A goodly apple rotten at the heart;
O what a goodly outside falsehood hath!
--SHAKESPEARE'S "MERCHANT OF VENICE."
In mental power, education, good looks, courtly manners, and general
information Mr. Egerton was decidedly superior to any of the young men
resident in Lansdale; and of this fact no one was better aware than,
himself. He did not confine his attentions to Elsie, and soon found
himself a prime favorite among the ladies of the town. No female
coquette ever coveted the admiration of the other sex more than he,
or sought more assiduously to gain it. He carried on numerous small
flirtations among the belles of the place, yet paid court to Elsie
much oftener than to any one else, using every art of which he was
master in the determined effort to win her affection and to make
himself necessary to her happiness.
He had read many books and seen much of life, having travelled all
over our own country, and visited both Europe and South America; and
possessing a retentive memory, fine descriptive powers, a fund of
humor, and a decided talent for mimicry, was able, when he chose, to
make his conversation exceedingly amusing and interesting, and very
instructive. Also, he seemed all that was good and noble, and she soon
gave him a very warm place in her regard; much warmer than she herself
at first suspected.
According to his own account--and probably it was the truth--Bromly
Egerton had had many hair-breadth escapes from sudden and violent
death. He was telling of one of these in which he had risked and
nearly lost his life from mere love of adventure. Elsie shuddered, and
drew a long breath of relief, as the story reached its close.
"Does it frighten you to hear of such things?" he asked, with a smile.
"Yes, it seems to me a dreadful thing to risk the loss of one's life,
when there is no good to ourselves or others to be gained by it."
"Ah, if you were a man or boy you would understand that more than half
the charm of such adventures lies in the risk."
"But is it right, or wise?"
"A mere matter of taste, or choice, I should say--a long dull life, or
a short and lively one."
Elsie's face had grown very grave. "Are those really your sentiments,
Mr. Egerton?" she asked, in a pained, disappointed tone. "I had
thought better of you."
"I do not understand; have I said anything very dreadful?"
"Is it not a sin to throw away the life which God has given us to be
used in His service?"
"Ah, perhaps that may be so; but I had not looked at it in precisely
that way. I had only thought of the fact that life in this world is
not so very delightful that one need be anxious to continue it for a
hundred years. We grow tired of it at times, and are almost ready to
throw it away; to use your expression."
"Ah, before doing that we should be very sure of going to a better
place."
"But how can we be sure of that, or, indeed, of anything? What is
there that we know absolutely, and beyond question? how can I be sure
of even my own existence? how do I know that I am what I believe
myself to be? There are crazy men who firmly believe themselves kings
and princes, or something else quite as far from the truth; and how do
I know that I am not as much mistaken as they?"
She gave him a look of grieved surprise, and he laughingly asked,
"Well, now, Miss Dinsmore, is there anything of which you really are
absolutely certain? or you, Miss King?" as Lottie drew near the log on
which the two were seated.
They had taken a long ramble through the woods that morning, and
Egerton and Elsie had some ten minutes before sat down here to rest
and wait for their companions, who had wandered a little from the path
they were pursuing.
"Cogito, ergo sum," she answered gayly, "Also I am sure we have had a
very pleasant walk. But isn't it time we were moving toward home?"
"Yes," Elsie answered, consulting her watch.
"That's a pretty little thing," observed Egerton. "May I look at it?"
And he held out his hand.
"One of papa's birthday gifts to his petted only daughter," she said,
with a smile, as she allowed him to take it. "I value it very highly
on that account even more than for its intrinsic worth; though it is
an excellent time-keeper."
"It must have cost a pretty penny; the pearls and diamonds alone must
be worth quite a sum," he said, turning it about and examining it with
eager interest. "I would be careful, Miss Dinsmore, how I let it be
known that I carried anything so valuable about me, or wore it into
lonely places, such as these woods," he added, as he returned it to
her.
"I never come out alone," she said, looking slightly anxious and
troubled; "papa laid his commands upon me never to do so; but I shall
leave it at home in future."
"Riches bring cares; that's the way I comfort myself in my poverty,"
remarked Lottie, lightly. "But, Elsie, my dear, don't allow anxious
fears to disturb you; we are a very moral people at Lansdale; I never
heard of a robbery there yet."
"I believe I am naturally rather timid," said Elsie, "yet I seldom
suffer from fear. I always feel very safe when papa is near to protect
me, and our Heavenly Father's care is always about us."
