Countess Vera; or, The Oath of Vengeance

"I will have some white dresses, I think," Lady Vera promises.

"Some of those sweet embroidered things!" Lady Clive exclaims, enthusiastically. "She will look lovely in them—don't you think so, Philip?"

"She looks lovely in anything," answers the loyal lover, and Lady Vera shivers and represses a sigh. Now and then a shadow from the nearing future falls darkly over her spirit. The memory of her vow of vengeance falls like an incubus over her spirit. What will Philip say to this strange vow of hers, she asks herself over and over.

She gives Worth carte blanche for the dresses, and in a few weeks they go up to London, already filling up with fashion and beauty. No one knows how regretfully Lady Vera looks back upon the happy hours she has spent at Fairvale Park with her happy lover. They see that her face is graver, but they do not guess her thoughts. How should they? No one dreams of that oath of vengeance bequeathed her by her dead father. No one knows how often she whispers to herself in the still watches of the wakeful nights:

"Soon I shall be face to face with Marcia Cleveland, and must punish her for her wicked sins. How shall I strike her best? What form will my vengeance take?"

Invitations began to pour in upon them as soon as they were fairly settled at Clive House. Lady Clive decides to attend Lady Spencer's grand ball.

Sir Harry objects.

"There will be a crush," he says. "Lady Spencer always asks everybody."

"Precisely why I am going," responds his vivacious wife. "Crowds always amuse me. Besides, we will see almost everybody who will be here for the season."

"Your countrymen, those rich Americans, will be there," Sir Harry insinuates, maliciously.

"I can stand that, too," Lady Clive retorts. "I am not to be daunted by trifles. Besides, I want Philip and Vera to see those people."

Lady Vera says not a word, but her heart beats high, and there is some little triumph mingled with her thoughts.

"Will Mrs. Cleveland and her daughter know me?" she asks herself. "Will they recognize the poor girl whom they injured and insulted so cruelly in the wealthy and honored Countess of Fairvale?"

She selects one of her loveliest dresses—a silvery white brocade, trimmed with a broidery and fringe of gleaming pearls. No jewels mar the rounded whiteness of her perfect arms and stately throat. The waving, golden hair is piled high upon her graceful head, with no ornament save a cluster of velvety white pansies.

"They say that my enemies' jewels are almost barbaric in their splendor. I will show them that I am lovely enough to leave my jewels at home," she tells herself, with some little girlish triumph.

CHAPTER XX

At Darnley House on the night of Lady Spencer's ball, all the devices of art and the aid of two well-nigh distracted maids are called in to beautify Mrs. Leslie Noble for her debut in London fashionable society. Her small, pale, faded face is rejuvenated by rouge and powder, the hair-dresser furnishes a tower of straw-gold puffs to crown her own sparse locks, and add dignity and hight to her low stature. Her dress is a chef-d'œuvre of the Parisian man milliner—palest blue satin, with diaphanous, floating draperies of blue embroidered crape. A magnificent diamond necklace clasps her small throat. Bracelets of diamonds shine on her wrists, diamonds blaze in her hair, diamond clasps hold the azure draperies in place. From head to foot the small blonde sparkles with splendor, and her weak soul thrills with vanity. She is determined to create a sensation, and to have the incense of admiration poured at her shrine.

When she has fretted and worried through the process of dressing, and slapped the face of one maid, and scolded the other one into floods of tears, she sends for her mother to come into the dressing-room.

There is a little delay, and then Mrs. Cleveland sails in, gorgeous in crimson brocade and rubies, her black eyes shining with triumphant satisfaction at her own really fine appearance. But Ivy, absorbed in her own self, has no admiration to spare for her mother.

"I sent for you, mamma, to ask you how I look," she says. "These stupid women have worried me into a fever. They can do nothing right. Tell me, do you think any of these proud, titled dames will outshine me in the ball-room to-night?"

Mrs. Cleveland's glance roves critically over the resplendent figure. All the appliances of wealth and art cannot hide the fretful, ill-natured look on the small, thin face, nor the shrewish light in the pale-blue eyes.

"Your dress is faultless—I do not believe anyone will be more magnificent than you," she answers; "but try to look more complaisant, do, Ivy. You have no idea how that fretful look mars the beauty of your face. Remember you will have some formidable rivals to-night. The grandest and most beautiful women in London will be at Lady Spencer's ball."

