THE SENDING OF THE TOKEN.
At seven o’clock that same morning, Sir Philip had been aroused from
his slumbers by Dakin.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” said the spy, “but I can’t help thinking
Miss Cranstoun has somehow got away. You see, you have taken away the
key of her room, and I can see a good way in through the keyhole. And
the bed’s empty; it doesn’t look as if it had been slept in, and I
can’t see any sign of her walking about the room.”
With a muttered execration, Sir Philip dismissed Dakin, and, hastily
dressing himself, repaired to the door of Stella’s room and rapped
several times sharply upon the panels. Getting no answer, he turned
the key in the lock and called to her to come out, before throwing the
door open, to find that the bird had flown.
It was easy enough to see how she had escaped. The window was wide
open, and the ivy a little below torn and disarranged. Rage and alarm
combined to give Sir Philip an extremely bad quarter of an hour, as he
turned over in his own mind all possible places to which she might
have gone, while his horse was bearing him toward the nearest gates of
the Chase enclosure.
Sir Philip had no idea of Hilary’s detention at the inn, but as the
hostlery was on the direct road to Grayling, from which town he
surmised that Stella would take the train for London, he resolved to
stop for a moment to inquire whether anything had been seen of her.
Hilary’s friend, the hostler, was holding the bridle of Black Bess at
the entrance, when the Squire rode up on his gray hunter, and Sir
Philip noticed at once that the mare carried a side-saddle.
“So you have lady visitors here, I see?” he said, pulling up his horse
before the archway.
Jim the hostler’s sympathies were all with the lovers, and he
recognized at once the necessity for putting the angry father off the
scent.
“Not as I knows on, sir,” he answered, pulling his forelock.
“Then what is the meaning of that side-saddle?”
“I suppose the missis is going for a ride, sir,” the man answered,
with an affectation of stupidity in his face and manner.
“What! on that horse? That isn’t one of your animals?”
“No, sir. It’s been left here by a gentleman for a day or two, and
we’ve got to exercise it every day.”
Still Sir Philip did not appear satisfied, and the hostler was
wondering whether he could not by some means convey a warning to the
young couple in the coffee-room, when, as ill-luck would have it, his
master, the landlord, came out into the courtyard at that identical
moment, and in answer to Sir Philip’s point-blank inquiry as to
whether he had seen Miss Cranstoun, blurted out that she was at that
moment within the house, talking to a friend in the coffee-room.
The landlord was thinking of his lease, and not of Stella’s love
affair, and he volunteered the further information that Miss Cranstoun
had only been there about ten minutes, having borrowed Mr. Pritchard’s
horse to go to Grayling and back.
This was the first intimation which the baronet received that Hilary
was not in London, and it made instantly clear to him Stella’s
disappearance from the Chase in the evening of the preceding day. She,
his own daughter, Miss Cranstoun of the Chase, was actually carrying
on a love affair at his very lodge gates, and making appointments with
a farming adventurer at an inn on her father’s land, under the eyes of
hostlers, and potmen, and farm laborers.
Rage almost choked him as he laid his hand on the door of the
coffee-room, and the sight which met his eyes as he opened it was
hardly calculated to assuage his anger. A superbly handsome young
giant, with one arm in a sling, was seated close to Stella in a
window-seat at the farther end of the room. It was easy enough to see
that they were lovers. He was speaking eagerly, and she was hanging on
his words, with her two hands clasped in one of his.
On Sir Philip’s entrance they started, and both of them rose to their
feet; but Hilary still retained Stella’s hand.
Sir Philip carefully closed the door behind him, and came close up to
the other two occupants of the room. In spite of the storm which raged
within him, he was beyond everything anxious to avoid any scene by
which his private affairs would become known to the people of the inn.
It was therefore in a voice so low as to be inaudible to any possible
listeners outside the room that he addressed himself to Hilary, fixing
him with his cold, glittering, light eyes as he spoke.
“What is your name?”
“Hilary Pritchard.”
“And what are you doing here with my daughter?”
“I have been asking her to marry me, Sir Philip!”
“You are not aware, then, that she is already engaged to be married to
Lord Carthew, by whose want of judgment a fellow like you got
introduced into a respectable house.”
“You have made some mistake, I think,” returned the young man,
resolutely keeping his temper in the face of provocation. “Your
daughter loves me, and she will never marry Lord Carthew.”
