They Looked and Loved; Or, Won by Faith

An earthquake could hardly have shocked Mrs. Courtney more than this humble plea from Nita, who had always resented her dislike and given her scorn for scorn. She put out her slender, aristocratic hand and clasped Nita's gently, drawing her to a seat by her side.

"My dear girl, of course I am your friend, and will do anything in the world for you," she exclaimed. "But let me tell you that you are very nervous and fanciful to-night. How can you call yourself friendless and alone when you have a rich and noble husband like Dorian Mountcastle? I assure you that a loving husband is always a woman's best friend. Then, too, you have a doting guardian."

The girl rose from her seat and stood before the woman, pale as a ghost.

"Mrs. Courtney, do not call them my friends, those two men," she said, almost sternly. "From to-night and henceforth forever, they are my bitterest foes."

Surprise held the listener dumb, and Nita continued:

"Never again while the world stands will I consent ever to look upon the face of Charles Farnham or Dorian Mountcastle."

"The girl is mad, mad as a March hare. Her adventures have turned her brain," murmured Mrs. Courtney amazedly.

"No, madam, I am not mad, I am perfectly sane, and I wish to make you an offer. Will you and Azalea go abroad with me, and travel wherever you wish for a year? I am rich. I will pay every expense if you will chaperon me on this trip. I will be perfectly frank with you. I want to avoid the two men of whom we have been speaking. I am afraid of them both. I have wronged them both, yet I am innocent of blame. Yet I fear the miser's hate and Dorian's love in equal measure. Oh, madam, be kind to me. Grant my prayer, and I will be forever grateful! And the time will come, I swear it to you, when you will say to yourself and to the world: 'I am glad I was kind to poor Nita, and had no hand in her tragic fate.' What say you, madam? Shall we start to-morrow on our travels?"

Nita need not have felt any doubt over the answer. It was the strangest turn of Fortune's wheel that Mrs. Courtney had ever known—the strangest, and the most welcome.

She felt that behind it lay some strange dark mystery, a baffling mystery that it should be her task to ferret out if it lay in mortal power, but in the meantime she accepted Nita's offer with pretended reluctance, putting it solely as a favor to the young girl. Then, after recommending her to retire as early as possible, she returned to her guests with a heart full of secret exultation.

Nita locked her door and fell down on her couch in a fit of hysterical sobbing. Mrs. Courtney's revelation had shown her all the horror of her position. Wife to two living men, she loathed the one who had the legal right to claim her.

And Nita knew, and the knowledge added poignancy to her pain, that it was her own fault. Why had she betrothed herself to Dorian when she was not free, cheating herself with a little semblance of happiness, and so led him on to the elopement that must now wreck his life?

She believed that Miser Farnham's wrath would be murderous when he recovered and learned what she had done. And Dorian, how he would hate her for her sin!

She would rather die than meet Dorian again—he whom she had so terribly deceived. If he cursed her for her folly she could not bear it; she must die at his feet of her bitter shame—and if he forgave her madness and loved her still, what then? Still she was not free! And how could she own the truth to him? She could never do that. She would sooner fly to the other end of the world.

She leaned from the window, and gazed upon the great ocean and the starlit sky.

"Oh, how beautiful the world is, and why should there be so much unhappiness in it?" she cried.

Nita's musings were interrupted by the sudden entrance of Mrs. Hill, the housekeeper, who was wild with joy over the news of Nita's return.

"Mrs. Courtney has told me how you were saved by a sailor, and brought back," she cried gladly, and added in a more subdued key: "But poor Lizette, that dear, good girl, what a pity she was not saved, too."

Nita was about to exclaim that Lizette was alive, but she suddenly remembered Donald Kayne's entreaty for her silence, and made no reply. In spite of his cruelty, she pitied the man.

Jack Dineheart had told her that the maid, on finding herself entrapped and deserted, had jumped from the window and broken her neck, but she tried not to believe the horrible story.

All that Donald Kayne had told in New York about Dorian Mountcastle was true. When concealment was no longer possible his friends had been obliged to break to him, as gently as might be, the news of Nita's death, and that it was her wraith, and not a living girl, that had appeared to him on board the yacht that fateful night. The despair of the bereaved young husband was awful in its intensity. His reason tottered, and it was found necessary to place him in strict confinement, and guard him closely for several days until his violent mood subsided into moody melancholy.

