Slighted love or, At her heart's expense
There was a moment’s blank silence. Italy’s slender gloved hands were
writhing together nervously in her lap, and her face flamed burning
red, then pale again. She faltered, with downcast eyes:
“I--I--did not go to a large hotel. It was a small house.”
“If you will give me the address, I will send the maid there to settle
your bill and bring away your clothes.”
She lifted up wild, frightened eyes, and she gasped faintly:
“I--I--paid my bill in advance, and the clothes really do not
matter--that old gray traveling-dress, you know. And, indeed I don’t
think I can recall the address. I have forgotten the street.”
“Then are you ready to come home with me?”
The dark eyes looked up at him with strange, piteous doubt, the red
lips faltered, as she asked:
“You cannot surely wish me to come--after yesterday?”
“Let us forget yesterday,” Francis Murray answered, with a constrained
laugh. “Perhaps I was too harsh and you too hasty. At least, you were
wrong to go away like that. Your proper home is with my mother, so you
must come back with me to The Lodge.”
Her eyes kept searching his face. She was surprised that he was so much
kinder now than in the weeks past.
“I ought not to go back again. You--you--hate me!” she cried, and he
smiled at her vehemence, and answered coolly:
“No, not quite!”
She looked so frightened, so doubtful, he was moved to a little act of
kindness. He put out his hand and took her cold, trembling one in a
firm clasp.
“I am your friend, Italy--your true friend,” he said gently. “And for
your father’s sake, I want to watch over you. Come with me now. The cab
is waiting.”
She drew her hand quickly from his, startled by the thrill that stirred
her heart at his warm, magnetic clasp. And to herself she cried
shudderingly:
“My friend, no, no; I must not call him my friend. I ought to go back
to Europe. What is the use staying here now? He suspects me--watches
me. My hands are tied.”
“Come,” he repeated, with gentle impatience, and some compelling power
in the clear voice, resistless as the tide of fate, made her rise and
follow him.
On the way to Winthrop they said but little. The curious maid was close
at hand always, but Italy did not care to talk. She was recalling with
horror last night’s events--events that must remain forever locked in
her own breast.
And Italy, who had gone away so angrily yesterday from Winthrop, was
now secretly glad to get back; so glad of the peace and security to
which she was going back that she could have fallen at Francis Murray’s
feet in gratitude for the gentle force that had compelled her to return.
“Have I wronged him by my suspicions? Is he as good and true and noble
as he seems?” she asked herself, with strangely softened feelings.
They were going up the walk to the house. A chattering group was on the
broad porch, and suddenly Francis Murray exclaimed:
“There is our friend that we have been expecting for a week past. He
must have arrived after I left this morning. You will like him, I
am sure, Italy, for he is very pleasant, and, besides, he was your
father’s dearest friend. Perhaps you have heard your mother speak of
him. His name is Percy Seabright.”
“No,” she answered, in surprise, and then she saw that the subject of
their talk was running down the steps to greet them. He was tall,
slender, elegant, and Italy looked up eagerly to meet her father’s
dearest friend. That face! She gave one look and fainted at his feet.
It was no wonder that Italy’s senses had failed her, for at the first
glance at Percy Seabright she had recognized in him the original of
the fascinating portrait she had seen over the mantel in the parlor of
that horror-haunted house last night--the same face exactly, although
older by at least five years, but carrying the marks of age so lightly
that at five-and-thirty the handsome, Jewish-looking face still bore an
expression of debonair youth and almost boyish beauty.
Italy had fallen on her face, and both men stooped quickly to raise her
up.
Francis Murray was first, and slipping his arm beneath her shoulder he
lifted the death-white face. The girl’s eyes were closed, and her head
fell heavily back against him. He took her into his arms and carried
her into the porch, followed by Mr. Seabright, who exclaimed ruefully:
“I must be turning into an ogre, the way I am frightening ladies
to-day! First there was Mrs. Dunn, who shrieked and fainted when I made
my bow to her this morning, and now here is Miss Vale frightened at the
first sight of me! Do you see anything alarming about me, Mr. Murray?”
“Nothing!” answered Francis Murray, almost curtly, as he laid Italy
upon a couch where the wind could blow over her pale face revivingly,
but Ralph Allen exclaimed banteringly:
“You strike them all senseless by the power of your fascinations,
Mr. Seabright. I am surprised that Alexie and Miss Alys did not fall
unconscious, too, before your dazzling glance!”
The ladies, with the exception of Mrs. Dunn, all crowded round Italy,
but the more skilful maid motioned them away.
“I think Mr. Murray had better carry her to her room. I want to loosen
her clothes, for this is no common faint,” she said gravely.
So once again Francis Murray took Italy up like a child in his arms,
and carried her to the room she had left in bitter anger yesterday. She
lay still as death against his breast, but his face looked calm and
quiet as usual. Who was to tell that his heart was beating violently
against its precious burden? Who could guess that a mad longing
overcame him to strain her close and kiss the white cheek lying on his
shoulder so near to his lips? It wrenched his heart to put her out of
his arms and leave her there to the care of the maid and his cold-faced
mother, just now entering.
“Shall I call a physician?” he asked anxiously.
“It is not necessary,” she replied indifferently, and closed the door
on his troubled face.
