It was a striking _tableau_, there beneath the over-arching trees that
fair, calm, summer night. Lady Vera's beautiful face was all pale with
passionate scorn and indignation as she leaned upon her lover's arm.
Her enemies had started back as her scathing accusation fell upon
them, and they now regarded her with looks of wrath, blent with honest
astonishment. Colonel Lockhart's face had turned to a dull, ashen gray,
like the pallor of death, but he stood his ground bravely, like the
soldier that he was. Lady Vera did not dare to look at him, but beyond
one swift, convulsive start, as though a sword had pierced his heart,
the arm that supported her did not even tremble. He had steeled himself
to bear his pain and make no sign.
"Colonel Lockhart," Mrs. Cleveland exclaims, starting boldly to the
front, "I would advise you to take Lady Fairvale home to her friends.
She must surely be raving mad. I know not how she came into possession
of any facts concerning us, but I swear to you, and can prove my
assertion, that Vera Campbell, the first wife of my son-in-law, Leslie
Noble, has been dead and buried three years. Is it not so, Leslie?"
"It is perfectly true," he answers, gazing curiously at the beautiful
girl who has claimed him as her husband. "If Lady Fairvale be Vera
Campbell Noble, then she has risen from the grave itself to claim me,
for I saw her buried three years ago, and I erected a costly marble
monument to her memory."
"She committed suicide!" Ivy screams out, spitefully. "She died in my
mother's house. I saw her lying dead, and I saw her buried."
"Oh, shameless falsehood!" Vera breaks out, warmly. "I did not die,
and you know it. The bitter drug with which I thought to end my
wretched life, turned out to be only a sleeping potion after all. Will
you deny, Marcia Cleveland, that Lawrence Campbell came to you that
night to denounce you for the falsehood with which you had betrayed
him, and to ask, at your hands, his wronged wife and child?"
Livid with rage and fear, the wicked woman stares at her fearless
accuser. How has this beautiful countess, with Vera Campbell's face,
learned the secret of her past life?
"Lady Fairvale," she answers, "I do not know how you, a stranger, have
learned the secrets of my past life, but I will answer your questions
fairly and truthfully. Lawrence Campbell did indeed come to me as you
assert, but his daughter had been buried that very day in Glenwood. I
bade him seek his wife and child in the grave, and he fell down like
one dead at my feet. I caused my servants to throw him into the street
like a dog, and I know not, to this day, if he be living or dead."
"He is dead," Lady Vera answers, with blazing eyes. "He has been dead
almost a year. He lived but for vengeance on you, Marcia Cleveland, and
when he died, he bade me swear an oath of vengeance on you. He bade
me avenge my martyred mother's bitter wrongs. It is for this I have
spoken. Do you think I did not shrink from claiming that craven coward
there," pointing a scornful finger, "as my husband?"
Flushing scarlet under her lightning scorn, Leslie Noble advances.
"Lady Fairvale, if indeed you are my wife," he says, "and," insolently,
"no man could have a wife more beautiful, will you tell me by what
strange chance you were rescued from the grave where I, myself, saw you
laid?"
"I deny that I was ever buried," Vera flashes out angrily. "My father
told me nothing of that. He declared that he had me carried away from
Mrs. Cleveland's in a deep narcotic sleep."
"Is it true that Lawrence Campbell was the Earl of Fairvale?" Mrs.
Cleveland demands, looking at Colonel Lockhart.
"It is perfectly true, madam," he answered, coldly.
"And it is true that I am his daughter, whom you and your daughter so
shamefully abused and maltreated?" Vera cries. "Do you remember, Ivy
Cleveland, how you abused and insulted me? How you struck me in the
face that night when my mother lay dead in the house? Do you recall
your anger because she had died before the embroidery was finished on
your Surah polonaise? Do you remember, Leslie Noble, how you stood by
the bedside of that dying saint, and swore to protect and love the
unconscious child you married! Ah, well you kept your vow when you
plotted with that wicked woman yonder to send me from you to a convent
school where I should be tortured to death, so that you should go free.