"I am as pretty as any of them," Mrs. Noble cries, irascibly. "I don't see why I am to be cautioned against my looks so much. An angel would lose her temper. There was Leslie to-day, telling me to look for my laurels, for the beauty of last season would be there, and carry all before her?"

"The Countess of Fairvale—yes, I have heard that she would be there," Mrs. Cleveland answers. "I am quite curious to see her. She is as lovely as a dream, they say, a dark-eyed blonde with golden hair."

"Leslie saw her portrait at Delany's—the great artist, you know," Mrs. Noble answers. "Would you believe he had the insolence to tell me she reminded him of that wretched creature—Vera Campbell?"

"She had dark eyes and fair hair, you remember," Mrs. Cleveland answers, carelessly.

"Yes, but the idea of comparing her to a great beauty like this Lady Fairvale—that girl who was no better than a servant!" Mrs. Noble cries, indignantly.

"Well, well, there is no use to be jealous of the dead. Vera Campbell was beautiful, certainly, but Leslie never cared for her, you know," Mrs. Cleveland answers, impatiently.

"Precious little he cares for me, either," her daughter complains. "He pretended to love me once, but he has dropped even the pretense long ago!"

"What does it matter? You are his wife, and spend his money all the same," Mrs. Cleveland answers, heartlessly. "Come, Ivy, if you mean to attend the ball to-night, it's time to be off. For Heaven's sake, smooth those ugly frowns off your face before we reach Lady Spencer's, or people will think you old and ugly in spite of your diamonds."

Ivy's pale eyes flash with rage at the cool reminder, but she is wise enough to know that her mother is speaking for her good. She dabs on a little more pearl powder, takes up her white satin cloak lined with snowy swan's-down, and with a fond, farewell glance into the mirror, turns to go.

"You need not fear for me, mamma," she says, summoning a smile to her painted lips. "I shall be as bright and smiling as the Countess of Fairvale herself. But I wonder where Leslie can be! He drank so much wine at dinner that I am afraid he is in no condition to attend us."

A door opens suddenly to her right, and Mr. Noble appears in full evening dress, his face somewhat flushed, but looking otherwise none the worse for the wine his wife deplores. He looks ungraciously at his resplendent wife.

"So you have got on all your war-paint," he sneers. "How ridiculously over-dressed you are, Ivy. You make one think of a jeweler's show-window. A pity you could not have bored a hole through your nose, and hung a diamond there, too."

"A pity you drank enough wine at dinner to make you a drunken boor," she retorts angrily.

CHAPTER XXI

Dazzling vistas of gorgeous rooms; a blaze of light and flowers everywhere: men and women in festive attire; over all, the throb and swell of the gay, sweet, maddening dance-music.

Lady Spencer's ball is in full blast, and as Sir Harry Clive predicted, it is a "crush." But after all everyone seems to be enjoying it, even Mrs. Noble, who, in a conspicuous position, and surrounded by a small circle of diamond-admirers, deems herself an acknowledged belle, and gives herself pleasant and coquettish little airs, accordingly.

"I have seen no one any prettier than I am," she confides to her mother, in a delighted whisper. "If that Lady Fairvale is here she cannot be a very great beauty. Doubtless she has been greatly overrated. I fancy that girl over there in the pink satin and opals must be she. You observe she has fair hair with dark eyes."

"No; for that is Lady Alice Fordham, I am told," Mrs. Cleveland answers. "I do not think the beauty has arrived yet."

"Staying late in order to create a sensation," Mrs. Noble sneers, then returning to her own admirers, forgets the distasteful subject for awhile in airing her own graces with the laudable intent of aggravating her husband, who has retired to a distant part of the room in supreme disgust.

But suddenly in Mrs. Noble's vicinity an eager whisper runs from lip to lip, all eyes turn in one direction, a lady and gentleman advancing down the center of the room are the cynosure of all eyes—Lady Fairvale and Colonel Lockhart. Mrs. Noble catches her breath in unwilling admiration.

For surely since Adam and Eve were paired in the Garden of Eden, no more beautiful pair had been created than these two!

Colonel Lockhart, to humor a whim of his sister's, appeared in the splendid and becoming uniform of a colonel in the United States Army. His martial form and handsome face appeared princely in his becoming garb, and his fine, dark-blue eyes were sparkling with pride and happiness as they rested on the lovely girl who hung upon his arm with all the confidence of first, pure, innocent love.

