"It was true—and false," answered Farnham angrily. "I had a letter from Mrs. Courtney telling me all about it. She drank laudanum, and it threw her into a deep sleep. At first they thought she was dead, but a physician succeeded in rousing and restoring her to life, although she has been in a strange, dazed state ever since, and it is thought that she may never recover from the effects of the drug she used. But Mrs. Courtney telegraphed me this morning that they had arrived in New York from Europe, and would proceed immediately to Gray Gables."
Old Meg listened with keen interest to every word, then exclaimed:
"If Nita had committed suicide in the old, wretched days when she was my hard-worked slave I should not have wondered at it, but it puzzles me that she should attempt it now when she is rich and happy as old Farnham's ward."
With a gulp of rage he answered:
"I will tell you why she wished to die. She was married to a man she hated so much that she would die rather than live with him."
"Hated that handsome swell that she eloped with? I don't believe it. The girl loved the very ground he walked on!" cried Meg.
"Yes, she loved Dorian Mountcastle, but he was not her husband," answered the old man. "Listen, Meg, to one of the strangest stories you ever heard."
And, slowly, and with infinite gusto, as though he enjoyed the telling, he related to her the story of that day in Central Park when he had wooed and won beautiful Nita for his reluctant bride. She listened like one turned to stone; not a syllable escaped her, and he ended with ghoulish glee.
"As her husband all of Juan de Castro's wealth is legally mine. I can take open possession of it now, and if questions should be asked I can point to my bride, his daughter, as the lawful heiress."
She started from her trance of silence muttering hoarsely:
"You—you promised to marry me when you took possession of the spoil."
"Be patient, Meg. She will not live long, you ought to know that well. You have known some people who hated me, and then died mysteriously, did they not? Well, this girl, this dark-eyed beauty, she loathes me, and some day—not far distant, perhaps—I shall take deadly revenge for her scorn. But, first, to force her to my arms, to humble her haughty spirit, and break her proud heart. Then your turn will come, Meg. Be patient and wait."
"You are deceiving me, Farnham. You love the daughter as you loved the mother. You will never kill Juanita de Castro when she looks at you with her mother's eyes. You will grovel at her feet for a word of kindness, and Jack and I—Jack, your son, for whose sake I crave the treasure—we will be thrust aside, forgotten! No, no, you traitor, we will not," she rose up and shook her clawlike hands in his face, "no, we will not be trodden upon! We will have revenge, Jack and I will betray you."
He grasped and shook her violently till the breath was almost out of her body, then flung her roughly back into her seat.
"You cat who did my bidding—you and your villainous son—how dare you threaten me? One word from me and you both would swing from a scaffold!" he hissed furiously. "Hold your cursed tongue, or beware of my vengeance!" and with an oath he left the house and took his way toward Gray Gables.
Meg crouched like one dazed in a chair where her assailant had flung her, but Jack Dineheart did not go in to see if she were dead or alive. He followed the miser almost to the gate of Gray Gables with a stealthy, sullen stride, then, suddenly, flung himself on him with resistless fury, and bore him down to the ground.
"Oh, you wretch, you devil, to have married her, the girl you promised in her bonny childhood should be mine, my wife! Oh, you fiend, to take her from me! But I will save poor Nita and avenge myself. Here at the gates of fancied bliss, you die."
A keen blade flashed in the air, then sunk in the man's breast.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE TENTH OF JUNE
It was true, as the old miser had told Meg Dineheart, Nita had been saved from death by the skilful efforts of a London physician, and in the stupid, weakened state induced by the drug she had taken, and the measures used to counteract its effects, she was like wax in Mrs. Courtney's hands, so that she was brought home with scarcely a protest.
In fact, she was so ill that during the whole voyage to New York she scarcely remembered the old miser's existence, and the dreadful fact that the year of her marriage-contract was drawing to its close.
When she was taken to Gray Gables some glimmerings of memory returned to her, but she did not remember that it was the fatal tenth of June.
It was May when she made the frantic effort to end her life. Since then, in the pangs of keen physical distress, time had slipped by unheeded.
It was touching to see the joy of good Mrs. Hill at the return of her beloved young mistress. She wept with joy, and hugged Nita close to her motherly bosom, kissing the top of the drooping little head, with its crown of dark, wavy tresses, threaded with gold.
She did not say one word to her of the story she had read in the New York paper, but when she looked into the pale and lovely face she knew that the shadow of some pathetic sorrow had fallen darkly on the young girl's heart.
Nita lay wearily on a sofa until it was time to dress for dinner. Then Mrs. Hill came up to help her, for her English maid had not accompanied her home.
"It does not matter what I wear," she said listlessly.
"But Mrs. Courtney expects company this evening, I think," said Mrs. Hill.
"It does not matter," the girl again replied wearily, her eyes full of tears.
But Mrs. Hill had excellent taste, and she laid out a dainty white gown for her young lady.
"I may be old-fashioned in my notions, but to my mind a young girl always looks best in white, and to you, Miss Nita, it's wonderfully becoming," she said, as she shook out the soft, shining robe of feather-light Lansdowne, with its profuse, airy trimmings of white, embroidered chiffon. "This is pretty enough for a bride," she said admiringly. "Won't you wear your moonstone jewelry with it, Miss Nita? It will suit you so well, and I will bring you some pale-pink roses and white jasmine flowers for your corsage. The garden is beautiful now, since the gardener had it in charge. You know last year when we first came it was all of a tangle."
So she rambled on, and listless Nita let her have her way, and barely looked in her mirror when the good woman said enthusiastically:
"Now you are finished, dearie. Look in the glass what a beauty you are!"
She was a beauty. The soft, shining robe draped her form exquisitely, and the filmy chiffon rufflings made a soft mist about her lovely half-bare neck and arms that were clasped with moonstones, set in frosted silver, looking soft and fairylike as linked moonbeams.
On her breast heaved a cluster of starry-white jasmine flowers mixed with pale-pink, half-opened rose-buds, making a delicate contrast of color with the whiteness of her costume.
Beautiful, yes—but with a tragedy of sorrow in the midnight eyes and on the pathetic curves of the exquisitely chiseled lips. She smiled faintly, and murmured some words of thanks, then went down-stairs.
The drawing-room, wearing a holiday air, with profuse decorations of flowers, was deserted as yet. Azalea and her mother were still dressing. With a sigh of relief Nita turned her footsteps to the garden, that, under the care of a gardener had been rescued from the tangle of last year, and made into a fairyland of beauty and fragrance.
Nita walked slowly along the graveled paths, now in the full beams of the rising moon, now in the long dark shadows of the tall fir-trees.
She paused to rest by the fountain where last year she had come with her lover's letter in her bosom, and her wild heart thrilling with pain and rapture. A sob swelled her throat as she lifted her sad gaze to the star-gemmed sky, and murmured: