CHAPTER XXXII.

THE DARKNESS THICKENS.

"Pass those letters over to me, Mr. Cheevers," suggested the wife, as the gentlemen addressed drew several from his pocket while waiting for his supper. "One from New Orleans--that is good--one from Washington! Lillian! It has been some time since we have had such a pleasure," continued the lady more calmly, for she had not intended to let Mrs. Belmont know of her correspondence with her daughter, but her glad surprise on this occasion had betrayed the secret. The husband was peering over the top of his paper at the mother as the exclamation fell on her ear, and saw the sudden start and pallor of her face as she endeavored to appear uninterested. Mrs. Cheevers had opened the welcome missive and was reading. "How strange," she murmured as she turned the page. Mrs. Belmont stirred uneasily in her chair. "_Well, I declare!_"

"A good many exclamation points"; this from the husband, carelessly.

"Lillian seems very happy with her husband and in her new vocation as nurse. How little we ever imagined, Charlotte, that your daughter would make such a noble woman! It takes a good many hard winds to bring out the strength of the 'sapling,' but it will do it!" The letter was finished and Mrs. Cheevers sat motionless with it lying upon her lap.

"No bad news, I hope?" interrogated Mrs. Belmont with some trepidation.

"No. I was trying, however, to guess it out! You did not tell us, Charlotte, that you had been in Washington; why did you not call upon your daughter? She writes that she saw you and has been looking everywhere and cannot find you, and has come to the conclusion that you are not in the city, and then adds 'she can hardly think of going back to Rosedale at present, as traveling in that direction would be very unpleasant with the whole army of the Potomac to encounter; and I have thought perhaps she would visit you. If she does, detain her if possible until my return to Philadelphia. Pearl is recovering, and before cold weather will probably go back to his duties. The realization of that coming good-bye envelopes me with its terrible presentiments. How can I ever permit him to go from my sight again! You will say I am foolish and Uncle would scold me if he could, for I propose going with him; not as a soldier but as assistant in the hospitals, which will spring up in the trail of our advancing army. But we will talk this over, when on his furlough we visit for a few days his mother and my dear uncle and aunt.' Now, why did you not like an affectionate mother go to see Lillian and get an introduction to your son-in-law?"

"You have explained the reason. I did not desire to meet her husband, and having learned that she was with him was compelled to leave the city without going to her as I would have wished. The time may come when my 'prejudices,' as you call them, can be overcome, but as yet my whole soul recoils from the contact!"

Mr. Cheevers laid down his paper and laughed ironically. "It seems to me that Irene is unusually slow. I must get back to the store." He walked across the floor impatiently.

"I will go and see what is the matter and let Sylvia's letter go until after tea." The bell soon rang, and while the husband was satisfying his appetite with the evening bounties the wife ran over Sylvia's letter.

"All well--but in a flutter of fearful forebodings," was the report as she proceeded. "Grace is dreadfully worried about Lillian," she added when the missive was finished. "I think the mails are not very regular, for I sent a full report of her doings and experiences a month ago."

"Write again, wife. All who love Lillian are anxious about her of course. It must be dreadful to them to have her up here among her enemies! This is the strangest war on record! Who ever read of the families of the belligerents rushing into the arms of their bitter foes for protection and safety? Here is Mrs. Belmont, for instance, who is shrinking and shivering at the very thought of the contaminations of her son-in-law, but who settles down as cozily as may be in the very midst of those whom she would be glad to see annihilated." He laughed heartily as he arose from the table and left the house.

Their guest was irritated, excited and alarmed! Had her daughter said more than had been imparted? There was something in the manner of both husband and wife that had made her feel this was so. But what was it? O, if she could only get that letter! If her eyes could devour its contents! She saw it go into the ample pocket of the lady's dress and her mind was made up; she would read it if in any way possible! She was coming, that was sure, and he would be with her. Could she meet them? How was it to be avoided? She had told him without doubt; but what if she had not? What if after all Lillian was anxious to bury the past--what if she did not know? "It was an error that I did not speak to her as she stood beside the carriage that afternoon; but how could I have explained? O the miseries of such a life. O the wretchedness of wrong-doing! While she is beloved, petted and sought after, I am suspected and growled at by every churlish dog who feels inclined to show his teeth menacingly! O if there was a place on the broad earth where such as I could find rest and concealment, thither would I go! But that letter I must have! If, as I suspect, a secret is divulged or a hint regarding my reasons for being in Washington, then I will not meet them, even if to avoid it I must hide myself beneath the muddy waters of the Schuylkill. No! no! Witness his exultations? Never!" It was a firm conclusion, but the haughty mistress of Rosedale never faltered when a resolve was fully taken.

