XIX.
A DISCOVERY.
Frank Etheridge waited a long time that night for the promisedcommunication. Darkness came, but no letter; eight o'clock struck, andstill there was no sign of the dilatory Doris. Naturally impatient, hesoon found this lengthy waiting intolerable. Edgar was busy in hisoffice, or he would have talked to him. The evening paper which he hadbrought from New York had been read long ago, and as for his cigar, itlacked flavor and all power to soothe him. In his exasperation he wentto the book-shelves, and began looking over the numberless volumesranged in neat rows before him. He took out one, glanced at it, and putit back; he took out another, without even seeing what its title was,looked at it a moment, sighed, and put that back; he took out a third,which opened in his hand at the title-page, saw that it was one of thoseold-fashioned volumes, designated _The Keepsake_, and was about to closeand replace it as he had done the others, when his attention wassuddenly and forcibly attracted by a name written in fine and delicatecharacters on the margin at the top. It was no other than this:
HARRIET SMITH Gift of her husband October 3rd 1848
_Harriet Smith!_ Astounded, almost aghast, he ran to Edgar's office withthe volume.
"Edgar! Edgar!" he cried; "look here! See that name! And the book was inyour library too. What does it mean? Who was, who is Harriet Smith, thatyou should have her book?"
Dr. Sellick, taken by surprise, stared at the book a minute, then jumpedto his feet in almost as much excitement as Frank himself.
"I got that book from Hermione Cavanagh years ago; there was a poem init she wanted me to read. I did not know I had the book now. I havenever even thought of it from that day to this. Harriet Smith! Yes, thatis the name you want, and they must be able to tell you to whom itbelongs."
"I believe it; I know it; I remember now that they have always shown aninterest in the matter. Hermione wanted to read the will, and--Edgar,Edgar, can they be the heirs for whom we are searching, and is that whyHuckins haunts the house and is received by them in plain defiance of myentreaties?"
"If they are the heirs they would have been likely to have told you.Penniless young girls are not usually backward in claiming propertywhich is their due."
"That is certainly true, but this property has been left under acondition. I recollect now how disappointed Hermione looked when sheread the will. Give me the book; I must see her sister or herself atonce about it." And without heeding the demurs of his more cautiousfriend, Frank plunged from the house and made his way immediately to theCavanagh mansion.
His hasty knock brought Emma to the door. As he encountered her look andbeheld the sudden and strong agitation under which she labored, herealized for the first time that he was returning to the house beforereading the letter upon which so much depended.
But he was so filled with his new discovery that he gave that idea but athought.
"Miss Cavanagh--Emma," he entreated, "grant me a moment's conversation.I have just found this book in Dr. Sellick's library--a book which hedeclares was once given him by your sister--and in it----"
They had entered the parlor by this time and were standing by a tableupon which burned a lamp----"is a name."
She started, and was bending to look at the words upon which his fingerrested, when the door opened. Hermione, alarmed and not knowing what tothink of this unexpected return of her lover so soon, as she supposed,after the receipt of her letter, had come down from her room in thatmood of extreme tension which is induced by an almost unendurablesuspense.
Frank, who in all his experience of her had never seen her look as shedid at this moment, fell back from the place where he stood and hastilyshook his head.
"Don't look like that," he cried, "or you will make me feel I can neverread your letter."
"And have you not read it?" she demanded, shrinking in her turn till shestood on the threshold by which she had entered. "Why then are you here?What could have brought you back so soon when you knew----"
"This," he interpolated hastily, holding up the book which he had letfall on the table at her entrance. "See! the name of Harriett Smith iswritten in it. Tell me, I pray, why you kept from me so persistently thefact that you knew the person to whom the property I hold in trustrightfully belongs."
The two girls with a quick glance at each other drooped their heads.
"What was the use?" murmured Emma, "since Harriet Smith is dead and herheirs can never claim the property. _We_ are her heirs, Mr. Etheridge;Harriet Smith was our mother, married to father thirty-nine years agoafter a widowhood of only three months. It was never known in this placethat she had had a former husband or had borne the name of Smith. Therewas so much scandal and unhappiness connected with her first mostmiserable marriage, that she suppressed the facts concerning it as muchas possible. She was father's wife and that was all that the peopleabout here knew."
"I see," said Frank, wondering greatly at this romance in real life.
"But you might have told me," he exclaimed. "When you saw what worrimentthis case was causing me, you might have informed me that I wasexpending my efforts in vain."
"I wished to do so," answered Emma, "but Hermione dreaded the argumentsand entreaties which would follow."
"I could not bear the thought of them," exclaimed the girl from thedoorway where she stood, "any more than I can bear the thought now whena matter of much more importance to me demands your attention."
"I will go," cried Frank. But it was to the empty doorway he spoke;Hermione had vanished with these passionate words.
"She is nearly ill," explained Emma, following him as he made for thedoor. "You must excuse one who has borne so much."
"I do not excuse her," he cried, "I love her." And the look he cast upthe stairs fully verified this declaration. "That is why I go with halfon my lips unsaid. To-morrow we will broach the topic again, meanwhilebeware of Huckins. He means you no good by being here. Had I known hisconnection with you, he should never have entered these doors."
"He is our uncle; our mother's brother."
"He is a scamp who means to have the property which is rightfully yourdue."
"And he will have it, I suppose," she returned. "Hermione has nevergiven me a hope that she means to contend with him in this matter."
"Hermione has had no counsellor but her own will. To-morrow she willhave to do with me. But shut the door on Huckins; promise me you willnot see him again till after you have seen me."
"I cannot--I know too little what is in that letter."
"Oh, that letter!" he cried, and was gone from the house.
When he arrived at Dr. Sellick's again, he found Doris awaiting him,looking very flushed and anxious. She had a shawl drawn around her, andshe held some bundles under that shawl.
"I hope," she said, "that you did not get impatient, waiting for me. Ihad some errands to do, and while doing them I lost the letter youexpected and had to go back and look for it. I found it lying under thecounter in Mr. Davis' store and that is why it is so soiled, but theinside is all right, and I can only beg your pardon for the delay."
Drawing the packet from under her shawl, she handed it to the frowninglawyer, her heart standing still as she saw him turn it over and over inhis hand. But his looks if angry were not suspicious, and with arelieved nod she was turning to go when he observed:
"I have one word to say to you, Doris. You have told me that you havethe welfare of the young ladies you serve at heart. Prove this to be so.If Mr. Huckins comes to the door to-night, or in the early morning, saythat Miss Cavanagh is not well and that he had better go to the hotel.Do not admit him; _do not even open the door_, unless Miss Cavanagh orher sister especially command you to do so. He is not a safe friend forthem, and I will take the responsibility of whatever you do."
Doris, with wide-stretched eyes and panting breath, paused to collecther faculties. A week ago she would have received this intimationregarding anybody Mr. Etheridge might choose to mention, with gratitudeand a certain sense of increased importa
nce. But ambition and the senseof being on intimate and secret terms with a man and bachelor whoboasted of his thousands, had made a change in her weak and cunningheart, and she was disposed to doubt the lawyer's judgment of what wasgood for the young ladies and wise for her.
But she did not show her doubt to one whom she had secretly wronged solately; on the contrary she bowed with seeming acquiescence, and saying,"Leave me alone to take good care of my young ladies," drew her shawlmore closely about her and quietly slid from the house.
A man was standing in the shadow of a great elm on the corner.
As she passed, he whispered: "Don't stop, and don't expect to see meto-night. There is some one watching me, I am sure. To-morrow, if I canI will come."
She had done a wicked and dangerous thing, and she had not learned thesecret.