The sinister mark
that the operation was considered dangerous--but I pinned my faith to
the last thing I'd learned--and hoped.
"I'd made up my mind to take the risk, anyway. I had my plans all laid,
and that Saturday morning I drew enough money to see me through.... My
only question was whether or not to tell you.... And then, that last
night--that last night, dear, my courage failed utterly. When you spoke
of 'my sister Anne' with such confidence in me in your dear voice--oh,
Donald, every time you mentioned her, I felt--I can't tell you how
beneath contempt I felt.... To deceive you! Oh, Donald----"
"Don't--don't think of it, dearest," he said, gently. "I understand, I
understand."
"Oh, you're wonderful, wonderful," she said, with tears in her eyes.
"But it would all have been different if I had realized. Mine was a
bad case, Donald; the position and size of the mark, and my nervous
exhaustion, they all told against me, and after the very first
treatment I collapsed utterly. I knew nothing for days and days....
They kept me under anæsthetics and the treatment went on.... When
I came fully to myself, it was so near the end, I was so close to
achieving my heart's desire, that I made up my mind to wait--just a
little while, dear--to regain my strength, and then come back and tell
you--everything.... Oh, Donald," she paused, and looked deep into
his eyes, "I wonder if you can realize, quite, what the whole thing
meant to me. I knew you loved me, but I also knew how you shrank from
anything ugly, abnormal. I had good reason to know.... And the thing
had been a nightmare to me all my life long; I could not bear it any
longer.... And, if the operation was not to be successful, I had made
up my mind, Donald, that I would never, never see you again.... That
Mary Blake should vanish. That there should be no one left but Anne,
and that she would never be found, for--there would be nothing left in
life for her, and she would have been glad to lay it down----"
"Oh, Mary, Mary!" he cried, and unheeding the others in the room, he
threw his arms about her and held her fast. "It wouldn't have mattered
if the experiment had failed, dear. I love you, _you_--you must have
seen, just now, out there on the stairs--you must have realized that it
would have made no difference----"
"Oh, yes, Donald, yes," she sobbed. "I saw--I saw it all, and I
can't help being a little glad to know that not even that hideous
disfigurement could make a difference. But I never would have caused
you that pain, not even for my poor sister's sake, if I'd had any
idea----"
"And that's what made me so angry with you, Don," said Doctor Stevens,
striving to break the emotional tension of the scene. "As I said
before, if you'd only waited as I told you, you'd have been saved a
lot. You see, Don," he explained, "I have a very strong professional
interest in the case upstairs, and there was just one chance in a
million of helping Miss Rosamond Curwood to regain her memory, and the
Lord put it into my hand. I do think, now, it was that good old chap,
O'Malley, who first made the suggestion. It seems he had an experience
once with a similar case, where the patient was confronted with someone
well--intimately--known in the past."
"And this is how it happened just as it did, Mr. Morris," Peter broke
in, eagerly. "I'd wired O'Malley and Mrs. Rutherford, from Cordenham,
to meet us at the Penn. Station. Miss Blake didn't want me to telegraph
you. She was afraid of the shock, and it would have been impossible to
explain--well, everything--you see, in a telegram.... We got in about
noon, and O'Malley told us of the discovery you'd made. We compared
notes, and Miss Blake was certain that the person you'd found must be
her twin sister, Rosamond, who'd disappeared years ago. Miss Blake was
naturally all broken up over the whole thing, and O'Malley had a hunch
that if the two sisters were suddenly brought together, it might bring
Rosamond to herself. He called up Doctor Stevens on his own, while we
were going over to Mrs. Rutherford's hotel, where we were going to ask
you to come; and, by the time we'd seen to Miss Blake's luggage and
arrived at the hotel, Doctor Stevens was there, waiting for us. He was
keen on making the experiment, and was neither to hold nor to bind,"
he glanced, quizzically, at the doctor, "until he'd tried it out. Both
Miss Blake and I wanted to get you first, but he said he wasn't at all
satisfied with Miss Curwood's condition, and that the thing should be
tried at once if it was to be any good. Miss Blake became alarmed at
that, and agreed. But then we struck a snag; Miss Rosamond would never
know her sister without the--the mark, which had been successfully
removed. Then Mrs. Rutherford came to the front. She said, 'Why not
paint it on again?' And that she did to perfection, I will say----"
"So I telephoned to keep you out of the way, Don," added Doctor
Stevens, "and you upset all our plans."
"But you haven't told me yet whether you were successful," said Donald,
who, with Mary's hand held close in his, had followed the conversation
intently. "Were they right, Mary? And is your sister----"
She shook her head, sadly,
"She knew me, Donald. She recognized me--but she remembers nothing,
nothing at all, that has happened since we were little children
together. Perhaps--oh, perhaps, Donald, it is just as well. She has no
painful memories, and her life must have been--hard, I'm afraid. Doctor
Stevens says----"
"We can hope. We can always hope," said the doctor, comfortingly; but
by the look in his eyes, Donald Morris knew that there was little
hope, in this world, for Rosamond Curwood.
"We'll take care of her, Mary," Donald said, gently. "We'll take care
of her together, dear."
There was a moment's pause, and then Mrs. Rutherford spoke, for almost
the first time.