Captain Van Hise was tender and devoted as a woman to his stricken friend, and when Dorian, after weeks of despair, became a pale, quiet shadow of his former self, he persuaded him to go abroad with him.

They went, but Dorian dwelt ceaselessly on the memory of that strange night when Nita had come to him and laid her head on his breast and her arms about his neck—aye, and kissed him, too, with ardent lips that seemed to burn with the breath of life. He prayed Heaven to grant him that sweet vision of his lost love again.

Van Hise was in despair.

"He will go crazy in earnest if he keeps on this way," he said to himself, despondently.

It was nearing spring then, and they were in Paris. But Dorian was familiar with Paris. Perhaps he had exhausted its delights long ago. He wearied of its splendors.

"I am tired. Let us go somewhere else," he said impatiently.

"But, my dear fellow, we have been everywhere."

"No, we have not. I know some men who are going on a journey into the interior of Norway. I have accepted for us both their invitation to join the party," said reckless Dorian.

"It will be quite out of the world," groaned the soldier, but he yielded.

It was strange that Dorian and Nita should both be abroad so many months without meeting each other, or even being aware of each other's movements.

And yet it was a fact that Captain Van Hise and Dorian had never even heard that Nita was alive, and Nita knew nothing of Dorian since the fateful night when Jack Dineheart had torn her from his arms and carried her back to Pirate Beach.

Since she had gone abroad with the Courtneys, life had been one feverish whirl of gayety, change, and sight-seeing. Nita, with her heart upon the rack, and a smile upon her lips, had borne her part bravely in all, lavishing gold like water in the pursuit of forgetfulness. The Courtneys, nothing loath, accepted her munificence, and made the most of it, although wondering at her reckless extravagance. They did not know how often she said to herself:

"The chest of gold is melting like snow in the sun, but why should I care? There remain to me but a few more months of life and liberty, then—darkness, nothingness, and death. Let me make the most of it!"

Mrs. Courtney had been in London in her days of prosperity, and had acquaintances among the nobility. In the spring, when the London season set in, she introduced her ward into the most fashionable set. And the fashionable world raved over the charms of la belle Americaine.

She had lovers by the score. Hearts and titles were laid at her feet, but all soon echoed what Mrs. Courtney had frankly told them of Nita:

"She has no heart."

Nita only smiled when they accused her of her fault.

"It is quite true," she said. "I have no heart to give any one. Why do you not fall in love with pretty, golden-haired Azalea?"

One man, piqued at her indifference, tried to take her advice. He transferred his attention to the affable blonde.

He was Sir George Merlin, a wealthy baronet, middle-aged, but very goodlooking. He was vain and conceited, and Nita's rejection hurt his pride as well as his love. He proposed to Azalea through pure pique.

The blonde accepted gladly, and Mrs. Courtney was transported with joy. The only drawback to her bliss was that the baronet did not seem in any hurry to name the wedding-day. But the engagement was formally announced, and his sister gave a ball in honor of the fair Azalea.

Nita's thoughts often wandered to Dorian. Where was he? What was he doing? Did he know that she was alive, or did he mourn her dead? Somehow, at first she had looked for him, dreaded his appearance with mingled pain and pleasure. As the months went past she gave up the thought of his coming. She began to fancy that he must be dead.

Sometimes it all seemed to her like a feverish dream, those strange past days of love and pain; yet all the time she was drawing nearer and nearer to the fatal end of the year, to the moment when her hated master would claim her as his bride.

It was May now, and the world was all in bloom. Charles Farnham would be coming to claim his bride.

On the very day of Lady Landon's ball for Azalea, Mrs. Courtney received a letter commanding her to return at once to New York with her charge. Mrs. Courtney went at once to Nita in her room.

"Nita, I must break through your rule, never to mention your guardian's name to you. I have a letter from him."

Nita turned a pale face of fear and despair.

"A—letter!" she faltered; "so, then—he—he—is coming for—me?"

The white terror of her face was enough to move a heart of stone. Mrs. Courtney smiled reassuringly.

"Do not look so frightened, Nita, there is no need, for he writes very kindly of you, and makes no mention of your marriage. Perhaps he means to forgive you and Dorian," she said, feeling magnanimous toward the girl now that Azalea's market was made.

