Pretty Geraldine, the New York Salesgirl; or, Wedded to Her Choice

"Although Cissy is very angry with me, and vows that I will repent it in dust and ashes," she added, uneasily.

"Don't listen to her croaking. She only envies your good fortune," he returned, reassuringly. "Why, you will soon be rich and famous, Miss Harding, for your beauty and talent will win you rapid promotion on the boards. Do you see how all those strangers have watched you on the ice to-day? It is because your face has already won you the sobriquet of 'the prettiest salesgirl in New York.' Soon it will be changed to 'the prettiest actress on the stage.' Will not that sound better?"

CHAPTER X.

A CRUEL DISAPPOINTMENT

"Love, dear friend, is a sacred thing!Love is not tinsel, silver or gold!Love is a fragment of Heaven's own gate,Broken in halves by God's hand, Fate,And given two kindred spirits to holdWho would colonize in our earth unknown,'Tis whispered them: 'You may be thrownFar apart—'"

Harry Hawthorne remained in the Bellevue Hospital ten days only, it having been discovered that his injuries were not internal, as at first feared.

His temporary unconsciousness had resulted from the severe cut on his head, and as this healed nicely, he grew better, and asked for his discharge from the hospital. Indeed, he would have recovered sooner but for a painful suspense and anxiety that augmented fever and restlessness.

The young fireman had been so deeply smitten by the charms of pretty Geraldine, that during his enforced confinement, the thought of her had never been absent from his mind. Love had sprung to life full grown within his breast.

When he was discharged from the hospital, he could not wait until evening to call on her. The ready excuse of the need of a pair of gloves took him to O'Neill's.

He did not wear his fireman's dress, but attired himself in an elegant suit of clothes, such as gentlemen wear to business. Thus arrayed, and looking as much the aristocrat as any Fifth avenue millionaire, he entered the store and went at once to the glove counter, his heart throbbing wildly at thought of seeing Geraldine again, and making an appointment to call on her that evening.

A whole row of smiling, pretty girls confronted him, but among them all he could not see his heart's darling, the lode-star of his dreams—sweet Geraldine.

He accosted the nearest girl—a plump, gray-eyed beauty—who fortunately proved to be Miss Carroll.

"I wish to have Miss Harding show me some gloves. Is she here?"

Cissy Carroll shook her dark head, and answered:

"Geraldine does not attend here any more. Can I show you the gloves?"

"If you please," he replied, and as she placed them before him, he took a pair, mechanically, in his shapely hand, but continued:

"I beg your pardon, but has Miss Harding gone to another store? She is a friend of mine. I wish to see her very much."

"Your name?" asked Cissy, with a quick suspicion of the truth, for he realized in his person Geraldine's description.

"I am Harry Hawthorne."

"I thought so. And I am Miss Carroll. Perhaps you have heard Geraldine speak of me?"

He smiled, and answered:

"Yes, as her 'chum Cissy.' She told me, also, that you roomed together."

"We did—but Geraldine has left me now."

She read the palpable disappointment on his face, and added, quickly:

"She had a talent for acting, and has gone upon the stage."

She saw him start as if she had struck him a blow in the face, and he grew lividly pale, as he asked:

"At what theatre?"

"Oh, she has left New York, and gone on the road with a stock company—the one that played 'Hearts and Homes' two weeks here. You may remember Clifford Standish, the leading man. He procured the situation for Geraldine."

Then, as she saw from his face that he was taking it quite hard, she added, with womanly curiosity:

"But how happens it that you are not acquainted with these facts? The papers had some very flattering paragraphs about the beautiful salesgirl who had left a New York store to adopt a stage career."

"I—I—haven't read the papers," he murmured, faintly, like one recovering from a blow.

"Oh, then you must have been away from New York—and poor Geraldine expecting you to call every evening. Why didn't you let her know?"

"I haven't been away from the city, Miss Carroll."

"Then why did you act toward her so shabbily?"

"Shabbily! Why I had a note written to her from the hospital, explaining that an accident had overturned my engine and seriously wounded me. I've been in Bellevue Hospital ten days, Miss Carroll. Look," and he showed her the scar on his head.

"Oh, it's a wonder you were not killed," said the girl, sympathetically.