The next morning when Mrs. Cheevers was superintending the kitchen, Mrs. Belmont might have been seen standing before the door of that lady's wardrobe, with a look of cynical scorn upon her still handsome features as her keen eyes were running over the page of the coveted letter she was holding in her hand. "Ah! I thought so. Could not tell what could have been my mission to Washington, but feared it was for no good, and that justice might overtake me. Kind, certainly! Yes, truly! The look on my face did 'reveal much,'" and she turned the page. "Here was where the 'exclamation points' came in. 'Revealed much, and my prayer is'--bosh!--'that she may be wise enough to run no risks. I have learned that she passed herself off as an English lady who had left the South on account of her anti-war proclivities, and was admitted to the most select circles on this account. If she is with you, or shall come, detain her until'--O yes, she could hear this. But why not the rest? The truth is clear. I am suspected! What if that splendid colonel of hers should take it into his noble head to pay off a few of the old scores?" A step was heard in the lower hall, and trusting the letter into the lower pocket, from whence it had been taken, she glided through an opposite door, and returned to her own room.

"This is no place for me," she thought, as, seating herself by the window, she prepared to look at the whole matter as it now appeared. "I am not wanted; but where can I go? Not to Rosedale? That is utterly impossible. Not to Charleston? There I shall be branded as a coward and disloyal to the trust imposed in me. Where can I go?" She sat a long time apparently watching the pedestrians who were leisurely walking past the house, and wondered if there was another in that vast city more wretched, more forlorn than was she. What a contrast to the years that were gone! "And it has all come about by the silliness of that girl. Her impudent and foolish marriage has covered me with shame and confusion." Ah, woman, not that!

"I'll do it!" she said at last. "How stupid in me not to have thought of that before! It will be dreary and desolate, but better so than to remain here. Then the check for that last paltry five hundred dollars must be cashed. A meager sum for the mistress of Rosedale to go out into the world with, but it will do." She arose from her seat and crossed over to the mirror. "Not the same face that was there--let me see--yes, seventeen years ago. Then those lines were not at the corners of the eyes, nor about the mouth; then there was no silver in these dark locks, for no such transgressions scorched my soul." She sank down upon a chair close by, and buried her face in her jeweled hands, and for the first time for many months tears came to moisten the hard ground where the roots of womanly affection were buried.

"My child! O, my child!" she murmured at last, as her long taper fingers were clasping themselves tightly together. "I have wronged you. It was cruel, fiendish, to take your babe from you; but doubly so--wretch that I am!--to plot her ruin by sending her off to a foreign port, where I thought she could never return. What a curse has fallen upon me! I did not intend all that was done. Those terrible black stains cannot be upon my soul."

The autumnal winds came and blew gently over the great city, scattering upon the tree-tops and velvety carpets of its many parks and lawns their tracery of change. The birds gathered themselves together among the branches to finish their arrangements for the long journey. Yet Mrs. Belmont lingered in her pleasant quarters, loth to exchange them for less comfortable ones. Then letters of inquiry, letters of solicitation, had been written, and answers must be waited for--and so she stayed.

All this time the two colonels were slowly but positively improving. George St. Clair might endure the jar and fatigue of travel, and Pearl Hamilton his former position at the head of his regiment, and word was sent to their respective destinations to this effect.

"In a week Pearl and Lillian will be here," was the report brought by Mrs. Cheevers on returning one day from a short round of calls, and her air was a trifle exultant. "We must do them honor, Mr. Cheevers. A colonel who has suffered and bled for our good, and to maintain the dignity of a free government, deserves all the glory an appreciative people can bestow."

The husband straightened himself back in his chair, and indulged in a most mirthful "encore." "Bravo, wife! The war is making personal developments as well. Who ever imagined there was so much of the truly eloquent in the bosom of my sweet little half? And such patriotism!"

"Pshaw! All of that fine speech, I tell you, came from the brain where such evolutions of respect for the brave boys are expected to be in action. We must give honor where honor is due."

"True as you live, wife; and now what is to be done?"

"Perhaps Charlotte can suggest, for if our fraternal strife has not awakened as much _patriotism_ in her heart as in yours, in the present case her _interest_ should be greater."

