She moved a step nearer, her burning eyes fixed on his.
"You remember Rachel Carter well enough. Have you no recollection of the little girl you used to play with? Minda? The babe who could scarcely toddle when you--"
"Of course I remember her," he cried impatiently. "I remember everything. You took her away with you and--why did you not leave her behind as my father left me? Why could you not have been as fair to your child as he was to his?"
She was silent for a moment, pondering her answer. "I do not suppose it has ever occurred to you that I might have loved my child too deeply to abandon her," she said, a strange softness in her voice.
"My father loved me," he cried out, "and yet he left me behind."
"He loved you,--yes,--but he would not take you. He left you with some one who also loved you. Don"t ever forget that, Kenneth Gwynne.
I would not go without Minda. No more would your mother have gone without you. Stop! I did not mean to offend. So you DO remember little Minda?"
"Yes, I remember her. But she is dead. Why do you mention her--"
"Minda is not dead," said she slowly.
"Not--why, she was drowned in the--"
"No. Minda is alive. You saw her last night,--at Phineas Striker"s house."
He started violently. "The girl I saw last night was--Minda?" he cried. "Why, Striker told me she was--"
"I know,--I know," she interrupted impatiently. "Striker told you what he believed to be true. He told you she was Robert Gwyn"s daughter and your half-sister. But I tell you now that she is Minda Carter. There is not a drop of Gwyn blood in her body."
"Then, she is not my half-sister?" he exclaimed, utterly dazed, but aware of the exquisite sensation of relief that was taking hold of him.
"She is no blood relation of yours."
"But she is,--yes, now I understand,--she is my step-sister," he said, with a swift fall of spirits.
"I suppose that is what you might call her," said Rachel Gwyn, indifferently. "I have not given it much thought."
"Does she know that she is not my father"s daughter?"
"No. She believes herself to be his own flesh and blood,--his own daughter," said she with the deliberateness of one weighing her words, that they might fall with full force upon her listener.
"Why are you telling me all this?" he demanded abruptly. "What is your object? If she does not know the truth, why should I? Good G.o.d, woman, you--you do not expect ME to tell her, do you? Was that your purpose in getting me here? You want me to tell her that--"
"No!" she cried out sharply. "I do not want you or any one else to do that. Listen to me. I sha"n"t beat about the bush,--I will not waste words. So far as Viola and the world are concerned, she is Robert Gwyn"s daughter. That is clear to you, is it not? She was less than two years old when we came away,--too young to remember anything. We were in the wilderness for two or three years, and she saw but one or two small children, so that it was a very simple matter to deceive her about her age. She is nearly twenty-two now, although she believes she is but nineteen. She does not remember any other father than Robert Gwyn. She has no recollection of her own father, nor does she remember you. She--"
"Last night she described her father to me," he interrupted. "Her supposed father, I mean. She made it quite plain that he did not love her as a father should love his own child."
"It was not that," she said. "He was afraid of her,--mortally afraid of her. He lived in dread of the day when she would learn the truth and turn upon him. He always meant to tell her himself, and yet he could not find the courage. Toward the end he could not bear to have her near him. It would not be honest in me to say that he loved her. I do not believe he would have loved a child if one had come to him and me,--no child of mine could take the place you had in his heart." She spoke with calm bitterness. "You say she told you about him last night. I am not surprised that she should have spoken of him as she did. It was not possible for her to love him as a father. Nature took good care of that. There was a barrier between them. She was not his child. The tie of blood was lacking.
Nature cannot be deceived. She has never told me what her true feelings toward him were, but I have sensed them. I could understand.
I think she is and always has been bewildered. It is possible that away back in her brain there is something too tiny to ever become a thought, and yet it binds her to a man she does not even remember.
But we are wasting time. You are wondering why I have told you the truth about Viola. The secret was safe, so why should I reveal it to you,--my enemy,--isn"t that what you are thinking?"
"Yes. I don"t quite grasp your motive in telling me, especially as I am still to look upon Viola as my half-sister. I have already stated that under no circ.u.mstances will I hurt her by raking up that old, infamous story. I find myself in a most difficult position.
She believes herself to be my sister while I know that she is not.
It must strike even you, Rachel Carter, as the ghastliest joke that fate ever played on a man,--or a woman, either."
"I have told you the truth, because I am as certain as I am that I stand here now that you would have found it all out some day,--some day soon, perhaps. In the first place your father did not mention her in his will. That alone is enough to cause you to wonder. You are not the only one who is puzzled by his failure to provide for her as well as for you. Before long you would have begun to doubt, then to speculate, and finally you would have made it your business to find out why she was ignored. In time you could have unearthed the truth. The truth will always out, as the saying goes. I preferred to tell it to you at once. You understand I cannot exact any promises from you. You will do as you see fit in the matter.
