Part 22 (1/2)
Thus the day wore on, and ere another week was gone Rose insisted upon a speedy removal to the seash.o.r.e, notwithstanding it was so early in the season, for by this means she hoped that Maggie's health would be improved. Accordingly, Henry went once more to Worcester, ostensibly for money, but really to see if George Douglas now would speak to him of Margaret. But George was in New York, they said; and, somewhat disappointed, Henry went back to Leominster, where everything was in readiness for their journey. Monday was fixed upon for their departure, and at an early hour Margaret looked back on what had been to her a second home, smiling faintly as Rose whispered to her cheerily, ”I have a strong presentiment that somewhere in our travels we shall meet with Arthur Carrollton.”
CHAPTER XXII.
THE HOUSE OF MOURNING.
Come now over the hills to the westward. Come to the Hillsdale woods, to the stone house by the mill, where all the day long there is heard but one name, the servants breathing it softly and low, as if she who had borne it were dead, the sister, dim-eyed now, and paler faced, whispering it oft to herself, while the lady, so haughty and proud, repeats it again and again, shuddering as naught but the echoing walls reply to the heartbroken cry of, ”Margaret, Margaret, where are you now?”
Yes, there was mourning in that household--mourning for the lost one, the darling, the pet of them all.
Brightly had the sun arisen on that June morning which brought to them their sorrow, while the birds in the tall forest trees caroled as gayly as if no storm-cloud were hovering near. At an early hour Mr.
Carrollton had arisen, thinking, as he looked forth from his window, ”She will tell me all to-day,” and smiling as he thought how easy and pleasant would be the task of winning her back to her olden gayety.
Madam Conway, too, was unusually excited, and very anxiously she listened for the first sound of Maggie's footsteps on the stairs.
”She sleeps late,” she thought, when breakfast was announced, and taking her accustomed seat she bade a servant see if Margaret were ill.
”She is not there,” was the report the girl brought back.
”Not there!” cried Mr. Carrollton.
”Not there!” repeated Madam Conway, a shadowy foreboding of evil stealing over her. ”She seldom walks at this early hour,” she continued; and, rising, she went herself to Margaret's room.
Everything was in perfect order, the bed was undisturbed, the chamber empty; Margaret was gone, and on the dressing-table lay the fatal letter telling why she went. At first Madam Conway did not see it; but it soon caught her eye, and tremblingly she opened it, reading but the first line, ”I am going away forever.”
Then a loud shriek rang through the silent room, penetrating to Arthur Carrollton's listening ear, and bringing him at once to her side. With the letter still in her hand, and her face of a deathly hue, and her eyes flas.h.i.+ng with fear, Madam Conway turned to him as he entered, saying, ”Margaret has gone, left us forever--killed herself it may be!
Read!” And she handed him the letter, herself bending eagerly forward to hear what he might say.
But she listened in vain. With lightning rapidity Arthur Carrollton read what Maggie had written--read that she, his idol, the chosen bride of his bosom, was the daughter of a servant, the grandchild of old Hagar! And for this she had fled from his presence, fled because she knew of the mighty pride which now, in the first bitter moment of his agony, did indeed rise up, a barrier between himself and the beautiful girl he loved so well. Had she lain dead before him, dead in all her youthful beauty, he could have folded her in his arms, and then buried her from his sight, with a feeling of perfect happiness compared to that which he now felt.
”Oh, Maggie, my lost one, can it be!” he whispered to himself, and pressing his hand upon his chest, which heaved with strong emotion, he staggered to a seat, while the perspiration stood in beaded drops upon his forehead and around his lips.
”What is it, Mr. Carrollton? 'Tis something dreadful, sure,” said Mrs.
Jeffrey, appearing in the door, but Madam Conway motioned her away, and, tottering to his side, said, ”Read it to me--read.”
