Yes, that is what I mean," returned Mrs. Garner, quietly. "Jessie
Staples loves _you_, my boy; but do not be hard on the poor girl.
Remember, love goes where it is sent. She never intended that you should
know it. She did not breathe a word about it to any one. It was by the
merest chance that we made the discovery, and she does not dream that we
know it."
Jack sank down in the nearest chair, quite overcome with dismay.
His mother came and bent over him, smoothing the fair hair back from his
damp brow with a trembling hand, but uttering no word.
At last he broke the deep silence:
"What am I to say--what am I to do, mother, if--if--your surmises be
actually true?"
"They are not surmises, my boy," returned his mother; "they are truths."
"You know that I like Jessie," he went on, huskily; "but as for any
other sentiment--why, it would be impossible. My life will always be
tinged with the bitter sorrow of that other love-dream which was so
cruelly shattered. I--I wish to Heaven you had not told me your
suspicions about Jessie, mother."
"Her secret fell from my lips in an unguarded moment," she answered,
slowly, "and I am sorry you know all. Yet it must be a source of comfort
to you to know that although Dorothy Glenn was false to you, there is
_one_ heart which beats only for you."
Jack started to his feet, a dull pallor creeping into his face as he
drew back from his mother's touch.
"Dorothy is _not false_ to me!" he cried. "If an angel from heaven
should tell me so I would not believe it. She is my betrothed bride. She
wears my betrothal-ring upon her little hand. No matter where she is,
she is true to me--true as God's promise. Shame has caused her to hide
herself from me, because she was so foolish as to go with another on an
excursion on Labor Day. But I have forgiven all that long ago. Oh,
Heaven! if I could but let her know it!"
Mrs. Garner shook her head.
"A young girl who can leave you for months without a word does not care
for you, my boy," she answered, sadly. "Surely there is great truth in
the words that 'Love is blind,' if you can not be made to see this."
Still the noble lover shook his head. There was no power on earth strong
enough to shake his faith in Dorothy's love.
Mrs. Garner had said all that she could say for Jessie, and she bowed
her head, and great tears rolled down her cheeks. She felt great pity
for Jessie. Why could not her son love her? She had heard the story of
jilted lovers turning to some sympathizing heart for solace, and in time
learning to love their consoler, and she wondered if this might not
mercifully happen to her darling, idolized boy.
She watched him as he paced excitedly up and down the room. Suddenly he
turned to her, and during all the long after years of sorrow and pain
she never forgot the expression of his face.
"Mother!" he cried, hoarsely, "if my Dorothy ever proved false to me, I
should be tempted to--to--kill her--and--then--kill--myself!"