Dainty's Cruel Rivals; Or, The Fatal Birthday
fashion! But death is no respecter of persons. He robbed me of my ailing
wife about the same time your mother was called. What! you don't
understand? Bless me! the girl's dropped like I'd shot her! Ailsa!
Ailsa!" he called in alarm, as he picked up the unconscious girl, and
hurried with her to the back of the store, which was also his dwelling.
Then a pretty, brown-eyed girl, sitting with several noisy children,
sprang up, and cried in wonder:
"What is the matter?"
"Here's your old neighbor and school-mate, Ailsa, little Dainty Chase.
She came into the store, and I was talking to her about the death of my
wife and her mother, when she dropped in a sort of fit. See to her, will
you, while I run back to my customers?"
Pretty Ailsa Scott hastened to resuscitate her old school-mate, and
when she revived, was startled to hear her sob, hysterically:
"I came to find my mother, Ailsa. I have been lost from her for wretched
months; but your step-father told me she was dead! Oh, it can not be
true! God would not be so cruel!"
Ailsa Scott had passed through the recent loss of her own mother, and
she knew what a blow it would be to Dainty when she heard the cruel
truth; but there was no escaping it, so she clasped her gentle arms
about the stricken girl, saying sadly:
"It makes my heart ache for you, dear Dainty, but it would be useless to
deceive you. About the time that mother lay in her last sickness it was
rumored that your mother came back here the very day after the house was
burned. I did not see her myself, but it was in all the papers that she
went suddenly insane, and after wandering wildly about the city all day,
calling for you, took poison and died in an alley. I do not know where
she is buried, for mother was so very ill, and died the same week. Since
then I've had my heart and hands both full with the care of the
children, and teaching school, too, for I would not depend on my
step-father for a penny. You know"--whispering--"I always hated him, and
there wasn't much love lost between us. Indeed, I wouldn't have stayed
here a day after mother's death only for my little half-brothers and
sisters. He had no relations to help him, and hired help is not very
reliable. He keeps a servant, but they tell me she is unkind to the
children when I'm at school. If you have no friends to go to, dear, I
wish you would stay with me awhile, and look after the little ones while
I'm away."
It was a delicate offer of a shelter, for Ailsa's eyes had taken in the
poverty of her guest, and Dainty was but too glad of a refuge in which
to nurse her deep despair.
When Ailsa informed her step-father questioningly of her offer, he
smiled approval, and made Dainty welcome in his simple home, while
tender-hearted Ailsa soothed her all she could in the bitterness of her
bereavement.
"We are both orphans, dear, and we can sympathize with each other," she
said, tenderly, and helped her friend to get some neat mourning gowns,
in which she looked so frail and lily-like that she seemed to be fading
away like a broken flower.
She tended patiently on the little children and won their love, and the
exuberant gratitude of their father, this latter so effusive that it
grew irksome to the sorrowful, reserved girl.
"Oh, Ailsa, I do not wish to seem ungrateful, but I dislike the man as
much as you do, and his attentions are getting too pointed to be
agreeable. I am afraid I shall have to leave you and the dear children,
much as I love you," she sighed, in December, after two quiet months in
the little house; and her friend rejoined, indignantly:
"I see he is trying to court you, although his wife, my dear mother, has
been dead but a few months. Oh, why did she ever marry such a brute? I
believe he broke her heart, for it was a strange decline of which she
died. He was always flirting with his women customers, and scolded his
wife harshly when she objected. He made her bitterly unhappy, the
coarse, unfaithful wretch, and that is why I hate him so for my own papa
never spoke an unkind word to her up to the day of his death. You will
have to repulse him, but not too unkindly to arouse his enmity."
But the crisis came suddenly the next day while Ailsa was at school.
Mr. Sparks boldly proposed marriage to the indignant girl.
Her blue eyes flashed disdain upon him, as she cried:
"How can you be so coarse and unfeeling, sir, showing so little respect
to the memory of the wife dead but a few months?"
"She is as dead now as she will be in ten years hence!" he replied, with
a grin that filled her with disgust; while he added, wheedlingly: "But I
know how particular women folks are over these trifles, and I would have
waited till spring before I spoke to you on the subject, but the fact
is, the neighbors are gossiping about my keeping house with two pretty
girls, and neither one any kin to me. So I thought I'd better marry one
of them, and shut scandal's mouth. And as for Ailsa, I never liked her.
She is always throwing up to me that her pa was a nicer man than I am.
But as for you, Dainty, I worship the very ground you walk on, and I'll
marry you to-morrow if you'll say the word."
"I can't marry you, sir. I--I--oh I am going right away, Mr. Sparks! I
couldn't breathe the same air with a man that was so disrespectful to
his first wife's memory as to court another in three months after her
death!" the young girl cried, in passionate disgust, arousing such
bitter spite that the rejected suitor cast courtesy to the winds,
rejoining, hotly:
"Go, then, Miss Pert, and the sooner the better! Shall I call a wagon to
take your trunk?" sarcastically.
"You know I have no trunk, Mr. Sparks, but I will pack my valise at
once, and perhaps you will let it stay till I can take it away. I must
rent a room somewhere first," she murmured.
