Her Mother's Secret Part 21

"But I did not praise her above her merits. Why, just look at her, Le!

Nearly forty years old, and the very handsomest woman in the country, and as n.o.ble and perfect in mind as in person!"

"Yes; and he laughed!"

"Look here, Le. You know he was a brother officer of my wife's brother, and an old friend of hers. Now, I'll tell you what, I often think that he was a rejected suitor of Lady Elfrida Glennon. And the memory of it makes him sore and sarcastic at times. Many little things in their intercourse makes me think that sometimes. Bear with him, Le, as I shall do, for Odalite's sake. Now shall we return to the drawing room?"

"If you please."

CHAPTER XVI

LE'S MYSTERIOUS MOVEMENTS

Le remained at Mondreer, only riding over to Greenbushes every day to superintend the repairs and refurnis.h.i.+ng of his house.

He never met Odalite except at meal times, and then their chairs were so placed that neither need look in the face of the other. Odalite's seat was near the head of the table. Le's near the foot, on the same side. They merely greeted each other on entering the dining room, and that was all.

Mr. and Mrs. Force treated their young relative with the most delicate consideration.

Col. Anglesea treated his defeated rival with offensive condescension.

Le tried to ignore the colonel's existence, and found his greatest comfort in the company of his little cousins. Their warm, sincere love and sympathy was as balm to his bruised heart.

The children had successfully pa.s.sed their home examination by the father, and their holidays had already commenced, though it was a full week before Christmas. And thus they were able to give their sailor cousin a great deal of their society.

The mother and father did not interfere. They were glad enough of any comfort or solace they could afford Le, to occupy or amuse his mind, and keep his fingers and his scalping knife off Anglesea's hair.

The children used often to walk over with Le to Greenbushes in the morning, spend the whole day there with their cousin, and return with him in the evening.

But, in consideration for him, they never alluded to the approaching wedding. They only kept their eyes and ears open, like the sharp little foxes that they were.

One day, however, when all three were walking through the wintry woods on their way to Greenbushes, Le himself, for the first time, alluded to the subject.

"How do you like your intended brother-in-law?" he inquired.

"What! that British beer barrel? I mean that English gentleman? I hate him! I detest him! I loathe him! I abhor him! And if there is any stronger word in the English or any other language, I _that_ him!" exclaimed Wynnette, clenching her fist and grinding her teeth.

"I say my prayers three times a day not to hate him; but, oh, dear!"

sighed little Elva.

"And I'll tell you what it is, Le. She hates him worse than I do," added Wynnette.

"My child! 'She?' Who?" exclaimed Le, starting, and coming to a dead halt.

"Why, Odalite."

"Wynnette, do you know what you are saying, dear?" demanded Le, in great agitation.

They had now reached Chincapin Creek bridge, and all had come to a stop.

"Do you know what you are saying, Wynnette?" anxiously repeated Le.

"Yes, indeed I do. And I know it is true. Odalite hates and scorns and loathes Col. Anglesea!" said the child, speaking in her intense way, with doubled fist, set teeth and gleaming eyes.

"Did she tell you so?"

"Why should she tell me? No; she never did. But all the same I would pledge my immortal soul upon it that she does."

"Why do you think so, then?"

"Why? Now, Le, where are your eyes and your common sense? I tell you disgust and abhorrence take possession of Odalite the minute he approaches her, and stick out all over her like the spikes on a hedgehog. Bah! bah!

Tchut! Tchis!" hissed the intense little creature.

"My Lord, if I thought so!"

"You had better think so. I tell you I believe if she is made to marry that beat--I mean that person--something awful will happen."

"'Made' to marry, my dear Wynnette! Why, she wants to do so."

"She don't! she don't! she don't!"

"But she told me so herself."

"I don't care what she told you. She don't."

"My dear, please to remember that Odalite never tells what is not true.

And she told me that she wanted to marry Anglesea."

"Yes, I know. She told me so, too, not ten minutes before you came home.

But how can I believe she does when I see that it is breaking her poor heart, and crazing her brain, and killing her? Tell me that."

"Oh, child! I can tell you nothing!" groaned Le. "I am even more mystified than you are! That this girl, who is truth itself, should insist that she wants to marry a man whose very presence fills her with loathing, is a mystery I cannot fathom!"

The children were by this time seated on a log at the end of the bridge--the same log on which, two weeks before, Odalite had been seated when she was surprised by Col. Anglesea.

Le stood near them, leaning with his back against the railings and his head bowed in deep thought.

Suddenly he started, and threw his hand to his head.

"What's the matter, Le?" inquired little Elva, while Wynnette stared.

"A remembered dream, or vision, that came to me three times on my homeward voyage," replied the young man, gravely.

"Oh, tell us!" exclaimed both the children in duet, with all their childish interest in the marvelous excited to the highest pitch.

"It is a vision of midnight on midocean--the blackness of darkness above, below, around, beneath. Suddenly into this opaque darkness glows a spark of red light. It increases, spreads, and shoots upward, revealing--a s.h.i.+p on fire! Showing the deck crowded with dark figures! Only one fearfully distinct form--the form of Odalite. She stands on the top of the bulwarks, clothed in white raiment, with her arms raised on high, her face turned upward, her hair streaming!--flames around and above her, the ocean beneath. I heard her call to me, speak to me: