Beadle's New York Dime Library No. 114 — page 15: what you’re looking at

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

A. a a a a Ba ell Bk. eat. — Occ itd won no recognition from her. The judge “ went bis pile on them boots,” and their failure, in tiis instance, to ‘*draw ” chagrined him not a little. As for the ‘‘ boys,” such indifference ‘‘ stumped ’em ali round!” Had they but known the fierce warfare going on within that beautiful little head, perhaps . luis insensibility to outward things would have been accounted for. *Issne younger than I? Is she more beauti- fulthan I¢ Shall I encounter a successful rival av the very outset? The ‘ Angel of Hard Luck,’ od * Angel’s Find’! H’m)!” Mrs. Bella Seaford compressed her red lips; {ho delicate color faded from her rounded cheeks; her black eyes snapped with an ominous fire, Iu this mood she was beautiful still, yet with a cruel sort cf beauty. And, come to think, thero was something cat-like in the daintiness with which she picked her way along the road, As she approached the buildings which con- stituted the Angel’s Lode property, she dis- tinguished through the gathering gloom tho mining works proper and an unpretentious yet comfortable cabin a little removed from the bustle of money-getting. Here all was beauty and perfume and _ peace. ‘Flowers and trailing vines!” mused Mrs. Seaford, her heart sinking cold, then leaping all uflame in her breast. ‘‘She is not a mountain savage, for she has neatness and taste. All the harsh features are hidden beneath a mantle of verdure. She bas made his home a paradise, in spite of her meager means. What is she like personally? Hark! Her ear caught a sound that caused her to stop abruptly. untrained voice, yet.as clear and sweet as a silver bell. The melody must have been im- provised. There were no words; only a succes- sion of rich notes, as a bird might have sung. How smoothly the varying cadences flowed into one another !—how Ey rippled like happy Jaughter!—how they sunk into languishing pathos, only to swell into a burst of triumphant exulfation | Mrs, Seaford stood with clenched hands and set teeth, and grew as cold as ice. ‘That woman is a genius,”’ she said, Hoarsely : ‘‘and she is happy. she happy in love? Is she singing to him ?” Stealthily she crept forward. Both door and window stood open. A tallow dip burning in the room disclosed a woman ranging on a dresser dishes which she had just finished washing. At sight of her Bella Seaford turned sick at heart. ‘Ten years younger than I,and— Ah!” She could not bring herself to admit, even to herself, that her rival was more beautiful, “She is alone,” mused the envious woman. “This is my eppartanity to speak to her. I must see what she is like. She may be uncouth and slangy, for all her—” She avoided the name of beauty. *T beg your pardon. Will you think me intrusive, come to you a perfect stranger, without introduction? But everything is so strange, and I felt so lonesome, and indeed a little Firnid, in a hotel without another woman in it—even the cook and chambermaid (it’ such a.name is appropriate) a Chinaman! I heard you spoken of, and thought that I must make your acquaintance before I slept, even at the ri k of coming out alone at so unseemly an hour. And then I have not yet thanked Mr. Carleton for rescuing me from a situation of terrible danger. Oh! I was so frightened that I lost all presence of mind—even to seeming remiss in courtesy, I am afraid, ‘“May I present myself? I am Mrs, Seaford, of Ban Francisco. And you are—Mrs. Carle- ton? Such was Bella Seaford’s apology and self-in- troduction. _ Lilian Amberleigh, whose heart at that mo- ment went out to all the world in a glad tender- ness which she would have been at a loss to ex- lain, was not disposed to carp at any slight Meetetion from social forms, even if the code of mountain etiquette had been far more stringent than that which actually obtaius in the free t es She first started at the sound of a strange voice; then smiled a genial welcome, upon seeing the most beautiful lady she remembered ever to have met, only excepting her long lost and tenderly mourned mother; and, last, flamed scarlet from chin to temple at being called Mrs. Carleton. “T am very glad that you came, Mrs. Sea- ford,” she said, stammering a little with embar- rassment. ‘‘ Strangers do not stand on ceremony bere, But you mistake in sRppOR Ag mea mar- ried woman. I keep house for my brother.” How famously blushing became her style of beauty! Bella Seaford hated her for that, as well as for other things, which, indeed, seemed to multiply, the more she