Chapter XIX.

A STRANGE THEORY.

"_OUR BODIES MAY BE TENANTED BY SOULS THAT HAVE LIVED BEFORE._"

A pouring rain from a vapor-laden sky, dull and gray, saluted Clifford the next morning with a chill welcome; but still the general gloom that pervaded all nature was in such perfect harmony with his mood that he felt a grim satisfaction, in a cold, lethargic way, at the sympathy of the elements.

"I am growing tired of this monotonous life," he said at breakfast, "and have decided to commute my homestead and knock around in the world awhile; so if Mr. Moreland, Ralph, and you, father, are willing to go to Abilene as my witnesses, we will start Saturday morning. I can take the train from there, and save another trip;" then seeing Maud's and his mother's look of distress, he added: "I may not be gone long, so I'll leave every thing as it is untill my return."

"Why, Clifford, my boy, what has come over you? This is wholly unlike your nature. I had always felt so glad that you were not of a roving disposition, and now you fly off at a tangent, and when we were not looking for any thing of the kind either. It is very strange, indeed!"

Clifford made no reply, but rose from the table, followed by Rob, whose face was momentarily growing longer and more doleful in its expression, while Maud shot a warning look at her parents, and as the boy's retreating footsteps grew fainter, she answered their questioning looks by saying:--

"Poor Clifford! he is passing through that course of true love which is said to never run smooth, and it is best not to interfere; but I hope at the picnic to see him on better terms with Mora, which may change his plans at once."

"Only a lovers' quarrel?" said Mrs. Warlow, with a troubled smile.

"No; I fear it is not so tangible as that," Maud replied. "Clifford seems to have caught the impression, some way, that Mora regards him as a mere fortune hunter, or looks down on him for his poverty; you know that she will be equal heir with Hugh in the immense Estill estate, which is said to be worth half a million, she being their only other child," she added, while narrowly watching her parents' faces; but to her wonder, her father and mother betrayed no surprise at this last remark, which caused a doubt to enter her mind that they were aware of the great discovery that Mora was the daughter of Bruce and Ivarene, which she had until this moment believed was a fact revealed to them when the Estills made their visit, more than a week before.

"Can it be that they are still ignorant of that fact?" Maud mentally asked herself; and then she began to wonder why the Estills had shown the locket, with its pictures of Bruce and his wife, and withheld from her parents the more important secret that Mora was also the daughter of those ill-fated friends; but her reflections were cut short by her father saying, with a weary sigh:--

"Ah! this is the sting of poverty indeed! Oh, why should I have been so ill-fated as to lose two fortunes in succession?"

"George, do not grieve over the past; that's beyond recall," Mrs. Warlow said gently; then she added: "It is better that my children should confine themselves to their own sphere; for you can see that if Miss Estill loved my boy, as well she might, for himself alone, she would never think of the difference in their wealth. It may save them a life-time of misery; for without mutual love, matrimony would be a state of abject servitude."

"Well, if Clifford sees fit to take a change of scene, it will serve to cure him of his--attachment; and if Mora, in the meantime, discovers her mistake in undervaluing Clifford--a fellow that any girl under the sun might be proud of--why, it may all come out right yet," said Maud as she rose from the table and began to polish and clean the great silver coffee-urn, another relic of old plantation glory, but which had never been considered too good for every-day service.

All day Clifford worked with a fever of energy to prepare for his journey, which he was compelled to do; for the picnic was set for the coming day, Friday, and he had to see the Morelands to secure their attendance with him at the land-office as witnesses to prove his actual residence and cultivation upon his homestead, which he had concluded to commute, or in other words, pay the sum of two hundred dollars to the government in lieu of five years of residence and cultivation thereon. Having secured their testimony, or their willing promise to accompany him to Abilene and there testify to his good faith, etc., he made everything ready for his departure the next morning after the picnic.

When Maud and his mother questioned him regarding the destination and duration of his trip, he said he would go South awhile, but evaded telling them that he had determined to go to Buenos Ayres and remain until he had made a fortune that would cause Miss Estill to regard him as an equal.