That was her wicked scheme, I know, for she had planned to marry you to
Ivy. Now you know why I tried to escape from you into the merciful land
of death. But Heaven spared me the commission of that sin. It was not
poison I took. I made a mistake in the drug. I lived to drag you down
to the dust, Marcia Cleveland; to punish you through your daughter's
shame for my parents' wrongs and mine! You understand now why I would
not speak to you, Ivy Cleveland! That man there whom I utterly loathe
and despise, is my husband, although I would not bear his name for
wealth untold. _You_ are a false and sinful woman unfit to mate with
the pure and true, knowing yourself to be only the reputed wife of a
bigamist!"
The torrent of passionate accusation comes to a sudden end, and Lady
Vera, with heaving breast and dilated eyes, looks contempt upon her
foes. They stand before her awed and silent for a moment. Her scathing
words have carried conviction to their hearts. They know her in truth
to be that Vera whom for three long years they have believed to be
sleeping under the costly marble that bears her name in Glenwood
Cemetery. But they will never admit it. To do that would be to throw up
the game and own themselves beaten and vanquished.
A curious crowd of ladies and gentlemen have gathered around attracted
by the sound of excited voices. With wonder and dismay they listen to
the scathing denunciations that fall from the lips of the beautiful
countess. Mrs. Cleveland, fully conscious of the curious eyes, turns
around and makes reply to them--not Lady Vera.
"My friends," she cries, with uplifted hands and a face of horror,
"surely this beautiful lady has lost her mind. She is stark, staring
mad, and for this I can forgive her the insults she has heaped upon my
daughter. I believe she is a clever adventuress whom Lawrence Campbell
has foisted on the world as his heiress. Vera, the real daughter of the
Earl of Fairvale, died three years ago in Washington. She is buried at
Glenwood beneath a marble monument that bears her name and age. I swear
before God that this is true. This girl here, this pretended Countess
of Fairvale, is, without doubt, a clever impostor, who is keeping
the Earl's true heir out of his own. Let her disprove this charge if
she can. If she be truly Vera Campbell, let her prove that she was
resurrected from the grave in Glenwood where my own eyes saw her laid."
A moment of perfect silence follows Mrs. Cleveland's venomous words.
Her daughter, who is a coward at heart in spite of all her bravado, has
fallen back a pace, allowing her mother to be spokesman, well knowing
that not even herself could so valiantly defend her cause.
There is a look of fear and dread on Ivy's face that gives her a
ghastly look in spite of her paint and powder.
Lady Vera's words have carried conviction to her heart, and in fancy
she sees herself deserted and abandoned by the man whom she believed
her husband, and whom she has relentlessly tyrannized over, recklessly
dissipating his fortune, and trampling on his heart.
She well knows that every spark of love he ever entertained for her had
died long ago, murdered by her own heartless, unloving course toward
him. What more natural than that he should rejoice if his bonds fell
from him and left him free from her mother and herself, who had been
fastened upon him like human vampires, draining his very heart's blood.
She glances at him, and that glance does not reassure her. There is a
strange expression on his face, and he is not looking at her, but at
the beautiful, high-born girl who has just claimed him as her husband,
albeit with words of scorn.
Even while she gazes at him in fear and terror he steps forward with
a certain craftiness in his eyes, and answers Mrs. Cleveland's angry
words.
"You speak too harshly, perhaps, Mrs. Cleveland. I have been impressed,
even against my will, by Lady Fairvale's words. She is certainly
possessed of knowledge that no one but Vera Campbell could have known.
Then, too, she is startlingly like my dead wife, both in voice and
person. Although I certainly buried my first wife and raised a costly
monument over her grave, I am still willing to investigate the strange
charges of Lady Fairvale. Strange things have happened sometimes. The
dead have come to life, the lost have been found. 'Let justice be done
though the heavens fall.'"
"Wretch! Would you turn traitor to me?" screams Ivy, clutching him
violently by the arm, forgetful of all but her fear of losing him.
He gazes down at her in a feigned sympathy and sorrow.
"My poor Ivy. Could you think so meanly of me?" he exclaims. "But
think, dear. How could we rest secure with this terrible charge hanging
over us? Were it not better that I should take steps to prove the truth
or falsity of this fair lady's bold accusation?"
