THE MYSTERIOUS LETTER.
It was not until late the next day that Lillian granted the oft repeated
request of her cousin to be allowed to come to her, and not a moment was
lost ere the two friends were together.
"It was cruel in you, my sweet Lillian, to banish me so long, but how
ill you look," and Grace Stanley clasped her arms about the dear form
and kissed the pale cheek tenderly.
"You are mistaken, pretty cousin, in my general appearance, for I have
not been so well in a long time. In fact, your 'poor despondent cousin'
is almost happy to-day."
Lillian was looking into the face of her companion while her pure liquid
eyes were overflowing with the new-found joy that was filling her heart.
"I have been troubled, Grace. Yesterday a heavy wave rolled over me,
that came near burying your 'Lily-Bell' beneath it. But it has passed
on, and I was left out of the tempest, and a hand reached out to hold me
as I was going down beneath the roaring billows. At any rate I am
standing firm to-day, and have no fears of winds or storms. Somehow I
feel secure in the belief that I shall be shielded and brought through
it all," and the fair head drooped for awhile on her hand, and the
joyful tears came and baptised afresh her trembling new-born hope.
Grace had no word of trust to lay on the altar of consecration, and
could only sit at the feet of her who was casting her all upon it, and
be silent.
"Forgive me cousin, my heart and thoughts have been straying. I wanted
to talk with you that I might, if possible, break the last cord that
binds me so tenaciously to the dark scenes of the past that I would bury
forever."
"Are you able, Lillian, to bear the agitation such a conversation would
subject you to?" interposed Grace, with much feeling. "It would make me
very happy to know you had opened wide the door of your poor heart and
taken me into its sacred places, yet I would not give you the slightest
needless pain."
"Thoughtful as ever, darling; but I feel quite sufficient for the task.
Yesterday you heard me tell George St. Clair of my marriage, and how my
mother came to the city and influenced me to go with her. No doubt you
think it strange, as he did, that no greater effort has been made by my
husband to reclaim his lost bride. I could not tell him all, the old
habitual fear made me silent. I am free to-day, and my confidence is
unfettered. No power could have kept him but the one this guilty hand
set up between us."
"You, Lillian?"
"Yes, Grace, I did it. Not willingly, not quite consciously, yet I did
it."
Grace looked puzzled, and her bright eyes were fixed intently on the
sweet face she so loved, then she said, "Go on."
"It was the night before our departure from Philadelphia when, seeing
the postman coming down the street, I ran out to meet him, for something
seemed to tell me he had a letter that would gladden my poor heart. I
was not mistaken. It was from Pearl, and O what a wealth of love it
contained. He would be at home in a week. The business that had called
him away was almost finished. 'Then, dearest,' he added, 'no king was
ever more ecstatic over his crown than I shall be with my own pure
Lily.'"
"'Pure!' How that word thrust itself home to my poor quivering heart. I
had run with the precious missive to my room, and there, as the evening
shades settled down about me, I raved in my agony with the madness of
delirium. _I would not leave him!_ Alone that night I would fly into the
darkness leaving behind me forever those who would tear me from him. By
and by my mother came in with her soft, soothing tones, she pitied and
caressed me. It was not at all strange, she said, that I, a child,
should struggle in the arms of wisdom. I was weak now, but by-and-by I
could walk alone, then would come her reward. She was laboring for my
good only, and when I could look at it I calmly would bless her for it.
We would go to England, where my father's relatives were living, and she
would cause pleasure to fall around me as bountiful as summer rain.
After a few years of travel and study, if I then should find my heart
still clinging to its 'imaginary' love, I should return to the object of
my tried devotion. O how gradually but surely did my silly heart yield
to this sophistry! In a few hours I was her submissive tool. The
fascination of a European tour, the pictures of Parisian frivolities,
and the glitter of pomp and fashion in the society into which I might
plunge and come forth sparkling with its polished gems for all future
adorning, captured my bewildered senses and stilled my whirling brain.
In the morning we were to start on our journey, would I like to leave a
few words for him who would probably for a while grieve at my absence
and mourn over his disappointment? It would not, however, last long,
such troubles never do with these of his sex, she said, and I should not
certainly make myself uncomfortable about it. Nothing could be more to
my wishes, and then I was told that she had written a short letter which
I had better copy, as my head was not clear enough to think
intelligently. It would help him to forget his disappointment and make
him happy, just as I wished him to be. O _that letter!_ I can only give
you its purport; that I can never forget. It told him that terrible
falsehood that I went from him willingly believing it not only to be my
duty, but better for us both. Then it went on to say that I had come to
the conclusion since his absence, that my affections were fleeting with
my childhood; but if in after years I found that I was mistaken I would
frankly write and tell him so; until then I wished he would not try to
see or hear from me. Georgia would not be a pleasant place for a
northern 'abolitionist' like himself to visit, and should he presume
upon so rash an act, I had no doubt my mother would not fail to incense
the people against him, and pleaded that for my sake he would not
attempt it. He might have suspected the origin of that infamous epistle,
had not a cunning brain devised and executed it. O Grace, dear Grace!
how can you hold that perjured hand so closely in your own?"
"It is pure and white my Lily-Bell; no sin-stain mars its beauty. Heart
and hand are free from such implications. But you told him also that you
were going to Europe?"
