Chapter 25

"AH! IF I BUT KNEW WHERE MY TRUE LOVE IS!"

Hubert Varrick felt excessively bored at the beauty's persistent efforts to amuse him during the afternoon that followed, and he experienced a great relief when he made his escape to his own room.

He had come there to visit his aged relatives and have a few days of quiet and rest from the turmoils and cares of a busy life, not to dance attendance on a capricious society girl. He had been back from Europe only a month. Directly on his return, he went to Fisher's Landing, there to be met with the intelligence that Jessie's uncle had died a fortnight ago, and that she was thrown penniless on the world, and had started out to battle for bread, none knew whither.

The shock of this intelligence nearly killed Hubert Varrick. He almost moved heaven and earth to find her; but every effort was useless; Jessie Bain seemed to have suddenly vanished from the face of the earth.

Hubert had been with his grandparents but a day when he felt strongly tempted to make excuses to get away at once; but before the shadows of that night fell, an event happened which changed the whole current of his life.

It came about in this way:

When he excused himself for leaving the drawing-room late that afternoon, under the plea of smoking a cigar and having letters to write, Rosamond, much incensed, had retired to her own _boudoir_, for she felt that she had made no headway with the handsome young heir. There was no one else to vent her spite on, save the young girl whom she found bending patiently over her dresses, stitching away as though for dear life.

"Why don't you sew faster?" Rosamond cried at length. "You will never get that done in time for me to wear this evening."

"I promise you, Miss Rosamond, that I will have it finished if the velvet ribbon comes in time."

"Hasn't it come yet?" cried the beauty, aghast. "Why, it's almost dark now. There's nothing else for it but for you to go after it, Jessie Bain; and mind that you get there before the store closes. Start at once."

Jessie laid down her work, walked slowly to the closet, and donned her hat and little jacket. After carefully learning the street and number, Jessie set out on her journey. It was fully two miles. The girl's heart sank as she stepped from the porch, and noted how deep the snow was. She wished that the heiress had given her her fare on the street-car; but such a thought had never entered the selfish head of this pampered creature of luxury.

Half an hour or more had passed. Long since one of the servants had lighted the chandelier, heaped more coal in the glowing grate, and drew the satin draperies over the frosty windows.

"Dear me, I wish I had told her to get a few flowers for me!" Rosamond muttered. Then she sat up straight in her chair. "Gracious me! how forgetful I am," she cried. "That velvet ribbon did come just as I was about to go down to luncheon, and I tossed it on a divan in the corner. It must be there now."

Springing from her seat, she went to the spot indicated. Yes, the little package was there.

"That Jessie Bain must have seen it," she muttered, angrily. "She must have passed it by a dozen times. No one can tell me that she did not open it--those girls are so prying. And now for spite she'll take as much time as she wishes to go and come. She ought to be back by this time. When she does come I shall scold her."

One, two hours passed. The clock on the mantle slowly chimed the hour of seven. Still the girl had not returned. Rosamond Lee was in a towering rage. She had sent for her own maid to help her dress, and she was obliged to wear a dress which was not near so becoming to her as the blue cashmere which she felt sure would fascinate handsome Hubert Varrick.

When the dinner-bell rang she hurried to the dining-room. Only the old gentleman and his wife were at the table.

"Where is Mr. Varrick?" she asked. "Surely, he has not dined yet?"

"Oh, no," said the old lady, complacently sipping her tea. "He went out for a walk some two hours ago, and he has not yet returned."

Rosamond started. Some two hours! Why, that was just about the time that Jessie Bain had left the house.

She wondered if by any chance he had seen her. What if he should have asked the girl where she was going, and learn that she had been sent by her so long a distance, and in the deep snow, on such a trifling errand! The girl might tell it out of pure spite. Laughing lightly, Rosamond shook off this fear.

She had never seen a man whom she liked as well as she liked Hubert Varrick. She always had her own way through life, and now that she had settled it in her mind that she would like to have this same Hubert Varrick for her husband, she no more thought it possible for her will to be thwarted than she deemed it possible for the night to turn suddenly into day. Rosamond was almost beside herself with excitement when that wedding was so summarily broken off.

"It was the hand of Fate!" she cried. "He was intended for me. That is why that marriage did not take place."

