A Black Adonis Part 36

Of course Shirley Roseleaf was almost too happy to breathe. But even the happiest of lovers somehow manage to inhale a sufficiency of oxygen to keep life in them, though they have no knowledge of the process by which this is accomplished. He had seen several of his productions in type, some in the leading magazines, and he had a permanent position now on the staff of a great periodical. When the month he had allowed himself as necessary for a wedding journey was ended, he would settle down to work, and he knew no reason why he might not make a success in his chosen field. And there was Daisy--always Daisy--he would never again be separated from Daisy! Who that has loved and been loved can doubt the perfect content of this young man?

The saddest face at Midlands was that of Mr. Fern, who failed in his best attempts to appear cheerful. He was not sorry that his daughter was to be married, he would not have put a single obstacle in her way; but she was going from him, and the very, very dear relations they had so long sustained would never be exactly the same again. It was the destiny of a woman to cleave to her husband. He found no fault with the law of nature, but he had clung to Daisy so devotedly that he could not welcome very sincerely the hour that was to take her away.

The marriage was to be early in the evening. Everything was ready, even to the trunks, filled with traveling and other dresses. The night was to be pa.s.sed at the Imperial Hotel in the city, and the journey proper to be begun some time on the following day.

On the most momentous morning of her life, Daisy Fern announced that she had an errand to do in the city and would return shortly after twelve o'clock. As she was so thoroughly her own mistress n.o.body thought of questioning her more particularly. But twelve o'clock came, and one o'clock, and three, and five, and she neither was seen at Midlands nor was any message received from her.

By the latter hour Mr. Fern was in a state of excitement. The entire house was in an uproar. The servants were catechised, one by one, to see if perchance any of them could guess the young lady's destination. Word was sent by telephone to various places in the city, asking information, but none was received. She had left the house, ostensibly to go to New York, and nothing could be learned of her from that moment.

As Mr. Roseleaf was not expected until some time later, Mr. Fern went at last to the city and sought the young man at his rooms. He found him in the company of Lawrence Gouger, dressed for the ceremony, and impatient for the arrival of the hour when he should start for his bride's abode.

It may be conceived that the news Mr. Fern brought was not the pleasantest for him.

"You--you have not seen Daisy?" came the stammering question, as the father paused on the threshold of Roseleaf's room.

"To-day? Why, certainly not!" was the stupefied answer. "I was just about to start for your house."

Mr. Fern sank upon a sofa just inside the door.

"Something--has--happened!" he groaned. "Ah, my boy, something has happened to my child!"

Roseleaf looked at Mr. Gouger, who in turn looked at Mr. Fern.

"She--went away--this morning--on an errand," enunciated the father, slowly, "saying--she would return--at noon. And--that is the last we--have seen--of her. Oh, it seems as if I should go mad!"

It seemed as if Shirley Roseleaf would go mad, too. He looked like one bereft of sense, as he stood there without uttering a word.

"Perhaps she has returned since you left home," suggested Mr. Gouger, on the spur of the instant. "Don't lose heart yet. Let me send to a telephone office and have them inquire. You have a 'phone in your house, have you not, Mr. Fern?"

The father bowed in reply. He was too crushed to say anything unnecessary. Touching a b.u.t.ton, Mr. Gouger soon had a messenger dispatched for the information desired, and in the meantime he tried, by suggesting possibilities, to soothe the two men.

"You shouldn't get so excited," he protested. "There are a hundred slight accidents that might be responsible for Miss Daisy's delay.

Perhaps she has met with an insignificant accident, and the word she has sent to her father has gone astray--as happens very often in these days. That would account for everything. Or she may have taken the wrong train--an express--that did not stop this side of Bridgeport, and hesitated to telegraph for fear of alarming you. 'Don't cry till you're hurt' is an old proverb. Why, neither of you act much better than as if her dead body had been brought home!"

They heard him, but neither replied. They waited--it seemed an hour--for an answer to the telephonic message, and it came, simply this: "Nothing has been heard as yet of Miss Fern."

The thoroughly distressed and disheartened father shrank before the gaze of the lover, when this news was promulgated by Mr. Gouger.