“My daughter is under age, sir, and her folly and inexperience would
make her an easy prey to the wiles of a cad and an adventurer such as
you. Luckily, I have interfered to save her good name. You entered my
house on sufferance, and taking advantage of my absence, and of your
friend’s foolish confidence in you, you presumed to make love to this
young lady in much the same rough-and-ready style as you would adopt
toward the haymakers and farmhands in your own rank of life. You, a
nobody, a penniless, intending emigrant, dared to try to steal my
daughter’s affections from your friend, to whom she had pledged them.
I have no hesitation in saying that your conduct has been mean,
cowardly, treacherous, and unmanly in the extreme. I would rather see
my daughter dead than lowered by any association with a low-born and
ungrateful pauper such as you.”
As he spoke, by a sudden movement he wrenched their hands asunder, and
seizing that of his daughter’s within his own, began to move toward
the door.
Hilary Pritchard had grown very pale under Sir Philip’s fierce
invective, but he did not condescend to defend himself against the
latter’s accusations.
“I hold you to your promise, Stella,” he said, quietly.
“I swear to you I will marry no one but you,” she returned.
One last, long look was interchanged between them, and then Stella was
dragged from the room by her father, who had pulled her hand through
his arm, and who, as soon as he reached the courtyard, gave orders in
an unconcerned voice that the side-saddle should be changed from Black
Bess to a horse belonging to the inn, the loan of which he required
for an hour or two.
“I fear we shall be late for breakfast,” he said, turning to his
daughter with an assumption of geniality, and speaking in a raised
tone of voice so that he might be overheard by all within range.
“Stella, you managed to get through your business in Grayling with
wonderful celerity. I never expected to find you back here so soon. I
am glad we found Mr. Pritchard none the worse for his unlucky
accident.”
Stella disdained to act up to his pretence of fatherly affection. It
was nothing to her if the whole world knew that she loved Hilary
Pritchard and that her father had come to part them. Sir Philip’s
family pride was, from her point of view, equally incomprehensible and
ridiculous. So she stood by his side, he detaining her hand in his arm
with a grasp which, while it affected to be fatherly, was really
vindictive and painful to bear, and which she endured with a set,
white face, blazing eyes, and tightly compressed lips.
In much the same fashion they rode away, she sitting straight upon her
horse, staring before her, unheeding the friendly talk he affected to
address to her. But Jim the hostler noticed that all the while he
spoke Sir Philip’s fingers touched his daughter’s bridle-rein.
“He’s a brute, that’s what _he_ is, for all his soft sawder,” was
Jim’s comment.
More than once during the ride home a mad longing seized Stella to
escape from her father’s tyranny. But Sir Philip’s gray would easily
have outstripped in speed the sorry hack upon which she was mounted,
even if her father’s hand had not held her bridle. Every cruel and
bitter taunt which his brain could conceive was hurled at her on their
progress between the inn and the Chase. But no words could provoke a
response from her. She was trying to remind herself that he was her
father, and that even if she could not love him she must at least
endeavor not to hate him.
At the doors of the house she sprang from her horse and ran swiftly up
the stairs to Lady Cranstoun’s room. Her stepmother was still in bed,
sitting up, wrapped in a white woollen shawl, drinking her coffee. She
had not quite recovered from the strain of the preceding day, and Dr.
Graham had prescribed complete rest and freedom from all excitement.
“I was wondering you had not come to say good-morning to me,” she
said, “but Margaret said Sir Philip had locked you in your room. Was
that true?”
“Don’t let’s talk of him, dear,” returned the young girl, kissing her
affectionately, and kneeling down at the bedside, caressing one of her
hands. “Let’s try to think he doesn’t exist.”
“Something has happened!” exclaimed the poor lady, apprehensively.
“You are dreadfully pale, and your hands are quivering. There are
tears in your eyes, too. Tell me, Stella, quickly, what is the
matter?”
“It is nothing,” she answered. “I am overtired after a bad night. That
is all.”
“It was not true--what you said last night in fun--about not marrying
Lord Carthew, was it, dear?”
“No; it was not true.”
Sir Philip’s voice broke sharply in upon their talk. He had entered
the room unperceived, and was standing on the other side of the bed.
Stella rose at sight of him, but remained with her arm round Lady
Cranstoun.
“The marriage will take place in the second week of May,” Sir Philip
proceeded, fixing a threatening glance upon his daughter.
“I am so glad; oh, I am so glad, my dear, dear child!”
Stella did not speak. She dared not at the moment undeceive her or
banish from her face that unwonted look of happiness and hope.
