Kate Danton, or, Captain Danton's Daughters Part 60

"Quite," replied his brother-in-law, very much surprised.

"I have a story to tell you--a secret to confide to you. Your services are required at the Hall; but before I can avail myself of these services, I have a sacred trust to confide to you--a trust I am certain you will never betray."

"I shall never betray any trust you may repose in me, Captain Danton,"

the young man answered gravely.

Some dim inkling of the truth was in his mind as he spoke. Captain Danton drew his chair closer, and in a low, hurried voice began his story. The story he had once before told Reginald Stanford, the story of his unfortunate son.

Doctor Frank listened with a face of changeless calm. No surprise was expressed in his grave, earnest, listening countenance. When the Captain had finished his narrative, with an account of the fever that rendered his presence at once necessary, a faint flush dyed his forehead.

"I shall be certain now," he thought. "I only saw Agnes Darling's husband once, and then for a moment; but I shall know him again if I ever see him."

"I shall be with you directly," he said, rising; "as soon as they saddle my horse."

He rang the bell and gave the order. By the time his cap and coat were on, and a few other preparations made, the hostler had the horse at the door.

It was quite dark now; but the road was white with snow and the two men rode rapidly to the Hall with the strong January wind blowing in their faces. They went upstairs at once, and Doctor Frank, with an odd sensation, followed the master of Danton Hall across the threshold of that mysterious Mr. Richards' room.

The Captain's son lay in a feverish sleep, tossing wildly and raving incoherently. Kate, sitting by his bedside, he mistook for some one else, calling her "Agnes," and talking in disjointed sentences of days and things long since past.

"He thinks she is his wife," the Captain said, very sadly; "poor boy!"

The Doctor turned up the lamp, and looked long and earnestly into the fever-flushed face. His own seemed to have caught the reflection of that red glow, when at last he looked up.

"It is the fever," he said, "and a very serious case. You sat up last night, your father tells me, Miss Kate?"

"Yes," Kate answered.

She was very white and thoroughly worn out.

"You are not strong enough to do anything of the kind. You look half-dead now. I will remain here all night, and do you at once go and lie down."

"Thank you very much," Kate said, gratefully. "I can sleep when I know you are with him. Do you think there is any danger?"

"I trust not. You and I have seen far more serious cases down there in St. Croix, and we have brought them round. It is a very sad story, his--I am very sorry for your brother." Kate stooped and kissed the hot face, her tears falling on it.

"Poor, poor Harry! The crime of that dreadful murder should not lie at his door, but at that of the base wretch he made his wife!"

"Are you quite sure, Miss Danton," said the young Doctor, seriously, "that there may not have been some terrible mistake? From what your father tells me, your brother had very little proof of his wife's criminality beyond the words of his friend Furniss, who may have been actuated by some base motive of his own."

"He had the proof of his own senses," Kate said, indignantly; "he saw the man Crosby with his wife, and heard his words. The guilt of Harry's rash deed should rest far more on her than on him."

She turned from the room, leaving her father and the young Doctor to watch by the sick man all night. The Captain sought his wife, and explained the cause of her brother's sudden summons; and Kate, in her own room, quite worn out, lay down dressed as she was, and fell into a profound, refreshing sleep, from which she did not wake until late next morning.

When she returned to her brother's chamber, she found the Doctor and the Captain gone, and Grace keeping watch. Mrs. Danton explained that Frank had been summoned away about an hour previously to attend a patient in the village; and the Captain, at her entreaty, had gone to take some rest. The patient was much the same, and was now asleep.

"But you should not have come here, Mrs. Danton," Kate expostulated.

"You know this fever is infectious."

Mrs. Danton smiled.

"My life is of no more value than yours or my husband's. I am not afraid--I should be very unhappy if I were not permitted to do what little good I can."

For the second time there flashed into Kate's mind the thought that she had never done this woman justice. Here she was, generous and self-sacrificing, risking her own safety by the sick-bed of her husband's own son. Could it be that after all she had married her father because she loved him, and not because he was Captain Danton of Danton Hall?

