A COUSIN FOR A LOVER.
Ah! love was never yet without
The pang, the agony, the doubt
Which rends my heart with ceaseless sigh,
While day and night roll darkling by.
BYRON.
What a day that was!
Kathleen seemed suddenly to grow well and strong at the wonderful
discovery that it was her own cousin who had saved her life, and that
the sweet, lovely woman who had cared for her so kindly was her own
dear grandmother.
They had volumes to tell each other; and how Mrs. Franklyn was shocked
when she heard that a decoy letter, pretending to be from herself, had
at last brought Kathleen to Richmond.
She wept bitterly at the thought that her precious granddaughter had so
nearly lost her life through this mysterious treachery.
"My dear, I never wrote you a line, nor did I ever hear from you.
I thought you were too proud to care about us; so I let you alone,
although it nearly broke my poor heart!"
She gazed with untiring love at the beautiful face, trying to trace in
it every faint resemblance to her dead daughter.
"You are more like your father than your mother," she said, with vague
disappointment. "Your eyes, your features are his; but there is an
expression like Zaidee's, and your hair is gold like hers was, only a
richer, deeper shade. You are more beautiful even than Zaidee was," she
continued, fondly, as she stroked the bronze-gold curls.
Chester had little to say. He looked and listened eagerly, his heart
thrilling at the thought that Kathleen was his cousin, and in a measure
belonged to them.
"For her father has disinherited her; her step-mother cast her off. We
are her nearest and dearest, and she will stay with us and share our
lot," he said within himself.
Kathleen, while confiding very freely in them, had held back with a
young girl's shyness the story of her love affair and her engagement
of marriage. She did not suppose they would care for _that_, and she
was so anxious to know what had befallen her uncle that she dwelt
constantly on that subject.
"Perhaps they murdered him, too," she sobbed. "Oh, cousin! will you not
telegraph at once to my friends in Boston, and let them know where I
am? Perhaps in that way I may get news of him sooner. And they will be
so uneasy over my fate."
"They?" the young man repeated, with his curious eyes upon her face.
"Mrs. Stone, my friend, and--Mr. Darrell--the man I am to marry,"
explained Kathleen, with a blush. Her eyes had dropped, so she did not
see the ashen pallor that suddenly overspread Chester Franklyn's face.
"You will telegraph at once, will you not, cousin?" she repeated, and
hastily scribbled down the addresses upon a card.
"I will go at once," he answered, taking the slip of paper and leaving
the room. But a terrible temptation had assailed him. "Why not wait a
little before I send the telegrams!" he thought. "I can not give her
up just yet to the proud, rich man she is going to marry. If she stays
with us a little longer, I may, perhaps, win beautiful Kathleen from
him. It ought to be so. Grandma and I ought to have Zaidee's child for
our own because we have been cheated of her sweetness all our lives.
I--will--not--send the telegrams just yet. She will never know."
He had often read the saying that "all is fair in love and war," and it
seemed to him that there could be nothing unfair in this. But yet his
heart smote him when he went back and met the eager light in the dark
eyes he loved so well.
"They will be so much relieved when they know that I am safe and well,"
she exclaimed. "And as soon as they can they will come for me."
"You are in a great hurry to leave us!" Chester cried, reproachfully.
"No, indeed, for I love you both dearly," the girl replied, not
dreaming how his heart leaped at the words. "But I am so anxious over
the fate of my uncle. Only think, cousin, I do not know if he is dead
or alive. Perhaps they drowned him, too;" and her eyes filled with
tears.
"Try and bear the suspense as well as you can. I will try to amuse
you," and he kept his word as far as lay in his power. He read to her,
sung to her, played games, talked, and Kathleen would have really
enjoyed his company only for the cruel suspense of her waiting.
"It is strange they do not come. It almost seems as if they did not
care for me," she said, wistfully, on the third day.
"They will come to-morrow. Do not think about them now. I want to sing
you this sweet little song," he said, going over to the piano and
seating himself.
He had found out that the best way to amuse or interest Kathleen was to
read or sing to her while she lay quietly on the sofa, her arms over
her head, her dark, curly lashes drooping over her sad, dreamy eyes.
Many a time when he was not looking, the burning tears ran down her
cheeks as she thought of Ralph, her dear, lost lover, who was brought
so vividly to mind by Chester's poetry and songs.
So she lay very still now while Chester, who really played and sung
very well, poured out in the sweet love-song the passion that filled
his heart.
"When nightly my wild harp I bring
To wake all its music for thee,
So sweet looks that face while I sing,
To reason no longer I'm free.
I forget thou art queen of the land,
'Tis thy beauty alone that I see!
And trembling at touch of thy hand,
All else is forgotten by me.
"The spell is upon me asleep,
In the region of dreams thou art mine--
I wake, but, ah! 'tis to weep,
And the hope of my slumbers resign.
Ah, hadst thou been less than thou art,
Or I more deserving of thee,
Thou mightst have been queen of my heart,
Thou mightst have been all things to me."
Tears came to the singer's eyes and tears to the listener's, the words
were so wildly sad. Chester thought of _her_, she of Ralph, so strange
are love's entanglements.
"Go on," she murmured, unwilling that he should turn and see the
burning tear-drops in her eyes, so Chester selected another song:
I've something to ask you to-night, Kathleen,
A secret I fain would know,
Oh, why do you seem so strange, Kathleen,
And why do you shun me so?
Come out on the porch in the starlight, sweet,
And tell me my joy or woe--
Your coldness is breaking my heart, Kathleen,
For, darling, I love you so!
You were never in earnest--were those your words?
Was that what you meant to say?
Your tones were so strangely low, Kathleen,
Yet I fancied I heard you say:
"I never loved you." Was that your voice,
Or the south wind's dreamy sigh?
Kathleen, Kathleen, you are dreaming, love,
Or perhaps it is only I!
Go and forget you? Kathleen, Kathleen,
Your light words were spoken in vain,
The revel was wild, and the wine flowed red,
But it never drowned his pain,
Till under the sod in the autumn days
He pillowed his dreamless head,
With "Twenty" carved on the marble slab
For he was but a boy, _she_ said.
And Kathleen goes on her lightsome way,
And smiles at his simple heart,
And dazzles and lures as she dazzled him
With the coquette's Circean art,
While under the daisy-dimpled turf,
A-sleeping light and low,
Heart-broken molder the lips that sighed
Kathleen, I love you so!
He turned around on the piano-stool and looked at her. She was sitting
upright, her dark eyes wide and startled.
"Forgive me," he said, gently. "The name was Irene, but I put in yours
because it rhymed so well."
"But why do you choose such sad songs?" she said. "They make my heart
ache."
"Because mine aches already," he answered, impulsively; and, seating
himself by her side, he continued, passionately: "Darling Kathleen, I
love you, and, unless you will give me your love in return, I shall die
of heartbreak, like that poor lad in the song."
She remained perfectly silent a moment, then answered, rebukingly:
"But you are my cousin."
"Cousins often marry," he replied, eagerly.
"But I can not marry you, Chester; I am engaged to marry a young man in
Boston. Besides, I don't love you," she replied.
"Do you love _him_?"
"Of--course," she replied; but her voice faltered as she thought how
impossible it was for her to love Teddy, because of that other passion
in her heart.
"Oh, Chester, please let me alone!" she cried, with sudden petulance.
"You have not known me two weeks, and I don't want your love! I do not
want anybody's love!"
Suddenly she burst into hysterical tears.