He noticed the sadness, however, of the family, and when he met Rob's look of grief his fortitude was sorely tried, and he regretted having formed such a hasty resolution. But it was too late now to retreat, he foolishly concluded; so, choking down a lump in his throat, he walked out to take a last view of his farm. As he sauntered along in a listless way, looking at the fields, every furrow of which he had turned over in the past with such a deep pride of ownership; at the trees and deep pools, that greeted him with the air of old friendship, he began to realize how dear the place had become, and he wondered, in a self-pitying way, how he could bear the existence that awaited him out on the sky-begirt level and lonely pampas of the Rio La Plata.

When he came to the gothic dwelling, the circle of roses and trellises of luxuriant vines, the sloping orchard and vineyard, they all seemed to be still imbued with the strange thought which had ever haunted him while he was busied there. "Here for the first time since eternity began, I found a true home. All this is mine, and on this spot I shall pass my life. What events will transpire here in the unknown future! I shall know joy and sorrow here, but who will share it all with me?" As these visions recurred, he thought bitterly that he never had counted upon an hour of trial like the present. Then, throwing himself down in the shade of the old wall, he cried aloud in anguish, as he buried his face in the soft, matted buffalo-grass: "Oh, it is hard to part from all this--and only for a woman who cares nothing for me!" But at length he became calmer, and as a feeling of resentment towards the proud heiress began to possess him, he arose and went into the house: then, after taking the usual precautions against surprise, he raised the trap-door and unlocked the treasure-chest.

On glancing at the heap of red gold mingled with the dazzling gems, he took from the compartment the paper which he had almost forgotten having never read; then breaking the seal, he found that it was the wills of both Bruce and his wife on separate sheets of vellum, executed at Santa Fe, devising all their estate each to the other, in case of either dying during the long journey on which they were about starting.

"I will bring her here to-morrow. She shall read the pathetic Journal of Ivarene and this will. I shall tell her of the long search after the treasure, and her right to all this wealth; then, after restoring both her name and fortune, there will be little left for me to do but to slink away, while some long-necked aristocrat will step to the foreground and carry off the prize," soliloquized our hero with bitter sarcasm, as he placed the papers in an inner pocket of his drab coat, and closed the chest with a vicious snap.

The rain had ceased long since, and a band of crimson and rose on the western horizon gave a promise of fair weather on the morrow; but Clifford lingered about the beloved place, feeling that this was his farewell to a spot that had grown dear as life to him in the last year. He found it hard to tear himself away; so he seated himself upon a travel-worn ridge in the old trail, worn years ago by the wheels of the freight wagons, but now carpeted thickly with the buffalo-grass, which seems to delight in hiding just such an unsightly, trampled place with its pale-green tendrils. As the shadows darkened among the trees, and the gloom of a starless, fog-ladened night settled down with a palpable silence, young Warlow became lost in thought.

The scene which followed was always a mystery to him; for he never knew whether he had witnessed a supernatural sight or not. He often tried to persuade himself that he had lapsed into a fit of transient slumber, and the whole spectacle was only a vivid dream.

The time passed by unheeded, and it was near the hour of ten when his fit of abstraction was broken by seeing a group of fire-flies flashing about in an unnatural manner. He remembered, dimly, seeing great numbers of these luminous insects congregating around the long grave, not fifty paces away; and his blood grew cold as he saw, with a thrill of horror, that the flashing, mazy clouds began to slowly resolve themselves into the semblance of human forms, that leaped and danced in fiendish glee; now bounding high into the murky air, or again brandishing weapons, that resembled war-clubs and tomahawks, in a threatening and heart-sickening manner.

While these mysterious forms gyrated about in their unearthly war-dance, Clifford stood petrified with horror and astonishment, not unmixed with a strange curiosity to see how it would terminate; and when the luminous figures joined hands, and slowly paced about the grave, as though to the chant of some wild and savage death-song, a dim and glimmering circle of phantom warriors, Clifford could bear it no longer, but sprang to his feet with a cry of horror, that was echoed by a shriek which he instantly recognized as being the voice of Rob. As the skurrying hoofs went tearing away, he shouted quickly:--

"Rob! Rob! wait,--it is Cliff! Come back like a man, and let's investigate;" but he saw that at the first sound of their voices the figures had flashed asunder like thistle-down before a breath, and now were whirling and weaving in a bewildering maze of light that melted away as he gazed, and separated into the innocent flitting forms of fire-flies that were hieing off to the dark nooks along the stream.