"What swindle is this?" were the bitter words he heard. "Have you decided on another husband for your daughter, and come to break the news to me in this fashion?"

Mr. Gouger interfered, to protect the old man whose suffering was evidently already too acute.

"Hush!" he exclaimed. "Can't you see that you are killing him? Be careful!"

Roseleaf waved him back with a sweep of his arm.

"Your advice has not been asked," he replied, gutturally. "I can see some things, if I _am_ blind. That girl has gone to the man she loves--the man he," indicating the father, "wanted her to marry. He is rich, and I am poor, and he has won! It is plain enough! And he pretended, day by day, to my face, that he had given her up for my sake; and she put her arms around me, and beguiled me into confidence, in order to strike me the harder at the end. Well, let him have her! I wouldn't take her from him. But there's an account between us that he may not like to settle. When you see your friend, tell him that!"

Mr. Fern heard these terrible sentences like a man in a dream. It could not be Roseleaf that was uttering them--the man to whom his young daughter had given the full affection of her innocent heart! He was mad to talk that way. Mad! mad!

"You will repent these rash statements," said the old gentleman, rising faintly from his seat. "You will repent them, sir, in sackcloth. I wish with all my heart that Mr. Weil was here, for he would at least try to help me find my child."

Mr. Gouger suggested that Mr. Weil would be at Midlands soon, as he had an invitation to the wedding.

"No," replied Mr. Fern, chokingly. "I received word from him to-day that he could not attend. He is out of the city."

Roseleaf gave vent to an expression of nausea.

"Are you yourself deceived?" he exclaimed. "He will not attend _my_ wedding; certainly not! He is attending _his own_. If, indeed, he does not compa.s.s his ends without that preliminary."

Weak and old as Mr. Fern was he would have struck the speaker had not the third person in the room interfered.

"Do you dare to speak in that manner of my daughter!" he cried. "Must you attack the character not only of my best friend but of my child as well? I thank G.o.d at this moment, whatever be her fate, that she did not join her life to yours!"

With a majestic step he strode from the presence of his late prospective son-in-law. Gouger, with a feeling that some one should accompany him, followed. But first he turned to speak in a low key to the novelist.

"Do not go out to-night, unless you hear from me," he said, impressively. "This may not be as bad as you think, after all. I will go to Midlands and return with what news I can get. Don't act until you are certain of your premises."

The young man was removing his wedding suit, already.

"I shall not go out," he responded, aimlessly.

"You might write a few pages--on your novel," suggested the critic, as he stood in the hallway. "There will never be a better--"

A vigorous movement slammed the door in his face before he could complete his sentence.

Hastening after Mr. Fern, Gouger accompanied him home, where the first thing he heard was that there was still no news of the missing one.

CHAPTER XXIII.

AN AWFUL NIGHT.

It was an awful night for Wilton Fern. The presence in the house of Mr.

Gouger and Mr. Boggs aided him but little to bear the weight that pressed upon his heart. It was better than being entirely alone, but not a great deal. Together they listened whenever their ears caught an unusual sound. Twenty times they went together to the street door and opened it to find nothing animate before them.

Morning came and still no tidings. The earliest trains from the city were visited by servants, for the master of the house was too exhausted to make the journey. And at nine o'clock the gentlemen who had pa.s.sed the night at Midlands took the railway back to New York, with no solution of the great problem.

Mr. Gouger had not been in his office an hour before the door opened and in walked Archie Weil. The critic started from his chair at the unexpected sight, and remarked that he had not expected to see his visitor so early.

"I presume you heard the news and came home at once," he added, meaningly.

Mr. Weil was pale, and wore the look of one whose rest has been disturbed.

"I don't know what you mean," he replied. "I was called away on business that I could not evade, and came back as soon as I could. I fear the Ferns thought it rather rough of me to stay away from the wedding, but I could not very well help it. You were there, of course. Everything went off well, I trust."

The speaker had the air of a man who tries to appear at ease when he is not. His voice trembled slightly and his hands roamed from one portion of his apparel to another.