Mrs. Alex. McVeigh Miller

“ He recoiled in horror from her bold accusation, his handsome face went white, his blue eyes flashed lightning.
“How dare you?” he thundered, clenching his fist; then it fell helplessly to his side. “You are a woman; I cannot strike you. I can only reason and explain.”
“Yes, explain, if you can, for your conduct certainly appears very suspicious,” Jessie Stirling answered, with a bitter, taunting laugh that nearly drove him wild.
And yet, in all his anger, he knew she was right; it did look bad, this masquerade; and, although he despised the girl, he knew he must explain for Leola’s sake. ”

“ Alston Mead had never fully recognized before all the rare beauty of Leola, for until now it had been shadowed by her secret sorrow—the thorn that was always piercing her heart.
When the girl looked up at him now her eyes were like stars, sudden roses had bloomed on her cheeks, and her lips were trembling with smiles of joy.
“Oh, it is like some sweet dream!” she cried, half fearfully, her white hands clasped above her wildly throbbing heart.
“It is no dream, my darling; it is a blissful reality,” her father cried. ”

“ Even Doctor Barnes, who had not found it necessary to pay but three visits to his patient, did not know of the romance going on at the cottage, and being very busy with the measles, just then epidemic in Alderson and the country round about, he had no time to gossip about the stranger whose life Leola Mead had saved. As there were none who knew Ray Chester, so there were none to worry over him; and beneath the matronly chaperonage of kind Widow Gray their secret love bloomed into a splendid flower whose strong roots only death could tear away. ”

“ I refuse the suitor you have chosen for me without even hearing his name!”
The old man muttered, sullenly.
“Marriage is the destiny of all young girls. You would not wish to grow into a sour old maid?”
“No, I do not intend to be an old maid, sir, but,” with a proud toss of her lovely head, “when I marry I shall choose the man myself, and it shall be for love, not money!”
“Money is the only thing worth having—money and long life,” he muttered, but Leola, with a contemptuous laugh, turned to go. ”

“ With Leola dead, all his plans would come to naught. Old Bennett would foreclose the mortgage and ruin him. In his old age he must go forth a beggar into the world, friendless, and without a place to lay his head.
Through this terrible trick of fate all his plans and aspirations must be wrecked, and science lose, perhaps, the magnificent discoveries to which he had devoted his life.
No wonder he was filled with a blind fury against Chester Olyphant, through whose treachery Leola’s death had come to pass, thus thwarting all his plans for future gain. ”

“ Hermann staggered after him with quaking limbs and a ghastly face; then Joslyn softly shut and locked the door.
The two old men, who had grown gray in each other’s confidence and service—grim old men, who had outgrown pity or interest in youth and love and all that was sweetest in the world, now stood face to face, and between them, on the floor, that limp body that, now cold and senseless, had been but a little while ago a picture of manly strength and splendor, with a heart throbbing fast with the passion of youth. ”

“ She avoided every one, which was not hard to do, the household consisting of only five members—her guardian and self, her former governess, who now combined teaching and housekeeping by way of economy, a fat black cook, and a man of all work, a misshapen, dwarfish creature of tremendous strength.
The day and night seemed interminably long to Leola, who lay awake many hours through pure joy of this blissful something that had come so suddenly into the placid current of her young life. Heaven forefend her from ever knowing the wakefulness of sorrow! ”

“ Even in that terrible moment, with the black horse plunging madly forward to the imminent peril of the driver’s life, Leola saw, as by a flash, that the man was young and very, very handsome, and her heart throbbed with wild pain at his danger, for on one side the road sloped, precipitously, downward to a dangerous stream of water, and a plunge over that steep incline meant death in horrible form. ”

“ Stood suddenly like fate—
To those who love, the world is wide,
But not to those who hate!”
Leola felt a small, gloved hand pressing hers very hard, looked into bluebell eyes under flaxen waves of hair, and turned cold with dislike and repulsion, dreading every moment to see over the blonde’s shoulder her husband’s face, handsome and winning, with the laughing blue eyes that had smiled her heart away.
With a strong effort she pulled herself together, calling her passionate pride to her aid. They should not see her wince; she would show them she had forgotten him. ”

