Wedded by fate

One dismal day in November—a day when the sky was dull and leaden, when the wind sighed and moaned mournfully, and, a fine cold rain that was almost sleet was falling, a young g...

He was apparently twenty-five years of age, a tall, massively formed fellow, yet so finely proportioned that he did not really seem so powerful as he was. A fine brow surmounted...

Meantime, how fared it with the heroic young nurse, who had so trustfully surrendered herself into the hands of Dr. Hunt, and sacrificed so much to save the life of another?

Dr. Winthrop had not been looking at Salome when he made the announcement of his contemplated departure. He was gazing out of the window beside which he sat, at some of the pati...

She had not given a thought to Truman Winthrop’s position in life nor to the possibility of his having a family who might not approve of his choice of a wife, and she became qui...

But she felt refreshed and very happy, and it was such a delightful sensation, after all the sorrow and loneliness of the past, to feel that she belonged to some one who was so...

Her husband assisted her to alight, led her up the steps to the entrance, and rang the bell. The door was almost immediately opened by a servant, who appeared greatly pleased at...

That same evening, just as Dr. Winthrop and his wife were ready to sit down to their dinner, they were startled by a pealing, imperative ring of the hall bell.

“I am sure, Truman, you need not get so excited,” Madame Winthrop remarked, in a more subdued tone than she had hitherto used, and flushing vividly; “no one wishes to repudiate...

When Salome awoke the next morning, she was conscious of a feeling of great nervousness and depression. Her head ached, her temples throbbed, and she felt both languid and weak.

Nellie had not been gone from the room with her message to the coachman more than ten minutes when the cook presented herself to ask whether she should serve French peas or arti...

“Well, mamma, I have learned something this morning that will astonish you,” Evelyn remarked, as she threw off her wraps and sank upon a chair, quivering to her finger-tips with...

Salome had sat like a statue during this last tirade. Her heart was like lead in her bosom; her feet and hands like ice, her face, after that vivid flush of shame, pale as marbl...

Madame Winthrop herself did not appear to be in a very amiable frame of mind that morning, and it was evident to Evelyn that her failure to bring Salome into subjection to her d...

“Has there no young woman of perhaps twenty-one or twenty-two years of age, of medium height, dark but rather pale complexion, with black hair and eyes, come here unattended to-...

Evelyn was the first to recover herself. “I never dreamed that True had such a temper,” she remarked, in a tone of awe, but uttering a sigh of relief that the trying interview w...

In a beautiful room in one of the apartment-houses in the Rue de Rivoli, in Paris, a handsome woman might have been seen sitting before a cheerful fire in the polished grate; fo...

While Mrs. Rochester and her daughter were absorbed in the contents of Dr. Winthrop’s letter, the young physician and his friend, Mr. Tillinghast, were rolling rapidly through t...

Mrs. Rochester continued to improve daily. She had been in perfect health at the time of her accident, and so suffered no inconvenience from it other than that caused by the tem...

He had the same symmetrical, stalwart form and noble carriage; the same fine, clear-cut intelligent face, and smile, and hair and eyes. But he lacked something that Dr. Winthrop...

“Perhaps they will know of some one whom I can get to nurse Tillinghast,” Dr. Winthrop muttered, as he watched these two Sisters of Mercy flitting from couch to couch, intent on...

Meantime, Mr. Tillinghast had been steadily gaining, and when all fear of any further danger from the scourge was past, Dr. Winthrop arranged that he should come out to the vill...

It was indeed Salome, fair and beautiful as when Dr. Winthrop had held her in his arms on the morning of his sudden departure for Europe, though she was somewhat worn and thin f...

It will be necessary now to go back a little, in order to learn how Salome happened to be in Paris during the raging of the plague, which slew its hundreds and thousands, and ye...

When Salome awoke to consciousness, she found herself lying upon a clean bed in a small, neatly furnished room, while a cheerful fire burned in an open, portable grate, and gave...

“And what are the wages to be, if you please, marm?” Miss Leonard continued in the same strain, but with a chuckle of appreciation that was not lost upon Salome.

If Miss Leonard recognized the fact that she had been reared a lady, she did not betray it in her treatment of her, and before the first week of her month had expired, the tired...

Salome was deeply troubled. She did not dare to assume the responsibility of administering remedies without the advice of an intelligent physician, and yet it would not do to pe...

To Salome’s great delight Miss Leonard did not make any of her idiosyncrasies disagreeably prominent during the voyage; indeed, she appeared to try to subdue her natural antagon...

We have now filled the gap between the time of Salome’s disappearance from her husband’s home, and the day when Mrs. Rochester and her daughter discovered her identity, upon rem...

After Mrs. Rochester’s departure for Paris, which, however, was known only to her daughter, Salome, who had been sitting up for the second time, although she had not yet been dr...

Miss Rochester seated herself at a table, and drawing forth writing materials, wrote rapidly for a few moments. Then she handed the communication to Salome to read. It ran thus:

She was a prisoner in a great insane asylum in the heart of Paris, and no one in all the world, save Mrs. Rochester, knew where she was. She was lost! She might almost as well h...

She was served by a pretty and good-natured maid; she had every luxury of the season provided to tempt her appetite, and was provided with a variety of entertaining reading, als...

On and on she plodded toward the village, taking no note of distance or her surroundings, until, all at once, a frisky dog, that she had kindly fed with dainty bits from the sic...

“The girl must know that she alone was to blame for the unlucky _contrétemps_ which occurred that morning,” he said impatiently, as he paced his room back and forth. “Why couldn...

The next morning Dr. Winthrop was an early visitor at the chateau. He was resolved to put his own and his brother’s fate to the test. Upon reaching the villa, he sent a servant...

“Don’t be afraid—I shall not harm you, though if I look as I feel I must appear devilish,” he said. “It is a hard word, Sadie,” he added, as she winced, “but no other will expre...

But the die was cast; her ambition was stronger than her love. She longed for wealth and position, and she could not turn her back upon the brilliant prospects before her and ma...

During all this time Dr. Winthrop was very busy. He was making a special study of diseases of the eye, ear, and brain, besides attending to some regular duties in one of the hos...

Yes, Truman Winthrop had found his wife at last! But the discovery came to him with such a shock that it nearly unhinged his own reason for the moment, and it almost seemed to h...

Dr. Winthrop’s lip curled as he listened to Dr. Arnot’s artful story, for he knew well enough that he had colored it to suit himself, and throw all the blame elsewhere.

Dr. Winthrop and Salome found their carriage waiting at the main entrance, but Dr. Arnot was not visible; he had not the courage to take leave of her, whom he had so wronged, an...

“No; I never saw him except once or twice in the distance, and then I had but a glimpse, and at dusk, when I was taking the air for a few moments. I supposed it was your brother...

“All this has been a test, at any rate,” Salome continued, after a few moments of thoughtful silence. “We are both sure that no unworthy motive has influenced us. We know that w...

Having dispatched this, the young physician went at once to his hotel, where, after writing some letters, he retired, to try to shorten by sleep the long hours which must interv...

“Will I do, True?” she quietly inquired, but with a conscious smile wreathing her red lips. It was not one of vanity, either, but of pure pleasure in her beauty for her husband’...

“Truman, it seems as if I could bear no more; but I suppose you will complete my wretchedness by utterly repudiating me—you will never forgive me?” she said, in a despairing tone.