A MOTHER'S ANGUISH.
They wondered why Lord Linleigh allowed no one to take the fatal news to
his wife but himself. The secret of her early ill-starred love and
marriage had been so well kept all those years, it was useless to betray
it now. He knew well what her anguish would be. He dreaded all scenes of
sorrow, but he loved his wife, and no one must be with her in the first
hour of her supreme trouble and bereavement.
He went to her room when the detectives left, and found Mattie still
keeping watch over her. Before speaking one word to his wife, he turned
to Mattie.
"Thank you, my dear," he said, gently; "you have carried out my wishes
most faithfully. Will you go to Earle? Eugenie will take you where he
is."
Then when she had quitted the room, Lady Estelle flung herself into his
arms.
"Ulric," she cried, "tell me what is the matter? I know that something
terrible has happened to Doris--what is it?"
"My darling wife," he said, "try to bear it. I have sad news for
you--the saddest that I could bring you. Doris is dead!"
But even he, knowing how dearly the mother loved her child, was hardly
prepared for the storm of anguish that broke over her.
"Dead!" she cried, "and never knew me as her mother! Dead! and never
clasped her sweet arms round my neck! Dead! without one word! I cannot
believe it, Ulric. How did it happen? Oh, my darling, my golden-haired
child, come back to me, only just to call me mother! How did it happen,
Ulric? Oh, I cannot believe it!"
He was obliged to tell her the pitiful story. Not one word did he say of
the wedding costume destroyed, or the captain's suspicion--not one
syllable; yet, strange to say, the same idea occurred to her. His wife
had lain her head on his breast; she was weeping bitterly, and he
clasped his arm round her. He said in a grave voice quite unlike his
own:
"It must have been some beggar or tramp, who knew the secret of that
spiral staircase, and had resolved upon breaking into the house by that
means--some one who had learned, in all probability, that our daughter's
jewels were kept in her chamber. Perhaps she carelessly left the outer
door unlocked, and, while she was sitting dreaming, the burglar entered
noiselessly; then, when she rose in her fright to give the alarm, he
stabbed her."
She did not think just then of asking if the jewels were stolen or not;
but, strange to say, she started up with a sudden cry.
"Oh, Ulric, Ulric! was it all right with her, do you think? I have
always been afraid--just a little afraid--since I heard how she begged
for secrecy over her wedding. Do you think she was frightened at any
one? Perhaps some one else loved her, and was madly jealous of her."
He did not let her see how her words startled him--so like those used by
Captain Ayrley. He tried to quiet her.
"No, my darling Estelle. Doris had many lovers--we knew them--men of
high repute and fair renown; but there was not one among them who would
have slain her because she loved Earle. Remember yet one thing more--no
one know she was going to marry Earle; it had not even been whispered
outside of our own house. It was a robbery, and nothing else, carefully
planned by some one who knew the only weak spot in the house. I have no
doubt of it."
Then she broke down again, and cried out with wild words and burning
tears for her child--her only child, who had never known her as her
mother.
They wondered again why the earl, with his own hand led Lady Linleigh to
the silent death-chamber. He did not wish any one to be near, to see or
to hear her.
He lived long after, but he never forgot that terrible scene; he never
forgot how the mother flung herself by the side of that silent
figure--how caressingly her hands lingered on the golden hair, on the
sweet, dead face; he never forgot the passionate torrent of words--words
that would have betrayed her secret over and over again a thousand times
had any one been present to hear them. She laid her face on the pale
lips.
"My darling," she cried, "come back to me, only for one hour: come back,
while I tell you that I was your mother, darling--your own mother. My
arms cradled you, my lips kissed you, my heart yearned over you. I am
your own mother, darling. Come back and speak one word to me--only one
word. Oh, Ulric, is it death? See, how beautiful she is! Her hair is
like shining gold, and she is smiling! Oh, Heaven, she is smiling! She
is not dead!"
But he drew her back, telling her it was only a sunbeam shining on the
dead face--that she was dead, and would never smile again.
"Only touch one hand," he said; "there is nothing so cold as death."
She could only cry out, "her darling! her darling!" Oh, for the days
that were gone--spent without her! How dearly she would love her if she
would but come back again!
Lord Linleigh was always thankful that he had brought her there alone;
and though he knew such indulgence in violent sorrow to be bad for her,
he would not ask her to go away until it was almost exhausted; then he
knelt down by her side.
