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diff --git a/old/ammn10.txt b/old/ammn10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8d138f3 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/ammn10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4963 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of An Ambitious Man, by Ella Wheeler Wilcox + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: An Ambitious Man + +Author: Ella Wheeler Wilcox + +Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7866] +[This file was first posted on May 28, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, AN AMBITIOUS MAN *** + + + + +Transcribed by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + +AN AMBITIOUS MAN + + + + +CHAPTER I + + + +Preston Cheney turned as he ran down the steps of a handsome house on +"The Boulevard," waving a second adieu to a young woman framed +between the lace curtains of the window. Then he hurried down the +street and out of view. The young woman watched him with a gleam of +satisfaction in her pale blue eyes. A fine-looking young fellow, +whose Roman nose and strong jaw belied the softly curved mouth with +its sensitive darts at the corners; it was strange that something +warmer than satisfaction did not shine upon the face of the woman +whom he had just asked to be his wife. + +But Mabel Lawrence was one of those women who are never swayed by any +passion stronger than worldly ambition, never burned by any fires +other than those of jealousy or anger. Her meagre nature was truly +depicted in her meagre face. Nature is ofttimes a great lair and a +cruel jester, giving to the cold and vapid woman the face and form of +a sensuous siren, and concealing a heart of volcanic fires, or the +soul of a Phryne, under the exterior of a spinster. But the old dame +had been wholly frank in forming Miss Lawrence. The thin, flat chest +and narrow shoulders, the angular elbows and prominent shoulder- +blades, the sallow skin and sharp features, the deeply set, pale blue +eyes, and the lustreless, ashen hair, were all truthful exponents of +the unfurnished rooms in her vacant heart and soul places. + +Miss Lawrence turned from the window, and trailed her long silken +train across the rich carpet, seating herself before the open +fireplace. It was an appropriate time and situation for a maiden's +tender dreams; only a few hours had passed since the handsomest and +most brilliant young man in that thriving eastern town had asked her +to be his wife, and placed the kiss of betrothal upon her virgin +lips. Yet it was with a sense of triumph and relief, rather than +with tenderness and rapture, that the young woman meditated upon the +situation--triumph over other women who had shown a decided interest +in Mr Cheney, since his arrival in the place more than eighteen +months ago, and relief that the dreaded role of spinster was not to +be her part in life's drama. + +Miss Lawrence was twenty-six--one year older than her fiance; and she +had never received a proposal of marriage or listened to a word of +love in her life before. Let me transpose that phrase--she had never +before received a proposal of marriage, and had never in her life +listened to a word of love; for Preston had not spoken of love. She +knew that he did not love her. She knew that he had sought her hand +wholly from ambitious motives. She was the daughter of the Hon. +Sylvester Lawrence, lawyer, judge, state senator, and proposed +candidate for lieutenant-governor in the coming campaign. She was +the only heir to his large fortune. + +Preston Cheney was a penniless young man from the West. A self-made +youth, with an unusual brain and an overwhelming ambition, he had +risen from chore boy on a western farm to printer's apprentice in a +small town, thence to reporter, city editor, foreign correspondent, +and after two or three years of travel gained in this manner he had +come to Beryngford and bought out a struggling morning paper, which +was making a mad effort to keep alive, changed its political +tendencies, infused it with western activity and filled it with +cosmopolitan news, and now, after eighteen months, the young man +found himself coming abreast of his two long established rivals in +the editorial field. This success was but an incentive to his +overwhelming ambition for place, power and riches. He had seen just +enough of life and of the world to estimate these things at double +their value; and he was, beside, looking at life through the +magnifying glass of youth. The Creator intended us to gaze on +worldly possessions and selfish ambitions through the small end of +the lorgnette, but youth invariably inverts the glass. + +To the young editor, the brief years behind him seemed like a long +hard pull up a steep and rocky cliff. From the point to which he had +attained, the summit of his desires looked very far away, much +farther than the level from which he had arisen. To rise to that +summit single-handed and alone would require unremitting effort +through the very best years of his manhood. His brain, his strength, +his ability, his ambitions, what were they all in the strife after +place and power, compared to the money of some commonplace adversary? +Preston Cheney, the native-born American directly descended from a +Revolutionary soldier, would be handicapped in the race with some +Michael Murphy whose father had made a fortune in the saloon +business, or who had himself acquired a competency as a police +officer. + +America was not the same country which gave men like Benjamin +Franklin, Abraham Lincoln and Horace Greeley a chance to rise from +the lower ranks to the highest places before they reached middle +life. It was no longer a land where merit strove with merit, and the +prize fell to the most earnest and the most gifted. The tremendous +influx of foreign population since the war of the Rebellion and the +right of franchise given unreservedly to the illiterate and the +vicious rendered the ambitious American youth now a toy in the hands +of aliens, and position a thing to be bought at the price set by un- +American masses. + +Thoughts like these had more and more with each year filled the mind +of Preston Cheney, until, like the falling of stones and earth into a +river bed, they changed the naturally direct current of his impulses +into another channel. Why not further his life purpose by an +ambitious marriage? The first time the thought entered his mind he +had cast it out as something unclean and unworthy of his manhood. +Marriage was a holy estate, he said to himself, a sacrament to be +entered into with reverence, and sanctified by love. He must love +the woman who was to be the companion of his life, the mother of his +children. + +Then he looked about among his early friends who had married, as +nearly all the young men of the middle classes in America do marry, +for love, or what they believed to be love. There was Tom Somers--a +splendid lad, full of life, hope and ambition when he married Carrie +Towne, the prettiest girl in Vandalia. Well, what was he now, after +seven years? A broken-spirited man, with a sickly, complaining wife +and a brood of ill-clad children. Harry Walters, the most infatuated +lover he had ever seen, was divorced after five years of discordant +marriage. + +Charlie St Clair was flagrantly unfaithful to the girl he had pursued +three years with his ardent wooings before she yielded to his suit. +Certainly none of these love marriages were examples for him to +follow. And in the midst of these reveries and reflections, Preston +Cheney came to Beryngford, and met Sylvester Lawrence and his +daughter Mabel. He met also Berene Dumont. Had he not met the +latter woman he would not have succumbed--so soon at least--to the +temptation held out by the former to advance his ambitious aims. + +He would have hesitated, considered, and reconsidered, and without +doubt his better nature and his good taste would have prevailed. But +when fate threw Berene Dumont in his way, and circumstances brought +about his close associations with her for many months, there seemed +but one way of escape from the Scylla of his desires, and that was to +the Charybdis of a marriage with Miss Lawrence. + +Miss Lawrence was not aware of the part Berene Dumont had played in +her engagement, but she knew perfectly the part her father's +influence and wealth had played; but she was quite content with +affairs as they were, and it mattered little to her what had brought +them about. To be married, rather than to be loved, had been her +ambition since she left school; being incapable of loving, she was +incapable of appreciating the passion in any of its phases. It had +always seemed to her that a great deal of nonsense was written and +talked about love. She thought demonstrative people very vulgar, and +believed kissing a means of conveying germs of disease. + +But to be a married woman, with an establishment of her own, and a +husband to exhibit to her friends, was necessary to the maintenance +of her pride. + +When Miss Lawrence's mother, a nervous invalid, was informed of her +daughter's engagement, she burst into tears, as over a lamb offered +on the altar of sacrifice; and Judge Lawrence pressed a kiss on the +lobe of Mabel's left ear which she offered him, and told her she had +won a prize in the market. But as he sat alone over his cigar that +night, he sighed heavily, and said to himself, "Poor fellow, I wish +Mabel were not so much like her mother." + + + +CHAPTER II + + + +"Baroness Brown" was a distinctive figure in Beryngford. She came to +the place from foreign parts some three years before the arrival of +Preston Cheney, and brought servants, carriages and horses, and +established herself in a very handsome house which she rented for a +term of years. Her arrival in this quiet village town was of course +the sensation of the hour, or rather of the year. She was known as +Baroness Le Fevre--an American widow of a French baron. Large, +voluptuous, blonde, and handsome according to the popular idea of +beauty, distinctly amiable, affable and very charitable, she became +at once the fashion. + +Invitations to her house were eagerly sought after, and her +entertainments were described in column articles by the press. + +This state of things continued only six months, however. Then it +began to be whispered about that the Baroness was in arrears for her +rent. Several of her servants had gone away in a high state of +temper at the titled mistress who had failed to pay them a cent of +wages since they came to the country with her; and one day the +neighbours saw her fine carriage horses led away by the sheriff. + +A week later society was electrified by the announcement of the +marriage of Baroness Le Fevre to Mr Brown, a wealthy widower who +owned the best shoe store in Beryngford. + +Mr Brown owned ten children also, but the youngest was a boy of +sixteen, absent in college. The other nine were married and settled +in comfortable homes. + +Mr Brown died at the expiration of a year. This one year had taught +him more of womankind than he had learned in all his sixty and nine +years before; and, feeling that it is never too late to profit by +learning, Mr Brown discreetly made his will, leaving all his property +save the widow's "thirds" equally divided among his ten children. + +The Baroness made a futile effort to break the will, on the ground +that he was not of sound mind when it was drawn up; but the effort +cost her several hundred of her few thousand dollars and the +increased enmity of the ten Brown children, and availed her nothing. +An important part of the widow's third was the Brown mansion, a +large, commodious house built many years before, when the village was +but a country town. Everybody supposed the Baroness, as she was +still called, half in derision and half from the American love of +mouthing a title, would offer this house for sale, and depart for +fresh fields and pastures new. But the Baroness never did what she +was expected to do. + +Instead of offering her house for sale, she offered "Rooms to Let," +and turned the family mansion into a fashionable lodging-house. + +Its central location, and its adjacence to several restaurants and +boarding houses, rendered it a convenient place for business people +to lodge, and the handsome widow found no trouble in filling her +rooms with desirable and well-paying patrons. In a spirit of fun, +people began to speak of the old Brown mansion as "The Palace," and +in a short time the lodging-house was known by that name, just as its +mistress was known as "Baroness Brown." + +The Palace yielded the Baroness something like two hundred dollars a +month, and cost her only the wages and keeping of three servants; or +rather the wages of two and the keeping of three; for to Berene +Dumont, her maid and personal attendant, she paid no wages. + +The Baroness did not rise till noon, and she always breakfasted in +bed. Sometimes she remained in her room till mid-afternoon. Berene +served her breakfast and lunch, and looked after the servants to see +that the lodgers' rooms were all in order. These were the services +for which she was given a home. But in truth the young woman did +much more than this; she acted also as seamstress and milliner for +her mistress, and attended to the marketing and ran errands for her. +If ever a girl paid full price for her keeping, it was Berene, and +yet the Baroness spoke frequently of "giving the poor thing a home." + +It had all come about in this way. Pierre Dumont kept a second-hand +book store in Beryngford. He was French, and the national +characteristic of frugality had assumed the shape of avarice in his +nature. He was, too, a petty tyrant and a cruel husband and father +when under the influence of absinthe, a state in which he was usually +to be found. + +Berene was an only child, and her mother, whom she worshipped, said, +when dying, "Take care of your poor father, Berene. Do everything +you can to make him happy. Never desert him." + +Berene was fourteen at that time. She had never been at school, but +she had been taught to read and write both French and English, for +her mother was an American girl who had been disinherited by her +grandparents, with whom she lived, for eloping with her French +teacher--Pierre Dumont. Rheumatism and absinthe turned the French +professor into a shopkeeper before Berene was born. The grandparents +had died without forgiving their granddaughter, and, much as the +unhappy woman regretted her foolish marriage, she remained a patient +and devoted wife to the end of her life, and imposed the same +patience and devotion when dying on her daughter. + +At sixteen, Berene was asked to sacrifice herself on the altar of +marriage to a man three times her age; one Jacques Letellier, who +offered generously to take the young girl as payment for a debt owed +by his convivial comrade, M. Dumont. Berene wept and begged +piteously to be spared this horrible sacrifice of her young life, +whereupon Pierre Dumont seized his razor and threatened suicide as +the other alternative from the dishonour of debt, and Berene in +terror yielded her word and herself the next day to the debasing +mockery of marriage with a depraved old gambler and roue. + +Six months later Jacques Letellier died in a fit of apoplexy and +Berene was freed from her chains; but freed only to keep on in a life +of martyrdom as servant and slave to the caprices of her father, +until his death. When he was finally well buried under six feet of +earth, Berene found herself twenty years of age, alone in the world +with just one thousand dollars in money, the price brought by her +father's effects. + +Without education or accomplishments, she was the possessor of youth, +health, charm, and a voice of wonderful beauty and power; a voice +which it was her dream to cultivate, and use as a means of support. +But how could she ever cultivate it? The thousand dollars in her +possession was, she knew, but a drop in the ocean of expense a +musical education would entail. And she must keep that money until +she found some way by which to support herself. + +Baroness Brown had attended the sale of old Dumont's effects. She +had often noticed the young girl in the shop, and in the street, and +had been struck with the peculiar elegance and refinement of her +appearance. Her simple lawn or print gowns were made and worn in a +manner befitting a princess. Her nails were carefully kept, despite +all the household drudgery which devolved upon her. + +The Baroness was a shrewd woman and a clever reasoner. She needed a +thrifty, prudent person in her house to look after things, and to +attend to her personal needs. Since she had opened the Palace as a +lodging-house, this need had stared her in the face. Servants did +very well in their places, but the person she required was of another +and superior order, and only to be obtained by accident or by +advertising and the paying of a large salary. Now the Baroness had +been in the habit of thinking that her beauty and amiability were +quite equivalent to any favours she received from humanity at large. +Ever since she was a plump girl in short dresses, she had learned +that smiles and compliments from her lips would purchase her friends +of both sexes, who would do disagreeable duties for her. She had +never made it a custom to pay out money for any service she could +obtain otherwise. So now as she looked on this young woman who, +though a widow, seemed still a mere child, it occurred to her that +Fate had with its usual kindness thrown in her path the very person +she needed. + +She offered Berene "a home" at the Palace in return for a few small +services. The lonely girl, whose strangely solitary life with her +old father had excluded her from all social relations outside, +grasped at this offer from the handsome lady whom she had long +admired from a distance, and went to make her home at the Palace. + + + +CHAPTER III + + + +Berene had been several months in her new home when Preston Cheney +came to lodge at the Palace. + +He met her on the stairway the first morning after his arrival, as he +was descending to the street door. + +Bringing up a tray covered with a snowy napkin, she stepped to one +side and paused, to make room for him to pass. + +Preston was not one of those young men who find pastime in +flirtations with nursery maids or kitchen girls. The very thought of +it offended his good taste. Once, in listening to the boastful tales +of a modern Don Juan, who was relating his gallant adventures with a +handsome waiter girl at a hotel, Preston had remarked, "I would as +soon think of using my dinner napkin for a necktie, as finding +romance with a servant girl." + +Yet he appreciated a snowy, well-laundried napkin in its place, and +he was most considerate and thoughtful in his treatment of servants. + +He supposed Berene to be an upper servant of the house, and yet, as +he glanced at her, a strange and unaccountable feeling of interest +seized upon him. The creamy pallor of her skin, colourless save for +the full red lips, the dark eyes full of unutterable longing, the +aristocratic poise of the head, the softly rounded figure, elegant in +its simple gown and apron, all impressed him as he had never before +been impressed by any woman. + +It was several days before he chanced to see her again, and then only +for a moment as she passed through the hall; but he heard a trill of +song from her lips, which added to his interest and curiosity. "That +girl is no common servant," he said to himself, and he resolved to +learn more about her. + +It had been the custom of the Baroness to keep herself quite hidden +from her lodgers. They seldom saw her, after the first business +interview. Therefore it was a matter of surprise to the young editor +when he came home from his office one night, just after twelve +o'clock, and found the mistress of the mansion standing in the hall +by the register, in charming evening attire. + +She smiled upon him radiantly. "I have just come in from a benefit +concert," she said, "and I am as hungry as a bear. Now I cannot +endure eating alone at night. I knew it was near your hour to +return, so I waited for you. Will you go down to the dining-room +with me and have a Welsh rarebit? I am going to make one in my +chafing dish." + +The young man hid his surprise under a gallant smile, and offering +the Baroness his arm descended to the basement dining-room with her. +He had heard much about the complicated life of this woman, and he +felt a certain amount of natural curiosity in regard to her. He had +met her but once, and that was on the day when he had called to +engage his room, a little more than two weeks past. + +He had thought her an excellent type of the successful American +adventuress on that occasion, and her quiet and dull life in this +ordinary town puzzled him. He could not imagine a woman of that +order existing a whole year without an adventure; as a rule he knew +that those blonde women with large hips and busts, and small waists +and feet, are as unable to live without excitement as a fish without +water. + +Yet, since the death of Mr Brown, more than a year past, the Baroness +had lived the life of a recluse. It puzzled him, as a student of +human nature. + +But, in fact, the Baroness was a skilled general in planning her +campaigns. She seldom plunged into action unprepared. + +She knew from experience that she could not live in a large city and +not use an enormous amount of money. + +She was tired of taking great risks, and she knew that without the +aid of money and a fine wardrobe she was not able to attract men as +she had done ten years before. + +As long as she remained in Beryngford she would be adding to her +income every month, and saving the few thousands she possessed. She +would be saving her beauty, too, by keeping early hours and living a +temperate life; and if she carefully avoided any new scandal, her +past adventures would be dim in the minds of people when, after a +year or two more of retirement and retrenchment, she sallied forth to +new fields, under a new name, if need be, and with a comfortably +filled purse. + +It was in this manner that the Baroness had reasoned; but from the +hour she first saw Preston Cheney, her resolutions wavered. He +impressed her most agreeably; and after learning about him from the +daily papers, and hearing him spoken of as a valuable acquisition to +Beryngford's intellectual society, the Baroness decided to come out +of her retirement and enter the lists in advance of other women who +would seek to attract this newcomer. + +To the fading beauty in her late thirties, a man in the early +twenties possesses a peculiar fascination; and to the Baroness, +clothed in weeds for a husband who died on the eve of his seventieth +birthday, the possibility of winning a young man like Preston Cheney +overbalanced all other considerations in her mind. She had never +been a vulgar coquette to whom all men were prey. She had always +been more or less discriminating. A man must be either very +attractive or very rich to win her regard. Mr Brown had been very +rich, and Preston Cheney was very attractive. + +"He is more than attractive, he is positively FASCINATING," she said +to herself in the solitude of her room after the tete-a-tete over the +Welsh rarebit that evening. "I don't know when I have felt such a +pleasure in a man's presence. Not since--" But the Baroness did not +allow herself to go back so far. "If there is any fruit I DETEST, it +is DATES," she often said laughingly. "Some people delight in a good +memory--I delight in a good forgettory of the past, with its telltale +milestones of birthdays and anniversaries of marriages, deaths and +divorces." + +"Mr Cheney said I looked very young to have been twice married. +Twice!" and she laughed aloud before her mirror, revealing the pink +arch of her mouth, and two perfect sets of yellow-white teeth, with +only one blemishing spot of gold visible. "I wonder if he meant it, +though?" she mused. "And the fact that I DO wonder is the sure proof +that I am really interested in this man. As a rule, I never believe +a word men say, though I delight in their flattery all the same. It +makes me feel comfortable even when I know they are lying. But I +should really feel hurt if I thought Mr Cheney had not meant what he +said. I don't believe he knows much about women, or about himself +lower than his brain. He has never studied his heart. He is all +ambition. If an ambitious and unsophisticated youth of twenty-five +or twenty-eight does get infatuated with a woman of my age--he is a +perfect toy in her hands. Ah, well, we shall see what we shall see." +And the Baroness finished her massage in cold cream, and put her +blonde head on the pillow and went sound asleep. + +After that first tete-a-tete supper the fair widow managed to see +Preston at least once or twice a week. She sent for him to ask his +advice on business matters, she asked him to aid her in changing the +position of the furniture in a room when the servants were all busy, +and she invited him to her private parlour for lunch every Sunday +afternoon. It was during one of these chats over cake and wine that +the young man spoke of Berene. The Baroness had dropped some remarks +about her servants, and Preston said, in a casual tone of voice which +hid the real interest he felt in the subject, "By the way, one of +your servants has quite an unusual voice. I have heard her singing +about the halls a few times, and it seems to me she has real talent." + +"Oh, that is Miss Dumont--Berene Dumont--she is not an absolute +servant," the Baroness replied; "she is a most unfortunate young +woman to whom my heart went out in pity, and I have given her a home. +She is really a widow, though she refuses to use her dead husband's +name." + +"A widow?" repeated Preston with surprise and a queer sensation of +annoyance at his heart; "why, from the glimpse I had of her I thought +her a young girl." + +"So she is, not over twenty-one at most, and woefully ignorant for +that age," the Baroness said, and then she proceeded to outline +Berene's history, laying a good deal of stress upon her own +charitable act in giving the girl a home. + +"She is so ignorant of life, despite the fact that she has been +married, and she is so uneducated and helpless, I could not bear to +see her cast into the path of designing people," the Baroness said. +"She has a strong craving for an education, and I give her good books +to read, and good advice to ponder over, and I hope in time to come +she will marry some honest fellow and settle down to a quiet, happy +home life. The man who brings us butter and eggs from the country is +quite fascinated with her, but she does not deign him a glance." And +then the Baroness talked of other things. + +But the history he had heard remained in Preston Cheney's mind and he +could not drive the thought of this girl away. No wonder her eyes +were sad! Better blood ran in her veins than coursed under the pink +flesh of the Baroness, he would wager; she was the unfortunate victim +of a combination of circumstances, which had defrauded her of the +advantages of youth. + +He spoke with her in the hall one morning not long after that; and +then it grew to be a daily occurrence that he talked with her a few +moments, and before many weeks had passed the young man approached +the Baroness with a request. + +"I have become interested in your protegee Miss Dumont," he said. +"You have done so much for her that you have stirred my better nature +and made me anxious to emulate your example. In talking with her in +the hall one day I learned her great desire for a better education, +and her anxiety to earn money. Now it has occurred to me that I +might aid her in both ways. We need two or three more girls in our +office. We need one more in the type-setting department. As The +Clarion is a morning paper, and you never need Miss Dumont's services +after five o'clock, she could work a few hours in the office, earn a +small salary, and gain something in the way of an education also, if +she were ambitious enough to do so. Nearly all my early education +was gained as a printer. She tells me she is faulty in the matter of +spelling, and this would be excellent training for her. You have, +dear madam, inspired the girl with a desire for more knowledge, and I +hope you will let me carry on the good work you have begun." + +Preston had approached the matter in a way that could not fail to +bring success--by flattering the vanity and pride of the Baroness. +So elated was she with the agreeable references to herself, that she +never suspected the young man's deep personal interest in the girl. +She believed in the beginning that he was showing Berene this kind +attention solely to please the mistress. + +Berene entered the office as type-setter, and made such astonishing +progress that she was promoted to the position of proof-reader ere +six months had passed. And hour by hour, day by day, week by week, +the strange influence which she had exerted on her employer, from the +first moment of their meeting, grew and strengthened, until he +realised with a sudden terror that his whole being was becoming +absorbed by an intense passion for the girl. + +Meantime the Baroness was growing embarrassing in her attentions. +The young man was not conceited, nor prone to regard himself as an +object of worship to the fair sex. He had during the first few +months believed the Baroness to be amusing herself with his society. +He had not flattered himself that a woman of her age, who had seen so +much of the world, and whose ambitions were so