As Rob came back, riding slowly and in an uncertain manner, Clifford emerged from the gloom of the trees into the less ebon darkness of the open ground; then Rob halted and said, in a shaky voice:--"I thought that I had run afoul of the old devil himself when you yelled so! What is the matter, anyway?"

Briefly as possible Clifford told of the strange sight which he had just witnessed--a scene which he then thought was more like a fevered dream than a reality.

"But how does it happen you were here?" he added.

"Why, we were uneasy about you, and I had come in search. I knew you would be up here, for I saw you walking this way. I had just got here, and was going to call you, when you yelled like a catamount down by the old grave. What does it mean, Cliff? It makes me cold yet!" he added, with chattering teeth.

"Well, it's something that can not be explained away," said Clifford, while walking back beside Rob, who, too well bred to ride while another walked, had dismounted, and was leading his horse. "There is only one view that I can take of it, and that is a supernatural one," he continued, as Rob linked his arm within his own, and they struck the road homeward. "There is a belief gaining ground, Rob, that the spirit--or the life principle, animation, or whatever it may be which we call soul--after it is disembodied by death, may yet linger about in some subtle, invisible form akin to electricity, and may become embodied again by entering into the being of a new-born child,--which, if true, may account for the strange resemblance we often see peering out of the eyes and face of an infant that recalls some long-dead friend or ancestor. It may be that the power which mind wields over matter would enable the strong, magnetic spirits of those savage warriors, who, no doubt, died terrible deaths of violence on this tragedy-haunted spot, to attract the fire-flies, and mold them into a semblance of their former bodies, or, at least, imprison them for a time within the spirit outline of their former selves. This, alone, would enable them to become visible to our eyes, proving what we already know, that without matter of a living nature the spirit--or magnetism, which we call soul--would be always as invisible as the air."

"Why, Cliff, you talk like a heathen!" replied Rob, vehemently, who, though addicted to the vice of swimming on the Sabbath, 'hooking' watermelons from the Mennonites, and hiding Easter eggs, was still strictly orthodox to his boot-heels. "So you think," he continued, "that a human soul may take the form of a panther or a pauper--whichever the spirit most resembles--and be cast and recast over and over again, like an old piece of boiler-iron, until at last it becomes--well, just what, I'd like to know?"

"A good Christian being that progresses towards perfection, and learns wisdom from his former mistakes, I guess," replied Clifford, as they turned the horse into the pasture and sought the house. As they came into the yard, he added: "If there is one spot on the continent that should be haunted, it certainly is the old Stone Corral and the near-by crossing of the Santa Fe and Abilene Trails; for there has been more crime and cruel deviltry committed there than upon any other square mile in the Western world."

The next morning broke with a cloudless sky, balmy and serene. A light wind from the south-west lifted the ribbon of vapor along the Cottonwood, and wafted the fresh and perfumed odors of wild hop-vine and water-mint, desert-sage and sand-plum, over the garden and into the Warlow breakfast-room, where Clifford was narrating to his horrified parents and sister the particulars of that unreal and mystery-wrapped scene which he had witnessed the night before.

"It all looks so unreal in this clear daylight that I am almost ashamed to repeat it," said Clifford, with a nervous laugh; but the hearers knew by the look of earnest gravity on his face that there could have been no mistake or deception as to his witnessing a sight that ever was a mystery to all.

"Well, this is a strange story indeed," said the colonel; "but, my boy, you must have been asleep unconsciously, and when you awoke your mind was in that abnormal state in which an optical illusion would have seemed like reality. An illusion of this nature is very hard to combat, from its very uncertainty; and we can only reason, from general principles, that it was a half-waking dream."

The preparations for the picnic put an end to any further discussion, and at ten the grounds were enlivened by a throng of people, all in their happiest mood and best attire.

When the Estill carriage came on the ground, Clifford hurried forward and assisted Miss Estill to alight; then, after shaking hands with Mrs. Estill, who excused her husband's absence by saying that he had not returned from the Comanche Pool, whither he had gone a week before, he found a seat for the elder lady, and disappeared with Mora on the pretext of boat-riding.

They walked in silence to where his boat was tied to the trunk of a weeping elm. As Clifford helped her into the seat, her warm clasp sent a thrill to his heart that caused a hot flush to mount to his face; but it soon receded, leaving him paler and more care-worn than ever. But Mora noticed that his cravat of dainty lawn was tied with that precision only attained by a thorough man of fashion, and the spray of snowy elder-bloom, late but fragrant, combined with a solitary pansy-shaped flower, pale blue with a fleck of gold at the heart, into a _boutonnière_ that denoted a taste refined and fastidious in its wearer.

They shot out into the narrow stream under Clifford's vigorous strokes, and skimmed lightly along through the silver-linked pools, shaded by trees that were smothered by poison-ivy and wild-grape vines, that trailed in the water with their purple-laden tendrils of ripening fruit. At length they reached the bank near young Warlow's dwelling, after a journey which he thought had lasted for an age, but which, to be correct, was just four minutes in duration. There had been an attempt on her part at conversation, but seeing the far-away look in his eyes and the expression of haggard misery on his white, handsome face, she became more cold and reserved than ever, and sat with averted face, trailing a gaudy cardinal-flower through the water.

On landing, he again encountered her hand, which did not fail to send an electric shock through him, as he assisted her ashore, and for a moment he thought that she held his hand longer than the occasion required, and he raised his eyes to her face with a quick flash of joy; but the downcast look and pale cheeks which he saw, sent the blood back to his heart with a sickening chill, and they walked together in silence up toward his dwelling.

When they reached the house he led the way to the spring and motioning her to a seat under the shade of that giant elm, he drew the wills forth and handed them to her saying:--

"Here, Miss Estill, is what makes you the greatest heiress in this western land!" then, as she silently read them through and lifted a puzzled face to his, he handed her the Journal of Ivarene, and watched breathlessly, while she became flushed and pale by turns while perusing the faded and time-worn paper.

"Ah! poor, ill-fated Ivarene! what could have become of her and that helpless infant,--and brave Bruce too?" she cried, with tears in her eyes.

"The parents were murdered, no doubt, by that mad hunter, and the child was stolen and left at Estill's ranch along with a locket containing the name of Morelia and the pictures of Bruce and Ivarene. The mysterious kinsman buried on the hill-top was Olin Estill, who was only the mad hunter in disguise, who stole that blue-eyed, dark-haired daughter, named Morelia."

"Ah! you believe me to be the daughter of Bruce and his lovely wife!" said Mora, springing to her feet, while tears rained from her eyes, and her hands were wrung with deep emotion.

"Yes, I am certain that you are Morelia Walraven. I had suspected this from the hour that father called you Ivarene, and I set to work earnestly to recover the lost fortune, which I believed was buried near this spot. I worked faithfully, Miss Estill, to restore it all to you, knowing full well, all the while, that when found it would only widen the gulf between me and the cattle-king's daughter an hundred-fold. I will not dwell on the horrors of that fortune hunt, nor its perils, when I fought that gray-robed demon, which glared at you upon the grave-capped hill; how I struggled with that murderous spectre in the darkness of midnight, after being greeted in a noisome pit by a gigantic rattlesnake, which I slew as it writhed at my feet, with certain death in its fangs; nor the horror I felt when it was dead, at length, to grasp a human skull, that mocked me with eyeless sockets and grinning teeth when I snatched it from the buried cask--hoping I had found the casket of gems.

"But come with me, and I will show you that the Warlow honor and pride is no vain boast; that the poor planter's son can face danger and death for the sake of right alone."

Then, as she followed, pale and trembling, into the room, he threw back the lid of the treasure-chest, and the red gold, the glorious rays from frosty pearls, sparkling diamonds, blood-red rubies, and strange green emeralds mingled, in a dazzling glare, with the sheen of fire-opals and the glint of amethysts of purple, lilac, and rose.

"Here, Morelia Walraven, is your lost treasure, your million of gems and gold, your proud name and ancestral hall, which I restore," as he handed her the deed of Monteluma. "To-morrow I shall leave home and country, friends dearer than life, to prove--to prove to you I am not that vile thing which you take me for--a Fortune Hunter!"

She merely glanced at the pile of dazzling wealth; then raised her eyes that glittered through her tears like the turquois among the gold, and while he poured forth a torrent of hot words that seemed to come from his very soul, her color came and went until a burning blush spread over her face, and in a choking gasp she essayed to speak. When he had ceased, she gazed a moment up into his face, seamed and drawn in lines of white agony, then she cried out:--

"Oh! what do I care for all this dross, whose daughter I may be, or my pride of ancestry? Clifford--oh, Clifford!--you shall never leave me. I will die if you do. I love you! Oh, will I have to say it?--yes, I love you better than all the world beside. No, no! you shall never leave me!" she said, with her white arms about his neck and her soft, warm cheek pressed close to his; and--and--well, I just skipped out there, leaving them alone with a scene that was growing too unutterably "rich for my blood," to use a Western phrase; but half an hour later, as they strolled back to the boat I overheard him say:--

"But why, my love, did you look so proud and cold in the hall when I came in at your house only the other night?"

"Proud and cold, indeed," she replied, with a gay laugh, as she shot a look of mingled love and amazement into his beaming eyes. "Now, that shows how well you can read a woman's heart, sir. Dear Clifford," she added, tearfully, "do you know, you dear blind boy, that at that very time I was wretched and miserable, and longed to kiss you and say that I had waited for years for just such an ideal as you are?"

"It is not too late now for that!" he cried rapturously, as they passed under the boughs of a drooping tree, then followed a sound so explosive that I beat a hasty retreat from such a danger-fraught vicinity, and never came near again until their boat touched shore. Maud came to them as they landed, and said:--

"Where have you been, truants? I have missed you for an hour."

"In paradise," replied Clifford, with such a look of happy abandon that Maud started joyfully; then Mora said, with a blush, as she clasped her arms about the form of delighted Maud:--

"Yes, I have coaxed him to stay forever; but I had to propose to the selfish being before he would promise at all."

Then Maud, seeing the tears of earnestness that began to start, kissed her new sister and Clifford very tenderly, saying, between her smiles and tears:--

"Oh, this is happiness indeed!" which sentiment seemed to be fully shared by the radiant couple whom she addressed.

Maud was not long in finding an excuse to leave the lovers to themselves; and when she had disappeared among the throng, they sauntered on to a secluded seat, under a vine-canopied tree, where the trailing bitter-sweet swept the closely-cropped grass with its graceful tendrils, loaded with a burden of orange and pink berries. Here, secure from intrusion, they could see the crowd of well-dressed people loitering about in detached groups, but were far enough removed from them to talk in that confidential strain peculiar to newly-mated young people, with no fear of interruption.

"When shall we reveal to your parents the discoveries which I disclosed to you to-day, Mora?" said Clifford, in a low tone.

"Let us be in no haste, Clifford," she replied; "for father is away, and mother would be unnerved and agitated at the revelation. Then we will have several guests to entertain for the next week, as Mrs. Potter and Miss Hanford will remain with us after the picnic. So I believe it would be best to defer it for a week or two."

"But what shall be done in the meantime with the treasure, Mora dear? There is a million dollars in gold and gems lying there in that chest. I tremble to think what the result might be if its existence were suspected in such an unprotected spot."

"Well, sir, you must nerve yourself to the task of not only caring for it, but of me also in the future," she replied, with a furtive caress; and, judging from his looks, he appeared to be equal to the latter responsibility at least.

"I have made arrangements to start to Abilene in the morning to commute my homestead and secure a title to it before the great sale of public lands Monday, which, it is said, will be sold at a very low figure," he replied, returning her caress with compound interest.