"O, yes, and that it would be uncertain when we should return. We went
as anticipated the next morning, taking with us one hired servant. This
seemed strange to me at that time, as I supposed we were to return to
our southern home immediately and would need no one if this be so. I
soon found, however, our route lay in a different direction. I cannot
tell where we spent the summer months, but it was in a small cottage in
a wild, dreary place not so far from human habitation but that Margeret
could go twice a week in a few hours to procure the necessities on which
we subsisted. The first of October we left this retreat where I had
spent so many wretched hours under the surveillance of my mother, and
after two days of tiresome travel by private carriage and cars we
arrived at the seashore. There we took possession of a summer residence
on a high cliff that overlooked the water, which showed signs of not
having been long vacated. Here in less than three weeks I became a
mother! Can I tell you about it? O the terrible suspicions that arise in
my poor brain as I remember that scene! Only once did I look on my sweet
lily bud! I cannot make you understand the rapture of that moment! It
was _mine_--it was _his_! How I longed that he should see our beautiful
flower; and then I said 'her name shall be Lily-Pearl, and that shall be
the inseparable tie between us.' I was very ill for a long time they
told me, and when my fluttering life came back with its full powers I
was informed that my beautiful bud had withered and died and lay
sleeping in the elegant robe my hands had taken such pleasure in
forming. Grace--God forgive me if I impute wrong to the innocent; but
here in the presence of Him into whose hands I have committed my cause I
assert my belief that the terrible blow that came near severing the
brittle, trembling thread of life was a base fabrication and that my
child is not dead!"
"Lillian! Lillian! I know it is a dreadful accusation, but listen! You
know I was in London five years and then my mother came for me. In one
year more we returned home. Not many weeks after my arrival I was
passing through the east hall when little Tommy came running to me with
a folded paper in his hand. He said he had picked it up from the floor
and I took it. It proved to be a letter written to my mother without
date or signature. It was hardly legible, for it was evident that the
hand by which it was written was unused to the pen. The writer, however,
complained of neglect and said the bargain made in regard to the child
had not been complied with; that she was worthless to them, and if the
three hundred dollars did not come soon my mother must find another
place for her. _What child can_ my mother possibly have any interest in?
Something further was said about her being six years old which I could
not make out. A terrible conviction took possession of me! _This was my
child! My Lily!_ And who knows but ere this she has been sent out into
the world in default of this paltry three hundred! Goaded by my
suspicions I rushed into the presence of my mother with that mysterious
paper burning in my hand! 'What is this? _What_ does it mean? _What_
child is the heartless wretch talking about?' I almost gasped so
ungovernably did my brain reel beneath the weight of this fearful
apprehension. Never shall I forget the look that greeted me! She was
standing before the mirror in her dressing-room as I entered, but turned
quickly as my tremulous voice fell upon her ear. Her face was as pale
and livid as the marble statuette near which she was standing, while her
eyes flashed with the inward fire she vainly endeavored to conceal.
'_Give me that paper!_' she demanded with extended hand; 'how did you
come by it?' 'Tell me first!' I exclaimed; '_who is the child_ spoken of
in it? I _must_--I _will_ know!' She stared wildly at me, while a
ghastly smile spread itself over her pallid features and suddenly her
voice sank to a low musical cadence peculiar to herself as you well
know, Grace, and somehow it has never failed to bring my most stubborn
will in meek subjection to her feet. 'Lillian, my child,' she said;
'_why_ are you so much agitated? Compose yourself; such fits of anger is
not at all becoming! The story of the child in whom you seem so much
interested is a very short one. I should have confided it to you long
ago, if by so doing I would not have been obliged to reveal a secret
which I could not have told with honor. I will now, however, satisfy
your curiosity in a measure. You know that I have both relatives and
friends in Savannah, one of these had a daughter who a few years ago
became a mother of an illegitimate child; of course the mortification
must be hidden if possible from the world, and much against my will I
became an accomplice in the affair. This is the one alluded to in that
document you hold so tenaciously in your hand. Now give it to me and
forget the subject altogether.' She reached for it, and with her eyes
gazing steadily into mine took it from me and walked with a firm tread
through an opposite door, leaving me standing alone conquered but not
convinced. Do not think harshly of me, dear Grace, I know my mother is
your beloved aunt, and for this reason I confide in you. I would not let
my suspicions loose upon the world, but something has whispered to me
many times since that day that Lily did not die in her infancy, and can
you imagine my agony when I realize that now she may be homeless and
friendless, or what is equally dreadful to me surrounded perhaps with
evil associations growing up into womanhood unlovely and unloved?" The
head of the agitated Lillian sank down on the shoulder of her companion,
and clasped in each other's arms the two mingled their tears of sorrow
and sympathy. During all this time Lillian had spoken kindly of the
cause of all this treachery and guilt! She was dealing with the great
sad past--unclasping it link by link from her present and future as one
throws off accumulated burdens when preparing for laborious action. She
had secretly before this laid them all at the feet of Him who had said,
"cast thy burdens on the Lord and he will sustain thee." His promises
she felt were true and she expected to be assisted over the road that
seemed stretching itself among the thick shadows farther than her faith
could penetrate.
A few hours before this conversation when alone with her blessed Saviour
she had said with quivering lips and wildly throbbing heart: "Forgive
the poor wailing cry, for I cannot hush its sobbings! Rachel wept for
her children and would not be comforted--my child is not--not dead, or
the mother love would cease its calling," and then she prayed: "Thou who
noticest the fall of a little sparrow watch over and protect my Lily!
Shield her--lead her in a path where I may find her."
Did the Father hear?
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