Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 151: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CLOVELLY. “Then instinct was right,” he cried. “ It has told me the truth whenever I have been near her. It has roared out to me above the evidence of my eyes and my ears. She had met you secretly for the sake of Perth. With the courage and the pure heart of a blameless girl, she dared to interview you in the middle of the night and dismiss you herself from the gate of the garden.” «She did.” ~“ Marberry—you consummate devil! Oh, Cecily, my beautiful—” And he turned and rushed from the room. When he was gone, Marberry reached for the bell—but a second thought made him draw back his hand again. Whatever he had lost in that interview, he had gained a jewel of which a king might have been proud. He leaned back in his chair again. The congested look of fear and shame left his face. The emerald lay like a pool of the purest beauty in the palm of his hand. It was more to this voluptuary than any woman. But in the meantime, Clovelly had reached the street with a brain on fire. For the dread which haunted him now was that at the very moment when he discovered the perfect purity of Cecily, she would be lost to him. It was strange enough, he thought, that she could have preferred him to Ipswich even for an instant. But it would be a miracle indeed if she still preferred him to the duke when the latter had had a chance to show himself in his most winning fashion to her and display before her all the resources of‘his fortune, all the talents of his person. It was White Harry that he rode through the streets of London, but even the speed of this powerful animal was slower than a snail’s pace dragging him wearily out the Oxford road.-White Harry was staggering with exhaustion when his master at last flung himself from the saddle. Into the court ran Clovelly; and there the solid blackness struck him in the face. No light was burning. All was sordid darkness. It so sickened him that he felt his Strength give way at the knees. He stag- 307 gered to the nearest door. The handle turned at once and admitted him to a pitch-dark hall. He called out he knew not what, and the long echoes rolled away. The howe was empty. And then, feeling what it meantethas Cecily had indeed made her choice and that Ipswich had taken her with him to another dwelling—all his agony broke from him in a terrible cry: ‘“‘ Cecily!” He dropped upon his knees; he covered his face with his hands; no tears came from his eyes, but his body shivered and was wrenched with agony. For this, he told himself mutely, was the judgment of God ' come upon him. Here was the end of his strength. Here was a defeat which all his skill with the sword could not redeem, but he was wrecked as utterly as a fine ship struck suddenly upon a reef. Then it seemed to Clovelly that he heard that voice of infinite sweetness calling to him out of the distance of his memory, ‘“ Michael!” as she had called on that other night when he had lost her in the wood, and she had guided him back to her with her own voice. At that memory, he felt he should go mad. And ah! what a consummate fool he had been to doubt her after that final proof of faith. What a fool to make the slightest question of her, after once looking into the crystal purity of her eyes! But, small and far, yet vibrant with grief and fear, he heard that cry again: “* Michael!” “It is not possible!” groaned Clovelly. “God, having seen me and judged me, would not let me find her again. This is all an illusion to drive me mad.” A door opened, and into the thick black- ness of that hall came her very voice like a blinding light to Clovelly: ** Michael!” He tried to answer, but his throat was aching and stiff with the marvel of this thing. Then he stretched out his arms, al- though he could not rise from his knees. He managed to utter a sound, he knew not what word, but it brought a wailing cry of joy down through the darkness toward him, until suddenly she was within his arms, she was kneeling hefcre him she was,