The Sound of her voice recalled his wandering mind, and covering his face with his hands he moaned in anguish; then, growing suddenly calm, he s.n.a.t.c.hed up the letter, which had fallen to the floor, and read it aloud; while Madam Conway, stupefied with horror, sank at his feet, and clasping her hands above her head, rocked to and fro, but made no word of comment. Far down the long ago her thoughts were straying, and gathering up many bygone scenes which told her that what she heard was true.
”Yes, 'tis true,” she groaned; and then, powerless to speak another word, she laid her head upon a chair, while Mr. Carrollton, preferring to be alone, sought the solitude of his own room, where un.o.bserved he could wrestle with his sorrow and conquer his inborn pride, which whispered to him that a Carrollton must not wed a bride so far beneath him.
Only a moment, though, and then the love he bore for Maggie Miller rolled back upon him with an overwhelming power, while his better judgment, with that love, came hand in hand, pleading for the fair young girl, who, now that he had lost her, seemed a thousandfold dearer than before. But he had not lost her; he would find her. She was Maggie Miller still to him, and though old Hagar's blood were in her veins he would not give her up. This resolution once made, it could not be shaken, and when half an hour or more was pa.s.sed he walked with firm, unfaltering footsteps back to the apartment where Madam Conway still sat upon the floor, her head resting upon the chair, and her frame convulsed with grief.
Her struggle had been a terrible one, and it was not over yet, for with her it was more than a matter of pride and love. Her daughter's rights had been set at naught; a wrong had been done to the dead; the child who slept beneath the pine had been neglected; nay, in life, had been, perhaps, despised for an intruder, for one who had no right to call her grandmother; and shudderingly she cried, ”Why was it suffered thus to be?” Then as she thought of white-haired Hagar Warren, she raised her hand to curse her, but the words died on her lips, for Hagar's deed had brought to her much joy; and now, as she remembered the bounding step, the merry laugh, the sunny face, and loving words which had made her later years so happy, she involuntarily stretched out her arms in empty air, moaning sadly: ”I want her here. I want her now, just as she used to be.” Then, over the grave of her buried daughter, over the grave of the sickly child, whose thin, blue face came up before her just as it lay in its humble coffin, over the deception of eighteen years, her heart bounded with one wild, yearning throb, for every bleeding fiber clung with a deathlike grasp to her who had been so suddenly taken from her. ”I love her still!” she cried; ”but can I take her back?” And then commenced the fiercest struggle of all, the battling of love and pride, the one rebelling against the child of Hagar Warren, and the other clamoring loudly that without that child the world to her was nothing. It was the hour of Madam Conway's humiliation, and in bitterness of spirit she groaned: ”That I should come to this! Theo first, and Margaret, my bright, my beautiful Margaret, next! Oh, how can I give her up when I loved her best of all--best of all!”
This was true, for all the deeper, stronger love of Madam Conway's nature had gone forth to the merry, gleeful girl whose graceful, independent bearing she had so often likened to herself and the haughty race with which she claimed relations.h.i.+p. How was this illusion dispelled! Margaret was not a Conway, nor yet a Davenport. A servant-girl had been her mother, and of her father there was nothing known. Madam Conway was one who seldom wept for grief. She had stood calmly at the bedside of her dying husband, had buried her only daughter from her sight, had met with many reverses, and shed for all no tears, but now they fell like rain upon her face, burning, blistering as they fell, but bringing no relief.
”I shall miss her in the morning,” she cried, ”miss her at noon, miss her in the lonesome nights, miss her everywhere--oh, Margaret, Margaret, 'tis more than I can bear! Come back to me now, just as you are. I want you here--here where the pain is hardest,” and she clasped her arms tightly over her heaving bosom. Then her pride returned again, and with it came thoughts of Arthur Carrollton. He would scoff at her as weak and sentimental; he would never take beyond the sea a bride of ”Hagarish” birth; and duty demanded that she too should be firm, and sanction his decision. ”But when he's gone,” she whispered, ”when he has left America behind, I'll find her, if my life is spared.
I'll find poor Margaret, and see that she does not want, though I must not take her back.”