unmistakable, could +regard him otherwise than as a diversion. + +But of late the truth had forced itself upon him that the woman +wished to entangle him in a serious affair. He could not afford to +jeopardise his reputation at the very outset of his career by any +such entanglement, or by the appearance of one. He cast about for +some excuse to leave the Palace, yet this would separate him in a +measure from his association with Berene, beside incurring the enmity +of the Baroness, and possibly causing Berene to suffer from her anger +as well. + +He seemed to be caught like a fly in a net. And again the thought of +his future and his ambitions confronted him, and he felt abashed in +his own eyes, as he realised how far away these ambitions had seemed +of late, since he had allowed his emotions to overrule his brain. + +What was this ignorant daughter of a French professor, that she +should stand between him and glory, riches and power? Desperate +diseases needed desperate remedies. He had been an occasional caller +at the Lawrence homestead ever since he came to Beryngford. Without +being conceited on the subject, he realised that Mabel Lawrence would +not reject him as a suitor. + +The masculine party is very dull, or the feminine very deceptive, +when a man makes a mistake in his impressions on this subject. + +That afternoon the young editor left his office at five o'clock and +asked Miss Lawrence to be his wife. + + + +CHAPTER IV + + + +Preston Cheney walked briskly down the street after he left his +fiancee, his steps directed toward the Palace. It was seven o'clock, +and he knew the Baroness would be at home. + +He had determined upon heroic treatment for his own mental disease +(as he regarded his peculiar sentiments toward Berene Dumont), and he +had decided upon a similar course of treatment for the Baroness. + +He would confide his engagement to her at once, and thus put an end +to his embarrassing position in the Palace, as well as to establish +his betrothal as a fact--and to force himself to so regard it. It +was strange reasoning for a young man in the very first hour of his +new role of bridegroom elect, but this particular groom elect had +deliberately placed himself in a peculiar position, and his reasoning +was not, of course, that of an ardent and happy lover. + +Already he was galled by his new fetters; already he was feeling a +sense of repulsion toward the woman he had asked to be his wife: and +because of these feelings he was more eager to nail himself hand and +foot to the cross he had builded. + +He was obliged to wait some time before the Baroness came into the +reception-room; and when she came he observed that she had made an +elaborate toilet in his honour. Her sumptuous shoulders billowed +over the low-cut blue corsage like apple-dumplings over a china dish. +Her waist was drawn in to an hourglass taper, while her ample hips +spread out beneath like the heavy mason work which supports a slender +column. Tiny feet encased in pretty slippers peeping from beneath +her silken skirts looked oddly out of proportion with the rest of her +generous personality, and reminded Preston of the grotesque cuts in +the humorous weeklies, where well-known politicians were represented +with large heads and small extremities. Artistic by nature, and with +an eye to form, he had never admired the Baroness's type of beauty, +which was the theme of admiration for nearly every other man in +Beryngford. Her face, with its infantine colouring, its large, +innocent azure eyes, and its short retrousse features, he conceded to +be captivatingly pretty, however, and it seemed unusually so this +evening. Perhaps because he had so recently looked upon the sharp, +sallow face of his fiancee. + +Preston frequently came to his room about this hour, after having +dined and before going to the office for his final duties; but he +seldom saw the Baroness on these occasions, unless through her own +design. + +"You were surprised to receive my message, no doubt, saying I wished +to see you," he began. "But I have something I feel I ought to tell +you, as it may make some changes in my habits, and will of course +eventually take me away from these pleasant associations." He paused +for a second, and the Baroness, who had seated herself on the divan +at his side, leaned forward and looked inquiringly in his face. + +"You are going away?" she asked, with a tremor in her voice. "Is it +not very sudden?" + +"No, I am not going away," he replied, "not from Beryngford--but I +shall doubtless leave your house ere many months. I am engaged to be +married to Miss Mabel Lawrence. You are the first person to whom I +have imparted the news, but you have been so kind, and I feel that +you ought to know it in time to secure a desirable tenant for my +room." + +Again there was a pause. The rosy face of the Baroness had grown +quite pale, and an unpleasant expression had settled about the +corners of her small mouth. She waved a feather fan to and fro +languidly. Then she gave a slight laugh and said: + +"Well, I must confess that I am surprised. Miss Lawrence is the last +woman in the world whom I would have imagined you to select as a +wife. Yet I congratulate you on your good sense. You are very +ambitious, and you can rise to great distinction if you have the +right influence to aid you. Judge Lawrence, with his wealth and +position, is of all men the one who can advance your interests, and +what more natural than that he should advance the interests of his +son-in-law? You are a very wise youth and I again congratulate you. +No romantic folly will ever ruin your life." + +There was irony and ridicule in her voice and face, and the young man +felt his cheek tingle with anger and humiliation. The Baroness had +read him like an open book--as everyone else doubtless would do. It +was bitterly galling to his pride, but there was nothing to do, save +to keep a bold front, and carry out his role with as much dignity as +possible. + +He rose, spoke a few formal words of thanks to the Baroness for her +kindness to him, and bowed himself from her presence, carrying with +him down the street the memory of her mocking eyes. + +As he entered his private office, he was amazed to see Berene Dumont +sitting in his chair fast asleep, her head framed by her folded arms, +which rested on his desk. Against the dark maroon of her sleeve, her +classic face was outlined like a marble statuette. Her long lashes +swept her cheek, and in the attitude in which she sat, her graceful, +perfectly-proportioned figure displayed each beautiful curve to the +best advantage. + +To a noble nature, the sight of even an enemy asleep, awakes +softening emotions, while the sight of a loved being in the +unconsciousness of slumber stirs the fountain of affection to its +very depths. + +As the young editor looked upon the girl before him, a passion of +yearning love took possession of him. A wild desire to seize her in +his arms and cover her pale face with kisses, made his heart throb to +suffocation and brought cold beads to his brow; and just as these +feelings gained an almost uncontrollable dominion over his reason, +will and judgment, the girl awoke and started to her feet in +confusion. + +"Oh, Mr Cheney, pray forgive me!" she cried, looking more beautiful +than ever with the flush which overspread her face. "I came in to +ask about a word in your editorial which I could not decipher. I +waited for you, as I felt sure you would be in shortly--and I was so +TIRED I sat down for just a second to rest--and that is all I knew +about it. You must forgive me, sir!--I did not mean to intrude." + +Her confusion, her appealing eyes, her magnetic voice were all fuel +to the fire raging in the young man's heart. Now that she was for +ever lost to him through his own deliberate action, she seemed +tenfold more dear and to be desired. Brain, soul, and body all +seemed to crave her; he took a step forward, and drew in a quick +breath as if to speak; and then a sudden sense of his own danger, and +an overwhelming disgust for his weakness swept over him, and the +intense passion the girl had aroused in his heart changed to +unreasonable anger. + +"Miss Dumont," he said coldly, "I think we will have to dispense with +your services after to-night. Your duties are evidently too hard for +you. You can leave the office at any time you wish. Good-night." + +The girl shrank as if he had struck her, looked up at him with wide, +wondering eyes, waited for a moment as if expecting to be recalled, +then, as Mr Cheney wheeled his chair about and turned his back upon +her, she suddenly sped away without a word. + +She left the office a few moments later; but it was not until after +eleven o'clock that she dragged herself up two flights of stairs +toward her room on the attic floor at the Palace. She had been +walking the streets like a mad creature all that intervening time, +trying to still the agonising pain in her heart. Preston Cheney had +long been her ideal of all that was noble, grand and good, she +worshipped him as devout pagans worshipped their sacred idols; and, +without knowing it, she gave him the absorbing passion which an +intense woman gives to her lover. + +It was only now that he had treated her with such rough brutality, +and discharged her from his employ for so slight a cause, that the +knowledge burst upon her tortured heart of all he was to her. + +She paused at the foot of the third and last flight of stairs with a +strange dizziness in her head and a sinking sensation at her heart. + +A little less than half-an-hour afterwards Preston Cheney unlocked +the street door and came in for the night. He had done double his +usual amount of work and had finished his duties earlier than usual. +To avoid thinking after he sent Berene away, he had turned to his +desk and plunged into his labour with feverish intensity. He wrote a +particularly savage editorial on the matter of over-immigration, and +his leaders on political questions of the day were all tinctured with +a bitterness and sarcasm quite new to his pen. At midnight that pen +dropped from his nerveless hand, and he made his way toward the +Palace in a most unenviable state of mind and body. + +Yet he believed he had done the right thing both in engaging himself +to Miss Lawrence and in discharging Berene. Her constant presence +about the office was of all things the most undesirable in his new +position. + +"But I might have done it in a decent manner if I had not lost all +control of myself," he said as he walked home. "It was brutal the +way I spoke to her; poor child, she looked as if I had beat her with +a bludgeon. Well, it is just as well perhaps that I gave her good +reason to despise me." + +Since Berene had gone into the young man's office as an employe her +good taste and another reason had caused her to avoid him as much as +possible in the house. He seldom saw more than a passing glimpse of +her in the halls, and frequently whole days elapsed that he met her +only in the office. The young man never suspected that this fact was +due in great part to the suggestion of jealousy in the manner of the +Baroness toward the young girl ever after he had shown so much +interest in her welfare. Sensitive to the mental atmosphere about +her, as a wind harp to the lightest breeze, Berene felt this +unexpressed sentiment in the breast of her "benefactress" and strove +to avoid anything which could aggravate it. + +With a lagging step and a listless air, Preston made his way up the +first of two flights of stairs which intervened between the street +door and his room. The first floor was in darkness; but in the upper +hall a dim light was always left burning until his return. As he +reached the landing, he was startled to see a woman's form lying at +the foot of the attic stairs, but a few feet from the door of his +room. Stooping down, he uttered a sudden exclamation of pained +surprise, for it was upon the pallid, unconscious face of Berene +Dumont that his eyes fell. He lifted the lithe figure in his sinewy +arms, and with light, rapid steps bore her up the stairs and in +through the open door of her room. + +"If she is dead, I am her murderer," he thought. But at that moment +she opened her eyes and looked full into his, with a gaze which made +his impetuous, uncontrolled heart forget that any one or anything +existed on earth but this girl and his love for her. + + + +CHAPTER V + + + +One of the greatest factors in the preservation of the Baroness's +beauty had been her ability to sleep under all conditions. The woman +who can and does sleep eight or nine hours out of each twenty-four is +well armed against the onslaught of time and trouble. + +To say that such women do not possess heart enough or feeling enough +to suffer is ofttimes most untrue. + +Insomnia is a disease of the nerves or of the stomach, rather than +the result of extreme emotion. Sometimes the people who sleep the +most profoundly at night in times of sorrow, suffer the more +intensely during their waking hours. Disguised as a friend, +deceitful Slumber comes to them only to strengthen their powers of +suffering, and to lend a new edge to pain. + +The Baroness was not without feeling. Her temperament was far from +phlegmatic. She had experienced great cyclones of grief and loss in +her varied career, though many years had elapsed since she had known +what the French call a "white night." + +But the night following her interview with Preston Cheney she never +closed her eyes in sleep. It was in vain that she tried all known +recipes for producing slumber. She said the alphabet backward ten +times; she counted one thousand; she conjured up visions of sheep +jumping the time-honoured fence in battalions, yet the sleep god +never once drew near. + +"I am certainly a brilliant illustration of the saying that there is +no fool like an old fool," she said to herself as the night wore on, +and the strange sensation of pain and loss which Preston Cheney's +unexpected announcement had caused her gnawed at her breast like a +rat in a wainscot. + +That she had been unusually interested in the young editor she knew +from the first; that she had been mortally wounded by Cupid's shaft +she only now discovered. She had passed through a divorce, two +"affairs" and a legitimate widowhood, without feeling any of the keen +emotions which now drove sleep from her eyes. A long time ago, +longer than she cared to remember, she had experienced such emotions, +but she had supposed such folly only possible in the high tide of +early youth. It was absurd, nay more, it was ridiculous to lie awake +at her time of life thinking about a penniless country youth whose +mother she might almost have been. In this bitterly frank fashion +the Baroness reasoned with herself as she lay quite still in her +luxurious bed, and tried to sleep. + +Yet despite her frankness, her philosophy and her reasoning, the +rasping hurt at her heart remained--a hurt so cruel it seemed to her +the end of all peace or pleasure in life. + +It is harder to bear the suffocating heat of a late September day +which the year sometimes brings, than all the burning June suns. + +The Baroness heard the click of Preston's key in the street door, and +she listened to his slow step as he ascended the stairs. She heard +him pause, too, and waited for the sound of the opening of his room +door, which was situated exactly above her own. But she listened in +vain, her ears, brain and heart on the alert with surprise, +curiosity, and at last suspicion. The Baroness was as full of +curiosity as a cat. + +It was not until just before dawn that she heard his step in the +hall, and his door open and close. + +An hour later a sharp ring came at the street door bell. A message +for Mr Preston, the servant said, in answer to her mistress's +question as she descended from the room above. + +"Was Mr Preston awake when you rapped on his door?" asked the +Baroness. + +"Yes, madame, awake and dressed." + +Mr Preston ran hurriedly through the halls and out to the street a +moment later; and the Baroness, clothed in a dressing-gown and silken +slippers, tiptoed lightly to his room. The bed had not been occupied +the whole night. On the table lay a note which the young man had +begun when interrupted by the message which he had thrown down beside +it. + +The Baroness glanced at the note, on which the ink was still moist, +and read, "My dear Miss Lawrence, I want you to release me from the +ties formed only yesterday--I am basely unworthy--" here the note +ended. She now turned her attention to the message which had +prevented the completion of the letter. It was signed by Judge +Lawrence and ran as follows:- + + +"My Dear Boy,--My wife was taken mortally ill this morning just +before daybreak. She cannot live many hours, our physician says. +Mabel is in a state of complete nervous prostration caused by the +shock of this calamity. I wish you would come to us at once. I fear +for my dear child's reason unless you prove able to calm and quiet +her through this ordeal. Hasten then, my dear son; every moment +before you arrive will seem an age of sorrow and anxiety to me. "S. +LAWRENCE." + + +A strange smile curved the corners of the Baroness's lips as she +finished reading this note and tiptoed down the stairs to her own +room again. + +Meantime the hour for her hot water arrived, and Berene did not +appear. The Baroness drank a quart of hot water every morning as a +tonic for her system, and another quart after breakfast to reduce her +flesh. Her excellent digestive powers and the clear condition of her +blood she attributed largely to this habit. + +After a few moments she rang the bell vigorously. Maggie, the +chambermaid, came in answer to the call. + +"Please ask Miss Dumont" (Berene was always known to the other +servants as Miss Dumont) "to hurry with the hot water," the Baroness +said. + +"Miss Dumont has not yet come downstairs, madame." + +"Not come down? Then will you please call her, Maggie?" + +The Baroness was always polite to her servants. She had observed +that a graciousness of speech toward her servants often made up for a +deficiency in wages. Maggie ascended to Miss Dumont's room, and +returned with the information that Miss Dumont had a severe headache, +and begged the indulgence of madame this morning. + +Again that strange smile curved the corners of the Baroness's lips. + +Maggie was requested to bring up hot water and coffee, and great was +her surprise to find the Baroness moving about the room when she +appeared with the tray. + +Half-an-hour later Berene Dumont, standing by an open window with her +hands clasped behind her head, heard a light tap on her door. In +answer to a mechanical "Come," the Baroness appeared. + +The rustle of her silken morning gown caused Berene to turn suddenly +and face her; and as she met the eyes of her visitor the young +woman's pallor gave place to a wave of deep crimson, which dyed her +face and neck like the shadow of a red flag falling on a camellia +blossom. + +"Maggie tells me you are ill this morning," the Baroness remarked +after a moment's silence. "I am surprised to find you up and +dressed. I came to see if I could do anything for you." + +"You are very kind," Berene answered, while in her heart she thought +how cruel was the expression in the face of the woman before her, and +how faded she appeared in the morning light. "But I think I shall be +quite well in a little while, I only need to keep quiet for a few +hours." + +"I fear you passed a sleepless night," the Baroness remarked with a +solicitous tone, but with the same cruel smile upon her lips. "I see +you never opened your bed. Something must have been in the air to +keep us all awake. I did not sleep an hour, and Mr Cheney never +entered his room till near morning. Yet I can understand his +wakefulness--he announced his engagement to Miss Mabel Lawrence to me +last evening, and a young man is not expected to woo sleep easily +after taking such an important step as that. Judge Lawrence sent for +him a few hours ago to come and support Miss Mabel during the trial +that the day is to bring them in the death of Mrs Lawrence. The +physician has predicted the poor invalid's near end. Sorrow follows +close on joy in this life." + +There was a moment's silence; then Miss Dumont said: "I think I will +try to get a little sleep now, madame. I thank you for your kind +interest in me." + +The Baroness descended to her room humming an air from an old opera, +and settled to the task of removing as much as possible all evidences +of fatigue and sleeplessness from her countenance. + +It has been said very prettily of the spruce-tree, that it keeps the +secret of its greenness well; so well that we hardly know when it +sheds its leaves. There are women who resemble the spruce in their +perennial youth, and the vigilance with which they guard the secret +of it. The Baroness was one of these. Only her mirror shared this +secret. + +She was an adept at the art of preservation, and greatly as she +disliked physical exertion, she toiled laboriously over her own +person an hour at least every day, and never employed a maid to +assist her. One's rival might buy one's maid, she reasoned, and it +was well to have no confidant in these matters. + +She slipped off her dressing-gown and corset and set herself to the +task of pinching and mauling her throat, arms and shoulders, to +remove superfluous flesh, and strengthen muscles and fibres to resist +the flabby tendencies which time produces. Then she used the dumb- +bells vigorously for fifteen minutes, and that was followed by five +minutes of relaxation. Next she lay on the floor flat upon her face, +her arms across her back, and lifted her head and chest twenty-five +times. This exercise was to replace flesh with muscle across the +abdomen. Then she rose to her feet, set her small heels together, +turned her toes out squarely, and, keeping her body upright bent her +knees out in a line with her hips, sinking and rising rapidly fifteen +times. This produced pliancy of the body, and induced a healthy +condition of the loins and adjacent organs. + +To further fight against the deadly enemy of obesity, she lifted her +arms above her head slowly until she touched her finger tips, at the +same time rising upon her tiptoes, while she inhaled a long breath, +and as slowly dropped to her heels, and lowered her arms while she +exhaled her breath. While these exercises had been taking place, a +tin cup of water had been coming to the boiling point over an alcohol +lamp. This was now poured into a china bowl containing a small +quantity of sweet milk, which was always brought on her breakfast +tray. + +The Baroness seated herself before her mirror, in a glare of cruel +light which revealed every blemish in her complexion, every line +about the mouth and eyes. + +"You are really hideously passee, mon amie," she observed as she +peered at herself searchingly; "but we will remedy all that." + +Dipping a soft linen handkerchief in the bowl of steaming milk and +water, she applied it to her face, holding it closely over the brow +and eyes and about the mouth, until every pore was saturated and +every weary drawn tissue fed and strengthened by the tonic. After +this she dashed ice-cold water over her face. Still there were +little folds at the corners of the eyelids, and an ugly line across +the brow, and these were manipulated with painstaking care, and +treated with mysterious oils and fragrant astringents and finally +washed in cool toilet water and lightly brushed with powder, until at +the end of an hour's labour, the face of the Baroness had resumed its +roseleaf bloom and transparent smoothness for which she was so +famous. And when by the closest inspection at the mirror, in the +broadest light, she saw no flaw in skin, hair, or teeth, the Baroness +proceeded to dress for a drive. Even the most jealous rival would +have been obliged to concede that she looked like a woman of twenty- +eight, that most fascinating of all ages, as she took her seat in the +carriage. + +In the early days of her life in Beryngford, when as the Baroness Le +Fevre she had led society in the little town, Mrs Lawrence had been +one of her most devoted friends; Judge Lawrence one of her most +earnest, if silent admirers. As "Baroness Brown" and as the landlady +of "The Palace" she had still maintained her position as friend of +the family, and the Lawrences, secure in their wealth and power, had +allowed her to do so, where some of the lower social lights had +dropped her from their visiting lists. + +The Baroness seemed to exercise a sort of hypnotic power over the +fretful, nervous invalid who shared Judge Lawrence's name, and this +influence was not wholly lost upon the Judge himself, who never +looked upon the Baroness's abundant charms, glowing with health, +without giving vent to a profound sigh like some hungry child +standing before a confectioner's window. + +The news of Mrs Lawrence's dangerous illness was voiced about the +town by noon, and therefore the Baroness felt safe in calling at the +door to make inquiries, and to offer any assistance which she might +be able to render. Knowing her intimate relations with the mistress +of the house, the servant admitted her to the parlour and announced +her presence to Judge Lawrence, who left the bedside of the invalid +to tell the caller in person that Mrs Lawrence had fallen into a +peaceful slumber, and that slight hopes were entertained of her +possible recovery. Scarcely had the words passed his lips, however, +when the nurse in attendance hurriedly called him. "Mrs Lawrence is +dead!" she cried. "She breathed only twice after you left the room." + +The Baroness, shocked and startled, rose to go, feeling that her +presence longer would be an intrusion. + +"Do not go," cried the Judge in tones of distress. "Mabel is nearly +distracted, and this news will excite her still further. We thought +this morning that she was on the verge of serious mental disorder. I +sent for her fiance, Mr Cheney, and he has calmed her somewhat. You +always exerted a soothing and restful influence over my wife, and you +may have the same power with Mabel. Stay with us, I beg of you, +through the afternoon at least." + +The Baroness sent her carriage home and remained in the Lawrence +mansion until the following morning. The condition of Miss Lawrence +was indeed serious. She passed from one attack of hysteria to +another, and it required the constant attention of her fiance and her +mother's friend to keep her from acts of violence. + +It was after midnight when she at last fell asleep, and Preston +Cheney in a state of complete exhaustion was shown to a room, while +the Baroness remained at the bedside of Miss Lawrence. + +When the Baroness and Mr Cheney returned to the Palace they were +struck with consternation to learn that Miss Dumont had packed her +trunk and departed from Beryngford on the three o'clock train the +previous day. + +A brief note thanking the Baroness for her kindness, and stating that +she had imposed upon that kindness quite too long, was her only +farewell. There was no allusion to her plans or her destination, and +all inquiry and secret search failed to find one trace of her. She +seemed to vanish like a phantom from the face of the earth. + +No one had seen her leave the Palace, save the laundress, Mrs Connor; +and little this humble personage dreamed that Fate was reserving for +her an important role in the drama of a life as yet unborn. + + + +CHAPTER VI + + + +Whatever hope of escape from his self-imposed bondage Preston Cheney +had entertained when he began the note to his fiancee which the +Baroness had read, completely vanished during the weeks which +followed the death of Mrs Lawrence. + +Mabel's nervous condition was alarming, and her father seemed to rely +wholly upon his future son-in-law for courage and moral support +during the trying ordeal. Like most large men of strong physique, +Judge Lawrence was as helpless as an infant in the presence of an +ailing woman; and his experience as the husband of a wife whose +nerves were the only notable thing about her, had given him an +absolute terror of feminine invalids. + +Mabel had never been very fond of her mother; she had not been a +loving or a dutiful daughter. A petulant child and an irritable, +fault-finding young woman, who had often been devoid of sympathy for +her parents, she now exhibited such an excess of grief over the death +of her mother that her reason seemed to be threatened. + +It was, in fact, quite as much anger as grief which caused her +nervous paroxysms. Mabel Lawrence had never since her infancy known +what it was to be thwarted in a wish. Both parents had been slaves +to her slightest caprice and she had ruled the household with a look +or a word. Death had suddenly deprived her of a mother who was +necessary to her comfort and to whose presence she was accustomed, +and her heart was full of angry resentment at the fate which had +dared to take away a member of her household. It had never entered +her thoughts that death could devastate HER home. + +Other people lost fathers and mothers, of course; but that Mabel +Lawrence could be deprived of a parent seemed incredible. Anger is a +strong ingredient in the excessive grief of every selfish nature. + +Preston Cheney became more and more disheartened with the prospect of +his future, as he studied the character and temperament of his +fiancee during her first weeks of loss. + +But the net which he had woven was closing closer and closer about +him, and every day he became more hopelessly entangled in its meshes. + +At the end of one month, the family physician decided