Daisy Brooks Part 40

"Yes, madame," she made answer, "I change cars there; I am going further."

The lady was struck by the peculiar mournful cadence of the young voice.

"I beg your pardon for my seeming rudeness," she said, looking long and earnestly at the fair young face; "but you remind me so strangely of a young school-mate of my youth; you are strangely like what she was then. We both attended Madame Whitney's seminary. Perhaps you have heard of the inst.i.tution; it is a very old and justly famous school."

She wondered at the beautiful flush that stole into the girl's flower-like face--like the soft, faint tinting of a sea-sh.e.l.l. "She married a wealthy planter," pursued the lady, reflectively; "but she did not live long to enjoy her happy home. One short year after she married Evalia Hurlhurst died." The lady never forgot the strange glance that pa.s.sed over the girl's face, or the wonderful light that seemed to break over it. "Why," exclaimed the lady, as if a sudden thought occurred to her, "when you bought your ticket I heard you mention Allendale. That was the home of the Hurlhursts. Is it possible you know them? Mr. Hurlhurst is a widower--something of a recluse, and an invalid, I have heard; he has a daughter called Pluma."

"Yes, madame," Daisy made answer, "I have met Miss Hurlhurst, but not her father."

How bitterly this stranger's words seemed to mock her! Did she know Pluma Hurlhurst, the proud, haughty heiress who had stolen her young husband's love from her?--the dark, sparkling, willful beauty who had crossed her innocent young life so strangely--whom she had seen bending over _her_ husband in the pitying moonlight almost caressing him? She thought she would cry out with the bitterness of the thought.

How strange it was! The name, Evalia Hurlhurst, seemed to fall upon her ears like the softest, sweetest music. Perhaps she wished she was like that young wife, who had died so long ago, resting quietly beneath the white daisies that bore her name.

"That is Madame Whitney's," exclaimed the lady, leaning forward toward the window excitedly. "Dear me! I can almost imagine I am a young girl again. Why, what is the matter, my dear? You look as though you were about to faint."

The train whirled swiftly past--the broad, glittering Chesapeake on one side, and the closely shaven lawn of the seminary on the other. It was evidently recess. Young girls were flitting here and there under the trees, as pretty a picture of happy school life as one would wish to see. It seemed to poor hapless Daisy long ages must have pa.s.sed since that morning poor old John Brooks had brought her, a shy, blushing, shrinking country la.s.sie, among those daintily attired, aristocratic maidens, who had laughed at her coy, timid mannerism, and at the clothes poor John wore, and at his flaming red cotton neckerchief.

She had not much time for further contemplation. The train steamed into the Baltimore depot, and she felt herself carried along by the surging crowd that alighted from the train.

She did not go into the waiting-room; she had quite forgotten she was not at the end of her journey.

She followed the crowds along the bustling street, a solitary, desolate, heart-broken girl, with a weary white face whose beautiful, tender eyes looked in vain among the throngs that pa.s.sed her by for one kindly face or a sympathetic look.

Some pushed rudely by her, others looked into the beautiful face with an ugly smile. Handsomely got-up dandies, with fine clothes and no brains, nodded familiarly as Daisy pa.s.sed them. Some laughed, and others scoffed and jeered; but not one--dear Heaven! not one among the vast throng gave her a kindly glance or a word. Occasionally one, warmer hearted than the others, would look sadly on that desolate, beautiful, childish face.

A low moan she could scarcely repress broke from her lips. A handsomely dressed child, who was rolling a hoop in front of her, turned around suddenly and asked her if she was ill.

"Ill?" She repeated the word with a vague feeling of wonder. What was physical pain to the torture that was eating away her young life? Ill?

Why, all the illness in the world put together could not cause the anguish she was suffering then--the sting of a broken heart.

She was not ill--only desolate and forsaken.

Poor Daisy answered in such a vague manner that she quite frightened the child, who hurried away as fast as she could with her hoop, pausing now and then to look back at the white, forlorn face on which the sunshine seemed to cast such strange shadows.

On and on Daisy walked, little heeding which way she went. She saw what appeared to be a park on ahead, and there she bent her steps. The shady seats among the cool green gra.s.ses under the leafy trees looked inviting. She opened the gate and entered. A sudden sense of dizziness stole over her, and her breath seemed to come in quick, convulsive gasps.

