Kathleen

“ He looked at beautiful Kathleen, with the fire of her dark eyes dim with tears, and her cheeks burning with resentment, feeling himself hardly able to refrain from taking her in his arms and kissing away the tempestuous tears.
Suddenly his repressed passion burst forth:
"Kathleen, my darling, do marry me! Can't you learn to love me just a little? I would be so fond of you, so devoted, that you could not help but learn to love me. And I am rich, you know. I would help you queen it over those insolent women." ”

“ After again commending Kathleen to his care, he added, "Remember, Aylmer. If when my child is grown-up, you and she desire to enter into the sweetest and closest of all relationships, you must recall our conversation of to-day, and feel assured that had her father been living, his consent and blessing would have been given, and his dearest wish fulfilled by such a union. But I know you, my dear boy, and that you will place Kathleen's happiness before your own. ”

“ With a prayer in his heart to Heaven, he turned his dark, despairing eyes toward the beautiful, anguished face at the window.
"Courage, my own love!" he called to her, bravely. "Death is but a fleeting pang, and then it will be life forever. Turn your sweet eyes away, my own Kathleen; do not torture yourself with the sight of my fate. ”

“ Tell me that it is not so! My one great hope is for freedom, that I may yet have the hope of winning you. Life without that hope would be a living death. [Pg 162] Oh, Kathleen, my love, my darling! pity me—pity yourself! You have not learned to love the man you have promised to marry. Send him from you. Wait a little, my darling, and happiness will come to us!
"Ralph."
"Oh, my poor boy—my poor boy!" sobbed Kathleen.
She forgot herself, she forgot Teddy Darrell, to whom she had promised herself, and she kissed Ralph Chainey's letter with red, clinging lips, as if it had been his handsome face. ”

“ Kathleen seemed suddenly to grow well and strong at the wonderful discovery that it was her own cousin who had saved her life, and that the sweet, lovely woman who had cared for her so kindly was her own dear grandmother.
They had volumes to tell each other; and how Mrs. Franklyn was shocked when she heard that a decoy letter, pretending to be from herself, had at last brought Kathleen to Richmond.
She wept bitterly at the thought that her precious granddaughter had so nearly lost her life through this mysterious treachery. ”

“ But you must call me Kathleen; you know we are not strangers to each other. I know all about you. I have lived at your home, slept in your pretty room, and—can you ever forgive me, dear?—I read your sweet diary! I was so lonely and so curious over the girl whose identity had become mixed with mine."
"It was very silly, was it not?—that is all I regret about it," Daisy Lynn answered, blushing crimson. Then she looked fearlessly into Kathleen's eyes as she added: "But I am cured now. I despise him. I could not love him now if he begged me on his knees!" ”

“ Kathleen really alive? Kathleen here, in the same city with us?" exclaimed Alpine Belmont, in genuine surprise.
Ralph Chainey had been telling her all about his visit to Mrs. Stone and his unexpected rencontre with his lost love.
"Some one has been slandering me to her, and she hates me now. She refused to have anything more to do with me," he ended, with a long sigh.
The beauty's lashes fell to hide her blue eyes' exultant gleam.
"Oh, how cruel of Kathleen!" she exclaimed. She sighed, and added, in a low, tender voice: "How could any one be cruel to you?" ”

“ Kathleen was playing and singing for Helen. Her back was turned to the door, so she did not know when the two young gentlemen entered and silently seated themselves, obeying a gesture from Helen.
The young girl, unconscious of her lover's presence, sung on, sweetly and sadly:
"One word is too often profaned,
For me to profane it,
One feeling too falsely disdained
For thee to disdain it.
One hope is too like to despair,
For prudence to smother,
And Pity from thee more dear
Than that from another. ”

“ Hastening into the mill in search of Kathleen, the two men were horrified to find upon the floor the ghastly, decapitated body of Fedora.
In another moment they saw near at hand the inanimate forms of Ralph and Kathleen.
"Oh, Heaven, we are too late! They are all dead!" exclaimed Teddy in anguish; but a low moan from Kathleen arrested him.
He stooped over his beautiful betrothed and lifted her in his arms. She opened her eyes, but they gazed blankly into his, and Kathleen murmured, gladly:
"Ralph, darling! I have saved you from a terrible death. Thank God! thank God! ”

