CHAPTER XXIV.
THE DARKEST HOUR.
A week had passed since the fatal birthday of Lovelace Ellsworth, and atthe quiet twilight hour he lay among his pillows, a pale, breathingimage of the splendid man whose life had been so cruelly blighted on hiswedding morn.
It was the strangest thing the medical fraternity had ever heard of--howthe young man lingered on with a bullet in his brain; but it wascertain, they said, to have a fatal ending soon. The strange, speechlessstupor in which he had lain for a week would soon close with death.
And meanwhile, his most faithful nurse was Dainty's mother.
The gentle woman had awakened from her drugged sleep directly after theexciting interview held in her room by Mrs. Ellsworth and her step-son,and her awakening had indeed been a most cruel one.
The news they had to tell her about Dainty was almost a death-blow.
She did not know how to credit the startling story, for she knew thather fair daughter never had a lover before coming to Ellsworth; but shedid not know how to contradict the letter they showed her that seemed tobe written in Dainty's own hand. She could only weep incessantly, andwonder why Heaven had dealt her so cruel a blow.
Then followed the attempted murder of Ellsworth; and rousing herselffrom the hopeless despair into which she was sinking, the noble womangave all her time and attention to caring for the sufferer, trying tolose her own keen sense of trouble in care for another.
And Love owed much to her tender care; for the hired nurse proved veryincompetent, and the ladies of the household gave no help, Mrs.Ellsworth continuing so ill for days as to engross the attention ofOlive and Ela.
In fact, they took no further interest in Lovelace Ellsworth, now thathe lay unconscious and dying, for what could be gained by kindness tohim now? It was better to cling to Mrs. Ellsworth, for she would inheritall her step-son's money by his failure to marry, and perhaps they mightcome in for a share through her favor.
So Mrs. Chase devoted herself to the sick man, weeping, hoping, andpraying for him to recover and help her to find Dainty; for instruggling back to consciousness that morning, she had heard vaguely, asin a dream, Love's assertion to his step-mother that he was already thehusband of her daughter.
This very day, a week after Dainty's disappearance, she had sought aninterview with the now recovered Mrs. Ellsworth, and begged her to usesome of her abundant means, as Love's agent, in searching for Dainty.
"It can not be true--that story that Dainty eloped with another for shenever had any lover but Mr. Ellsworth. Besides, when I was awakeningfrom my strange sleep that morning, I heard him telling you he hadmarried my daughter two weeks before," she said, wondering why Mrs.Ellsworth gasped and grew so deathly pale before she burst into thatstrange laugh, declaring that Mrs. Chase had dreamed the whole thing.
"Nothing of the kind was said by my step-son," she declared, firmly;adding, with a sneer: "Your trouble must have turned your brain, causingyou to imagine such a ridiculous thing; and I hope you will not mentionit to any one else, for Lovelace Ellsworth was the soul of honor, Iassure you, and the last person in the world to lead an innocent younggirl into anything so disgraceful as a secret marriage."
"I know that he was very noble," faltered the poor little woman, "and Imust indeed have dreamed it if you deny that I heard such a statement.Yet the dream was as vivid as a reality."
"Dreams often are, and this was only another instance," replied thehaughty woman, coldly, adding: "I see no use trying to find Dainty. Shewent away of her own free will, and she will not communicate herwhereabouts till she chooses. With that you must rest content. As for mypart, I am free to confess that I am so indignant at her treachery toLove that I don't care if I never see her face again!"
Mrs. Chase shrank sensitively from the angry flash of hersister-in-law's black eyes, and returned meekly to Love's bedside towatch the slowly sinking life and wipe the moisture from the pale browthat Dainty had so loved to kiss, and her tortured heart prayed hourly:
"Oh, God, give back his life! Raise him up from this bed of illness,that he may unravel the web of mystery that entangles the fate of mylost darling!"
Mrs. Ellsworth was terribly frightened, for Sheila Kelly had promptlytold her of Dainty's declaration that she was already married to Love,and her offer that Love would make her rich if she would set her free.
If the proud woman had felt the least pity for Dainty, it all died nowin the dread lest she should escape and rob her of the rich inheritancethat would be hers if Love died unmarried. She said to herselfresolutely that there was no help for it now. Dainty's life must besacrificed to the terrible exigencies of her position.
Not that Mrs. Ellsworth would have taken the girl's life with her ownwhite hands, or even deputed another to do so. Oh, no, no! Of course shewould not be so wicked, she told herself complacently.