Nita only sunk helplessly into a chair, her face white, her eyes wild. It seemed as if she could not reply. Mrs. Courtney, with her eyes on the letter, continued:

"Mr. Farnham is quite well again, and wants me to hasten home with you. He says that he has bought and furnished a Fifth Avenue palace for you, with carriages and horses of the finest, and is most anxious to see you queening it in New York society. Indeed, Nita, after the training I have given you, it will be easy for you to do so"—complacently. "Really, my dear, the old man seems very proud and fond of you, and I never heard of a more generous guardian. You are a very fortunate girl, and I am sure you have only to ask him, and he will pardon you and Dorian."

"Ah! you do not know, you do not dream," moaned the girl, hiding her face in her hands.

Must she go? must she obey the old miser's command?

"This letter has been following us about for some time, and I must reply to it to-morrow," continued the lady. "What shall I say to him, Nita? That we will cross next week?"

"I will not go!" cried Nita, with a frantic gesture.

"But, really, Nita, I think we must go. I cannot understand this strange fear of your guardian. A young girl like you must obey either her guardian or her husband. You repudiate the claim of Dorian Mountcastle, and so you remain subject to the orders of Mr. Farnham."

"Let us speak no more of it now. I will decide to-morrow," Nita answered.

Mrs. Courtney knew that it was almost time to dress for the ball, so she retired, determined in her own mind that she would take Nita speedily back to New York and Fifth Avenue.

"Our leaving now will force Sir George to ask Azalea to name the wedding-day," she thought sagely. "And Nita is so generous I think she will readily purchase the trousseau. The marriage can take place from the miser's place, and Sir George need never know how very poor we are."

CHAPTER XXV.

"LET US DIE TOGETHER."

"A gentleman to see Miss Farnham."

Nita was in her ball-dress. There were pearls and diamonds at her throat, and in the wavy masses of her hair.

"Who?" she asked carelessly.

"He did not send his card; he said to tell you a friend. He is waiting in the private parlor."

Nita thought carelessly that it was one of her many lovers come to lay heart and hand and fortune at her feet, and get the same answer she had given others:

"I have no love to give."

She had a tender heart, but it vexed her when men wooed her.

"I am no coquette. I do not encourage them. Why will they not leave me alone?" she thought impatiently.

And it was on her lips to decline to see the caller. The next moment she reflected that if she declined to-night he would come again to-morrow. The unpleasant moment was only deferred.

"I will go, I will have it over!" she exclaimed, and took up her bouquet.

"I will pretend that I am in a great hurry to start to the ball," she thought.

As she entered the parlor a man stood at an open window, breathing in the sweetness of the fair spring night. As Nita softly closed the door he came forward into the light, and stood revealed, tall, fair, handsome—Dorian Mountcastle!

A thrilling heart-cry escaped from Nita's lips:

"Dorian!"

"Nita, my love, my bride!" cried the young man, and caught her in his arms, straining her fondly to his throbbing heart.

She did not resist him. How could she forego the ecstasy of that embrace, the warm, intoxicating sweetness of that kiss? For one moment she forgot the gulf between them. Her arms crept up about his neck and held him close and tenderly—her lips clung to his. Eden came back for a few moments to earth again. He pressed the beautiful form closely to his breast.

Ah, the gladness, the madness, after believing her dead and lost to him forever on earth, to find her once again, so beautiful, so tender, and so loving, alive in his arms. He drew her at last to a seat, and whispered lovingly:

"Speak to me, my darling. Let me be sure this is no dream!"

"No dream," she murmured happily, then asked, with a smile. "How came you to find me, Dorian?"

"My love, my bride, how beautiful you are," he murmured, "and to think that I believed you dead, drowned in the cruel sea!"

She gave a convulsive start, she drew back a little from him, the joy went out of her face. But there was a mist of actual tears—tears of joy—in Dorian's eyes, and he did not note the curious change on her face.