that travel and +change of air and scene was an imperative necessity for Miss +Lawrence. Judge Lawrence was engaged in some important legal matters +which rendered an extended journey impossible for him. To trust +Mabel in the hands of hired nurses alone, was not advisable. It was +her father who suggested an early marriage and a European trip for +bride and groom, as the wisest expedient under the circumstances. + +Like the prisoner in the iron room, who saw the walls slowly but +surely closing in to crush out his life, Preston Cheney saw his +wedding day approaching, and knew that his doom was sealed. + +There were many desperate hours, when, had he possessed the slightest +clue to the hiding-place of Berene Dumont, he would have flown to +her, even knowing that he left disgrace and death behind him. He +realised that he now owed a duty to the girl he loved, higher and +more imperative by far than any he owed to his fiancee. But he had +not the means to employ a detective to find Berene; and he was not +sure that, if found, she might not spurn him. He had heard and read +of cases where a woman's love had turned to bitter loathing and +hatred for the man who had not protected her in a moment of weakness. +He could think of no other cause which would lead Berene to disappear +in such a mysterious manner at such a time, and so the days passed +and he married Mabel Lawrence two months after the death of her +mother, and the young couple set forth immediately on extended +foreign travels. Fifteen months later they returned to Beryngford +with their infant daughter Alice. Mrs Cheney was much improved in +health, though still a great sufferer from nervous disorders, a +misfortune which the child seemed to inherit. She would lie and +scream for hours at a time, clenching her small fists and growing +purple in the face, and all efforts of parents, nurses or physicians +to soothe her, served only to further increase her frenzy. She +screamed and beat the air with her thin arms and legs until nature +exhausted itself, then she fell into a heavy slumber and awoke in +good spirits. + +These attacks came on frequently in the night, and as they rendered +Mrs Cheney very "nervous," and caused a panic among the nurses, it +devolved upon the unhappy father to endeavour to soothe the violent +child. And while he walked the floor with her or leaned over her +crib, using all his strong mental powers to control these unfortunate +paroxysms, no vision came to him of another child lying cuddled in +her mother's arms in a distant town, a child of wonderful beauty and +angelic nature, born of love, and inheriting love's divine qualities. + +A few months before the young couple returned to their native soil, +they received a letter which caused Preston the greatest +astonishment, and Mabel some hours of hysterical weeping. This +letter was written by Judge Lawrence, and announced his marriage to +Baroness Brown. Judge Lawrence had been a widower more than a year +when the Baroness took the book of his heart, in which he supposed +the hand of romance had long ago written "finis," and turning it to +his astonished eyes revealed a whole volume of love's love. + +It is in the second reading of their hearts that the majority of men +find the most interesting literature. + +Before the Baroness had been three months his wife, the long years of +martyrdom he had endured as the husband of Mabel's mother seemed like +a nightmare dream to Judge Lawrence; and all of life, hope and +happiness was embodied in the woman who ruled his destiny with a +hypnotic sway no one could dispute, yet a woman whose heart still +throbbed with a stubborn and lawless passion for the man who called +her husband father. + + + +CHAPTER VII + + + +More than two decades had passed since Preston Cheney followed the +dictates of his ambition and married Mabel Lawrence. + +Many of his early hopes and desires had been realised during these +years. He had attained to high political positions; and honour and +wealth were his to enjoy. Yet Senator Cheney, as he was now known, +was far from a happy man. Disappointment was written in every +lineament of his face, restlessness and discontent spoke in his every +movement, and at times the spirit of despair seemed to look from the +depths of his eyes. + +To a man of any nobility of nature, there can be small satisfaction +in honours which he knows are bought with money and bribes; and to +the proud young American there was the additional sting of knowing +that even the money by which his honours were purchased was not his +own. + +It was the second Mrs Lawrence (still designated as the "Baroness" by +her stepdaughter and by old acquaintances) to whom Preston owed the +constant reminder of his dependence upon the purse of his father-in- +law. In those subtle, occult ways known only to a jealous and +designing nature, the Baroness found it possible to make Preston's +life a torture, without revealing her weapons of warfare to her +husband; indeed, without allowing him to even smell the powder, while +she still kept up a constant small fire upon the helpless enemy. + +Owing to the fact that Mabel had come as completely under the +hypnotic influence of the Baroness as the first Mrs Lawrence had been +during her lifetime, Preston was subjected to a great deal more of +her persecutions than would otherwise have been possible. Mabel was +never happier than when enjoying the companionship of her new mother; +a condition of things which pleased the Judge as much as it made his +son-in-law miserable. + +With a malicious adroitness possible only to such a woman as the +second Mrs Lawrence, she endeared herself to Mrs Cheney, by a +thousand flattering and caressing ways, and by a constant exhibition +of sympathy, which to a weak and selfish nature is as pleasing as it +is distasteful to the proud and strong. And by this inexhaustible +flow of sympathetic feeling, she caused the wife to drift farther and +farther away from her husband's influence, and to accuse him of all +manner of shortcomings and faults which had not suggested themselves +to her own mind. + +Mabel had not given or demanded a devoted love when she married +Preston Cheney. She was quite satisfied to bear his name, and do the +honours of his house, and to be let alone as much as possible. It +was the name, not the estate, of wifehood she desired; and motherhood +she had accepted with reluctance and distaste. + +Never was a more undesired or unwelcome child born than her daughter +Alice, and the helpless infant shared with its father the resentful +anger which dominated her unwilling mother the wretched months before +its advent into earth life. + +To be let alone and allowed to follow her own whims and desires, and +never to be crossed in any wish, was all Mrs Cheney asked of her +husband. + +This role was one he had very willingly permitted her to pursue, +since with every passing week and month he found less and less to win +or bind him to his wife. Wretched as this condition of life was, it +might at least have settled into a monotonous calm, undisturbed by +strife, but for the molesting "sympathy" of the Baroness. + +"Poor thing, here you are alone again," she would say on entering the +house where Mabel lounged or lolled, quite content with her situation +until the tone and words of her stepmother aroused a resentful +consciousness of being neglected. Again the Baroness would say: + +"I do think you are such a brave little darling to carry so smiling a +face about with all you have to endure." Or, "Very few wives would +bear what you bear and hide every vestige of unhappiness from the +world. You are a wonderful and admirable character in my eyes." Or, +"It seems so strange that your husband does not adore you--but men +are blind to the best qualities in women like you. I never hear Mr +Cheney praising other women without a sad and almost resentful +feeling in my heart, realising how superior you are to all of his +favourites." It was the insidious effect of poisoned flattery like +this, which made the Baroness a ruling power in the Cheney household, +and at the same time turned an already cold and unloving wife into a +jealous and nagging tyrant who rendered the young statesman's home +the most dreaded place on earth to him, and caused him to live away +from it as much as possible. + +His only child, Alice, a frail, hysterical girl, devoid of beauty or +grace, gave him but little comfort or satisfaction. Indeed she was +but an added disappointment and pain in his life. Indulged in every +selfish thought by her mother and the Baroness, peevish and petulant, +always ailing, complaining and discontented, and still a victim to +the nervous disorders inherited from her mother, it was small wonder +that Senator Cheney took no more delight in the role of father than +he had found in the role of husband. + +Alice was given every advantage which money could purchase. But her +delicate health had rendered systematic study of any kind impossible, +and her twentieth birthday found her with no education, with no use +of her reasoning or will powers, but with a complete and beautiful +wardrobe in which to masquerade and air her poor little attempts at +music, art, or conversation. + +Judge Lawrence died when Alice was fifteen years of age, leaving both +his widow and his daughter handsomely provided for. + +The Baroness not only possessed the Beryngford homestead, but a house +in Washington as well; and both of these were occupied by tenants, +for Mabel insisted upon having her stepmother dwell under her own +roof. Senator Cheney had purchased a house in New York to gratify +his wife and daughter, and it was here the family resided, when not +in Washington or at the seaside resorts. Both women wished to +forget, and to make others forget, that they had ever lived in +Beryngford. They never visited the place and never referred to it. +They desired to be considered "New Yorkers" and always spoke of +themselves as such. + +The Baroness was now hopelessly passee. Yet it was the revealing of +the inner woman, rather than the withering of the exterior, which +betrayed her years. The woman who understands the art of bodily +preservation can, with constant toil and care, retain an appearance +of youth and charm into middle life; but she who would pass that +dreaded meridian, and still remain a goodly sight for the eyes of +men, must possess, in addition to all the secrets of the toilet, +those divine elixirs, unselfishness and love for humanity. Faith in +divine powers, too, and resignation to earthly ills, must do their +part to lend the fading eye lustre and to give a softening glow to +the paling cheek. Before middle life, it is the outer woman who is +seen; after middle life, skilled as she may be by art and however +endowed my nature, yet the inner woman becomes visible to the least +discerning eye, and the thoughts and feelings which have dominated +her during all the past, are shown upon her face and form like +printed words upon the open leaves of a book. That is why so many +young beauties become ugly old ladies, and why plain faces sometimes +are beautiful in age. + +The Baroness had been unremitting in the care of her person, and she +had by this toil saved her figure from becoming gross, retaining the +upright carriage and the tapering waist of youth, though she was upon +the verge of her sixtieth birthday. Her complexion, too, owing to +her careful diet, her hours of repose, and her knowledge of skin +foods and lotions, remained smooth, fair and unfurrowed. But the +long-guarded expression in her blue eyes of childlike innocence had +given place to the hard look of a selfish and unhappy nature, and the +lines about the small mouth accented the expression of the eyes. + +It was, despite its preservation of Nature's gifts, and despite its +forced smiles, the face of a selfish, cruel pessimist, disappointed +in her past and with no uplifting faith to brighten the future. + +The Baroness had been the wife of Judge Lawrence a number of years, +before she relinquished her hopes of one day making Preston Cheney +respond to the passion which burned unquenched in her breast. It had +been with the idea of augmenting the interests of the man whom she +believed to be her future lover, that she aided and urged on her +husband in his efforts to procure place and honour for his son-in- +law. + +It was this idea which caused her to widen the breach between wife +and husband by every subtle means in her power; and it was when this +idea began to lose colour and substance and drop away among the +wreckage of past hopes, that the Baroness ceased to compliment and +began to taunt Preston Cheney with his dependence upon his father-in- +law, and to otherwise goad and torment the unhappy man. And Preston +Cheney grew into the habit of staying anywhere longer than at home. + +During the last ten years the Baroness had seemed to abandon all +thoughts of gallant adventure. When the woman who has found life and +pleasures only in coquetry and conquest is forced to relinquish these +delights, she becomes either very devout or very malicious. + +The Baroness was devoid of religious feelings, and she became, +therefore, the most bitter and caustic of cynical critics at heart, +though she guarded her expression of these sentiments from policy. + +Yet to Mabel she expressed herself freely, knowing that her listener +enjoyed no conversation so much as that of gossip and criticism. A +beautiful or attractive woman was the target for her most cruel +shafts of sarcasm, and indeed no woman was safe from her secret +malice save Mabel and Alice, over whom she found it a greater +pleasure to exercise her hypnotic control. For Alice, indeed, the +Baroness entertained a peculiar affection. The fact that she was the +child of the man to whom she had given the strongest passion of her +life, and the girl's lack of personal beauty, and her unfortunate +physical condition, awoke a medley of love, pity and protection in +the heart of this strange woman. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + + +The Baroness had always been a churchgoing woman, yet she had never +united with any church, or subscribed to any creed. + +Religious observance was only an implement of social warfare with +her. Wherever her lot was cast, she made it her business to discover +which church the fashionable people of the town frequented, and to +become a familiar and liberal-handed personage in that edifice. + +Judge Lawrence and his family were High Church Episcopalians, and the +second Mrs Lawrence slipped gracefully into the pew vacated by the +first, and became a much more important feature in the congregation, +owing to her good health and extreme desire for popularity. Mabel +and Alice were devout believers in the orthodox dogmas which have +taken the place of the simple teachings of Christ in so many of our +churches to-day. They believed that people who did not go to church +would stand a very poor chance of heaven; and that a strict +observance of a Sunday religion would ensure them a passport into +God's favour. When they returned from divine service and mangled the +character and attire of their neighbours over the Sunday dinner- +table, no idea entered their heads or hearts that they had sinned +against the Holy Ghost. The pastor of their church knew them to be +selfish, worldly-minded women; yet he administered the holy sacrament +to them without compunction of conscience, and never by question or +remark implied a doubt of their true sincerity in things religious. +They believed in the creed of his church, and they paid liberally for +the support of that church. What more could he ask? + +This had been true of the pastor in Beryngford, and it proved equally +true of their spiritual adviser in Washington and in New York. + +Just across the aisle from the Lawrences sat a rich financier, in his +sumptuously cushioned pew. During six days of each week he was +engaged in crushing life and hope out of the hearts of the poor, +under his juggernaut wheels of monopoly. His name was known far and +near, as that of a powerful and cruel speculator, who did not +hesitate to pauperise his nearest friends if they placed themselves +in his reach. That he was a thief and a robber, no one ever denied; +yet so colossal were his thefts, so bold and successful his +robberies, the public gazed upon him with a sort of stupefied awe, +and allowed him to proceed, while miserable tramps, who stole +overcoats or robbed money drawers, were incarcerated for a term of +years, and then sternly refused assistance afterward by good people, +who place no confidence in jail birds. + +But each Sunday this successful robber occupied his high-priced +church pew, devoutly listening to the divine word. + +He never failed to partake of the holy communion, nor was his right +to do so ever questioned. + +The rector of the church knew his record perfectly; knew that his +gains were ill-gotten blood money, ground from the suffering poor by +the power of monopoly, and from confiding fools by smart lures and +scheming tricks. But this young clergyman, having recently been +called to preside over the fashionable church, had no idea of being +so impolite as to refuse to administer the bread and wine to one of +its most liberal supporters! + +There were constant demands upon the treasury of the church; it +required a vast outlay of money to maintain the splendour and +elegance of the temple which held its head so high above many others; +and there were large charities to be sustained, not to mention its +rector's princely salary. The millionaire pewholder was a liberal +giver. It rarely occurs to the fashionable dispensers of spiritual +knowledge to ask whether the devil's money should be used to gild the +Lord's temple; nor to question if it be a wise religion which allows +a man to rob his neighbours on weekdays, to give to the cause of +charity on Sundays. + +And yet if every clergyman and priest in the land were to make and +maintain these standards for their followers, there might be an +astonishing decrease in the needs of the poor and unfortunate. + +Were every church member obliged to open his month's ledgers to a +competent jury of inspectors, before he was allowed to take the holy +sacrament and avow himself a humble follower of Christ, what a +revolution might ensue! How church spires would crumble for lack of +support, and poorhouses lessen in number for lack of inmates! + +But the leniency of clergymen toward the shortcomings of their +wealthy parishioners is often a touching lesson in charity to the +thoughtful observer who stands outside the fold. + +For how could they obtain money to convert the heathen, unless this +sweet cloak of charity were cast over the sins of the liberal rich? +Christ is crucified by the fashionable clergymen to-day more cruelly +than he was by the Jews of old. + +Senator Cheney was not a church member, and he seldom attended +service. This was a matter of great solicitude to his wife and +daughter. The Baroness felt it to be a mistake on the part of +Senator Cheney, and even Judge Lawrence, who adored his son-in-law, +regretted the young man's indifference to things spiritual. But with +all Preston Cheney's worldly ambitions and weaknesses, there was a +vein of sincerity in his nature which forbade his feigning a faith he +did not feel; and the daily lives of the three feminine members of +his family were so in disaccord with his views of religion that he +felt no incentive to follow in their footsteps. Judge Lawrence he +knew to be an honest, loyal-hearted, God and humanity loving man. "A +true Christian by nature and education," he said of his father-in- +law, "but I am not born with his tendency to religious observance, +and I see less and less in the churches to lead me into the fold. It +seems to me that these religious institutions are getting to be vast +monopolistic corporations like the railroads and oil trusts, and the +like. I see very little of the spirit of Christ in orthodox people +to-day." + +Meanwhile Senator Cheney's purse was always open to any demand the +church made; he believed in churches as benevolent if not soul-saving +institutions, and cheerfully aided their charitable work. + +The rector of St Blank's, the fashionable edifice where the ladies of +the Cheney household obtained spiritual manna in New York, died when +Alice was sixteen years old. He was a good old man, and a sincere +Episcopalian, and whatever originality of thought or expression he +may have lacked, his strict observance of the High Church code of +ethics maintained the tone of his church and rendered him an object +of reverence to his congregation. His successor was Reverend Arthur +Emerson Stuart, a young man barely thirty years of age, heir to a +comfortable fortune, gifted with strong intellectual powers and +dowered with physical attractions. + +It was not a case of natural selection which caused Arthur Stuart to +adopt the church as a profession. It was the result of his middle +name. Mrs Stuart had been an Emerson--in some remote way her family +claimed relationship with Ralph Waldo. Her father and grandfather +and several uncles had been clergymen. She married a broker, who +left her a rich widow with one child, a son. From the hour this son +was born his mother designed him for the clergy, and brought him up +with the idea firmly while gently fixed in his mind. + +Whatever seed a mother plants in a young child's mind, carefully +watches over, prunes and waters, and exposes to sun and shade, is +quite certain to grow, if the soil is not wholly stony ground. + +Arthur Stuart adored his mother, and stifling some commercial +instincts inherited from the parental side, he turned his attention +to the ministry and entered upon his chosen work when only twenty- +five years of age. Eloquent, dramatic in speech, handsome, and +magnetic in person, independent in fortune, and of excellent lineage +on the mother's side, it was not surprising that he was called to +take charge of the spiritual welfare of fashionable St Blank's Church +on the death of the old pastor; or that, having taken the charge, he +became immensely popular, especially with the ladies of his +congregation. And from the first Sabbath day when they looked up +from their expensive pew into the handsome face of their new rector, +there was but one man in the world for Mabel Cheney and her daughter +Alice, and that was the Reverend Arthur Emerson Stuart. + +It has been said by a great and wise teacher, that we may worship the +god in the human being, but never the human being as God. This +distinction is rarely drawn by women, I fear, when their spiritual +teacher is a young and handsome man. The ladies of the Rev. Arthur +Stuart's congregation went home to dream, not of the Creator and +Maker of all things, nor of the divine Man, but of the handsome face, +stalwart form and magnetic voice of the young rector. They feasted +their eyes upon his agreeable person, rather than their souls upon +his words of salvation. Disappointed wives, lonely spinsters and +romantic girls believed they were coming nearer to spiritual truths +in their increased desire to attend service, while in fact they were +merely drawn nearer to a very attractive male personality. + +There was not the holy flame in the young clergyman's own heart to +ignite other souls; but his strong magnetism was perceptible to all, +and they did not realise the difference. And meantime the church +grew and prospered amazingly. + +It was observed by the congregation of St Blank's Church, shortly +after the advent of the new rector, that a new organist also occupied +the organ loft; and inquiry elicited the fact that the old man who +had officiated in that capacity during many years, had been retired +on a pension, while a young lady who needed the position and the +salary had been chosen to fill the vacancy. + +That the change was for the better could not be questioned. Never +before had such music pealed forth under the tall spires of St +Blank's. The new organist seemed inspired; and many people in the +fashionable congregation, hearing that this wonderful musician was a +young woman, lingered near the church door after service to catch a +glimpse of her as she descended from the loft. + +A goodly sight she was, indeed, for human eyes to gaze upon. Young, +of medium height and perfectly symmetry of shape, her blonde hair and +satin skin and eyes of velvet darkness were but her lesser charms. +That which riveted the gaze of every beholder, and drew all eyes to +her whereever she passed, was her air of radiant health and +happiness, which emanated from her like the perfume from a flower. + +A sad countenance may render a heroine of romance attractive in a +book, but in real life there is no charm at once so rare and so +fascinating as happiness. Did you ever think how few faces of the +grown up, however young, are really happy in expression? Discontent, +restlessness, longing, unsatisfied ambition or ill health mar ninety +and nine of every hundred faces we meet in the daily walks of life. +When we look upon a countenance which sparkles with health and +absolute joy in life, we turn and look again and yet again, charmed +and fascinated, though we do not know why. + +It was such a face that Joy Irving, the new organist of St Blank's +Church, flashed upon the people who had lingered near the door to see +her pass out. Among those who lingered was the Baroness; and all day +she carried about with her the memory of that sparkling countenance; +and strive as she would, she could not drive away a vague, strange +uneasiness which the sight of that face had caused her. + +Yet a vision of youth and beauty always made the Baroness unhappy, +now that both blessings were irrevocably lost to her. + +This particular young face, however, stirred her with those half- +painful, half-pleasurable emotions which certain perfumes awake in +us--vague reminders of joys lost or unattained, of dreams broken or +unrealised. Added to this, it reminded her of someone she had known, +yet she could not place the resemblance. + +"Oh, to be young and beautiful like that!" she sighed as she buried +her face in her pillow that night. "And since I cannot be, if only +Alice had that girl's face." + +And because Alice did not have it, the Baroness went to sleep with a +feeling of bitter resentment against its possessor, the beautiful +young organist of St Blank's. + + + +CHAPTER IX + + + +Up in the loft of St Blank's Church the young organist had been +practising the whole morning. People paused on the street to listen +to the glorious sounds, and were thrilled by them, as one is only +thrilled when the strong personality of the player enters into the +execution. + +Down into the committee-room, where several deacons and the young +rector were seated discussing some question pertaining to the well- +being of the church, the music penetrated too, causing the business +which had brought them together, to be suspended temporarily. + +"It is a sin to talk while music like that can be heard," remarked +one man. "You have found a genius in this new organist, Rector." + +The young man nodded silently, his eyes half closed with an +expression of somewhat sensuous enjoyment of the throbbing chords +which vibrated in perfect unison with the beating of his strong +pulses. + +"Where does she come from?" asked the deacon, as a pause in the music +occurred. + +"Her father was an earnest and prominent member of the little church +down-town of which I had charge during several years," replied the +young man. "Miss Irving was scarcely more than a child when she +volunteered her services as organist. The position brought her no +remuneration, and at that time she did not need it. Young as she +was, the girl was one of the most active workers among the poor, and +I often met her in my visits to the sick and unfortunate. She had +been a musical prodigy from the cradle, and Mr Irving had given her +every advantage to study and perfect her art. + +"I was naturally much interested in her. Mr Irving's long illness +left his wife and daughter without means of support, at his death, +and when I was called to take charge of St Blank's, I at once +realised the benefit to the family as well as to my church could I +secure the young lady the position here as organist. I am glad that +my congregation seem so well satisfied with my choice." + +Again the organ pealed forth, this time in that passionate music +originally written for the Garden Scene in Faust, and which the +church has boldly taken and arranged as a quartette to the words, +"Come unto me." + +It may be that to some who listen, it is the divine spirit which +makes its appeal through those stirring strains; but to the rector of +St Blank's, at least on that morning, it was human heart, calling +unto human heart. Mr Stuart and the deacons sat silently drinking in +the music. At length the rector rose. "I think perhaps we had +better drop the matter under discussion for to-day," he said. "We +can meet here Monday evening at five o'clock if agreeable to you all, +and finish the details. There are other and more important affairs +waiting for me now." + +The deacons departed, and the young rector sank back in his chair, +and gave himself up to the enjoyment of the sounds which flooded not +only the room, but his brain, heart and soul. + +"Queer," he said to himself as the door closed behind the human +pillars of his church. "Queer, but I felt as if the presence of +those men was an intrusion upon something belonging personally to me. +I wonder why I am so peculiarly affected by this girl's music? It +arouses my brain to action, it awakens ambition and gives me courage +and