CHAPTER IV.
THE OLD MONK.
The ill-looking maid flounced away, thinking resentfully that the prettyyoung lady was afraid to trust her with her keys, while Dainty, whoseonly reason had been an unwillingness to expose her simple wardrobe,proceeded to lay out a gown for the evening--a delicately embroideredwhite cashmere that no one would have suspected had been cleverly madeover from her mother's bridal _trousseau_.
While she was dressing her hair with deft fingers, she was startled by avery unpleasant sound--a series of harsh, hacking coughs--seeming toproceed from the room next her own. She thought:
"Some one is ill in there. What a terribly consumptive cough, poorsoul!"
Presently Sheila hurried in with a wealth of roses glistening with thefresh-fallen evening dew, and after thanking her, Dainty asked,curiously:
"Is there some one ill in the next room?"
"Shure, miss, there's nobuddy in the next room at all, at all, and not asick crathur in the house. Why is it ye thought so?"
"I heard some one coughing in there--a tight, hacking cough, like someone in the last stages of consumption," Dainty answered; and instantlySheila Kelly crossed herself and looked furtively behind her like onepursued, muttering:
"The saints preserve us! T' ould _monk_!"
"The old monk, did you say? Who is he?" exclaimed Dainty, sharply; butthe maid shook her head.
"Don't ask _me_, _miss_, please--ask the young master about the _cough_ye heard, and shure he will tell ye, darlint," returned Sheila, with asomewhat nervous giggle and a second furtive glance behind her, as sheadded: "Better hurry up, now; ye've only five minutes before dinner isannounced, ye see."
Dainty quickly pinned on a great bunch of the fragrant roses, andhurried down to the parlor, where she found the others waiting, Mrs.Ellsworth alone in an easy-chair, Olive and Love at the piano with Ela,who was playing the accompaniment for a sentimental song that Olive sangwhile Love turned the leaves.
At dinner the hostess managed to separate Dainty and Love as widely aspossible, and when they left the table, she pursued the same course,leading Dainty to a distant seat, saying:
"Come and sit by me, dear. I have so many questions to ask you aboutyour home and your mother; and I will tell you some interesting thingsabout your papa's boyhood."
Her step-son, pleased at her seeming interest in his beautiful love, andunwilling to interrupt the flow of their mutual confidences, permittedthe two other girls to monopolize him the whole evening; so that whenbed-time arrived, he had not had the chance of a single word, except theformal good-night.
He went out then to smoke a cigar, and secretly deprecate Mrs.Ellsworth's selfishness in keeping such a lovely girl to herself all theevening, and the girls went upstairs to their rooms along the dimlylighted corridor.
Dainty slipped her hand through Ela's arm, whispering, nervously:
"Are your rooms close to mine, Ela?"
"No; mine and Olive's are down there at the end of the corridor,adjoining, and there are only vacant rooms next you."
"But that can not be, Ela, for I heard some one in the room next minecoughing horribly while I was dressing; but the maid denied that any onewas in there, and muttered something about the old monk. What could shehave meant?"
She fancied that Ela shuddered, and her eyes dilated with alarm as shereturned:
"Good heavens! is that old wretch going to haunt us? Why, Dainty, don'tyou know about the family ghost of Ellsworth?--the wicked old monk, arelative of the family, who murdered one of the brotherhood, and fled tohis old home, hiding himself in a dungeon here till he died ofconsumption. Well, it is said that he haunts the old wing of Ellsworth,and that whenever his awful, discordant cough is heard it forebodes evilto the hearer. But here is your door. Good-night!"--with a mockinglaugh.
Dainty had never slept away from her mother's arms before. Lonely andnervous, she slipped into a white dressing-gown, and sat down by thewindow to watch the full moon sailing above the purple peaks of themountain range, and listening in a sort of terror for the monk's cough;but the excitement of the day induced speedy sleep.
How long she rested there in the moonlight, sleeping heavily, like aweary child tired of playing, she could not tell, only that suddenly shestarted wide awake in terror, feeling as if a cold, icy hand had pressedher warm bosom, turning her cold as death.
Springing to her feet, she found she was not alone, for in the broadglare of the moonlight she saw by her side the tall form of a man gownedin a long black robe girdled with a rosary of beads, while hisclose-shaven face shone ghastly white under his black skull-cap, and thedull, fixed eyes had the awful stare of death.
With a piercing cry, Dainty sprang past the midnight visitant, rushed tothe door, and throwing it open, bounded into the corridor, flying withterror-winged feet toward her cousin's room. Then she pounded on thedoor, shrieking, piteously:
"For God's sake, let me in!"
The door opened so quickly that Dainty, leaning against it, lost herbalance, and fell blindly forward into the arms of the man who hadopened it--Lovelace Ellsworth, who had not yet retired, because hisheart and mind were so full of her he knew he could not sleep.