"Father Francis ought to know," she mused; "and Father Francis sings her praises on every occasion. I know Eeny loves her dearly, and the servants like and respect her in a manner I never saw surpa.s.sed. Can it be that I have been blind, and unjust, and prejudiced from first to last, and that my father's wife is a thousand times better than I am?"

The two women sat together in the sick-room all the forenoon. Kate talked to her step-mother far more socially and kindly than she had ever talked to her before, and was surprised to find Grace had a ready knowledge of every subject she started. She smiled at herself by and by in a little pause in the conversation.

"She is really very pleasant," she thought. "I shall begin to like her presently, I am afraid."

Early in the afternoon, Doctor Frank returned. There was little change in his patient, and no occasion for his remaining. He stayed half an hour, and then took his hat to leave. He had more pressing cases in the village to attend, and departed promising to call again before nightfall.

The news of Mr. Richards' illness had spread by this time through the house. The young Doctor knew this, and wondered if Agnes Darling had heard it, and why she did not try to see him. He was thinking about it as he walked briskly down the avenue, and resolving he must try and see her that evening, when a little black figure stepped out from the shadow of the trees and confronted him.

"'Angels and ministers of grace defend us,'" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Doctor; "I thought it was a ghost, and I find it is only Agnes Darling. You look about as pale as a ghost, though. What is the matter with you?"

She clasped her hands and looked at him piteously.

"He is sick. You have seen him? Oh, Doctor Danton! is it Harry?"

"My dear Mrs. Danton, I am happy to tell you it is. Don't faint now, or I shall tell you nothing more."

She leaned against a tree, white and trembling; her hands clasped over her beating heart.

"And he is ill, and I may not see him. Oh, tell me what is the matter."

"Fever. Don't alarm yourself unnecessarily. I do not think his life is in any danger."

"Thank G.o.d! Oh, thank G.o.d for that!"

She covered her face with her slender hands, and he could see the fast-falling tears.

"My dear Agnes," he said, kindly. "I don't like to see you distress yourself in this manner. Besides, there is no occasion. I think your darkest days are over. I don't see why you may not go and nurse your husband."

Her hands dropped from before her face, her great dark eyes fixed themselves on his face, dilated and wildly.

"You would like it, wouldn't you? Well, I really don't think there is anything to hinder. He is calling for you perpetually, if it will make you happy to know it. Tell Miss Danton your story at once; tell her who you are, and if she doubts your veracity, refer her to me. I have a letter from Mr. Crosby, testifying in the most solemn manner your innocence. I wrote to him, Agnes, as I could not find time to visit him.

Tell Miss Kate to-day, if you choose, and you may watch by your husband's bedside to night. Good afternoon. Old Renaud is shouting out with rheumatism; I must go and see after him."

He strode away, leaving Agnes clinging to the tree, trembling and white.

The time had come, then. Her husband lived, and might be returned to her yet. At the thought she fell down on her knees on the snowy ground, with the most fervent prayer of thanksgiving in her heart she had ever uttered.

Some two hours later, and just as the dusk of the short winter day was falling, Kate came out of her brother's sick-room. She looked jaded and worn, as she lingered for a moment at the hall-window to watch the grayish-yellow light fade out of the sky. She had spent the best part of the day in the close chamber, and the bright outer air seemed unspeakably refreshing. She went to her room, threw a large cloth mantle round her shoulders, drew the fur-trimmed hood over her head, and went out.

The frozen fish-pond glittered like a sheet of ivory in the fading light; and walking slowly around it, she saw a little familiar figure, robed like a nun, in black. She had hardly seen the pale seamstress for weeks, she had been too much absorbed in other things; but now, glad of companionship, she crossed over to the fish-pond and joined her. As she drew closer, and could see the girl's face in the cold, pale twilight, she was struck with its pallor and indescribably mournful expression.

"You poor, pale child!" Miss Danton said; "you look like some stray spirit wandering ghostily around this place. What is the matter now, that you look so wretchedly forlorn?"