A Double Life Part 3

"It is I who should beg pardon for forgetting myself in such society, and indulging in the reveries that will come unbidden to such poor shadows as I."

The voice that answered, though low-toned, was singularly persuasive, and the words were uttered with an expression more engaging than a smile.

"Magician, you bade me look to you. I take you at your word. I dare you to show your skill, and prove that yours is no empty boast," said Kate Heath, with evident satisfaction at the offer and interest in its maker.

Rising slowly, Felix Stahl advanced towards her, and, despite his want of stature and vigor, which are the manliest attributes of manhood, no one felt the lack of them, because an instantaneous impression of vitality and power was made in defiance of external seeming. With both hands loosely folded behind him, he paused before Miss Heath, asking, tranquilly: "Which wish shall I grant? Will you permit me to read your palm? Shall I show you the image of your lover in yonder gla.s.s? or shall I whisper in your ear the most secret hope, fear or regret, which you cherish? Honor me by choosing, and any one of these feats I will perform."

Kate stole a covert glance at the tall mirror, saw that it reflected no figure but that of the speaker, and with an irrepressible smile she s.n.a.t.c.hed her eyes away, content, saying hastily: "As the hardest feat of the three, you shall tell me what I most ardently desire, if the rest will submit to a like test. Can you read their hearts as well as mine?"

His eye went slowly round the little circle, and from each face the smile faded, as that searching gaze explored it. Constrained by its fascination, more than by curiosity or inclination, each person bowed their acquiescence to Kate's desire, and as Stahls eye came back to her, he answered briefly, like one well a.s.sured of his own power: "I can read their hearts. Shall I begin with you?"

For a moment she fluttered like a bird caught in a fowler's net, then with an effort composed both att.i.tude and aspect, and looked up half-proudly, half-pleadingly, into the colorless countenance that bent till the lips were at her ear. Only three words, and the observers saw the conscious blood flush scarlet to her forehead, burning hotter and deeper as eyes fell, lips quivered and head sank in her hands, leaving a shame-stricken culprit where but an instant ago a bright, happy-hearted woman sat.

Before Ursula could reach her friend, or either gentleman exclaim, Stahl's uplifted hand imposed pa.s.sive silence and obtained it, for already the magnetism of his presence made itself felt, filling the room with a supernatural atmosphere, which touched the commonplace with mystery, and woke fantastic fears or fancies like a spell. Without a look, a word for the weeping girl before him, he turned sharply round on Evan Forrest, signified by an imperious gesture that he should bend his tall head nearer, and when he did so, seemed to stab him with a breath. Pale with indignation and surprise, the young man sprang erect, demanding in a smothered voice: "Who will prevent me?"

"I will."

As the words left Stahl's lips, Evan stirred as if to take him by the throat, but that thin, womanish hand closed like a steel spring round his wrist and held the strong arm powerless, as, with a disdainful smile, and warning "Remember where vou are!" the other moved on undisturbed. Evan flung himself into a seat, vainly attempting self-control, while Stahl pa.s.sed to Captain Hav, w ho sat regarding him with undisguised interest and amazement, which latter sentiment reached its climax as the magic whisper came.

"How in Heaven's name did vou know that?" he cried, starting like one stupefied; then overturning his chair in his haste, he dashed out of the room with every mark of uncontrollable excitement and alarm.

"Dare you let me try my power on you, Miss Forrest?" asked Stahl, pausing at her side, with the first trace of emotion visible in his inscrutable face.

"I dare everything!" and as she spoke, Ursula's proud head rose erect, Ursula's dauntless eyes looked full into his own.

"In truth you do dare everything," he murmured below his breath, with a glance of pa.s.sionate admiration. But the soft ardor that made his eyes wonderfully lovely for an instant flamed as suddenly into a flash of anger, for there was a perceptible recoil of the white shoulder as his breath touched it in bending, and when he breathed a single word into her ear, his face wore the stealthy ferocity of a tiger in the act of springing upon his unsuspecting prey. Had she been actually confronted with the veritable beast, it could scarcely have wrought a swifter panic than that one word. Fixed in the same half-shrinking, half-haughty att.i.tude, she sat as if changed suddenly to stone. Her eyes, dark and dilated with some unconquerable horror, never left his face while light, color, life itself seemed to ebb slowly from her own, leaving it as beautiful yet wo- ful to look upon as some marble Medusa's countenance. So sudden, so entire was the change in that blooming face, that Kate forgot her own dismay, and cried: "Ursula, what is it?" while Evan, turning on the worker of the miracle, demanded hotly: "What right have you to terrify women and insult men by hissing in their ears secret information dishonorably obtained?"