saw of her. How. refined her manner! how pure her ac- cent! From, where she od Bella Seaford could see books and magazines. So she had been under William Carleton’s tutelage? Nature _ had pevered a rich soil for his seeds of in- ‘‘Oh! I beg your pardon, Miss Carleton,” rt her guest. ‘‘ Mr. Carleton is your brother, then? Again Lilian Amberleigh’s cheek flushed crim- SOL, ‘*Not. my real brother,” she corrected; “though he has been that, and father and motber to me as well, ever since I lost my own dear mamma, almost in my babyhoou,” A tender humidity dimmed her eyes, and a pathetic cadence crept into her voice, The memory of her mother always evoked these tokens of loving regret. ‘*But my name is Lilian Amberleigh,” she pursued, her sunny nature reasserting itself in- stantly. ‘‘ Pray comoin and bo seated. I beg your pardon for neglecting to invite you more promptly. Believe me, it was not from lack of cordiality.” No! Bella Seaford would not accept even the offer of a chair from the rival she already hated with an intensity beyond words, though ber smiling face gave no token of the bitterness it masked. ‘Thank you, I will sit down just here, if you ere she said, with the swietest suavity, se- ecting a rustic bench that surrounded the trunk of a mountain pine. *‘ I have been housed all my life, it is a treat to me to be out of doors in this wonderful country. Everything is so strange, and yet so delightful. But one would not suppose that the wilderness could be made so like a paradise as this spot, just here,” It had been a labor of love to Lilian. Now, as her eye roved over the work of her own hands, as revealed in the mellow moonlight, her heart swelled, remembering for whose- pleasure it had all been done, But need we follow their conversation in de- tail? Bella Seaford sat and chatted penanty, to all outward seeming, with this girl whom na- ture had so richly dowered, while every word, every gesture, every tone was a separate stab. She noted every tremor of the delicate ps, every flush of the sensitive cheek, every bright- ening of the eyes every tender modulation of the voice, as she led her to talk of her guar- an. ** She loves him! Oh! how I hate her for it! anne goes he love her? I will crush her, if he oes |’ Those were her thoughts when she bade Lilian Amberleigh—ah! how unsuspecting !— good-night. But the forms of politeness were on her lips, the cadences of friendliness in her voice, Onty when she got away out of sight and hearing did her true feeling burst its way } into speech. She bad declined Lilian’s offer to accompany her back to her hotel. She did not go there directly. She felt that she could not pass under. human observation, until she had battled. with the fiends of hatred and despair. They crowded upon her so fiercely that she must yield them sway for a little time at least. So she turned from the path. She, had enough physical courage, little as she was, to feel no personal fear, And there in the forest solitude she gave the rein to her emotions. Then her beauty was transformed, Her pas- sion convulsed face, not to consider the reckless words that forced their way from her lips in hoarse mutterings and sharp, almost savage, cries, showed that she was a wicked and des- perate woman. “To win him from her, if [ can—to crush her, if I fail!—that is the task before me!” she muttered, ‘* And I will doit!—I will do it! I will stop. at nothing! She has robbed me. but reclaim my own. Let her look to herself! ‘*Oh, my darling! I have loved you always! And to find you thus! But you must return to me!—you shall return!” The battle was at his hight when she heard SpRrog bits footsteps. He entered a moonlit glade just before her. She acted on the impulse of the moment, advanced, and sunk on her knees at his feet! She had put her destiny to the touch. What would be the decree of fate? CHAPTER XXI. HOPE CRUSHED TO EARTH. WHEN our hero left his home with a vague excuse, it was with a mind almost as much per- turbed as that of the girl from whose presence he went. What was this revelation that had so suddenly burst upon him? The tenderest af- fection had always existed between him and his fair charge, and heretofore its manifesta- tion had been as free as that between any bro- thér and sister, But now— He scarcely dared face the truth! . Was all the delightful past to be changed? Should he lose his little sister?’ What would take her place? He asked the question with a vague sense of in. The old freedom lost, what would they be to each other? - For the first time in his life he asked him- self:— ‘* What docs the world say of our Bd ole Then hot flashes and icy chills followed. each other in quick succession from his heart to his extremities, and he stopped short, panting and The Gentleman from Pike. trembling. An altogether unreasonable rage suddenly possessed him, “*T should like to see the man who dares lispa eh Oe a thought—to her disparage- ment!’ And his band fell on the butt of his revolver. But the unsuitableness of that means to reach the evil, if evil there were, was patent at once; and the keenest sense of regret succeeded his transient anger, ‘“And have I unwittingly cxposed her to this?’ he mused, ‘‘ Her false position must be corrected at once. But. alas! Lsball lose her, in its accomplishment. She bas grown a part of my life, ow canI tear her cut of itf And what can I say to her/—how explain the neces- sity of parting without wounding bcr sense of delicacy beyond repair?” ‘*Ah, how heed ess I havo been! A woman would have foreseen this fatal cilemma; but I have lived on from day to day, never perceiv- ing that she has ceased to be a little girl, and that a new rule must regulate ber life. ‘¢ And she, in her innocence, my little sister in feeling, has known no other thought. But now— - Leaving the world out of the question, could they continue the old lite?’ Were they the same in heart that they bad been that morning? No! —he could not but admit the change. Their life-path had narrowed until they could no longer walk side by side. They must walk as one, or separate! The former alternative did not occur to him yet, He thought only that he must lose her. ‘* But. where can she live?” he asked himself, “ Not alone in a hotel—a child like her. Notin a cabin by herself, ‘““Ah! Anidea! I might get an elderly wo- man to live with us, and so retain my darling, and preserve the proprieties as well.” He was in a fever of excitement over this so- lution, ‘* But where to get the chaperon?” And an icy chill fell upon his hopes, ‘‘I might send her to school?” he reflected. “Young ladies attend boarding school beyond her age. Seventeen! She would be provided for for two or three years.” And then:— ** What! send her away where I could not see her for a single hour in the twenty-four? I could not endure such cruel privation as that. And she would grieve, I know.” “No; we must not be ppther. But how re- main together? Together !” He stopped, breatlless, “ Together |” What was the magic of that word? A profuse perspiration burst from every pore in his body. He stood still, trembling and pass- ing his fingers through his hair, a trick he had on those rare occasions when he gave way to nervous excitement, Khan 6 together—as one! Why not?” he asked himself, with a great burst of triumphant de- light. “Why not? Why not? Wuy nor?’ e kept repeating the question, aid his trem- Beye happiness augmented wi.h overy itera- on, “Surely we already love each other ruflicient- ly. It is this very love that was to pait us! Why not unite us? How stupid I have been} Why not unite us?” Ah! why not unite them? Was there no rea- son? ‘Link my blighted life with her fresh young existence?” he asked. ‘‘Oh! but what is the use of talking? I can never mako her mine. I know itin my heart. I cannot bind her to a—a Hatovatea tla fons With his e cover is face w bands, and was terribly shaken. ‘*A fugitive from justice, to contaminate her pure life—to be her husband, the father of her children! No! no! no!” he groaned. Then came the agonized protest: “But L am not guilty in the sight of God: Oh! He cannot condemn me! He knows that that moment of madness has been atoned by years of contrition, He knows the provocation, the agony, the despair! It was not 1? No! no! no! ith such a blot on my soul I could not bave been to her what I have been. She so Diner apne instinct must have made her re- vo ‘‘No! that has clouded my life long enough. I will put it behind me, Twelve vival The world has forgotten it. has forgiven it. He himself has vouchsafed me this chance of happiness. Why should not I accept it?” y ee he asked himself: . “ Why not ?” And the longer he contemplated this bright romise the higher mounted his eager hope, un- il the man was transfigured. Then came his answer, as if the very heavens had placed it before him—a woman-kneeling at his feet in the moonlight! One moment her agonized face with its tear- ng eyes, all clearly. defined in the flood of moonlight, was lifted to his amazed his hor- rified vision; then her head sunk upon her breast, as if she were blighte! by his stony stare, The man uttered not a sound. He drewa step nearer, and with hands that trembled like aspen EOMANCELOCC) SiG (0)