"That reminds me that you have not answered my question," remarked
Egerton, switching off the head of a clover-blossom with his cane. "Is
the care you speak of one thing of which you feel certain?"
"Yes, and there are others."
"May I ask what?"
She turned her sweet, soft eyes full upon him as she answered in low,
clear tones, "'I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no
good thing.' 'I know that my Redeemer liveth.' 'I know that it shall
be well with them that fear God.'"
"You are quoting?"
"Yes, from a book that I know is true. Do you doubt it, Mr. Egerton?"
"Why, Miss Dinsmore, you do not take me for an infidel, surely?"
"No, until to-day I had hoped you were a Christian."
Her eyes were downcast now, and there were tears in her voice as she
spoke. He saw he had made a false step and lowered himself in her
esteem, yet, remembering his talk with Arthur, he felt certain he
could more than retrieve that error. And he grew exultant in the
thought of the evident pain the discovery of his unbelief had caused
her. "She does care for me; I believe the prize is even now almost
within my reach," he said to himself, as they silently pursued their
way into the town, no one speaking again until they parted at Miss
Stanhope's gate.
Elsie, usually full of innocent mirth and gladness, was very quiet at
dinner that day, and Aunt Wealthy, watching her furtively, thought she
noticed an unwonted shade of sadness on the fair face.
"What is it, dear?" she asked at length; "something seems to have gone
wrong with you."
The young girl replied by repeating the substance of the morning's
talk with Mr. Egerton, and expressing her disappointment at the
discovery that he was not the Christian man she had taken him to be.
"Perhaps what you have taken in earnest, was but spoken in jest, my
child," said Miss Stanhope.
"Ah, auntie, but a Christian surely could not say such things even
in jest," she answered, with a little sigh, and a look of sorrowful
concern on her face.
Half an hour later, Elsie sat reading in the abode of the vine-covered
porch, while her aunt enjoyed her customary after-dinner nap. She
presently heard the gate swing to, and the next moment Mr. Egerton was
helping himself to a seat by her side.
"I hope I don't intrude, Miss Dinsmore," he began, assuming a slightly
embarrassed air.
"Oh, no, not at all," she answered, closing her book; "but aunt is
lying down, and--"
"Ah, no matter; I wouldn't have her disturbed for the world; and in
fact I am rather glad of the opportunity of seeing you alone. I--I
have been thinking a good deal of that talk we had this morning,
and--I am really quite shocked at the sentiments I then expressed,
though they were spoken more than half in jest. Miss Dinsmore, I am
not a Christian, but--but I want to be, and would, if I only knew how;
and I've come to you to learn the way; for somehow I seem to feel that
you could make the thing plainer to me than any one else. What must I
do first?"
Glad tears shone in the soft eyes she lifted to his face as she
answered, "'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.'
Believe, 'only believe.'"
"But I must do something?"
"'Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts,
and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him, and
to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.'"
The man was an arrant knave and hypocrite, simulating anxiety about
his soul's salvation only for the purpose of ingratiating himself
with Elsie; but "the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God,"
pricked him for the moment, as she wielded it in faith and prayer.
What ways, what thoughts were his! Truly they had need to be forsaken
if he would hope ever to see that holy city of which we are told
"There shall in no wise enter it anything that defileth, neither
whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie."
For a moment he sat silent and abashed before the gentle, earnest
young Christian, feeling her very purity a reproach, and fearing that
she must read his hypocrisy and the baseness of his motives in his
countenance.
But hers was a most innocent and unsuspicious nature, apt to believe
others as true and honest as herself. She went on presently. "It is so
beautifully simple and easy,--God's way of saving us poor sinners:
it is its very simplicity that so stumbles wise men and women, while
little children, in their sweet trustfulness, just taking God at His
word, understand it without any difficulty." She spoke in a musing
tone, not looking at Egerton at all, but with her eyes fixed
meditatingly upon the floor.
He perceived that she had no doubts of his sincerity, and rallying
from the thrust she had so unconsciously given him, went on with the
rôle he had laid down for himself.
"I fear I am one of the wise ones you speak of, for I confess I do not
see the way yet. Can you not explain it more fully?"
"I will try," she said. "You believe that you are a sinner deserving
of God's wrath?"
"Yes."