Neither question received an answer, for Ursula and Stahl seemed unconscious of any presence but their own, as each silently regarded the other with a gaze full of mutual intelligence, yet opposing emotions of triumph and despair. At the sound of Evan's voice, a shudder shook Ursula from head to foot, but her eye never wavered, and the icy fixture of her features remained unchanged as she asked in a sharp, shrill whisper - "Is it true?"

"Behold the sign!" and with a gesture, too swift and unsuspected for any but herself to see or understand the revelation made, Stahl bared his left arm, held it before her eyes, and dropped it in the drawing of a breath. Whatever Ursula saw confirmed her dread; she uttered neither cry nor exclamation, but wrung her hands together in dumb anguish, while her lips moved without uttering a sound.

Kate Heath's over-wrought nerves gave way, and weeping hysterically, she clung to Evan, imploring him to take her home. Instantly a.s.suming his usual languid courtesy of mien and manners, Stahl murmured regretful apologies, rang the bell for Miss Heath's carriage, and bringing her veil and mantle from the ante-room, implored the privilege of shawling her with a penitent devotion wonderfully winning, yet which did not prevent her shrinking from him and accepting no services but such as Evan half-unconsciouslv bestowed.

"You are coming with me? You promised mama to bring me safely back. Mr. Forrest, take pity on me, for I dare not go alone."

She spoke tearfully, still agitated by the secret wound inflicted by a whisper.

"Hay will gladly protect you, Kate; I cannot leav e Ursula," began Evan, but a smooth, imperious voice took the w ord from his lips.

"Hay is gone, I shall remain with Ursula, and you, Forrest, will not desert Miss Heath in the distress which I have unhappilv caused by granting her wish. Forgive me, and good-night."

As Stahl spoke, he kissed the hand that trembled in his own, with a glance that lingered long in poor Kate's memory, and led her towards her friend. But Evan's dark face kindled with the pa.s.sion that he had vainly striven to suppress, and though he tried to curb his tongue, his eye looked a defiance as he placed himself beside his cousin, saying doggedly: "I shall not leave Ursula to the tender mercies of a charlatan unless she bids me go. Kate, stay with us and lend vour carriage to this gentleman, as his own is not yet here."

Bowing with a face of imperturbable composure, Stahl answered in his softest tones, bending an inquiring glance on Ursula: "Many thanks, but I prefer to receive my dismissal from the lady of the house, not from its would-be master. Miss Forrest, shall I leave you to begin the work marked out for me? or shall I remain to untold certain matters which nearly concern yourself, and which, if neglected, may result in misfortune to more than one of us?"

As if not only the words but the emphasis with which they were p.r.o.nounced recalled some forgotten fact, woke some new fear, Ursula started from her stupor of surprise and mental suffering into sudden action. All that had pa.s.sed while she sat dumb seemed to return to her, and a quick glance from face to face appeared to decide her in the course she must pursue.

Rising she went to Kate, touched her wet cheek with lips that chilled it, and turning to her companions regarded them with an eye that seemed to pierce to the heart's core of each. What she read there none knew, but some purpose strong enough to steady and support her with a marvellous composure seemed born of that long scrutiny, for motioning her cousin from her she said: "Go, Evan, I desire it."

"Go! and leave you with that man? I cannot, Ursula!"

"You must, you will, if I command it. I wish to be alone with him; I fear nothing, not even this magician, who in an instant has changed my life by a single word. See! I trust myself to his protection; I throw myself upon his mercy, and implore you to have faith in me."

With an air of almost pathetic dignity, a gesture of infinite grace, she stretched a hand to either man, and as each grasped the soft prize a defiant glance was exchanged between them, a daring one was fixed upon the beautiful woman for whom, like spirits of good and ill, they were henceforth to contend.

"I shall obey you, but may I come to-morrow?" Evan whispered, as he pressed the hand that in his own was tremulous and warm.

"Yes, come to me early, I shall need you then - if ever."

And as the words left her lips that other hand in Felix Stahl's firm hold grew white and cold as if carved in marble.

With Kate still trembling on his arm, Evan left them; his last glance showing him his rival regarding his departure with an air of tranquil triumph, and Ursula, his proud, high-hearted cousin, sinking slowly on her knees before this man, who in an hour seemed to have won the right to make or mar her happiness for ever.

How the night pa.s.sed Evan Forrest never knew. I le took Kate home, and then till day dawned haunted beach and cliff like a restless ghost, thinking only of Ursula, remembering only that she bade him come early, and chiding the tardy sun until it rose upon a day that darkened all his life. As the city bells chimed seven from the spires that shone across the little bav, Evan re-entered his cousin's door; but before he could p.r.o.nounce her name the lady who for years had filled a mothers place to the motherless girl came hurrying to meet him, with every mark of sleepless agitation in her weary vet restless face and figure.

"Thank heaven, vou are come!" she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, drawing him aside into the ante-room. "Oh, Mr. Forrest, such a night as I have pa.s.sed, so strange, so unaccountable, I am half distracted."

"Where is Ursula?" demanded Evan.

"Just where vou left her, sir; she has not stirred since that dreadful Mr. Stiihl went away."

"When was that?"

"Past midnight. At eleven I went down to give him a hint, but the door was fast, and for another hour the same steady sound of voices came up to me as had been going on since you left. When he did go at last it was so quietlv I only knew it by the glimpse I caught of him gliding down the walk, and vanishing like a spirit in the shadow of the great gate."

"Then you went to Ursula?"

"I did, sir; I did, and found her sitting as I saw her when I left the room in the evening."

"What did she say? what did she do?"

"She said nothing, and she looked like death itself, so white, so cold, so still; not a sigh, a tear, a motion; and when I implored her to speak she only broke my heart w ith the look she gave me, as she whispered, 'Leave me in peace till Evan comes.'"

With one stride he stood before the closed door, but when he tapped no voice bade him enter, and opening he noiselessly glided in. She was there, sitting as Mrs. Yorke described her, and looking more like a pale ghost than a living woman. Evan's eye wandered round the room, hungry to discover some clue to the mystery, but nothing was changed. The lamps burned dimly in the glare of early sunshine streaming through the room; the curtains were still wafted to and fro by balmy breezes; the seats still stood scattered here and there as they were quitted; Captain Hay's chair still lay overthrown; Kate's gloves had been trodden under foot, and round the deep chair in the window still glowed the scattered petals of the rose with which Felix Stahl had regaled himself while lying there.

"Ursula!"

No answer came to his low call, and drawing nearer, Evan whispered tenderly: "My darling, speak to me! It breaks my heart to see you so, and have no power to help you."

The dark eyes fixed on vacancy relaxed in their strained gaze, the cold hands locked together in her lap loosened their painful pressure, and with a long sigh Ursula turned towards him, saying, like one wakened from a heavy dream: "I am glad you are come;" then as if some fear stung her, added with startling abruptness, "Evan! what did he whisper in your ear last night?"

Amazed at such a question, yet not ill pleased to answer it even then, for his full heart was yearning to unburden itself, the young man instantly replied, while his face glowed with hope, and his voice grew tender with the untold love that had long hovered on his lips: "He said, 'You will never win your cousin;' but, Ursula, he lied, for I will win you even if he bring the powers of darkness to confound me. He read in my face what you must have read there long ago, and did not rebuke by one cold look, one forbidding word. Let me tell my love now; let me give you the shelter of my heart if you need it, and whatever grief or shame or fear has come to you let me help you bear it if I cannot banish it."

She did not speak, till kneeling before her he said imploringly: "Ursula, you bade me trust you; I do entirely. Can you not place a like confidence in me?"

"No, Evan."

"Then you do not love as I love," he cried, with a foreboding fear heavy at his heart.

"No, I do not love as you love." The answer came like a soft echo, and her whole frame trembled for an instant as if some captive emotion struggled for escape and an iron hand restrained it. Her cousin saw it, and seizing both her hands, looked deep into her eyes, demanding, sternly: "Do you love this man?"

"I shall marry him."

Evan stared aghast at the hard, white resolution stamped upon her face, as she looked straight before her with a blank yet steady gaze, seeming to see and own allegiance to a master invisible to him. A moment he struggled with a chaos of conflicting pa.s.sions, then fought his way to a brief calmness, intent on fathoming the mystery that had wrought such a sudden change in both their lives.

"Ursula, as the one living relative whom you possess, I have a right to question you. Answer me truly, I conjure you, and deal honestly with the heart that is entirely your own. I can forget myself, can put awav mv own love and longing, can devote my whole time, strength, life to vour service, if you need me. Something has happened that affects you deeply, let me know it. No common event would move you so, for lovers do not woo in this strange fashion, nor betrothed brides wear their happiness with such a face as you now wear."

"Few women have such lovers as mine, or such betrothals to tell. Ask me nothing, Evan, I have told you all I may; go now, and let me rest, if any rest remains for me."

"Not yet," he answered, with as indomitable a purpose in his face as that which seemed to have fixed and frozen hers. "I must know more of this man before I give you up. Who and what is he?"

"Study, question, watch and a.n.a.lyse him. You will find him what he seems - no more, no less. I leave you free to do what you will, and claim an equal liberty for myself," she said. .

"I thought he was a stranger to you as to me and others. You must have known him elsewhere, Ursula?"

"I never saw or knew him till a month ago."

Evan struck his hands together with a gesture of despair, as he sprang up, saying: "Ah! I see it now. A month ago I left you, and in that little time you learned to love."

"Yes, in that little time I did learn to love."

Again the soft echo came, again the sadder tremor shook her, but she neither smiled, nor wept, nor turned her steady eyes away from the unseen but controlling presence that for her still seemed to haunt the room.

Evan Forrest was no blind lover, and despite his own bitter loss he was keen-eyed enough to see that some emotion deeper than caprice, stronger than pity, sharper than regret, now held possession of his cousin's heart. He felt that some tie less tender than that which bound him to her bound her to this man, who exercised such power over her proud spirit and strong will. Bent on reading the riddle, he rapidly glanced through the happy past, so shared with Ursula that he believed no event in the life of either was unknown to the other; yet here was a secret lying dark between them, and only one little month of absence had sowed the seed that brought such a harvest of distrust and pain. Suddenly he spoke: "Ursula, has this man acquired power over you through any weakness of your own?"

A haughty flash kindled in her eves, and for an instant her white face glowed with womanly humiliation at the doubt implied.

"I am as innocent of any sin or shame, any weakness or wrong, as when I lay a baby in my mother's arms. Would to G.o.d I lay there now as tranquilly asleep as she!"

The words broke from her with a tearless sob, and spreading her hands before her face he heard her murmur like a broken-hearted child: "How could he, oh, how could he wound me with a thought like that?"

"I will not! I do not! Hear me, Ursula, and forgive me, if I cannot submit to see you leave me for a man like this without one effort to fathom the inexplicable change I find in you. Only tell me that he is worthy of you, that you love him and are happy, and I will be dumb. Can you do this to ease my heart and conscience, Ursula?"

"Yes, I can do more than that. Rest tranquil, dearest Evan. I know what I do; I do it freely, and in time you will acknowledge that I did well in marrying Felix Stahl."

"You are betrothed to him?"

"I am; his kiss is on my cheek, his ring is on my hand; I accept both."

With a look and gesture which he never could forget she touched the cheek w here one deep spot of color burned as if branded there, and held up the hand whose only ornament beside its beautv was a slender ring formed of two twisted serpents, whose diamond eyes glittered with an uncannv resemblance of life.

"And you will marry him?" repeated Evan, finding the hard fact impossible to accept.

"I will."

"Soon, Ursula?"

"Very soon."

"You wish it so?"

"I w ish what he wishes."

"You will go away with him?"

"To the end of the earth if he desires it."

"My G.o.d! is this witchcraft or infatuation?"

"Neither, it is woman's love, w hich is quick and strong to dare and suffer all things for those who are dearer to her than her life." He could not see her face, for she had turned it from him, but in her voice trembled a tender fervor w hich could not be mistaken, and with a pang that wrung his man's heart sorely he relinquished all hope, and bade farewell to love, believing that no mystery existed but that which is inexplicable, the workings of a woman's heart.

"I am going, Ursula," he said; "you no longer have any need of me, and I must fight out my fight alone. G.o.d bless you, and remember w hatever befalls, while life lasts you have one unalterable friend and lover in me."

