Ann S. Stephens

“ Wondering where her want of attractions lay, humble in self-estimation, yet feverishly wounded in her pride, the girl started up, pushed back the rich blonde hair from a face fresh as a blush rose with dew upon it, for it was wet with tears, and looked into the opposite mirror, where she made as lovely a picture as Sir Joshua ever painted. The tumultuous, loving, passionate picture of a young woman, angry with herself for being so beautiful and so fond, without the power to win one heart which was all the world to her. ”

“ Why will you torment me so?" said Ruth, hoarse with dread.
"Torment! As if the sight of one's own true love ever did that, especially when he comes to comfort one. Mother, who is so anxious to have you for a daughter, sent me."
"You cannot comfort any one against her will," said Ruth, striving to appear calm. "As for me, I only want to be left alone!" [366]
"As if any man, with a heart in his bosom, could do that; especially one so fond of you as I am," answered Storms; "besides, I have a fear that you may not always want to be alone. ”

“ The poor girl was not quite sure of her own disinterested judgment. For the world, she would not have said a word against Ruth, believing that word false; but she was conscious of such infinite relief when the news came to her of the engagement between Ruth Jessup and Storms, that the joy of it made her self-distrustful. How could she be glad that a creature so bright, so delicate, and thoroughly well-bred, should be mated with this keen, sinister man, whom no one loved, and who was held, she knew well, in little respect by his own class? ”

“ WHERE could Ruth go? She had never been from home more than once or twice in her life. Her world was there lying about "The Rest"—her home in that cottage, where she was born, and her mother had died. She must leave it; of course, she must leave it, but how? To what place would Sir Noel Hurst send her? With that awful secret lying between her and Richard Storms, would she dare to go? He would avenge her absence on Hurst. She, no doubt, stood between him and the thing she shuddered to think of. What could she do?
All night long the poor child lay asking herself these questions. ”

“ The florid face of William Jessup turned to marble in the moonlight, and a fierce, hot flame leaped to his eyes.
"I will not walk a pace quicker, or be made to spy on my girl, by anything you can say, Dick; not if it were to save my own life; but I like you, lad—your father and I are fast friends. We meant that, by-and-by, you and Ruth should come together."
Storms flung up his head with an insulting sneer.
"Together! Not if every hair on her head was weighed down with sovereigns. I am an honest man, William Jessup, and will take an honest woman home to my mother, or take none." ”

“ The ivy about the window shed a lovely twilight around her, and the shadows of its trembling leaves tinted the snowy whiteness of the pillow on which her cheek rested, with fairy-like embroidery. The place was like heaven to her. Here this young girl lay, thrilled heart and soul by the first passion of her womanhood. This feeling that burned on her cheek, and swelled in her bosom, was a delicious insanity. There was no hope in it—no chance for reason, but Hurst loved her, and that one thought filled the moment with joy. ”

“ Ruth looked around warily, for even in that fearful hour she remembered the threat of her tormentor, and dreaded some harm to the beloved being she was determined to save.
The moon was buried in clouds, storm-clouds, that made the whole landscape funereal, like the heart of that poor girl. She went through shrubberies and flower-beds, straight toward the window of Walton Hurst's room. Pulling aside the ivy, she mounted the half-concealed step, not cautiously, as she had done on another occasion, but with a concentration of feeling which left fear behind. ”

“ Stay, stay! How soft your hand is. Your dress rustles like silk. Your voice has changed. Woman, who are you?"
"Take the jewels. Oh, for pity's sake, unlock them, and let me go."
The hand that held that delicate wrist so firmly dropped it, the dark body swerved aside, and Richard Storms plunged down the path. Swift as a lapwing Lady Rose sped up the hill through the shrubberies, nearest "The Rest," and at last stood panting within the shadows of the terrace, where a solitary man was walking up and down with mournful slowness.
"It is Sir Noel," she said, as the moonlight fell on his white face. ”

“ So, with the sting of a rude insult urging him on, he went to Jessup's cottage.
Ruth was lying in the little parlor, weak and helpless as a crushed flower, all her rich color gone, all the velvety softness of her eyes clouded. A man's step on the porch made her start, and listen. She had cause to dread such steps, and they terrified her. A knock, measured and gentle—what if it was her husband's? What if Storms was on the watch? He must not come in. That was to endanger more than his life. It was her hard task to say this. Ruth started up, crept to the door, and opened it, with trembling hands. ”

“ Jessup turned away from her. That sweet appealing face made his heart ache.
Ruth saw this look of relenting, and would not give up her cause. She approached close to her father, and, clinging to his arm, implored him, with bitter sobs, to believe her when she said that this marriage would be worse than death to her.
"Hush, girl!" said the old man. "Hush, now, or I may believe some hints that the young man has thrown out of another person. No girl in these parts would refuse a young fellow so well-to-do and so good-looking, if she hadn't got some one else in her mind." ”

