Dainty's Cruel Rivals; Or, The Fatal Birthday
But at length all went to their rooms, and the weary servants closed the
great house, darkened the lights, and everything sank into silence,
broken only now and then by the call of a night bird in the shrubbery,
or the whistle of a far-away locomotive. The full moon sailed high in
the deep blue heaven, brooding over the sleeping world in its mystery,
its beauty, its joy and sorrow.
Love and Dainty had gone along the corridors hand in hand like happy
children, pausing to say good-night before their own doors.
"Mamma will share my room to-night--we have so much to say to each other
this last night," Dainty said to her lover, with a fleeting blush like
the sunset glow.
They were quite alone, with no envious eyes peering in the dim night
light, and Love took his charming sweetheart in his arms and clasped and
kissed her many times in passionate love.
"'This last night!' how solemn it sounds!" he echoed, then laughed. "Oh,
my love, my love! what rapture to know that after to-night we never
shall be parted again!"
"Never, never!" she cried, joyfully, and clasped her white arms around
his neck, laying her soft cheek to his, whispering: "Oh, how glad I am
that you love me, that you chose me for your very own, life of your
life, heart of your heart! I thank God for His goodness to me, and I
will try always to deserve my great happiness."
Sweet, shy Dainty had never spoken to her lover with such ardor and
eloquence before, and his reply was such a shower of kisses that she
could hardly tear herself away to enter her own room, where her mother
waited, and said, laughingly:
"Darling, I thought you and Love were not going to say good-night till
the morning dawned!"
CHAPTER XVIII
THE WEDDING MORN.
Love retired into his room and sat down beside the window to brood over
his great happiness.
Something like humility blended with his grateful thoughts.
Who was he, what had he done, that Heaven should be so good to him,
giving him the fairest, truest, sweetest girl in the world for his
adored and loving bride?
He lifted his dark, dreamy eyes to the moonlit heavens and prayed
reverentially:
"God make me worthy of the prize I have won!"
From the next room he could hear the low murmur of voices, as Dainty
conversed with her mother in happy tones; but by and by all grew silent,
as the fair girl sank to sleep, nestling against her mother's heart for
the last time, for to-morrow would give her to her husband's arms.
Love heard the clock in the tower chime the midnight hour, and retired
to dream of the happiness that would be his to-morrow.
And never came fairer dreams of the future to any lover's heart, as
surely no lover's heart had ever been so bound up in its beauteous idol.
"Love thee? So well, so tenderly
Thou'rt loved, adored by me,
Fame, fortune, wealth, and liberty
Were worthless without thee.
Though brimmed with blessings pure and rare
Life's cup before me lay,
Unless thy love were mingled there,
I'd spurn the draught away.
"Without thy smile the monarch's lot
To me were dark and lone,
While, _with_ it, even the humblest cot
Were brighter than his throne.
Those words for which the conqueror sighs
For me would have no charms;
My only world thy gentle eyes,
My throne thy circling arms."
Wrapped in blissful dreams, he slumbered on till the night passed away.
The morning dawned and the sun rode high in the heavens ere he started,
broad awake, remembering that this was his wedding-day, and that he had
overslept himself.
Indeed, at that moment, some one tapped on the door, and the voice of
Harry Chilton, his cousin and best man, called out, gayly:
"Heavens, man! what can you mean by sleeping to within two hours of your
wedding?"
"Is it possible?" cried Love, looking at his clock, and finding that the
assertion was quite true.
He opened the door to his cousin, and they became immediately immersed
in preparations for the ceremony which was to take place in the
large parlor at nine o'clock, to be followed by the splendid
wedding-breakfast.
The great house was in a hubbub of excitement with the final
preparations and the dressing of the guests; but the bride's door had
never opened yet, though no one thought strange of that, for she had
gently declined all offers of assistance at her toilet, saying that
mamma would do all that was necessary.
Never had there been a fairer morn for a birthday bridal. Not the
slightest cloud marred the deep-blue sky; the sun shone in radiant
splendor on the dewy flowers and the green earth, and the little birds
seemed almost to know that there was to be a wedding, they warbled so
persistently in the joy of their little hearts.
Time wore on till it lacked but fifteen minutes to the ceremony. The
house was thronged with the wedding-guests, and the bishop of the
diocese had arrived to perform the ceremony. The musicians were getting
ready to play the wedding-march.
Love was all ready, looking faultlessly handsome in his wedding-suit,
and he began to grow impatient because he had received no message from
his darling that morning.
"How strange if she and her mother have overslept themselves! I will go
and knock on the door," he said, suiting the action to the words.
He could not hear the least sound in the room, and he received no answer
to his knock. He rapped impatiently again.
"Dainty! Mrs. Chase!" he called, anxiously, several times.
But there was no reply.
He bent his ear to the key-hole, but there was not a sound within the
bride's room--all was still as the grave.
The handsome bridegroom grew pale and alarmed, crying out to his best
man, who stood by his side:
"Surely something has happened, for I have heard not a sound from the
room. We must force the door."
They put their shoulders against it; the lock yielded, it flew open, and
they stood within the room.