"They thought I was at first, for I didn't recover consciousness until the next day. Then, as soon as I could think clearly at all, I thought of my broken engagement of the evening before, and wondered what she would think of me. I persuaded the nurse to write a little note for me, as I was too shaky myself, and sent it by the messenger-boy at the hospital. I hoped she would write me a line of sympathy, and that—perhaps—she might even be sorry enough to come and see me there. But I never received a word!"

"She did not receive your note. Your failure to come was a mystery to her always, Mr. Hawthorne."

"Why, that is very strange. I'll go back to the hospital and see that messenger. But—will you give me her address now?" eagerly. "I will write to her and explain."

Cissy blushed vividly, and said:

"I am sorry that I cannot, but the fact is I don't know where she is, for—we parted in anger, vowing to have no more to do with each other. I disliked Clifford Standish, and tried to persuade her not to go on the stage. She went in defiance of my advice—so she has not written to me."

CHAPTER XI.

A CRUSHING SORROW

"Till now thy soul hath beenAll glad and gay;Bid it arise and lookAt grief to-day!For now life's stream has reachedA deep, dark sea,And sorrow, dim and crowned,Is waiting thee."

Miss Carroll was sorry for the young fireman, as she saw how pale and troubled his handsome face became at her tidings.

She exclaimed, sympathetically:

"Maybe Geraldine will get over her anger and write to me yet. She never stays angry long at a time. So, if she writes, I'll let you know."

"Thank you, a hundred times over," gratefully, "and may I call on you sometimes, to inquire?"

"Certainly," replied Cissy, who liked him as much as she had despised the actor. Almost every one has antipathies. The actor was one of Cissy's, no doubt.

Harry Hawthorne thanked her for her courtesy, paid for his gloves, and walked away with such a princely air that all the pretty salesgirls followed his exit with admiring eyes, and there was a swelling murmur of ejaculations:

"Oh, what a handsome fellow!"

"Isn't he perfectly magnif'?"

"Who is he, Cissy? A Fifth avenue millionaire?"

"Oh, no, indeed, girls; don't lose your wits! He's a fireman at the Ludlow street engine-house, that's all."

"Oh, then he must be a prince in disguise; and, come to think of it, millionaires are not usually good-looking, any way. I might have known he was poor, from his beauty. He was talking to you about Jerry Harding, wasn't he? Is she his sweetheart?"

"Perhaps so. Don't bother me! I don't know," laughed Cissy, cutting short their merry chatter.

Meanwhile the object of their admiration hurried away and returned to the hospital.

He had no trouble in finding the messenger-boy who had taken his note to Geraldine, and the youth, unconscious of having done wrong, very readily admitted that he had given the note to a gentleman, who said he was going in, and had offered to hand the letter to the lady.

"No harm done, I hope, sir?" he said, regretfully.

"Yes, more harm than you know. The man kept the letter, so the young lady never received it. It was something very important, too; and now she has gone away, and the mischief you did can never be undone."

"Oh, my! what a pity!" exclaimed the boy, readily guessing that here was a broken-off love affair. He looked pityingly at Hawthorne a minute, then continued: "I'm very sorry I made such a mistake. I thought the fellow was a gentleman. But I know him, and I'll get even with him for that trick—you see if I don't!"

"Who was he, Rob?"

"Why, that Standish that plays in 'Hearts and Homes.' An elegant swell, don't you know? Gave me a quarter, like a lord. But I'll hunt him up, and get back that letter."

"You are too late, Rob. He has gone on the road with his company."

"Whew! And the lady gone, too, with him?"

"Yes."

"Oh, what a kettle of fish! Of my mixing, too! Indeed, Mr. Hawthorne, I'm sorry; and, if I ever get a chance, I'll do that fellow up for his treachery, the villain!" cried the boy, so earnestly that the listener could but smile, for he had no faith in the possibility of such an event taking place.

He walked away, bitter at heart over the actor's treachery.

"He kept that letter, and managed to make trouble between us somehow, the cunning wretch!" he mused, sadly enough, for the case looked hopeless now.

Standish, having gained such a signal advantage over him in taking pretty Geraldine away, would follow it up by wedding her before his return.