hope, and yet--" He paused before allowing his feeling to shape +itself into thoughts. Then closing his eyes and clasping his hands +behind his head while the music surged about him, he lay back in his +easy-chair as a bather might lie back and float upon the water, and +his unfinished sentence took shape thus: "And yet stronger than all +other feelings which her music arouses in me, is the desire to +possess the musician for my very own for ever; ah, well! the Roman +Catholics are wise in not allowing their priests and their nuns to +listen to all even so-called sacred music." + +It was perhaps ten minutes later that Joy Irving became conscious +that she was not alone in the organ loft. She had neither heard nor +seen his entrance, but she felt the presence of her rector, and +turned to find him silently watching her. She played her phrase to +the end, before she greeted him with other than a smile. Then she +apologised, saying: "Even one's rector must wait for a musical +phrase to reach its period. Angels may interrupt the rendition of a +great work, but not man. That were sacrilege. You see, I was really +praying, when you entered, though my heart spoke through my fingers +instead of my lips." + +"You need not apologise," the young man answered. "One who receives +your smile would be ungrateful indeed if he asked for more. That +alone would render the darkest spot radiant with light and welcome to +me." + +The girl's pink cheek flushed crimson, like a rose bathed in the +sunset colours of the sky. + +"I did not think you were a man to coin pretty speeches," she said. + +"Your estimate of me was a wise one. You read human nature +correctly. But come and walk in the park with me. You will overtax +yourself if you practise any longer. The sunlight and the air are +vying with each other to-day to see which can be the most +intoxicating. Come and enjoy their sparring match with me; I want to +talk to you about one of my unfortunate parishioners. It is a +peculiarly pathetic case. I think you can help and advise me in the +matter." + +It was a superb morning in early October. New York was like a +beautiful woman arrayed in her fresh autumn costume, disporting +herself before admiring eyes. + +Absorbed in each other's society, their pulses beating high with +youth, love and health; the young couple walked through the crowded +avenues of the great city, as happily and as naturally as Adam and +Eve might have walked in the Garden of Eden the morning after +Creation. + +Both were city born and city bred, yet both were as unfashionable and +untrammelled by custom as two children of the plains. + +In the very heart of the greatest metropolis in America, there are +people who live and retain all the primitive simplicity of village +life and thought. Mr Irving had been one of these. Coming to New +York from an interior village when a young man, he had, through +simple and quiet tastes and religious convictions, kept himself +wholly free from the social life of the city in which he lived. +After his marriage his entire happiness lay in his home, and Joy was +reared by parents who made her world. Mrs Irving sympathised fully +with her husband in his distaste for society, and her delicate health +rendered her almost a recluse from the world. + +A few pleasant acquaintances, no intimates, music, books, and a large +share of her time given to charitable work, composed the life of Joy +Irving. + +She had never been in a fashionable assemblage; she had never +attended a theatre, as Mr Irving did not approve of them. + +Extremely fond of outdoor life, she walked, unattended, wherever her +mood led her. As she had no acquaintances among society people, she +knew nothing and cared less for the rules which govern the +promenading habits of young women in New York. Her sweet face and +graceful figure were well known among the poorer quarters of the +city, and it was through her work in such places that Arthur Stuart's +attention had first been called to her. + +As for him, he was filled with that high, but not always wise, +disdain for society and its customs, which we so often find in town- +bred young men of intellectual pursuits. He was clean-minded, +independent, sure of his own purposes, and wholly indifferent to the +opinions of inferiors regarding his habits. + +He loved the park, and he asked Joy to walk with him there, as freely +as he would have asked her to sit with him in a conservatory. It was +a great delight to the young girl to go. + +"It seems such a pity that the women of New York get so little +benefit from this beautiful park," she said as they strolled along +through the winding paths together. "The wealthy people enjoy it in +a way from their carriages, and the poor people no doubt derive new +life from their Sunday promenades here. But there are thousands like +myself who are almost wholly debarred from its pleasures. I have +always wanted to walk here, but once I came and a rude man in a +carriage spoke to me. Mother told me never to come alone again. It +seems strange to me that men who are so proud of their strength, and +who should be the natural protectors of woman, can belittle +themselves by annoying or frightening her when alone. I am sure that +same man would never think of speaking to me now that I am with you. +How cowardly he seems when you think of it! Yet I am told there are +many like him, though that was my only experience of the kind." + +"Yes, there are many like him," the rector answered. "But you must +remember how short a time man has been evolving from a lower animal +condition to his present state, and how much higher he is to-day than +he was a hundred years ago even, when occasional drunkenness was +considered an attribute of a gentleman. Now it is a vice of which he +is ashamed." + +"Then you believe in evolution?" Joy asked with a note of surprise in +her voice. + +"Yes, I surely do; nor does the belief conflict with my religious +faith. I believe in many things I could not preach from my pulpit. +My congregation is not ready for broad truths. I am like an eclectic +physician--I suit my treatment to my patient--I administer the old +school or the new school medicaments as the case demands." + +"It seems to me there can be but one school in spiritual matters," +Joy said gravely--"the right one. And I think one should preach and +teach what he believes to be true and right, no matter what his +congregation demands. Oh, forgive me. I am very rude to speak like +that to you!" And she blushed and paled with fright at her boldness. + +They were seated on a rustic bench now, under the shadow of a great +tree. + +The rector smiled, his eyes fixed with pleased satisfaction on the +girl's beautiful face, with its changing colour and expression. He +felt he could well afford to be criticised or rebuked by her, if the +result was so gratifying to his sight. The young rector of St +Blank's lived very much more in his senses than in his ideals. + +"Perhaps you are right," he said. "I sometimes wish I had greater +courage of my convictions. I think I could have, were you to +stimulate me with such words often. But my mother is so afraid that +I will wander from the old dogmas, that I am constantly checking +myself. However, in regard to the case I mentioned to you--it is a +delicate subject, but you are not like ordinary young women, and you +and I have stood beside so many sick-beds and death-beds together +that we can speak as man to man, or woman to woman, with no false +modesty to bar our speech. + +"A very sad case has come to my knowledge of late. Miss Adams, a +woman who for some years has been a devout member of St Blank's +Church, has several times mentioned her niece to me, a young girl who +was away at boarding school. A few months ago the young girl +graduated and came to live with this aunt. I remember her as a +bright, buoyant and very intelligent girl. I have not seen her now +during two months; and last week I asked Miss Adams what had become +of her niece. Then the poor woman broke into sobs and told me the +sad state of affairs. It seems that the girl Marah is her daughter. +The poor mother had believed she could guard the truth from her +child, and had educated her as her niece, and was now prepared to +enjoy her companionship, when some mischief-making gossip dug up the +old scandal and imparted the facts to Marah. + +"The girl came to Miss Adams and demanded the truth, and the mother +confessed. Then the daughter settled into a profound melancholy, +from which nothing seemed to rouse her. She will not go out, remains +in the house, and broods constantly over her disgrace. + +"It occurred to me that if Marah Adams could be brought out of +herself and interested in some work, or study, it would be the +salvation of her reason. Her mother told me she is an accomplished +musician, but that she refuses to touch her piano now. I thought you +might take her as an understudy on the organ, and by your influence +and association lead her out of herself. You could make her +acquaintance through approaching the mother who is a milliner, on +business, and your tact would do the rest. In all my large and +wealthy congregation I know of no other woman to whom I could appeal +for aid in this delicate matter, so I am sure you will pardon me. In +fact, I fear were the matter to be known in the congregation at all, +it would lead to renewed pain and added hurts for both Miss Adams and +her daughter. You know women can be so cruel to each other in subtle +ways, and I have seen almost death-blows dealt in church aisles by +one church member to another." + +"Oh, that is a terrible reflection on Christians," cried Joy, who, a +born Christ-woman, believed that all professed church members must +feel the same divine spirit of sympathy and charity which burned in +her own sweet soul. + +"No, it is a simple truth--an unfortunate fact," the young man +replied. "I preach sermons at such members of my church, but they +seldom take them home. They think I mean somebody else. These are +the people who follow the letter and not the spirit of the church. +But one such member as you, recompenses me for a score of the others. +I felt I must come to you with the Marah Adams affair." + +Joy was still thinking of the reflection the rector had cast upon his +congregation. It hurt her, and she protested. + +"Oh, surely," she said, "you cannot mean that I am the only one of +the professed Christians in your church who would show mercy and +sympathy to poor Miss Adams. Surely few, very few, would forget +Christ's words to Mary Magdalene, 'Go and sin no more,' or fail to +forgive as He forgave. She has led such a good life all these +years." + +The rector smiled sadly. + +"You judge others by your own true heart," he said. "But I know the +world as it is. Yes, the members of my church would forgive Miss +Adams for her sin--and cut her dead. They would daily crucify her +and her innocent child by their cold scorn or utter ignoring of them. +They would not allow their daughters to associate with this blameless +girl, because of her mother's misstep. + +"It is the same in and out of the churches. Twenty people will +repeat Christ's words to a repentant sinner, but nineteen of that +twenty interpolate a few words of their own, through tone, gesture or +manner, until 'Go and sin no more' sounds to the poor unfortunate +more like 'Go just as far away from me and mine as you can get--and +sin no more!' Only one in that score puts Christ's merciful and +tender meaning into the phrase and tries by sympathetic association +to make it possible for the sinner to sin no more. I felt you were +that one, and so I appealed to you in this matter about Marah Adams." + +Joy's eyes were full of tears. "You must know more of human nature +than I do," she said, "but I hate terribly to think you are right in +this estimate of the people of your congregation. I will go and see +what I can do for this girl to-morrow. Poor child, poor mother, to +pass through a second Gethsemane for her sin. I think any girl or +boy whose home life is shadowed, is to be pitied. I have always had +such a happy home, and such dear parents, the world would seem +insupportable, I am sure, were I to face it without that background. +Dear papa's death was a great blow, and mother's ill health has been +a sorrow, but we have always been so happy and harmonious, and that, +I think, is worth more than a fortune to a child. Poor, poor Marah-- +unable to respect her mother, what a terrible thing it all is!" + +"Yes, it is a sad affair. I cannot help thinking it would have been +a pardonable lie if Miss Adams had denied the truth when the girl +confronted her with the story. It is the one situation in life where +a lie is excusable, I think. It would have saved this poor girl no +end of sorrow, and it could not have added much to the mother's +burden. I think lying must have originated with an erring woman." + +Joy looked at her rector with startled eyes. "A lie is never +excusable," she said, "and I do not believe it ever saves sorrow. +But I see you do not mean what you say, you only feel very sorry for +the girl; and you surely do not forget that the lie originated with +Satan, who told a falsehood to Eve." + + + +CHAPTER X + + + +Ever since early girlhood Joy Irving had formed a habit of jotting +down in black and white her own ideas regarding any book, painting, +concert, conversation or sermon, which interested her, and +epitomising the train of thought to which they led. + +The evening after her walk and talk with the rector of St Blank's, +she took out her note-book, which bore a date four years old under +its title "My Impressions," and read over the last page of entries. +They had evidently been written at the close of some Sabbath day and +ran as follows:- + + +Many a kneeling woman is more occupied with how her skirts hang than +how her prayers ascend. I am inclined to think we all ought to wear +a uniform to church if we would really worship there. God must grow +weary looking down on so many new bonnets. + +I wore a smart hat to church to-day, and I found myself criticising +every other woman's bonnet during service, so that I failed in some +of my responses. + +If we could all be compelled by some mysterious power to THINK ALOUD +on Sunday, what a veritable holy day we would make of it! Though we +are taught from childhood that God hears our thoughts, the best of us +would be afraid to have our nearest friends know them. + +I sometimes think it is a presumption on the part of any man to rise +in the pulpit and undertake to tell me about a Creator with whom I +feel every whit as well acquainted as he. I suppose such thoughts +are wicked, however, and should be suppressed. + +It is a curious fact, that the most aggressively sensitive persons +are at heart the most conceited. + +I wish people smiled more in church aisles. In fact, I think we all +laugh at one another too much and smile at one another too seldom. + +After the devil had made all the trouble for woman he could with the +fig leaf, he introduced the French heel. + +It is well to see the ridiculous side of things, but not of people. + +Most of us would rather be popular than right. + + +To these impressions Joy added the following:- + + +It is not the interior of one's house, but the interior of one's mind +which makes home. + +It seems to me that to be, is to love. I can conceive of no state of +existence which is not permeated with this feeling toward something, +somebody or the illimitable "nothing" which is mother to everything. + +I wish we had more religion in the world and fewer churches. + +People who believe in no God, invariably exalt themselves into His +position, and worship with the very idolatry they decry in others. + +Music is the echo of the rhythm of God's respirations. + +Poetry is the effort of the divine part of man to formulate a worthy +language in which to converse with angels. + +Painting and sculpture seem to me the most presumptuous of the arts. +They are an effort of man to outdo God in creation. He never made a +perfect form or face--the artist alone makes them. + +I am sure I do not play the organ as well at St Blank's as I played +it in the little church where I gave my services and was unknown. +People are praising me too much here, and this mars all spontaneity. + +The very first hour of positive success is often the last hour of +great achievement. So soon as we are conscious of the admiring and +expectant gaze of men, we cease to commune with God. It is when we +are unknown to or neglected by mortals, that we reach up to the +Infinite and are inspired. + +I have seen Marah Adams to-day, and I felt strangely drawn to her. +Her face would express all goodness if it were not so unhappy. +Unhappiness is a species of evil, since it is a discourtesy to God to +be unhappy. + +I am going to do all I can for the girl to bring her into a better +frame of mind. No blame can be attached to her, and yet now that I +am face to face with the situation, and realise how the world regards +such a person, I myself find it a little hard to think of braving +public opinion and identifying myself with her. But I am going to +overcome such feelings, as they are cowardly and unworthy of me, and +purely the result of education. I am amazed, too, to discover this +weakness in myself. + +How sympathetic dear mamma is! I told her about Marah, and she wept +bitterly, and has carried her eyes full of tears ever since. I must +be careful and tell her nothing sad while she is in such a weak state +physically. + +I told mamma what the rector said about lying. She coincided with +him that Mrs Adams would have been justified in denying the truth if +she had realised how her daughter was to be affected by this +knowledge. A woman's past belongs only to herself and her God, she +says, unless she wishes to make a confidant. But I cannot agree with +her or the rector. I would want the truth from my parents, however +much it hurt. Many sins which men regard as serious only obstruct +the bridge between our souls and truth. A lie burns the bridge. + +I hope I am not uncharitable, yet I cannot conceive of committing an +act through love of any man, which would lower me in his esteem, once +committed. Yet of course I have had little experience in life, with +men, or with temptation. But it seems to me I could not continue to +love a man who did not seek to lead me higher. The moment he stood +before me and asked me to descend, I should realise he was to be +pitied--not adored. + +I told mother this, and she said I was too young and inexperienced to +form decided opinions on such subjects, and she warned me that I must +not become uncharitable. She wept bitterly as she thought of my +becoming narrow or bigoted in my ideas, dear, tender-hearted mamma. + +Death should be called the Great Revealer instead of the Great +Destroyer. + +Some people think the way into heaven is through embroidered altar +cloths. + +The soul that has any conception of its own possibilities does not +fear solitude. + +A girl told me to-day that a rude man annoyed her by staring at her +in a public conveyance. It never occurred to her that it takes four +eyes to make a stare annoying. + +Astronomers know more about the character of the stars than the +average American mother knows about the temperament of her daughters. + +To some women the most terrible thought connected with death is the +dates in the obituary notice. + +As a rule, when a woman opens the door of an artistic career with one +hand, she shuts the door on domestic happiness with the other. + + + +CHAPTER XI + + + +The rector of St Blank's Church dined at the Cheney table or drove in +the Cheney establishment every week, beside which there were always +one or two confidential chats with the feminine Cheneys in the +parsonage on matters pertaining to the welfare of the church, and +occasionally to the welfare of humanity. + +That Alice Cheney had conceived a sudden and consuming passion for +the handsome and brilliant rector of St Blank's, both her mother and +the Baroness knew, and both were doing all in their power to further +the girl's hopes. + +While Alice resembled her mother in appearance and disposition, +propensities and impulses occasionally exhibited themselves which +spoke of paternal inheritance. She had her father's strongly +emotional nature, with her mother's stubbornness; and Preston +Cheney's romantic tendencies were repeated in his daughter, without +his reasoning powers. Added to her father's lack of self-control in +any strife with his passions, Alice possessed her mother's hysterical +nerves. In fact, the unfortunate child inherited the weaknesses and +faults of both parents, without any of their redeeming virtues. + +The passion which had sprung to life in her breast for the young +rector, was as strong and unreasoning as the infatuation which her +father had once experienced for Berene Dumont; but instead of +struggling against the feeling as her father had at least attempted +to do, she dwelt upon it with all the mulish persistency which her +mother exhibited in small matters, and luxuriated in romantic dreams +of the future. + +Mabel was wholly unable to comprehend the depth or violence of her +daughter's feelings, but she realised the fact that Alice had set her +mind on winning Arthur Stuart for a husband, and she quite approved +of the idea, and saw no reason why it should not succeed. She +herself had won Preston Cheney away from all rivals for his favour, +and Alice ought to be able to do the same with Arthur, after all the +money which had been expended upon her wardrobe. Senator Cheney's +daughter and Judge Lawrence's granddaughter, surely was a prize for +any man to win as a wife. + +The Baroness, however, reviewed the situation with more concern of +mind. She realised that Alice was destitute of beauty and charm, and +that Arthur Emerson Stuart (it would have been considered a case of +high treason to speak of the rector of St Blank's without using his +three names) was independent in the matter of fortune, and so dowered +with nature's best gifts that he could have almost any woman for the +asking whom he should desire. But the Baroness believed much in +propinquity; and she brought the rector and Alice together as often +as possible, and coached the girl in coquettish arts when alone with +her, and credited her with witticisms and bon-mots which she had +never uttered, when talking of her to the young rector. + +"If only I could give Alice the benefit of my past career," the +Baroness would say to herself at times. "I know so well how to +manage men; but what use is my knowledge to me now that I am old? +Alice is young, and even without beauty she could do so much, if she +only understood the art of masculine seduction. But then it is a +gift, not an acquired art, and Alice was not born with the gift." + +While Mabel and Alice had been centring their thoughts and attentions +on the rector, the Baroness had not forgotten the rector's mother. +She knew the very strong affection which existed between the two, and +she had discovered that the leading desire of the young man's heart +was to make his mother happy. With her wide knowledge of human +nature, she had not been long in discerning the fact that it was not +because of his own religious convictions that the rector had chosen +his calling, but to carry out the lifelong wishes of his beloved +mother. + +Therefore she reasoned wisely that Arthur would be greatly influenced +by his mother in his choice of a wife; and the Baroness brought all +her vast battery of fascination to bear on Mrs Stuart, and succeeded +in making that lady her devoted friend. + +The widow of Judge Lawrence was still an imposing and impressive +figure wherever she went. Though no longer a woman who appealed to +the desires of men, she exhaled that peculiar mental aroma which +hangs ever about a woman who has dealt deeply and widely in affairs +of the heart. It is to the spiritual senses what musk is to the +physical; and while it may often repulse, it sometimes attracts, and +never fails to be noticed. About the Baroness's mouth were hard +lines, and the expression of her eyes was not kind or tender; yet she +was everywhere conceded to be a universally handsome and attractive +woman. Quiet and tasteful in her dressing, she did not accentuate +the ravages of time by any mistaken frivolities of toilet, as so many +faded coquettes have done, but wisely suited her vestments to her +appearance, as the withering branch clothes itself in russet leaves, +when the fresh sap ceases to course through its veins. New York City +is a vast sepulchre of "past careers," and the adventurous life of +the Baroness was quietly buried there with that of many another +woman. In the mad whirl of life there is small danger that any of +these skeletons will rise to view, unless the woman permits herself +to strive for eminence either socially or in the world of art. + +While the Cheneys were known to be wealthy, and the Senator had +achieved political position, there was nothing in their situation to +challenge the jealousy of their associates. They moved in one of the +many circles of cultured and agreeable people, which, despite the +mandate of a M'Allister, formed a varied and delightful society in +the metropolis; they entertained in an unostentatious manner, and +there was nothing in their personality to incite envy or jealousy. +Therefore the career of the Baroness had not been unearthed. That +the widow of Judge Lawrence, the stepmother of Mrs Cheney, was known +as "The Baroness" caused some questions, to be sure, but the simple +answer that she had been the widow of a French baron in early life +served to allay curiosity, while it rendered the lady herself an +object of greater interest to the majority of people. + +Mrs Stuart, the rector's mother, was one of those who were most +impressed by this incident in the life of Mrs Lawrence. "Family +pride" was her greatest weakness, and she dearly loved a title. She +thought Mrs Lawrence a typical "Baroness," and though she knew the +title had only been obtained through marriage, it still rendered its +possessor peculiarly interesting in her eyes. + +In her prime, the Baroness had been equally successful in cajoling +women and men. Though her day for ruling men was now over, she still +possessed the power to fascinate women when she chose to exert +herself. She did exert herself with Mrs Stuart, and succeeded +admirably in her design. + +And one day Mrs Stuart confided her secret anxiety to the ear of the +Baroness; and that secret caused the cheek of the listener to grow +pale and the look of an animal at bay to come into her eyes. + +"There is just one thing that gives me a constant pain at my heart," +Mrs Stuart had said. "You have never been a mother, yet I think your +sympathetic nature causes you to understand much which you have not +experienced, and knowing as you do the great pride I feel in my son's +career, and the ambition I have for him to rise to the very highest +pinnacle of success and usefulness, I am sure you will comprehend my +anxiety when I see him exhibiting an undue interest in a girl who is +in every way his inferior, and wholly unsuited to fill the position +his wife should occupy." + +The Baroness listened with a cold, sinking sensation at her heart + +"I am sure your son would never make a choice which was not agreeable +to you," she ventured. + +"He might not marry anyone I objected to," Mrs Stuart replied, "but I +dread to think his heart may be already gone from his keeping. Young +men are so susceptible to a pretty face and figure, and I confess +that Joy Irving has both. She is a good girl, too, and a fine +musician; but she has no family, and her alliance with my son would +be a great drawback to his career. Her father was a grocer, I +believe, or something of that sort; quite a common man, who married a +third-class actress, Joy's mother. Mr Irving was in very comfortable +circumstances at one time, but a stroke of paralysis rendered him +helpless some four years ago. He died last year and left his widow +and child in straitened circumstances. Mrs Irving is an invalid now, +and Joy supports her with her music. Mr Irving and Joy were members +of Arthur Emerson's former church (Mrs Stuart always spoke of her son +in that manner), and that is how my son became interested in the +daughter--an interest I supposed to be purely that of a rector in his +parishioner, until of late, when I began to fear it took root in +deeper soil. But I am sure, dear Baroness, you can understand my +anxiety." + +And then the Baroness, with drawn lips and anguished eyes, took both +of Mrs Stuart's hands in hers, and cried out: + +"Your pain, dear madam, is second to mine. I have no child, to be +sure, but as few mothers love I love Alice Cheney, my dear husband's +granddaughter. My very life is bound up in her, and she--God help +us, she loves your son with her whole soul. If he marries another it +will kill her or drive her insane." + +The two women fell weeping into each other's arms. + + + +CHAPTER XII + + + +Preston Cheney conceived such a strong, earnest liking for the young +clergyman whom he met under his own roof during one of his visits +home, that he fell into the habit of attending church for the first +time in his life. + +Mabel and Alice were deeply gratified with this intimacy between the +two men, which brought the rector to the house far oftener than they +could have tastefully done without the co-operation of the husband +and father. Besides, it looked well to have the head of the +household represented in the church. To the Baroness, also, there +was added satisfaction in attending divine service, now