Kidnapped at the Altar Part 42

"What would you do?" she screamed.

He looked at her with cunning eyes.

"How came you by this?" he cried, in an awful voice, as he struggled with her desperately to gain the paper.

No word answered him.

"You shall not have it!" he cried, wrenching it from her by main force.

"You shall not show this up to the world until it is too late to affect Hubert Varrick."

A cry of agony burst from Jessie's death-white lips. She saw, in her terror, that the old butler had lost his reason, and yet withal he was so cunning.

She pleaded with him on her knees, but it was useless. He muttered over and over again that she should not have the paper, that he would keep her there a prisoner until all was over.

Despite her entreaties, to her great horror the man kept his word, and Jessie found herself a prisoner in the isolated place. She was too weak to make any effort to escape; there was none to hear her faint cries.

It must be said for the man that he tended her as faithfully as a woman might have done; but he was deaf to her pitiful and desperate appeal. He taunted her from day to day with the knowledge that it wanted but one day more to Hubert Varrick's trial. At last the terrible time dawned. It seemed to Jessie that she would go mad with the horror of it.

She tried with all her weak strength to break the firm old locks that held her a prisoner there, but it was useless, useless. The sun slowly climbed the heavens, and she knew, oh G.o.d! she knew what was to happen to Hubert Varrick within those hours.

She sunk on her knees, crying out that if she could not aid the man she loved, that the same sun would set upon her lifeless form--she would kill herself.

Hardly had this resolve become a fixed purpose with her, ere she became conscious of a loud knock at the door.

"I-- I am a prisoner here!" she cried. "I beg you, whoever you are, break the lock of the door!"

This was hastily complied with, and she saw standing before her two officers of the law.

"Oh, sir!" she gasped, "take me to Hubert Varrick at once, or it will be too late to save him!"

"We are here for that very purpose," answered one of them. "We know all.

The late butler of the Varrick mansion has just breathed his last, and confessed all--that it was he who committed the murder, and just how it happened, begging us to come after you, and to liberate you at once, and tell you that Hubert Varrick is now free. A carriage is in waiting. Come at once. Mrs. Varrick awaits you there," he adding, noting how stunned the girl looked, as though she could hardly believe what she heard.

There was one thing that Jessie never quite fully understood: how she reached the lonely cottage of the old butler. She believed his mind must have been wandering when he gave such a singular account of a runaway, and a gentleman being with her in the coupe. She firmly insisted that the butler must have chloroformed her, abducted her, and brought her to that place, in the hope that she would then be powerless to aid Hubert Varrick.

Who could describe the meeting between Hubert and Jessie and Mrs.

Varrick which occurred an hour later at the Varrick mansion.

Hubert would have taken the girl he loved so madly, in his arms on sight and covered her face with kisses, but she held him off at arm's-length, though she longed to rest in his strong arms and weep on the broad bosom that she knew beat for her alone.

"No, you must not touch me, Hubert," she whispered. "It would not seem right so--so soon after--after poor Gerelda's untimely death."

"Forgive me--pardon me, Jessie," he answered, brokenly. "For the moment I had--_forgotten_, my love for you was so great!"

Here Mrs. Varrick quickly interposed:

"Jessie is quite right, my boy," she said. "You must not mention one word of love to her for many a day yet. Perhaps your troubles will be over before many months."

"If you both think that, it will not do for me to remain beneath this roof where Jessie is," he declared, huskily. "I am only human, you know, and we both love each other so!"

Thus it was that it was arranged that it was best for Hubert to go away, travel abroad, and return a year from that day to claim Jessie. But it was with many misgivings that Hubert tore himself away.

"If anything comes of this enforced separation, always remember that I pleaded hard against it, but in the end yielded to your wishes." On the morrow Hubert Varrick left Boston.

During the months that followed Jessie lived quietly at the Varrick mansion with Hubert's mother.

The year of probation had not yet waned, when, one lovely April morning, while Jessie was walking through the grounds that surrounded the mansion, she espied a bearded stranger standing at the gate, leaning on it with folded arms, evidently lost in admiration of the early blossoming buds and half-blown roses.

"Permit me to gather you some of the roses you seem to be admiring so much, sir," she said, courteously.

"Pardon me, would you permit me to enter and gather for myself the one I care for most?"

The request was an odd one, but she granted it with a smile.

He swung open the heavy gate, and in an instant was by her side, folding her in his arms, and kissing her with all his soul on his lips.

"Am I changed so that Love can not recognise me?" he cried.

"Hubert--oh, Hubert! is it _you_--_really you_?" sobbed Jessie, laughing and crying all in a breath.

And there Mrs. Varrick found them an hour later, planning for the marriage, which Hubert declared should be solemnized before the sun set.

This time he had his own way, and when the stars came out, they shone on sweet little Jessie Bain, a bride; and surely the sweetest and most adorable one that ever a young husband wors.h.i.+ped.

And there we will leave them, dear reader, for when a girl marries, all the ills of life should be left behind her, and she should dwell in suns.h.i.+ne and love ever after.

Those who knew her as pretty, saucy, sweet Jessie Bain never forgot her.

And may I hope that this will be the case with you, my dear reader?