Beadle's Dime Library, Vol. III, No. 29 — page 2: what you’re looking at

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

2 -_--——- —— om pains me more than I can tell that I should be the unwitting cause of your misery. I would do any- thing I could to relieve it.” . “Then do not reject me entirely. Give me time. Give me ii! hace to win your love. I shall worship you. y passion will constrain a response for very sympathy. Only let me show you how.I can love, how I do love you.” ‘ She shook her head. “TIT shall always regard you as a very dear friend— as one who has my highest esteem—’ ‘*Conventionalities all!’ he eried, with heat. ‘“‘Do not torture me with meaningless phrases. How ready you are to give that for which I do not ask, and withhold the thing my soul craves! Oh, Flo- rence! may you never know the agony of a moment like this!" *“ You have my friendship; I cannot give you more,”’ she said, still gently. ‘ He had let his head fall upon his arm. He now raised it with a sardonic laugh. “No,” he said; “I suppose it is no longer within your control.”’ See started back with a hurt, not angry expres- sion. . ‘<n. umont!” : * What's ‘the use of omen over matters?” he cried, recklessly. ‘* No doubt Mr. Frederick Powell, my successful rival—"’ Now she arose without a word, anger flashing in her eye and glowing in her cheek, and a tremor of indignation and wounded delicacy running through her frame “Ah! that touches the quick?" mont, white with jealous rage. his triumph ” Jf Florence would have deigned a reply, it was cut short by a crunching step on the gravel walk. “Speak of angels, and you will hear-the rustle of their wings,”’ said Beaumont, with bitter irony; and added, taking his hat and bowing with mock cour- me : “TL beg that you will not allow me to interfere with your coming lete-a-lele. Let me bid you good- eas, And he was gone, A moment Florence vacillated between conflict- ing emotions, and then, taking another path, she disappeared amid the shrubbery in the direction of the house. The arbor had been empty scarcely a moment when it was entered by the man whose approach had interrupted the stormy scene just enacted within it. “T surely heard voices,’ he said, with a look of surprise. Then his glance fell upon a little volume bound in reen and gold, lying on the rustic center-table. A k of tenderness came into his eyes as he picked it up and turned over its leaves. It was open at the sad tale of Zelica, in that sweetest, saddest of lover’s songs, Lalla Rookh. ‘Dear girl!’ whispered the young se Ne ; - the absent reader, not to the ill-starred heroine of t the poem. He touched his lips to the leaves, where they had felt the pressure of the fingers he loved so well. And then, as thousands of lovers have done aud thousands more will do again, he glanced around with a foolish expression, asif he had feared that some prying eye had deteeted the silly act. : Entering the house, he placed himself at the piano, and after an airy prelude, began to sing: ‘* Oh, where dost thou ms My sweet, pretty maid? I wait for thy coming Alone in the glade. The sound of thy footstep Falls not on my ear; The moments that hold thee Are burdened with fear— The heavy-winged moments. are bur- dened with fear.” He paused a moment in expectancy. From the conservatory came a response, in clear, bell-like tones: ursued Beau- “IT wish him joy of * Ah! well may the moments Be heavy with fear; Unconscious thou waitest With death lurking near. Its shadow envelops The ae seer > lade; Oh, ne’er shalt thou linger Again for thy maid— No, nevermore, nevermore wait for thy maid!” “Talk of romance!” laughed Fred Powell, enter- ing the conservatory as she ceased singing. Morence stood blushing and smiling as he ap- proached. In her heart there was a shadow of com- punction that she could be so happy, when scarcel a moment before a fellow-creature had left her side in such wretchedness. Then came the question, had Fred overheard Beaumont’s jealous accusation, and she gazed timidly into his’ face, to see if she could detect anything confirmatory of the fear; but the frankness of his manner relieved her anxiety, when he added, with a shrug and a grimace: “ But don’t you predict a very lugubrious termina- tion to my vigil?” ‘Oh, you know we