"Look here, Don," she said, in her deep, commanding voice. "I don't
want you to blame Anne for having played a part to the world."
"I don't, Aunt Kate," he said, looking not at her, but at Mary. "I
understand----"
"But that's just it," interrupted the old lady, quickly. "You
understand a part. That's all. I know you've a lively imagination,
and I will say, Don, that you're--that you're a pretty satisfactory
person--take it all in all.... But I want you to understand that it
was I who put Anne up to the whole thing, and I guess I'll need a few
prayers if my poor old soul is ever to get out of Purgatory."
"Don't talk that way, Aunt Kate," said Donald, smiling at her perturbed
face.
"All right, Don," she agreed, "but I want you to know, just the same,
how the whole thing came about. This clever young countryman of mine,"
with an appreciative glance at Peter, "figured out the whole affair.
His knowledge of it came to me like a bolt from the blue. I'd never
seen him, you know, till you introduced him to me in Fennimore Park,
and you can, perhaps, imagine my surprise when he told me who he was,
and what he was doing. I was startled nearly out of my wits, and when,
without more ado, he plunged into the very middle of the situation, and
announced, in a whisper that would have done credit to Henry Irving:
'Mrs. Rutherford, there has never been, in that apartment in New York,
but one person--and her name is Anne Curwood,' I was simply taken
completely off my feet."
She glanced about to note the effect of these lines, dramatically
uttered, then she went on:
"I told him, after that, what I'm going to tell you all now--you who
know some of the facts.... It was all my fault.... I found Anne slaving
her youth away in menial tasks--and I found out that she was the
daughter of my old friend, Winthrop Curwood."
"Winthrop Curwood of the old Athenæum Company?" asked Donald, with keen
interest. "Why, I've heard my mother speak of him often. She knew his
people in England."
"Yes, Don. That's the man. But please don't interrupt. I want to
get the whole thing off my mind. My conscience has been worrying me
so, in the last few days, that I must clear it, and take all the
blame.... This is how it was--I discovered, almost at once, that Anne
had inherited her father's wonderful gifts, and that he had given
her a perfectly marvellous training.... He had become blind, stone
blind, poor, poor Win--and teaching her had been his one pleasure and
recreation. He'd done wonders for her, and probably had great hopes
for her future. He never knew--Anne told me all this. With tears in
her eyes, she said that she could never bring herself to tell him that
there would be no possible chance for her on the stage.... When she
told me that--I had a great idea. I took her up to my room, and I made
her up with my own hands. Nobody was ever more skilful at that than
Kate Rohan." There was pride in the deep old voice. "I made her look
at herself in the glass. You could see the birthmark in the bright
daylight a little, not very much. But when I drew the blinds and turned
on the electric lights, there wasn't a trace--not a trace.
"Then I thought it all out.... She couldn't be seen in the daytime, in
a bright light, without the defect being discovered. And if it was once
known, it would be talked about, and I could see that Anne would never
be able to stand the kind of notoriety it would bring her. She was
too terribly sensitive about it.... I was at my wits' end for quite a
while, and then--suddenly--I saw a way out....
"I was determined that her wonderful gifts should not be lost to the
world, and I got Arthur Quinn to come up to Fennimore Park. I made Anne
act for him, after I'd made her up as she ought to look on the stage.
He was crazy--mad about her, and when I saw how he felt, I told him
everything, including my plan--which was that she should be two persons
instead of one.... I even picked out a name for her--Mary, for my own
mother, and Blake, which was part of her mother's name--Blakeslie....
So--as Mary Blake she was to astonish and delight the world; and as
Anne Blake she was to pursue her daily round, without any subterfuge
other than the change of name, to agree with that of her 'sister.'
And, too, I suggested that she play the part, while she was about
it--play Mary with spirit and pride, standing tall and straight, as
she always did when she was taken out of herself--and let Anne be as
she was: plainly dressed, timid, quiet, retiring; stooping a little as
she walked or stood.... To me, it was an added touch to the dramatic
possibilities of the situation, but Anne looked at the whole thing
with distaste and it took some time to persuade her--but, at last, she
yielded.
"I arranged everything for her with Arthur Quinn, contracts and all. We
even managed to have her photographed so that the photographer didn't
suspect. That was rather ticklish business, for the camera sometimes
sees what the eye doesn't. But we took care of the lighting, and the
results were perfectly satisfactory.
"In the meantime, I found the apartment in Waverly Place, and we
furnished it together."
"And had special lighting installed," put in Peter, eagerly.
"Ah, you noticed that, did you, Mr. Clancy?" The old, young eyes
flashed him a quick look. "Yes. You see, she had to make up for 'Mary
Blake' at home, and we were taking no chances with the gas, which was
already there. Anne was staying at my hotel, as my companion, so all
that was easily accomplished.... Then, when she began making money,
we had to get banking accommodations for her. Arthur Quinn managed
that. He took her to the Scoville Bank, where he had an account, and
introduced her."
"Twice?" asked Peter, quickly.
"Yes," replied Mrs. Rutherford, giving him a keen glance. "He waited
for a cloudy day, when there would be artificial light in the bank, and
then he took 'Mary Blake,' and helped her open an account. That was