"Clifford, it looks mercenary and not at all sentimental for us to talk of business at such a time; but still we can love one another no less for that. The time is very short before that sale. It is a critical moment. I advise you to buy all the land that you can Monday; it will be very valuable soon," she said, with that mingling of sentiment and business peculiar to Western women.

"I shall invest what little I possess in that way, Mora; it is secure at least. I have always longed to own more of the land to the north of the corral; and this is, as you say, a golden opportunity to acquire it."

Then there was silence for a moment as Clifford sadly thought how little he really had for investment compared to the hoard that was lying useless in the chest. His father's gold was there still, but he had no real claim upon it ("I must deliver it to-night," he mentally concluded); and an involuntary sigh escaped him at the thought that strangers yet might control all that rolling, fertile prairie to the north, which he had vainly dreamed of owning.

As if divining his thoughts, Mora quickly said, as her hand sought his own with a gentle clasp:--

"Why not use some of that idle treasure for this purpose, Clifford? If it is mine, as it really seems to be, there will be no harm in investing part of it in that way. The emergency is great for decision and swift action, so I really believe you should take a large sum along for that purpose, not less than fifty thousand dollars of the recovered treasure, at least."

"You dear, clear-headed little woman!" he replied radiantly; "that is a capital plan indeed; so, if you think it best, I will take that sum with me, and invest it in land for your benefit."

"No, no; you misunderstand me, Clifford; it is for your benefit that I made the suggestion. You may take it as a loan, and repay me some time in the future," she added, demurely.

He was on the point of making some laughing rejoinder, when he started at the recollection that it seemed like fate when he recalled the loan of exactly fifty thousand dollars which Ivarene had tendered his father, of which Mora was in total ignorance. Then, in a low tone, he told her of the strange coincidence, where history was repeating itself; but he had not finished the story when a summons to dinner was heard, and he accompanied Mora to the Estill carriage, finishing the recital as they walked slowly thither.

There were several guests clustered about the carriage, and Clifford accepted an invitation to remain for dinner, which Mrs. Estill gave him, and with Mora and young Downels, Miss Hanford and Mrs. Potter, Clifford was soon busy helping to spread the dinner on the snowy cloth beneath the shade of a dense-foliaged elm. When the hampers were unpacked and they were all seated upon the grass about the cloth, it was evident that the Estills could not be taxed with the sin of inhospitality, for they had brought enough in their hampers for an extra dozen guests.

There was boned turkey, hinting of sweet marjoram, garnished with quivering moulds of cherry-jelly; chicken salad, with sprays of parsley; tankards of silver and glass, filled with creamy milk; tall glasses of jelly--pink, amber, and crimson; pyramids of cake, bronzed and frosty, that conveyed a faint suspicion they were only meant for show; great baskets of silver, marvels of frostwork on flower and vine, piled high with purple grapes, peaches of white and crimson, and golden oranges,--all of which, alas! were the contribution of far-off California.

Young Downels sat near Mora, who was as fascinating and gracious as ever; but Clifford felt a contentment and trust too deep for jealousy, and was gay and witty to such a degree that Downels began to have a suspicion of the true situation, which was in no wise allayed when he saw their eyes meet in a quick flash of love and admiration; so he speedily transferred his attentions to Miss Hanford, who seemed not at all averse to receiving them "_ad infinitum_."

An afternoon of unalloyed bliss followed, and when our hero placed Mora in the carriage, he had given her a promise to ride down on his return from Abilene, the following week; then, as the stately barouche rolled away, he hurried homeward to complete his preparations for to-morrow's journey.

At the supper-table, which was spread at a later hour than usual, Colonel Warlow looked grave and care-worn, while his wife was sad and thoughtful, remembering that Clifford was to leave them, perhaps forever, and this was his last night under the home-roof, a delusion which he was soon to dispel. Maud's face wore a look of cheerfulness which puzzled her parents, who had not witnessed their son's manoeuvres during the day; and Rob's eyes fairly danced with suppressed excitement.