DONALD KAYNE'S RETURN.
Through Azalea Courtney's revelations the elopement of Dorian
Mountcastle and Nita Farnham had become the sensation of the hour, and
innumerable newspaper paragraphs had chronicled the facts of the duel,
the death of Donald Kayne, the elopement of the young lovers on the
yacht. And then Irwin returned with the story of the tragedy of Nita's
loss at sea with her maid Lizette.
It was a tragedy so full of woe that it thrilled every heart that read
it with sympathy and sorrow. Even the Courtneys, who hated the girl,
grew pale as they realized how soon Nita's happiness had come to an end,
and that Dorian was so terribly bereft of his love.
But into the ward of Bellevue, where Miser Farnham lay barely alive, so
terribly had he been hurt in the railway accident, and so slight were
his chances for life, penetrated no tidings from the outer world. None
there knew anything of the beautiful ward who had eloped with her lover
the very night of the accident. Charles Farnham was supposed to be
friendless and poor, save for some miserly savings of whose hiding-place
none had any knowledge. No one took any interest in his fate except the
doctors and nurses at Bellevue, and they all believed that it was
impossible that he should recover from his internal injuries. He was
alive and little more. He had never uttered a conscious word since the
accident.
As for the Courtneys, they were still at Gray Gables, carrying out their
policy of masterly inaction. The flight of Nita and the condition of the
miser made no difference to them. A lawyer, acting under instructions
received from Farnham previous to the accident, was entrusted with the
conduct of expenses incident to the housekeeping at Gray Gables.
Everything went on like clock-work, except that the good housekeeper,
Mrs. Hill, who had grown to love her young mistress so dearly, carried
always a sad face and aching heart for poor Nita's tragic fate.
Weeks flew past, and it would have been very lonely at Gray Gables but
that the Courtneys invited some city friends for a few weeks, and got
through the July days with some bathing, dressing, boating, and dancing,
not keeping up any pretense of mourning over Nita's supposed death.
Meg Dineheart, the old fortune-teller, still prowled about the beach
like a bird of evil omen, and had twice been driven ignominiously out of
Gray Gables with threats of arrest if she ever showed her face there
again.
To tell the truth, Meg was slyly seeking for Nita's chest of gold that
Lizette had carefully hidden in the closet of her mistress, but she
found such lynx eyes watching her whenever she ventured into the old
stone mansion that she almost despaired of success.
During the summer, Meg had made two trips to New York to see Miser
Farnham at the hospital, but she got no good out of these visits. He
still lingered in that strange, comatose condition, taking no notice of
anything, and yet improving slowly but appreciably, so the nurses said,
until they began to believe that he would really get well again.
"The old wretch! I wish he would die, then maybe Jack and me would get
the handling of all that money if only we knew where it was hid,"
muttered Meg angrily, and she was in no wise pleased to learn that he
was likely to recover.
She was very anxious for her son Jack to return from his last trip to
sea, for he had been away several months, and she was eager to know what
he would say to the happenings at Pirate Beach since he went away, the
return and death of Nita, whom he had wished to marry, and the accident
to the miser, whose gold both mother and son greedily coveted.
New York had another sensation the middle of August when Donald Kayne,
the millionaire, who was believed to have been killed in the duel with
Dorian Mountcastle returned, alive and well, to the city in his own
yacht.
"It was all a mistake, the report of my death. My antagonist was much
more seriously wounded than myself, and I have heard had a hard tussle
for life," he told his friends carelessly.
Yet a strange change had come over Donald Kayne. Always nervous and
restless, his friends observed that he was now more so than ever before.
He veered from place to place. He could hardly be seen at his club any
more. And no one had any news of Dorian Mountcastle's whereabouts until
received through him.
"My yacht stayed a few days at Fortune's Bay," he said. "While there I
heard that Dorian Mountcastle's yacht had been there before me. Dorian
had been recovering slowly from the wound I gave him, and he had not
been told of the tragic death of his wife. When it could be kept from
him no longer the truth was broken to him gently, but it almost bereft
him of reason. The last I heard of him was that his friends had taken
him abroad for a year to recuperate his health."
He went down to Pirate Beach to see the Courtneys, who were very
gracious. Azalea had almost given up all hope of ever winning Dorian,
and she tried all her fascinations on Donald Kayne.
