Marcia Cleveland and Leslie Noble were buried in a quiet, country
graveyard. By Lady Vera's care a plain gray stone was raised above
their graves recording their names and nationality, with a brief line
commending them to the mercy of Heaven.
The remnant of Leslie Noble's once princely fortune reverted to the
Countess of Fairvale. She devoted it to the maintenance of poor Ivy
Cleveland in the best insane asylum in England.
She hoped that with time and care her reason might return to her, but
the poor creature remained a confirmed maniac to the end her long life,
never very dangerous or troublesome, but always fancying herself some
royal personage, and always planning new costumes for some imaginary
ball.
The splendid jewels, for whose sake she dyed her hands in human blood,
were kindly spared to her as playthings. They constituted all the
happiness of her life.
For Countess Vera, after that night of storm and death and merciful
rescue, there dawned a brighter day.
Only one cloud dimmed the horizon of her life-sky. It was Raleigh
Gilmore's suit at law. Even her best friends, those who believed in her
the most loyally, secretly feared that it would go against her.
When Lady Vera met Sir Harry Clive again she went to him with a smile,
the open memorandum-book in her white hand.
"You see," she said to him with that triumphant I-told-you-so smile,
which women are wont to wear on such occasions, "it was no dream, Sir
Harry. Here are the precious lines in my father's writing, word for
word, as I repeated them to you that day."
Sir Harry humbly begged her pardon for his doubts.
"You wrote to this Joel McPherson, did you not?" he asks, anxiously.
"Yes," she answers. "Has no word come from him yet?"
"No," Sir Harry replies, "not a word. Perhaps he is dead; perhaps he
has gone away."
"We must send someone over to America to look for him," Lady Vera
replies decisively.
"I think you are right. It is the best thing that can be done," he
agrees.
Her lawyer is of the same opinion. They decide to send Mr. Sharpe,
the efficient detective, to Washington to find the missing sexton of
Glenwood.
When Lady Vera has repeated to them Leslie Noble's assertion, that
he had written to a friend to keep the sexton out of the way, they
strongly suspect that McPherson has been made away with.
Mr. Sharpe is sent on his errand to America, Lady Vera's keen-witted
lawyer staves off the impending trial from day to day pending the
arrival of her important witness, and all wait in suspense for news
from the detective.
Meanwhile, Raleigh Gilmore's case has weakened daily.
The witnesses upon whom he had relied so confidently, Mrs. Cleveland
and her daughter, and possibly Leslie Noble, were all unavailable, two
being dead, one the incurable inmate of a madhouse.
The tide of fortune was setting against him. Lady Vera's friends began
to desert his banner.
Meanwhile, Lady Vera's lover and friends rejoiced in her returning
health and strength. She had been so frail and delicate when
Colonel Lockhart brought her back to them that they were shocked and
frightened. They thought she would die. Lady Clive and the faithful
maid, Elsie, wept floods of tears over her. Little Hal took a great
deal of blame to himself for Lady Vera's abduction.
"Vera, I should never have given you that dreadful old woman's letter
if I had known what it was about," he reiterates in her patient ear
many times.
"I know that, dear," she always answers, kindly. "No one blames you,
Hal, for my misfortune. It was my own willfulness that led me into
danger. Had I listened to my faithful Elsie, I should not have gone."
But their fears for her health are soon dissipated. Happiness, love and
hope, are potent restorers. The light returns to Lady Vera's eyes, the
roundness to her face and form, the color to her cheeks, and the slight
shade of thought and sadness around her lovely lips does not detract
from her beauty.
No one can tell with what happiness Colonel Lockhart basks in the
sunlight of her presence, though when she runs her white fingers
through his hair, she wonders at the silver threads that shine in the
brown, clustering curls.
"They were not there three months ago," she says to him thoughtfully.
"Are you growing old so fast, Philip?"
"I have grown old in sorrow since we parted, dear," he answers,
searching her face, gravely. "Shall you love me less for my gray hairs,
dearest?"
"No, for they were whitened by your grief for me," she answers,
pressing her sweet, shy lips on those silvery tokens of his sorrow.
And now Colonel Lockhart begs her to name an early day for their
marriage.
"We have had so many vicissitudes in our courtship, darling, that I can
never feel sure of you until you are my wife. Let it be soon, dear," he
pleads.
But Lady Vera, blushing her sweetest, answers:
"Not until after the trial is decided, Philip."
But this is just what the handsome soldier is unwilling to do.
"Why wait until after that?" he asks. "Do you mean to throw me over
if--all does not go to please you?"
The dark eyes look at him gravely.
"If it goes against me, Philip, would you be willing to wed one whom
the world will brand as an impostor?" she asks him, slowly.
"Yes, for I would know the charge was untrue. Oh, Vera, let me make you
my own now, while the issue is still in doubt, that you may know that I
loved you for yourself alone."
"As if I did not know that already," she answers, looking at him with
sweet reproach.
"That the world may know it, too, then," he urges.
He is most anxious that the marriage shall take place before the trial.
Then if, as he fears, the trial should go against her, she will be safe
in her position as his wife, and none will dare assail her. But he
cannot explain this without wounding her sensitive feelings, so he is
forced to admit her denial.
"Not until after the trial, Philip."
"And then?" he asks, eagerly.
"As soon as you please," she answers, with tender blushes glowing all
over her beautiful face, and then she laughs musically.
"We are setting the day for our marriage, and we are not even engaged,"
she laughs, in answer to his aggrieved look.
"We are!" he insists.
"We are not," she declares. "We dissolved our engagement several months
ago, and since I became free you have not asked me to renew it."
The tender mischief in the lovely, laughing, dark eyes, almost
disconcerts the handsome soldier.
"Oh, Vera, I thought of course you knew that I meant it," he says,
rather incoherently. "We _are_ engaged, and we are going to be married,
aren't we, dear?"
"If you ask me," she says, with demure mirth, out of the happiness of
her heart.
"I ask you now," he answers, laughing too. "Is it yes, Vera?"
She murmurs assent with a pretty assumption of coquetry, and bends
her head for her second betrothal kiss, delighting her lover by the
child-like gaiety that shows how her spirit is gradually throwing off
the depressing influence of grief that has so long surrounded her.
"Then, Vera, I may write to my father, General Lockhart, and ask him to
come over to the wedding?" he says, presently.
"What! and the _trousseau_ not ready yet?" she laughs.
"Oh, my darling, you will write and order it at once, will you not?" he
exclaims.
"I have already ordered it, Colonel Lockhart," she replies, demurely.
"What! before you were engaged?" he retorts, feeling it his turn to
tease now.
"I had the prospect of a proposal, sir," she answers, with charming
frankness.
"Then I shall write to my father to come over. I would not miss having
him see my lovely bride, and I intend that the wedding shall come off
as soon as the _trousseau_ is ready," declares the happy lover.
Lady Vera does not say him nay. She is very happy in the prospect of
a union with her faithful lover. The days glide past like a dream of
pleasure, quietly, because as yet she denies herself to callers, but
happily, because surrounded by her dearest friends and her adoring
lover.