"Ah, Nita, how I have suffered!" he cried. "When they told me you were dead, and that it was your wraith I saw on the yacht that night at Fortune's Bay, I went mad with grief. They have told me that I tried to kill myself, that I raved like a madman. But I remembered nothing for weary days until the reawakening to memory of my loss. Ah, love, pardon me these wild words, but it seemed to me that without you I was in hell—in torment without hope of release! Then Van Hise brought me abroad, but, oh, the long, long months of dark despair that followed—I will not dwell on them, my darling, now that I have found you again. And is it not strange I was so long finding out the truth? You must have written me, of course, love. Is it not strange your letters did not reach me? And all the while, my precious one, you must have been wearying for me as I for you, is it not so, sweetheart?

"In Norway one night some fellows with us were speaking of beautiful women they had met, and your name was mentioned, my darling—your old name, Nita Farnham. I was struck speechless with emotion, but Van Hise, my true friend, came to the rescue. He asked questions, he learned where you were—you and the Courtneys. The news seemed too good to be true, but Van Hise and I left the party and traveled night and day to reach London, and find out if it were really my bride given back to me from the dead. Thank God, thank God, it is true, we are reunited never to part again!"

But, to his amazement, she drew back from his proffered kiss, she recoiled a little from him, whispering in a frightened voice:

"Do not make too sure of that, Dorian!"

Mountcastle threw back his handsome head with a happy laugh.

"No coquetry, my darling, it is quite too late for that," he replied gaily. "You are all my own, you know, and now that I have found you I shall never leave you again."

His arm tightened about her waist, his eyes beamed adoring love into hers, but she trembled and gasped in deadly fear as he held her close. She loved him madly, adoringly, but her soul was as pure as a white rose-leaf, and she knew that to remain with Dorian would be deadly sin.

Oh, why had he found her here? why had they met again, only to part in despair? Better if he had gone on believing her dead, as she would, alas! be soon. No thought came to her that it might be best to confess all to Dorian, and ask him to help her out of her terrible strait. She did not know that anything but death could absolve her from her wifely vows to her husband. She understood his malignant nature well enough to know that he would pursue her to the ends of the earth if she tried to escape him. And in her stainless purity she would sooner have died than seek refuge from him in Dorian's arms.

"Oh, Dorian, Dorian, it breaks my heart to tell you," she sobbed; "but—but our marriage was all a mistake, I—I can never be your wife."

"Are you going mad, my darling? You are my wife already, you know," he replied wonderingly.

"No, Dorian, no; it was all a mistake, I tell you. I told you always that I could never marry you while my guardian lived. Captain Van Hise told me that night that he was dead, and so I consented to be married. But there was a mistake. Mr. Farnham was not dead. He lives—he claims me—so I cannot be yours."

Dorian Mountcastle laughed at her childish fears.

"His death or his life makes no difference now," he replied soothingly. "You belong to me alone, and no power on earth can take you from me. Perhaps he has some hold on your fortune. Is that what you mean? Let him have every penny, Nita. I have enough."

"Dorian, words are useless. I never can be yours. We must part."

He looked at her in amazement. He grew impatient at what he considered a silly whim.

"I do not understand all these silly fancies, Nita," he burst out angrily. "Perhaps you have ceased to love me, perhaps you have repented our marriage—is it so?"

"Yes, I repent it," she replied despairingly.

A flood of jealous rage poured like molten lava through his veins.

"You have met some one you love better?" he cried, in a voice so strange from excess of keen emotion that it did not sound like his own.

"No; ah, no, my love, my Dorian," she moaned, and suddenly flung herself at his feet. "Oh, I love you. I love you. I love you," she cried passionately, as she knelt there with upraised eyes.

Startled by her emotion, he stooped to raise her, but she resisted the effort.

"No; let me kneel here humbly at your feet and thank you for your love while I implore your pardon for my weakness," she sobbed. "Oh, Dorian, there can never be any happiness for us, dearest, while Charles Farnham lives. If he were dead—if he were only dead—we might be happy. I wish that he had died that night when he was hurt. Oh, Dorian, he holds a power over me that you do not dream of. We must part, my own dear love, we must go our ways in life alone unless–"

She paused a moment, and searched his face with eager eyes.

"Ah, Dorian, do you love me very, very much?" she sighed.

"Better than the whole world, better than my own soul!" he answered fervently.

And a low sigh of gladness heaved her breast.

"A terrible temptation has come to me, Dorian. We love each other so well that life apart would be worse than death. And yet—yet—we must part. Oh, Dorian, let us foil our malignant fate. Let us die together."