that Preston +Cheney sat in the pew. All hope of winning the love she had so +longed to possess, died many years before; and she had been cruel and +unkind in numerous ways to the object of her hopeless passion, yet +like the smell of dead rose leaves long shut in a drawer, there clung +about this man the faint, suggestive fragrance of a perished dream. + +She knew that he did not love his wife, and that he was disappointed +in his daughter; and she did not at least have to suffer the pain of +seeing him lavish the affection she had missed, on others. + +Mr Cheney had been called away from home on business the day before +the new organist took her place in St Blank's Church. Nearly a month +had passed when he again occupied his pew. + +Before the organist had finished her introduction, he turned to +Alice, saying: + +"There has been a change here in the choir, since I went away, and +for the better. That is a very unusual musician. Do you know who it +is?" + +"Some lady, I believe; I do not remember her name," Alice answered +indifferently. Like her mother, Alice never enjoyed hearing anyone +praised. It mattered little who it was, or how entirely out of her +own line the achievements or accomplishments on which the praise was +bestowed, she still felt that petty resentment of small creatures who +believe that praise to others detracts from their own value. + +A fortune had been expended on Alice's musical education, yet she +could do no more than rattle through some mediocre composition, with +neither taste nor skill. + +The money which has been wasted in trying to teach music to unmusical +people would pay our national debt twice over, and leave a competency +for every orphan in the land. + +When the organist had finished her second selection, Mr Cheney +addressed the same question to his wife which he had addressed to +Alice. + +"Who is the new organist?" he queried. Mabel only shook her head and +placed her finger on her lip as a signal for silence during service. + +The third time it was the Baroness, sitting just beyond Mabel, to +whom Mr Cheney spoke. "That's a very remarkable musician, very +remarkable," he said. "Do you know anything about her?" + +"Yes, wait until we get home, and I will tell you all about her," the +Baroness replied. + +When the service was over, Mr Cheney did not pass out at once, as was +his custom. Instead he walked toward the pulpit, after requesting +his family to wait a moment. + +The rector saw him and came down into the aisle to speak to him. + +"I want to congratulate you on the new organist," Mr Cheney said, +"and I want to meet her. Alice tells me it is a lady. She must have +devoted a lifetime to hard study to become such a marvellous mistress +of that difficult instrument." + +Arthur Stuart smiled. "Wait a moment," he said, "and I will send for +her. I would like you to meet her, and like her to meet your wife +and family. She has few, if any, acquaintances in my congregation." + +Mr Cheney went down the aisle, and joined the three ladies who were +waiting for him in the pew. All were smiling, for all three believed +that he had been asking the rector to accompany them home to dinner. +His first word dispelled the illusion. + +"Wait here a moment," he said. "Mr Stuart is going to bring the +organist to meet us. I want to know the woman who can move me so +deeply by her music." + +Over the faces of his three listeners there fell a cloud. Mabel +looked annoyed, Alice sulky, and a flush of the old jealous fury +darkened the brow of the Baroness. But all were smiling deceitfully +when Joy Irving approached. + +Her radiant young beauty, and the expressions of admiration with +which Preston Cheney greeted her as a woman and an artist, filled +life with gall and wormwood for the three feminine listeners. + +"What! this beautiful young miss, scarcely out of short frocks, is +not the musician who gave us that wonderful harmony of sounds. My +child, how did you learn to play like that in the brief life you have +passed on earth? Surely you must have been taught by the angels +before you came." + +A deep blush of pleasure at the words which, though so extravagant, +Joy felt to be sincere, increased her beauty as she looked up into +Preston Cheney's admiring eyes. + +And as he held her hands in both of his and gazed down upon her it +seemed to the Baroness she could strike them dead at her feet and +rejoice in the act. + +Beside this radiant vision of loveliness and genius, Alice looked +plainer and more meagre than ever before. She was like a wayside +weed beside an American Beauty rose. + +"I hope you and Alice will become good friends," Mr Cheney said +warmly. "We should like to see you at the house any time you can +make it convenient to come, would we not Mabel?" + +Mrs Cheney gave a formal assent to her husband's words as they turned +away, leaving Joy with the rector. And a scene in one of life's +strangest dramas had been enacted, unknown to them all. + +"I would like you to be very friendly with that girl, Alice," Mr +Cheney repeated as they seated themselves in the carriage. "She has +a rare face, a rare face, and she is highly gifted. She reminds me +of someone I have known, yet I can't think who it is. What do you +know about her, Baroness?" + +The Baroness gave an expressive shrug. "Since you admire her so +much," she said, "I rather hesitate telling you. But the girl is of +common origin--a grocer's daughter, and her mother quite an inferior +person. I hardly think it a suitable companionship for Alice." + +"I am sure I don't care to know her," chimed in Alice. "I thought +her quite bold and forward in her manner." + +"Decidedly so! She seemed to hang on to your father's hand as if she +would never let go," added Mabel, in her most acid tone. "I must +say, I should have been horrified to see you act in such a familiar +manner toward any stranger." A quick colour shot into Preston +Cheney's cheek and a spark into his eye. + +"The girl was perfectly modest in her deportment to me," he said. +"She is a lady through and through, however humble her birth may be. +But I ought to have known better than to ask my wife and daughter to +like anyone whom I chanced to admire. I learned long ago how futile +such an idea was." + +"Oh, well, I don't see why you need get so angry over a perfect +stranger whom you never laid eyes on until to-day," pouted Alice. "I +am sure she's nothing to any of us that we need quarrel over her." + +"A man never gets so old that he is not likely to make a fool of +himself over a pretty face," supplemented Mabel, "and there is no +fool like an old fool." + +The uncomfortable drive home came to an end at this juncture, and +Preston Cheney retired to his own room, with the disagreeable words +of his wife and daughter ringing in his ears, and the beautiful face +of the young organist floating before his eyes. + +"I wish she were my daughter," he said to himself; "what a comfort +and delight a girl like that would be to me!" + +And while these thoughts filled the man's heart the Baroness paced +her room with all the jealous passions of her still ungoverned nature +roused into new life and violence at the remembrance of Joy Irving's +fresh young beauty and Preston Cheney's admiring looks and words. + +"I could throttle her," she cried, "I could throttle her. Oh, why is +she sent across my life at every turn? Why should the only two men +in the world who interest me to-day, be so infatuated over that girl? +But if I cannot remove so humble an obstacle as she from my pathway, +I shall feel that my day of power is indeed over, and that I do not +believe to be true." + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + + +Two weeks later the organ loft of St Blank's Church was occupied by a +stranger. For a few hours the Baroness felt a wild hope in her heart +that Miss Irving had been sent away. + +But inquiry elicited the information that the young musician had +merely employed a substitute because her mother was lying seriously +ill at home. + +It was then that the Baroness put into execution a desire she had to +make the personal acquaintance of Joy Irving. + +The desire had sprung into life with the knowledge of the rector's +interest in the girl. No one knew better than the Baroness how to +sow the seeds of doubt, distrust and discord between two people whom +she wished to alienate. Many a sweetheart, many a wife, had she +separated from lover and husband, scarcely leaving a sign by which +the trouble could be traced to her, so adroit and subtle were her +methods. + +She felt that she could insert an invisible wedge between these two +hearts, which would eventually separate them, if only she might make +the acquaintance of Miss Irving. And now chance had opened the way +for her. + +She made her resolve known to the rector. + +"I am deeply interested in the young organist whom I had the pleasure +of meeting some weeks ago," she said, and she noted with a sinking +heart the light which flashed into the man's face at the mere mention +of the girl. "I understand her mother is seriously ill, and I think +I will go around and call. Perhaps I can be of use. I understand +Mrs Irving is not a churchwoman, and she may be in real need, as the +family is in straitened circumstances. May I mention your name when +I call, in order that Miss Irving may not think I intrude?" + +"Why, certainly," the rector replied with warmth. "Indeed, I will +give you a card of introduction. That will open the way for you, and +at the same time I know you will use your delicate tact to avoid +wounding Miss Irving's pride in any way. She is very sensitive about +their straitened circumstances; you may have heard that they were +quite well-to-do until the stroke of paralysis rendered her father +helpless. All their means were exhausted in efforts to restore his +health, and in the employment of nurses and physicians. I think they +have found life a difficult problem since his death, as Mrs Irving +has been under medical care constantly, and the whole burden falls on +Miss Joy's young shoulders, and she is but twenty-one." + +"Just the age of Alice," mused the Baroness. "How differently +people's lives are ordered in this world! But then we must have the +hewers of wood and the drawers of water, and we must have the +delicate human flowers. Our Alice is one of the latter, a frail +blossom to look upon, but she is one of the kind which will bloom out +in great splendour under the sunshine of love and happiness. Very +few people realise what wonderful reserve force that delicate child +possesses. And such a tender heart! She was determined to come with +me when she heard of Miss Irving's trouble, but I thought it unwise +to take her until I had seen the place. She is so sensitive to her +surroundings, and it might be too painful for her. I am for ever +holding her back from overtaxing herself for others. No one dreams +of the amount of good that girl does in a secret, quiet way; and at +the same time she assumes an indifferent air and talks as if she were +quite heartless, just to hinder people from suspecting her charitable +work. She is such a strange, complicated character." + +Armed with her card of introduction, the Baroness set forth on her +"errand of mercy." She had not mentioned Miss Irving's name to Mabel +or Alice. The secret of the rector's interest in the girl was locked +in her own breast. She knew that Mabel was wholly incapable of +coping with such a situation, and she dreaded the effect of the news +on Alice, who was absorbed in her love dream. The girl had never +been denied a wish in her life, and no thought came to her that she +could be thwarted in this, her most cherished hope of all. + +The Baroness was determined to use every gun in her battery of +defence before she allowed Mabel or Alice to know that defence was +needed. + +The rector's card admitted her to the parlour of a small flat. The +portieres of an adjoining room were thrown open presently, and a +vision of radiant beauty entered the room. + +The Baroness could not explain it, but as the girl emerged from the +curtains, a strange, confused memory of something and somebody she +had known in the past came over her. But when the girl spoke, a more +inexplicable sensation took possession of the listener, for her voice +was the feminine of Preston Cheney's masculine tones, and then as she +looked at the girl again the haunting memories of the first glance +were explained, for she was very like Preston Cheney as the Baroness +remembered him when he came to the Palace to engage rooms more than a +score of years ago. "What a strange thing these resemblances are!" +she thought. "This girl is more like Senator Cheney, far more like +him, than Alice is. Ah, if Alice only had her face and form!" + +Miss Irving gave a slight start, and took a step back as her eyes +fell upon the Baroness. The rector's card had read, "Introducing Mrs +Sylvester Lawrence." She had known this lad by sight ever since her +first Sunday as organist at St Blank's, and for some unaccountable +reason she had conceived a most intense dislike for her. Joy was +drawn toward humanity in general, as naturally as the sunlight falls +on the earth's foliage. Her heart radiated love and sympathy toward +the whole world. But when she did feel a sentiment of distrust or +repulsion she had learned to respect it. + +Our guardian angels sometimes send these feelings as danger signals +to our souls. + +It therefore required a strong effort of her will to go forward and +extend a hand in greeting to the lady whom her rector and friend had +introduced. + +"I must beg pardon for this intrusion," the Baroness said with her +sweetest smile; "but our rector urged me to come and so I felt +emboldened to carry out the wish I have long entertained to make your +acquaintance. Your wonderful music inspires all who hear you to know +you personally; the service lacked half its charm on Sunday because +you were absent. When I learnt that your absence was occasioned by +your mother's illness, I asked the rector if he thought a call from +me would be an intrusion, and he assured me to the contrary. I used +to be considered an excellent nurse; I am very strong, and full of +vitality, and if you would permit me to sit by your mother some +Sunday when you are needed at church, I should be most happy to do +so. I should like to make the acquaintance of your mother, and +compliment her on the happiness of possessing such a gifted and +dutiful daughter." + +Like all who sat for any time under the spell of the second Mrs +Lawrence, Joy felt the charm of her voice, words and manner, and it +began to seem as if she had been very unreasonable in entertaining +unfounded prejudices. + +That the rector had introduced her was alone proof of her worthiness; +and the gracious offer of the distinguished-looking lady to watch by +the bedside of a stranger was certainly evidence of her good heart. +The frost disappeared from her smile, and she warmed toward the +Baroness. The call lengthened into a visit, and as the Baroness +finally rose to go, Joy said: + +"I will take you in and introduce you to mamma now. I think it will +do her good to meet you," and the Baroness followed the graceful girl +through a narrow hall, and into a room which had evidently been +intended for a dining-room, but which, owing to its size and its +windows opening to the south, had been utilised as a sick chamber. + +The invalid lay with her face turned away from the door. But by the +movement of the delicate hand on the counterpane, Joy knew that her +mother was awake. + +"Mamma, I have brought a lady, a friend of Dr Stuart's, to see you," +Joy said gently. The invalid turned her head upon the pillow, and +the Baroness looked upon the face of--Berene Dumont. + +"Berene!" + +"Madam!" + +The two spoke simultaneously, and the invalid had started upright in +bed. + +"Mamma, what is the matter? Oh, please lie down, or you will bring +on another haemorrhage," cried the startled girl; but her mother +lifted her hand. + +"Joy," she said in a firm, clear voice, "this lady is an old +acquaintance of mine. Please go out, dear, and shut the door. I +wish to see her alone." + +Joy passed out with drooping head and a sinking heart. As the door +closed behind her the Baroness spoke. + +"So that is Preston Cheney's daughter," she said. "I always had my +suspicions of the cause which led you to leave my house so suddenly. +Does the girl know who her father is? And does Senator Cheney know +of her existence, may I ask?" + +A crimson flush suffused the invalid's face. Then a flame of fire +shot into the dark eyes, and a small red spot only glowed on either +pale cheek. + +"I do not know by what right you ask these questions, Baroness +Brown," she answered slowly; and her listener cringed under the old +appellation which recalled the miserable days when she had kept a +lodging-house--days she had almost forgotten during the last decade +of life. + +"But I can assure you, madam," continued the speaker, "that my +daughter knows no father save the good man, my husband, who is dead. +I have never by word or line made my existence known to anyone I ever +knew since I left Beryngford. I do not know why you should come here +to insult me, madam; I have never harmed you or yours, and you have +no proof of the accusation you just made, save your own evil +suspicions." + +The Baroness gave an unpleasant laugh. + +"It is an easy matter for me to find proof of my suspicions if I +choose to take the trouble," she said. "There are detectives enough +to hunt up your trail, and I have money enough to pay them for their +trouble. But Joy is the living evidence of the assertion. She is +the image of Preston Cheney, as he was twenty-three years ago. I am +ready, however, to let the matter drop on one condition; and that +condition is, that you extract a promise from your daughter that she +will not encourage the attentions of Arthur Emerson Stuart, the +rector of St Blank's; that she will never under any circumstances be +his wife." + +The red spots faded to a sickly yellow in the invalid's cheeks. "Why +should you ask this of me?" she cried. "Why should you wish to +destroy the happiness of my child's life? She loves Arthur Stuart, +and I know that he loves her! It is the one thought which resigns me +to death; the thought that I may leave her the beloved wife of this +good man." + +The Baroness leaned lower over the pillow of the invalid as she +answered: "I will tell you why I ask this sacrifice of you." + +"Perhaps you do not know that I married Judge Lawrence after the +death of his first wife. Perhaps you do not know that Preston +Cheney's legitimate daughter is as precious to me as his illegitimate +child is to you. Alice is only six months younger than Joy; she is +frail, delicate, sensitive. A severe disappointment would kill her. +She, too, loves Arthur Stuart. If your daughter will let him alone, +he will marry Alice. Surely the illegitimate child should give way +to the legitimate. + +"If you are selfish in this matter, I shall be obliged to tell your +daughter the true story of her life, and let her be the judge of what +is right and what is wrong. I fancy she might have a finer +perception of duty than you have--she is so much like her father." + +The tortured invalid fell back panting on her pillow. She put out +her hands with a distracted, imploring gesture. + +"Leave me to think," she gasped. "I never knew that Preston Cheney +had a daughter; I did not know he lived here. My life has been so +quiet, so secluded these many years. Leave me to think. I will give +you my answer in a few days; I will write you after I reflect and +pray." + +The Baroness passed out, and Joy, hastening into the room, found her +mother in a wild paroxysm of tears. Late that night Mrs Irving +called for writing materials; and for many hours she sat propped up +in bed writing rapidly. + +When she had completed her task she called Joy to her side. + +"Darling," she said, placing a sealed manuscript in her hands, "I +want you to keep this seal unbroken so long as you are happy. I know +in spite of your deep sorrow at my death, which must come ere long, +you will find much happiness in life. You came smiling into +existence, and no common sorrow can deprive you of the joy which is +your birthright. But there are numerous people in the world who may +strive to wound you after I am gone. If slanderous tales or cruel +reports reach your ears, and render you unhappy, break this seal, and +read the story I have written here. There are some things which will +deeply pain you, I know. Do not force yourself to read them until a +necessity arises. I leave you this manuscript as I might leave you a +weapon for self-defence. Use it only when you are in need of that +defence." + +The next morning Mrs Irving was weakened by another and most serious +haemorrhage of the lungs. Her physician was grave, and urged the +daughter to be prepared for the worst. + +"I fear your mother's life is a matter of days only," he said. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + + +The Baroness went directly from the home which she had entered only +to blight, and sent her card marked "urgent" to Mrs Stuart. + +"I have come to tell you an unpleasant story," she said--"a painful +and revolting story, the early chapters of which were written years +ago, but the sequel has only just been made known to me. It concerns +you and yours vitally; it also concerns me and mine. I am sure, when +you have heard the story to the end, you will say that truth is +stranger than fiction, indeed: and you will more than ever realise +the necessity of preventing your son from marrying Joy Irving--a +child who was born before her mother ever met Mr Irving; and whose +mother, I daresay, was no more the actual wife of Mr Irving in the +name of law and decency than she had been the wife of his many +predecessors." + +Startled and horrified at this beginning of the story, Mrs Stuart was +in a state of excited indignation at the end. The Baroness had +magnified facts and distorted truths until she represented Berene +Dumont as a monster of depravity; a vicious being who had been for a +short time the recipient of the Baroness's mistaken charity, and who +had repaid kindness by base ingratitude, and immorality. The man +implicated in the scandal which she claimed was the cause of Berene's +flight was not named in this recital. + +Indeed the Baroness claimed that he was more sinned against than +sinning, and that it was a case of mesmeric influence, or evil eye, +on the part of the depraved woman. + +Mrs Lawrence took pains to avoid any reference to Beryngford also; +speaking of these occurrences having taken place while she spent a +summer in a distant interior town, where, "after the death of the +Baron, she had rented a villa, feeling that she wanted to retire from +the world." + +"My heart is always running away with my head," she remarked, "and I +thought this poor creature, who was shunned and neglected by all, +worth saving. I tried to befriend her, and hoped to waken the better +nature which every woman possesses, I think, but she was too far gone +in iniquity. + +"You cannot imagine, my dear Mrs Stuart, what a shock it was to me on +entering that sickroom to-day, my heart full of kindly sympathy, to +encounter in the invalid the ungrateful recipient of my past favours; +and to realise that her daughter was no other than the shameful +offspring of her immoral past. In spite of the girl's beauty, there +is an expression about her face which I never liked; and I fully +understand now why I did not like it. Of course, Mrs Stuart, this +story is told to you in strict confidence. I would not for the world +have dear Mrs Cheney know of it, nor would I pollute sweet Alice with +such a tale. Indeed, Alice would not understand it if she were told, +for she is as ignorant and innocent as a child in arms of such +matters. We have kept her absolutely unspotted from the world. But +I knew it was my duty to tell you the whole shameful story. If worst +comes to worst, you will be obliged to tell your son perhaps, and if +he doubts the story send him to me for its verification." + +Worst came to the worst before twenty-four hours had passed. The +rector received word that Mrs Irving was rapidly failing, and went to +act the part of spiritual counsellor to the invalid, and sympathetic +friend to the suffering girl. + +When he returned his mother watched his face with eager, anxious +eyes. He looked haggard and ill, as if he had passed through a +severe ordeal. He could talk of nothing but the beautiful and brave +girl, who was about to lose her one worshipped companion, and who ere +many hours passed would stand utterly alone in the world. + +"I never saw you so affected before by the troubles and sorrows of +your parishioners," Mrs Stuart said. "I wonder, Arthur, why you take +the sorrows of this family so keenly to heart." + +The young rector looked his mother full in the face with calm, sad +eyes. Then he said slowly: + +"I suppose, mother, it is because I love Joy Irving with all my +heart. You must have suspected this for some time. I know that you +have, and that the thought has pained you. You have had other and +more ambitious aims for me. Earnest Christian and good woman that +you are, you have a worldly and conventional vein in your nature, +which makes you reverence position, wealth and family to a marked +degree. You would, I know, like to see me unite myself with some +royal family, were that possible; failing in that, you would choose +the daughter of some great and aristocratic house to be my bride. +Ah, well, dear mother, you will, I know, concede that marriage +without love is unholy. I am not able to force myself to love some +great lady, even supposing I could win her if I did love her." + +"But you might keep yourself from forming a foolish and unworthy +attachment," Mrs Stuart interrupted. "With your will-power, your +brain, your reasoning faculties, I see no necessity for your allowing +a pretty face to run away with your heart. Nothing could be more +unsuitable, more shocking, more dreadful, than to have you make that +girl your wife, Arthur." + +Mrs Stuart's voice rose as she spoke, from a quiet reasoning tone to +a high, excited wail. She had not meant to say so much. She had +intended merely to appeal to her son's affection for her, without +making any unpleasant disclosures regarding Joy's mother; she thought +merely to win a promise from him that he would not compromise himself +at present with the girl, through an excess of sympathy. But already +she had said enough to arouse the young man into a defender of the +girl he loved. + +"I think your language quite too strong, mother," he said, with a +reproving tone in his voice. "Miss Irving is good, gifted, amiable, +beautiful, beside being young and full of health. I am sure there +could be nothing shocking or dreadful in any man's uniting his +destiny with such a being, in case he was fortunate enough to win +her. The fact that she is poor, and not of illustrious lineage, is +but a very worldly consideration. Mr Irving was a most intelligent +and excellent man, even if he was a grocer. The American idea of +aristocracy is grotesquely absurd at the best. A man may spend his +time and strength in buying and selling things wherewith to clothe +the body, and, if he succeeds, his children are admitted to the +intimacy of princes; but no success can open that door to the +children of a man who trades in food, wherewith to sustain the body. +We can none of us afford to put on airs here in America, with +butchers and Dutch peasant traders only three or four generations +back of our 'best families.' As for me, mother, remember my loved +father was a broker. That would damn him in the eyes of some people, +you know, cultured gentleman as he was." + +Mrs Stuart sat very still, breathing hard and trying to gain control +of herself for some moments after her son ceased speaking. He, too, +had said more than he intended, and he was sorry that he had hurt his +mother's feelings as he saw her evident agitation. But as he rose to +go forward and beg her pardon, she spoke. + +"The person of whom we were speaking has nothing whatever to do with +Mr Irving," she said. "Joy Irving was born before her mother was +married. Mrs Irving has a most infamous past, and I would rather see +you dead than the husband of her child. You certainly would not want +your children to inherit the propensities of such a grandmother? And +remember the curse descends to the third and fourth generations. If +you doubt my words, go to the Baroness. She knows the whole story, +but has revealed it to no one but me." + +Mrs Stuart left the room, closing the door behind her as she went. +She did not want to be obliged to go over the details of the story +which she had heard; she had made her statement, one which she knew +must startle and horrify her son, with his high ideals of womanly +purity, and she left him to review the situation in silence. It was +several hours before the rector left his room. + +When he did, he went, not to the Baroness, but directly to Mrs +Irving. They were alone for more than an hour. When he emerged from +the room, his face was as white as death, and he did not look at Joy +as she accompanied him to the door. + +Two days later Mrs Irving died. + + + +CHAPTER XV + + + +The congregation of St Blank's Church was rendered sad and solicitous +by learning that its rector was on the eve of nervous prostration, +and that his physician had ordered a change of air. He went away in +company with his mother for a vacation of three months. The day +after his departure Joy Irving received a letter from him