“ A sudden illumination swept the white face of Ruth Jessup. Her eyes took fire, her breath rose in quick gasps, out of which came those two words. Then another question—would a death save him?
"If my death could do it, I need not have come to you," answered Lady Rose, proudly.
"True, true, I can see that. Do not think so hardly of me. I am not born to bravery, as you are. My father was only a poor gardener. When great sacrifices are asked of me, I may want a little time. ”

“ Was Lady Rose chosen to guard her Paradise, because of the sin through which she had entered it? How like a glorious angel she looked in the soft whiteness and tender [326] blue of garments that floated around her like a cloud. How bright and rich were the waves and curls of her hair! Surely no angel ever could be more beautiful!
This passion of feeling, which combined so many elements of unrest, was thrown into abeyance when Ruth got home; for, looking up, with her hand on the gate, she saw her father sitting at the chamber-window waiting for her. ”

“ He was thinking how much she looked like Ruth Jessup, with that warm love-light in her face—how beautiful she really was in the lustre of that rising moon. Tenderness with him at the moment was not all a pretence. But Storms was a man to bring the worst as well as the best passions of a heart down to his own interests, and never, for a moment, since he had seen old Jessup's letter in Judith's hand, had he ceased to devise some means of gaining possession of it.
"Words are so easily spoken," he said; "but I like deeds. I want the girl I love to trust me." ”

“ Let me rest; my eyes ache with heaviness. I have no strength for anything. This is a sad place, and I am sad like the rest; if you would leave me now, in all kindness I ask it; perhaps the good God might permit me to sleep. Since the night he died I have been fearfully awake, sitting by him, you know. Now—now I would like to be alone, quite alone. There is something I wish to ask of God."
Mrs. Storms yielded to this sad pleading, laid the girl's hands into her lap, kissed her forehead and went away, thinking, in her motherly innocence:
"The child is worn out, dazed with her great sorrow. ”

“ The old lake house flung down uncouth shadows on one hand, a gnarled oak pushed its gaunt limbs far over the waters on the other. The rushes around her swayed and moaned in the wind like living things in pain.
Was it this weird picture that brought Ruth to a sense of her own condition? Did it seem to her as if she had already accomplished her purpose, and was entering upon its punishment? Who can answer for the impulses of a soul in its passions of distress? No two events are alike in all the tumultuous actions of life. ”

“ DURING the time that his mother was so kindly persuading Ruth to accept a home with her, Richard Storms was pacing the Lake House to and fro, like a caged animal waiting for its feeder.
The triumph of his revenge and his love seemed near at hand now. Before Jessup's death his power was insufficient, his influence feeble, for no one was in haste to take up a wrong which the sufferer was the first to ignore. But now the wound had done its work. A man had been shot to death, and any subject of Her Majesty had the right to call for a full investigation before a magistrate. ”

“ I could have cried for joy that—that it was no worse."
"Still you hated her!"
"Because she dared to love where I did."
"Do you indeed love me so, Judith?"
"Do I love myself, so common and worthless, compared to you? Do I love the air I breathe? Do I love sleep, after a hard day's work? Oh, oh, Richard, why ask such silly questions?"
"Why? Oh, because one is never certain. Girls are so fickle now-a-days."
"As if any girl who ever loved you could be fickle."
Storms looked into the girl's face as she nestled close [306] to him, and a strange, fond glow came into his eyes. ”

“ But what if I tell you that the old man in yonder knew just all that happened after I was turned out of the kitchen that night?"
"It was you who told him that which might have brought great trouble on him and me; only good men are slow to believe evil of those they love. I knew from his own lips that you had waylaid him in the park with a wicked falsehood."
"It was the truth, every word of it," exclaimed Storms, stamping his foot on the floor. "I saw it with my own eyes."
"Saw what?" faltered the girl, sick with apprehension. ”

“ One day my Ruth may be next door to that," said Jessup, putting forth all his affectionate craft. "Farmer Storms is a warm man, and Dick is his only son. It is the lad's own right if he sometimes brings his gun and shoots our game—his father has an interest in it, you know. The master has no right over his farm, and birds swarm there."
Jessup stopped suddenly, for Ruth stood before him white and still as marble, the ribbon which she had taken from the floor streaming from her hand in vivid contrast with the swift pallor that had settled upon her. ”

“ What would Sir Noel say? What would the Lady Rose say?"
"She has no right. What is it to her?" cried the girl, stung by a sharp pang of jealousy, which overmastered every other feeling.
"Ruth!"
"Forgive me. I am so unhappy."
"Ruth, I do not understand. You do not cry like a child, but as women cry when their hearts are breaking."
"My heart is breaking."
"Poor child! Is it about your father?"
"Yes, oh, yes! My father!" [191]
"But the doctors say he is better."
"He is better; but we fear trouble, great trouble."
"Where? How?"
"Oh, Mrs. Mason, I must tell you, or you will not let me see him. ”