"She is as lovely as a dream," Mrs. Cleveland had said to her daughter, and Ivy, with a gasp of envy, is fain to acknowledge the truth.

Tall, slenderly formed, with

"Cheek of rose and brow of pearl,Shadowed by many a golden curl,"

with dark eyes radiating light beneath the drooping, ebon lashes, with neck and arms moulded like the gleaming white marble of a sculptor's masterpiece, and guiltless of all adornment; with that silvery robe sweeping about the stately form as if the mist of the sea had enveloped her, Lady Vera looks and moves "a queen," gracious, lovely, smiling, as if the shadow of a great despair were not brooding over that golden head.

"Not a jewel, scarcely a flower, and yet more perfect than an artist's dream," Mrs. Cleveland whispers maliciously to her overbearing daughter.

But Ivy forgets to be angry at the little thrust. She stares at the beautiful vision, pale to the very lips.

"Leslie was right," she murmurs, like one dazed. "She frightens me, she is so like—so like that dead girl, Vera. Do you not see it, mamma?"

"Yes, but why should a mere chance likeness frighten you?" Mrs. Cleveland retorts, with subdued scorn.

Lady Vera has not seen her enemies yet. A group of admirers has closed around her, and for a little while she forgets that she will meet here the heartless and vindictive woman who destroyed the happiness of her parents. Her lover claims her hand for the dance, and she passes from their sight a little space.

Colonel Lockhart is radiant with joy and pride. The hum of admiration that follows his darling everywhere is music in his ears.

"My darling, do you see how every eye follows you?" he whispers, fondly.

But Lady Vera laughs archly in the happiness of her heart.

"You are mistaken. They are only admiring your uniform," she retorts, gayly, and the soldier thinks to himself that surely the smile upon the crimson lips is the gladdest and sweetest that ever rejoiced a lover's heart.

But it fades suddenly, the glad, sweet smile, and the blush upon the rounded cheek.

The dance is over, and they are lingering together by a stand of rare and fragrant flowers.

Suddenly the blush and smile fade together. A strange, stern look comes into the dark eyes, she drops the rose that her lover has just placed in her hand.

"Vera," he asks, looking anxiously at her, "what ails you, dear? You have grown so grave."

She looks up at him with strange eyes, from which the light and joy of a moment ago have faded as if they had never been.

"Philip, who is that woman over there, in the crimson brocade and rubies?" she asks, indicating the person by a slight inclination of her head.

His glance follows hers.

"That woman—yes, someone told me awhile ago that she was a countrywoman of mine, a Mrs. Cleveland. The one next her, in the diamonds, is her daughter."

Lady Vera is silent a moment, gazing steadily at the unconscious two.

She has recognized them instantly, and only asked the question to "make assurance doubly sure." Some of the bitterness in the heart rises up to her face. Her lips curl in scorn.

Colonel Lockhart regards her anxiously, puzzled by the inexplicable change in her face.

"What is it, Vera? Do you know these people?" he asks.

"How should I know them?" she asks, trying to throw off the weight that has fallen on her heart.

"Are you ill, then? These flowers are too heavy and sweet, perhaps. Shall I take you away?" he inquires.

"Not yet," she answers.

She continues gazing steadily at Mrs. Cleveland and her daughter. To her heart she is saying over and over:

"I am face to face with my enemies at last. What form will my vengeance take?"

In a moment that question that she has asked herself so many times is terribly answered.

Watching Ivy with her strange, intent gaze, she sees a gentleman come up to her side.

"Am I mad," she asks herself, with terrible calm despair, "or is it really Leslie Noble?"

Her lover unconsciously answers the silent question.

"You see that dark, handsome man, Vera?" he says. "His name is Leslie Noble. He is the husband of the lady in the diamonds."

She makes him no answer at first. Her eyes are wide and dark with horror. All in a moment she sees plainly the awful answer to the question so often asked of her shuddering heart.

"Vera, indeed you are ill. Let me take you away from the heavy scent of these flowers," her lover pleads.

She starts like one waking from a dreadful dream, and clings to his arm.

"Yes, take me away," she echoes, in a far-off voice. "There are too many flowers here, and the light hurts my eyes, and the music my heart."

