"OH, SIR, HAVE PITY ON ME!" PRAYED DAISY LYNN.
Misery! we have known each other
Like a sister and a brother,
Dwelling in the same lone home
Many years . . . . . . . .
SHELLEY.
It seemed almost as if there was a fate in it that poor Daisy Lynn,
whose life-path had so strangely crossed Kathleen's, should again
become a figure on the scene of her destiny.
Jack Wren having been furnished by Uncle Ben with a photograph of
Kathleen, suddenly chanced upon a face that made him think he had found
the missing girl.
It was a face at the window of a little cottage in the suburbs of
the city--a beautiful face, dark-eyed, golden-haired, with piquant
features, so close a copy of Kathleen's that the detective was
startled. He consulted the photograph closely, and it seemed to him
that the description answered in every particular. So he congratulated
himself that he had been mistaken in his theory that Kathleen was dead.
"But why did they leave her alive, and what is she doing here?" he
asked himself in wonder.
He made some cautious inquiries among the neighbors, and he found that
the beautiful young girl was a governess in the family of a young
lawyer who occupied the cottage. His wife was an invalid, and had
employed the young girl to fill the position of nursery governess to
her five tow-headed boys, "the worst limbs in the whole neighborhood,"
averred the gossiping neighbors.
The new governess Daisy Lynn, as she called herself, had only been
there three weeks, they said, and they were sure she would not stay the
month out. No one could endure that Perkins tribe more than a month.
The oldest boy was twelve, the youngest only four. "But," said the
grocery man at the corner, "from the biggest to the littlest, they are
all imps of Satan!"
"But why did the girl come here? why does she stay? Evidently she is
here of her own free will," thought the puzzled detective.
He made up his mind to a bold procedure: he would go and see the girl.
He rang the bell at the door, and a slatternly negro girl opened it and
started at the elegant-looking caller with his shiny hat.
"I want to see Miss Lynn," he said; and she showed him into the little
parlor, and went to call the governess.
He did not have to wait long before the face he had seen at the window
appeared within the room--such a beautiful face, but, oh! so pale and
frightened, the sweet lips trembling as she said, nervously:
"I--I don't know you, sir."
"But I know you, Miss Carew," he replied, as he rose and bowed.
"Miss Carew!" She caught eagerly at the words. "Oh, I knew you were
mistaken! That is not my name, sir."
Jack Wren laughed lightly and drew the photograph from his pocket.
"Is not that your face?" he asked.
The lovely girl started with surprise.
"Oh, dear! it does look like me; but I never had my photograph taken in
my life!" she exclaimed.
The detective smiled unbelievingly.
"You are a very clever young girl, but I do not understand your game,"
he said, bluntly. "Why have you run away from your friends and your
bright prospects, Miss Carew, to masquerade under a false name and wear
out your life teaching the rough Perkins cubs?"
She trembled and grew deathly pale as she faltered:
"There is--there must be--some mistake. My name is really Daisy Lynn,
and I--I have not--I have no friends and no bright prospects, except to
earn my own living by unremitting toil."
Tears came into the dark eyes as she spoke. The great Southern
detective looked at her with puzzled eyes. "What superb acting!" he
thought, admiringly. "But, what the deuce is the matter with the girl,
to make her hide herself in this way from her friends?"
"Perhaps you do not know who I am?" he said; and he held before her
eyes a card on which was neatly engraved his name and profession.
"I--I have heard of you, Mr. Wren!" gasped Daisy Lynn.
She sunk into a chair, and put her small white hand before her eyes, as
if to shut out some dreadful sight, her bosom heaving with frightened
sobs.
He remained perfectly silent, and all at once Daisy Lynn slid out of
her chair and knelt in child-like humility at his feet.
"Oh, sir, have pity on me!" she prayed. "Go away, and leave me in
peace! I am not insane, whatever any one may say. That was but a
temporary spell, and, under the care of the kind friend to whom Heaven
directed me that awful night, I soon recovered my reason. A wrecked
love had made me mad, but that is all over now. Only--only you would
not be able to convince them of it. So I--I do not want to go back.
Oh, God! I shall go mad, indeed, if I am sent again to that dreadful
place! Mr. Wren, perhaps you have a sister of your own. Think of her,
and, for sweet pity's sake, do not betray me to my enemies, who, under
the guise of friends, would work me the bitterest woe!"
A light broke in upon his mind.
"The girl is insane. That explains everything."
He was a stern man, inured to trying scenes, but his heart stirred with
pity for her, so young, so beautiful, and--insane.
He went up to her as she rose and sunk feebly into her chair. Touching
her kindly on the shoulder, he said:
"I am very, very sorry for you, but it is better that you should
return to your friends. They are almost broken-hearted over your
disappearance, and have sent me here for you. Now, get your bonnet,
like a good girl, and come with me."
"I can not go back to them. I would rather die," sobbed Daisy Lynn; and
when he insisted, she grew frantic and rebellious. "I--will--not--go!"
she cried. "They will put me in a horrible lunatic asylum, although I
am not mad. Oh, Mr. Wren, have pity on a most unfortunate young girl!
Go away and tell them you could not find me. Heaven will bless you for
your goodness."
He thought it was a very good proof of her insanity that she expected
Heaven to bless him for telling a falsehood for her sake, and smiled
indulgently as he said:
"My dear young lady, think of the distress of your lover if I go back
without you--the rich, handsome young man you have promised to marry."
An expression of blended pain and scorn crossed the lovely face.
"Do not speak to me of _him_," she cried, passionately. "It was his
falsity that wrecked my life. But that brief madness has passed. I am
sane now, and I scorn him as much as I once loved him."
Oh, the imperial scorn with which she drew her graceful form erect, the
fire that flashed from her lovely eyes! He said to himself that she
was the most beautiful girl he had ever beheld.
"It is not _he_, my false lover, that wants me; I am sure of that. It
is my aunt that has sent you," she continued.
"No, it is your uncle, Mr. Carew," he replied.
"But I have no uncle," she replied, in surprise.
He was nonplused at her persistence in deception, and said, with rising
impatience:
"You must really go with me and see Mr. Carew. If there is any mistake
he will detain you but a few minutes."
"Will you not go and bring him here?" she asked, beseechingly.
"And give you a chance to escape while I am away? No; I am too sharp
for that. Get your bonnet and come with me to the hotel where your
uncle is staying," replied Mr. Wren, firmly.
With a stifled sob she rose to obey, although she said:
"You are very cruel, and I warn you that if I am sent to the lunatic
asylum I shall kill myself."
"They will not send you there," he replied, soothingly.
In a few minutes she joined him in the hall, heavily veiled, and they
set forth on their trip to the Broad Street Hotel, where Uncle Ben and
Teddy Darrell were staying. He called a hack and assisted her into it,
and in a very few minutes they arrived at their destination.
Uncle Ben was so prostrated with grief that he had been unable to leave
his room for days. He was now in his private parlor, and Teddy was
sitting with him, both men looking very sad and dejected, when the door
suddenly opened and Jack Wren entered, the picture of triumph, leading
a beautiful, weeping, dark-eyed girl.
"Kathleen, my darling!" cried Teddy, springing to meet her; but she
shrieked, in dismay:
"I do not know you!"