"If I could find out where she is on the road, I might still write and explain all," he thought, with a gleam of hope that quickly faded as he recalled the treacherous nature of his rival.

"If I wrote to her, he would intercept my letter. He will be on the watch for that. There is no use trying and hoping. I have lost her forever—bonny, brown-eyed Geraldine!" he sighed, hopelessly.

As he returned to his work at the engine-house, he felt as if he had just closed the coffin-lid over a well-beloved face.

Such hopes and dreams as had come to him since he met fair Geraldine were hard to relinquish; they had brought such new brightness into his prosaic life; but he felt that all was over now.

True, he felt that he had made a strong impression on the girl's heart, but his rival would soon teach her to forget that he had ever existed.

But in a few days hope began unconsciously to reassert itself. He decided to call on Cecilia Carroll to inquire if she had any news.

He went that evening, and she told him that Geraldine had not written yet.

"But I found out from a manager the proposed route of the company, and I have written to her, and told her about you," she added, out of the kindness of her heart.

"Clifford Standish will take good care that she never receives your letter," he said, bitterly, as he told her how the actor had intercepted the note he had sent to Geraldine.

"I suspected as much, the grand villain!" cried Cissy, indignantly. "So now I shall write to her again and expose him!"

She did so, but no answer came to either of her letters.

Clifford Standish was too wily to permit Geraldine to receive them. He easily got possession of her mail, and destroyed it without a pang of remorse at his selfish heart.

CHAPTER XII.

THE LETTER THAT NEVER CAME

"Write me a letter, my dear old friend,I love you more and more,As farther apart we drift, dear heart,And nearer the other shore.The dear old loves and the dear old daysAre a balm to life's regret;It's easy to bear the worry and careIf the old friends love us yet."

Yes, pretty Geraldine, piqued and unhappy over her cruel disappointment in love, had joined the Clemens Company, the manager of which was also one of the actors—Cameron Clemens. He played the clever villain in "Hearts and Homes," his special play, while Clifford Standish took the hero's part.

Geraldine threw her whole heart into her work, and succeeded so well that she was promoted in a week, owing to the illness and withdrawal of the second lady from the company. It was the part of an ingenue, which just suited Geraldine's youth and naivette. She could act it to perfection without laying aside her pretty naturalness of manner.

They traveled from town to town, staying just a night or two in each place, usually drawing full houses, and Geraldine proved a great attraction, winning always so much admiration that it was a wonder her pretty little head was not turned by flattery.

It might have been had not her heart been so sore over its brief, broken love-dream.

To have known a man but two brief, bright, happy days, and not be able to forget him, it was absurd, she thought, in desperate rebellion against her own heart.

And yet, through the busy weeks of travel, study, and acting, Harry Hawthorne's image staid in her mind, and his voice rang through her dreams, sweet and low and tender as it had always been to her whenever he spoke.

In her waking hours she knew him light and false; in her dreams he was always tender and true, and inexpressibly dear.

"Last night in my deep sleep I dreamed of you—Again the old love woke in me and thrivedOn looks of fire, on kisses, and sweet wordsLike silver waters purling in a stream—A dream—a dream!"

Through all the changing days in which the silent struggle against a hopeless love went on in her young heart, Clifford Standish was ever near, patient, tender, devoted, telling her with his yearning eyes the love she was not ready to listen to yet.

And in spite of herself, Geraldine found a subtle comfort in his devotion.

It was a balm of healing to her proud heart, so deeply wounded by Harry Hawthorne's trifling.

Many hearts have been caught in the rebound in this fashion, many true loves won.

True, there are many proud ones who do not prize a love they can only have because it has been scornfully refused by another.

They will say, resentfully:

"I will not accept a love that is given me only because it was left by one who did not prize it."

Others, more humble, will gladly accept the grateful love of a wounded heart that finds consolation in their tenderness.

Clifford Standish, madly in love with Geraldine, was glad to accept such crumbs of love as might fall to him from the royal feast that had been spread for Harry Hawthorne.

So he hovered by her side, he paid her the most delicate attentions, anticipating every wish, and found ample reward as he saw himself gaining in her grateful regard.

At the same time the arch-traitor was intercepting the few letters that came to her, and the ones she wrote to Miss Carroll.

