Saved from herself or, On the edge of doom
And he never turned to see that the knife had gone home to the hilt.
“You’re quite right,” she spoke slowly, flatly. “I shouldn’t have said
it. Take me home now. You’ll tell me, won’t you, if you think you are
going to find--that woman?”
“Yes,” reluctantly. “But I wish I had never named a woman like that to
you. Wait, Ismay,” with a motion of his broad shoulders, as if he shook
off the memory of a distasteful burden, “I want to give you something
first.”
He drew a case from his pocket, and even in the light that was nearly
gone from the sky she saw something flash as he opened it. The next
instant he slipped a band of great diamonds, each one a fortune, on her
smooth white finger.
“With my body I thee worship,” he quoted softly, his eyes, that were
her heaven, bent on her changing face. “I will say that once more when
I put another ring on your finger.”
For a moment her hard-held composure was gone.
“Mark,” she stammered, “I can’t wear it.”
“Mark! My name isn’t Mark.” He looked at her hardly, sharply in the
dusk. “What do you mean, Ismay? Are you dreaming, or do you think you
are talking to another man?”
Appalled by her own slip of the tongue, she could not speak. What was
this love doing to her, that she was losing her nerve, her self-command?
“Ismay, answer me!” How stern his voice was. “Is there any other man
who ever said he loved you, that you should think of him now?”
With the sure instinct that the truth alone could answer him, she
turned to him, her face white and hard as he had never seen it.
“Did you think I meant you when I said ‘Mark’? I meant”--somehow, she
seemed as tall as he as she faced him--“the man my mother means to
marry me to. He is staying with us now. When I said his name and not
yours I meant that with his eyes on me I would never dare to wear it.”
“Staying with you now? What for?” His heart revolted at the thought of
guests in a house of mourning. “And why should you mind his seeing it?
What is he to you?”
“Nothing. A thing so small that I would kill myself before I fell into
his hands. And that is what would happen if he saw me wearing your
ring.”
“Ismay, don’t speak in riddles. Tell me what you mean. What right has
any man to object to your wearing my ring?”
“Don’t speak to me like that. I can’t bear it.” To his shame he saw
that she was crying. Ismay, who never cried, to whose eyes tears were
strangers!
“Oh, he can do anything, anything,” she sobbed. “He--he knows something
about my mother; she is afraid of him.”
“My sweet, my poor sweet.” The man who had done his best to threaten
that mother into leaving Marchant’s Hold felt suddenly guilty and
ashamed. “What can I say to you? But if you would listen to me and get
your mother on my side I think I could make short work of him for her.”
“Can you blot out the past?” said Ismay Trelane.
She wiped away her tears that shamed her; was she no stronger than
Cristiane that she must cry in her pain?
Very pitifully the man kissed her.
“I would do anything on earth for you!” he whispered. “Can’t you tell
me what it is he knows?”
“She’s my mother.” Once more she held her head up, proudly, lest he
should see her wince at her mother’s shame. “And as for Marcus Wray, I
will beat him yet, and then you can marry me--if you will.”
“I’d rather help you.” But she made no answer as they hurried homeward,
his ring still on her finger, the little scarab, that he had forgotten,
safe inside the palm of her other hand.
“I’m coming over to-morrow to see Cristiane,” he threatened, as he left
her in the garden.
“Oh, Miles, don’t,” she cried sharply; “or, if you come, wait for me
there by the lake behind those cedars. I daren’t see you before Marcus
Wray. And yet I may want you.”
“What do you mean, sweet?”
But she only laughed, and the laugh was not good to hear.
“I don’t know; but you’ll see,” and she was gone. There was nothing to
tell him that by to-morrow she thought to catch Marcus Wray red-handed,
and so would never fear him any more. Her heart was lighter than for
many a day as she locked away the little blue-green beetle that Cylmer
had forgotten. The diamond ring she hid away with it. Never till the
owner of his scarab was found would she dare to put it on. And, oh!
would it be to-morrow?
But at the thought her heart sank again. The owner of the lost scarab
must be found first, and how was she to do it?
CHAPTER XXV.
THE GRATITUDE OF CRISTIANE.
No day that held murder and sudden death in it ever dawned more fair to
see than the next morning.
The sun shone sweetly on the frozen world, the robins came confidently
to the dining-room window, red-breasted, certain of crumbs; the lake
shone as glittering glass; the cold, sweet air of morning was like wine
to the nerves as Ismay, after breakfast, stood at the window feeding
the hungry birds.
She almost wondered at her own fear of Marcus Wray this morning. The
look of latent savagery was all gone from his calm, clean-shaven face
as he stood by the fire idly smoking a cigarette. And the strained,
expectant horror was gone from her mother’s face. For some reason or
other, the awful purpose of the day had been postponed. There was
relief at Ismay’s heart as she read those faces.
“We are a nice, harmonious, affectionate household for one more day. I
suppose he has his reasons,” she thought. But she did not want to catch
his eye. She stood with an indifferent shoulder to him as he moved
toward the door. “What, Cristiane?” She started from her reverie as if
she were shot.
Cristiane was eying her like a kitten who has just scratched.
“I only said you and Miles were very late last night,” she repeated
viciously.
Ismay could not speak. She made instead a quick step toward the door
that had barely closed behind Wray. Was he out of hearing, or was he
there still?
“I--and Miles!” she said coldly. “What do you mean?”