“ When the rash words had passed Leola’s lips a great trembling seized upon her, a horror of life she had never felt before, and she longed to scream out aloud to him that she must take back her promise—that she could not bind her beautiful, throbbing young life to oily, unctuous Giles Bennett, the man more than twice her age, and who in no way could be her fitting mate, not if he paid a million dollars instead of what he offered. ”

“ With sudden angry passion, her dark eyes flashing, she turned upon the artful girl:
“Please speak no more to me on that subject, Jessie. You weary me. I despise the man. I wish never to hear his name again!” she cried, bitterly, and her weakness seemed to fall from her, in passionate contempt.
“Poor Leola, I cannot blame you,” cried the triumphant blonde, cheerfully, just as the door opened again, and Wizard Hermann glided softly into the room.
“Ah, Leola, you are better. I am very glad,” he said, in a smooth, oily voice, taking the chair Jessie vacated, saying she must go to mamma. ”

“ Then I took the train for West Virginia, and on arriving at Alderson I started out the same morning to find you, Leola; for, of course, you have guessed it was yourself! Directly my horse took fright; and only fancy my feelings when I saw you coming toward me on your white pony, a perfect vision of youth and joy and beauty, and realized that a horrible death might thrust us apart in another fatal moment. You saved my life, and can you wonder I look upon you as my fate—the fairest fate that ever life gave to a man? ”

“ Who took care of the poor man?” cried Leola, with tears in her eyes, forgetting her own wrongs in exquisite sympathy.
“Why, the Bennetts took him to their house and cared for him till he recovered; and he lives there yet, having a man attend to him all the time. I must say Mrs. Bennett acted beautifully to Uncle Hermann, and has befriended him all this time in spite of the fact that he hadn’t been as good as he might to her when she was a lone old maid.”
“It was just like dear Miss Tuttle to return good for evil! She had a noble heart!” cried Leola. ”

“ Still unconscious that his bonny sweetheart lay upon the ground, so close that if he stepped backward he must stumble over her senseless form, he glanced out of the arbor to see if she were coming, and then turned back to Jessie, saying, hoarsely:
“It looks suspicious, I grant you, but when a man is cursed with immense wealth, and knows himself constantly the prey of designing women wanting to marry him for his money, is it not excusable that, by a little harmless deception, he may win a girl’s heart by love alone, and thus ensure his future happiness?” ”

“ As for the rest, when you are once his wife, you can wind the foolish old man around your fingers like a ribbon, and have your own way in everything. If you refuse he swears he will turn us all out of doors in twenty-four hours.”
He paused and waited, but she did not speak, and realizing how futile would be the attempted exercise of authority, he fell to pleading:
“Can you let this terrible calamity befall us, Leola—me in my old age, you in your youth and beauty? Why, we would not have whereon to lay our heads if we anger Giles Bennett.” ”

“ Leola, with her beautiful face glowing like a rose, exclaimed:
“I don’t want you to die, Jessie, so I am going to ‘’fess,’ as the children say, and, after all, I think I ought to confide in you, for it is through you all this happiness has come to me.”
“Through me,” gasped Jessie, and her lips went white, while a cold hand seemed to press all the life from her heart with a swift, horrible suspicion that centered around that name “Chester,” breathed so sweetly just now from Leola’s lovely lips. ”

“ On learning that the rotund widower, Bennett, whom she secretly loved, was a suitor for Leola’s hand, the spinster promptly went into hysterics that she could not have helped to save her life.
She shrieked furiously:
“Oh, the fat villain, the vile deceiver! After all his attentions to me since his poor wife died, to turn around and fall in love with a chit of a girl like Leola! Oh, I could tear him limb from limb, the wretch! And as to marrying him, she shall not—never, never!” ”

“ Leola obeyed him, pouting, for she hated to lose time indoors this gladsome, golden day.
There was no love lost between her and her grim guardian, anyway, for he was a stern old man, reticent and mysterious, spending most of his time in a horrid laboratory up in the tower chamber of the rough old stone house, where the country folk said he was working either to wrest from Nature the secret of making gold, or the still greater mystery of distilling a magic elixir of life. ”

