“I HAD HOPED--BUT ALL IS OVER NOW!”
A week passed, very quietly and wearily to our sweet Violet in her
seclusion at the home of Mrs. Lavarre.
To her restless heart, tortured by suspense and anxiety, the time
seemed endless, but the advice of her two new friends was still to wait
a while and take no steps to break up the mystery that surrounded her
flight.
“If I might only write to Cecil,” she sighed, and the thought of his
trouble weighed like lead upon her spirits.
She knew not what story her enemies had invented to impose upon his
credulity. Perhaps Amber had declared that she was false and heartless,
and had married Harold Castello knowingly, and of her own free choice.
“She will win his heart from me, and then I shall die of despair,” she
moaned; but when she gazed on her opal ring she saw the beautiful jewel
glowing with dazzling hues of rainbow light, and knew that Cecil’s
heart was still her own, no matter what cruel story of treachery and
desertion they had poured into his ears.
“He loves me still, my darling!” she murmured, and took comfort in the
thought, forgetting that she was bound by irrevocable ties to another,
and that Cecil’s love could only be sorrow.
But when she pleaded so piteously that she ought to write to Cecil,
Lena Lavarre gently reminded her of the hideous truth that she was
Harold Castello’s wife.
“To write to your lost lover would only augment his misery,” she
said. “Besides, your enemies will be watching for that very clew, and
they would pounce upon you like merciless hawks. Be patient, dear, and
wait a little while before you make a single move in this strange game
you are playing with destiny. It seems to me that Heaven itself will
interfere to save you from Harold Castello.”
“Heaven did not interfere to save you, Lena,” Violet answered, bitterly.
A heart-rending sigh heaved Lena’s breast, and she answered, sadly:
“I did not deserve Heaven’s mercy, Violet, for I was a willful,
disobedient daughter, and ignored the fifth commandment in my
determination to please myself. So I was punished for my sin. But with
you, dear, it is different. You are good and gentle, but you fell
a victim to the wicked plots of your enemies without fault of your
own, so I believe that God is watching to save you and restore you to
happiness again.”
“How can I ever be happy again, bound to that guilty wretch, Harold
Castello?” cried hapless Violet, with the big tears raining from her
blue eyes down upon her pale, lovely cheeks.
“Trust in God and wait,” answered poor Lena, reverently, and after a
moment’s thought, she added:
“Who knows even yet but that I may be Castello’s lawful wife? In that
case your own marriage would be a sham, and you would be free from
your hateful bonds. I’ll tell you, Violet, that I have been trying to
see his valet--the one that he said acted the parson in our marriage
ceremony. I shall ask him if it is true, and thus settle the doubt
forever.”
All Violet’s hopes hinged on this doubt. She prayed night and day
that the truth might be revealed, and Lena Lavarre proved to be Harold
Castello’s legal wife.
“Then I should be free again--oh, blissful thought!--and my undying
love for Cecil would no longer be a sin! I should send for him to
come to me here, and throwing myself into his dear arms, tell him how
cruelly we both had been tricked and deceived. We would be married
soon, and Amber’s wicked arts could never part us again!” she thought,
hopefully.
But this faint, lingering doubt, that in its uncertainty saved her from
complete despair, was soon to be dissipated by the truth.
Lena Lavarre had washed from her face and hands the brown dye she had
assumed when she answered Harold Castello’s advertisement for a French
maid for his bride, and with her fair complexion, rich golden hair,
and large brown eyes, appeared so beautiful that Violet did not wonder
at Harold Castello’s infatuation with the dazzling coquette. Even now,
with the pensive shade of a tragedy on her exquisite face, she was very
charming.
But Lena no longer exulted in the beauty that had brought her so much
sorrow. When she went abroad on simple domestic errands for her mother,
she always wore a thick vail that obscured her face, and she appeared
unconscious of the admiring glances that rested on her queenly form and
graceful carriage. The zest for flirtation was over now, for her proud
heart was broken, and Lena would be glad when death released her from
her undying remorse for her ruined life and her father’s untimely death.
One day her mother sent her into the heart of the city on an errand,
and when she returned they saw by the expression of her face that
something startling had happened.
“What is it, my poor Lena? What has grieved you so much, and washed out
all the light of your eyes in tears?” cried the anxious mother.
Lena had, indeed, been weeping bitterly all the way home. Her thick
vail was wet with the tears she had shed.
With a stifled sob, she threw off her hat and wrap, and sank wearily
into a chair, while Violet and her mother hung about her in surprise
and sympathy.
“Oh, Lena, what is the matter? What new sorrow has come to your poor
heart?” cried Violet.
Lena lifted her beautiful streaming eyes to her sweet friend, crying,
bitterly:
“My poor darling, it is for you that I weep so bitterly! I had
hoped--hoped--but all is over now. I have seen Jacques, the valet. I
know all the bitter truth!” and clasping Violet’s hand, she pressed it
to her feverish lips in passionate sympathy.
“You have seen Jacques Brown, Harold Castello’s servant? When? Where?”
exclaimed Mrs. Lavarre, in keen agitation.