But to imprison the poor girl on bread and water in a sunless dungeon,and goad her to despair till she died of persecution, or even took herown life--oh, that was quite another thing! thought the heartless woman,stifling the voice of conscience in her determination to succeed in herwicked aims.
With Sheila Kelly, as with Mrs. Chase, the mistress of Ellsworth laughedto scorn the assertion of Dainty that she was Love Ellsworth's wife.
"She was only trying to work on your feelings--do not pay any attentionto her falsehoods," she said; and Sheila, who had half-way determined tomake capital some way out of her important secret, stupidly yielded thepoint, and again became the tool of her wily mistress.
When Dainty had been imprisoned a week, Sheila visited her again, and,as a result, hurried to her mistress with a pale, scared face,whispering:
"I have earned the promised reward, madame. The girl is out of the way!"
"Dead!" whispered the woman, with an uncontrollable shudder.
"Yes, cowld and dead for hours, pore craythur!" answered the woman,displaying at last a touch of natural feeling in something like remorseover her hellish work.
"How?" demanded her mistress, hoarsely.
"By the poison, madame. It was all black on her lips, and spilt on thebed-clothes, and the vial broken on the floor; but she got enough tokill her stone dead."
"That is well. If she chose to die by suicide, we are not accountable,"she said, heartlessly, though her frame shook as with an ague chill.
No amount of sophistry could make her believe herself guiltless of thisterrible deed.
"Will you come and look at the corp', madame? I want you to be satisfiedI'm telling the truth," continued the Irish woman, eagerly; and after amoment of hesitation, Mrs. Ellsworth decided to go.
It was best to make sure of her cruel work.
In the twilight gloom they stole away, and threaded the dark, noisomecorridors of the ruined wing down to the underground passages, till theyreached the dark cell where poor Dainty's life had ebbed away inuntended illness and fever, till, crazed and delirious, she had endedall with the tempting draught that promised oblivion of her sorrows inwelcome death.
It was a sight to make the angels weep with pity when Sheila flashed herlight in the gloomy place, and revealed to Mrs. Ellsworth's shrinkingeyes the pale, still form of the girl she had hated and wronged, lyingon the squalid couch, with her golden tresses veiling her wasted formand framing the fair, dead face like sunshine; the blue eyes closed onthe world that had been so cruel to her; the pale lips stained with thedark liquid she had drained in the madness of her desperation.
On the chair lay the broken remains of the bread she had been too ill toswallow; but the bottles of water were quite empty, and perhaps theycould guess how she had drained them and wept for more in the terriblefeverish thirst of her last hours; but they spoke no word to each otherof this, only gazed and gazed with a sort of conscience-stricken awe onthe dead girl, until at last Mrs. Ellsworth stooped and placed her handon the white breast.
"Yes, she is gone, poor girl! Her heart is cold and still, her formseems quite rigid; she must have been dead quite a long whi
le," shemuttered, in a tone of relief.
In reality, it was but a few hours ago that Dainty had swallowed thelaudanum while just sinking into the stupor of a malignant fever; but toall intents and purposes, in the garish light, she looked like a corpseof ten hours' duration.
And now came an important question--how to dispose of the fair, deadgirl; for it would never do to leave her here, lest the body bediscovered in future, and the crime traced to the door of those who wereresponsible for her death.
Sheila Kelly had a plan, and she quickly proposed it.
"Yer want iverybody to know she's dead, because if Mr. Ellsworth getswell, he'll be searching for her till kingdom come, unless he knows thetruth."
"Yes, you are right; although there is not one chance in a hundred ofhis recovery. He just lies with closed lips and eyes like a breathingcorpse," said Mrs. Ellsworth, impatiently.
"I was a-thinkin' this," said Sheila. "It's a dark night, and there'llbe no moon till midnight. I can carry her body in me arrums down to theroad, and lay her under the tree by the creek, with the bottle oflaudanum in her hand, and a little note, if ye choose to write it,a-sayin' she is deserted by her lover, who refused to make her an honestwife, so she chooses ter die. Then the coroner's 'quest will find thepoison in her stomach, and all is over, and no suspicion of our part inher taking off."
"Capital, Sheila!" cried her mistress, approvingly, though she added: "Ihate the sensation that will follow the finding of the body; but it isbest, as you say, to let the world know she is dead; then, shouldLovelace survive, he can not doubt he is a widower, if he was evermarried. So you may carry out your plan, Sheila, and come to me at oncefor your pay."