"You have broken His law, and His justice demands your punishment; but
Jesus has kept its requirements, and borne its penalty in your
stead, and now offers you his righteousness and salvation as a free
gift,--'without money and without price.'"
"But what am I to do?"
"Simply take the offered gift."
"But how? I fear I must seem very obtuse, but I really do not
comprehend."
"Then ask for the teachings of the Spirit; ask Jesus to give you
repentance and faith. 'Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye
shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you; for every one
that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that
knocketh, it shall be opened."
Elsie's voice was low and pleading, her tones were tremulous with
earnest entreaty, the eyes she lifted to his face were half filled
with tears; for she felt that the eternal interests of her hearer were
trembling in the balance.
He looked at her admiringly, and, lost in the contemplation of her
beauty, had almost betrayed himself by his want of interest in what
she was saying. But just then Miss Stanhope joined them, and shortly
after he took his leave.
From this time Egerton played his part with consummate skill,
deceiving Elsie so completely that she had not the slightest doubt of
his being an humble, penitent, rejoicing believer; and great were her
joy and thankfulness when he told her that she had been the means of
leading him to Christ; that her words had made the way plain to him,
as he had never been able to see it before. It seemed to her a very
tender, strong tie between them, and he appeared to feel it to be so
also.
She was not conscious of looking upon him in the light of a lover, but
he saw with secret exultation that he was fast winning her heart; he
read it in the flushing of her cheek and the brightening of her eye at
his approach, and in many other unmistakable signs. He wrote to Arthur
that the prize was nearly won; so nearly that he had no doubt of his
ultimate success.
"And I'll not be long now about finishing up the job," he continued;
"it's such precious hard work to be so good and pious all the time,
that I can hardly wait till matters are fully ripe for action. I'm
in constant danger of letting the mask slip aside in some unguarded
moment, and so undoing the whole thing after the world of trouble it
has cost me. It's no joke, I can assure you, for a man of my tastes
and habits to lead the sort of life I've led for the last three
months, I believe I'd give her up this minute, fortune and all, if the
winning of them would lay me under the necessity of continuing it for
the rest of my days, or even for any length of time. But once the knot
is tied, and the property secured, there'll be an end of this farce.
I'll let her know I'm done with cant, will neither talk it nor listen
to it."
Arthur Dinsmore's face darkened as he read, and in a sudden burst of
fury he tore the letter into fragments, then threw them into the empty
grate. He was not yet so hardened as to feel willing to see Elsie in
the power of such a heartless wretch, such a villain as he knew Tom
Jackson to be. Many times already had he bitterly repented of having
told him of her wealth, and helped him to an acquaintance with her.
His family pride revolted against the connection, and some latent
affection for his niece prompted him to save her from the life of
misery that must be hers as the wife of one so utterly devoid of honor
or integrity.
Yet Arthur lacked the moral courage to face the disagreeable
consequences of a withdrawal from his compact with Jackson, and a
confession to his father or Horace of the wretch's designs upon Elsie
and his own disgraceful entanglement with him. He concluded to take a
middle course. He wrote immediately to Jackson, somewhat haughtily,
advising him at once to give up the whole thing.
"You will inevitably fail to accomplish your end," he said. "Elsie
will never marry without her father's consent, and that you will find
it utterly impossible to gain. Horace is too sharp to be hoodwinked or
deceived, even by you. He will ferret out your whole past, lay bare
the whole black record of your rascalities and hypocrisies, and forbid
his daughter ever again to hold the slightest communication with you.
And she will obey if it kills her on the spot."
"There's some comfort in that last reflection," muttered Arthur to
himself, as he folded and sealed his epistle; "no danger of the rascal
getting into the family."
Two days later, Egerton took this letter from the post-office in
Lansdale. He read it with a scowl on his brow. "Ah! I see your game,
young man," he muttered with an oath, "but you'll find that you've got
hold of the wrong customer. My reply shall be short and sweet, and
quite to the point."
It ran thus: "Your warning and advice come too late, my young friend;
the mischief is already wrought, and however unworthy your humble
servant may be deemed by yourself or others of its members to become
connected with the illustrious D---- family, they will find they
cannot help themselves; the girl loves me, and believes in me, and I
defy all the fathers and relations in creation to keep us apart." Then
followed some guarded allusions to various sums of borrowed money, and
so-called "debts of honor," and to some compact by which they were to
be annulled, accompanied by a threat of exposure if that agreement
were not kept to the very letter.