"Estelle," he said, "you remember that it was for your father's sake we
resolved to keep this secret--nay, we promised to do so. You must not
break this promise now. You kept it while our darling lived; keep it
still. Control your sorrow for your father's sake. Kiss the quiet lips,
love, and tell our darling that you will keep our secret for all time."
She had exhausted herself by passionate weeping and passionate cries,
she obeyed him, humbly and simply, as though she had been a child. She
laid her quivering lips on the cold white ones, and said:
"I shall keep our secret, Doris."
Then he led her away.
That same day Lord Linleigh sent telegrams to the Duke and Duchess of
Downsbury and to Brackenside. Before the noon of the next day the duke
and duchess had reached Linleigh Court. The duke took an active part in
all the preparations for the ceremony of interment. The duchess shut
herself up in her daughter's room, and would not leave her. Later on in
the day Mark and Mrs. Brace came: their grief was intense. Lord Linleigh
little knew how near he was then to the solving of the mystery; but the
same carefully prepared story was told to them as was told to every one
else--a burglar had broken into her room, and, in the effort to give an
alarm, Lady Doris Studleigh had been cruelly murdered. Nothing was said
of the crushed bridal wreath or the torn wedding-dress.
Honest Mark never heard that there was any other mystery connected with
the murder than the wonder of who had done it. Perhaps had he told the
story of Lord Vivianne's visit to Brackenside, it would have furnished
some clew; but the earl was deeply engrossed and troubled. Mark never
even remembered the incident. Had he heard anything of the captain's
suspicions, he might have done so. It did not seem to him improbable
that the young girl had been slain in the effort to save her jewelry;
and jewel robberies, he read, were common enough.
Though the summer's sun shone and the flowers bloomed, the darkest gloom
hung over Linleigh Court. Who could have believed that so lately it had
been gay with preparations for a wedding? Lady Doris lay white, still,
and beautiful in her silent room. Earle had shut himself up in the
solitude of his chamber, and refused to come out into the light of day.
Lady Estelle was really ill, and the duchess never left her. The one
source of all help and comfort, the universal consoler, was Mattie; in
after times they wondered what they should have done without her.
The duke and Lord Linleigh were incessantly engaged.
For many long years nothing had made so great a sensation as this
murder--all England rang with it. So young, so beautiful, so highly
accomplished, heiress to great wealth, and on the point of marriage with
the man she loved best in all the world. It was surely the most sad and
pathetic affair within the memory of man. There was a suspicion of
romance in it, too--murdered on the eve of her marriage.
Some of the best detective skill in England was employed to trace out
the murderer; but it was all in vain. The duke offered an unprecedented
reward, the earl another, and government another; but it was all in
vain; there did not seem to be the slightest clew--no handkerchief with
the murderer's name, no weapon bearing his initials, no trace of any
kind could be discovered of one of the most horrible crimes in the whole
annals of the country.
There had been an inquest. The maid Eugenie, Mattie Brace, Earle, and
Lord Linleigh, all gave their evidence; but when it was sifted and
arranged, there was absolutely nothing in it; so that the verdict given
was, "Found murdered, by some person or persons unknown."
Nothing remained then but to bury her. The brief life was ended; there
was no more joy, no more sorrow for her--it was all over; neither her
youth, her beauty, nor her wealth could save her. Her sin had found her
out, and the price of her sin was death. There could have been no
keener, swifter punishment than hers, and sin always brings it.
It seems so easy; the temptation, like that of Doris, is so sudden, so
swift, so sweet; the retribution seems so far off. But, sure as night
follows day, surely as the golden wheat ripens under the summer sun, it
comes at last.
Until the hour she was taken from the sight of men she never lost any of
her marvelous loveliness; until the last she looked like a marble
sculpture, the highest perfection of beauty. They wondered--those who
loved her best, as they knelt by her side and kissed her for the last
time--why such wondrous loveliness had been given to her; it had brought
her no good--it had given her swift, terrible death. Rank, wealth,
position, all have their perils, but it seemed to those who watched her
that surely the greatest peril of all is the peril of beauty. She had
been so vain of her fair face; it seemed to her that fair, fragile
beauty was the chief thing in life. It had led her to vanity, and from
vanity to sin of the deepest, deadliest dye. She had paid the price
now--her life was the forfeit. The sheen of the golden hair, the light
of the proud eyes, the beauty of the radiant face, the grace of the
perfect figure, were all hidden away; that for which she had sinned and
suffered--for which she had neglected her heart, mind, and soul--for
which she had neglected Heaven--was already a thing of the past. Let
poets and artists rave of beauty--let the dead girl answer, "What had
beauty done for her?"