"Perhaps G.o.d has heard my prayer, Rex, my love," she sighed. "I am sick and weary unto death. Oh, Rex--Rex--"

The beautiful eyelids fluttered over the soft, blue eyes, and with that dearly loved name on her lips, the poor little child-bride sunk down on the cold, hard earth in a death-like swoon.

"Oh, dear me, Harvey, who in the world is this?" cried a little, pleasant-voiced old lady, who had witnessed the young girl enter the gate, and saw her stagger and fall. In a moment she had fluttered down the path, and was kneeling by Daisy's side.

"Come here, Harvey," she called; "it is a young girl; she has fainted."

Mr. Harvey Tudor, the celebrated detective, threw away the cigar he had been smoking, and hastened to his wife's side.

"Isn't she beautiful?" cried the little lady, in ecstasy. "I wonder who she is, and what she wanted."

"She is evidently a stranger, and called to consult me professionally,"

responded Mr. Tudor; "she must be brought into the house."

He lifted the slight, delicate figure in his arms, and bore her into the house.

"I am going down to the office now, my dear," he said; "we have some important cases to look after this morning. I will take a run up in the course of an hour or so. If the young girl should recover and wish to see me very particularly, I suppose you will have to send for me. Don't get me away up here unless you find out the case is imperative."

And with a good-humored nod, the shrewd detective, so quiet and domesticated at his own fireside, walked quickly down the path to the gate, whistling softly to himself--thinking with a strange, puzzled expression in his keen blue eyes, of Daisy. Through all of his business transactions that morning the beautiful, childish face was strangely before his mind's eye.

"Confound it!" he muttered, seizing his hat, "I must hurry home and find out at once who that pretty little creature is--and what she wants."

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

The sunny summer days came and went, lengthening themselves into long weeks before Daisy Brooks opened her eyes to consciousness. No clew could be found as to who the beautiful young stranger was.

Mr. Tudor had proposed sending her to the hospital--but to this proposition his wife would not listen.

"No, indeed, Harvey," she exclaimed, twisting the soft, golden curls over her white fingers, "she shall stay here where I can watch over her myself, poor little dear."

"You amaze me, my dear," expostulated her husband, mildly. "You can not tell who you may be harboring."

"Now, Harvey," exclaimed the little woman, bending over the beautiful, still, white face resting against the crimson satin pillow, "don't insinuate there could be anything wrong with this poor child. My woman's judgment tells me she is as pure as those lilies in yonder fountain's bed."

"If you had seen as much of the world as I have, my dear, you would take little stock in the innocence of beautiful women; very homely women are rarely dangerous."

"There is no use in arguing the point, Harvey. I have determined she shall not be sent to the hospital, and she shall stay here."

Mrs. Tudor carried the point, as she always did in every argument.

"Well, my dear, if any ill consequences arise from this piece of folly of yours, remember, I shirk all responsibility."

"'When a woman will, she will, you may depend on't, And when she won't--she won't, and there's an end on't,'"

he quoted, dryly. "I sincerely hope you will not rue it."

"Now, you would be surprised, my dear, to find out at some future time you had been entertaining an angel unawares."

"I should be _extremely_ surprised; you have put it mildly, my dear--nay, I may say dumbfounded--to find an angel dwelling down here below among us sinners. My experience has led me to believe the best place for angels is up above where they belong. I am glad that _you_ have such pretty little notions, though, my dear. It is not best for women to know too much of the ways of the world."

"Harvey, you shock me!" cried the little lady, holding up her hands in horror at her liege lord's remarks.

Still she had her own way in the matter, and Daisy stayed.

Every day the detective grew more mystified as to who in the world she could be. One thing was certain, she had seen some great trouble which bid fair to dethrone her reason.

At times she would clasp his hands, calling him Uncle John, begging him piteously to tell her how she could die. And she talked incoherently, too, of a dark, handsome woman's face, that had come between her and some lost treasure.

Then a grave look would come into the detective's face. He had seen many such cases, and they always ended badly, he said to himself. She had such an innocent face, so fair, so childish, he could not make up his mind whether she was sinned against or had been guilty of a hidden sin herself.