"Take steps--how?" the bejeweled little woman falters confusedly.
"Nothing easier," he answers. "I shall cable to Washington to have my
first wife's grave opened. If her remains are found undisturbed, then
you are still my wife, Ivy, and this lady's story is an imposture.
But if Vera's grave be found empty, I shall be forced to believe that
Lady Fairvale is in sober reality the Vera whom, for three years, we
believed dead and buried."
He speaks to Ivy, but he looks at Vera. Something in that glance makes
her turn pale and flash a glance of silent scorn upon him.
"She is not Vera. She is an impostor whom Lawrence Campbell put into
the place of his dead daughter," Ivy screams, impetuously, clinging to
him with both hands. "Come away from her, Leslie. She is a false and
wicked woman, and we will yet prove her so--will we not, mamma?"
"Yes, it shall be war to the knife between us," Mrs. Cleveland mutters,
menacingly, flinging a glance of deadly hatred upon Lady Vera's pale
and lovely face. "Come away now, Leslie, and bring Ivy home. She is too
slight and frail to bear all this excitement."
Silently obeying the imperious will that has ruled him for almost three
years, Leslie Noble moves away with Ivy on his arm, after a courteous
bow to Vera, which she returns with a cold stare of contempt.
"Lady Vera, shall I take you away also? You look weary and
exhausted," says Colonel Lockhart, in a low voice that shows intense
self-repression and emotion.
She starts and shivers at the sound of his voice.
"If you will be so kind," she answers, sadly, and moving away on his
supporting arm she meets Lady Clive and Mrs. Vernon coming toward her.
Their grave faces show instantly that they know all. Lady Vera pauses,
with a strange, cold smile.
"Mrs. Vernon, I am sure you will never forgive me for my undignified
act in creating an excitement and a sensation at your party. I was
compelled to keep my oath to the dead. Yet _she_ forced it on me. I
did not mean to speak--just yet," she falters, incoherently, and Mrs.
Vernon, who is the kindest woman alive, presses her hand, and murmurs
gently, "Poor darling," while Lady Clive murmurs tenderest words of
sympathy and love.
It is too much for Lady Vera--this gentleness and love after the
exciting scene through which she has passed. Her forced calmness and
self-control give way beneath its softening spell.
She reels dizzily, and only Colonel Lockhart's support prevents her
from falling. In a moment he says to his sister, anxiously:
"She has fainted, Nella. What shall we do?"
"Bring her up-stairs into my _boudoir_," replies Mrs. Vernon, promptly
and kindly. "We will revive her directly."
But Lady Clive negatives the proposal, decidedly.
"No, we will put her into the carriage and take her home," she says.
"She will come to herself, directly. It is a blessed unconsciousness
for her, poor girl. Why should we call her back to remembrance too
soon?"
So the soldier lifts her in his strong and tender arms, and bears her
to the carriage. Lady Clive receives the drooping head upon her lap,
and they roll homeward, Lady Vera lying pale and mute between them
like some pure, white lily, broken and beaten down by the force of the
pitiless storm.
"This is hard lines upon you, Phil," Sir Harry Clive says, from his
corner.
"Yes," his brother-in-law answers, in a low voice, and they speak no
more until low sighs, rippling over Lady Vera's lips, presage her
return to consciousness.
She lifts her head and looks at them, then drops her face in her hands,
and bursts into passionate sobs and tears.
Lady Clive folds her white arms fondly around the heaving form.
"Do not weep so wildly, darling Vera," she whispers, gently.
But the heavy sobs only break forth more tumultuously.
"Do not check me," she whispers, "let me weep. Perhaps these tears may
save my heart from breaking. There is such a terrible weight on heart
and brain, and has been for weary, weary days. Let me weep until I can
weep no more, and then I may be calm enough to tell you all my wretched
story. Then you may know how to pardon my act of to-night."
So Lady Clive expostulates no more, only holds the slight form closer
in her tender arms, reckless of the raining tears that spot and stain
her azure satin robe as the burning drops fall on it from Vera's eyes.