CHAPTER XXIV
The invitations for Mrs. Vernon's lawn-party had been issued at least a fortnight, and but few people had declined them.
It was well known that she gave charming entertainments, and people were always eager to attend. A lawn-party, too, was so romantic, "too sweet for anything," declared the young women who adored those out-of-door entertainments where the most flagrant flirtations were possible, and where the plainest faces acquired a certain beauty from the blended light of lamp-light and moonlight, and the flickering leaf-shadows cast by the over-arching trees.
Older people dreaded the night-air and the dew, but to these the drawing-rooms were always open, so that no one dreamed of declining Mrs. Vernon's elegant cards.
Lady Clive was present that evening, her fair and stately beauty, so like her brother's, thrown into perfect relief by a robe of blue and silver, with pale, gleaming pearls around her graceful throat and white arms.
Lady Vera wore white satin and tulle, with water-lilies here and there, a beautiful dress that was most becoming to her, and made her look regal as a young princess.
A flush of excitement glowed upon her cheeks, and her eyes were bright and restless with a strange look of expectancy and almost dread in their beautiful depths.
The constant thought in her mind was:
"I shall see my enemies to-night. What will be the result? They pretend to regard me as a perfect stranger. What shameless audacity. I cannot understand how they can carry it out so boldly. And yet God knows that but for my oath of vengeance I would never speak. Ivy might have my husband and welcome. Yet I would give much to know whose death it was I read in that American paper. Leslie Noble's father, perhaps, though I had some vague idea that he was dead long ago."
Colonel Lockhart is present too, this evening, ever watchful, ever near his darling, though without the least appearance of intrusiveness.
Other lovers take his place by her side, but as usual she is calm and cold to all.
She is done with love and lovers, she tells herself with sad self-pity.
All her future life will lie in the dun, gray twilight of sorrow.
"As the blade wears the scabbard,
The billow the shore;
So sorrow doth fret me
Forevermore!"
It is late in the evening before Colonel Lockhart ventures to address her.
Then something in her glance has drawn him to her side, in spite of his determination not to intrude upon her.
Lady Eva Clarendon and Miss Montgomery are present, and both have laid some claims to his attention. In spite of herself, Lady Vera cannot keep the pain out of her eyes, and Philip, watching her with the keenness of love, is quick to see it. In a moment he is by her side.
"Will you promenade with me?" he asks, deferentially.
A sudden smile of irrepressible pleasure lights the beautiful face. She loves him dearly, and it is so hard to give him up.
Rising, she lays her white hand on his arm, and they move away together down a quiet path under the shade of the leafy trees hung with gayly-colored lamps, whose checkered light throws their faces now in brightness, now in shadow.
The scene, the hour, is full of romance. Tall marble vases here and there are crowded with fragrant flowers, whose sweetness makes breathing a perfect delight. The moon is at its full, pouring down a flood of pure white radiance that makes the glimmering light of the lamps seem garish and unnecessary. Soft music rises, blent with the sound of happy voices, and a nightingale has perched itself on a rose tree near by, and is
"Pouring his full heart
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art."
They walk slowly on, speaking little, but with hearts that tremble with mingled pain and pleasure. The presence of each to the other is perilously sweet. In his mind runs the refrain of a song she had sung that evening:
"Beloved eye! beloved star,
Thou art so near and yet so far."
Suddenly, in turning a curve in the path, they come face to face with a couple walking from the opposite direction—Leslie Noble and his wife.
The small blonde is attired in an elaborate costume of white and green, and the snaky fire of emeralds blaze round her throat and wrists. Her pale eyes glare with a snaky anger, too, as they light upon the beautiful young countess, looking bride-like in her rich, white dress, and the white lace scarf that she has carelessly thrown over her golden hair.
With an impulsive movement Ivy disengages her hand from her husband's arm, and places herself directly in Vera's way, her pale eyes flashing with rage, her head held high, her slight figure drawn erect, making the most of her insignificant stature.
"Lady Fairvale," she exclaims, insolently, "they tell me you refuse to know me or my husband, or my mother. Will you tell me the reason why?"
There is a dead pause, and Leslie Noble tries to drag his wife away, but she defies him.
"I shall not go!" she answers, sharply. "I told you I would do it. I have asked this proud lady the reason of her scorn, and I am waiting for an answer."
Lady Vera faces her a moment in scornful silence, but her pallid cheeks, her intense gaze, and her curling lips, all betray the tumult in her breast. She turns to Captain Lockhart, with a soul's despair in her lovely eyes.
