“I believe love, pure and true
Is to the soul a sweet, immortal dew
That gem life’s petals in its hours of dusk.
The waiting angels see and recognize
The rich crown-jewels, love, of Paradise,
When life falls from us like a withered husk.”
As John Dinsmore instinctively turned toward the door, the silk
portières were swept aside with a white, jeweled hand, but his
disappointment was great, for, instead of beholding Jess, he saw
Queenie, in her long, trailing robes of black, standing on the
threshold.
He greeted her constrainedly, for he noticed the heightened color
that flashed into her face, crimsoning it from brow to chin, and the
dazzling smile of welcome on her lips.
Queenie swept into the room and up to his side with the graceful,
gliding motion peculiar to her, and which he had always admired so
greatly.
Then he noticed that she held something in her hand--a letter.
“You expected to see your wife,” she began, and then hesitated as
though at a loss how to proceed.
“Yes,” he answered, and she saw him give a sudden start and turn pale,
as he quickly asked:
“Is she not--well?”
A sudden fire leaped into Queenie’s eyes at his solicitude over Jess,
and it hardened her heart toward him for being so interested in any
human being save herself. She felt no remorse for what she was about to
do; no sorrow for the blow her hand was about to inflict.
No one would have dreamed that the sympathy she assumed in the
expression of her face as she looked up at him was far from being
the real state of her feelings. No one would ever have imagined that
beneath her calm demeanor her heart was rent with a war of dark, angry
passions, the outcome of a love which she realized was hopeless, by
the cold, distant greeting he had given her. She felt within her heart
and soul that he was there to claim Jess and take her away with him to
happiness and love, instead of being there to inform her that he wished
to part from her. Queenie’s keen intuition, her knowledge of men and
the world, told her that.
Slowly she held up her white, jeweled hand with the letter in it,
saying, gently:
“The bearers of unwelcome messages often share the fate of the messages
they bring. Do not let me be so unfortunate, Joh--Mr. Dinsmore.”
Still he did not answer; his eyes were riveted on the letter she held,
which he could see bore his name.
“This is for you,” she said, gently, “but ere you open it, let me say a
few words to you.”
Again he bowed his fine, handsome head, wondering what she could have
to say to him, and also what Jess could have written to him about, for
he believed he recognized the handwriting upon the envelope, and his
heart was on fire to tear it open and devour its sweet contents.
“Last evening Jess had a caller--a gentleman,” began Queenie, slowly,
pretending not to notice the violent start John Dinsmore gave. “He
remained an hour or more, and after he left, and Jess had returned to
her own room, which is opposite mine, I saw that she was strangely
agitated, and yet extremely jubilant--hilariously so.
“She did not come into my boudoir to chat, as has been her custom since
she has been my guest here, saying she had a letter to write. That was
the last I saw of her, as I kissed her good-night and left her.
“This morning one of the servants handed me this letter, saying that
Miss Jess, as they called her, had given this to them the night before
at a late hour, requesting that it should be given to me to place in
your hands when you should come to-day. I will retire into the library
while you read it at your leisure.”
The next moment John Dinsmore found himself standing alone in the
luxurious drawing-room with Jess’ letter in his hand.
“Why should his little bride write to him, instead of telling him
anything she had to say in person?” he wondered, vaguely, and with
the letter still held unopened in his hand he asked himself who Jess’
caller of the previous evening could have been. But quite as soon as
the thought shaped itself in his mind, he came to the conclusion that
it must have been Lawyer Abbot. No doubt the letter was to inform him
that she had confessed her marriage to the old lawyer, and begged him
to send her word that he was not so very angry, ere she ventured to
come to him.
He broke the seal and drew forth the letter. He had seen but one of
Jess’ letters before, the one which had reached him when he was lying
sick unto death from the outcome of the duel at Newport, consequently
he could not recollect the chirography very clearly, save that it was
in an unformed, straggling, girlish hand--the same as this appeared to
be.
