THE MASK THROWN OFF.
As a consequence of this, two days afterward Mary Grey received a
tender, affectionate, sympathetic letter from Emma Cavendish pressing
her to come down to Blue Cliffs at once and let them love her and nurse
her back to health and happiness. And this letter inclosed a check for
double the amount of the usual quarterly stipend.
Miss Cavendish, for some coy reason or other, did not allude to her
approaching marriage. Perhaps she deferred the communication purposely,
with the friendly hope that Mary Grey would visit her at Blue Cliffs,
where she could make it to her in person.
Mrs. Grey, who did not dare to let her true handwriting go to Blue
Cliffs, lest it should be seen and recognized by Mrs. Fanning, and who
could not disguise it safely either, without some fair excuse to Emma
Cavendish for doing so, put on a tight glove, and took a hard stiff pen
and wrote a short note, full of gratitude and affection for Emma and all
the family, and of complaints about her wretched crippled finger, that
made it so painful for her to write, and prevented her from doing so as
often as she wished; and of her still more wretched health, that
hindered her from accepting her dear friend's kind invitation.
In reply to this letter, she got another, and a still kinder one, in
which Miss Cavendish spoke of her own speedily approaching marriage, and
pressed Mrs. Grey to come and be present on the occasion, adding:
"My dearest, you _must_ make an effort and come. Alden himself
will escort you on the journey, and take such good care of you
that you shall suffer no inconvenience from the journey. You must
come, for my happiness will not be complete without the presence
of my dear father's dearest friend--of her who was to have been
his bride."
This loving and confiding letter was never answered or even acknowledged
by Mrs. Grey. It was entirely ignored, its contents were never mentioned
to any one, and itself was torn to fragments and burned to ashes.
Two more letters of precisely the same character were written to her by
Miss Cavendish; but they suffered the same fate at the hands of Mrs.
Grey.
She had a deep motive in ignoring and destroying those letters. She did
not wish the world ever by any accident to find out that she had been
informed of the approaching marriage of Alden Lytton and Emma Cavendish
before it had taken place, or in time to prevent it.
Two weeks passed, and then she received a visit from Mr. Alden Lytton.
She received him alone in the front drawing-room.
He apologized for calling on her after she had forbidden him to do so,
but said that he came on the part of Miss Cavendish to ask if she had
received certain letters from Blue Cliff Hall, and to renew, in Emma's
name, her pressing invitation to Mrs. Grey to come and be present at the
approaching wedding.
"Emma wishes me to take charge of you on the journey. And I assure you,
if you will intrust yourself to me, I will take such tender care of you
that you shall know neither fatigue nor inconvenience of any sort," he
added, earnestly.
"I can not go," she answered, coldly.
"Ah, do, for your friend's sake, change your mind," pleaded Alden.
"I can not," she answered.
"But Emma will be so disappointed!"
"I can not help it if she should be. I can not be present at the
wedding," she repeated, faintly.
"But why not? Why can you not go?" persisted Alden.
"Man--man," she burst forth, suddenly, as her whole face changed
fearfully, "how can you ask me such a question? Do you forget that _we_
were to have been married once?--that _we_ loved each other once? But
you threw me over. Now you invite me to your wedding with my rival! And
you ask me why I can not go! Do you take me for a woman of wood or stone
or iron? You will find me a woman of fire! I told you not to come
here--to keep away from me! If you had had sense to perceive--if you had
had even eyes in your head to see with, you would have obeyed me and
avoided me! I told you not to come here. I tell you now to go away. I
will not be present at your wedding. Make what explanation or excuse to
Miss Cavendish you please. Tell her, if you like, that the heart you
have given her was first offered to _me_--that the vows you have made to
her were first breathed at _my_ feet! Tell her," she added, with keen
contempt, "that you are but a poor, second-handed article, after all!
Now go, I say! Why do you stand gazing upon me? Go, and never come near
me, if you can help it, again! For I fancy that you will not feel very
glad to see me when _next_ we meet!" she hissed, with a hidden meaning,
between her clinched teeth.
Alden Lytton was so unutterably amazed by this sudden outbreak that he
had no power of replying by word or gesture. Without resenting her
fierce accusation, or even noticing her covert threat, he stood staring
at her for a moment in speechless amazement.
"Are you going?" she fiercely demanded.
"I am going," he said, recovering his self-possession. "I am going. But,
Mrs. Grey, I am more surprised and grieved than I have words to express.
I shall never, willingly, voluntarily approach you again. If, however,
you should ever need a friend, do not hesitate to call on me as freely
as you would upon a brother, and I shall serve you in any way in my
power as willingly as if you were my own sister."
"Ur-ur-ur-r-r!" she broke forth, in an inarticulate growl of disgust and
abhorrence.
"Good-bye!" he said, very gently, as he bowed and left the room.
Nothing but sympathy and compassion for this "poor woman," as he called
her, filled his heart.
Her outbreak of hysterical passion had been a revelation to him; but it
had shown him only half the truth. In its light he saw that she loved
him still, but he did not see that she hated her rival. He saw that she
was jealous, but did not see that she was revengeful.
He reproached himself bitterly, bitterly, for ever having fallen under
her spell, for ever having loved her, or sought to win her love, and for
thus being the remote cause of her present sorrows.
He had never confided to Emma Cavendish the story of his first foolish,
boyish love, and sufferings and cure. For Mary Grey's sake he had kept
that secret from his betrothed, from whom he had no other secret in the
world.
But now he felt that he must tell Emma the truth, gently and lovingly,
lest Mary Grey should do it rudely and angrily.
For Mary Grey's sake he had hitherto been silent. For his own and Emma
Cavendish's sake he must now speak.
He went straight to the telegraph office and dispatched a message to
Miss Cavendish, saying that he should be down to Wendover by the next
train to pay her a flying visit.
Then he hurried to his office, put his papers in order, left some
directions with his clerk, and hastened off to the railway station,
where he caught the train just as it started, and jumped aboard the cars
while they were in motion.