The Masked Bridal

by Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

  CHAPTER XXXV.

  "THAT MAN MY FATHER!"

  Isabel Stewart was the first to recover herself, when, gently linkingher arm within Edith's, she whispered, softly:

  "Come with me, dear; I would like to see you alone for a few minutes."

  She led her unresistingly from the room, across the hall, to a smallreception-room, when, closing the door to keep out intruders, sheturned and laid both her trembling hands upon the girl's shoulders.

  "Tell me," she said, looking wistfully into her wondering eyes, "areyou the daughter of Albert and Edith Allandale?"

  "Yes."

  It was all the answer that Edith, in her excitement, could make.

  The beautiful woman caught her breath graspingly, and every particleof color faded from her face.

  "Tell me, also," she went on, hurriedly, "did you ever hear your--yourmother speak of a friend by the name of Belle Haven?"

  Edith's heart leaped into her throat at this question, and she, too,began to tremble, as a suspicion of the truth flashed through hermind.

  "No," she said, with quivering lips, "I never heard her mention such aperson; but--"

  "Yes--'but'--" eagerly repeated her companion.

  "But," the fair girl continued, gravely, while she searched with alook of pain the eyes looking so eagerly into hers, "the evening aftermamma was buried, I found some letters which had been written to herfrom Rome, and which were all signed 'Belle.'"

  "Oh!--"

  It was a sharp cry of agony that burst from Isabel Stewart's lips.

  "Oh, why did she keep them?" she went on, wildly; "how could she havebeen so unwise? Why--why did she not destroy them?"

  At these words a light so eager, so beautiful, so tender that itseemed to transfigure her, suddenly illumined Edith's face, for theyconfirmed, beyond a doubt, the suspicion and hope that had beencreeping into her heart.

  "Tell me--are you that 'Belle'?" she whispered, bending nearer to herwith gleaming eyes.

  "Oh, do not ask me!" cried the unhappy woman, a bitter sob escapingher.

  She had never dreamed of anything so dreadful as that those fatalletters would fall into the hands of her child, to prejudice her andmake her shrink from her with aversion.

  She had planned, if she was ever so fortunate as to find her, and hadto reveal her history to her, to smooth over all that would be likelyto shock her--that she would never confess to her how despair haddriven her to the verge of that one crime upon which she now lookedback with unspeakable horror.

  The thought that this beautiful girl knew all, and believed theworst--as she could not fail to do, she reasoned, after reading thecrude facts mentioned in those letters--filled her with shame andgrief: for how could she ever eradicate those first impressions, andwin the love she so craved?

  Thus she was wholly unprepared for what followed immediately upon herindirect acknowledgment of her identity.

  The gentle girl, her expressive face radiant with mingled joy, love,sympathy, slipped both arms around her companion's waist, and droppingher head upon her shoulder, murmured, fondly:

  "Ah, I am sure you are!--I am sure that I have found my mother, and--Iam almost too happy to live."

  "Child! my own darling! Is it possible that you can thus open yourheart of hearts to me?" sobbed the astonished woman, as she claspedthe slight form to her in a convulsive embrace.

  "Oh, yes--yes; I have longed for you, with longing unspeakable, eversince I knew," Edith murmured, tremulously.

  "Longed for me? Ah, I never dared to hope that Heaven could be sokind. I feared, love, that you would despise me, as a weak and willfulwoman, even after I should tell you all my story, with its extenuatingcircumstances; but now, while knowing and believing only the worst,you take me into the arms of your love, and own me--your mother!"

  She broke down utterly at this point, and both, clasped in eachother's embrace, sobbed in silent sympathy for a few moments.

  "Well, dearest, this will never do," Mrs. Stewart at last exclaimed,as she lifted her face and smiled tenderly upon Edith; "we must atleast compose ourselves long enough to make our adieus to our hostess;then I am going to take you home with me, to have all the story of ourtangled past unraveled and explained. Come, let us sit down for a fewmoments, until we get rid of the traces of our tears, and you shalltell me how you happened to be in Boston under the name of EdithAllen."

  She drew her toward a couch as she spoke, and there Edith related howshe had happened to meet the Goddard's on the train, between New Yorkand Boston, and was engaged to act as madam's companion, and how alsothe mistake regarding her name had occurred.

  "And were you happy with them, my dear?" inquired Mrs. Stewart,regarding her curiously.

