Remain perfectly quiet till nightfall and then go home a wiser and a better man."
"G.o.d bless you, miss!" said the man brokenly. "I have been very wicked all my life. I have wronged many, and you more than all; but if my life is spared, I"ll make some things right."
Wondering at his words, Daisy left him and rejoined her friends, after the brief absence which was destined to bear rich fruits to her orphaned heart.
That night, under cover of the darkness, the man went away. But at ten o"clock, in defiance of prudence, he came back, knocked boldly, and asked to see Miss Templeton--he had a package for her. She came, and placing something in her hand, abruptly left, mounted his horse, and rode away in a fierce gallop, ere she could speak, and again Daisy closed the door upon this thread of her romantic destiny.
On opening the package she found a coral necklace and armlets, with clasps engraved, and a soiled, miserably-scrawled letter. The initials on the jewels were R.M. The letter told her that he, the desperate and outlawed writer, had been leagued with a band of reckless men some years ago, and had stolen her away from her beautiful home in Louisville, thinking to obtain a heavy ransom. While pa.s.sing through Garrard county, he, the man to whose care the gang had confided her, because he was sort o" womanish, they said, had lagged behind intent upon a bottle of whisky, and when he recovered his senses, the child was gone. Fearing that she had met her death, and knowing nothing then of the picnic party that had rescued her, he fled the country for some years, and after his return he had never had courage to confess his crime. Her parents were wealthy, and their name was Mentelle. He could tell her nothing of their present whereabouts.
New Year"s Eve comes in cold, and a deep snow envelops the earth.
A wedding party at the corner house on Danville street is the event of the evening. Roye Howard and Daisy Mentelle have just taken their marriage vows, and the house is crowded with guests. Just before supper a new arrival startles and astonishes the brilliant company. Henry Clay, grown grey with years and honors, is among them, never having lost sight of his protege. After congratulating the pair and kissing the bride, he bade her come with him to another apartment; and when she had wonderingly obeyed, he proudly presented to her a handsome lady richly dressed in mourning.
"This, my dear, is your mother. I have not rested till I found her."
"It is she--it is she, indeed," exclaimed the n.o.ble-looking woman--"my own little Ray--my Daisy!" and the mother clasped her newfound darling to her breast in a pa.s.sion of thankfulness and joy.
"This is my bridal present, my dear," said the statesman, after much had been told, and Roye admitted to the circle.
"Since your letter of inquiry to me, my search has been constant. Your father is no more, but this boon is the greatest of all. Receive her with my blessing. Three times have I pa.s.sed through your town. Always has it held a warm place in my heart. May every succeeding twelve months bring to you as happy a New Year!"
An Easter Dawn
"AND THERE WAS LIGHT"
"Are you inflexible, Doris? Can nothing alter your decision?"
"Spare us both further pain, Warner. I cannot leave my blind mother. It is useless to ask it."
"And do I ask it? You can still care for your mother. I do not ask you to leave her."
The girl shook her head sadly.
"As a wife I must go with my husband. In the conflict of duties the mother must yield. No, no, it would be cruel."
"Even admitting this, is there not a way out of it? Will she not try to have her sight restored? Once relieved she might depend upon others, and be content without you. Then you could come to me."
"I dare not urge this. Think what she endured before--the operation, the mismanagement, the suffering, and the final loss of the eye itself. Oh, Warner, the recollection of that terrible time makes me shudder. I pray that she may forget it. I dare not urge another trial. Spare me that."
There was silence in the room, broken only by the ticking of the little mantle clock, till in a low suppressed voice she continued:
"And you know the awful blow that came so soon after, that has broken her down. She clings to me in so many ways. No, Warner, she might yield to my persuasions, but I should never forgive myself if things went wrong."
"Wrong?" echoed the man, bitter pain tugging at his heart. "How much more wrong could things go? But it is nothing to you that my life is made desolate, that loving you through all its best years I must quietly give you up, and that, too, when I am in condition to take care of you.
Have I shown no consideration by waiting? Have I ever pressed my claim till I knew I could make you comfortable and happy? But why do I cringe and beg like this?" he added, setting his teeth hard with the pain of disappointment. "If you really loved me you could not quibble about the thing you call duty." And he strode back and forth, refusing to take in the situation.
Then the girl"s forced composure gave way. This was not her first tilt with the man she loved, but he had never been so hard, so desperate, so unjust. Heroically she had tried to do her duty. Ignominously she now felt herself faltering in the way.
He could not bear her tears. The sight of her grief drove him from himself. Pausing before her, he said:
"Doris, I yield. Let it be as you say."
And he lifted her hand to his lips in adieu; though in his powerfully imposed self-restraint he could not be all tenderness. His tones were gentle, and in the look he cast upon her bowed figure there was no reproach.
He was gone; and Doris went back to the mother who was unconscious that she was wrecking the happiness of this devoted child; the only one left to her. One by one they had married and gone, and now in her darkened world she was enduring a more fearful weight of woe than blindness.
