CHAPTER XIV.
When Lester Stanwick returned to the cottage he found that quite anunexpected turn of events had transpired. Miss Burton had gone out toDaisy--she lay so still and lifeless in the long green grass.
"Heaven bless me!" she cried, in alarm, raising her voice to a pitchthat brought both of the sisters quickly to her side. "Matilda, go atonce and fetch the doctor. See, this child is ill, her cheeks areburning scarlet and her eyes are like stars."
At that opportune moment they espied the doctor's carriage proceedingleisurely along the road.
"Dear me, how lucky," cried Ruth, "Doctor West should happen alongjust now. Go to the gate, quick, Matilda, and ask him to stop."
The keen eyes of the doctor, however, had observed the figure lying onthe grass and the frantic movements of the three old ladies bendingover it, and drew rein of his own accord to see what was the matter.
He drew back with a cry of surprise as his eyes rested on thebeautiful flushed face of the young girl lying among the blueharebells at his feet.
"I am afraid this is a serious case," he said, thoughtfully, placinghis cool hand on her burning forehead; "the child has all the symptomsof brain fever in its worst form, brought on probably through somegreat excitement." The three ladies looked at one another meaningly."She must be taken into the house and put to bed at once," hecontinued, authoritatively, lifting the slight figure in his strongarms, and gazing pityingly down upon the beautiful flushed face framedin its sheen of golden hair resting against his broad shoulders.
The doctor was young and unmarried and impressible; and the strangestsensation he had ever experienced thrilled through his heart as theblue, flaring eyes met his and the trembling red lips incoherentlybeseeched him to save her, hide her somewhere, anywhere, before thefifteen minutes were up.
A low muttered curse burst from Stanwick's lips upon his return, as hetook in the situation at a single glance.
As Daisy's eyes fell upon Stanwick's face she uttered a piteous littlecry:
"Save me from him--save me!" she said, hysterically, growing rapidlyso alarmingly worse that Stanwick was forced to leave the room,motioning the doctor to follow him into the hall.
"The young lady is my wife," he said, with unflinching assurance,uttering the cruel falsehood, "and we intend leaving Elmwood to-day. Iam in an uncomfortable dilemma. I must go, yet I can not leave my--mywife. She must be removed, doctor; can you not help me to arrange itin some way?"
"No, sir," cried the doctor, emphatically; "she can not be removed. Asher physician, I certainly would not give my consent to such aproceeding; her very life would pay the forfeit."
For a few moments Lester Stanwick paced up and down the hall lost indeep thought; his lips were firmly set, and there was a determinedgleam in his restless black eyes. Suddenly he stopped short directlybefore the doctor, who stood regarding him with no very agreeableexpression in his honest gray eyes.
"How long will it be before the crisis is past--that is, how long willit be before she is able to be removed?"
"Not under three weeks," replied the doctor, determinedly.
"Good heavens!" he ejaculated, sharply. "Why, I shall have to--" Hebit his lip savagely, as if he had been on the point of disclosingsome guarded secret. "Fate is against me," he said, "in more ways thanone; these things can not be avoided, I suppose. Well, doctor, as I amforced to leave to-day I shall leave her in your charge. I will returnin exactly two weeks. She has brain fever, you say?"
The doctor nodded.
"You assure me she can not leave her bed for two weeks to come?" hecontinued, anxiously.
"I can safely promise that," replied the doctor, wondering at thestrange, satisfied smile that flitted like a meteor over hiscompanion's face for one brief instant.
"This will defray her expenses in the meantime," he said, putting afew crisp bank-notes into the doctor's hand. "See that she has everyluxury."
He was about to re-enter the room where Daisy lay, but the doctor heldhim back.
"I should advise you to remain away for the present," he said, "yourpresence produces such an unpleasant effect upon her. Wait until shesleeps."
"I have often thought it so strange people in delirium shrink so fromthose they love best; I can not understand it," said Stanwick, with anodd, forced laugh. "As you are the doctor, I suppose your orders mustbe obeyed, however. If the fever should happen to take an unfavorableturn in the meantime, please drop a line to my address, 'care of MissPluma Hurlhurst, of Whitestone Hall, Allendale,'" he said, extendinghis card. "It will be forwarded to me promptly, and I can come on atonce."