There is one thing that you must realize, however. Viola has not robbed you of anything--not even a father"s love. She does not profit by his death. He did not leave her a farthing, not even a spadeful of land. I am ent.i.tled to my share by law. The law would have given it to me if he had left no will. I am safe. That is clear to you, of course. I earned my share,--I worked as hard as he did to build up a fortune. When I die my lands and my money will go to my daughter. You need not hope to have any part of them. I do not ask you to keep silent on my account. I only ask you to spare her.
If I have sinned,--and in the sight of man, I suppose I have,--I alone should be punished. But she has not sinned. I have thought it all out carefully. I have lain awake till all hours of the night, debating what was the best thing to do. To tell you or not to tell you, that was the question I had to settle. This morning I decided and this is the result. You know everything. There is no need for you to speculate. There is nothing for you to unravel. You know who Viola is, you know why she was left out of your father"s will.
The point is this, when all is said,--she must never know. She must always,--do you hear me?--she must always look upon you as her brother. She must never know the truth about me. I put her happiness, her pride, her faith, in your hands, Kenneth Gwynne."
He had listened with rigid attention, marvelling at the calm, dispa.s.sionate, unflinching manner in which she stated her case and Viola"s,--indeed, she had stated his own case for him. Apparently she had not even speculated on the outcome of her revelations; she was sure of her ground before she took the first step.
"There is no other course open to me," he said, taking up his hat.
He was very pale. "There is nothing more to say,--now or hereafter.
We have had, I trust, our last conversation. I hate you. I could wish you all the unhappiness that life can give, but I am not such a beast as to tell your daughter what kind of a woman you are. So there"s the end. Good-day, Rachel Carter."
He turned away, his hand was on the door-latch, before she spoke again.
"There is something more," she said, without moving from the spot where she had stood throughout the recital. The same calm, cold voice,--the same compelling manner. "It was my pleading, back in those other days, that finally persuaded Robert Gwyn to let me bring Minda up as his daughter. He was bitterly opposed to it at first. He never quite reconciled himself to the deception. He did not consider it being honest with her. He was as firm as a rock on one point, however. He would bring her up as his daughter, but he would not give her his name. It was after he agreed to my plan that he changed the spelling of his own name. She was not to have his name,--the name he had given his own child. That was his real reason for changing his name, and not, as you may suspect, to avoid being traced to this strange land."
"A belated attempt to be fair to me, I suppose," he said, ironically.
"As you like," she said, without resentment. "In the beginning, as I have told you, he believed it to be his duty to tell her the truth about herself. He was sincere in that. But he did not have the heart to tell her after years had pa.s.sed. Now let me tell you what he did a few weeks before he pa.s.sed away,--and you will know what a strange man he was. He came home one day and said to me: "I have put Viola"s case in the hands of Providence. You may call it luck or chance if you like, but I call it Providence. I cannot go to her face to face and tell her the truth by word of mouth, but I have told her the whole story in writing." I was shocked, and cried out to know if he had written to her in St. Louis. He smiled and shook his head. "No, I have not done that. I have written it all out and I have hidden the paper in a place where she is not likely to ever find it,--where I am sure she will never look. I will not even tell you where it is hidden,--for I do not trust you,--no, not even you. You would seek it out and destroy it." How well he knew me! Then he went on to say, and I shall never forget the solemn way in which he spoke: "I leave it all with Providence. It is out of my hands. If she ever comes across the paper it will be a miracle,--and miracles are not the work of man. So it will be G.o.d Himself who reveals the truth to her." Now you can see, Kenneth, that the secret is not entirely in our keeping. There is always the chance that she may stumble upon that paper. I live in great dread. My hope now is that you will find it some day and destroy it. I have searched in every place that I can think of. I confess to that. It is hidden on land that some day will belong to Viola,--that much he confided to me. It is not on the land belonging to you,--nor in your house over there."
"You are right," he said, deeply impressed. "There is always the chance that it will come to light. There is no telling how many times a day she may be within arm"s length of that paper,--perhaps within inches of it. It is uncanny."
He cast a swift, searching look about the room, as if in the hope that his eyes might unexpectedly alight upon the secret hiding place.
"He could not have hidden it in this house without my knowing it,"
she said, divining his thought.
He was silent for a moment, frowning reflectively. "Are you sure that no one else knows that she is not his daughter?"
"I am sure of it," she replied with decision.
"And there is nothing more you have to tell me?"
"Nothing. You may go now."
Without another word he left her. He was not surprised by her failure to mention the early morning episode at Striker"s cabin.
His concluding question had opened the way; it was clear that she had no intention of discussing with him the personal affairs of her daughter. Nevertheless he was decidedly irritated. What right had she to ask him to accept Viola as a sister unless she was also willing to grant him the privileges and interests of a brother?
Certainly if Viola was to be his sister he ought to have something to say about the way she conducted herself,--for the honour of the family if for no other reason.
As he walked rapidly away from the house in the direction of Main Street, he experienced a sudden sense of exaltation. Viola was not his sister! As suddenly came the reaction, and with it stark realization. Viola could never be anything to him except a sister.
CHAPTER IX
BROTHER AND SISTER