CHAPTER XXII

"My darling, I do not know what to think," Colonel Lockhart exclaims, anxiously. "A moment ago you were so bright and happy—now you look pale and startled, and your words are strange and wild. Has anything frightened you, my darling?"

She lifts her heavy, dark eyes almost beseechingly to his own.

"Philip, please do not talk to me, now," she says. "Do not ask me any questions. Only find me a quiet place away from the crowd, where I may rest awhile. I am ill."

"I do not know where to find such a place, unless I take you into the conservatory. I expect it is quite deserted now," he answers.

"We will go there, then," she replies.

Troubled at heart, and very anxious over his darling, Colonel Lockhart leads her down through the long vistas of fragrant bloom to a quiet seat under a slender young palm tree. There are very few flowers here—only cool, green thickets of lovely, lace-like ferns, watered by the sparkling fountain poured from the lifted urn of a marble Naiad.

"Will this spot suit you, Vera?" he inquires, anxiously.

She bows, and looks at him with her grave, sad gaze.

"Philip, you must leave me here alone for half an hour," she says, "I wish to rest awhile. Then you may come to me."

"You look so ill and pale I am almost afraid to leave you alone," he answers. "May I not remain near you, Vera? I will not talk to you, nor weary you in any way. I will sit silently and wait your pleasure."

"I would rather be alone," she answers, wearily.

"Then I will go, my darling, but I shall be very anxious over you. It will be the longest half hour of my life."

He stoops over her, and taking the sweet white face in his hands, kisses the pale, drawn lips. A stifled sob breaks from her at the thought that in a little while these kisses will be hers no longer.

"You are nervous, dear. Let me send my sister to you," he urges.

"I had rather be alone," she answers.

"Forgive me, dear. I will go, then," he answers, turning away.

The tall form disappears in the green, flowery shrubbery. The echo of the firm, elastic footstep dies away. Lady Vera is alone at last, sitting with folded hands and dark, terrified eyes, face to face with the awful reality of her life's despair.

"Leslie Noble, my unloved and unloving husband, is alive and married to his old love, Ivy Cleveland—how passing strange," she murmurs, hollowly, to herself. "What strange mystery is here? Did he believe me dead, as I did him? Or has he, in the madness of his love for Ivy, recklessly plunged into sin? But if so, why did he bring her here where they must meet me? There is some strange, unfathomable mystery here which I cannot penetrate."

Alas, poor Vera! the gloom of a subtle mystery wraps thee round, indeed, and the hand that held the key to the secret is cold in death.

Low moans gurgle over her lips, and blend with the murmur of the fountain as it splashes musically into the marble basin. She is thinking of her handsome, noble lover between whose heart and hers a barrier has risen, wide and deep as the eternal Heaven.

"I must part from him, my Philip, my love!" she moans, "for in the sight of God I am Leslie Noble's wife, even though before men he is Ivy Cleveland's husband."

She bows her face in her hands, and bitter, burning tears stream through her fingers. In all the hours when she has brooded over that oath of vengeance made by her father's death-bed, no slightest thought has come to her in what terrible way she must keep her vow, and at what fearful cost to her life's happiness.

"What strange prescience came to my father in dying?" she asks herself, in wonder. "How strangely his words were shaped to fit the awful reality. I must punish Marcia Cleveland through her dearest affections, he said. All her heart is centered on Ivy, and when I claim Leslie Noble from her and cover her head with that awful shame, my father's wishes will be fulfilled. And lest I should falter in my dreadful task, he added that last clause, no matter at what cost to myself. Oh, God! what will Philip say when he learns the truth? The way is plain before me how to keep my vow. I, who loathe and despise Leslie Noble, must claim him before God and man as my husband, and humiliate Ivy Cleveland to the dust. In no other way can I punish Marcia Cleveland and avenge my mother's wrongs."

"In no other way," the fountain seems to echo, as it splashes musically down, and Lady Vera, turning coward now in the face of the terrible future, prays in bitterest agony: "Oh, God! if I could die—die here and now, with Philip's last fond kiss still warm upon my lips, before I have to speak the dreadful words that will doom us to a living death in life."

With an effort she shakes off, presently, the horror and dread and shrinking repugnance with which she looks forward to the fulfillment of her oath.