The curtains and the shutters were closely drawn, and the night-lamp
flickered dimly behind a screen. At one end of the room several chairs
were littered with the wedding finery--the tiny white silken hose and
slippers, the satin gown, the misty thread-lace veil.
In the midst of it all, Mrs. Chase lay on the bed, sleeping heavily, but
Dainty was nowhere to be seen.
Love stood looking about him, pale and alarmed, but it was Harry Chilton
who first caught sight of a note pinned on the pillow, and drew Love's
attention to it.
"She is gone. Perhaps that may explain," he said.
Love caught up the note from the pillow, and read with staring eyes:
"DEAR MR. ELLSWORTH,--I have deceived you, and I can
not keep the farce up any longer. I never loved you,
never; but mamma always told me to get a rich husband
if I could, and I was going to marry you for your
money, knowing I would be a wretched wife, because all
my heart was given to another.
"But last evening I met my lover in the grounds, and he
persuaded me to go away with him. When this reaches
you, I shall be his happy bride. We will be poor, but
we shall have love to cheer us. Forgive me, and don't
let the wedding be spoiled. Marry Olive or Ela.
"DAINTY."
Once in a lifetime a man may excusably swoon. Lovelace Ellsworth fell
heavily to the floor like an insensate log.
CHAPTER XIX.
A MADMAN'S DEED.
When he came back to life presently, with a strangling gasp of pain, he
met the anxious gaze of Doctor Platt, who was kneeling beside him.
"Good! You are better! Let me help you to rise," said the old man,
aiding him to a sofa. Taking a chair by him, he continued: "You have
been unconscious for ten minutes, and we have read your letter from Miss
Chase, which I believe to be a cussed forgery!"
"You are right," declared Love, sitting upright, deathly pale and
trembling; while he added, sternly: "Dainty never went away of her own
free will. It is a case of kidnaping!"
"Yes; for there lies her poor mother in a drugged sleep that will most
likely last several hours longer. I have examined the dregs left in
their pitcher of ice-water last night, and found a potent drug in it. I
may also tell you that the overhead wire connecting this room with the
bell in yours has been cut, thus making the bell powerless to ring if
Miss Chase had wished to summon you to her assistance. There is evidence
that the malice of Miss Chase's enemies has triumphed at last,"
sorrowfully replied the old doctor, who had in his heart been a true and
stanch friend to the lovers.
A groan of anguish passed Love's pallid lips.
"Oh, my dearest, what have they done to you, my treasure, the ruthless
enemies who hated you!"
At that moment a stately figure in rustling silk crossed the threshold,
and a haughty voice exclaimed:
"Doctor Platt and Mr. Chilton, will you kindly withdraw for a few
moments? I wish to speak privately with my step-son."
She closed the door on their retreating forms, glanced scornfully at the
silent, sleeping face of Mrs. Chase, and exclaimed, eagerly:
"What strange story is this that is being whispered around, Love, that
Dainty has deserted you and eloped with a more favored lover?"
"There is the note I found on her pillow. You are welcome to read it,"
he replied, coldly.
She took it up from the table, glanced quickly over the contents, and
groaned:
"What a wicked girl to throw you over at the eleventh hour like this!
How will you bear the shame of it, my poor boy, jilted like this, at the
very altar, by the poor nobody whom you had stooped to raise to your
side?"
Love answered not one word. He simply rested his head on his elbow, and
stared curiously into Mrs. Ellsworth's eager, excited face with his
dark, penetrating eyes as she continued:
"I am pained for you, my dear Love, but not at all surprised. I feared
something like this, for I knew that Vernon Ashley was Dainty's lover,
not Ela's, and I believed that love would triumph in the end over the
greed for gold. Poor Dainty! she must have loved him well to sacrifice
all her ambitions for a poor man's love. But she will be happier with
him than she could have been with you. The hand without the heart does
not promise well for wedded bliss."
Still without a word, he listened to the fluent tide of her speech, a
strange, mocking light in his eyes, whose portent she could not fathom.
She continued, insinuatingly:
"But Dainty Chase has done you a cruel injustice, Love, for, besides
depriving you of a bride to-day, she has cheated you out of your
inheritance. Remember, unless you are married to-day, your fortune
reverts to me!"
He bowed in silence, and Mrs. Ellsworth added, nervously:
"No wonder you are stricken dumb by the magnitude of your misfortune,
losing everything that made life worth living, as it were. But cheer up,
my dear boy, for I am not so selfish as to wish to deprive you of your
fortune; and as soon as I heard that Dainty had eloped with another, I
began to plan to help you, and I soon saw that there was a way out of
your difficulty."
"Yes?" Love said, inquiringly, and his pale lips curled with a sneer
whose subtle meaning she could not understand; but taking it for
encouragement, she blurted out, boldly:
"The preacher is here, the people are here, and the wedding-breakfast
waits. You can vanquish fate if you will. Though Dainty is gone, I have
two other nieces."
Again that cold, scornful smile as she added, desperately:
"I see that Dainty advises you here to marry either Olive or Ela. Well,
you can have either one for the asking."
His pale, writhing lips unclosed to ask, curtly:
"Are you speaking with their permission?"
"Yes," she replied, eagerly and hopefully, feeling sure that he must