Great Heaven! How long was it since the dead girl, now sleeping under the deep waters, was happy and bright as they?
He fled again. This time the piercing cry filled his ears; it seemed to deaden his brain. He fell in the field near the cottage. Hours afterward the children out at play found him lying in the dank gra.s.s that fringed the pond under the alder trees.
The first faint flush of dawn, a rosy light, broke in the eastern sky, a tremulous, golden shimmer was on the lake as the sunbeams touched it.
The forest birds awoke and began to sing; they flew from branch to branch; the flowers began to open their "dewy eyes," the stately swans came out upon the lake, bending their arched necks, sailing round the water lilies and the green sedges.
The sun shone out at length in his majesty, warming and brightening the fair face of nature--it was full and perfect day. The gardeners came through the park to commence their work; the cows out in the pasture land stood to be milked, the busy world began to rouse itself; but the fatal secret hidden beneath the cold, dark water remained still untold.
Chapter XLI
The sun shone bright and warm in the breakfast room at Earlescourt.
The rays fell upon the calm, stately face of Lady Helena, upon the grave countenance of her son, upon the bright, handsome features of Lord Airlie. They sparkled on the delicate silver, and showed off the pretty china to perfection. The breakfast was upon the table, but the three occupants of the room had been waiting. Lady Helena took her seat.
"It seems strange," she said to Lord Earle, "to breakfast without either of the girls. I would not allow Lillian to rise; and from some caprice Beatrice forbade her maid to call her, saying she was tired."
Lord Earle made some laughing reply, but Lady Helena was not quite pleased. Punctuality with her had always been a favorite virtue. In case of real illness, allowance was of course to be made; but she herself had never considered a little extra fatigue as sufficient reason for absenting herself from table.
The two gentlemen talked gayly during breakfast. Lord Earle asked Hubert if he would go with him to Holte, and Lord Airlie said he had promised to drive Beatrice to Langton Priory.
Hearing that, Lady Helena thought it time to send some little warning to her grandchild. She rang for Suzette, the maid who waited upon Beatrice, and told her to call her young mistress.
She stood at her writing table, arranging some letters, when the maid returned. Lady Helena looked at her in utter wonder--the girl"s face was pale and scared.
"My lady," she said, "will you please come here? You are wanted very particularly."
Lady Helena, without speaking to either of the gentlemen, went to the door where the girl stood.
"What is it, Suzette?" she asked. "What is the matter?"
"For mercy"s sake, my lady," replied the maid, "come upstairs. I I can not find Miss Beatrice--she is not in her room;" and the girl trembled violently or Lady Helena would have smiled at her terror.
"She is probably with Miss Lillian," she said. "Why make such a mystery, Suzette?"
"She is not there, my lady; I can not find her," was the answer.
"She may have gone out into the garden or the grounds," said Lady Helena.
"My lady," Suzette whispered, and her frightened face grew deathly pale, "her bed has not been slept in; nothing is touched in her room; she has not been in it all night."
A shock of unutterable dread seized Lady Earle; a sharp spasm seemed to dart through her heart.
"There must be some mistake," she said, gently; "I will go upstairs with you."
The rooms were without occupant; no disarray of jewels, flowers, or dresses, no little slippers; no single trace of Beatrice"s presence was there.
The pretty white bed was untouched--no one had slept in it; the blinds were drawn, and the sunlight struggled to enter the room. Lady Helena walked mechanically to the window, and drew aside the lace curtains; then she looked round.
"She has not slept here," she said; "she must have slept with Miss Lillian. You have frightened me, Suzette; I will go and see myself."
Lady Helena went through the pretty sitting room where the books Beatrice had been reading lay upon the table, on to Lillian"s chamber.
The young girl was awake, looking pale and languid, yet better than she had looked the night before. Lady Earle controlled all emotion, and went quietly to her.
"Have you seen Beatrice this morning?" she asked. "I want her."
"No," replied Lillian; "I have not seen her since just before dinner last evening."
"She did not sleep with you, then?" said Lady Earle.
"No, she did not sleep here," responded the young girl.
Lady Helena kissed Lillian"s face, and quitted the room; a deadly, horrible fear was turning her faint and cold. From the suite of rooms Lord Earle had prepared and arranged for his daughters a staircase ran which led into the garden. He had thought at the time how pleasant it would be for them. As Lady Helena entered, Suzette stood upon the stairs with a bow of pink ribbon in her hand.
"My lady," she said, "I fastened the outer door of the staircase last night myself. I locked it, and shot the bolts. It is unfastened now, and I have found this lying by it. Miss Earle wore it last evening on her dress."
"Something terrible must have happened," exclaimed Lady Helena.
"Suzette, ask Lord Earle to come to me. Do not say a word to any one."
He stood by her side in a few minutes, looking in mute wonder at her pale, scared face.
"Ronald," she said, "Beatrice has not slept in her room all night. We can not find her."
He smiled at first, thinking, as she had done, that there must be some mistake, and that his mother was fanciful and nervous; but, when Lady Helena, in quick, hurried words, told him of the unfastened door and the ribbon, his face grew serious. He took the ribbon from the maid"s hand--it seemed a living part of his daughter. He remembered that he had seen it the night before on her dress, when he had held up the beautiful face to kiss it. He had touched that same ribbon with his face.
"She may have gone out into the grounds, and have been taken ill," he said. "Do not frighten Airlie, mother; I will look round myself."
He went through every room of the house one by one, but there was no trace of her. Still Lord Earle had no fear; it seemed so utterly impossible that any harm could have happened to her.
Then he went out into the grounds, half expecting the beautiful face to smile upon him from under the shade of her favorite trees. He called aloud, "Beatrice!" The wind rustled through the trees, the birds sang, but there came no answer to his cry. Neither in the grounds nor in the garden could he discover any trace of her. He returned to Lady Helena, a vague fear coming over him.
"I can not find her," he said. "Mother, I do not understand this. She can not have left us. She was not unhappy--my beautiful child."
There was no slip of paper, no letter, no clew to her absence. Mother and son looked blankly at each other.
"Ronald," she cried, "where is she? Where is the poor child?"
He tried to comfort her, but fear was rapidly mastering him.
"Let me see if Airlie can suggest anything," he said.
They went down to the breakfast room where Lord Airlie still waited for the young girl he was never more to meet alive. He turned round with a smile, and asked if Beatrice were coming. The smile died from his lips when he saw the pale, anxious faces of mother and son.
"Hubert," said Lord Earle, "we are alarmed--let us hope without cause.
Beatrice can not be found. My mother is frightened." Lady Helena had sunk, pale and trembling, upon a couch. Lord Airlie looked bewildered.