“ The Southern relatives, so long deaf to her loving appeals, wrote at last to say that they wanted Kathleen to come and live with them. They were rich now, and could make her life as gay and luxurious as it was before her father's death.
"I should like to go and visit them. My heart always yearned for my mother's people," Kathleen said, wistfully.
Uncle Ben was thoughtfully perusing the letter. He answered:
"I will take you to them, my dear. I should not like for you to travel alone any more."
"Oh, how good you are, dearest uncle!" cried the girl, gladly. ”

“ I want to enjoy his agony when he realizes the awful death that lies before him. He must know that Kathleen is here, that she will witness his death, and then meet the same horrible fate."
It was a scene on which the devils in hell might have gloated: the old mill, with its dim lights and strange, flickering shadows; the prostrate man, with his death-white face; the two fiends binding him with strong cords, lest he should recover and escape their vengeful fury; and looking on with anguished eyes at the doom of her beloved was our beautiful Kathleen.
"He revives!" hissed Fedora. ”

“ From the curtained darkness beyond a fiend is gliding toward you!
The shrouding hood of the long cloak has fallen back from the face of a woman—a bold, handsome face with steel-blue eyes, and glittering golden hair. In her upraised hand glitters a long thin dagger, on her face is stamped in awful, ashen pallor the fell purpose—murder!
But he sleeps on lightly, dreaming, perhaps, of Kathleen, while this beautiful fury glides soundlessly across the thick moquette carpet, gains his side, poises her shining weapon on high, aims for his heart, and—it descends, it pierces his breast! ”

“ He gazed through blinding tears upon the sweet white face; he took her cold, white hand and kissed the wound upon it, and then he whispered, as if she could hear him:
"Beautiful Kathleen! you will never know now how dearly I have loved you since first I saw your face! You are dead—dead! and soon the dark earth will cover you away forever from the sight of men. Ah! if only those dead lips could unclose long enough to tell me the name of your dastardly murderer, I would pursue him to the ends of the earth, but that I would bring him to punishment!" ”

“ CHAPTER XX. KATHLEEN MAKES A STARTLING DISCOVERY.
"Who that feels what Love is here—
All its falsehood, all its pain—
Would, for even Elysium's sphere,
Risk the fatal dream again?"
When Kathleen Carew recovered consciousness she found herself on a bed in a shabby garret bed-room, with the eyes of the blonde beauty looking into hers.
"So you are come to at last? I began to think you were dead, child. Here! smell this, and you'll soon be better," she exclaimed, vivaciously, as she held a bottle of camphor under Kathleen's nose. ”

“ Now, as they drew near the fairy rath, Kathleen tiptoed over the rocky path, thinking every moment to see a fairy slip behind a pebble or a blade of grass. She felt sure that when they stepped within the rocky ring, a door would open in the grassy [10] mound and show to her eager eyes long rooms glittering with jewelled walls, leading one after another into the depths of the earth. ”

“ Tears stopped Kathleen's utterance for a while. She had begged her aunt and cousin just to let her tell her tale uninterrupted.
"For," she said, "if you begin to pity me and speak lovingly, it will never be told. I shall break down, and cannot begin again."
"You have had one great blessing out of the trouble, one light that has pierced the darkness, Kathleen," said Mrs. Ellicott. "You have been brought nearer to God, and realized, as you never did before, the love that never faileth." ”

“ When Ralph Chainey had left Kathleen alone the stranger boldly approached the weeping girl.
Standing before Kathleen, she touched her on the shoulder, and when Kathleen shrunk back and lifted her white face in piteous fear and entreaty, the stranger almost started at its wonderful beauty.
"Ralph Chainey is deceiving you," was the startling sentence that fell on Kathleen's ear.
[Pg 84]
"Oh!" the girl exclaimed in bewilderment; but the blonde beauty went on:
"He has promised to marry you, but he does not mean it, you poor, pretty child. It is only a plot to betray you." ”

“ Now that he had begun to think of marriage, who so suitable as Kathleen? He knew of Fairing's adoration, but he took it as a matter of course that she had nothing to give of the same sort in return. Her beauty was still serene and unimpaired. He would not spoil it by the tortures of emotion. He would try to make Kathleen's heart beat in harmony with his own; it should not thunder out of time. He had made up his mind that he would marry her. ”