“ Ruth lifted her pleading eyes to his—those great, innocent eyes, and answered, humbly, "How could I help it?"
"How long is this since, Ruth?"
"I don't know. It seems to me always; but he knows best."
"But, my poor child, how do you expect this to end?"
"It is ended! oh, it is ended! I wish you would tell him so, Sir Noel. I must never, never see him again."
Ruth threw both arms over the end of the sofa, and, burying her face upon them, broke into a wild passion of sobs. ”

“ The man was looking out on the lake as he spoke, and did not see the flash of those black eyes, or the rage that curved those lips till the teeth gleamed menacingly through.
"A miserable fool," he went on, "or you would have known that a man who had the chance of a girl like Ruth Jessup would never think of you."
"Ah, it is Ruth Jessup, then?"
"Yes, it is Ruth Jessup—the only girl I ever cared a straw for. The letter you gave me gets her with the rest. That is the grandest part of my bargain. She cannot help herself." ”

“ Nay, I have my doubts if the young man has not helped it on, else, how did that brazen-faced maid at the inn know about it, and taunt him with it before a half-score of drinkers?"
The eyes of Ruth Jessup grew large with wonder.
"Among drinkers! He at the public inn! Godmother, of whom are you speaking?"
"Who should I speak of, but the young man himself, Richard Storms?"
As a cloud sometimes sweeps suddenly from the blue sky, the shame and the fear left that young girl's face. ”

“ With the keen perceptions of a man of the world, he had, without spying upon Walton, observed him anxiously. He knew that more of his time was spent about the gardener's cottage than seemed consistent with any interest he could have felt in William Jessup. He saw that the young daughter, whom he could with difficulty look upon as more than a child, was, in fact, a wonderfully beautiful girl. Beyond all this he perceived that, day by day, the young man drifted from his home, that the society of Lady Rose was almost abandoned, and that this fair young patrician drooped under the change. ”

“ In his hot impetuosity, he had involved himself and her in a labyrinth of difficulties that led, as he could not help seeing, in his calmer moments, to deception, if not dishonor.
"I will atone for it all," he said to himself. "The moment I am strong enough to face his just resentment, my father shall know everything. God grant that the disappointment will only rest with him," he added, as his disturbed mind turned on Lady Rose with a thrill of compunction. "In my mad haste I may have; but no, no! she is too proud, too thoroughbred for a grand passion. ”

“ As if I was not as good as Ruth Jessup, any day, and more of a lady, too," retorted the girl, with passionate tears in her eyes.
"Ruth Jessup isn't the girl to lay her hands on a man's shoulder without his asking," said Storms, setting down his gun, and dusting his coat, as if her touch had soiled it. "Who knows that some one may not be looking on?" ”

“ What I can do is nothing. It will be you that saves him."
"I cannot! I cannot!"
"Ruth Jessup! You refuse? You have the power to save him, and will not?"
"God help me! God help me, I cannot do it."
Lady Rose turned away from the girl haughtily, angrily.
"And I could think that she loved Walton Hurst," she said, in bitterness of heart.
"Oh, do not, do not condemn me. If you only knew—if you only knew," cried Ruth, wringing her hands in wild desperation. [402]
"I know that you could save him from death, and his whole family from dishonor, and will not. That is enough. ”

“ Directly the sound of voices swept that way, and the great cedar trees were reddened with a glare of torches, and a streaming light from lanterns. Then Lady Rose, who had been sitting upon the ground with Walton Hurst's head resting on her lap, bent down softly, kissed the white forehead, and stole away from all traces of light. Sir Noel had been thoughtful for her. She could not have borne that the eyes of those menial helpers, or their masters either, should see her ministering to a man who, perhaps, would hold her care, as he might her love, in careless indifference. ”

“ A flash of fire shot through the pallor of Ruth Jessup's face. She drew her slender figure upright.
"Shame! No, father. Sick or well, I will not let you say that. No shame has fallen upon us." [195]
"Ruth! Ruth! You say this?"
"Father, I swear it! I, who tremble at the sound of an oath, knowing how sacred a thing it is. I swear it by my mother, who is in heaven!"
The old man reached up his arms, and drew the girl down to his bosom, which was heaving with great wave-like sobs. ”

“ He thought I was doubting him—that I meant to harm him, may be. Youth is so quick to act—so quick!"
"Oh, father, did he—did he do it?" cried Ruth, with a quick, passionate outburst.
"Have I not said that nothing should make me answer that, lass? No one shall hurt the young master with my help."
Ruth questioned her father no more. His words had confirmed her worst fears. It seemed to her as if all the world had arrayed itself against her feeble strength. But one ray of light broke through her troubles. Her father was better. He evidently believed in her. ”

“ Of course young women think such things no lies, and never expect to be believed; but Ruthy has been brought up better, and need not attempt to throw sand into her godmother's eyes, whatever she does with the rest of the world."
"You speak as if you believed all this nonsense," said Hurst, with quick fire in his eyes.
"Believe it? Why, there isn't a man on the estate who has not seen them, over and over again. Not that there is harm in it, because old Storms and Jessup have agreed upon it while they were children, and Ruth was ever obedient. ”