THE SHADOWS FALL.
Sibyl St. Alban uttered a dramatic shriek, and rushed forward to meet
her host.
“Oh, Talbot, Talbot,” she cried, lifting her humid blue eyes to his
face, appealingly, “Your wife has insulted me cruelly! She has been
saying the most dreadful things to me. She hates me, she says, and she
has called me all sorts of bad names, and----”
But he checked the torrent of complaint by putting her firmly aside,
while his dark eyes flashed her a look so stern that she quailed
beneath it.
“Sibyl, I have no time to hear your complaints now,” he said,
impatiently. “My wife needs me. I must attend to her.”
She threw herself, weeping, upon a silken sofa, and Talbot hastened
on to the spot where Nina lay white and motionless, with the veil of
her golden hair about her. He was frightened when he saw how white and
rigid was the lovely young face.
“It is only a faint,” said Miss Drusilla, “But I wish you would carry
her to her room, Talbot.”
“If you will lead the way,” he replied; and the ladies exchanged
glances. What a strange husband not even to know where his wife’s room
was.
He took the slender young form up tenderly in his strong arms, and
followed Miss Drusilla from the room. Mrs. St. Alban sent a long look,
full of hatred, after the retreating forms.
“I will be revenged for this,” she muttered, clenching her tiny fist
angrily under the silken folds of her dress. “I will not be thrown
aside for that impertinent, black-eyed minx! So she saw me with him
in the conservatory, did she? Well, I meant that she should. That
theatrical scene was intended for her benefit. She is madly jealous;
she knows already that he loves me, that he has loved me for years. I
intended that she should know it, but she has found it out by Talbot’s
bungling, not by my telling. That is best. All is working well for my
purpose; all but Talbot himself. How dare he throw me over after all
our hopes and plans? But he shall not do it. I will not give him up. I
will yet win him for my husband. I love him, and I will not give him up
to that disdainful heiress, not if he were hers by even a stronger tie
than he is!”
And as she lay there in sullen anger, a diabolical purpose entered her
soul.
Dashing the angry tears from her cheeks, she rose and trailed her rich
silken robes slowly over the floor to where the two young girls were
whispering together.
“Did you ever hear such an ill-bred, unprovoked attack?--and in her own
house, too?”--she exclaimed, “I never was so insulted in my life! I
shall go back to Baltimore in the morning. If Duke Cameron won’t take
me in the yacht, I’ll go on the earliest steamer!”
“I want to go, too,” said Virgie Mason, “somehow I feel mean, although
I didn’t dream that I should cause such a scene by my idle curiosity.
But, oh, Sib, I love Mrs. Strangemore, and I feel sorry for her. Only
fancy her feelings! she saw you--we all saw you--among the flowers,
with your arms around Talbot Strangemore and your head on his breast,”
and she flashed a look that was almost contempt upon the flaxen haired
blonde.
Mrs. St. Alban had the grace to color under the reproachful glance of
those pure young eyes, then she crested her head defiantly.
“How could I help it if Talbot Strangemore caught me in his arms and
kissed me and cried out that he was wretched in his marriage to that
girl?” she said. “He has been in love with me six years, as you all
know. I threw him over once for Mr. St. Alban, and since my husband’s
death you know he has come back again as loving as ever. I am sorry for
the girl, but how can I help Talbot’s loving me so?”
“But indeed, Sibyl, I rather think you encouraged him to flirt with
you--didn’t you now?” said frank Virgie.
“Oh, Virgie Mason, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! How can
you even hint such a thing? I encourage a married man’s folly and
misplaced affection! you know me better than that although you talk to
me so! I wish I had never allowed myself to be persuaded to come to
this dreadful place!” wept Mrs. St. Alban, hiding her face in her tiny
lace handkerchief.
“I thought that you were the first one that proposed coming,” said
Helen Starr, rather drily, but the wounded widow was saved the
necessity for a reply by the entrance of the gentlemen.
Candid Virgie immediately blurted out the whole story of the scene that
had passed. They all looked very grave when they heard it. Talbot’s
infatuation for the beautiful widow had long been patent to all, and
they had heretofore made a jest of it: Now that they had come to Selwyn
Heights and seen the beautiful young neglected wife and heard her
indignant plaint the affair suddenly assumed a different aspect.
“We should not have come here at all. It was an unwarrantable
intrusion,” said Duke Cameron, who was the prince of good fellows,
immensely rich, and as generous as a king to his friends. “I think we
must all go away in the morning.”
“That is just what I was saying before you came in,” cried the widow,
eagerly, “I have been cruelly insulted by poor Talbot’s wife, and if
you all will not go with me, I shall go alone! I do think however, that
that girl ought to apologize to me for what she said. I am not to blame
for her husband loving me! We were engaged when he was a student at
college, and how could I help it if he went on loving me after I threw
him over for one whom I liked better than----”
Her torrent of words was interrupted by the sudden entrance of Talbot
himself. He came up to them pale, but composed.
“I can guess what you are talking of,” he said, seeing how silent they
all suddenly became. “I am very sorry for all that has happened this
evening. I hope no one will blame my wife. She is but a child in her
innocence and ignorance of the world. I take the blame upon myself. I
have neglected her, forgotten her, and acted a dastardly part for which
the devotion of my whole future can scarce atone.”
He looked so shamed and contrite that every one was sorry for him but
Sibyl, at whom he did not look while he was speaking, for he well knew
that his words would make her bitterly angry.
Virgie Mason cried out, impulsively:
“I love your sweet Nina dearly, and I do not blame her one bit! Please
tell us if she is any better, Mr. Strangemore?”
“I left her with her maid and my aunt. They think she will soon be
better,” he replied, gratefully.