have got past the days of in- oly and perhaps I am not a true prophetess,” * os slyly pinning a knot of flowers in his but- tonhole. » “TT hope not—at least in this case,” he replied, and taking her arm, led her out into the arden. ss The last iris tints of sunset were fading out of the west, and from a sky of deepest azure the moon threw her tranquilizing light over the scene, Fred and Florence strolled down the garden-path to the arbor. The volume lying on the cenfer-table ave direction to their conversation, and whether in- uenced by the time, the subject, or by the uncon- scious attraction of their hearts, their words took a tender tone. Then, with her hands in his and his eyes on her face, Fred asked: | = s re I be Feramorz, and will you by my Lalla oo = le > “Whatin the world should we do for a Fadla- deen?”’ laughed Florence, pretending not to see the drift of his words, though her cheeks were as red as roses and her eyes flashed like diamonds. “Bother Fadladeen!” replied her lover. ‘I should ee ot eS NN ee ee | Beadle’s Dime Library. — ee ee —_ ee a + —S ee : ————— want a less carping critic than he. Would you be | fers of his employers, in the desperate effort to re- _ trieve what he had lost; and now he found himeelf a neess?”’ as well as the prince?’’ asked ng him. as partial as the I “Could you sin Florence, still ev ““My song would draw its inspiration from the | same source—my love for you, darling!’ he replied, letting his arm go round her in a tremulous embrace. “ Now will you be my Lalla Rookh; or, better still, will you be my wife?” Her heart beat against his, her lips touched his neck, as she replied: ‘ “Tf youare aes sure that you are the true prince, I guess I shall have to say—yes!” And so was told the old, old story that is ever new. That evening, when they were exchanging their last words of leave-taking at the gate, I"lorence clung to his arm with a shade of anxiety in her eyes, as if she were loath to let him go. ** What is it, Flo?’ he asked, looking questioningly Nothing. thing,” she replied, glancing wistful ‘ Nothing—nothing,” she replied, glanc - ly down the moonlit road, Suddenly, something in the expression of Cecil Beaumont’s face, when he left her, appeared before her mind, But, casting aside the vague appre- hension, she smiled a farewell to her lover.. He bent over her a moment, and was gone, leaving her cheeks a vivid crimson, Two hours before, the same road had been trav- ersed by Cecil Beaumont; but in a far different mood from that in which Fred Powell now etenped prey over the ground. The latter weut with head erect, _ ashes on my lips. defaulter to the amount of several thousand dollars, and the ery was still for more. “Till give up the struggle; I’ve had enough of it,” he , bitterly, as his mind passed Lis life in re- view. “I tried to wrest enjoyment from I'ate, and she laughed at me when the golden apples turned to Then I resolved to propitiate her by what the world calls honest living, angi I have my labor for my pains. The one thing I crave is lost to me, and the rest might as well go with it. “Oh, perdition!” he cried, “springing and striding fiercely up and down; “T to his feet ut a bullet through my brain, and end it all! Ishould be bene- ot society, at least,” he added, laughing bitterly. ** But, no,” he continued, with a sudden rigidity of the muscles, “if I cannot win the game myself, it shall not be my faultif itis not a drawn battle. I can chest expanded and limbs swinging free, with a sense | of buoyancy and happiness; the head of the former was bowed, his teeth set and hands clenched. Approaching his boarding-place, Cecil found that Mrs. McPherson was away from home. He passed on into the garden back of the house. Striding back and forth under the trees, he gave vent to his rage | and disappointment, “The only woman I ever loved,’’ he muttered be- tween his teeth, ‘“‘and to be de rived of her! Then | carriage drove up to the private entranceof the bank;. witha ‘ here is this a 3 fool, May Powell, languishing in my | arms. Curse her! her only recommendation is her money. ‘Is it thus that the world ever mocks us, thrust- ing into our laps that for which we care nothing—at which we sicken with disgust—and holding just be- yond our grasp that for which we hunger with all he power of passion? Oh, a grand thing is this life! Ha! ha!’’ laughing bitterly; ‘Show thankful we should be to Providence for its many blessings! **But to be beaten by that idiot—that jackanapes, with money in the place of brains—that coxcomb, without an idea beyond the set of his necktie, or the part of his hair! What can she see in him? curse him! I should like to pitch him neck and heels into a horse-pond! ‘**But he shall never marry her—I swear it! Tl kill him first !"’ He ground his teeth in a transport of rage, and smote his breast with his clenched hand. Then, with a sudden revolution of feeling, he covered his face with his hands and groaned: “Oh, Florence! Florence! Ilove you so! I would ive my life for one smile, one pressure of your hand in affection!” Then changing as suddenly: “Pugh! Im a fool! I have the game in my own hands. I'll make him an outcast. She shall blush at the sight of bim. The fool is among that class who call themselves ‘ moderate drinkers’; they ‘take a glass now and then, for the sake of good-fellow- ship.’ The idiots think that they can play with the fires of hell and come se unscathed. Ha! ha! I have tried that myself. Experience is a thorough teacher, and brings bitter conviction!” Thus he railed on, forgetful of everything but his meditated revenge. Mrs. McPherson, on his return home, heard him from her window, and caught the drift of his wild ravings. After he had entered the house aud gone up to his room, she heard him in backward and forward across the floor, still hurl- ing imprecations at his rival. CHAPTER I. AN UNWELCOME ENCOUNTER, Crct, Braumont sat at his desk, in the bank of which he was cashier, It was five o’clock, and he had the bank all to himself. Before him lay a tele- ram, and spread out beneath it a Chicago paper, olded down to the grain reports. Gecil’s head rested on his hands, his elbows on the desk. His eyes were fixed, not on the telegram, but away beyond it on vacancy. A painful frown in- dented his brow, and there was a look of weariness and discouragement on his face. “It’s of no use,” he muttered, half aloud; ‘it’s like pouring water on sand. If I put any more money into this infernal speculation, it will be sunk alon with the rest, instead of saving it. Luck is d against me; that’s certain, into it, wheat goes down and corn comes up. Well, let it go. I'm tired of this life, anyway. The sooner it’s over the better. We wrangle over the things of the world like a pack of fools; but, sooner or later, we all accept the conclusion that the game isn’t worth the candle, I'm of eee Well, let the ee Be it out among them; iT bi He dropped his head upon his arms in utter weari- ness. There was a sensationof constraint in his breast and a choking pain in his throat, while the feeling of hopeless a i cient, and exhaustion forced scalding tears into his eyes. It was no one thing that weighed him down, but the accumulated fail- ures and rebuffs of a,lifetime, crowned by rejection at the hands of the woman he loved, and the pros- pect of soon being branded with infamy. In his haste to become rich, Cecil Beaumont had entered that maelstrom of gambling which in the Western metropolis takes the place of Wall street. At first, the of ag ood fortune of his agent yielded him promising returns, Afterward came re- verses that swept away all of the means at his com- mand. But he received advices that the “corner” must yield in a few days, and if his investment were now bolstered ‘up by a couple of thousands, they might weather the storm. Then Cecil yielded to the = to appropriate funds which were his only n trust. Again and again had his hands gone into the cof- Oh, When I put my hand. sha’n't take another: ' fathe _ stave off detection until I have dragged iim in the mire; for, by the fiend! Aé shall never have her! “And if, while I am trampling him under foot, Fortune should yield to my desperation what she has hitherto denied !—ah! that were a stake! With him out of my way, and myself clear of this accursed scrape, what may not be effected? Money!