Lady Cranstoun kissed her affectionately, and then as though nerving
herself for a great effort, and timidly retaining the girl’s hands in
hers, she addressed her husband.
“I have not told you before, Philip,” she began, “in fact, I have not
had an opportunity, that while you were away, feeling that I might die
any minute, I sent to town for my father’s lawyer.”
“Without consulting _me_?”
“Yes. You see, there is that legacy of my Uncle Charles, which I came
into last year----”
“Well?”
“It isn’t very much--only five thousand pounds, in fact--but I have
left it by will to Stella when she attains the age of twenty-one. You
see, the estates being entailed, I did not like the idea of my little
girl being without pocket-money. And it will be a nice little sum for
herself when she marries Lord Carthew.”
Sir Philip was for the moment struck dumb with surprise and
indignation. That his colorless, obedient wife should dare in his
absence to make a will, leaving money away from him to his rebellious
daughter, struck him as a most unwifely and outrageous liberty, and
the desire to sting and humiliate both his wife and daughter became
too strong to be resisted.
“_Your_ little girl!” he repeated, with a hard laugh. “Haven’t you
grown out of that silly delusion yet? _Your_ child died years ago, as
a weakly, miserable baby. That girl beside you, to whom you are so
anxious to will your money, is no relation to you, but simply the
daughter of my first wife, who died at her birth, exactly three months
before I married you.”
“Philip! Stella! It is not true--say it is not true!” gasped Lady
Cranstoun.
“How can you be so cruel?” exclaimed the young girl, turning in
passionate reproach upon her father. “Don’t worry, and don’t listen,
mamma, dear. You know that I am yours, and that I love you!”
“Your dutiful affection is not without its reward,” sneered Sir
Philip. “Five thousand pounds is certainly a great deal more than you
would ever get from _me_. But it is time this mother and daughter
nonsense was done away with, except for the purpose of giving the girl
a more respectable ancestry than she could show as the daughter of a
gypsy. Where did you suppose she got her beauty from? You Douglases
have always been an ugly, high-cheekboned race. There is nothing of
the Douglas about _her_.”
Lady Cranstoun was moaning as if in pain, and her pale eyes had a
hunted, terrified expression as she turned them helplessly from her
husband to Stella.
“Not my child,” she whispered. “Not--my--child!” and as the words left
her lips, she fell backward in Stella’s arms, cold and motionless, to
all appearance dead already.
“You have killed her!” the latter cried, as she vainly tried to
restore animation to the still figure, and for a few moments Sir
Philip believed, not without a momentary pang of self-reproach, that
she was right. Gradually, however, under Dr. Graham’s care,
consciousness returned, but only feebly; and throughout the morning
she fell from one fainting-fit into another. Stella never left her for
a moment, and everything that skill and care could do was done to
prolong the faint flicker of life within her wasted frame. A heart
specialist was telegraphed for from London, and Lord Carthew, who had
intended leaving for town early in the day, having heard no word of
Hilary’s presence in the vicinity, delayed his journey until he could
hear the doctor’s verdict.
It was unfavorable in a high degree. Lady Cranstoun was, so the great
man agreed with Dr. Graham, slowly dying, and could not possibly last
through the night. Toward evening she suddenly appeared to rally,
recognized and spoke to Stella, and asked in a clear, distinct voice
for Lord Carthew. When the young man came, she gave him her hand, and
drew his toward that of Stella, which rested on the coverlet beside
her.
“Be--very good--to her,” she murmured; and so, still occupied with
thoughts for Stella’s future, she closed her eyes and fell asleep,
never to open them on this world again.
To Stella the blow was terrible, overwhelming. The tie between her and
her step-mother, as she now knew her to be, had been extremely strong,
cemented by unselfishness on both sides, the girl patiently giving up
the greater portion of her day in attendance and nursing, and the
woman keeping silent about her sufferings, lest she might too greatly
sadden her young companion. Such faults and foibles as Lady Cranstoun
possessed, her intense timidity and cowardice, her limited
intelligence, and excessive pride of birth, were but trifling when
weighed against her kindly and affectionate nature. Stella’s own
mother, had she lived, could not possibly have shown more sympathy and
affection toward her child, whom she would probably have tormented by
her violent and jealous nature.
Lord Carthew’s heart was deeply touched by the sight of Stella’s
grief. He had no opportunity of speaking to her between the time of
leaving the house and his attendance at Lady Cranstoun’s funeral four
days later. Even then he did not see her. She was utterly prostrated
by grief, Sir Philip informed him, and he did not think fit to add
that from the hour of Lady Cranstoun’s death, the girl had been kept a
close prisoner, the maid Ellen or Dakin sleeping in her room, which
had been changed, so that no escape by the window was possible.