Ralph, her youngest, and her darling, the Benjamin of her old age, had fled the country under the awful ban of murder. His employer, a hard man, had been found dead in his private office from a blow on the back of the head. Suspicion pointed to Ralph, who, poor, hot-headed fellow, had been heard to vow vengeance against the dead man for his harshness.
A fellow clerk warned him in time to flee from the officers of the law.
He could not go without seeing his mother. In the silence of the night he had clasped her trembling form in his stalwart young arms, and in broken, quivering tones, bade her trust in his innocence. "Mother, believe me, only believe me; I did not do it," and sped on in the darkness, an exile. She did believe in him. She would almost as soon have doubted her Savior"s love. But her stern, unbending pride of race was wounded. Her loving heart was pierced in its tenderest spot, and in a few short weeks she was a fretful, peevish invalid, making wholesale but unconscious draughts upon her n.o.ble daughter"s patience.
Five years had gone by since these household fetters had been forged for Doris. Young and lovely, she adorned every circle. Offers of marriage were unheeded, and her heart was untouched till Warner Douglas, the young physician, came. They had met when she was a school girl and he a student in the same town; and now it was revealed to her why he had chosen her place of residence as the starting point in his career. So they had loved and hoped on only to be crushed at last.
The day after her final rejection of his suit, the post brought a note that ran thus:
"Doris, good-bye; not for a day, or a week, but as long as may require to perfect my plans. I have spent a sleepless night, and this is my conclusion. There is one way out of this. Maddening as is your decision, I am forced to yield. But I shall not give you up without a struggle. I have determined to study the human eye as a specialty.
The savings I had meant to devote to our united lives shall go to this end. If I do not write often and in lover-like fashion, it will be because I must be firm in my undertaking. When I have mastered the science, I hope to come back to you with healing in my hand for the mother for whose infirmities you sacrifice me. Do not think me bitter; I am trying to be kind. In any case, be my probation long or short, I shall be
"Ever yours,
"WARNER DOUGLAS."
Long Doris wept heart-breaking tears over this letter. Had she decided aright? She mused far into the night, and at last her tired spirit found comfort in the hope that her lover might one day unlock the prison doors of both her mother and herself. Next day and for many days she went about her duties mechanically, but her blind mother missed nothing, knew nothing. Wearisome vigils were those! Not for a moment could she trust her charge alone. With the perverseness of age she would try to grope her way about, and more than once had she wandered into danger. Besides this active, bodily vigilance, there were papers and books to read to her, and the post-office was fairly haunted by fruitless messages for tidings of the wandering boy. "How long, O Lord, how long?" was the burden of the mother"s heart, and upon Doris fell the hopeless task of comforting.
Two years dragged their slow lengths. Time and sorrow made little change in Doris Hadyn. The fair, round cheeks had lost none of their bloom, for duty well performed brings its own reward. She was the moving spirit in all good works, and several of her young friends had gradually come to share her time in amusing and interesting her invalid mother.
Her lover"s departure, leaving his patients to a brother physician, had been a nine-days" wonder, but now all were rejoicing in his success at the city hospitals. Several wonderful operations had made a great noise, and he awoke one morning to find himself famous. No more anxious care for the savings he had intended for himself and his bride. They were returning upon him tenfold. At last he wrote to Doris:
"Are you waiting for me? I am coming, not for an hour, or for a day, but to cast my lot once more near you. But first I shall come as the physician, since till that mission is ended, I am forbidden to come as a lover.
"WARNER."
Not even the reproach in this laconic letter could tinge her joy. He was coming; that was uppermost. He came, and Doris met him as she had parted--loving and faithful; so proud of him, too, but unalterable in her duty as before. She found his whole nature widened and broadened, just as in appearance he was more manly. He was then a clever pract.i.tioner: he was now the renowned oculist. From the first day his office swarmed with patients. Old, chronic cases seemed to spring up everywhere, and he found himself in a fair way of being taxed beyond the limit.
Gently he began his ministrations to the mother of his beloved. When he had won her confidence, he felt that the battle was half fought. She soon expressed a willingness to submit to anything, to undergo any pain, if only her sight might be restored. This he could not promise, but his experienced eye could detect nothing worse than a cataract obstructing the vision, and he convinced her that it was worth the trial.
One mild winter day she was taken to his office now fitted up with all the belongings of his service. With bated breath he adjusted his instrument. Heavy portieres shut out the daylight. Steadily the electric ray was thrown into the darkened eye. Shrinking with a thousand fears, and tortured with suspense, Doris sank upon a sofa. In silence he applied his tests. She could hear the beatings of her heart. Softly he questioned his patient, who hung upon his words for her life sentence.
At last, lying a hand almost caressingly upon each shoulder, he said:
"My dear Mrs. Hadyn, I think I can give you sight."
An involuntary cry broke from her lips, and Doris burst into convulsive tears. Then relaxing the tension of these many weary years, the bearer of good tidings folded his arms about the slight form for a moment as he led her to her mother. Not yet, even, would he give full rein to his hopes. He might fail. There was inflammation lurking behind the eye-ball, caused by contagion from its fellow, which, when carelessly bandaged too closely, had burst from its socket, irretrievably lost.
He could but try; and now his humanity as well as his love nerved him to the task.