—bah! I'd pour it like water to secure such an end! Ay, I'd wg: my hands in blood, to win her for my own!’ le strode up and down in wild exhilaration of hope, running his fingers excitedly through his hair. But the fit burned itself out the quicker because of its intensity; and he again threw himself despon- dently into a chair, “Bah! what a feol-I am! If I sink him to perdi- tion, she is just the sort of a woman to follow the man she loves to the veriest depths. “And if he were dead she cares nothing for me—she never will, It is cold comfort seeking only revenge—living only to thwart another man.” , While he was yet struggling with his emotions, a a lady alighted, ran up the steps, and in a moment was in his presence, “Cecil! Are you alone?” she asked, advancing bright smile, All plone, as you see, r? He had a busivess appointment imm ‘ Are. you looking for your ate- ly after banking hours.” | pretty show of coquettish impatience. | * But I’m not looking for armel “lor Fred?” asked Cecil, striving to appear na- tural, and reaching for a paper on the floor, to hide the repugnance with which he uttered the name. ‘He went out soon after four.” . oe 1 am not looking for Fred either.” a) oO ll ac No yes She repeated the word after him sharply, with a rw of Cecil looked up at her SEDERRGIY ‘* Is there no one but papa and Fred whom I might call upon—old Dawson, the janitor, for instance? But why are you looking so troubled and worn, Cecil?’ she asked, a little shyly, with a sudden shade of anxiety in her a **Troubled—am [?”’ “Why, yes. You don't look well at all; and you haven't seemed yourself for several days.” “I suppose we must lay it to business,” he replied trying to smile, But the attempt was a failure, and died out in the old look of weariness. May Powell placed her hand on Cecil’s shoulder and looked even more anxiously into his face, “What is it Cecil?’ she asked. ‘* Won't youtell me what troubles you?” “IT suppose we all have the blue-devils sometimes, don’t wer’ he replied, evasively; and added, with bitterness: ‘‘No doubt it is very uncomplimentary to let you see that your presence has not altogether banished them,” “Cecil, take me into your confidence. Let me share your anxieties with you. Somehow feel that it is no trivial cause that moves you so." There was lo tenderness in her pleading tones; and her humid eyes told how her heart yearned to- ward him, Cecil avoided her gaze, as he replied, with a shud- der: ‘*Men are every day called to bear burdens tha would be ill-suited oS the delicate shoulder of oe man,” ‘‘There is no cross so grievous that I weuld not joyously help you to bear it, Cecil, It shall be the one happiness of my life to lighten your burdens,” There came into Cecil Beaumont’s heart some- thing like a glow of gratitude for this great devotion, and perhaps a slight tw of remorse, at the thought ae poo no ie 44 Sa a Ms ‘hes gently, ga er han ween iy of his, **T believe that you love me very dearly, ittle girl.” She clung convulsively to his hands, tears welled into her eyes, and she trembled from head to foot with the unutterable emotion that swayed her, ‘ait Oh, Cecil! So dearly—so dearly! I could only you!” And, letting an arm giide around his neck, she fell to weeping on bis breast. Who could remain insensible to such a passion? Cecil Beaumont, world worn man as he yen felt his heart softened by her words and tears. It was sore with disappointed ambition and baffled pride; it ached beneath its load of selfishness and sin; and now her pure tears fell upon it like cooling balm, Footsore on the dusty highway of life, her love wags to him a shadowy retreat by the wayside, her heart a pure spring where he might lave his parched lips, e took off her hat and one it on the desk be- fore him, Then, drawing her head upon his shoul- der, he brushed the hair back from her temples and “6 SE oT he anid, uf I never before realized the depth, the fervor of your love. It is more than I deserve,’ “No, no, Cecil; not more than — deserve; but all that my poor heart can generate, Oh, Cecil! do you owed never was so happy in all my.life!"’ ‘And she shrunk closer in his arms with a little tre- f ecstasy. me Who could help loving you, my darling?” he w red: and, for the time, Florence Goldthorp faded from his mind, and all the sin and misery of his life was forgotten in a moment of perfect happi- ness. j The minutes sped by unobserved, while they sat thus, and May was startled by the clock on the man- m (E (E(@) JOO ‘S..CO