But he was cold, taciturn and moody, and had no interest in anything
except the mystery that had brought him to Pirate Beach--the mystery of
Nita Farnham's possession of the serpent ring. But in spite of Azalea's
efforts she had nothing to tell him, beyond what she had written him
before the duel.
"And yet, I believe," she said, "that the old fortune-teller, who lives
in an old boat-cabin down the beach, knows more about Nita than the most
of us. I have talked with her, and she is very mysterious. She would
neither admit nor deny any knowledge of Nita, but if I had not been too
poor to bribe her I believe she would have given me some information."
Donald Kayne sought Meg Dineheart at sunset, and found her standing
alone in the strange purple glow by the sea, a weird, witchlike figure,
with elf-locks streaming on the breeze, while she shaded her eyes with
her hand and strained her gaze across the darkening waters, watching, as
she was always watching now, for her son's bark to come sailing home.
She turned upon the intruder with a curse, but Azalea had been right in
believing that gold would loosen the old harpy's tongue.
Kayne soon learned that Nita had been reared at Pirate Beach by the old
fortune-teller, until at the age of fifteen she had run away to make her
own living at the metropolis.
"What is the girl to you?" asked Donald Kayne, but she leered and
refused to reply.
"And the serpent ring she wore? I will make your fortune, old woman, if
you will tell me how Nita Farnham came by that ring," he exclaimed
eagerly.
Bitterly did Meg regret that she could not gratify his curiosity.
"I know nothing of the ring, except that I saw it on Nita's hand before
she went away on Mountcastle's yacht. Stay--you say there is but one
ring like it in the world? Then I saw the same ring more than fourteen
years ago on another woman's hand."
"You saw her? Where? Where, woman?" he cried in fierce excitement.
The old witch peered curiously into the face of her interlocutor. Donald
Kayne's face was wild and haggard. Unconsciously to himself, in his wild
excitement, he stretched out his hand and clutched the woman's shoulder
in a grasp that was painful.
"Speak!" he uttered hoarsely; "speak this instant, and tell me when and
where you saw the woman with the serpent ring. Why are you so dumb when
you see how impatient I am! Answer before I throttle you!"
But with a ghastly grin Meg writhed herself out of his grasp and
sneered:
"That secret is worth gold to me!"
"Harpy," he cried, and thrust his hands into his pockets, but withdrew
them disappointed. He had already given her all the money about him. He
tore the watch from his pocket, the ring from his hand, and flung them
at her feet.
"Take these, and speak!" he cried, but Meg spurned them with her foot.
"It is not enough! Besides, I do not want jewels, but money!"
"You shall have money to-morrow. But do not keep me waiting, I implore
you! I am mad, mad for the clue you can give me. Speak now, for sweet
pity's sake! Tell me all you know, and if it is worth anything to me, I
will reward you richly."
But the woman began to realize that her knowledge was valuable, and
decided to sell it dearly.
"The gold first!" she cried. "You are a stranger to me, and if I told
you the secret first you might go away and never pay me!"
Vainly he entreated and implored, promising money upon the morrow, but
Meg was immovable. She was insensible to the pitiful anxiety of his
haggard face. She obstinately refused his prayer, mocking at his
impatience.
Donald Kayne, mad with impatient wrath, lifted his hand and struck her
lightly across the mouth.
"Take that, you devil!" he cried hoarsely, and with a shriek of rage Meg
sprung at him with a knife drawn.
"I will kill you!" she hissed, with savage fury.
But Donald Kayne was more than a match for the tigress, and soon
disarmed her, although in the struggle he received a wound in the hand.
He flung the knife into the sea, and wrapped his handkerchief about the
wound, while she stood at a little distance watching him with glowering
eyes.
But his heart sank as he realized that his imprudence had defeated his
own object, and that he might never be able to wrest from her the
longed-for secret. But there was no present help for it, and he hurried
from her along the beach toward Gray Gables.
Meg shook her fist after him, and muttered anathemas upon him until he
was almost out of sight; then turned her eyes again upon the sea, where
the last fading rays of sunset lingered in radiant light.
A sudden cry of joy shrilled over her lips. Across the water, in clear
sight, was riding a trimly built little sailing craft, that had a very
familiar look to her old eyes.
"My son's bark!" she shrieked joyfully.