Mrs. Trelane, reading a letter, fairly dropped it as she stared at the
two. What had Ismay been doing? Was the girl crazy?
Cristiane laughed, like a child pleased with mischief.
“Don’t look so angry,” she remarked. “I was only trying to pay you
for--you know what!” with a nod in the direction of the departed Wray.
“You two children!” said Mrs. Trelane, with an indulgent smile, that
covered her relief that this was only play.
But Ismay, facing Cristiane, was not so certain. There was a something
in the baby face of the only child that she did not like.
“She saw us! And if she tells Marcus I’m done,” she reflected.
But Cristiane, as she purred an amiable apology, had no intention of
telling Marcus. She meant to have Marcus and Miles both, and something
warned even her that it would not be well to speak of Ismay to Wray.
And Ismay, in spite of the exquisite day, was feeling strangely dull.
A deadly lassitude was in all her limbs; the strain of constant,
racking thought for the girl who was so spoiled, the mother who was so
careless, was telling on her.
She saw Wray go out, and Cristiane busy writing a note, to whom she did
not care, and crept away to a dark corner of the hall where a screen
hid her from passers-by. While things were quiet she must sleep, or she
would break down. Had there been anything the matter with her coffee?
But she could think no longer. She dropped on the seat behind the
screen, never stopping to consider that she was clearly visible from
the turn of the stairs overhead, and slept like a dead thing.
Hours passed, and she knew nothing, felt nothing, except that once
she tried to brush what felt like a fly from her cheek; once turned,
in what seemed a happy dream, to the familiar touch of a man’s rough
tweed coat on her face, stretching her arms out in sleep at the happy
thought; in her dream nestling close to the dear shoulder, till
suddenly a nightmare terror shook her. She tried to scream and could
not; woke for an instant to think she heard a footstep stealing away,
and, not half-awake, was asleep again almost before she realized her
thought.
“Where can Ismay be?” Mrs. Trelane wondered at lunch.
Cristiane shook her head with guileless innocence.
Wray said carelessly that he did not know, but his face flushed a
little.
Mrs. Trelane finished her lunch and went to find out. Half-way upstairs
she looked down; there was Ismay on her comfortably padded sofa,
stretching herself awake.
“Well, of all the peculiar people! I never saw any one stretch so like
a cat. Ismay,” she said aloud, “what on earth are you doing there?”
“I was tired--I think. Mother, come here a minute.”
The unusual tone in her voice astounded the listener; she came
down-stairs hastily.
“Tired! From what? And why did you go to sleep here? I couldn’t find
you anywhere, and I was terrified Cristiane might think something
about you and that horrid Cylmer. Tell me, did she mean anything this
morning?” sharply, seating herself on the end of the sofa.
“Don’t know, and don’t care,” said the girl sleepily. “Of course not.
How could she? It was to pay me for saying Marcus was horrid.”
“You said that to her!”
“Oh, don’t be agitated. She didn’t believe me,” said Ismay flippantly.
“Mother, I want to speak to you. No, don’t move! It’s safer here than
anywhere. We can hear any one coming a long way off on this hard oak
floor. I want you to tell me--think hard, mother, I mean it--if you
don’t know of any one that might have been in Abbotsford’s room that
day?”
“What makes you think of that now?”
“I’m always thinking of it,” her hand to her head that felt so oddly
heavy. “I’m frightened.”
“What of? I didn’t do it,” almost absently. “Think of some one, you
say. You little fool, do you suppose I have not tried and tried? There
was no one who had anything against Abbotsford. I know you don’t
believe me; I know you think I did it.”
“You might as well have if we can’t find out who did,” Ismay said
wearily. “Look here, where was Marcus that day?”
“Marcus!” She hushed the cry with a sudden remembrance of those two in
the dining-room; but she went on with unexpected freedom, recollecting
they were going out, were gone by now.
“Oh, you needn’t think of him!” she said scornfully. “He was across the
way, waiting to see Florrie Bernstein, the dancer. She was out, and to
amuse himself the devil put it in his head to stare out the window. He
never had anything to do with the matter.”
The strangely found beetle was on the girl’s lips, but the sleep was
off her brain now, and she dared not trust her secret to her mother’s
careless keeping.
“I wish he had done it. I should like him to be hanged,” she muttered.
“He’s too clever,” bitterly, “to do anything but bully women.”
“Where is he now?” with late caution.
“He and Cristiane have gone out skating,” she said carelessly, for
Marcus had assured her the night before that the time was not ripe yet
for any action. “They’re all right, you little idiot. There’s no need
for you to look like that.”
Wild, dazed, swaying, Ismay was on her feet. All right, with that black
place in the ice, with that purpose in Wray’s mind!
“Get out of my way! Move!” she cried. “Get me some water, brandy,
anything! I can’t stand.”
Mrs. Trelane was in the dining-room and back almost before she knew at
the authority in the sharply breathed words.
“What’s the matter? Are you going to be ill?” she cried.
Ismay snatched the brandy and water.
“Ill? No! If I am we’re ruined.” With quick, swaying steps she passed
her mother, letting the empty glass fall in shivers to the floor.
“Then you’re crazy!” cried the mother. She stared stupidly at the
splinters, and by the time she had shrugged her shoulders amazedly
Ismay was gone.
Out the great door, hatless, into the winter air, that struck cold on