“I think the sooner you marry her and take her away with you the
better,” Sir Philip said, as the two men were returning in the
mourning-coach from the scene by the Cranstoun vault in Grayling
Cemetery after the ceremony. “The poor child has cried herself ill;
she will scarcely eat, and refuses to leave the house. I am really
growing extremely anxious about her. Your letters are the only things
that seem to give her any pleasure, although, as she says, she hasn’t
the heart to answer them yet.”
As a matter of fact, Lord Carthew’s letters had been opened and read
by Sir Philip on their arrival each day, and subsequently laid upon
the dressing-table of Stella, for the amusement, apparently, of Dakin
and Ellen, since the lady to whom they were addressed had never so
much as touched one of them. They were good letters, too; full of
affection and intelligence, if a little didactic in tone; too good by
far to be wasted upon a cynical man of the world and two uneducated
female spies.
“I am almost afraid for her reason,” continued Sir Philip. “A change
of surroundings is imperative, so the doctor tells me. The attachment
between mother and daughter was so great that the blow is
proportionately heavy. In fact, my dear Carthew, it is now the
twentieth of April, and I propose that the marriage, which, of course,
will be strictly private, should take place at the date originally
fixed--the tenth of May. It was her poor mother’s last wish, as you
know, and under such circumstances should have with us the weight of a
command.”
To this suggestion Lord Carthew agreed warmly. He was greatly
disappointed at not seeing his fair _fiancée_, but was to some extent
soothed by a fictitious message, brought to him by her maid Ellen, to
the effect that Miss Cranstoun was so ill that she had not risen that
day, but that she sent her love and asked him to excuse her.
Just for the few minutes while Ellen was repeating these words to Lord
Carthew, in her master’s presence, having been previously taught them
by Sir Philip himself, Stella was left alone in her bedroom, the door
of which was carefully locked, and the window securely barred. It was
her first moment of solitude since Lady Cranstoun’s death, and as luck
would have it, Stephen Lee was standing on the terrace immediately
beneath her window, which was situated in a turret on the third floor
of the building.
For the past four days, although Stella knew it not, Stephen had taken
every possible opportunity of hanging about the house, the serious
illness of one of the collies--an illness so opportune for his plans
that he might be almost suspected of having some hand in it--forming
an excellent excuse for loitering near the house, young Stephen being
renowned for his success as a horse and dog doctor.
As soon, therefore, as Stella’s pale face was pressed against her
prison bars, her eyes fell upon the handsome, swarthy countenance and
black beard of the young gamekeeper, and the words spoken by old
Sarah, the gypsy fortune-teller, flashed back into her mind.
The hag had sworn to her that the “Romanys” were her friends, her
people, and that they would help her to escape, if escape were
necessary. At the time, her words seemed mere incomprehensible jargon,
and her allusions to “Clare,” and assertions that Stella was “Clare’s
child,” had seemed the idle chatter of a woman whose wits were
wool-gathering in second childhood.
But now all that was changed. The key to the mystery was in Stella’s
possession, and her cheeks flushed and her heart beat high with
excitement and hope as she recalled the fact that her mother had
escaped out of Sir Philip’s power back to her own people, if it was
only to die, and that she, Stella, might well do the same. Old Sarah
had told her what to do if she needed her help. She had but to place
within the hands of Stephen Lee that little old coin, slung on a piece
of red silk string, which she still carried about her, and succor
would most certainly come.
In an instant she had made a rapid gesture to Stephen, whose eyes were
upturned to her window. He glanced quickly round, and nodded; then
noted, with the keen eye of a man who spent his life out of doors, the
direction taken, in falling, by the little medal as it was cast down
by Stella’s hand, caught it in his fingers, slipped it in his pocket,
and walked leisurely away, as though nothing had happened.
Stella had just time to close the window and retire from its vicinity,
when the maid Ellen returned. Her presence and that of Dakin were
detestable to Stella, who could not even weep for Lady Cranstoun’s
death free from their curious and vulgar gaze, nor would she ever
exchange a word with either of them.
To-day, for the first time, buoyed up by this new hope of escape, she
seemed indifferent to the woman’s presence.
Her hope lay in the gypsies, and with all the wild gypsy element in
her blood, she was longing to be free.