which read +as follows:- + + +"My Dear Miss Irving,--You may not in your deep grief have given me a +thought. If such a thought has been granted one so unworthy, it must +have taken the form of surprise that your rector and friend has made +no call of condolence since death entered your household. I want to +write one little word to you, asking you to be lenient in your +judgment of me. I am ill in body and mind. I feel that I am on the +eve of some distressing malady. I am not able to reason clearly, or +to judge what is right and what is wrong. I am as one tossed between +the laws of God and the laws made by men, and bruised in heart and in +soul. I dare not see you or speak to you while I am in this state of +mind. I fear for what I may say or do. I have not slept since I +last saw you. I must go away and gain strength and equilibrium. +When I return I shall hope to be master of myself. Until then, +adieu. "ARTHUR EMERSON STUART." + + +These wild and incoherent phrases stirred the young girl's heart with +intense pain and anxiety. She had known for almost a year that she +loved the young rector; she had believed that he cared for her, and +without allowing herself to form any definite thoughts of the future, +she had lived in a blissful consciousness of loving and being loved, +which is to the fulfilment of a love dream, like inhaling the perfume +of a rose, compared to the gathered flower and its attending thorns. + +The young clergyman's absence at the time of her greatest need had +caused her both wonder and pain. His letter but increased both +sentiments without explaining the cause. + +It increased, too, her love for him, for whenever over-anxiety is +aroused for one dear to us, our love is augmented. + +She felt that the young man was in some great trouble, unknown to +her, and she longed to be able to comfort him. Into the maiden's +tender and ardent affection stole the wifely wish to console and the +motherly impulse to protect her dear one from pain, which are strong +elements in every real woman's love. + +Mrs Irving had died without writing one word to the Baroness; and +that personage was in a state of constant excitement until she heard +of the rector's plans for rest and travel. Mrs Stuart informed her +of the conversation which had taken place between herself and her +son; and of his evident distress of mind, which had reacted on his +body and made it necessary for him to give up mental work for a +season. + +"I feel that I owe you a debt of gratitude, dear Baroness," Mrs +Stuart had said. "Sad as this condition of things is, imagine how +much worse it would be, had my son, through an excess of sympathy for +that girl at this time, compromised himself with her before we +learned the terrible truth regarding her birth. I feel sure my son +will regain his health after a few months' absence, and that he will +not jeopardise my happiness and his future by any further thoughts of +this unfortunate girl, who in the meantime may not be here when we +return." + +The Baroness made a mental resolve that the girl should not be there. + +While the rector's illness and proposed absence was sufficient +evidence that he had resolved upon sacrificing his love for Joy on +the altar of duty to his mother and his calling, yet the Baroness +felt that danger lurked in the air while Miss Irving occupied her +present position. No sooner had Mrs Stuart and her son left the +city, than the Baroness sent an anonymous letter to the young +organist. It read: + + +"I do not know whether your mother imparted the secret of her past +life to you before she died, but as that secret is known to several +people, it seems cruelly unjust that you are kept in ignorance of it. +You are not Mr Irving's child. You were born before your mother +married. While it is not your fault, only your misfortune, it would +be wise for you to go where the facts are not so well known as in the +congregation of St Blank's. There are people in that congregation +who consider you guilty of a wilful deception in wearing the name you +do, and of an affront to good taste in accepting the position you +occupy. Many people talk of leaving the church on your account. +Your gifts as a musician would win you a position elsewhere, and as I +learn that your mother's life was insured for a considerable sum, I +am sure you are able to seek new fields where you can bide your +disgrace. + +"A WELL-WISHER." + + +Quivering with pain and terror, the young girl cast the letter into +the fire, thinking that it was the work of one of those half-crazed +beings whose mania takes the form of anonymous letters to unoffending +people. Only recently such a person had been brought into the courts +for this offence. It occurred to her also that it might be the work +of someone who wished to obtain her position as organist of St +Blank's. Musicians, she knew, were said to be the most jealous of +all people, and while she had never suffered from them before, it +might be that her time had now come to experience the misfortunes of +her profession. + +Tender-hearted and kindly in feeling to all humanity, she felt a +sickening sense of sorrow and fear at the thought that there existed +such a secret enemy for her anywhere in the world. + +She went out upon the street, and for the first time in her life she +experienced a sense of suspicion and distrust toward the people she +met; for the first time in her life, she realised that the world was +not all kind and ready to give her back the honest friendship and the +sweet good-will which filled her heart for all her kind. Strive as +she would, she could not cast off the depression caused by this vile +letter. It was her first experience of this cowardly and despicable +phase of human malice, and she felt wounded in soul as by a poisoned +arrow shot in the dark. And then, suddenly, there came to her the +memory of her mother's words--"If unhappiness ever comes to you, read +this letter." + +Surely this was the time she needed to read that letter. That it +contained some secret of her mother's life she felt sure, and she was +equally sure that it contained nothing that would cause her to blush +for that beloved mother. + +"Whatever the manuscript may have to reveal to me," she said, "it is +time that I should know." She took the package from the hiding +place, and broke the seal. Slowly she read it to the end, as if +anxious to make no error in understanding every phase of the long +story it related. Beginning with the marriage of her mother to the +French professor, Berene gave a detailed account of her own sad and +troubled life, and the shadow which the father's appetite for drugs +cast over her whole youth. "They say," she wrote, "that there is no +personal devil in existence. I think this is true; he has taken the +form of drugs and spirituous liquors, and so his work of devastation +goes on." Then followed the story of the sacrilegious marriage to +save her father from suicide, of her early widowhood; and the proffer +of the Baroness to give her a home. Of her life of servitude there, +her yearning for an education, and her meeting with "Apollo," as she +designated Preston Cheney. "For truly he was like the glory of the +rising day to me, the first to give me hope, courage and unselfish +aid. I loved him, I worshipped him. He loved me, but he strove to +crush and kill this love because he had worked out an ambitious +career for himself. To extricate himself from many difficulties and +embarrassments, and to further his ambitious dreams, he betrothed +himself to the daughter of a rich and powerful man. He made no +profession of love, and she asked none. She was incapable of giving +or inspiring that holy passion. She only asked to be married. + +"I only asked to be loved. Knowing nothing of the terrible conflict +in his breast, knowing nothing of his new-made ties, I was wounded to +the soul by his speaking unkindly to me--words he forced himself to +speak to hide his real feelings. And then it was that a strange fate +caused him to find me fainting, suffering, and praying for death. +The love in both hearts could no longer be restrained. Augmented by +its long control, sharpened by the agony we had both suffered, +overwhelmed by the surprise of the meeting, we lost reason and +prudence. Everything was forgotten save our love. When it was too +late I foresaw the anguish and sorrow I must bring into this man's +life. I fear it was this thought rather than repentance for sin +which troubled me. Well may you ask why I did not think of all this +before instead of after the error was committed. Why did not Eve +realise the consequences of the fall until she had eaten of the +apple? Only afterward did I learn of the unholy ties which my lover +had formed that very day--ties which he swore to me should be broken +ere another day passed, to render him free to make me his wife in the +eyes of men, as I already was in the sight of God. + +"Yet a strange and sudden resolve came to me as I listened to him. +Far beyond the thought of my own ruin, rose the consciousness of the +ruin I should bring upon his life by allowing him to carry out his +design. To be his wife, his helpmate, chosen from the whole world as +one he deemed most worthy and most able to cheer and aid him in +life's battle--that seemed heaven to me; but to know that by one +rash, impetuous act of folly, I had placed him in a position where he +felt that honour compelled him to marry me--why, this thought was +more bitter than death. I knew that he loved me; yet I knew, too, +that by a union with me under the circumstances he would antagonise +those who were now his best and most influential friends, and that +his entire career would be ruined. I resolved to go away; to +disappear from his life and leave no trace. If his love was as +sincere as mine, he would find me; and time would show him some wiser +way for breaking his new-made fetters than the rash and sudden method +he now contemplated. He had forgotten to protect me with his love, +but I could not forget to protect him. In every true woman's love +there is the maternal element which renders sacrifice natural. + +"Fate hastened and furthered my plans for departure. Made aware that +the Baroness was suspicious of my fault, and learning that my lover +was suddenly called to the bedside of his fiancee, I made my escape +from the town and left no trace behind. I went to that vast haystack +of lost needles--New York, and effaced Berene Dumont in Mrs Lamont. +The money left from my father's belongings I resolved to use in +cultivating my voice. I advertised for embroidery and fine sewing +also, and as I was an expert with the needle, I was able to support +myself and lay aside a little sum each week. I trimmed hats at a +small price, and added to my income in various manners, owing to my +French taste and my deft fingers. + +"I was desolate, sad, lonely, but not despairing. What woman can +despair when she knows herself loved? To me that consciousness was a +far greater source of happiness than would have been the knowledge +that I was an empress, or the wife of a millionaire, envied by the +whole world. I believed my lover would find me in time, that we +should be reunited. I believed this until I saw the announcement of +his marriage in the press, and read that he and his bride had sailed +for an extended foreign tour; but with this stunning news, there came +to me the strange, sweet, startling consciousness that you, my +darling child, were coming to console me. + +"I know that under the circumstances I ought to have been borne down +to the earth with a guilty shame; I ought to have considered you as a +punishment for my sin--and walked in the valley of humiliation and +despair. + +"But I did not. I lived in a state of mental exaltation; every +thought was a prayer, every emotion was linked with religious +fervour. I was no longer alone or friendless, for I had you. I sang +as I had never sung, and one theatrical manager, who happened to call +upon my teacher during my lesson hour, offered me a position at a +good salary at once if I would accept. + +"I could not accept, of course, knowing what the coming months were +to bring to me, but I took his card and promised to write him when I +was ready to take a position. You came into life in the depressing +atmosphere of a city hospital, my dear child, yet even there I was +not depressed, and your face wore a smile of joy the first time I +gazed upon it. So I named you Joy--and well have you worn the name. +My first sorrow was in being obliged to leave you; for I had to leave +you with those human angels, the sweet sisters of charity, while I +went forth to make a home for you. My voice, as is sometimes the +case, was richer, stronger and of greater compass after I had passed +through maternity. I accepted a position with a travelling +theatrical company, where I was to sing a solo in one act. My +success was not phenomenal, but it WAS success nevertheless. I +followed this life for three years, seeing you only at intervals. +Then the consciousness came to me that without long and profound +study I could never achieve more than a third-rate success in my +profession. + +"I had dreamed of becoming a great singer; but I learned that a voice +alone does not make a great singer. I needed years of study, and +this would necessitate the expenditure of large sums of money. I had +grown heart-sick and disgusted with the annoyances and vulgarity I +was subjected to in my position. When you were four years old a good +man offered me a good home as his wife. It was the first honest love +I had encountered, while scores of men had made a pretence of loving +me during these years. + +"I was hungering for a home where I could claim you and have the joy +of your daily companionship instead of brief glimpses of you at the +intervals of months. My voice, never properly trained, was beginning +to break. I resolved to put Mr Irving to a test; I would tell him +the true story of your birth, and if he still wished me to be his +wife, I would marry him. + +"I carried out my resolve, and we were married the day after he had +heard my story. I lived a peaceful and even happy life with Mr +Irving. He was devoted to you, and never by look, word or act, +seemed to remember my past. I, too, at times almost forgot it, so +strange a thing is the human heart under the influence of time. +Imagine, then, the shock of remembrance and the tidal wave of +memories which swept over me when in the lady you brought to call +upon me I recognised--the Baroness. + +"It is because she threatened to tell you that you were not born in +wedlock that I leave this manuscript for you. It is but a few weeks +since you told me the story of Marah Adams, and assured me that you +thought her mother did right in confessing the truth to her daughter. +Little did you dream with what painful interest I listened to your +views on that subject. Little did I dream that I should so soon be +called upon to act upon them. + +"But the time is now come, and I want no strange hand to deal you a +blow in the dark; if any part of the story comes to you, I want you +to know the whole truth. You will wonder why I have not told you the +name of your father. It is strange, but from the hour I knew of his +marriage, and of your dawning life, I have felt a jealous fear lest +he should ever take you from me; even after I am gone, I would not +have him know of your existence and be unable to claim you openly. +Any acquaintance between you could only result in sorrow. + +"I have never blamed him for my past weakness, however I have blamed +him for his unholy marriage. Our fault was mutual. I was no +ignorant child; while young in years, I had sufficient knowledge of +human nature to protect myself had I used my will-power and my +reason. Like many another woman, I used neither; unlike the +majority, I did not repent my sin or its consequences. I have ever +believed you to be a more divinely born being than any children who +may have resulted from my lover's unholy marriage. I die strong in +the belief. God bless you, my dear child, and farewell." + +Joy sat silent and pale like one in a trance for a long time after +she had finished reading. Then she said aloud, "So I am another like +Marah Adams; it was this knowledge which caused the rector to write +me that strange letter. It was this knowledge which sent him away +without coming to say one word of adieu. The woman who sent me the +message, sent it to him also. Well, I can be as brave as my mother +was. I, too, can disappear." + +She arose and began silently and rapidly to make preparations for a +journey. She felt a nervous haste to get away from something--from +all things. Everything stable in the world seemed to have slipped +from her hold in the last few days. Home, mother, love, and now hope +and pride were gone too. She worked for more than two hours without +giving vent to even a sigh. Then suddenly she buried her face in her +hands and sobbed aloud: "Oh, mother, mother, you were not ashamed, +but I am ashamed for you! Why was I ever born? God forgive me for +the sinful thought, but I wish you had lied to me in place of telling +me the truth." + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + + +Just as Mrs Irving had written her story for her daughter to read, +she told it, in the main, to the rector a few days before her death. + +Only once before had the tale passed her lips; then her listener was +Horace Irving; and his only comment was to take her in his arms and +place the kiss of betrothal on her lips. Never again was the painful +subject referred to between them. So imbued had Berene Dumont become +with her belief in the legitimacy of her child, and in her own +purity, that she felt but little surprise at the calm manner in which +Mr Irving received her story, and now when the rector of St Blank's +Church was her listener, she expected the same broad judgment to be +given her. But it was the calmness of a great and all-forgiving love +which actuated Mr Irving, and overcame all other feelings. + +Wholly unconventional in nature, caring nothing and knowing little of +the extreme ideas of orthodox society on these subjects, the girl +Berene and the woman Mrs Irving had lived a life so wholly secluded +from the world at large, so absolutely devoid of intimate +friendships, so absorbed in her own ideals, that she was incapable of +understanding the conventional opinion regarding a woman with a +history like hers. + +In all those years she had never once felt a sensation of shame. Mr +Irving had requested her to rear Joy in the belief that she was his +child. As the matter could in no way concern anyone else, Mrs +Irving's lips had remained sealed on the subject; but not with any +idea of concealing a disgrace. She could not associate disgrace with +her love for Preston Cheney. She believed herself to be his +spiritual widow, as it were. His mortal clay and legal name only +belonged to his wife. + +Mr Irving had met Berene on a railroad train, and had conceived one +of those sudden and intense passions with which a woman with a past +often inspires an innocent and unworldly young man. He was sincerely +and truly religious by nature, and as spotless as a maiden in mind +and body. + +When he had dreamed of a wife, it was always of some shy, innocent +girl whom he should woo almost from her mother's arms; some gentle, +pious maid, carefully reared, who would help him to establish the +Christian household of his imagination. He had thought that love +would first come to him as admiring respect, then tender friendship, +then love for some such maiden; instead it had swooped down upon him +in the form of an intense passion for an absolute stranger--a woman +travelling with a theatrical company. He was like a sleeper who +awakens suddenly and finds a scorching midday sun beating upon his +eyes. A wrecked freight train upon the track detained for several +hours the car in which they travelled. The passengers waived +ceremony and conversed to pass the time, and Mr Irving learnt +Berene's name, occupation and destination. He followed her for a +week, and at the end of that time asked her hand in marriage. + +Even after he had heard the story of her life, he was not deterred +from his resolve to make her his wife. All the Christian charity of +his nature, all its chivalry was aroused, and he believed he was +plucking a brand from the burning. He never repented his act. He +lived wholly for his wife and child, and for the good he could do +with them as his faithful allies. He drew more and more away from +all the allurements of the world, and strove to rear Joy in what he +believed to be a purely Christian life, and to make his wife forget, +if possible, that she had ever known a sorrow. All of sincere +gratitude, tenderness, and gentle affection possible for her to feel, +Berene bestowed upon her husband during his life, and gave to his +memory after he was gone. + +Joy had been excessively fond of Mr Irving, and it was the dread of +causing her a deep sorrow in the knowledge that she was not his +child, and the fear that Preston Cheney would in any way interfere +with her possession of Joy, which had distressed the mother during +the visit of the Baroness, rather than unwillingness to have her sin +revealed to her daughter. Added to this, the intrusion of the +Baroness into this long hidden and sacred experience seemed a +sacrilege from which she shrank with horror. But she now told the +tale to Arthur Stuart frankly and fearlessly. + +He had asked her to confide to him whatever secret existed regarding +Joy's birth. + +"There is a rumour afloat," he said, "that Joy is not Mr Irving's +child. I love your daughter, Mrs Irving, and I feel it is my right +to know all the circumstances of her life. I believe the story which +was told my mother to be the invention of some enemy who is jealous +of Joy's beauty and talents, and I would like to be in a position to +silence these slanders." + +So Mrs Irving told the story to the end; and having told it, she felt +relieved and happy in the thought that it was imparted to the only +two people whom it could concern in the future. + +No disturbing fear came to her that the rector would hesitate to make +Joy his wife. To Berene Dumont, love was the law. If love existed +between two souls she could not understand why any convention of +society should stand in the way of its fulfilment. + +Arthur Stuart in his role of spiritual confessor and consoler had +never before encountered such a phase of human nature. He had +listened to many a tale of sin and folly from women's lips, but +always had the sinner bemoaned her sin, and bitterly repented her +weakness. Here instead was what the world would consider a fallen +woman, who on her deathbed regarded her weakness as her strength, her +shame as her glory, and who seemed to expect him to take the same +view of the matter. When he attempted to urge her to repent, the +words stuck in his throat. He left the deathbed of the unfortunate +sinner without having expressed one of the conflicting emotions which +filled his heart. But he left it with such a weight on his soul, +such distress on his mind that death seemed to him the only way of +escape from a life of torment. + +His love for Joy Irving was not killed by the story he had heard. +But it had received a terrible shock, and the thought of making her +his wife with the probability that the Baroness would spread the +scandal broadcast, and that his marriage would break his mother's +heart, tortured him. Added to this were his theories on heredity, +and the fear that there might, nay, must be, some dangerous tendency +hidden in the daughter of a mother who had so erred, and who in dying +showed no comprehension of the enormity of her sin. Had Mrs Irving +bewailed her fall, and represented herself as the victim of a wily +villain, the rector would not have felt so great a fear of the +daughter's inheritance. A frail, repentant woman he could pity and +forgive, but it seemed to him that Mrs Irving was utterly lacking in +moral nature. She was spiritually blind. The thought tortured him. +To leave Joy at this time without calling to see her seemed base and +cowardly; yet he dared not trust himself in her presence. So he sent +her the strangely worded letter, and went away hoping to be shown the +path of duty before he returned. + +At the end of three months he came home stronger in body and mind. +He had resolved to compromise with fate; to continue his calls upon +Joy Irving; to be her friend and rector only, until by the passage of +time, and the changes which occur so rapidly in every society, the +scandal in regard to her birth had been forgotten. And until by +patience and tenderness, he won his mother's consent to the union. +He felt that all this must come about as he desired, if he did not +aggravate his mother's feeling or defy public opinion by too +precipitate methods. + +He could not wholly give up all thoughts of Joy Irving. She had +grown to be a part of his hopes and dreams of the future, as she was +a part of the reality of his present. But she was very young; he +could afford to wait, and while he waited to study the girl's +character, and if he saw any budding shoot which bespoke the maternal +tree, to prune and train it to his own liking. For the sake of his +unborn children he felt it his duty to carefully study any woman he +thought to make his wife. + +But when he reached home, the surprising intelligence awaited him +that Miss Irving had left the metropolis. A brief note to the church +authorities, resigning her position, and saying that she was about to +leave the city, was all that anyone knew of her. + +The rector instituted a quiet search, but only succeeded in learning +that she had conducted her preparations for departure with the +greatest secrecy, and that to no one had she imparted her plans. + +Whenever a young woman shrouds her actions in the garments of +secrecy, she invites suspicion. The people who love to suspect their +fellow-beings of wrong-doing were not absent on this occasion. + +The rector was hurt and wounded by all this, and while he resented +the intimation from another that Miss Irving's conduct had been +peculiar and mysterious, he felt it to be so in his own heart. + +"Is it her mother's tendency to adventure developing in her?" he +asked himself. + +Yet he wrote her a letter, directing it to her at the old number, +thinking she would at least leave her address with the post-office +for the forwarding of mail. The letter was returned to him from that +cemetery of many a dear hope, the dead-letter office. A personal in +a leading paper failed to elicit a reply. And then one day six +months after the disappearance of Joy Irving, the young rector was +called to the Cheney household to offer spiritual consolation to Miss +Alice, who believed herself to be dying. She had been in a decline +ever since the rector went away for his health. + +Since his return she had seen him but seldom, rarely save in the +pulpit, and for the last six weeks she had been too ill to attend +divine service. + +It was Preston Cheney himself, at home upon one of his periodical +visits, who sent for the rector, and gravely met him at the door when +he arrived, and escorted him into his study. + +"I am very anxious about my daughter," he said. "She has been a +nervous child always, and over-sensitive. I returned yesterday after +an absence of some three months in California, to find Alice in bed, +wasted to a shadow, and constantly weeping. I cannot win her +confidence--she has never confided to me. Perhaps it is my fault; +perhaps I have not been at home enough to make her realise that the +relationship of father and daughter is a sacred one. This morning +when I was urging her to tell me what grieved her, she remarked that +there was but one person to whom she could communicate this sorrow-- +her rector. So, my dear Dr Stuart, I have sent for you. I will +conduct you to my child, and I leave her in your hands. Whatever +comfort and consolation you can offer, I know will be given. I hope +she will not bind you to secrecy; I hope you may be able to tell me +what troubles her, and advise me how to help her." + +It was more than an hour before the rector returned to the library +where Preston Cheney awaited him. When the senator heard his +approaching step, he looked up, and was startled to see the pallor on +the young man's face. "You have something sad, something terrible to +tell me!" he cried. "What is it?" + +The rector walked across the room several times, breathing deeply, +and with anguish written on his countenance. Then he took Senator +Cheney's hand and wrung it. "I have an embarrassing announcement to +make to you," he said. "It is something so surprising, so +unexpected, that I am completely unnerved." + +"You alarm me, more and more," the senator answered. "What can be +the secret which my frail child has imparted to you that should so +distress you? Speak; it is my right to know." + +The rector took another turn about the room, and then came and stood +facing Senator Cheney. + +"Your daughter has conceived a strange passion for me," he said in a +low voice. "It is this which has caused her illness, and which she +says will cause her death, if I cannot return it." + +"And you?" asked his listener after a moment's silence. + +"I? Why, I have never thought of your daughter in any such manner," +the young man replied. "I have never dreamed of loving her, or +winning her love." + +"Then do not marry her," Preston Cheney said quietly. "Marriage +without love is unholy. Even to save life it is unpardonable." + +The rector was silent, and walked the room with nervous steps. "I +must go home and think it all out," he said after a time. "Perhaps +Miss Cheney will find her grief less, now that she has imparted it to +me. I am alarmed at her condition, and I shall hope for an early +report from you regarding her." + +The report was made twelve hours later. Miss Cheney was delirious, +and calling constantly for the rector. Her physician feared the +worst. + +The rector came, and his presence at once soothed the girl's +delirium. + +"History repeats itself," said Preston Cheney meditatively to +himself. "Alice is drawing this man into the net by her alarming +physical condition, as Mabel riveted the chains about me when her +mother died. + +"But Alice really loves the rector, I think, and she is capable of a +much stronger passion than her mother ever felt; and the rector loves +no other woman at least, and so this marriage, if it takes place, +will not be so wholly wicked and unholy as mine was." + +The marriage did take place three months later. Alice Cheney was not +the wife whom Mrs Stuart would have chosen for her son, yet she urged +him to this step, glad to place a barrier for all time between him +and Joy Irving, whose possible return at any day she constantly +feared, and whose power over her son's heart she knew was +undiminished. + +Alice Cheney's family was of the best on both sides; there were +wealth, station, and honour; and a step-grandmamma who could be +referred to on occasions as "The Baroness." And there was no +skeleton to be hidden or excused. + +And Arthur Stuart, believing that Alice Cheney's life and reason +depended upon his making her his wife, resolved to end the bitter +struggle with his own heart and with fate, and do what seemed to be +his duty, toward the girl and toward his mother. When the wedding +took place, the saddest face at the ceremony, save that of the groom, +was the face of the bride's father. But the bride was radiant, and +Mabel and the Baroness walked in clouds. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + + +Alice did not rally in health or spirits after her marriage, as her +family, friends and physician had anticipated. She remained nervous, +ailing and despondent. + +"Should maternity come to her, she would doubtless be very much +improved in health afterward," the doctor said, and Mabel, +remembering how true a similar prediction proved in her case, despite +her rebellion against it, was not sorry when she knew that Alice was +to become a mother, scarcely a year after her marriage. + +But Alice grew more and more despondent as the months passed by; and +after the birth of her son, the young mother developed dementia of +the most hopeless kind. The best specialists in two worlds were +employed to bring her out of the state of settled melancholy into +which she had fallen, but all to no avail. At the end of two years, +her case was pronounced hopeless. Fortunately the child died at the +age of six weeks, so the seed of insanity which in the first Mrs +Lawrence was simply a case of "nerves," growing into the plant +hysteria in Mabel, and yielding the deadly fruit of insanity in +Alice, was allowed by a kind providence to become extinct in the +fourth generation. + +This disaster to his only child caused a complete breaking down of +spirit and health in Preston Cheney. + +Like some great, strongly coupled car, which loses its grip and goes +plunging down an incline to destruction, Preston Cheney's will-power +lost its hold on life, and he went down to the valley of death with +frightful speed. + +During the months which preceded his death, Senator Cheney's only +pleasure seemed to be in the companionship of his son-in-law. The +strong attachment between the two men ripened with every day's +association. One day the rector was sitting by the invalid's couch, +reading aloud, when Preston Cheney laid his hand on the young man's +arm and said: "Close your book and let me tell you a true story +which is stranger than fiction. It is the story of an ambitious man +and all the disasters which his realised ambition brought into the +lives of others. It is a story whose details are known to but two +beings on earth, if indeed the other being still exists on earth. I +have long wanted to tell you this story--indeed, I wanted to tell it +to you before you made Alice your wife, yet the fear that I would be +wrecking the life and reason of my child kept me silent. No doubt if +I had told you, and you had been influenced by my experience against +a loveless marriage, I should to-day be blaming myself for her +condition, which I see plainly now is but the culmination of three +generations of hysterical women. But I want to tell you the story +and urge you to use it as a warning in your position of counsellor +and friend of ambitious young men. + +"No matter what else a man may do for position, don't let him marry a +woman he does not love, especially if he crucifies a vital passion +for another, in order to do this." Then Preston Cheney told the +story of his life to his son-in-law; and as the tale proceeded, a +strange interest which increased until it became violent excitement, +took possession of the rector's brain and heart. The story was so +familiar--so very familiar; and at length, when the name of BERENE +DUMONT escaped the speaker's lips, Arthur Stuart clutched his hands +and clenched his teeth to keep silent until the end of the story +came. + +"From the hour Berene disappeared, to this very day, no word or +message ever came from her," the invalid said. "I have never known +whether she was dead or alive, married, or, terrible thought, perhaps +driven into a reckless life by her one false step with me. This last +fear has been a constant torture to me all these years. + +"The world is cruel in its judgment of woman. And yet I know that it +is woman herself who has shaped the opinions of the world regarding +these matters. If men had had their way since the world began, there +would be no virtuous women. Woman has realised this fact, and she +has in consequence walled herself about with rules and conventions +which have in a measure protected her from man. When any woman +breaks through these conventions and errs, she suffers the scorn of +others who have kept these self-protecting and society-protecting +laws; and, conscious of their scorn, she believes all hope is lost +for ever. + +"The fear that Berene took this view of her one mistake, and plunged +into a desperate life, has embittered my whole existence. Never +before did a man suffer such a mental hell as I have endured for this +one act of sin and weakness. Yet the world, looking at my life of +success, would say if it knew the story, 'Behold how the man goes +free.' Free! Great God! there is no bondage so terrible as that of +the mind. I have loved Berene Dumont with a changeless passion for +twenty-three years, and there has not been a day in all that time +that I have not during some hours endured the agonies of the damned, +thinking of all the disasters and misery that might have come into +her life through me. Heaven knows I would have married her if she +had remained. Strange and intricate as the net was which the devil +wove about me when I had furnished the cords, I could and would have +broken through it after that strange night--at once the heaven and +the hell of my memory--if Berene had remained. As it was--I married +Mabel, and you know what a farce, ending in a tragedy, our married +life has been. God grant that no worse woes befell Berene; God grant +that I may meet her in the spirit world and tell her how I loved her +and longed for her companionship." + +The young rector's eyes were streaming with tears, as he reached over +and clasped the sick man's hands in his. "You will meet her," he +said with a choked voice. "I heard this same story, but without +names, from Berene Dumont's dying lips more than two years ago. And +just as Berene disappeared from you--so her daughter disappeared from +me; and, God help me, dear father--doubly now my father, I crushed +out my great passion for the glorious natural child of your love, to +marry the loveless, wretched and UNNATURAL child of your marriage." + +The sick man started up on his couch, his eyes flaming, his cheeks +glowing with sudden lustre. + +"My child--the natural child of Berene's love and mine, you say; oh, +my God, speak and tell me what you mean; speak before I die of joy so +terrible it is like anguish." + +So then it became the rector's turn to take the part of narrator. +When the story was ended, Preston Cheney lay weeping like a woman on +his couch; the first tears he had shed since his mother died and left +him an orphan of ten. + +"Berene living and dying almost within reach of my arms--almost +within sound of my voice!" he cried. "Oh, why did I not find her +before the grave closed between us?--and why did no voice speak from +that grave to tell me when I held my daughter's hand in mine?--my +beautiful child, no wonder my heart went out to her with such a gush +of tenderness; no wonder I was fired with unaccountable anger and +indignation when Mabel and Alice spoke unkindly of her. Do you +remember how her music stirred me? It was her mother's heart +speaking to mine through the genius of our child. + +"Arthur, you must find her--you must find her for me! If it takes my +whole fortune I must see my daughter, and clasp her in my arms before +I die." + +But this happiness was not to be granted to the dying man. Overcome +by the excitement of this new emotion, he grew weaker and weaker as +the next few days passed, and at the end of the fifth day his spirit +took its flight, let us hope to join its true mate. + +It had been one of his dying requests to have his body taken to +Beryngford and placed beside that of Judge Lawrence. + +The funeral services took place in the new and imposing church +edifice which had been constructed recently in Beryngford. The quiet +interior village had taken a leap forward during the last few years, +and was now a thriving city, owing to the discovery of valuable stone +quarries in its borders. + +The Baroness and Mabel had never been in Beryngford since the death +of Judge Lawrence many years before; and it was with sad and bitter +hearts that both women recalled the past and realised anew the +disasters which had wrecked their dearest hopes and ambitions. + +The Baroness, broken in spirit and crushed by the insanity of her +beloved Alice, now saw the form of the man whom she had hopelessly +loved for so many years, laid away to crumble back to dust; and yet, +the sorrows which should have softened her soul, and made her heart +tender toward all suffering humanity, rendered her pitiless as the +grave toward one lonely and desolate being before the shadows of +night had fallen upon the grave of Preston Cheney. + +When the funeral march pealed out from the grand new organ during the +ceremonies in the church, both the Baroness and the rector, absorbed +as they were in mournful sorrow, started with surprise. Both gazed +at the organ loft; and there, before the great instrument, sat the +graceful figure of Joy Irving. The rector's face grew pale as the +corpse in the casket; the withered cheek of the Baroness turned a +sickly yellow, and a spark of anger dried the moisture in her eyes. + +Before the night had settled over the thriving city of Beryngford, +the Baroness dropped a point of virus from the lancet of her tongue +to poison the social atmosphere where Joy Irving had by the merest +accident of fate made her new home, and where in the office of +organist she had, without dreaming of her dramatic situation, played +the requiem at the funeral of her own father. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + + +Joy Irving had come to Beryngford at the time when the discoveries of +the quarries caused that village to spring into sudden prominence as +a growing city. Newspaper accounts of the building of the new +church, and the purchase of a large pipe organ, chanced to fall under +her eye just as she was planning to leave the scene of her +unhappiness. + +"I can at least only fail if I try for the position of organist +there," she said, "and if I succeed in this interior town, I can hide +myself from all the world without incurring heavy expense." + +So all unconsciously Joy fled from the metropolis to the very place +from which her mother had vanished twenty-two years before. + +She had been the organist in the grand new Episcopalian Church now +for three years; and she had made many cordial acquaintances who +would have become near friends, if she had encouraged them. But +Joy's sweet and trustful nature had received a great shock in the +knowledge of the shadow which hung about her birth. Where formerly +she had expected love and appreciation from everyone she met, she now +shrank from forming new ties, lest new hurts should await her. + +She was like a flower in whose perfect heart a worm had coiled. Her +entire feeling about life had undergone a change. For many weeks +after her self-imposed exile, she had been unable to think of her +mother without a mingled sense of shame and resentment; the adoring +love she had borne this being seemed to die with her respect. After +a time the bitterness of this sentiment wore away, and a pitying +tenderness and sorrow took its place; but from her heart the twin +angels, Love and Forgiveness, were absent. She read her mother's +manuscript over, and tried to argue herself into the philosophy which +had sustained the author of her being through all these years. + +But her mind was shaped far more after the conventional pattern of +her paternal ancestors, who had been New England Puritans, and she +could not view the subject as Berene had viewed it. + +In spite of the ideality which her mother had woven about him, Joy +entertained the most bitter contempt for the unknown man who was her +father, and the whole tide of her affections turned lavishly upon the +memory of Mr Irving, whom she felt now more than ever so worthy of +her regard. + +Reason as she would on the supremacy of love over law, yet the bold, +unpleasant fact remained that she was the child of an unwedded +mother. She shrank in sensitive pain from having this story follow +her, and the very consciousness that her mother's experience had been +an exceptional one, caused her the greater dread of having it known +and talked of as a common vulgar liaison. + +There are two things regarding which the world at large never asks +any questions--namely, How a rich man made his money, and how an +erring woman came to fall. It is enough for the world to know that +he is rich--that fact alone opens all doors to him, as the fact that +the woman has erred closes them to her. + +There was a common vulgar creature in Beryngford, whose many amours +and bold defiance of law and order rendered her name a synonym for +indecency. This woman had begun her career in early girlhood as a +mercenary intriguer; and yet Joy Irving knew that the majority of +people would make small distinctions between the conduct of this +creature and that of her mother, were the facts of Berene's life and +her own birth to be made public. + +The fear that the story would follow her wherever she went became an +absolute dread with her, and caused her to live alone and without +companions, in the midst of people who would gladly have become her +warm friends, had she permitted. + +Her book of "Impressions" reflected the changes which had taken place +in the complexion of her mind during these years. Among its entries +were the following:- + + +People talk about following a divine law of love, when they wish to +excuse their brute impulses and break social and civil codes. + +No love is sanctioned by God, which shatters human hearts. + +Fathers are only distantly related to their children; love for the +male parent is a matter of education. + +The devil macadamises all his pavements. + +A natural child has no place in an unnatural world. + +When we cannot respect our parents, it is difficult to keep our ideal +of God. + +Love is a mushroom, and lust is its poisonous counterpart. + +It is a pity that people who despise civilisation should be so +uncivil as to stay in it. There is always darkest Africa. + +The extent of a man's gallantry depends on the goal. He follows the +good woman to the borders of Paradise and leaves her with a polite +bow; but he follows the bad woman to the depths of hell. + +It is easy to trust in God until he permits us to suffer. The +dentist seems a skilled benefactor to mankind when we look at his +sign from the street. When we sit in his chair he seems a brute, +armed with devil's implements. + +An anonymous letter is the bastard of a diseased mind. + +An envious woman is a spark from Purgatory. + +The consciousness that we have anything to hide from the world +stretches a veil between our souls and heaven. We cannot reach up to +meet the gaze of God, when we are afraid to meet the eyes of men. + +It may be all very well for two people to make their own laws, but +they have no right to force a third to live by them. + +Virtue is very secretive about her payments, but the whole world +hears of it when vice settles up. + +We have a sublime contempt for public opinion theoretically so long +as it favours us. When it turns against us we suffer intensely from +the loss of what we claimed to despise. + +When the fruit must apologise for the tree, we do not care to save +the seed. + +It is only when God and man have formed a syndicate and agreed upon +their laws, that marriage is a safe investment. + +The love that does not protect its object would better change its +name. + +When we say OF people what we would not say TO them, we are either +liars or cowards. + +The enmity of some people is the greatest compliment they can pay us. + + +It was in thoughts like these that Joy relieved her heart of some of +the bitterness and sorrow which weighed upon it. And day after day +she bore about with her the dread of having the story of her mother's +sin known in her new home. + +As our fears, like our wishes, when strong and unremitting, prove to +be magnets, the result of Joy's despondent fears came in the scandal +which the Baroness had planted and left to flourish and grow in +Beryngford after her departure. An hour before the services began, +on the day of Preston Cheney's burial, Joy learned at whose rites she +was to officiate as organist. A pang of mingled emotions shot +through her heart at the sound of his name. She had seen this man +but a few times, and spoken with him but once; yet he had left a +strong impression upon her memory. She had felt drawn to him by his +sympathetic face and atmosphere, the sorrow of his kind eyes, and the +keen appreciation he had shown in her art; and just in the measure +that she had been attracted by him, she had been repelled by the +three women to whom she was presented at the same time. She saw them +all again mentally, as she had seen them on that and many other days. +Mrs Cheney and Alice, with their fretful, plain, dissatisfied faces, +and their over-burdened costumes, and the Baroness, with her cruel +heart gazing through her worn mask of defaced beauty. + +She had been conscious of a feeling of overwhelming pity for the +kind, attractive man who made the fourth of that quartette. She knew +that he had obtained honours and riches from life, but she pitied him +for his home environment. She had felt so thankful for her own happy +home life at the time; and she remembered, too, the sweet hope that +lay like a closed-up bud in the bottom of her heart that day, as the +quartette moved away and left her standing alone with Arthur Stuart. + +It was only a few weeks later that the end came to all her dreams, +through that terrible anonymous letter. + +It was the Baroness who had sent it, she knew--the Baroness whose +early hatred for her mother had descended to the child. "And now I +must sit in the same house with her again," she said, "and perhaps +meet her face to face; and she may tell the story here of my mother's +shame, even as I have felt and feared it must yet be told. How +strange that a 'love child' should inspire so much hatred!" + +Joy had carefully refrained from reading New York papers ever since +she left the city; and she had no correspondents. It was her wish +and desire to utterly sink and forget the past life there. Therefore +she knew nothing of Arthur Stuart's marriage to the daughter of +Preston Cheney. She thought of the rector as dead to her. She +believed he had given her up because of the stain upon her birth, +and, bitter as the pain had been, she never blamed him. She had +fought with her love for him and believed that it was buried in the +grave of all other happy memories. + +But as the earth is wrenched open by volcanic eruptions and long +buried corpses are revealed again to the light of day, so the +unexpected sight of Arthur Stuart, as he took his place beside Mabel +and the Baroness during the funeral services, revealed all the pent- +up passion of her heart to her own frightened soul. + +To strong natures, the greater the inward excitement the more quiet +the exterior; and Jay passed through the services, and performed her +duties, without betraying to those about her the violent emotions +under which she laboured. + +The rector of Beryngford Church requested her to remain for a few +moments, and consult with him on a matter concerning the next week's +musical services. It was from him Joy learned the relation which +Arthur Stuart bore to the dead man, and that Beryngford was the +former home of the Baroness. + +Her mother's manuscript had carefully avoided all mention of names of +people or places. Yet Joy realised now that she must be living in +the very scene of her mother's early life; she longed to make +inquiries, but was prevented by the fear that she might hear her +mother's name mentioned disrespectfully. + +The days that followed were full of sharp agony for her. It was not +until long afterward that she was able to write her "impressions" of +that experience. In the extreme hour of joy or agony we formulate no +impressions; we only feel. We neither analyse nor describe our +friends or enemies when face to face with them, but after we leave +their presence. When the day came that she could write, some of her +reflections were thus epitomised: + + +Love which rises from the grave to comfort us, possesses more of the +demons' than the angels' power. It terrifies us with its +supernatural qualities and deprives us temporarily of our reason. + +Suppressed steam and suppressed emotion are dangerous things to deal +with. + +The infant who wants its mother's breast, and the woman who wants her +lover's arms, are poor subjects to reason with. Though you tell the +former that fever has poisoned the mother's milk, or the latter that +destruction lies in the lover's embrace, one heeds you no more than +the other. + +The accumulated knowledge of ages is sometimes revealed by a kiss. +Where wisdom is bliss, it is folly to be ignorant. + +Some of us have to crucify our hearts before we find our souls. + +A woman cannot fully know charity until she has met passion; but too +intimate an acquaintance with the latter destroys her appreciation of +all the virtues. + +To feel temptation and resist it, renders us liberal in our judgment +of all our kind. To yield to it, fills us with suspicion of all. + +There is an ecstatic note in pain which is never reached in +happiness. + +The death of a great passion is a terrible thing, unless the dawn of +a greater truth shines on the grave. + +Love ought to have no past tense. + +Love partakes of the feline nature. It has nine lives. + +It seems to be difficult for some of us to distinguish between +looseness of views, and charitable judgments. To be sorry for +people's sins and follies and to refuse harsh criticism is right; to +accept them as a matter of course is wrong. + +Love and sorrow are twins, and knowledge is their nurse. + +The pathway of the soul is not a steady ascent, but hilly and broken. +We must sometimes go lower, in order to get higher. + +That which is to-day, and will be to-morrow, must have been +yesterday. I know that I live, I believe that I shall live again, +and have lived before. + +Earth life is the middle rung of a long ladder which we climb in the +dark. Though we cannot see the steps below, or above, they exist all +the same. + +The materialist denying spirit is like the burr of the chestnut +denying the meat within. + +The inevitable is always right. + +Prayer is a skeleton key that opens unexpected doors. We may not +find the things we came to seek, but we find other treasures. + +The pessimist belongs to God's misfit counter. + +Art, when divorced from Religion, always becomes a wanton. + +To forget benefits we have received is a crime. To remember benefits +we have bestowed is a greater one. + +To some men a woman is a valuable book, carefully studied and +choicely guarded behind glass doors. To others, she is a daily +paper, idly scanned and tossed aside. + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + + +While Joy battled with her sorrow during the days following Preston +Cheney's burial, she woke to the consciousness that her history was +known in Beryngford. The indescribable change in the manner of her +acquaintances, the curiosity in the eyes of some, the insolence or +familiarity of others, all told her that her fears were realised; and +then there came a letter from the church authorities requesting her +to resign her position as organist. + +This letter came to the young girl on one of those dreary autumn +nights when all the desolation of the dying summer, and none of the +exhilaration of the approaching winter, is in the air. She had been +labouring all day under a cloud of depression which hovered over her +heart and brain and threatened to wholly envelop her; and the letter +from the church committee cut her heart like a poniard stroke. +Sometimes we are able to bear a series of great disasters with +courage and equanimity, while we utterly collapse under some slight +misfortune. Joy had been a heroine in her great sorrows, but now in +the undeserved loss of her position as church organist, she felt +herself unable longer to cope with Fate. + +"There's no place for me anywhere," she said to herself. Had she +known the truth, that the Baroness had represented her to the +committee as a fallen woman of the metropolis, who had left the city +for the city's good, the letter would not have seemed to her so +cruelly unjust and unjustifiable. + +Bitter as had been her suffering at the loss of Arthur Stuart from +her life, she had found it possible to understand his hesitation to +make her his wife. With his fine sense of family pride, and his +reverence for the estate of matrimony, his belief in heredity, it +seemed quite natural to her that he should be shocked at the +knowledge of the conditions under which she was born; and the thought +that her disappearance from his life was helping him to solve a +painful problem, had at times, before this unexpected sight of him, +rendered her almost happy in her lonely exile. She had grown +strangely fond of Beryngford--of the old streets and homes which she +knew must have been familiar to her mother's eyes, of the new church +whose glorious voiced organ gave her so many hours of comfort and +relief of soul, of the tiny apartment where she and her heart +communed together. She was catlike in her love of places, and now +she must tear herself away from all these surroundings and seek some +new spot wherein to hide herself and her sorrows. + +It was like tearing up a half-rooted flower, already drooping from +one transplanting. She said to herself that she could never survive +another change. She read the letter over which lay in her hand, and +tears began to slowly well from her eyes. Joy seldom wept; but now +it seemed to her she was some other person, who stood apart and wept +tears of sympathy for this poor girl, Joy Irving, whose life was so +hemmed about with troubles, none of which were of her own making; and +then, like a dam which suddenly gives way and allows a river to +overflow, a great storm of sobs shook her frame, and she wept as she +had never wept before; and with her tears there came rushing back to +her heart all the old love and sorrow for the dead mother which had +so long been hidden under her burden of shame; and all the old +passion and longing for the man whose insane wife she knew to be a +more hopeless obstacle between them than this mother's history had +proven. + +"Mother, Arthur, pity me, pity me!" she cried. "I am all alone, and +the strife is so terrible. I have never meant to harm any living +thing! Mother Arthur, GOD, how can you all desert me so?" + +At last, exhausted, she fell into a deep and dreamless sleep. + +She awoke the following morning with an aching head, and a heart +wherein all emotions seemed dead save a dull despair. She was +conscious of only one wish, one desire--a longing to sit again in the +organ loft, and pour forth her soul in one last farewell to that +instrument which had grown to seem her friend, confidant and lover. + +She battled with her impulse as unreasonable and unwise, till the day +was well advanced. But it grew stronger with each hour; and at last +she set forth under a leaden sky and through a dreary November rain +to the church. + +Her head throbbed with pain, and her hands were hot and feverish, as +she seated herself before the organ and began to play. But with the +first sounds responding to her touch, she ceased to think of bodily +discomfort. + +The music was the voice of her own soul, uttering to God all its +desolation, its anguish and its despair. Then suddenly, with