"Mother, forgive me," she weeps. "Do I not remember all your bitter wrongs and mine, and how often my young heart burned to avenge them? And shall I shrink back now when the flaming sword is in my hand, and I am able to crush your enemy into the dust? No, no! What matter if it breaks my heart? My gentle mother, yours was broken, too. And though I tread on burning plow-shares, I will keep my oath of vengeance."

No faltering; no looking back now. Something of her father's haughty spirit is infused into Lady Vera's soul. Her dark eyes light with the strange fire that burns on the altar of her heart, and when her lover comes anxiously to seek her, she has recovered all her usual calmness, and greets him with a smile.

"You are better, dear?" he exclaims.

"Yes, and we will return to the ball-room now," she answers, resting her icy fingers lightly against his arm.

Passing from the subdued light of the conservatory into the glare of the ball-room, they come face to face with Leslie, with Ivy hanging on his arm, flushed and heated from the dance. Lady Vera lifts her head with stag-like grace, and looks steadily into their eyes, but beyond an insolent stare from Ivy, and a glance of warm admiration from the man, they give no sign of recognition. Lady Vera passes on, and Lady Clive comes up to her, laughing.

"My dear, you have seen our country people—the rich Americans," she says. "How do you like them?"

"I will tell you some day," she answers, in a strange tone, yet with a careless smile.

Still later in the evening Lady Spencer seeks out the countess.

"Dear Lady Fairvale, will you allow me to introduce to you our American guests?" she asks. "They are most anxious to know the beauty of the season."

Lady Vera, growing pale as her white robe, draws her slight form proudly erect.

"Pray, pardon my rudeness, Lady Spencer," she answers, coldly. "But I must decline. I do not wish to know them."

CHAPTER XXIII

Society, which likes nothing better than a bit of gossip, commented considerably on the Countess of Fairvale's refusal to know the rich Americans. There were some who blamed her and thought she was over-nice and proud. The American Consul vouched for their respectability, and their style of living attested to their wealth. What more could she desire? Everyone else received them on equal terms. Why did Lady Vera hold out so obstinately against speaking to them? It could only be a girl's foolish whim—nothing more, for she assigned no reason for her refusal.

But it created some little embarrassment at first. People did not like to invite the countess and the Americans together for fear of an unpleasant collision. They could not slight Lady Vera, and they did not wish to offend the Americans. The affair was quite unpleasant, and created some little notoriety.

"And after all, Lady Vera's mother was an American, and she was born in the United States herself. Why should she hold herself above one of her own country people?" said one of the knowing ones.

No one could answer the question, and least of all the Americans themselves, who were secretly galled and humiliated almost beyond endurance by the scorn and indifference of the proud and beautiful young girl.

Mr. Noble was sorely chafed by Lady Vera's course. He had conceived a great admiration for her, and desired to hear her talk, that he might learn if her voice as well as her face resembled his dead wife, Vera, the girl who had committed suicide rather than be an unloving wife. Mrs. Cleveland, who had desired to know her because she was the fashion just then, was very angry, too, but Ivy took it the hardest of all. She considered it a deliberate and malicious affront to herself.

"The proud minx!" she said, angrily. "In what is she better than I am that she should refuse to know me? I shall ask her what she means by it."

"You will do no such thing," Mrs. Cleveland cries out, startled by the threat. "You would make yourself perfectly ridiculous! We will pass it over in utter silence, and show her that we cannot be hurt by such foolish airs as she gives herself."

"I am as good as she. I will not be trampled upon!" Ivy retorts, venomously. "What! is she made of more than common clay because she has gold hair and black eyes, and a pink and white face like a doll? It is all false after all, I have no doubt. Her hair is bleached by the golden fluid, and her red and white bought at Madame Blanche's shop!"

"People who live in glass houses should never throw stones," interpolates her lord and master, thus diverting her wrath a moment from Lady Vera and drawing it down upon his own devoted head.

But no one is more surprised at Vera's course than her lover, Colonel Lockhart.

It is when they have gone home from Lady Spencer's ball, and he detains her one moment in the drawing-room to say good-night, that he asks her anxiously:

"Vera, my darling, what story lies behind your refusal to know these people to-night?"

He feels the start and shiver that runs over the graceful form as he holds her hand in his own. She looks up at him with such a white and despairing face that he is almost frightened.