  The fair girl flushed.

  "Indeed I was not," she replied, "I think they were the strangestpeople I ever met."

  Almost as she spoke the door of the reception-room opened, and GeraldGoddard himself appeared upon the threshold.

  He was pale to ghastliness, and looked years older than when Edith hadseen him in the drawing-room a few minutes previous.

  "Pardon me this intrusion, Miss--Edith," he began, shrinkingly, whilehe searched both faces before him with despairing eyes; "but I amabout to leave, and I wished to give you this note before I went. If,after reading it, you should care to communicate with me, you canaddress me at the Murry Hill Hotel."

  He laid the missive upon a table near the door, then, with a bow,withdrew, leaving the mother and daughter alone again.

  "That was Mr. Goddard," Edith explained to her companion, as she aroseto take the letter; but without a suspicion that the two had ever metbefore, or that the man was her own father--the "monster" who had sowronged her beautiful mother.

  Mrs. Stewart made no reply to the remark; and Edith, breaking the sealof the envelope in her hands, drew forth several closely-writtenpages.

  "Why!" she exclaimed, in a startled tone, "this is Mrs. Goddard'shandwriting!"

  She hastily unfolded the sheets and ran her eye rapidly down the firstpage, when a low cry broke from her lips, and, throwing herself uponher knees before her mother, she buried her face in her lap,murmuring joyfully:

  "Saved! saved!"

  "Darling, tell me!--what is this that excites you so?" Mrs. Stewartpleaded, as she bent over her and softly kissed her flushed cheek.

  Edith put the letter into her hands, saying, eagerly:

  "Read it--read it!--it will tell its own story."

  Her companion obeyed her, and, as she read, her face grew stern andwhite--her eyes glittered with a fiery light which told of an outragedspirit aroused to a point where it would have been dangerous for thewoman who once had deeply wronged her, had she been living, to havecrossed her path again.

  "If I had known!--if I had known--" she began, when she reached theend. Then, suddenly checking herself, she added, tenderly, to Edith:"My love, it seems so wonderful--all this that has happened to you andto me! We must take time to talk it all over by ourselves. You canexcuse yourself to your friend, can you not, and come with me to theWaldorf? Say that I wish to keep you for the remainder of the day andnight, but will return you to her in the morning."

  Edith's face beamed with delight at this proposal.

  "Yes, indeed," she said, rising to comply at once with the request. "Iam sure Nellie will willingly give me up, when I whisper the truth inher ear. My dear--dear mother!" she added, tremulously, as she bentforward and kissed the beautiful face with quivering lips, "thiswonderful revelation seems too joyful to be true!"

  "Edith, my child," gravely said Isabel Stewart, as she held the girl alittle away from her and searched her face with anxious eyes, "afterlearning what you did of me, from those horrible letters, is there noshrinking in your heart--is there no feeling of--of shame or ofpitiful contempt for me?"

  "Not an atom, dear," whispered the trustful maiden, whose keenintuitions had long since fathomed the character of the woman beforeher; "to me you are as pure and dear as if that man--whoever he mayhave
been--had never cast a shadow upon your life by the shamefuldeception which he practiced upon you."

  "My blessed little comforter! you shall be rewarded for your faith inme," returned Mrs. Stewart, her lips wreathed in fondest smiles, hereyes glowing with happiness. "But go excuse yourself to Mrs. Morrell,then we will take leave of our hostess, and go home."

  Ten minutes later they were on their way to the Waldorf.

  It was rather a silent drive, for both were still too deeply movedover their recent reunion to care to enter into details just then. Itwas happiness enough to sit side by side, hand clasped in hand,knowing that they were mother and daughter, and in tenderest sympathywith each other.

  Upon arriving at her hotel Mrs. Stewart led the way directly to herdelightful suite of rooms, where, the moment the door was closed, sheturned and once more gathered Edith into her arms.

  "I must hold you--I must feel you, else I shall not be quite sure thatI am not dreaming," she exclaimed. "I find it difficult to realize mygreat happiness. Can it be possible that I have my own again, after somany years! that you were once the tiny baby that I held in my arms inRome, and loved better than any other earthly object? It is wonderful!wonderful! and strangest of all is the fact that your heart turns sofondly to me! Are you sure, dear, that you can unreservedly accept andlove your mother, in spite of those letters, and what they revealedregarding my past life?"