no +seeming volition of her own, it changed to a passion of human love, +human desire; the sorrow of separation, the strife with the emotions, +the agony of renunciation were all there; and the November rain, +beating in wild gusts against the window-panes behind the musician, +lent a fitting accompaniment to the strains. + +She had been playing for perhaps an hour, when a sudden exhaustion +seized upon her, and her hands fell nerveless and inert upon her lap; +she dropped her chin upon her breast and closed her eyes. She was +drunken with her own music. + +When she opened them again a few moments later, they fell upon the +face of Arthur Stuart, who stood a few feet distant regarding her +with haggard eyes. Unexpected and strange as his presence was, Joy +felt neither surprise nor wonder. She had been thinking of him so +intensely, he had been so interwoven with the music she had been +playing, that his bodily presence appeared to her as a natural +result. He was the first to speak; and when he spoke she noticed +that his voice sounded hoarse and broken, and that his face was drawn +and pale. + +"I came to Beryngford this morning expressly to see you, Joy," he +said. "I have many things to say to you. I went to your residence +and was told by the maid that I would find you here. I followed, as +you see. We have had many meetings in church edifices, in organ +lofts. It seems natural to find you in such a place, but I fear it +will be unnatural and unfitting to say to you here, what I came to +say. Shall we return to your home?" + +His eyes shone strangely from dusky caverns, and there were deep +lines about his mouth. + +"He, too, has suffered," thought Joy; "I have not borne it all +alone." Then she said aloud: + +"We are quite undisturbed here; I know of nothing I could listen to +in my room which I could not hear you say in this place. Go on." + +He looked at her silently for a moment, his cheeks pale, his breast +heaving. Before he came to Beryngford, he had fought his battle +between religion and human passion, and passion had won. He had cast +under his feet every principle and tradition in which he had been +reared, and resolved to live alone henceforth for the love and +companionship of one human being, could he obtain her consent to go +with him. + +Yet for the moment, he hesitated to speak the words he had resolved +to utter, under the roof of a house of God, so strong were the +influences of his early training and his habits of thought. But as +his eyes feasted upon the face before him, his hesitation vanished, +and he leaned toward her and spoke. "Joy," he said, "three years ago +I went away and left you in sorrow, alone, because I was afraid to +brave public opinion, afraid to displease my mother and ask you to be +my wife. The story your mother told me of your birth, a story she +left in manuscript for you to read, made a social coward of me. I +was afraid to take a girl born out of wedlock to be my life +companion, the mother of my children. Well, I married a girl born in +wedlock; and where is my companion?" He paused and laughed +recklessly. Then he went on hurriedly: "She is in an asylum for the +insane. I am chained to a corpse for life. I had not enough moral +courage three-years ago to make you my wife. But I have moral +courage enough now to come here and ask you to go with me to +Australia, and begin a new life together. My mother died a year ago. +I donned the surplice at her bidding. I will abandon it at the +bidding of Love. I sinned against heaven in marrying a woman I did +not love. I am willing to sin against the laws of man by living with +the woman I do love; will you go with me, Joy?" There was silence +save for the beating of the rain against the stained window, and the +wailing of the wind. + +Joy was in a peculiarly overwrought condition of mind and body. Her +hours of extravagant weeping the previous night, followed by a day of +fasting, left her nervous system in a state to be easily excited by +the music she had been playing. She was virtually intoxicated with +sorrow and harmony. She was incapable of reasoning, and conscious +only of two things--that she must leave Beryngford, and that the man +whom she had loved with her whole heart for five years, was asking +her to go with him; to be no more homeless, unloved, and alone, but +his companion while life should last. + +"Answer me, Joy," he was pleading. "Answer me." + +She moved toward the stairway that led down to the street door; and +as she flitted by him, she said, looking him full in the eyes with a +slow, grave smile, "Yes, Arthur, I will go with you." + +He sprang toward her with a wild cry of joy, but she was already +flying down the stairs and out upon the street. + +When he joined her, they walked in silence through the rain to her +door, neither speaking a word, until he would have followed her +within. Then she laid her hand upon his shoulder and said gently but +firmly: "Not now, Arthur; we must not see each other again until we +go away. Write me where to meet you, and I will join you within +twenty-four hours. Do not urge me--you must obey me this once-- +afterward I will obey you. Good-night." + +As she closed the door upon him, he said, "Oh, Joy, I have so much to +tell you. I promised your father when he was dying that I would find +you; I swore to myself that when I found you I would never leave you, +save at your own command. I go now, only because you bid me go. +When we meet again, there must be no more parting; and you shall hear +a story stranger than the wildest fiction--the story of your father's +life. Despite your mother's secretiveness regarding this portion of +her history, the knowledge has come to me in the most unexpected +manner, from the lips of the man himself." + +Joy listened dreamily to the words he was saying. Her father--she +was to know who her father was? Well, it did not matter much to her +now--father, mother, what were they, what was anything save the fact +that he had come back to her and that he loved her? + +She smiled silently into his eyes. Glance became entangled with +glance, and would not be separated. + +He pushed open the almost closed door and she felt herself enveloped +with arms and lips. + +A second later she stood alone, leaning dizzily against the door; +heart, brain and blood in a mad riot of emotion. + +Then she fell into a chair and covered her burning face with her +hands as she whispered, "Mother, mother, forgive me--I understand--I +understand." + + + +CHAPTER XX + + + +The first shock of the awakened emotions brings recklessness to some +women, and to others fear. + +The more frivolous plunge forward like the drunken man who leaps from +the open window believing space is water. + +The more intense draw back, startled at the unknown world before +them. + +The woman who thinks love is all ideality is more liable to follow +into undreamed-of chasms than she who, through the complexity of her +own emotions, realises its grosser elements. + +It was long after midnight when Joy fell into a heavy sleep, the +night of Arthur Stuart's visit. She heard the drip of the dreary +November rain upon the roof, and all the light and warmth seemed +stricken from the universe save the fierce fire in her own heart. + +When she woke in the late morning, great splashes of sunlight were +leaping and quivering like living things across the foot of her bed; +she sprang up, dazed for a moment by the flood of light in the room, +and went to the window and looked out upon a sun-kissed world smiling +in the arms of a perfect Indian summer day. + +A happy little sparrow chirped upon the window sill, and some +children ran across the street bare-headed, exulting in the soft air. +All was innocence and sweetness. Mind and morals are greatly +influenced by weather. Many things seem right in the fog and gloom, +which we know to be wrong in the clear light of a sunny morning. The +events of the previous day came back to Joy's mind as she stood by +the window, and stirred her with a sense of strangeness and terror. +The thought of the step she had resolved to take brought a sudden +trembling to her limbs. It seemed to her the eyes of God were +piercing into her heart, and she was afraid. + +Joy had from her early girlhood been an earnest and sincere follower +of the Christian religion. The embodiment of love and sympathy +herself, it was natural for her to believe in the God of Love and to +worship Him in outward forms, as well as in her secret soul. It was +the deep and earnest fervour of religion in her heart, which rendered +her music so unusual and so inspiring. There never was, is not and +never can be greatness in any art where religious feeling is lacking. + +There must be the consciousness of the Infinite, in the mind which +produces infinite results. + +Though the artist be gifted beyond all other men, though he toil +unremittingly, so long as he says, "Behold what I, the gifted and +tireless toiler, can achieve," he shall produce but mediocre and +ephemeral results. It is when he says reverently, "Behold what +powers greater than I shall achieve through me, the instrument," that +he becomes great and men marvel at his power. + +Joy's religious nature found expression in her music, and so +something more than a harmony of beautiful sounds impressed her +hearers. + +The first severe blow to her faith in the church as a divine +institution, was when her rector and her lover left her alone in the +hour of her darkest trials, because he knew the story of her mother's +life. His hesitancy to make her his wife she understood, but his +absolute desertion of her at such a time, seemed inconsistent with +his calling as a disciple of the Christ. + +The second blow came in her dismissal from the position of organist +at the Beryngford Church, after the presence of the Baroness in the +town. + +A disgust for human laws, and a bitter resentment towards society +took possession of her. When a gentle and loving nature is roused to +anger and indignation, it is often capable of extremes of action; and +Arthur Stuart had made his proposition of flight to Joy Irving in an +hour when her high-wrought emotions and intensely strung nerves made +any desperate act possible to her. The sight of his face, with its +evidences of severe suffering, awoke all her smouldering passion for +the man; and the thought that he was ready to tread his creed under +his feet and to defy society for her sake, stirred her with a wild +joy. God had seemed very far away, and human love was very precious; +too precious to be thrown away in obedience to any man-made law. + +But somehow this morning God seemed nearer, and the consciousness of +what she had promised to do terrified her. Disturbed by her +thoughts, she turned towards her toilet-table and caught sight of the +letter of dismissal from the church committee. It acted upon her +like an electric shock. Resentment and indignation re-enthroned +themselves in her bosom. + +"Is it to cater to the opinions and prejudices of people like THESE +that I hesitate to take the happiness offered me?" she cried, as she +tore the letter in bits and cast it beneath her feet. Arthur Stuart +appeared to her once more, in the light of a delivering angel. Yes, +she would go with him to the ends of the earth. It was her +inheritance to lead a lawless life. Nothing else was possible for +her. God must see how she had been hemmed in by circumstances, how +she had been goaded and driven from the paths of peace and purity +where she had wished to dwell. God was not a man, and He would be +merciful in judging her. + +She sent her landlady two months' rent in advance, and notice of her +departure, and set hurriedly about her preparations. + + +Twenty-five years before, when Berene Dumont disappeared from +Beryngford, she had, quite unknown to herself, left one devoted +though humble friend behind, who sincerely mourned her absence. + +Mrs Connor liked to be spoken of as "the wash-lady at the Palace." +Yet proud as she was of this appellation, she was not satisfied with +being an excellent laundress. She was a person of ambitions. To be +the owner of a lodging-house, like the Baroness, was her leading +ambition, and to possess a "peany" for her young daughter Kathleen +was another. + +She kept her mind fixed on these two achievements, and she worked +always for those two results. And as mind rules matter, so the +laundress became in time the landlady of a comfortable and +respectable lodging-house, and in its parlour a piano was the chief +object of furniture. + +Kathleen Connor learned to play; and at last to the joy of the +lodgers, she married and bore her "peany" away with her. During the +time when Mrs Connor was the ambitious "wash-lady" at the Palace, +Berene Dumont came to live there; and every morning when the young +woman carried the tray down to the kitchen after having served the +Baroness with her breakfast, she offered Mrs Connor a cup of coffee +and a slice of toast. + +This simple act of thoughtfulness from the young dependant touched +the Irishwoman's tender heart and awoke her lasting gratitude. She +had heard Berene's story, and she had been prepared to mete out to +her that disdainful dislike which Erin almost invariably feels +towards France. Realising that the young widow was by birth and +breeding above the station of housemaid, Mrs Connor and the servants +had expected her to treat them with the same lofty airs which the +Baroness made familiar to her servants. When, instead, Berene +toasted the bread for Mrs Connor, and poured the coffee and placed it +on the kitchen table with her own hands, the heart of the wash-lady +melted in her ample breast. When the heart of the daughter of Erin +melts, it permeates her whole being; and Mrs Connor became a secret +devotee at the shrine of Miss Dumont. + +She had never entertained cordial feelings toward the Baroness. When +a society lady--especially a titled one--enters into competition with +working people, and yet refuses to associate with them, it always +incites their enmity. The working population of Beryngford, from the +highest to the lowest grades, felt a sense of resentment toward the +Baroness, who in her capacity of landlady still maintained the airs +of a grand dame, and succeeded in keeping her footing with some of +the most fashionable people in the town. + +Added to these causes of dislike, the Baroness was, like many +wealthier people, excessively close in her dealings with working +folk, haggling over a few cents or a few moments of wasted time, +while she was generosity itself in association with her equals. + +Mrs Connor, therefore, felt both pity and sympathy for Miss Dumont, +whose position in the Palace she knew to be a difficult one; and when +Preston Cheney came upon the scene the romantic mind of the motherly +Irishwoman fashioned a future for the young couple which would have +done credit to the pen of a Mrs Southworth. + +Mr Cheney always had a kind word for the laundress, and a tip as +well; and when Mrs Connor's dream of seeing him act the part of the +Prince and Berene the Cinderella of a modern fairy story, ended in +the disappearance of Miss Dumont and the marriage of Mr Cheney to +Mabel Lawrence, the unhappy wash-lady mourned unceasingly. + +Ten years of hard, unremitting toil and rigid economy passed away +before Mrs Connor could realise her ambition of becoming a landlady +in the purchase of a small house which contained but four rooms, +three of which were rented to lodgers. The increase in the value of +her property during the next five years, left the fortunate +speculator with a fine profit when she sold her house at the end of +that time, and rented a larger one; and as she was an excellent +financier, it was not strange that, at the time Joy Irving appeared +on the scene, "Mrs Connor's apartments" were as well and favourably +known in Beryngford, if not as distinctly fashionable, as the Palace +had been more than twenty years ago. + +So it was under the roof of her mother's devoted and faithful mourner +that the unhappy young orphan had found a home when she came to hide +herself away from all who had ever known her. + +The landlady experienced the same haunting sensation of something +past and gone when she looked on the girl's beautiful face, which had +so puzzled the Baroness; a something which drew and attracted the +warm heart of the Irishwoman, as the magnet draws the steel. Time +and experience had taught Mrs Connor to be discreet in her treatment +of her tenants; to curb her curiosity and control her inclination to +sociability. But in the case of Miss Irving she had found it +impossible to refrain from sundry kindly acts which were not included +in the terms of the contract. Certain savoury dishes found their way +mysteriously to Miss Irving's menage, and flowers appeared in her +room as if by magic, and in various other ways the good heart and +intentions of Mrs Connor were unobtrusively expressed toward her +favourite tenant. Joy had taken a suite of four rooms, where, with +her maid, she lived in modest comfort and complete retirement from +the social world of Beryngford, save as the close connection of the +church with Beryngford society rendered her, in the position of +organist, a participant in many of the social features of the town. +While Joy was in the midst of her preparations for departure, Mrs +Connor made her appearance with swollen eyes and red, blistered face. + +"And it's the talk of that ould witch of a Baroness, may the divil +run away with her, that is drivin' ye away, is it?" she cried +excitedly; "and it's not Mrs Connor as will consist to the daughter +of your mother, God rest her soul, lavin' my house like this. To +think that I should have had ye here all these years, and never known +ye to be her child till now, and now to see ye driven away by the +divil's own! But if it's the fear of not being able to pay the rint +because ye've lost your position, ye needn't lave for many a long day +to come. It's Mrs Connor would only be as happy as the queen herself +to work her hands to the bone for ye, remembering your darlint of a +mother, and not belavin' one word against her, nor ye." + +So soon as Joy could gain possession of her surprised senses, she +calmed the weeping woman and began to question her. + +"My good woman," she said, "what are you talking about? Did you ever +know my mother, and where did you know her?" + +"In the Palace, to be sure, as they called the house of that imp of +Satan, the Baroness. I was the wash-lady there, for it's not Mrs +Conner the landlady as is above spakin' of the days when she wasn't +as high in the world as she is now; and many is the cheerin' cup of +coffee or tay from your own mother's hand, that I've had in the +forenoon, to chirk me up and put me through my washing, bless her +sweet face; and niver have I forgotten her; and niver have I ceased +to miss her and the fine young man that took such an interest in her +and that I'm as sure loved her, in spite of his marrying the Judge's +spook of a daughter, as I am that the Holy Virgin loves us all; and +it's a foine man that your father must have been, but young Mr Cheney +was foiner." + +So little by little Joy drew the story from Mrs Connor and learned +the name of the mysterious father, so carefully guarded from her in +Mrs Irving's manuscript, the father at whose funeral services she had +so recently officiated as organist. + +And strangest and most startling of all, she learned that Arthur +Stuart's insane wife was her half-sister. + +Added to all this, Joy was made aware of the nature of the reports +which the Baroness had been circulating about her; and her feeling of +bitter resentment and anger toward the church committee was modified +by the knowledge that it was not owing to the shadow on her birth, +but to the false report of her own evil life, that she had been asked +to resign. + +After Mrs Connor had gone, Joy was for a long time in meditation, and +then turned in a mechanical manner to her delayed task. Her book of +"Impressions" lay on a table close at hand. + +And as she took it up the leaves opened to the sentence she had +written three years before, after her talk with the rector about +Marah Adams. + + +"It seems to me I could not love a man who did not seek to lead me +higher; the moment he stood below me and asked me to descend, I +should realise he was to be pitied, not adored!" + + +She shut the book and fell on her knees in prayer; and as she prayed +a strange thing happened. The room filled with a peculiar mist, like +the smoke which is illuminated by the brilliant rays of the morning +sun; and in the midst of it a small square of intense rose-coloured +light was visible. This square grew larger and larger, until it +assumed the size and form of a man, whose face shone with immortal +glory. He smiled and laid his hand on Joy's head. "Child, awake," +he said, and with these words vast worlds dawned upon the girl's +sight. She stood above and apart from her grosser body, untrammelled +and free; she saw long vistas of lives in the past through which she +had come to the present; she saw long vistas of lives in the future +through which she must pass to gain the experience which would lead +her back to God. An ineffable peace and serenity enveloped her. The +divine Presence seemed to irradiate the place in which she stood--she +felt herself illuminated, transfigured, sanctified by the holy flame +within her. + +When she came back to the kneeling form by the couch, and rose to her +feet, all the aspect of life had changed for her. + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + + +Joy Irving had unpacked her trunks and set her small apartment to +rights, when the postman's ring sounded, and a moment later a letter +was slipped under her door. + +She picked it up, and recognised Arthur Stuart's penmanship. She sat +down, holding the unopened letter in her hands. + +"It is Arthur's message, appointing a time and place for our +meeting," she said to herself. "How long ago that strange interview +with him seems!--yet it was only yesterday. How utterly the whole of +life has changed for me since then! The universe seems larger, God +nearer, and life grander. I am as one who slept and dreamed of +darkness and sorrow, and awakes to light and joy." + +But when she opened the envelope and read the few hastily written +lines within, an exclamation of surprise escaped her lips. It was a +brief note from Arthur Stuart and began abruptly without an address +(a manner more suggestive of strong passion than any endearing +words). + + +"The first item which my eye fell upon in the telegraphic column of +the morning paper, was the death of my wife in the Retreat for the +Insane. I leave by the first express to bring her body here for +burial. + +"A merciful providence has saved us the necessity of defying the laws +of God or man, and opened the way for me to claim you before all the +world as my worshipped wife so soon as propriety will permit. + +"I shall see you at any hour you may indicate after to-morrow, for a +brief interview. + +"ARTHUR EMERSON STUART." + + +Joy held the letter in her hand a long time, lost in profound +reflection. Then she sat down to her desk and wrote three letters; +one was to Mrs Lawrence; one to the chairman of the church committee, +who had requested her resignation; the third was to Mr Stuart, and +read thus: + + +"My Dear Mr Stuart,--Many strange things have occurred to me since I +saw you. I have learned the name of my father, and this knowledge +reveals the fact to me that your unfortunate wife was my half-sister. +I have learned, too, that the loss of my position here as organist is +not due to the narrow prejudice of the committee regarding the shadow +on my birth, but to malicious stories put in circulation by Mrs +Lawrence, relating to me. + +"Infamous and libellous tales regarding my life have been told, and +must be refuted. I have written to Mrs Lawrence demanding a letter +from her, clearing my personal character, or giving her the +alternative of appearing in court to answer the charge of defamation +of character. I have also written to the church committee requesting +them to meet me here in my apartments to-morrow, and explain their +demand for my resignation. + +"I now write to you my last letter and my farewell. + +"In the overwrought and desperate mood in which you found me, it did +not seem a sin for me to go away with the man who loved me and whom I +loved, before false ideas of life and false ideas of duty made him +the husband of another. Conscious that your wife was a hopeless +lunatic whose present or future could in no way be influenced by our +actions, I reasoned that we wronged no one in taking the happiness so +long denied us. + +"The last three years of my life have been full of desolation and +sorrow. From the day my mother died, the stars of light which had +gemmed the firmament for me, seemed one by one to be obliterated, +until I stood in utter darkness. You found me in the very blackest +hour of all--and you seemed a shining sun to me. + +"Yet so soon as my tired brain and sorrow-worn heart were able to +think and reason, I realised that it was not the man I had worshipped +as an ideal, who had come to me and asked me to lower my standard of +womanhood. It was another and less worthy man--and this other was to +be my companion through time, and perhaps eternity. When I learned +that your insane wife was my sister, and that knowing this fact you +yet planned our flight, an indescribable feeling of repulsion awoke +in my heart. + +"I confess that this arose more from a sentiment than a principle. +The relationship of your wife to me made the contemplated sin no +greater, but rendered it more tasteless. + +"Had I gone away with you as I consented to do, the world would have +said, she but follows her fatal inheritance--like mother like +daughter. There were some bitter rebellious hours, when that thought +came to me. But to-day light has shone upon me, and I know there is +a law of Divine Heredity which is greater and more powerful than any +tendency we derive from parents or grandparents. I have believed +much in creeds all my life; and in the hour of great trials I found I +was leaning on broken reeds. I have now ceased to look to men or +books for truth--I have found it in my own soul. I acknowledge no +unfortunate tendencies from any earthly inheritance; centuries of +sinful or weak ancestors are as nothing beside the God within. The +divine and immortal ME is older than my ancestral tree; it is as old +as the universe. It is as old as the first great Cause of which it +is a part. Strong with this consciousness, I am prepared to meet the +world alone, and unafraid from this day onward. When I think of the +optimistic temperament, the good brain, and the vigorous body which +were naturally mine, and then of the wretched being who was my +legitimate sister, I know that I was rightly generated, however +unfortunately born, just as she was wrongly generated though legally +born. + +"My father, I am told, married into a family whose crest is traced +back to the tenth century. I carry a coat-of-arms older yet--the +Cross; it dates back eighteen hundred years--yes, many thousand +years, and so I feel myself the nobler of the two. Had you been more +of a disciple of Christ, and less of a disciple of man, you would +have realised this truth long ago, as I realise it to-day. No man +should dare stand before his fellows as a revealer of divine +knowledge until he has penetrated the inmost recesses of his own +soul, and found God's holy image there; and until he can show others +the way to the same wonderful discovery. The God you worshipped was +far away in the heavens, so far that he could not come to you and +save you from your baser self in the hour of temptation. But the +true God has been miraculously revealed to me. He dwells within; one +who has found Him, will never debase His temple. + +"Though there is no legal obstacle now in the path to our union, +there is a spiritual one which is insurmountable. I NO LONGER LOVE +YOU. I am sorry for you, but that is all. You belonged to my +yesterday--you can have no part in my to-day. The man who tempted me +in my weak hour to go lower, could not help me to go higher. And my +face is set toward the heights. + +"I must prove to that world that a child born under the shadow of +shame, and of two weak, uncontrolled parents, can be virtuous, +strong, brave and sensible. That she can conquer passion and +impulse, by the use of her divine inheritance of will; and that she +can compel the respect of the public by her discreet life and lofty +ideals. + +"I shall stay in this place until I have vindicated my name and +character from every aspersion cast upon them. I shall retain my +position of organist, and retain it until I have accumulated +sufficient means to go abroad and prepare myself for the musical +career in which I know I can excel. I am young, strong and +ambitious. My unusual sorrows will give me greater power of +character if I accept them as spiritual tonics--bitter but +strengthening. + +"Farewell, and may God be with you. + +"Joy Irving." + + +When the rector of St Blank's returned from the Beryngford Cemetery, +where he had placed the body of his wife beside her father, he found +this letter lying on his table in the hotel. + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, AN AMBITIOUS MAN *** + +This file should be named ammn10.txt or ammn10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, ammn11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, ammn10a.txt + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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