She had made numerous little excuses to go to Boston with her maid, and always called at his mother's house, making herself most agreeable to the haughty mother, for the sake of the handsome son.

Rosamond had quite wormed herself into the good graces of Hubert's mother. She had not been there for over six months, however, and consequently had never heard of Jessie Bain.

She had been waiting long and patiently, when suddenly she had read of his marriage to Geralda Northrup, and almost immediately after came the startling intelligence of the disaster in which he had lost his bride. And again Rosamond Lee said that Gerelda was not to have him, that Fate intended him for her; and she timed her visit to her guardian's when she knew he would be there.

Rosamond tried hard to take an interest in the dinner, but everything seemed to go wrong with her. The tea was too weak, the biscuits too cold, and the tarts too sweet.

She did her best to keep up the conversation with her guardian and his chatty old wife, but it was a dismal failure. At every footstep she started. Why did he not come?

It was a relief to her when the meal was over. She walked slowly into the drawing-room, angry enough to find old Mr. Bassett and his wife had preceded her, and that they had settled themselves down there for a long evening. Up and down the length of the long room Rosamond swept to and fro, stopping every now and then to draw the heavy curtains aside, in order to strain her eyes out into the darkness of the night.

Ah, what a terrible storm was raging outside! What a wild night it was! The snow drifted in great white mountains against the window-panes, and as far as her eyes could reach, the great white snow-drifts greeted her sight. The bronze clock on the mantle struck the hour of eight in loud, sonorous strokes. With a guilty thrill of her heart, she thought of Jessie Bain. Hastily excusing herself, she hurried to her room.

Of course the girl would be there--there was no doubt about that. With a nervous hand Rosamond flung open the door, crossed the handsome _boudoir_ with swift step, and looked into the little room beyond. But the slender form which she had expected to see was not there.

"Janet!" she called, sharply, "where is that Jessie Bain? I sent her on an errand--hasn't she returned yet? What in the world do you think is keeping that girl?"

"Look out of that window, ma'am, and that will tell you," returned Janet, laconically. "I tell you, Miss Rosamond, your sending the girl out on such a night as this is the talk of the whole house."

"Did she go round tattling in the servants' hall?" cried the heiress, quivering with rage.

"I'll tell you how it came about," said Janet. "One of the maids, who was at the window, called to her as she was going out. I heard it all from another window.

"'Why, where are you going, Miss Bain?' she called, 'you are mad to step out-of-doors in the face of such a storm as this!'

"'I'm going on an errand for Miss Rosamond,' she answered.

"'You will have a hard time getting to the street-car.'

"'I shall not ride,' said Jessie Bain, 'I shall walk!'

"'Walk?' screamed the other. 'Oh, Jessie Bain, don't you do it; you will perish; and all because that Rosamond Lee was too stingy to give you your car-fare. I wish to Heaven that I had the money with me, I'd give it to you in a minute. But hold on, wait a second-- I'll go and tell the servants about it, and I reckon that some of them can raise enough money to see you through.'

"With that I slipped down to the servants' hall, to be ahead of her, and to hear what she would say, and, oh! bless my life, what a tongue-lashing they all gave you! It's a wonder your ears didn't burn like fire, miss.

"They said it was a beastly shame. They wished a mob would come in and give you a ducking out in the snow-drift, and see how you would like it. They were not long in making up the money, but when they went to look for Jessie she was nowhere to be seen.

"I am almost certain that Mr. Hubert Varrick must have heard something of what was said, for one of the girls saw him standing in the door-way, listening intently. Before she could utter a word of warning he turned, with something very like a muttered threat on his lips, and strode down the corridor.

"When night fell and Jessie Bain had not returned, the anger of the servants ran high. I attempted to take your part, saying that you didn't know how bad the day really was, when they set upon me with the fury of devils.

"'Don't attempt to shield her!' they cried, brandishing their fists in my face, some of them grazing my very nose.

"'Like mistress, like maid.' We hate you almost as much as we do her. None of us shall close our eyes to-night until Jessie Bain has been found; and if she lies dead under the snow-drifts, we will form a little band that will avenge her! If Jessie Bain has died from exposure to the terrible storm, Rosamond Lee, who caused it all, shall suffer for it! If she is not here by midnight--hark you, Janet! bear this message from us to your mistress, the haughty, heartless heiress--"

But what that message was, Janet whispered in her mistress's ear.