The lady thus appealed to was listening with more interest than her companions were aware of, but the queries that were perplexing her were not how she could bestow honors upon the worthy, but how she, the unworthy, could escape dishonor! "I cannot stay longer," she thought; "I must away!" At being thus appealed to, however, she replied blandly; "I have waited weeks already that I might bestow my congratulations, but, as they have delayed coming so long, have made other arrangements that will be impossible to postpone. I have been loitering that letters from home might reach me, and cannot understand why Charles does not write. In a day or two, at the farthest, I shall be compelled to leave for my winter quarters."

"Leave here!" exclaimed Mrs. Cheevers, with surprise.

"Certainly. You did not suppose I was to impose myself on my friends as a settled fact, did you?" She smiled, but it was only as a feeble ray struggling across the chill, damp cloud, where the winter's snows were gathering.

"But it will look strangely, and I beg your pardon, one might think a trifle suspicious; it may be a fear lest you should meet them. I do not say that I think so, but such things might be said!"

"A new development, my dear! Is it prescience or imagination that is now whirling in your prolific brain?"

"Do not jest, Hiram; really there is a seriousness in all this. Why could you not have been a good staid old Quaker, like your father, so that you could have been sensible when circumstances seemed to demand it?"

"Hardly, according to nature, wife, to be old, like my honored sire, as our birthdays did not come in the same year."

This little humorous parley gave their guest ample time to recover from her shock of indignation and alarm. How was this to end? Would her departure excite suspicion? But it was known here, without doubt,--a part, if not the whole truth--for letters had been received from Washington into which she had not been permitted to have a peep. Lillian knew where her mother had taken refuge, and, probably, was expecting to meet her.

"What shall I do?" darted up through her accumulating perplexities, and burst from her quivering lips.

"Do? Why stay where you are, and welcome your child as a mother should, greet her husband cordially and sensibly. It must be done, and what have you to fear? Are you a criminal fleeing from justice and dare not come in contact with honest people? You need not look at me so, certainly if you abscond on the very eve of their arrival these are the only conclusions that can be adduced. Is it not so husband?"

"Face the music, Charlotte; face the music! If your native zeal has carried you outside the track, switch on again, and go ahead. But here I am wasting my precious time listening to two silly women, and on an empty stomach at that! Charlotte, why did you not bring along one of your ebony faithfuls? I am getting tired of waiting three times a day for my meals."

"Irene is slow, but I ought to have attended to my duties better. The fact is, I am getting out of house-keeping and gone into the business of minding other people's affairs," and the good lady walked out of the room.

"Mrs. Cheevers is right on this subject; you cannot leave here at this time without drawing censure and, it may be, suspicion down upon yourself. I would not do it."

Supper was announced, and Mrs. Belmont, trembling with emotion, as her pride went on battling with fear and indignation, seated herself at the table, but not to eat. There was a vein of proffered wisdom in the advice given that irritated her. "Can I not judge for myself? Am I not supposed to know more about my own business than others."

Mr. Cheevers rallied her upon such a loss of appetite and the saving it would be to his pocket, a pleasantry in which the lady endeavored to join, but the _repartee_ died on her lips, and, excusing herself, she went without farther delay to her own room.

"That woman, wife, has her own reasons for desiring to escape doing honor to Colonel Hamilton and lady, that we are not advised of. As for me, I begin to pity her! She looks as though she had lost her hold on earth and her hope of heaven!"

"How can you, Hiram."

"It is true. Perhaps Lillian ought to have written to her mother, and yet, as she declared, what could she say? It is a muddle, my good wife, sure enough, still we must keep her here until they come. That is the only clear thing I can get out of it," and he left the table.

In the room above, a tall, stately form was standing by the window, her dark eyes wandering with a listless gaze out over the gray waters of the Schuylkill, where the evening shades were slowly creeping, while within her soul the conflicting elements of warring tumults were raging. "O, wretched woman that I am!" she repeated, "What power can deliver me from myself! Great God! If Thou didst ever pity, pity now! Are there not stains on my soul that He will never blot out? Stains of--murder! O misery! 'The wicked shall not go unpunished,'--I have read it; it is true! The God I have offended has said it! What if the curtain that hides the last seventeen years from the world should be torn away!" She paced the floor as the night stole in and covered her with its darkness. O, the gloom! O, the forebodings of a sin-cursed soul.