“ Franklyn entered the room with an excited face.
"Kathleen, do you remember the strange story you told us about Daisy Lynn?" she asked. "Well, she is here in this house! She is no more insane than you are, and is your living image—only, perhaps, not quite as pretty. She knows all you suffered in her place, and is just dying to meet you. Will you come down?"
"I should like to have her come up here," answered Kathleen, who felt as if she would like to be quite alone at first with Daisy Lynn, the fair young girl whose line of life had so strangely and tragically crossed her own. ”

“ She was not usually romantic, this girl, but Kathleen's horrible fate had terribly unnerved her. A strange impulse came to her to go down alone to the parlor, to stand by that open coffin, and beg Kathleen to forgive her all the wicked past.
"She will hear me, for the spiritualists tell us that the souls of the dead remain at first near their unburied bodies," she thought, superstitiously; and, obeying her impulse, rose, slipped on a dressing-gown, and drawn by an awful and irresistible yearning, sought the presence of the dead. ”

“ Vincent Carew had been a singularly handsome and imposing gentleman, and the fine artist had done full justice to his noble subject. The dark eyes seemed to hold the very fire of life and the smiling lips almost about to breathe a blessing on his wronged, unhappy orphan child.
As Kathleen paused in front of the magnificent portrait of her lost father, the hard, defiant look on her face faded as if by magic, and the burning light of her large Oriental dark eyes was softened by a rush of tears. Almost unconsciously she sunk upon her knees and lifted her clasped white hands appealingly. ”

“ Then she left the little girls to play by themselves, and Mary Ellen lay on the grass among the spring blossoms while Kathleen sat down beside her to tell her a long story.
“This is a truly fairy rath,” she began, “and Cousin Bee’s farm is the fortune fairy’s palace.”
And Cousin Bee, putting her cream into the churn, said to herself, “Sure, the farm is big enough to keep both the children for awhile. I’ll let Kathleen stay on with Mary Ellen till her Aunt Hannah sends for her again.” ”

“ I want—want—her—to enjoy her trip as long as she likes," faltered Kathleen, piteously.
"You dear, timid child! you are determined to make Teddy wait for his happiness," laughed her friend. "Well, never mind: let it be as long as you choose. Only you will not mind if I begin to get your trousseau ready? You know there are always so many delays."
A burning blush stole over Kathleen's pure cheek.
"Dear Mrs. Stone, Teddy will have to take me as I am. I have no money for a trousseau," she sighed.
"Let that be my care. Surely I may make a wedding gift to my cousin's bride!" ”

“ It is not right. You—you—are not free!" she cried, trying to be loyal to her absent betrothed.
"I shall be—soon. The courts will certainly grant me a divorce from that dreadful woman. But then, Kathleen, my freedom will avail me nothing if you are lost to me! Oh, my own love—my darling! be brave, and break through the fetters that bind you to this man you do not love! Wait for me?"
[Pg 216]
Oh, the passionate pleading in his voice and eyes! how they thrilled her soul. She wished to herself that she had never seen poor Teddy, whom she had so rashly promised to marry. ”

“ I know. How could any one live in the house with her and not be devoted to one so sweet and lovely?"
Alpine withdrew her hand and played nervously with her many rings.
"Yes. I was fond of Kathleen," she murmured. "You did well to come to me. You have all my sympathy, and oh! how I wish I could find her and restore her to you. Is there nothing I can do? I am rich, you know, and if you wish it, I will employ a detective to find Kathleen;" but even as she breathed the tender words, the wily girl knew that she would rather employ a detective to hunt her rival down to her death. ”

“ In a short time Kathleen returned, and brought some dry peat and a measure of whisky. "If what you say is true," said Kathleen, "and sure enough you're no Irish, and very young for a tithe proctor, who must grow old before he can be such a villain, you are in no very pleasant way. The O'Tooles are here, and I've an idea they mean no good; for they sit with all their heads together, whispering to each other, and all their shillelaghs by their sides."
"Tell me, Kathleen, was the daughter of Sir William a fair-haired, blue-eyed girl?" ”