He could not return to the guests below just yet. He walked the length
of the hall and paused a while in the embrasure of the window, looking
out at the restless sea.
There had been a high wind last night, and in the storm a pretty little
sloop had gone to pieces. The wreck had washed up on Winthrop beach,
and lay there now idly in the full sunlight of the day, while the
waves, still a little rough and heady, came breaking against the ruined
hull with sharp reports, spattering the powdery spray high in the
air. Some heaps of drift dotted the sands, and the glancing wings of
sea-gulls flashed over the waters here and there. Francis Murray seemed
to be looking at these things, but in reality it was a vacant stare. He
was looking into his own heart.
He was startled at the violence of his own emotions now and while he
had carried helpless Italy close in his strong arms.
Since the day when she had come first to The Lodge, and he had received
her unwillingly as a guest, his life had been altered--into its calm,
scholarly quiet had crept a strange and subtile unrest.
He had begun by disliking Italy Vale for her mother’s sake, and this
very dislike created a strange tumult within him. He had watched her
closely, and yesterday, when he had spoken to her so harshly it had
seemed to him that dislike had turned into actual hate.
What had happened to him since yesterday? Was his heart in revolt
against his judgment and his reason? Was it a boy’s heart, still to
be thrilled by somber dark eyes, a red mouth like a flower, and the
warmth of a little helpless form carried tenderly in his arms?
“I cannot help but pity her,” he murmured, as if that accounted for all.
He was startled from his musings presently by the voice of his mother.
“After all, Frank, I believe you had better call in Doctor Barksdale.
Italy’s swoon is so heavy that we do not know what to do.”
Doctor Barksdale came promptly, but it required all the skill he was
possessed of to restore the young girl to consciousness.
Then a week passed before she came out of her own room again.
A light attack of brain-fever had followed her swoon. Fortunately, it
was very mild and soon subdued.
In the meantime the Boston papers had duly chronicled the mysterious
disappearance of Craig Severn, a young lawyer, who had been in charge
of Lawyer Gardner’s office while the latter was abroad resting from
overwork. The young wife of Mr. Severn, it was said, was almost frantic
with grief, and feared foul play.
Uncharitable people declared that Severn had led a fast life, and had,
perhaps, disappeared with his employer’s funds. Mr. Gardner had been
advised by cable of the facts.
On the very day that Italy arose from her sick-bed, the newspapers
announced the finding of Craig Severn’s body in the river, badly
decomposed, and with a bullet-wound in the breast, showing that he had
been murdered.
CHAPTER VI.
EMMETT’S PLEA.
“Miss Vale, I hope you did not conceive an aversion for me the day you
fainted so tragically at my feet,” said Percy Seabright.
He had found Italy alone on the wide porch fronting the sea, a few
days after her recovery. A chilly east wind blew from the beach, in
spite of the warm sunshine, and she wore a picturesque dark-red cloak
about the shoulders of her white serge yachting-dress with its smart
gilt anchors. She had promised to join the yacht-club in a charming
excursion that day. His voice was very kind and solicitous, and she
answered frankly:
“Oh, no, no, Mr. Seabright. On the contrary, I was prepared to like you
very much, for Mr. Murray had been telling me that you were my father’s
dearest friend.”
Instantly a peculiar change came over his face. He had been smiling,
but the smile faded into sadness and gloom on the lips and in the eyes,
and his dark cheek seemed to grow livid with silent emotion.
“Oh, forgive me!” cried the girl impulsively, and her heart warmed
toward him. “You loved him, and it grieves you still to remember his
sad fate.”
“Yes, I loved him,” Percy Seabright answered huskily, “and as Mr.
Murray has told you, I was Ronald’s dearest friend. Will you be my
friend, too--for his sake?”
He held out to her a graceful white hand, and after a moment’s
embarrassed pause, Italy placed hers in it, meeting a warm, strong
pressure that she permitted but did not return. Some strange emotion
thrilled her at the touch, she hardly knew whether it was pleasure or
repulsion.
“Will you promise to be my friend?” he repeated, in an eager, impulsive
way, with a winning smile.
“I--hope--I--will,” she answered, a little deliberately; “I scarcely
know you yet, you know, and I am not used to choosing friends so
quickly. Mama always told me it was rash to do so--that one might be
mistaken, and that friends should be tried and proved--but still, you
were my father’s friend. He loved you, trusted you.”
“And why not you?” he exclaimed, with a persuasive glance of his bright
dark eyes that somehow won her to reply:
“I will.”
He thanked her fervently, and then she continued:
“I am so glad to have a single true friend--one who knows the past, one
who might help me.”
“Tell me what I can do for you. I am ready and willing”--eagerly.
The surf beat loud and sharply on the beach, the wind rose and whistled
around the corners of the house and through the stately fir-trees with
a soughing murmur. If she had listened to them, they would have sounded
eerily, warningly, in her ears, but she heard only that low-toned,
persuasive voice, saw only the dazzling dark eyes bent with an intense
gaze upon her own, inviting her confidence. She looked up at him with
big, solemn eyes.
“I will confide in you,” she said impetuously. “I will tell you the
dream, the aim, the purpose of my life. It is to clear the memory of