"No; take it with you, I say. Your clothes might get contaminated
breathing the same air with me!" he answered, angrily.
So presently Dainty went away in the teeth of a howling winter storm,
without a penny in her purse, or a shelter for her head, while the
little ones sobbed out to Ailsa when she returned that bad papa had
driven sweet Dainty away.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
A NEW HOME.
Dainty dragged herself slowly along the snowy street, almost exhausted
by the weight of the hand-bag; and she wondered pathetically if it might
not be best to follow her mother's example, and seek refuge from life's
woes by the straight gate of death?
"Dear mother, if I only knew where to find the lonely grave where
strangers laid you, I would stretch myself upon it and die!" she sobbed,
the tears in her cheeks mixing with the melting snow, as it flew into
her pale face, driven by the bleak December gale.
She crept presently into a quiet area-way, and somewhat sheltered from
the driving storm, pondered on what she was to do now, without friends
and without money, in a cold, suspicious world.
Presently she heard girlish chatter and tittering, and glancing through
a window, saw several young girls busy at sewing-machines, directed by
an angular spinster whom she took to be a dress-maker.
A sudden temptation seized her, and she rapped timidly on the basement
door, bringing the spinster hurriedly to it.
"Do you want a dress made?" she inquired, glancing at Dainty's hand-bag.
"No, madame. I am in search of work. Do you wish another hand to sew?"
faltered Dainty.
"Um! yes--I don't know. Bring in your valise, and let us talk it over;"
ushering her into a tiny, cozy kitchen, where they could talk in
private.
"Now, then, what's your name, and how came you out hunting work in the
face of such weather? Tell the truth," she said, suspiciously; and
Dainty obeyed.
"I have been employed to help nurse some children, and was discharged
to-day. My name is Miss Chase."
"Did you bring a recommendation?" sharply.
"No, ma'am; but I think I can refer you to Miss Ailsa Scott, on this
same street. It was her mother's children I was nursing; but the father
sent me away."
"I know Mr. Sparks. Why did he send you away?"
"I would rather not tell."
"Then I can not give you work!" curtly.
"Oh, madame, I am ashamed to tell you! The man wanted to marry me, and
his poor wife dead but a few months! I refused with scorn, and he drove
me away," the girl answered, wearily.
"Humph! I can't see what he wanted with a chit like you for a wife," the
spinster returned, tossing her false frizzes disparagingly, and adding:
"I do need another hand, but the pay is too much. I can not afford it."
"Oh, madame, I would work for my board awhile, if you will let me stay
here!" pleaded Dainty, eagerly; and the woman answered:
"I don't know but that would suit me very well. I live here by myself,
all the girls going home in the evenings. You may take off your things,
and I'll get some work ready for you. But, mind, I'll call on Ailsa
Scott to-night, and unless you have spoken the truth, out you go in the
morning."
"I have only spoken the truth, madame," Dainty sighed, as she obeyed the
commands, and soon found herself seated among the busy sewing girls,
basting away on a ruffle, and thanking God in her heart for even this
poor shelter that must be paid for with constant toil.
The girls all seemed to be gay enough, in spite of their poverty; but
Dainty, poor, nervous girl, was glad when they went away at sunset, and
left her alone with Miss White, as she found the name of her employer to
be.
The spinster was not more than forty, and rather good-looking, in spite
of her angularity. She asked Dainty many questions about Sparks,
betraying quite a lively interest in the widower; and by and by she
dressed herself smartly in a black silk gown and red bonnet, and went
off to get Dainty's character from Ailsa Scott, leaving the girl alone
in the house, save for some tenants in the upper part.
Dainty was very tired and sad; but she washed the tea-things and put
them away, and lay down on the lounge in the sewing-room, with a sigh of
relief at the chance to rest.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THROWN ON THE WORLD.
Poor Dainty was always tired and sad now. She had never been very strong
since her illness in the mountains.
Her face was always thin and pale, her blue eyes hollow, with dark
circles beneath them, while her breath was short and palpitating. She
knew that she was strangely ill, and had a fancy that she was going into
a rapid decline.
Ailsa Scott wanted her to see a doctor, but she always refused to do so.
"I want to die! I would rather not take any medicine from the best
doctor in the world!" she exclaimed, rebelliously.
She had not told her friend the strange story of her secret marriage,
fearing lest the threatened revenge of Mrs. Ellsworth should find her
out even this far away; but Ailsa guessed well at some sad secret, and
pitied the poor girl with all her gentle heart.
By and by Miss White returned in a very good humor indeed, saying that
Miss Scott said everything was all right, and she would call to see her
friend on her way from school the next day.
"I saw Mr. Sparks, too, and really, he is the most charming man I ever
met," she simpered, adding: "I don't see how you could repulse his
addresses, Miss Chase; he is so handsome and agreeable. Then, too, poor
man, his sweet little children stand so much in need of a mother that
he was excusable for haste, though he ought to have picked an older
woman than you."
"I should say that you, Miss White, would be the most suitable woman in
the world for him," Dainty ventured, with a faint smile.
"Thank you for the compliment. I wonder if he thinks so, too? He was
certainly quite attentive, and I didn't let him guess I knew he was
looking for a wife; but I made up my mind to buy my groceries from him