Daisy Brooks: or, A Perilous Love. Libbey Laura Jean

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СКАЧАТЬ answered Septima, awkwardly. “I beg your pardon, miss, for keeping you standing outside so long.”

      As Pluma took the seat Septima placed for her, the dark cloak she wore fell from her shoulders, and Septima saw with wonder she still wore the shimmering silk she had in all probability worn at the fête. The rubies still glowed like restless, leaping fire upon her perfect arms and snowy throat, and sprays of hyacinth were still twined in her dark, glossy hair; but they were quite faded now, drooping, crushed, and limp among her curls; there was a strange dead-white pallor on her haughty face, and a lurid gleam shone in her dark, slumbrous eyes. Pluma had studied well the character of the woman before her–who made no secret of her dislike for the child thrust upon their bounty–and readily imagined she would willingly aid her in carrying out the scheme she had planned.

      Slowly one by one the stars died out of the sky; the pale moon drifted silently behind the heavy rolling clouds; the winds tossed the tops of the tall trees to and fro, and the dense darkness which precedes the breaking of the gray dawn settled over the earth.

      The ponies which the groom had held for long hours pawed the ground restlessly; the man himself was growing impatient.

      “She can be up to no good,” he muttered; “all honest people should be in their beds.”

      The door of the cottage opened, and Pluma Hurlhurst walked slowly down the path.

      “All is fair in love’s warfare,” she mutters, triumphantly. “Fool! with your baby face and golden hair, you shall walk quickly into the net I have spread for you; he shall despise you. Ay, crush with his heel into the earth the very flowers that bear the name of Daisy.”

      CHAPTER VI

      Under the magnolia-tree, among the pink clover, Rex Lyon paced uneasily to and fro, wondering what could have happened to detain Daisy. He was very nervous, feverish, and impatient, as he watched the sun rising higher and higher in the blue heavens, and glanced at his watch for the fifth time in the space of a minute.

      “Pshaw!” he muttered, whisking off the tops of the buttercups near him with his ebony walking-stick. “I am not myself at all. I am growing as nervous as a woman. I think I’ll read little sister Birdie’s letter over again to occupy my mind until my sweet little Daisy comes.”

      He sighed and smiled in one breath, as he threw himself down at full length on the green grass under the trees. Taking from his pocket a little square white envelope, addressed in a childish hand to “Mr. Rexford Lyon, Allendale, West Virginia, Care of Miss Pluma.” Rex laughed aloud, until the tears started to his eyes, as they fell on the words “Care of Miss Pluma,” heavily underlined in the lower corner.

      “That is just like careless little romping Birdie,” he mused. “She supposes, because she knows who Miss Pluma is, every one else must certainly be aware of the same fact.”

      He spread out the letter on his knee, trying hard to while away time in perusing its pages.

      Rex looked so fresh and cool and handsome in his white linen suit, lying there under the shady trees that summer morning, his dark curls resting on his white hand, and a smile lighting up his pleasant face, it is not to be wondered at he was just the kind of young fellow to win the love of young romantic girls like Daisy and Pluma–the haughty young heiress.

      Slowly Rex read the letter through to the end. The morning stage whirled rapidly past him on its way to meet the early train. Yet, all unconscious that it bore away from him his treasure, he never once glanced up from the letter he was reading.

      Again Rex laughed aloud as he glanced it over, reading as follows:

      “Dear Brother Rex,–We received the letter you wrote, and the picture you sent with it, and my heart has been so heavy ever since that I could not write to you because big tears would fall on the page and blot it. Now, dear old Brother Rex, don’t be angry at what your little Birdie is going to say. Mamma says you are going to marry and bring home a wife, and she showed me her picture, and said you was very much in love with her, and I must be so too. But I can’t fall in love with her, Brother Rex; indeed, I’ve tried very hard and I can’t; don’t tell anybody, but I’m awfully afraid I sha’n’t like her one bit. She looks stylish, and her name Pluma sounds real stylish too, but she don’t look kind. I thought, perhaps, if I told you I did not like her you might give her up and come home. I forgot to tell you the blue room and the room across the hall is being fixed up for you just lovely, and I am to have your old one.

      “P.S.–And we received a letter from Mr. Lester Stanwick, too. He says he will be passing through here soon and wishes to call. When are you coming home, Rex? Don’t bring any one with you.

“Your loving little sister,“Birdie.”

      “There’s no fear of my bringing Pluma home now,” he laughed, whistling a snatch of “The Pages’ Chorus.” “Birdie won’t have anything to fear on that score. I do wish mother hadn’t set my heart on my marrying Pluma. Parents make a mistake in choosing whom their children shall marry and whom they shall not. Love goes where it is sent.”

      He looked at his watch again.

      “By George!” he muttered, turning very pale upon seeing another hour had slipped away, “I can not stand this a minute longer. I must see what has happened to Daisy.”

      With a nameless fear clutching at his heart–a dark, shadowy fear–like the premonition of coming evil, Rex made his way rapidly through the tangled underbrush, cutting across lots to John Brooks’ cottage.

      He had determined to call for Daisy upon some pretext. It was rather a bold undertaking and might cause comment, still Rex was reckless of all consequences; he must see Daisy at all hazards; and when Rex made up his mind to do anything he usually succeeded; he was as daring and courageous as he was reckless and handsome.

      Once, twice, thrice he knocked, receiving no answer to his summons.

      “That’s strange,” he mused, “exceedingly strange.”

      Hardly knowing what prompted him to do it, Rex turned the knob; it yielded to the touch, swinging slowly back on its creaking hinges.

      “Good heavens!” he ejaculated, gazing wildly about him and as pale as death, “Daisy is gone and the cottage is empty!”

      He leaned against the door-way, putting his hand to his brow like one who had received a heavy blow; and the bare walls seemed to take up the cry and echo, mockingly, “Gone!”

      The blow was so sudden and unexpected he was completely bewildered; his brain was in a whirl.

      He saw a laborer crossing the cotton-fields and called to him.

      “I was looking for John Brooks,” said Rex. “I find the cottage empty. Can you tell me where they have gone?”

      “Gone!” echoed the man, surprisedly. “I don’t understand it; I was passing the door a few hours since, just as the stage drove off with John Brooks and Daisy. ‘Good-bye, neighbor,’ he called out to me, ‘I am off on an extended business trip. You must bring your wife over to see Septima; she will be lonely, I’ll warrant.’ There was no sign of him moving then. I–I don’t understand it.”

      “You say he took Daisy with him,” asked Rex, with painful eagerness. “Can you tell me where they went?”

      The man shook his head and passed on. СКАЧАТЬ