As he spoke w ith full eyes, broken voice and face eloquent with love, regret and pity, Ursula rose suddenly and fell upon his bosom, clinging there with pa.s.sionate despair that deepened his ever growing wonder.

"G.o.d help you, Evan! love me, trust me, pity me, and so goodbye! good-bye!" she cried, in that strange paroxysm of emotion, as tearless, breathless, trembling and wearied, yet still self-controlled, she kissed and blessed and led him to the door. No pause upon the threshold; as he lingered she put him from her, closed and bolted it: then as if with him the sustaining power of her darkened life departed, she fell down upon the spot where he had stood, and lay there, beautiful and pale and still as some fair image of eternal sleep.

PART II.

THE NINE Days' WONDER at the sudden wedding which followed that strange betrothal had died away, the honeymoon was over, and the bridal pair were alone together in their new home. Ursula stood at the window looking out, with eyes as wistful as a caged bird's, upon the fading leaves that fluttered in the autumn wind. Her husband lay on his couch, apparently absorbed in a vellum-covered volume, the cabalistic characters of which were far easier to decipher than the sweet, wan face he was studying covertly. The silence which filled the room was broken by a long sigh of pain as the book fell from Stahl's hand, and his head leaned wearily upon the pillow. Ursula heard the sigh, and, like a softly moving shadow, glided to his side, poured wine from an antique flask, and kneeling, held it to his lips. He drank thirstily, but the cordial seemed to impart neither strength nor- comfort, for he drew his wife's head down beside him, saying: "Kiss me, Ursula; I am so faint and cold, nothing seems to warm my blood, and my body freezes, while mv heart burns with a never-dying fire."

With a meek obedience that robbed the act of all tenderness, she touched her ruddy lips to the paler ones that ardently returned the pressure, yet found no satisfaction there. Leaning upon his arm, he held her to him with a fierce fondness, in strange contrast to his feeble frame, saving earnestly: "Ursula, before I married you I found such strength and solace, such warmth and happiness in vour presence, that I coveted you as a precious healing for my broken health. Then I loved you, forgetful of self - loved you as you never will be loved again, and thanked heaven that my fate was so interwoven with your own that the utterance of a word secured my life's desire. But now, when I have made you wholly mine, and hope to bask in the sunshine of vour beauty, youth and womanhood, I find a cold, still creature in my arms, and no spark of the fire that consumes me ever w arms the image of my love. Must it be so? Can I never see you what you were again?"

"Never!" she answered, leaning there as pale and pa.s.sive as if she were in truth a marble woman. "I vowed obedience at the altar, nothing more. I did not love you; I could not honor you, but I felt that I might learn to obey. I have done so, be content."

"Not I! Colder women have been taught love as well as obedience; you, too, shall be a docile pupil, and one day give freely what I sue for now. Other men woo before they wed, my wooing and my winning will come later - if I live long enough."

He turned her face towards him as he spoke and scanned it closely; but no grateful sign of softness, pity or regret appeared, and, with a broken exclamation, he put her from him, locked both hands across his eyes and lav silent, till some uncontrollable paroxysm of emotion had pa.s.sed bv. Presently he spoke, and the words betrayed what the pain had been.

"My mother - heaven bless her for her tenderness! - used to pray that her boy's life might be a long and happy one; it is a bitter thing to feel that the only woman now left me to love prays for the shortening of that same life, and can bestow no look or word to make its failing hours happv."

The unwonted tone of filial affection, the keen sorrow and the mournful acknowledgment of an inevitable doom touched Ursula as no ardent demonstration or pa.s.sionate reproach had ever done. She softly lifted up the folded hands, saw that those deep eyes were wet with tears, and in that pallid countenance read the melancholy record of a life burdened with a sad heritage of pain, thwarted by unhappy love and darkened by allegiance to a superst.i.tious vow. Great as her sacrifice had been, deep as the wound still was, and heavily as her captivity weighed on her proud heart, it was still womanly, generous and gentle; and, despite all wrongs, all blemishes, all bitter memories, she felt the fascination of this wild and wayward nature, as she had never done before, and yielded to its persuasive potency. Laying her cool hand on his hot forehead, she leaned over him, saying, with an accent of compa.s.sion sweeter to his ear than her most perfect song: "No, Felix, I pray no prayers that heaven would refuse to grant. I only ask patience for myself, a serener spirit for you, and G.o.d's blessing upon Evan, wherever he may be."