As John Dinsmore’s eyes ran rapidly over the first few lines, the blood
in his veins turned as cold as ice, and a blood-red mist seemed to
sweep across his vision.
The letter ran as follows:
“MY HUSBAND: When you are reading what I am now writing, I shall be
flying far away from you. I will tell you now by the medium of pen
and paper what I was too much of a coward to tell you yesterday in
person, and that is, that our marriage was a terrible mistake, and I
am rueing it most bitterly, especially since last evening.
“At that time some one came to call upon me. I might just as well
tell you frankly who that some one was--the lover with whom I broke
faith when I so thoughtlessly, on the spur of the moment, sealed a
bitter fate for myself by marrying you. We had quarreled, and I,
well, to be truthful, I married you just to make him suffer, but the
words were scarcely uttered which bound me to you ere I rued it most
bitterly, though I did not betray my grief to you by word or act.
“Well, my old lover came, and I--I do not ask your pity for my
weakness, for I realize fully that I do not deserve it. I knew that I
could not live my life out if he went from me again, though I knew I
was bound to you. Well, he felt the same toward me that I felt toward
him, and we both agreed to brave the world for love--and each other.
“I gathered my few articles together, and--as I have said, by the
time you are reading these lines I will be far away with the man I
love.
“I should not blame you if you were to get a divorce from me at once.
I realize that this admission from me gives you the proper grounds
for it. Indeed, I should be thankful if you would, for then I shall
be free to marry the man who already has my heart. I hope you will
find forgiveness for me in that big, noble heart of yours.
“Forget me, and that I ever came into your life, and be happy, as I
feel sure you will be, in some other girl’s love.
“I have nothing more to say, except that I hope you will not search
for me, for it will be useless. You can never, never find me. All
that I ask from you is to be let alone. I have followed the dictates
of my own heart, and that must be my reason for the step I am to take.
“Again I urge that you make no attempt to discover my whereabouts.
Thanking you in advance for complying with my earnest request in this
respect, I sign myself for the first and last time.
“YOUR WIFE JESS.”
For some moments after he had finished this cruel epistle, John
Dinsmore sat staring at it like one suddenly bereft of reason. Little
Jess gone! eloped with a former lover! He could scarcely believe that
he had read the written lines aright. He told himself that he must be
laboring under some mad delusion.
Over and over again he read the fatal words, until every line was
burned in letters of fire indelibly into his brain.
He passed his cold, trembling hands over his brow. Great beads of
perspiration were standing out on it, and his veins were like knotted
whipcords.
Little Jess, who only yesterday had clung to him with loving words and
kisses, awakening all the love that had lain dormant in his heart and
soul, had fled from him. He could almost as easily have looked for the
world to come suddenly to an end, and all time, light, hope and life
to be suddenly blighted and turned into chaos and darkness!
In that moment of bitter pain he thought of lines he had read only
the day before in a book which he had seen on the drawing-room table,
while he was awaiting the coming of Jess. They recurred to him now with
crushing force:
“I met a kindred heart, and that heart to me said: ‘Come;’
Mine went out to meet it, but was lost in sudden gloom.
Whither wander all these fair things, to some land beyond life’s sea?
Is there nothing glad and lasting in this weary world for me?”
Never until that moment did John Dinsmore realize how deeply he had
learned to love the girlish bride who had just fled from him, crushing
his heart and wrecking his life so cruelly.
For the second time in his life he had been ruthlessly hurt by the
woman to whom he had allowed his honest heart to go out in abounding
love.
He heard a rustle beside him, and raising his death-white face quickly,
he saw Queenie standing before him.
“I know all, John--Mr. Dinsmore,” she murmured, “and I pity you from
the depths of my heart. If I could give my life to bring her back to
you, if you love her, I would gladly do it. And yet, she’s not worthy
of such terrible grief as you are enduring.”
Alas! in that hour of his bitter woe, how sweet was Queenie’s sympathy,
which was indeed balm to his wounded, bleeding heart.