Madame Ray guessed not of the intentions of Everard Dawn, or she would
have been most unhappy at the thought of parting from Cinthia.
With each day the girl grew dearer to her heart, and it had become her
secret fixed intention to make her home near to Cinthia’s, wherever it
should be, and never lose sight of her again.
Her love for the fair young girl was a passion of devotion. She would
have sacrificed all she possessed to secure her happiness.
Yet Cinthia seemed further away than ever from it now.
“Ah, my darling, you should not brood so morbidly over the past!” she
cried, winding her arms around the fair girl’s waist. “You have lost
a lover, it is true; but think how much more I have suffered, when
scarcely as old as you, losing a beloved husband and darling infant.”
“You have lost a child? Dear heart, how I pity you!” Cinthia cried,
tenderly.
“Yes, Cinthia, I have lost a little daughter, who would be as old as
you are. It is for her sake I love you so dearly, because you are
motherless, and I, alas! childless. It is a sad story, and some day I
will tell it to you. Then you will see that my sorrow is greater than
yours,” sighed the lovely actress.
Cinthia pressed her hand, and murmured:
“You had their love till they died, and in heaven they are waiting to
welcome you home, still your own, still fond and true. But he I loved
proved false, and another may win him from me. Were it not better if he
had really died and belonged to me truly in heaven?”
Oh, how sad the pathetic voice, how mournful the far-off gaze, piercing
the listener’s heart like an arrow!
She cried out, bitterly:
“Ah, Cinthia, you know not the depth of my bereavement. My husband is
dead, it is true. I had his love but a little while, but it was bliss
while it was mine, and I know it is waiting for me in heaven, but oh,
Cinthia, my little one, my baby--oh! oh! oh!” and she dissolved in a
passion of tears that startled Cinthia from her own morbid grief and
turned her to the task of the consoler.
Most gently, most fondly, most lovingly she caressed the agitated
mourner, murmuring to her of the beautiful home, not made with hands,
where her dead child was a precious angel.
“Think what sorrows she may have escaped by her early translation to
heaven. Is it not better thus than to have reached girlhood, as I did,
to have her faith and love trampled in the dust, and her life saddened
forever?” she cried, earnestly.
“Ah, my dear, you do not understand. I had not finished telling you.
She--my little darling, my unnamed daughter, did not die.”
“Not die!” Cinthia echoed, in bewilderment.
“No, she did not die, and I know not to this day whether she is alive
or dead. She--was stolen--from me,” sobbed the bereaved mother, letting
her head fall on the sill of the open window where they were sitting.
Cinthia was so shocked for a moment that she could not speak. She could
only throw her arms about the mourner and clasp her close with a love
as true and warm as if she had been the dear lost daughter.
The balmy summer breeze swept in caressingly over the two fair heads
nestled close together, while Madame Ray sobbed:
“Now you understand why I love you so, my dear. Not but that your own
beauty and sweetness is enough to charm any heart. But when I found
you in Washington that first day, a motherless girl scarcely past
childhood, forsaken by your lover, wretched, desperate, almost driven
to suicide, my heart went out to you in a passion of pitying love as
I thought, my own child, if alive, is no older than this one. Who can
tell but that she may be in an even more grievous strait than this poor
girl, whom I will try to advise and befriend, praying Heaven to deal
as kindly with my dear lost little one.”
“Oh, you were an angel to me in that hour!” cried Cinthia, eagerly,
gratefully. “Oh, I was wretched and desperate, as you say, weary of
life and longing for death, almost driven by my humiliation to the
awful sin of suicide. When I opened that door, intending to rush
recklessly into the streets, careless of my fate, what terrible
calamity might have happened me if I had not found you standing like an
angel on the threshold, sent by God Himself to save me from myself. You
drew me back, you pitied and advised me, you made me a better girl than
I ever was before. And since that hour your love has been to me more
than words can express, my anchor of hope in a stormy life, my refuge
from despair, my haven of love. Oh, I have been ungrateful, nursing my
woe in spite of all your goodness and patience. I will try to be braver
and stronger, indeed I will. I will always remember the keen sorrows
you have borne while you wore a smile of comfort and cheer for me. And,
oh, I pray that God has given to your lost child as dear a comforter as
I have found in you.”
The words, poured forth in a passion of grateful emotion, ended in a
burst of sobs, and they mingled their tears together and found subtle
relief in each other’s sympathy.
When they grew calmer, Madame Ray said softly in her low, flute-like
voice:
“I am glad indeed if I have been to you all that you say, Cinthia,
dear, for you were indeed in need of love and care when we first met. I
have lavished on you a mother’s love, while you have repaid me with a
daughter’s, I know.”
“Yes--yes; but I could not fill up the void caused by your own child’s
loss.”
“You have been a great comfort to me, dear, and I hope never to be
parted from you in life unless you marry, and even then, dear, I shall
manage to see you often, as a mother clings to a married daughter.”
“How I wish that you and papa would marry!” cried the eager girl.
“My dear, do not nourish such a thought. It can never be. I am sure
that both our hearts are buried in our dear ones’ graves.”
“It does not seem as if papa really loved my mother much, or he would
care more for me,” Cinthia exclaimed, with the old resentment of her
father’s strange indifference.
“My dear, do not judge him harshly. Mr. Dawn looks to me like a man
capable of strong affections, but he also bears on his face the signs
of tragic happenings that have blighted the promise of his life. If you
will take my judgment for it, dearest, your father is a most unhappy
and weary man!” continued Madame Ray.