"Philip, will you go away, and leave me alone with this woman?" she asks, pleadingly.
It seems to him that Vera does not know what is best for herself. How can he go away, and leave her to bear the brunt of this coarse woman's fury alone?
"Forgive me for refusing you, dear," he whispers back, "but it is better that I should stay. I cannot leave you without a friend by your side."
A look of futile despair flashes over the lovely face, but she urges him no more. Her eyes turn from his handsome, tender face to meet Ivy's angry, insolent gaze.
"I ask you again, Lady Fairvale," exclaims the small fury, "why do you refuse to speak to us?"
"Oh, God, give me strength," Lady Vera prays, silently, "to keep the oath of vengeance made to my dying father!"
The memory of her parent's cruel wrongs flashes into her mind and steels her heart. She remembers her mother's broken heart, her father's ruined life, her own joyless, slavish girlhood, driven by these two women who now stand glaring stonily upon her, for Mrs. Cleveland, coming in search of her daughter, has become a sudden and amazed spectator of the curious scene.
"I will tell why I hold myself above you," Lady Vera answers, in a voice that quivers with scornful indignation. "It is because you are false and vile—a guilty woman, and a shameless sinner!"
"How dare you traduce me thus?" Mrs. Noble shrieks, in anger and amazement.
"I dare, because I speak the truth before God," her enemy answers, fearlessly. "How dare you claim to be Leslie Noble's wife, when you know that I, his first wife, Vera Campbell, am living?"
CHAPTER XXV
It was a striking tableau, there beneath the over-arching trees that fair, calm, summer night. Lady Vera's beautiful face was all pale with passionate scorn and indignation as she leaned upon her lover's arm. Her enemies had started back as her scathing accusation fell upon them, and they now regarded her with looks of wrath, blent with honest astonishment. Colonel Lockhart's face had turned to a dull, ashen gray, like the pallor of death, but he stood his ground bravely, like the soldier that he was. Lady Vera did not dare to look at him, but beyond one swift, convulsive start, as though a sword had pierced his heart, the arm that supported her did not even tremble. He had steeled himself to bear his pain and make no sign.
"Colonel Lockhart," Mrs. Cleveland exclaims, starting boldly to the front, "I would advise you to take Lady Fairvale home to her friends. She must surely be raving mad. I know not how she came into possession of any facts concerning us, but I swear to you, and can prove my assertion, that Vera Campbell, the first wife of my son-in-law, Leslie Noble, has been dead and buried three years. Is it not so, Leslie?"
"It is perfectly true," he answers, gazing curiously at the beautiful girl who has claimed him as her husband. "If Lady Fairvale be Vera Campbell Noble, then she has risen from the grave itself to claim me, for I saw her buried three years ago, and I erected a costly marble monument to her memory."
"She committed suicide!" Ivy screams out, spitefully. "She died in my mother's house. I saw her lying dead, and I saw her buried."
"Oh, shameless falsehood!" Vera breaks out, warmly. "I did not die, and you know it. The bitter drug with which I thought to end my wretched life, turned out to be only a sleeping potion after all. Will you deny, Marcia Cleveland, that Lawrence Campbell came to you that night to denounce you for the falsehood with which you had betrayed him, and to ask, at your hands, his wronged wife and child?"
Livid with rage and fear, the wicked woman stares at her fearless accuser. How has this beautiful countess, with Vera Campbell's face, learned the secret of her past life?
"Lady Fairvale," she answers, "I do not know how you, a stranger, have learned the secrets of my past life, but I will answer your questions fairly and truthfully. Lawrence Campbell did indeed come to me as you assert, but his daughter had been buried that very day in Glenwood. I bade him seek his wife and child in the grave, and he fell down like one dead at my feet. I caused my servants to throw him into the street like a dog, and I know not, to this day, if he be living or dead."
"He is dead," Lady Vera answers, with blazing eyes. "He has been dead almost a year. He lived but for vengeance on you, Marcia Cleveland, and when he died, he bade me swear an oath of vengeance on you. He bade me avenge my martyred mother's bitter wrongs. It is for this I have spoken. Do you think I did not shrink from claiming that craven coward there," pointing a scornful finger, "as my husband?"
Flushing scarlet under her lightning scorn, Leslie Noble advances.
"Lady Fairvale, if indeed you are my wife," he says, "and," insolently, "no man could have a wife more beautiful, will you tell me by what strange chance you were rescued from the grave where I, myself, saw you laid?"