Surely she must be going mad to talk in this strange fashion when there was nothing that could come between their wedded hearts, nothing that could keep them apart. He spoke to her soothingly, tenderly, but she only became more wildly agitated.

"Do you think that I talk strangely?" she cried. "Oh, Dorian, I have heard and read of lovers who died in each other's arms rather than live apart. Let us follow their example. A drop of poison—poison that will kill easily, you know—and, locked in each other's arms, we may drift together—always together, darling—into heaven or hell, or whatever home God gives to reckless, broken-hearted lovers. What say you, Dorian? Shall it be so?"

And she gazed wildly into his horrified face.

Dorian gazed in mingled grief and horror at the beautiful girl. Surely she must be mad, he thought. Then his heart sank. Had her love turned from him in their long months of separation?

Dorian had a passionately jealous nature, and the fear of Nita's fickleness once admitted to his mind, caught fire and burned like a devouring flame. The girl's eager, beseeching eyes beheld all at once a strange change pass over his fair, handsome face, and, rising, he pushed her from him, crying out angrily:

"I understand you, Nita. In the months of our separation you have wearied of me. Do not deny it, for I will not listen to your protestations. A moment ago I thought you must be mad, now I perceive that there is method in your madness. You chafe at the tie that binds us together. You would fain be free, so you pretend this baseless fear of your guardian. Fickle heart, you have wrecked my life! I adored you, but you found my love only a weariness. Well, take your freedom! I go, never to molest you again."

The white, crouching figure lifted a pallid, woful face, and moaned:

"Oh, Dorian, will you leave me? Must I die alone?"

"Die!" the husband sneered angrily. "No, you will live to make some other fool happy a while, as you did me, then throw him over in this heartless fashion!"

All Dorian's old cynical distrust of woman's love was returning, supplemented by jealous agony too deep for words. It seemed to him that Nita was simply playing a part, pretending this unreasoning dread of her guardian's anger.

"Dorian, my love, forgive my weakness!" pleaded Nita wildly; but his eyes flashed back only a limitless wrath and scorn.

"Forgive you! no—not while life lasts! But—farewell forever!"

Then the door opened and closed—Dorian was gone in anger, and Nita was alone with her despair, her heart breaking with its heavy burden.

Slowly and wearily she dragged herself back to her room. She was glad the maid was not there to see her pale, changed face and crumpled ball-gown. She closed the door, and mechanically removed the bitter traces of tears from her face and rearranged her dress.

"For I must not stay away from the ball. That shallow Azalea would think I envied her triumph," she thought in bitter pride, and as one goes to the stake she accompanied the Courtneys to Lady Landon's ball, never telling them that Dorian had sought her out, and that she had sent him away from her, reckless and broken-hearted.

But when Dorian read of it all in the next day's papers that praised the beauty of Miss Farnham, the lovely American, and told how the Earl of Winthrop had paid her such devoted attention, he smiled in bitter mockery.

"It is just as I thought—there is a title in the case, and she means to repudiate me. American girls all run wild over coronets nowadays," he said bitterly, to Captain Van Hise, to whom he had confided the story of Nita's strange behavior.

Van Hise was frankly puzzled. He had believed in beautiful Nita, and he would not give up his faith yet. He remembered the night of the marriage, how she had refused her consent until he had told her that the old miser was dead.

"There is something very strange here. I honestly believe in her professed dread of her guardian," he said thoughtfully. "And as for the title, Dorian, you know how we were told of her coldness and indifference to all her suitors. No, she cares for no one but you, but she will let her guardian's influence wreck both your lives unless you take the matter frankly in hand. What say you? Shall we go home to New York, and have it out with the old miser? Beard the lion in his den, and find out the worst of his power. You consent? Good. We will sail this week."

Lady Landon's ball had indeed been a great success, and the Courtneys were highly elated over the admiration excited by Azalea's delicate blond beauty. Her future sister-in-law had been quite cordial, too, but in her secret heart she would have preferred the magnificent Nita with her calm manner and queenly beauty. She hinted as much to her brother, but he told her bitterly that Miss Farnham aspired to higher rank than a mere baronet, and the attentions of Lord Winthrop certainly lent color to the assertion.