A Face Illumined Part 46

Chapter x.x.xIX. Van Berg's Escape.

Ida found the party, on whose companions.h.i.+p she had in a measure forced herself, waiting and calling for her. The words of the old gentleman had inspired them with kinder and more considerate feeling.

"I'm coming," she answered; "don't wait for me, I'll keep near you."

As they had already observed her evident wish to be left to herself, they complied with her request.

The icy calm of her despair was now broken.

"G.o.d bless him for his kindness!" she murmured, and "G.o.d bless him for his hearty, hopeful words; they may save me yet," and she followed the others, crying softly to herself like a little child.

It would seem as if every warm tear fell on her heart, that had been so hard and desperate before, so rapidly did it melt at the thought of the old man's kindness.

But before she reached the hotel she began to grow excessively weary. She had not only overtaxed her powers of endurance, but had over-estimated them.

At last, as she was about to ask her companions to walk more slowly, lest she should be left alone by the roadside in her weakness, she heard the sound of strong, rapid steps.

"Where is Miss Mayhew?" was the anxious query of a voice that made her heart bound and color come into her face, even at the moment of almost mortal weakness and weariness.

"Here is Miss Mayhew," said one of the half-grown youths. "She prefers to walk by herself, it seems."

"Thank you," replied Van Berg, decisively. "I will see her safely home;" and the part went on, leaving him face to face with the maiden whom he now believed he had very greatly wronged, and who, he feared might yet proved herself capable of a terrible crime.

She stood before him with bowed head. In her weakness and agitation she trembled so violently that even in the starlight he could not help seeing her distress, and it filled him at once with pity and alarm.

"You are ill, Miss Mayhew," he said, anxiously.

"Yes," she answered; then, conscious of her growing need, she said, appealingly, "Mr. Van Berg, with all my faults I am at least a woman. Please help me home. I'm so weak and weary that I'm almost ready to faint."

He seized her hand and faltered hoa.r.s.ely, "Miss Mayhew, you have not--you have not taken that drug---"

She was so vividly conscious of her own dark secret, and so impressed by his power to discover all the evil in her nature, that she replied in a low tone,

"Hush. I understand you. Not yet."

"Thank G.o.d!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, with such a deep sigh of relief that she looked at him in surprise. The he drew her hand within his arm, and weary as she was, she could not help noting that it trembled as if he had an ague.

For a few moments they walked on without speaking. Then the artist addressed her.

"Miss Mayhew---"

"Mr. Van Berg," she said, hastily interrupting him. "Spare me to-night. I'm too weary even to think."

Again they walked on in silence, but his agitation was evidently increasing.

"Let me enter by that side door, please," she said as they approached the hotel.

"Miss Mayhew," he began in a low, hurried tone, "I must speak. You said you were a woman. As such I appeal to you. A woman may, at times, have no pity on herself, but it rarely happens that she is pitiless towards others, and it is said that she is often the most generous and merciful towards those who have wronged her. I have wronged you cruelly and unpardonably. I knew it as soon as you entered the parlor last evening. There is no excuse for me--I will never forgive myself, but I do most sincerely apologize and ask your forgiveness. Miss Mayhew, I appeal to your generosity--I appeal to your woman's heart. If you should consummate the awful purpose which I fear has been in your mind, I should go mad with remorse. You would destroy me as surely as yourself. Pardon me for speaking thus, but I fear so greatly--O G.o.d! can she have already committed the fatal act?"

Ida's overtaxed powers had given way, and she would have fallen had he not sustained her. His words had overwhelmed her, and, taken in connection with those spoken by old Mr. Eltinge, had given a glimpse of the awful abyss into which she had well nigh plunged, dragging others, perhaps, after her. She recoiled from it all so strongly that she became sick and faint from dread; and Van Berg was compelled to support her to a rustic seat near the path. He was bout to leave her in order to obtain a.s.sistance, when she put her hand on his arm and gasped:

"Wait--give me time--I'll soon be better. Do not call any one, I beg."

"Let me quietly bring you a little wine, then, from my own room?"

She bowed her a.s.sent.

The stimulant soon revived her. He stood at her side waiting with intense anxiety till she should speak. At last she rose slowly and weakly, saying in a low tone:

"Mr. Van Berg, I suppose I have now reached the lowest depth in your estimation, but I cannot help it. I admit that I was in an awful and desperate mood, and was about to act accordingly. There is no use of trying to hid anything from you. But a good man spoke kindly to me to-night, and the black spell is broken. There is the drug I purchased," and she handed him the phial of laudanum.

"You many now dismiss all fears. I will explain further another time if you care to hear. Please let me go in by myself."