"I deny that I was ever buried," Vera flashes out angrily. "My father told me nothing of that. He declared that he had me carried away from Mrs. Cleveland's in a deep narcotic sleep."
"Is it true that Lawrence Campbell was the Earl of Fairvale?" Mrs. Cleveland demands, looking at Colonel Lockhart.
"It is perfectly true, madam," he answered, coldly.
"And it is true that I am his daughter, whom you and your daughter so shamefully abused and maltreated?" Vera cries. "Do you remember, Ivy Cleveland, how you abused and insulted me? How you struck me in the face that night when my mother lay dead in the house? Do you recall your anger because she had died before the embroidery was finished on your Surah polonaise? Do you remember, Leslie Noble, how you stood by the bedside of that dying saint, and swore to protect and love the unconscious child you married! Ah, well you kept your vow when you plotted with that wicked woman yonder to send me from you to a convent school where I should be tortured to death, so that you should go free. That was her wicked scheme, I know, for she had planned to marry you to Ivy. Now you know why I tried to escape from you into the merciful land of death. But Heaven spared me the commission of that sin. It was not poison I took. I made a mistake in the drug. I lived to drag you down to the dust, Marcia Cleveland; to punish you through your daughter's shame for my parents' wrongs and mine! You understand now why I would not speak to you, Ivy Cleveland! That man there whom I utterly loathe and despise, is my husband, although I would not bear his name for wealth untold. You are a false and sinful woman unfit to mate with the pure and true, knowing yourself to be only the reputed wife of a bigamist!"
The torrent of passionate accusation comes to a sudden end, and Lady Vera, with heaving breast and dilated eyes, looks contempt upon her foes. They stand before her awed and silent for a moment. Her scathing words have carried conviction to their hearts. They know her in truth to be that Vera whom for three long years they have believed to be sleeping under the costly marble that bears her name in Glenwood Cemetery. But they will never admit it. To do that would be to throw up the game and own themselves beaten and vanquished.
A curious crowd of ladies and gentlemen have gathered around attracted by the sound of excited voices. With wonder and dismay they listen to the scathing denunciations that fall from the lips of the beautiful countess. Mrs. Cleveland, fully conscious of the curious eyes, turns around and makes reply to them—not Lady Vera.
"My friends," she cries, with uplifted hands and a face of horror, "surely this beautiful lady has lost her mind. She is stark, staring mad, and for this I can forgive her the insults she has heaped upon my daughter. I believe she is a clever adventuress whom Lawrence Campbell has foisted on the world as his heiress. Vera, the real daughter of the Earl of Fairvale, died three years ago in Washington. She is buried at Glenwood beneath a marble monument that bears her name and age. I swear before God that this is true. This girl here, this pretended Countess of Fairvale, is, without doubt, a clever impostor, who is keeping the Earl's true heir out of his own. Let her disprove this charge if she can. If she be truly Vera Campbell, let her prove that she was resurrected from the grave in Glenwood where my own eyes saw her laid."
A moment of perfect silence follows Mrs. Cleveland's venomous words. Her daughter, who is a coward at heart in spite of all her bravado, has fallen back a pace, allowing her mother to be spokesman, well knowing that not even herself could so valiantly defend her cause.
There is a look of fear and dread on Ivy's face that gives her a ghastly look in spite of her paint and powder.
Lady Vera's words have carried conviction to her heart, and in fancy she sees herself deserted and abandoned by the man whom she believed her husband, and whom she has relentlessly tyrannized over, recklessly dissipating his fortune, and trampling on his heart.
She well knows that every spark of love he ever entertained for her had died long ago, murdered by her own heartless, unloving course toward him. What more natural than that he should rejoice if his bonds fell from him and left him free from her mother and herself, who had been fastened upon him like human vampires, draining his very heart's blood.
She glances at him, and that glance does not reassure her. There is a strange expression on his face, and he is not looking at her, but at the beautiful, high-born girl who has just claimed him as her husband, albeit with words of scorn.
Even while she gazes at him in fear and terror he steps forward with a certain craftiness in his eyes, and answers Mrs. Cleveland's angry words.
"You speak too harshly, perhaps, Mrs. Cleveland. I have been impressed, even against my will, by Lady Fairvale's words. She is certainly possessed of knowledge that no one but Vera Campbell could have known. Then, too, she is startlingly like my dead wife, both in voice and person. Although I certainly buried my first wife and raised a costly monument over her grave, I am still willing to investigate the strange charges of Lady Fairvale. Strange things have happened sometimes. The dead have come to life, the lost have been found. 'Let justice be done though the heavens fall.'"