For Geraldine had long ago gotten over her pet with her friend, since she know in her heart how dear she was to Cissy, and that the girl had advised her for her own good.

Geraldine had found out that the career of an actress—even a young, pretty, and popular one—is not always strewn with roses.

She had to study hard, and she did not enjoy traveling all day, or even half a day, and then appearing on the boards at night. Sometimes the hotel accommodations of country towns where they stopped over were wretchedly indifferent. Sometimes her head ached miserably, but she must appear on the boards, all the same. And the free-and-easy ways of some of the company did not please the fastidious taste of the girl.

Now and then she found her thoughts returning to the old days behind the counter at O'Neill's with Cissy and the other girls, with an almost pathetic yearning. Secretly she longed to be back again.

How she wished that Cissy would write to her now, and beg her to return, so that she might have an excuse for following the dictates of her heart.

At last, believing that Cissy was too proud and stubborn to write first, she penned her a long, affectionate letter, through which breathed an underline of repentance and regret that her chum would be sure to answer it by writing:

"Come home, dear. I told you that you would get sick of being an actress."

But Geraldine was too weary and heart-sick to care for a hundred "I-told-you-so's" from the triumphant Cissy. What did it matter so that she got back to her dear old chum again and their cozy little rooms, and even to what she had once called her slavery behind the counter.

She recalled what Harry Hawthorne had told her about it being a slavery of the stage, too; then put the thought from her with an impatient sigh.

"What do I care what he said about it?" indignantly, then sighing, "even though I have found it to be, alas, too true!"

She wrote her letter to Cissy, and after that her heart felt lighter. She knew her chum would be glad to get the letter—glad to have her back.

"Dear, I tried to write you such a letterAs would tell you all my heart to-day.Written Love is poor; one word were better!Easier, too, a thousand times to say."I can tell you all; fears, doubts unheeding,While I can be near you, hold your hand,Looking right into your eyes and readingReassurance that you understand."Yet I wrote it through, then lingered, thinkingOf its reaching you what hour, what day,Till I felt my heart and courage sinkingWith a strange, new, wondering dismay."'Will my letter fall,' I wondered, sadly,'On her mood like some discordant tone,Or be welcomed tenderly and gladly?Will she be with others, or alone?"It may find her too absorbed to read it,Save with hurried glance and careless air;Sad and weary, she may scarcely heed it;Gay and happy, she may hardly care."If perhaps now, while my tears are falling,She is dreaming quietly alone,She will hear my love's far echo calling,Feel my spirit drawing near her own."Wondering at the strange, mysterious powerThat has touched her heart, then she will say:'Some one whom I love this very hourThinks of me, and loves me far away.'"

Poor Geraldine! what a hopeless waiting she had for the letter that never came!

How could he bear the wistful light in her sad brown eyes, the wretch who had robbed her young life of happiness?

In his keeping rested the letters of the two fond girls to each other—the letters that would have brought happiness to three sad hearts.

And the weeks slipped into months while they echoed in their souls the poet's plaint:

"The solemn Sea of Silence lies between us;I know thou livest and thou lovest me;And yet I wish some white ship would come sailingAcross the ocean bearing news of thee."The dead calm awes me with its awful stillness,And anxious doubts and fears disturb my breast.I only ask some little wave of languageTo stir this vast infinitude of rest."Too deep the language which the spirit utters;Too vast the knowledge which my soul hath stirred.Send some white ship across the Sea of Silence,And interrupt its utterance with a word."

It was two months now since they had gone upon the road, but not a word had Geraldine received. It seemed to her as if the past days were a dream, so different was her life now—all whirl, confusion, and excitement.

Once she had thought this would be charming. Now she found it the reverse.

How glad she was to hear that the company would go back to New York in time for Christmas. She was so tired of the West, where they had been all these weeks.

When they were on their homeward way, they stopped over for a night at a pretty West Virginia town a few hundred miles from New York.

They had come straight through from Chicago, and the stop-over was very agreeable to the weary members of the company.

They arrived in the afternoon, and the tired travelers, after resting a while at their romantic hotel on the banks of the beautiful Greenbrier River, set out to explore the little town of Alderson, first hurrying to the post-office for their letters, which they expected to be awaiting them there.

