THE PLOTTER'S VICTORY.
Rose Alstine did not visit the widow in her prison home for some days
after her encounter with the counterfeit August Bordine. In fact, she was
quite ill for a time, and kept her room, refusing to see any one, not
excepting her cousin Janet.
"What a tormented little fool," declared the old maid. "If a man had used
me as this one has Cousin Rose, do you think I'd take on, and make myself
miserable over his villainy? No, I wouldn't--"
"But you'd go for another man at once," put in Sallie, the maid, who had
overheard the remark of Miss Williams.
"Faugh! I'd keep clear of the vampires, I tell you," snorted the old
maid, with a toss of her diminutive head.
"It seems you've been doing that pretty thoroughly in the past, Miss
Williams," retorted Sallie, with a malicious little laugh.
"What do you mean by that?" demanded Miss Williams, tartly.
"Oh, don't fly mad, Miss, I was only speaking from a historical point of
view. Judging from the past, it seems to me you wouldn't be apt to have
more than a dozen beaux dangling after you after they'd used you mean as
you say--"
"Girl, I'll have you discharged."
"You can't do that," retorted Sallie, defiantly.
"I'll show you, huzzy!" and the old maid flounced from the room.
"I'd like to see the likes of her turning me off," muttered the maid. "I
don't think Miss Rose'll pay any attention to that vinegar-cruet."
And in this opinion the maid was not far wrong. Rose did not permit her
cousin to interfere in the least with the internal relations of the
household.
In the evening, while Rose was in the parlor for the first time in
several days, a visitor was announced, a gentleman.
"Who is it, Sallie?"
"Stranger, ma'am."
"What does he want?"
But at this moment the visitor took the liberty to make himself known in
person, a tall, slender man, with gray beard, neatly dressed, and
evidently of the upper class.
Rose greeted the stranger politely and offered a chair.
Of course the maid, seeing that she was no longer needed, passed out and
closed the door.
"To what do I owe the honor of this visit, sir?" questioned Rose.
"I could not stay away longer. I have been burning to see you and have it
out," said the man in a trembling voice; then, with a quick movement he
removed a wig and revealed a young and pleasant face.
Rose recoiled.
"August Bordine!"
He stood before her with outstretched hands and pleading eyes. It was
hard for her to resist that look, yet she viewed him coldly, and refused
to look in his face.
"Don't scorn me until you hear my plea, Rose," he said in a passionate
outcry, that thrilled a chord in her heart.
"Oh, sir, why did you come? Are you not aware that you risk your life?"
"I would risk Heaven for you, my darling. I know how much I risk in
coming here, but I must have this horrible unrest settled for all time.
See, on my bended knees I swear to you, Rose, I am innocent of the murder
of that poor girl. It is a great mistake all round, and I mean to give
myself up and stand trial.
"I have been a coward without your love, Rose. You cannot imagine how
your scorn has weakened me, and the whole affair has been one round of
ghastly mistakes. I am here to-night to tell you the truth. You have
constantly denied me audience, and so to-night I resolved to see you or
die in the attempt. As an excuse I plead only my deep love, and my
innocence, which I believe I shall be able to prove. I hear that you have
been kind to my mother in prison, and to-day I learn that she was
permitted to return to her lonely home through your interference in her
behalf.
"For this I thank you, and if a life-time of devotion can repay you it
shall be yours--"
"Cease, sir," Rose interrupted at the first opportunity. "I am willing to
believe you innocent of that awful crime at Ridgewood, but there are
other crimes as wicked as murder--"
"I know," he cried, rising and clasping his hands, while he bent a
pleading, wistful look into her face. "You refer to that scene in the
garden."
"I do," coldly.
"You have never permitted me to explain that."
"It is not susceptible of explanation."
"It is--"
"I must take counsel of my senses, Mr. Bordine," persisted Rose,
trampling fiercely on her own heart. "I know that that woman was your
wife. I heard enough to convince me of this. Your perfidy ought to make
me hate you."
"And you do hate me, Rose?"
"No--"
"Thank Heaven for that."