"Wretch! Would you turn traitor to me?" screams Ivy, clutching him violently by the arm, forgetful of all but her fear of losing him.
He gazes down at her in a feigned sympathy and sorrow.
"My poor Ivy. Could you think so meanly of me?" he exclaims. "But think, dear. How could we rest secure with this terrible charge hanging over us? Were it not better that I should take steps to prove the truth or falsity of this fair lady's bold accusation?"
"Take steps—how?" the bejeweled little woman falters confusedly.
"Nothing easier," he answers. "I shall cable to Washington to have my first wife's grave opened. If her remains are found undisturbed, then you are still my wife, Ivy, and this lady's story is an imposture. But if Vera's grave be found empty, I shall be forced to believe that Lady Fairvale is in sober reality the Vera whom, for three years, we believed dead and buried."
He speaks to Ivy, but he looks at Vera. Something in that glance makes her turn pale and flash a glance of silent scorn upon him.
"She is not Vera. She is an impostor whom Lawrence Campbell put into the place of his dead daughter," Ivy screams, impetuously, clinging to him with both hands. "Come away from her, Leslie. She is a false and wicked woman, and we will yet prove her so—will we not, mamma?"
"Yes, it shall be war to the knife between us," Mrs. Cleveland mutters, menacingly, flinging a glance of deadly hatred upon Lady Vera's pale and lovely face. "Come away now, Leslie, and bring Ivy home. She is too slight and frail to bear all this excitement."
Silently obeying the imperious will that has ruled him for almost three years, Leslie Noble moves away with Ivy on his arm, after a courteous bow to Vera, which she returns with a cold stare of contempt.
"Lady Vera, shall I take you away also? You look weary and exhausted," says Colonel Lockhart, in a low voice that shows intense self-repression and emotion.
She starts and shivers at the sound of his voice.
"If you will be so kind," she answers, sadly, and moving away on his supporting arm she meets Lady Clive and Mrs. Vernon coming toward her. Their grave faces show instantly that they know all. Lady Vera pauses, with a strange, cold smile.
"Mrs. Vernon, I am sure you will never forgive me for my undignified act in creating an excitement and a sensation at your party. I was compelled to keep my oath to the dead. Yet she forced it on me. I did not mean to speak—just yet," she falters, incoherently, and Mrs. Vernon, who is the kindest woman alive, presses her hand, and murmurs gently, "Poor darling," while Lady Clive murmurs tenderest words of sympathy and love.
It is too much for Lady Vera—this gentleness and love after the exciting scene through which she has passed. Her forced calmness and self-control give way beneath its softening spell.
She reels dizzily, and only Colonel Lockhart's support prevents her from falling. In a moment he says to his sister, anxiously:
"She has fainted, Nella. What shall we do?"
"Bring her up-stairs into my boudoir," replies Mrs. Vernon, promptly and kindly. "We will revive her directly."
But Lady Clive negatives the proposal, decidedly.
"No, we will put her into the carriage and take her home," she says. "She will come to herself, directly. It is a blessed unconsciousness for her, poor girl. Why should we call her back to remembrance too soon?"
So the soldier lifts her in his strong and tender arms, and bears her to the carriage. Lady Clive receives the drooping head upon her lap, and they roll homeward, Lady Vera lying pale and mute between them like some pure, white lily, broken and beaten down by the force of the pitiless storm.
"This is hard lines upon you, Phil," Sir Harry Clive says, from his corner.
"Yes," his brother-in-law answers, in a low voice, and they speak no more until low sighs, rippling over Lady Vera's lips, presage her return to consciousness.
She lifts her head and looks at them, then drops her face in her hands, and bursts into passionate sobs and tears.
Lady Clive folds her white arms fondly around the heaving form.
"Do not weep so wildly, darling Vera," she whispers, gently.
But the heavy sobs only break forth more tumultuously.
"Do not check me," she whispers, "let me weep. Perhaps these tears may save my heart from breaking. There is such a terrible weight on heart and brain, and has been for weary, weary days. Let me weep until I can weep no more, and then I may be calm enough to tell you all my wretched story. Then you may know how to pardon my act of to-night."
So Lady Clive expostulates no more, only holds the slight form closer in her tender arms, reckless of the raining tears that spot and stain her azure satin robe as the burning drops fall on it from Vera's eyes.