Kidnapped at the Altar: or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain. Libbey Laura Jean

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СКАЧАТЬ to inspect your drawings," he said, tersely, as he waved the young man to a seat.

      Frank Moray laid them down upon the table. There was something in Varrick's manner that startled him, for he had always been courteous and pleasant to him before.

      Varrick ran his eyes critically over the pieces of card-board, the frown on his face deepening.

      "I hope the plans meet your approval, sir," said the young man, very respectfully. "I showed them from day to day, as I progressed, to Miss Jessie Bain, and she seemed very much interested in them."

      Those words were fatal to the young man's cause. With an angry gesture, Varrick threw the drawings down upon the table.

      "Your plans do not please me at all," he returned. "Stop right where you are. Return to your firm at once and tell them to send me another man, an older man, one with more experience – one who can spend more time at his business and less time in chattering. Your sketches are miserably drawn!"

      Frank Moray had risen to his feet, his face white as death.

      "Mr. Varrick," he cried hoarsely, "let me beg of you to reconsider your words. Only try me again. Let me make a new set of drawings to submit to you. It would ruin my reputation if you were to send this message to the firm, for they have hitherto placed much confidence in my work."

      "You will leave the house at once," he said, "and send a much older man, I repeat, to continue the work."

      The poor fellow fairly staggered from the drawing-room. He could not imagine why, in one short hour, he had dropped from heaven to the very depths of Hades, as it were.

      Varrick breathed freely when he saw him leave the house and walk slowly down the lilac-bordered path and out through the arched gate-way.

      A little later Jessie came flying into the library. Varrick was still seated at the table, poring over his books.

      "Where is Mr. Moray – do you know?" she asked, quickly – "I want to return him a paper he loaned me this morning. I have been looking everywhere for him, but can not find him. There is something in the paper that you would like to hear about too."

      "Sit down on this hassock, Jessie, and read it to me," he said.

      "Oh, no! You want to make fun of me," she pouted, "and see me get puzzled over all the big words. Please read it yourself, Mr. Varrick."

      "Suppose you tell me the substance of it, and that will save me reading it," he said.

      "Oh, I can do that. There isn't so much to tell. It's about a fire last night on one of the little islands in the St. Lawrence. No doubt you have heard of the place – Wau-Winet Island. The mysterious stone house that was on it has been burned to the ground. The owner was away at the time. It is supposed that everyone else on the island perished in the flames."

      Hubert Varrick listened with interest, but he never dreamed how vitally, in the near future, this catastrophe would concern him.

      He thought of his strange visit to that place, and that no doubt the owner was none too sorry to see it laid to ashes, as he had acknowledged that it had caused him much annoyance owing to the uncanny rumors floating about that the place was haunted by a young and beautiful woman whose spirit would not be laid.

      Then, in talking to Jessie during the next half hour he entirely forgot the fire that had occurred on that far-away island in the St. Lawrence.

      He broached the subject that the architect had gone for good, narrowly watching Jessie's pretty face as he told her.

      "Oh! I am so sorry," she declared, disappointedly, "for he was such a nice young man; and in his spare moments he had promised to teach me to sketch;" and her lovely face clouded.

      "Would not I do as well?" asked Hubert Varrick, gently, as his hand closed over the little white one so near his own.

      The girl trembled beneath his touch. In that one moment her heart went from her, and she experienced the sweet elysium of a young life just awakening to love's bewildering dream.

      "Would I not make as good a teacher?" repeated Varrick, softly; and he bent his dark, handsome head, looking earnestly into the girl's flushed face.

      "Perhaps," she answered, evasively; and she was very much relieved to hear some one calling her at that moment.

      Mrs. Varrick heard of the proposed sketching lessons with great displeasure. Despite all that she had done and said, she saw these two young people falling more and more in love with each other with every passing day.

      "How can I stop it? What shall I do?" she asked herself night after night, as she paced the floor of her boudoir.

      She fairly cursed the hour that brought lovely, innocent little Jessie Bain beneath that roof, and she wished she knew of some way in which to get rid of the girl for good and all.

      She paced the floor until the day dawned. A terrible scheme against the life and happiness of poor Jessie Bain had entered her brain – a scheme so dark and horrible that even she grew frightened as she contemplated it.

      Then she set her lips together, muttering hoarsely:

      "I would do anything to part my son and Jessie Bain!"

      Chapter IX.

      GERELDA'S ESCAPE FROM WAU-WINET ISLAND

      The fire at Wau-Winet Island, as the papers had explained, had taken place during the owner's absence. No one knew how it had happened; there seemed to be no one left to tell the tale.

      When Captain Frazier returned that evening and found the place in ruins, he was almost wild with grief. In his own mind he felt that he knew how it had come about.

      In her desperation to get away, Gerelda had fired the house. But, for all that, she had not succeeded in making her escape, as the flames must have overtaken her.

      Those who watched Captain Frazier had great difficulty in preventing him from flinging himself headlong into the bay, he seemed so distracted over the loss of Gerelda, the girl whom he loved so sincerely.

      The truth of the matter was, Gerelda had not fired the place. It had been caused by a spark from an open fire-place; and in the confusion and the darkness of the night she had succeeded in making her way out of the house and down to the shore.

      With trembling hands she had untied one of the little boats which lay there rocking to and fro, had sprung into it, and ere the flames burst through the arched windows of the stone house she was far across the bay, and was soon lost to sight in the darkness. She had taken the precaution to seize a long cloak and veil belonging to the maid, and these she proceeded to don while in the boat.

      By daylight she found herself drifting slowly toward a little village, and as the lights became clear enough to discern objects distinctly, she saw that the place was Kingston.

      At this Gerelda was overjoyed, for she remembered her old nurse, whom she had not seen since early childhood, lived here. The sun was shining bright and clear when Gerelda Northrup stepped from the boat and wended her way up the grass-grown streets of the quaint little Canadian town.

      By dint of inquiry here and there, she at length found the nurse's home – a little cottage, almost covered with morning-glory vines, setting back from the main road.

      Although the nurse had not seen СКАЧАТЬ