  And again she searched Edith's face and eyes as if she would read herinmost thoughts.

  She met her glance clearly, unshrinkingly.

  "I am sure that you never committed a willful wrong in your life," shegravely replied. "It was a sad mistake to go away from your home andparents, as you did; but there is no intent to sin to be laid to yourcharge--your soul shines, like a beacon light, through these deareyes, and I am sure it is as pure and lovely as your face isbeautiful."

  "May He who always judges with divine mercy bless you for your sweetcharity and faith," murmured Isabel Stewart, in tremulous tones, asshe passionately kissed the lips which had just voiced such a blessedassurance of trust and love.

  "Now come," she went on, a moment later, while, with her own hands,she tenderly removed Edith's hat and wrap, "we will make ourselvescomfortable, then I will tell you all the sad story of my misguidedyouth."

  Twining her arms about the girl's waist, she led her to a seat, andsitting beside her, she circumstantially related all that we alreadyknow of her history.

  But not once did she mention the name of the man who had so deeplywronged her; for she had resolved, if it were possible, to keep fromEdith the fact that Gerald Goddard, under whose roof she had lived,was her father.

  The young girl, however, was not satisfied, was not content to be thuskept in the dark; and, when her mother's story was ended, sheinquired, with grave face and clouded eyes:

  "Who was this man?--why have you so persistently retrained fromidentifying him? What was the name of that coward to whom--with shameI say it--I am indebted for my being?"

  "My love, cannot you restrain your curiosity upon that point? Will younot let the dead past bury its dead, without erecting a tablet to itsmemory?" her companion pleaded, gently. "It can do you no possiblegood--it might cause you infinite pain to know."

  "Is the man living?" Edith sternly demanded.

  Mrs. Stewart flushed.

  "Yes," she replied, after a moment of hesitation.

  "Then I must know--you must tell me, so that I may shun him as I wouldshun a deadly serpent," the young girl exclaimed, with compressed lipsand flashing eyes.

  Mrs. Stewart looked both pained and troubled.

  "My love, I wish you would not press this point," she remarked,nervously.

  "Edith turned and gazed searchingly into her eyes.

  "Do you still cherish an atom of affection for him?" she inquired.

  "No! a thousand times no!" was the emphatic response, accompanied by agesture of abhorrence.

  "Then you can have no personal motive or sensitiveness concerning thematter."

  "No, my child--my desire is simply to save you pain--to spare you ashock, perchance."

  "Do I know him already?--have I ever seen him?" cried Edith, in astartled tone.

  "Yes, dear."

  "Then tell me! tell me!" panted the girl. "Oh! if I have spoken withhim, it is a wonder that my tongue was not paralyzed in the act--thatmy very soul did not shrink and recoil with aversion from him!" sheexclaimed, trembling from head to foot with excitement.

  Her mother saw that it would be useless to attempt to keep the truthfrom her; that it would be better to tell her, or she might brood overthe matter and make herself unhappy by vainly trying to solve theriddle in her own mind.

  "Edith," she said, with gentle gravity, "the man is--Gerald Goddard!"

  The girl sprang to her feet, electrified by the startling revelation,a low cry of dismay escaping her.

  "He! that man my--father!" she breathed, hoarsely, with dilatingnostrils and horrified eyes.

  "It is true," was the sad response. "I would have saved you the painof knowing this if I could."

  "Oh! and I have lived day after day in his presence! I have talked andjested with him! I have eaten of his bread, and his roof has shelteredme!" cried Edith, shivering with aversion. "Why, oh, why did not someinstinct warn me of the wretched truth, and enable me to repudiate himand then fly from him as from some monster of evil? Ah, I was warned,if I had but heeded the signs," she continued, with flushed cheeks andflaming eyes. "There were many times when some word or look wouldmake me shrink from him with a strange repugnance, and that last nightin Wyoming--oh, he revealed his evil nature to me in a way that mademe loathe him!"

  "My child, pray calm yourself," pleaded her mother, regarding her withastonishment, for she never could have believed, but for thismanifestation, that the usually gentle girl could have displayed somuch spirit under any circumstances. "Come," she added, "sit downagain, and explain what you meant by your reference to that last nightat Wyoming."

  And Edith, obeying her, related the conversation that had occurredbetween Mr. Goddard and herself, on the night of the ball, when theman had come to the dressing-room and asked her to button his gloves.