Part 34 (2/2)

Now, why did you not like an affectionate mother go to see Lillian and get an introduction to your son-in-law?”

”You have explained the reason. I did not desire to meet her husband, and having learned that she was with him was compelled to leave the city without going to her as I would have wished. The time may come when my 'prejudices,' as you call them, can be overcome, but as yet my whole soul recoils from the contact!”

Mr. Cheevers laid down his paper and laughed ironically. ”It seems to me that Irene is unusually slow. I must get back to the store.” He walked across the floor impatiently.

”I will go and see what is the matter and let Sylvia's letter go until after tea.” The bell soon rang, and while the husband was satisfying his appet.i.te with the evening bounties the wife ran over Sylvia's letter.

”All well--but in a flutter of fearful forebodings,” was the report as she proceeded. ”Grace is dreadfully worried about Lillian,” she added when the missive was finished. ”I think the mails are not very regular, for I sent a full report of her doings and experiences a month ago.”

”Write again, wife. All who love Lillian are anxious about her of course. It must be dreadful to them to have her up here among her enemies! This is the strangest war on record! Who ever read of the families of the belligerents rus.h.i.+ng into the arms of their bitter foes for protection and safety? Here is Mrs. Belmont, for instance, who is shrinking and s.h.i.+vering at the very thought of the contaminations of her son-in-law, but who settles down as cozily as may be in the very midst of those whom she would be glad to see annihilated.” He laughed heartily as he arose from the table and left the house.

Their guest was irritated, excited and alarmed! Had her daughter said more than had been imparted? There was something in the manner of both husband and wife that had made her feel this was so. But what was it? O, if she could only get that letter! If her eyes could devour its contents! She saw it go into the ample pocket of the lady's dress and her mind was made up; she would read it if in any way possible! She was coming, that was sure, and he would be with her. Could she meet them?

How was it to be avoided? She had told him without doubt; but what if she had not? What if after all Lillian was anxious to bury the past--what if she did not know? ”It was an error that I did not speak to her as she stood beside the carriage that afternoon; but how could I have explained? O the miseries of such a life. O the wretchedness of wrong-doing! While she is beloved, petted and sought after, I am suspected and growled at by every churlish dog who feels inclined to show his teeth menacingly! O if there was a place on the broad earth where such as I could find rest and concealment, thither would I go! But that letter I must have! If, as I suspect, a secret is divulged or a hint regarding my reasons for being in Was.h.i.+ngton, then I will not meet them, even if to avoid it I must hide myself beneath the muddy waters of the Schuylkill. No! no! Witness his exultations? Never!” It was a firm conclusion, but the haughty mistress of Rosedale never faltered when a resolve was fully taken.

The next morning when Mrs. Cheevers was superintending the kitchen, Mrs.

Belmont might have been seen standing before the door of that lady's wardrobe, with a look of cynical scorn upon her still handsome features as her keen eyes were running over the page of the coveted letter she was holding in her hand. ”Ah! I thought so. Could not tell what could have been my mission to Was.h.i.+ngton, but feared it was for no good, and that justice might overtake me. Kind, certainly! Yes, truly! The look on my face did 'reveal much,'” and she turned the page. ”Here was where the 'exclamation points' came in. 'Revealed much, and my prayer is'--bos.h.!.+--'that she may be wise enough to run no risks. I have learned that she pa.s.sed herself off as an English lady who had left the South on account of her anti-war proclivities, and was admitted to the most select circles on this account. If she is with you, or shall come, detain her until'--O yes, she could hear this. But why not the rest? The truth is clear. I am suspected! What if that splendid colonel of hers should take it into his n.o.ble head to pay off a few of the old scores?”

A step was heard in the lower hall, and trusting the letter into the lower pocket, from whence it had been taken, she glided through an opposite door, and returned to her own room.

”This is no place for me,” she thought, as, seating herself by the window, she prepared to look at the whole matter as it now appeared. ”I am not wanted; but where can I go? Not to Rosedale? That is utterly impossible. Not to Charleston? There I shall be branded as a coward and disloyal to the trust imposed in me. Where can I go?” She sat a long time apparently watching the pedestrians who were leisurely walking past the house, and wondered if there was another in that vast city more wretched, more forlorn than was she. What a contrast to the years that were gone! ”And it has all come about by the silliness of that girl. Her impudent and foolish marriage has covered me with shame and confusion.”

Ah, woman, not that!

”I'll do it!” she said at last. ”How stupid in me not to have thought of that before! It will be dreary and desolate, but better so than to remain here. Then the check for that last paltry five hundred dollars must be cashed. A meager sum for the mistress of Rosedale to go out into the world with, but it will do.” She arose from her seat and crossed over to the mirror. ”Not the same face that was there--let me see--yes, seventeen years ago. Then those lines were not at the corners of the eyes, nor about the mouth; then there was no silver in these dark locks, for no such transgressions scorched my soul.” She sank down upon a chair close by, and buried her face in her jeweled hands, and for the first time for many months tears came to moisten the hard ground where the roots of womanly affection were buried.

”My child! O, my child!” she murmured at last, as her long taper fingers were clasping themselves tightly together. ”I have wronged you. It was cruel, fiendish, to take your babe from you; but doubly so--wretch that I am!--to plot her ruin by sending her off to a foreign port, where I thought she could never return. What a curse has fallen upon me! I did not intend all that was done. Those terrible black stains cannot be upon my soul.”

The autumnal winds came and blew gently over the great city, scattering upon the tree-tops and velvety carpets of its many parks and lawns their tracery of change. The birds gathered themselves together among the branches to finish their arrangements for the long journey. Yet Mrs.

Belmont lingered in her pleasant quarters, loth to exchange them for less comfortable ones. Then letters of inquiry, letters of solicitation, had been written, and answers must be waited for--and so she stayed.

All this time the two colonels were slowly but positively improving.

George St. Clair might endure the jar and fatigue of travel, and Pearl Hamilton his former position at the head of his regiment, and word was sent to their respective destinations to this effect.

”In a week Pearl and Lillian will be here,” was the report brought by Mrs. Cheevers on returning one day from a short round of calls, and her air was a trifle exultant. ”We must do them honor, Mr. Cheevers. A colonel who has suffered and bled for our good, and to maintain the dignity of a free government, deserves all the glory an appreciative people can bestow.”

The husband straightened himself back in his chair, and indulged in a most mirthful ”encore.” ”Bravo, wife! The war is making personal developments as well. Who ever imagined there was so much of the truly eloquent in the bosom of my sweet little half? And such patriotism!”

”Pshaw! All of that fine speech, I tell you, came from the brain where such evolutions of respect for the brave boys are expected to be in action. We must give honor where honor is due.”

”True as you live, wife; and now what is to be done?”

”Perhaps Charlotte can suggest, for if our fraternal strife has not awakened as much _patriotism_ in her heart as in yours, in the present case her _interest_ should be greater.”

The lady thus appealed to was listening with more interest than her companions were aware of, but the queries that were perplexing her were not how she could bestow honors upon the worthy, but how she, the unworthy, could escape dishonor! ”I cannot stay longer,” she thought; ”I must away!” At being thus appealed to, however, she replied blandly; ”I have waited weeks already that I might bestow my congratulations, but, as they have delayed coming so long, have made other arrangements that will be impossible to postpone. I have been loitering that letters from home might reach me, and cannot understand why Charles does not write.

In a day or two, at the farthest, I shall be compelled to leave for my winter quarters.”

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