“I AM NO BEGGAR.”
Squire Moulton was walking on the white pebbly margin of his beautiful
miniature lake.
His head was bowed upon his narrow and sunken chest, his hands were
clasped with rigid firmness at his back, while his long grizzly hair
hung in neglected masses around his stooping shoulders.
His face, always ugly, looked yellower and uglier still as the dim light
of a cloudy day—rendered yet more dismal by the thick branches of the
overhanging trees—fell around him.
He looked like some restless evil spirit haunting that lovely spot, and
lying in wait for his unsuspecting prey, rather than the master and the
owner of so much beauty.
He was pacing back and forth in deep and evidently unpleasant
meditation, judging of his lowering brow and the mutterings constantly
issuing from his thin lips.
He doubtless considered himself entirely alone. But he could not see the
pair of eyes, bright and black, and evil as his own, that glared
fiercely upon him from within a closely growing circle of arbor vitæ.
For an hour his restless pacings and mutterings had continued, and for
an hour these fierce eyes had blazed upon him, at first with anger and
hatred, then as time went on, with uneasiness. Evidently whoever was
within that verdant circle was becoming impatient with the proprietor’s
lengthened promenade; for there was a slight rustle as if some one was
trying to change his or her position.
Unlucky moment!
For losing its balance, a figure came crushing against the branches with
a force that could not fail to disturb and attract the attention of the
master of Moulton Hall.
With a start of surprise, and a quick glance of his fiery eyes toward
the place, he called out rudely:
“Who’s there? and what do you want?”
There was no reply, only a further crouching among the foliage.
With hasty steps the squire reached the arbor, parted the branches at
the entrance, and gazed within.
A woman in soiled and ragged garments slowly turned her face, scornful
and defiant, full upon him!
For a moment she gazed thus upon him, then silently arose.
She must have been beautiful once; but her cheeks were hollow and livid,
the large and brilliant black eyes sunken in their sockets. The mouth
was distorted with the play of evil passion and suffering; while her
long raven hair, streaked with silver, hung in tangled masses from
beneath her soiled and misshapen hat.
“What do you want here?” again demanded the squire. “I do not allow
beggars about my premises.”
“I am no beggar,” she replied, lifting her head with a sudden, haughty
grace, and her voice possessed a certain musical cadence, despite its
sharpness.
What was there in her movement and tone that made the proud squire start
and gaze so fixedly at her, while a white fear settled over his face?
“Who are you then?” he asked, quickly.
“Ha, ha!” laughed the woman. “Your memory does not serve you quite as
well as mine does me, most worthy squire. I presume my acquaintance
would not be considered much of an honor. Nevertheless you and I are old
friends!”
“Have done with your croaking, and tell me what you want here,”
interrupted Squire Moulton, impatiently, yet with a touch of uneasiness
in his voice.
“What do I want? I will tell you soon enough what I wish!” she replied,
flashing her eyes angrily at him. “You had a sister once?”
“Yes, to my sorrow. What of her?”
“Where is she now?” asked his visitor, with a sinister smile.
“Dead, and gone to perdition, for all I know or care,” returned he,
brutally.
“Dead, is she,” repeated the woman, with the same look.
“Yes, dead, I say! Confound you, what do you mean by all this quizzing,
you fool?”
The squire was becoming enraged, and could not calmly bear the
steadfast, penetrating gaze of the persistent woman before him.
“How do you know she is dead?” was the quiet question.
“How do I know, you vile hag? She died at Naples, thirteen years ago. I
was with her only a few hours before her death. The next time I went to
see her they told me she was dead and buried.”
“Ah! but what became of the child she left for you to take charge of?”
She bent forward and gazed eagerly into his face, as if she would read
his very soul.
“Curse you, it’s none of your business! I’m sure I don’t know why I
stand here parleying with such as you.”
A bright flush spread itself over the woman’s pale face at this taunt,
while her lips quivered with suppressed rage.
“Stop!” she said, sternly, as he turned to go. “Stop, you fiend in human
form, and give an account of yourself. It is my business, and I will
know. It is true your sister was sick and destitute in the city of
Naples. It is also true that when she heard of your arrival there she
sent to you for assistance. She felt there was no help on earth for her,
and she wanted to be reconciled to the only living member of her family
before she went the way of all the earth. She also needed food and
medicines, but most of all she wanted to give you her child, her bright
and beauteous boy, to educate and rear, so that he might never feel the
curse and sting of poverty and shame. You obeyed the summons. But how
did you comfort her? You swore at her; you taunted and reviled her; you
cursed her with the bitterest curses your vile heart could invent, and
your lips utter; and when she prayed for a little love and forgiveness,
you turned a deaf ear to her entreaties. Ah! cannot you hear her now
pleading for her boy, that you would not leave him to the cold mercies
of strangers? Cannot you see her now as she quivered in her anguish when
you swore that you would not be disgraced by such as he? Are your dreams
never haunted by that white, drawn face, by a wasted hand clutching
yours, and a trembling voice begging, pleading for her one earthly
treasure? Does not a phantom hover around your couch at night? I think
there does. You look as if your whole life had been passed amid ghostly
shadows.
“But to my story. A week after you left your only sister to suffer and
die alone—a stranger in a strange land—you sought her again; your hard
heart relented a little. Tardy repentance! They told you she was dead
and buried. With a curse, and not even inquiring where her body was
laid, you asked for her boy and took him away with you. That, Ralph
Moulton, was the only good deed you ever did in your life. But has it
continued to be a good deed? How have you kept your trust? Is it well,
or would it have been better that he had died also, than that you should
have taken him to rear in a poisoned atmosphere? I ask you, Ralph
Moulton, where is that boy—where is he whom you have named for yourself,
but who was christened Ralph Ellerton?”
The wicked man stood gazing at her, as if an avenging angel had smitten
him, while she related these incidents of his past life. A look of blank
amazement and fear covered his face; his knees knocked together, and
when he tried to speak his ashen lips refused to move.
At length he managed to articulate:
“Who are you, that you know all this?”
“Who am I?” she cried, bitterly. “Look and see who I am. Does not your
heart speak for itself? Is there not one spark of kindred affection left
in its hardened depths? Who am I indeed? I am Rose Moulton; she who
loved, trusted, and was betrayed; who thought she was an honored and
cherished wife, whom Heaven had blessed with its own and earth’s richest
blessings, but who soon awoke to the misery and knowledge that she was
no wife—only a disgraced and ruined woman, whose only child and treasure
had no right to claim his father’s name. An outcast, deserted and
dishonored! Who am I? I am your disgraced and erring sister, whom you
cast off when she and every one else thought she was dying. I did not
die. I began to gain from the moment you left me.”
“It is a lie!” shrieked the wretched old man, as, with eyes starting
from their sockets, he staggered back against the green wall behind him.
“It is no lie; and you know every word I speak is true. I have followed
you—I have been on your track ever since; and now I have come to claim
my son, and be recognized as a member of your family. I knew if you
thought me dead and out of the way, you would take my boy. So I went and
hid myself, making those who took care of me promise to say I was dead.
I followed you from abroad. I have watched you ever since, but have
never spoken to my boy since I pressed that last fond kiss upon his pure
lips, when I left him quietly sleeping in his childish innocence. I have
just recovered from a long and weary illness. I am alone, forsaken,
destitute; and, my brother, I have come to you for comfort and support.
Oh! Ralph, will you not take your Rose once again to your heart, forgive
her, and bless her with your love?”
She stopped and looked beseechingly in his face, while her wild eyes
softened and tears poured down her sunken cheeks. Her hands were
clasped, and in almost breathless silence, she awaited his reply.