“They used to hang behind the pantry door–a great bunch of them. Don’t they hang there now?”
“Ye–es.”
“I thought so,” muttered the woman, triumphantly. “Now, listen, Pluma; I want you to do exactly as I bid you. I want you to go quickly and quietly, and bring me the longest and thinnest one. You are not to breathe one word of this to any living soul. Do you understand, Pluma–I command you to do it.”
“Yes,” answered the child, dubiously.
“Stay!” she called, as the child was about to turn from her. “Why is the house lighted up to-night?”
Again the reckless spirit of the child flashed forth.
“My father has brought home his bride,” she said. “Don’t you see him bending over her, toward the third window yonder?”
The woman’s eyes quickly followed in the direction indicated.
Was it a curse the woman muttered as she watched the fair, golden-haired young girl-wife’s head resting against Basil Hurlhurst’s breast, his arms clasped lovingly about her?
“Go, Pluma!” she commanded, bitterly.
Quickly and cautiously the child sped on her fatal errand through the storm and the darkness. A moment later she had returned with the key which was to unlock a world of misery to so many lives.
“Promise me, Pluma, heiress of Whitestone Hall, never to tell what you have done or seen or heard to-night. You must never dare breathe it while you live. Say you will never tell, Pluma.”
“No,” cried the child, “I shall never tell. They might kill me, but I would never tell them.”
The next moment she was alone. Stunned and bewildered, she turned her face slowly toward the house. The storm did not abate in its fury; night-birds flapped their wings through the storm overhead; owls shrieked in the distance from the swaying tree-tops; yet the child walked slowly home, knowing no fear. In the house lights were moving to and fro, while servants, with bated breath and light footfalls, hurried through the long corridors toward her father’s room. No one seemed to notice Pluma, in her dripping robe, creeping slowly along by their side toward her own little chamber.
It was quite midnight when her father sent for her. Pluma suffered him to kiss her, giving back no answering caress.
“I have brought some one else to you, my darling,” he said. “See, Pluma–a new mamma! And see who else–a wee, dimpled little sister, with golden hair like mamma’s, and great blue eyes. Little Evalia is your sister, dear. Pluma must love her new mamma and sister for papa’s sake.”
The dark frown on the child’s face never relaxed, and, with an impatient gesture, her father ordered her taken at once from the room.
Suddenly the great bells of Whitestone Hall ceased pealing for the joyous birth of Basil Hurlhurst’s daughter, and bitter cries of a strong man in mortal anguish rent the air. No one had noticed how or when the sweet, golden-haired young wife had died. With a smile on her lips, she was dead, with her tiny little darling pressed close to her pulseless heart.
But sorrow even as pitiful as death but rarely travels singly. Dear Heaven! how could they tell the broken-hearted man, who wept in such agony beside the wife he had loved so well, of another mighty sorrow that had fallen upon him? Who was there that could break the news to him? The tiny, fair-haired infant had been stolen from their midst. They would have thanked God if it had been lying cold in death upon its mother’s bosom.
Slowly throughout the long night–that terrible night that was never to be forgotten–the solemn bells pealed forth from the turrets of Whitestone Hall, echoing in their sound: “Unhappy is the bride the rain falls on.” Most truly had been the fulfillment of the fearful prophecy!
“Merciful God!” cried Mrs. Corliss, “how shall I break the news to my master? The sweet little babe is gone!”
For answer Hagar bent quickly over her, and breathed a few words in her ear that caused her to cry out in horror and amaze.
“No one will ever know,” whispered Hagar; “it is the wisest course. The truth will lie buried in our own hearts, and die with us.”
Six weeks from the night his golden-haired wife had died Basil Hurlhurst awoke to consciousness from the ravages of brain-fever–awoke to a life not worth the living. Quickly Mrs. Corliss, the housekeeper, was sent for, who soon entered the room, leaning upon Hagar’s arm.
“My wife is–” He could not say more.
“Buried, sir, beneath yonder willow.”
“And the babe?” he cried, eagerly. “Dead,” answered Hagar, softly. “Both are buried in one grave.”
Basil Hurlhurst turned his face to the wall, with a bitter groan.
Heaven forgive them–the seeds of the bitterest of tragedies were irrevocably sown.
CHAPTER II
One bright May morning some sixteen years later, the golden sunshine was just putting forth its first crimson rays, lighting up the ivy-grown turrets of Whitestone Hall, and shining upon a little white cottage nestling in a bower of green leaves far to the right of it, where dwelt John Brooks, the overseer of the Hurlhurst plantation.
For sixteen years the grand old house had remained closed–the plantation being placed in charge of a careful overseer. Once again Whitestone Hall was thrown open to welcome the master, Basil Hurlhurst, who had returned from abroad, bringing with him his beautiful daughter and a party of friends.
The interior of the little cottage was astir with bustling activity.
It was five o’clock; the chimes had played the hour; the laborers were going to the fields, and the dairy-maids were beginning their work.
In the door-way of the cottage stood a tall, angular woman, shading her flushed and heated face from the sun’s rays with her hand.
“Daisy, Daisy!” she calls, in a harsh, rasping voice, “where are you, you good-for-nothing lazy girl? Come into the house directly, I say.” Her voice died away over the white stretches of waving cotton, but no Daisy came. “Here’s a pretty go,” she cried, turning into the room where her brother sat calmly finishing his morning meal, “a pretty go, indeed! I promised Miss Pluma those white mulls should be sent over to her the first thing in the morning. She will be in a towering rage, and no wonder, and like enough you’ll lose your place, John Brooks, and ’twill serve you right, too, for encouraging that lazy girl in her idleness.”
“Don’t be too hard on little Daisy, Septima,” answered John Brooks, timidly, reaching for his hat. “She will have the dresses at the Hall in good time, I’ll warrant.”
“Too hard, indeed; that’s just like you men; no feeling for your poor, overworked sister, so long as that girl has an easy life of it. It was a sorry day for me when your aunt Taiza died, leaving this girl to our care.”
A deep flush mantled John Brooks’ face, but he made no retort, while Septima energetically piled the white fluted laces in the huge basket–piled it full to the brim, until her arm ached with the weight of it–the basket which was to play such a fatal part in the truant Daisy’s life–the life which for sixteen short years had been so monotonous.
Over the corn-fields half hid by the clover came a young girl tripping lightly along. John Brooks paused in the path as he caught sight of her. “Poor, innocent little Daisy!” he muttered half under his breath, as he gazed at her quite unseen.
Transferred to canvas, it would have immortalized a painter. No wonder the man’s heart softened as he gazed. He saw a glitter of golden curls, and the scarlet gleam of a mantle–a young girl, tall and slender, with rounded, supple limbs, and a figure graceful in every line and curve–while her arms, bare to the elbow, would have charmed a sculptor. Cheek and lips were a glowing rosy red–while her eyes, of the deepest and darkest blue, were the merriest that ever gazed up to the summer sunshine.
Suddenly