"Pardon me for saying, no," he answered, gently. "I think I am best able to-night to judge of what is right. You must go in at the main entrance, and on my arm. Henceforward I shall treat you with respect, and I intend that all others shall also."

With a low sob, she said, impulsively: "Oh, Mr. Van Berg, forgive me! but that was my motive. I meant to compel your respect; and I thought there was no other way. I thought that if I went to my grave, instead of going to the man who attempted your life, you would see that you had misjudged me. Here is a letter which I wrote you. It should go with the poison. It is all that I can offer in excuse or extenuation."

"Good G.o.d!" he exclaimed. "I have escaped a worse fate than yours would have been," and she felt his arm again trembling violently beneath her hand.

"I did not think you would care so greatly," she murmured.

"Miss Mayhew," he said, in a deep voice, "promise me, before G.o.d, that you will never harbor such a thought again."

"I hope I never may," she replied, despondently, "but I've lost all confidence in myself, Mr. Van Berg."

"Poor child! What a brute I've been," he muttered; but she heard him.

As the mounted the piazza, they met Stanton and Mrs. Mayhew.

"Why, Ida," exclaimed her mother, "I thought you were in your room."

"I walked to the village with a party of young people," was her hasty reply, "and Mr. Van Berg met me on our return. I'm very tired. Good-night," and she went directly to her room.

The artist's manner in parting was polite and respectful, and by this simple act, he did much to reinstate her in the social position she had well nigh lost, through her supposed infatuation with the man who was now a synonym in the house for everything that was vile.

On the following day, through the aid of Miss Burton, he caused the impression to be generally given that Miss Mayhew had been exceedingly mortified that she had ever a.s.sociated with such a villain as Sibley had shown himself to be, and still more pained to think that she should be imagined capable of any other feeling save contempt for him, after learning of his disgraceful words and actions. These explanations gave an entirely new aspect to the matter, and sufficiently accounted for her increasing indisposition and rather odd behavior. Indeed, people placed it to her credit that she was so deeply affected, and were all the more inclined to make amends for having misjudged her.

Mrs. Mayhew accompanied her daughter to her room, but Ida told her that she was too weary to answer a single question, and that she wished to be alone.

"Van, may I speak with you?" Stanton had asked, anxiously.

When they were sufficiently far from the house to ensure privacy he began again: "Van, what's the matter? You were as white as if you had seen a ghost."

"I'm not afraid of ghosts," said the artist, almost sternly, "but there are things which I mortally fear, and chief among these are blunders--stupid, irrational acts, but involving results that may be beyond remedy. You and I have just made one that might have cost us dear. Of course you will treat your cousin hereafter as you please, but I most decidedly request that you do and say nothing that involves any reference to me. I wish her to form her opinions of my att.i.tude towards her solely from her own observation."

"I think you are a trifle severe, but I suppose I deserve it," said Stanton, stiffly.

"I admit that I am strongly moved. I do not excuse myself in the least; and yet you know I was misled. I must tell you plainly that Ida Mayhew is not a girl to be trifled with. I fear her mother wholly fails in understanding her, and from what you yourself have told me of her father, she has no help there. She has no brother, and you should take the place of one, as far as possible. The only right I have to speak thus is on the ground of the great wrong I have done her, and for which I can never forgive myself. Miss Mayhew and I are comparative strangers and our brief summer sojourn here will soon be over. By mere accident facts have come to my knowledge to-night which prove in the most emphatic manner, that she requires kind, un.o.btrusive, but vigilant care. I never knew of a girl who needed a brother more than she. She is not bad at heart--far from it, but she is fearfully rash, and she is warped by education, or its lack, and by the vile literature she has read, to such a degree that she cannot see things in their true moral aspects. I'll give you a plain hint, and then you must not ask me anything further, for both you and I must be able to say that the history of my last interview was never given. My hint is this--I do not believe that self-destruction ever appeared to Miss Mayhew as an awful and revolting crime. Her actual life, hitherto, has been a round of frivolity. Only on the stage or in the absurd woes of her stilted heroes and heroines, has she given any attention to the sad and serious side of life. Men and women committing suicide to slow music is the chief stock in trade in some quarters, and when serious trouble came to her this devil's comedy had been robbed of its horror by the clap-trap of stage effect. That is the only way in which I can account for it all or excuse her. But the fact that she recoiled from Sibley so strongly and felt the disgrace of her a.s.sociation so keenly, proves that she possesses a true woman's nature. But, as I said, she needs a brother's care. You are nearest of kin, Stanton, and you must give it. Indeed, Ik, pardon the freedom of an old friend whom circ.u.mstances have strangely mixed up in this affair, I think you are honor-bound to give this brother's protection; and you ARE a man of honor if you pa.s.s your word."