Again the doctor nodded, putting the card safely away in his wallet,and soon after Lester Stanwick took his departure, roundly cursing hisluck, yet congratulating himself upon the fact that Daisy could notleave Elmwood--he could rest content on that score.
Meanwhile the three venerable sisters and the young doctor werewatching anxiously at Daisy's bedside.
"Oh, my poor little dear--my pretty little dear!" sobbed Ruth,caressing the burning little hands that clung to her so tightly.
"Won't you hide me?" pleaded Daisy, laying her hot cheek against thewrinkled hand that held hers. "Hide me, please, just as if I were yourown child; I have no mother, you know."
"God help the pretty, innocent darling!" cried the doctor, turninghastily away to hide the suspicious moisture that gathered in hiseyes. "No one is going to harm you, little one," he said, soothingly;"no one shall annoy you."
"Was it so great a sin? He would not let me explain. He has gone outof my life!" she wailed, pathetically, putting back the golden ringsof hair from her flushed face. "Rex! Rex!" she sobbed, incoherently,"I shall die--or, worse, I shall go mad, if you do not come back tome!"
The three ladies looked at one another questioningly, in alarm.
"You must not mind the strange ravings of a person in delirium," saidthe doctor, curtly; "they are liable to imagine and say all sorts ofnonsense. Pay no attention to what she says, my dear ladies; don'tdisturb her with questions. That poor little brain needs absoluterest; every nerve seems to have been strained to its utmost."
After leaving the proper medicines and giving minute instructions asto how and when it should be administered, Dr. West took hisdeparture, with a strange, vague uneasiness at his heart.
"Pshaw!" he muttered to himself, as he drove briskly along the shadowyroad, yet seeing none of its beauty, "how strange it is these younggirls will fall in love and marry such fellows as that!" he mused."There is something about his face that I don't like; he is ascoundrel, and I'll bet my life on it!"
The doctor brought his fist down on his knee with such a resoundingblow that poor old Dobbin broke into a gallop. But, drive as fast hewould, he could not forget the sweet, childish face that had takensuch a strong hold upon his fancy. The trembling red lips and pleadingblue eyes haunted him all the morning, as though they held some secretthey would fain have whispered.
All the night long Daisy clung to the hands that held hers, beggingand praying her not to leave her alone, until the poor old lady wasquite overcome by the fatigue of continued watching beside her couch.Rest or sleep seemed to have fled from Daisy's bright, restless eyes.
"Don't go away," she cried; "everybody goes away. I do not belong toany one. I am all--all--alone," she would sigh, drearily.
Again she fancied she was with Rex, standing beneath the magnoliaboughs in the sunshine; again, she was clinging to his arm--while somecruel woman insulted her--sobbing pitifully upon his breast; again,she was parting from him at the gate, asking him if what they had donewas right; then she was in some school-room, begging piteously forsome cruel letter; then out on the waves in the storm and theon-coming darkness of night.
The sisters relieved one another at regular intervals. They had ceasedto listen to her pathetic little appeals for help, or the wild criesof agony that burst from the red feverish lips as she started up fromher slumbers with stifled sobs, moaning out that the time was flying;that she must
escape anywhere, anywhere, while there were stillfifteen minutes left her.
She never once mentioned Stanwick's name, or Septima's, but calledincessantly for Rex and poor old Uncle John.
"Who in the world do you suppose Rex is?" said Matilda, thoughtfully."That name is continually on her lips--the last word she utters whenshe closes her eyes, the first word to cross her lips when she awakes.That must certainly be the handsome young fellow she met at the gate.If he is Rex I do not wonder the poor child loved him so. He was thehandsomest, most noble-looking, frank-faced young man I have everseen; and he took on in a way that made me actually cry when I toldhim she was married. He would not believe it, until I called the childand she told him herself it was the truth. I was sorry from the bottomof my heart that young fellow had not won her instead of thisStanwick, they were so suited to each other."
"Ah," said Ruth, after a moment's pause, "I think I have the key tothis mystery. She loves this handsome Rex, that is evident; perhapsthey have had a lovers' quarrel, and she has married this one on thespur of the moment through pique. Oh, the pretty little dear!" sighedRuth. "I hope she will never rue it."