Geraldine did not expect any mail, poor girl! She waited at the door while Clifford Standish went in and came out with a little budget for himself.

"Nothing for you, Geraldine. It seems that Miss Carroll is still unforgiving," he laughed, without noting the sensitive quiver of her scarlet lips.

They walked on, and she pretended to be absorbed in contemplation of the beautiful mountain scenery, while he ran over his letters.

"Let us cross the railroad and walk on the bridge over there," she said, at last.

It was a beautiful sunny day, very calm and mild for December. They loitered on the broad bridge that spanned the romantic river between the two towns, Alderson and North Alderson, and while she watched the lapsing river and the mountain peaks against the clear blue sky, he read to her bits of his letters from New York.

"Here's one that will interest you," he laughed, meaningly, and read:

"'Well, old fellow, there's nothing that I know in the way of interesting news just now, unless that a girl you used to be sweet on is going to be married to-morrow. It's little Daisy Odell, you know, of Newburgh. She's been visiting a married sister here, and caught a beau. He's a fireman named Harry Hawthorne, a big, handsome fellow, the hero of several fires. The marriage will take place at Mrs. Stansbury's, and I've an invitation to it.'"

He looked from the letter to her face, and saw that she was deadly pale and grief-stricken.

"Oh, will you let me read that for myself?" she gasped, as if she could scarcely believe him.

"Why, certainly," he answered, but as he was handing her the crumpled sheet, the wind caught it somehow, and fluttered it beyond reach over the rail and down into the river.

"Oh! oh! oh!" he cried, with pretended dismay, but his outstretched hand could not grasp it.

"It's gone; but no matter—the news must be true, for Charlie Butler wrote it, and he always tells the truth," he said, carelessly.

And how was the unsuspecting girl to know that no such words were written in the letter, and that it was from a woman, instead of Charlie Butler?

CHAPTER XIII.

TORTURED TO MADNESS

"So the truth's out. I'll grasp it like a snake;It will not slay me. My heart shall not break."I was so happy I could not make him blest!So falsely dreamed I was his first and best!"He'll keep that other woman from my sight;I know not if her face be foul or bright;I only know that it is his delight."

Geraldine was proud, very proud—and she thought she had quite overcome her hopeless love for Harry Hawthorne.

But the sudden, unexpected news of his marriage, that she never thought of doubting, struck her with the suddenness of an awful blow, beating down pride and reserve at one terrible stroke.

She realized all at once that her heart had still kept alive a little fire of hope burning before the shrine of its unacknowledged love. The quenching of this spark of hope was almost like the going out of life itself.

The other members of the party had gone on to the other side of the bridge and she was alone with Clifford Standish—alone with the agony of soul that blanched her sweet face to death-like pallor, and made her clutch at the rails, gasping out that she was ill, dying.

The arch-villain caught her swaying form and held it tenderly in his arms, while her white, unconscious face rested against his shoulder.

Some country people walking over the bridge at that moment stared in amazement, and going on to town, reported that, "those actor-folks were carrying on dreadful on the bridge—hugging right before folks."

But neither of the two participants was troubled over this sensation, Geraldine being unconscious, and Standish too much absorbed in her to heed aught else.

In a minute or two she sighed and opened her eyes.

"Oh!" she cried, as she met his eyes gazing deep into hers, and tried to struggle from his clasp.

"Wait. You cannot stand alone yet," he said, tenderly, then murmured: "Oh, Geraldine, it breaks my heart to find that you loved him, that low fireman, so unworthy of you; while I—I—have worshiped you ever since the hour I first saw you behind the counter, so bright and beautiful. I have been trying to win you ever since, and hoped—vainly hoped, as I see now—that I was succeeding. Oh, how did he succeed—this man you saw but a few hours—in winning your love?"

She struggled from his clasp, her strength returning, her face hot with blushes of fierce shame.

"It—it—is not true that I love him—no, no, no!" she faltered, wildly.

"But, my dearest girl, you fainted when you heard of his marriage."

"Oh, no, it was not that. I was tired, ill—from traveling, you know," cried poor Geraldine, who would have died rather than admit the truth which her pale, pale cheeks and trembling lips told all too plainly by their mute despair.