"Leave me now, Mr. Bordine."
"Mr. Bordine!" he cried bitterly. "It is August no longer. You would
drive me from you without permitting me to explain. You are unjust,
Rose."
"Never. Would to Heaven I could be!"
What did she mean?
A sudden, wild hope entered the heart of the schemer. He was making even
better progress than he had anticipated.
"You will, you must hear my explanation of that scene in the garden,"
persisted he. "If you can scorn and cast me aside after you know the
truth then I am willing to go."
Rose sank to a seat.
She had been standing, up to this moment, but now she felt strangely weak
and unsteady. He, however, refused to be seated until, as he said, he
made his peace with her.
Their interview had a witness suspected by neither.
Miss Williams, piqued at the attentions her cousin received, resolved to
play the eavesdropper, and so she crouched in the hall at the parlor door
and listened to every word that fell from the lips of the gentleman
visitor.
Although Miss Williams was not the brightest female in the world, she was
far removed from a fool, and soon she learned enough to convince her that
the outlaw, August Bordine, was in the parlor.
This discovery was one which agitated the old maid not a little.
She remembered the immensity of the reward offered for this man, and
realized that if she could win a portion of it, it would be of wonderful
help to her as a matter of pin-money, and it might influence some man to
take pity on her single state and propose.
When the old maid had revolved these thoughts in her brain sufficiently,
she rose to her feet and donning hat and shawl hastened from the house.
"You imagined that that poor woman you heard addressing me as husband
that day was my wife," proceeded Barkswell, after a moment of silence,
"but that was where the trouble came in and the mistake rose."
"Do you deny--"
"It is not necessary. That woman was my sister, but she has been out of
her mind for years. Four years ago I placed her in an asylum near
Rochester for treatment, and this spring she left the place, declared
cured by the doctors. Of course I was overjoyed at this, and hastened to
remove her to my home in this city, where I have resided for more than
two years, as you know. Mother wished to keep the fact of her having a
daughter secret until we were sure that the terrible malady would not
return. It did return, and so we have kept my poor sister very close for
some time. She has strange hallucinations, and imagines that I am her
husband, and that she is ill-treated. It was a love affair that turned
her brain, and I suppose this has much to do with her present
hallucination."
In measured tones he uttered this information, and it did not seem
possible that the man was uttering a deliberate lie.
Rose moved uneasily in her seat.
His dark eyes, full of an intense love-light, were fixed on her face.
He saw that his falsehood was having its effect.
"You no doubt wonder why you haven't heard of this sooner. You must
remember that I have failed to gain an audience with you since that
hour."
"August, are you speaking the truth?"
Her face was ghastly white, and her full bosom rose and fell with the
violence of her inward emotions.
"If you doubt, I am ready to swear it," he cried, sinking to her feet
once more, bowing his head as a subject might to his sovereign.
"No, no," she cried suddenly. "Rise up, August. Heaven help me and _you_
if this is a deception. I can do no other way than to believe."
He uttered a glad cry and pressed her hands to his lips, covering it with
kisses.
She sat like one in a dream, unresisting, feeling a portion of bliss, yet
filled with a vague alarm that was far from pleasant.
"And now I shall not fear to brave the world, and proclaim and prove my
innocence," he cried boldly, coming to his feet.
She regarded him with a faint, fluttering heart, the faintest impress of
a smile on her beautiful face.
Was it possible that happiness was in store for her in the near future?
Even while these thoughts filtered through her brain he spoke again.
"Poor Iris, she will no longer suffer."
"Your sister?"
"Yes; she died to-night."
"That is terrible."
"And yet it is best so. Insanity is far worse than death; at any rate it
seems so to me," he said solemnly and slow. "And now, dear Rose, I have
but one request to make. If we could only be married before this trial I
should feel doubly strong to face the world."
She opened her lips to reply, but the words were drowned in their
inseption by the crash of feet in the hall.
Swiftly the man sprang across the carpet and turned the key in the lock,
just as a hand shook the door, and a loud voice demanded admittance.