“ Then Leola recalled the morning, three weeks ago, when her guardian had bidden her prepare to be married in a month to the man of his choice.
“So this is my rich suitor—old Bennett!” she burst out, laughing, for she could not regard it seriously at all, not realizing Wizard Hermann’s grim determination.
“Why do you call him old? He is only about fifty or so, and a fine, handsome man!” complained the tearful governess.
She could hardly understand why the volatile Leola burst into spasms of the merriest laughter, in which Ray Chester could not help joining. ”

“ I was in an accident; my horse ran away, and I was thrown out of the runabout. Was I killed? Is this heaven, and are you an angel?”
Leola laughed a happy, rippling laugh, sweet as music to his ears.
“An angel? No, indeed,” she cried; “and this is not heaven, either, only a rough, rocky road, where you fell when you pitched out of your trap. Oh! are you hurt very bad? Does your poor head pain you very much?” ”

“ I’m so glad I came this morning, for I have detected a villain in a plot to ruin poor Leola! You remember how I told you I was betrothed to Chester Olyphant, a millionaire of New York, and that he was gone on a yachting tour for a few weeks. Well, this morning I found that, instead of going yachting, as he pretended, the unprincipled villain, who knew of Leola from me, had come down here masquerading as Ray Chester, an artist, making love to poor, innocent Leola. This morning he came upon us in the arbor, and when I exposed him to the girl, she fell in a swoon so deep that it looks like death. ”

“ A cry of alarm shrilled over the old man’s lips, and he stood like one rooted to the spot, listening for the cry of pain that must announce the dread result of the perilous leap. Visions of Leola crippled or dead floated before his mind’s eye, and he muttered, savagely:
“Little vixen, if you have broken your neck it is your own fault! But if you live you shall marry the man of my choice one month from to-day, I swear it!” ”

“ But he shall never marry Leola Mead—never! Why, I think I would murder her first! And what will he say when he finds me here? Above all, why is he masquerading under a false name, and pretending to be a poor artist? Ah, I have it! He means to deceive the silly girl; his intentions are dishonorable, but I will unmask him, I will break up the affair, I swear it!” clenching her white hands desperately.
Leola came back with the wine and a biscuit, and Jessie accepted, eagerly. ”

“ Why linger on when the charm is gone from life, and I must live on, shamed, humiliated, by the thought that Jessie Stirling’s proud, rich lover stooped from the height where he should dwell to pluck a wayside flower, then trample it beneath his feet? ”

“ I have no more use for so unworthy a guardian, but I shall not take revenge by foreclosing my mortgage on his home. I shall leave him in peaceable possession the term of his life; then Wheatlands will revert to my daughter, Leola. For the rest, as soon as Leola can pack up to leave I shall take my dear girl away with me to New York, and if Mr. Bennett repudiates his pretty bride, she may accompany us. I am rich, and for her love and care of Leola she shall be well repaid. ”

“ Be seated, I beg you, and calm yourself. This is certainly a very unexpected rencontre. I did not know you were at Wheatlands. Has not Leola, then, told you she is my promised wife?”
Sinking, sullenly, to the arbor bench as he raised her to her feet, she hissed, furiously:
“The silly little rustic told me she was in love with a man named Ray Chester, but how was I to guess that her poor artist lover was the millionaire society man, Chester Olyphant, masquerading under a false name and guise, perhaps to deceive a pretty, ignorant country girl, with more beauty than brains?” ”

“ Leola’s dark eyes blazed with indignation.
“You must surely be mad,” she cried, passionately. “The man I would choose for my husband must ask me for my hand, not you, sir. This is free America, you must remember, not France, where marriages are arranged by old people who have forgotten love and youth. ”

“ Tell her how rich you are, and that you’ll give her anything her heart craves. If she refuses, then I shall have to use my influence,” Wizard Hermann said, consolingly, wishing he were well out of all this bother and back in his laboratory at work with his beloved chemicals.
His house and lands were all mortgaged to his rich neighbor, and he had not a dollar to pay him to prevent foreclosure. It seemed like a providence when the rich widower cast his covetous eyes on lovely Leola, and offered, if Hermann could get her to marry him, to release the debt. ”