The Missing Bride Part 33

The man clasped his left arm fiercely around her waist, lifted his right hand, and, hissing sharply through his clenched teeth:

"You have drawn on your own doom--die, wretched girl!" plunged a dagger in her bosom, and pushed her from him.

One sudden, piercing shriek, and she dropped at his feet, grasping at the ground, and writhing in agony. Her soul seemed striving to recover the shock, and recollect its faculties. She half arose upon her elbow, supported her head upon her hand, and with her other hand drew the steel out from her bosom, and laid it down. The blood followed, and with the life-stream her strength flowed away. The hand that supported her head suddenly dropped, and she fell back. The man had been standing over her, speechless, motionless, breathless, like some wretched somnambulist, suddenly awakened in the commission of a crime, and gazing in horror, amazement, and unbelief upon the work of his sleep.

Suddenly he dropped upon his knees by her side, put his arm under her head and shoulders and raised her up; but her chin fell forward upon her bosom, and her eyes fixed and glazed. He laid her down gently, groaning in a tone of unspeakable anguish:

"Miss Mayfield! My G.o.d! what have I done?" And with an awful cry, between a shriek and a groan, the wretched man cast himself upon the ground by the side of the fallen body.

The storm was beating wildly upon the a.s.sa.s.sin and his victim; but the one felt it no more than the other. At length the sound of footsteps was heard approaching fast and near. In the very anguish of remorse the instinct of self-preservation seized the wretched man, and he started up and fled as from the face of the avenger of blood.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE STRUGGLE ENDED.

In the meantime Jacquelina had reached home sooner than she had expected. It was just dark, and the rain was beginning to fall as she sprang from the carriage and darted into the house.

Mrs. Waugh met her in the hall, took her hand, and said:

"Oh, my dear Lapwing! I'm so glad you have come back, bad as the weather is; for indeed the professor gives me a great deal of anxiety, and if you had stayed away to-night I could not have been answerable for the consequences. There, now; hurry up-stairs and change your dress, and come down to tea. It is all ready, and we have a pair of canvasback ducks roasted."

"Very well, aunty! But--is Grim in the house?"

"I don't know, my love. You hurry."

Jacquelina tripped up the stairs to her own room, which she found lighted, warmed, and attended by her maid, Maria. She took off her bonnet and mantle, and laid them aside, and began to smooth her hair, dancing all the time, and quivering with suppressed laughter in antic.i.p.ation of her "fun." When she had arranged her dress, she went down-stairs and pa.s.sed into the dining-room, where the supper table was set.

"See if Nace Grimshaw is in his room, and if he is not, we will wait no longer!" said the hungry commodore, thumping his heavy stick down upon the floor.

Festus sprang to do his bidding, and after an absence of a few minutes returned with the information that the professor was not there.

Jacquelina shrugged her shoulders, and shook with inward laughter.

They all sat down, and amid the commodore's growls at Grim's irregular hours, and Jacquelina's shrugs and smiles and sidelong glances and ill-repressed laughter, the meal pa.s.sed. And when it was over, the commodore, leaning on Mrs. Waugh's arm, went to his own particular sofa in the back parlor; Mrs. L'Oiseau remained, to superintend the clearing away of the supper-table; and Jacquelina danced on to the front parlor, where she found no one but the maid, who was mending the fire.

"Say! did you see anything of the professor while I was gone?" she inquired.

"Lors, honey, I wish I hadn't! I knows how de thought of it will give me 'liriums nex' time I has a fever."

"Why? What did he do? When was it?"

"Why, chile, jes afore sundown, as I was a carryin' an armful of wood up-stairs, for Miss Mary's room, I meets de 'fessor a comin' down. I like to 'a' screamed! I like to 'a' let de wood drap! I like to 'a'

drapped right down myself! It made my heart beat in de back o' my head--he look so awful, horrid gashly! Arter speakin' in a voice hollow as an empty coffin, an' skeerin' me out'n my seventeen sensibles axin arter you, he jes tuk hisself off summers, an' I ain't seen him sence."

"What did he ask you? What did you tell him?"

"He jes ax where you was. I telled him how you were gone home 'long o'

Miss Marian; he ax when you were comin' back; I telled him I believed not till to-morrow mornin'; then his face turned all sorts of awful dark colors, an' seemed like it crushed right in, an' he nodded and said 'Ah!' but it sounded jes like a hollow groan; and he tuk hisself off, and I ain't seen him sence."

The elf danced about the room, unable to restrain her glee. And the longer Dr. Grimshaw remained away, the more excited she grew. She skipped about like the very sprite of mischief, exclaiming to herself:

"Oh, shan't we have fun presently! Oh, shan't we, though! The Grim maniac! he has gone to detect me! And he'll break in upon Thurston and Marian's interview. Won't there be an explosion! Oh, Jupiter! Oh, Puck!

Oh, Mercury! What fun--what delicious fun! Wr-r-r-r! I can scarcely contain myself! Begone, Maria! Vanis.h.!.+ I want all the s.p.a.ce in this room to myself! Oh, fun alive! What a row there'll be! Me-thinks I hear the din of battle!

"Oh clanga a rang! a rang! clang! clas.h.!.+ Whoop!"

sang the elf, springing and dancing, and spinning, and whirling, around and around the room in the very ecstasy of mischief. Her dance was brought to a sudden and an awful close.

The hall door was thrown violently open, hurried and irregular steps were heard approaching, the parlor door was pushed open, and Dr.

Grimshaw staggered forward and paused before her!

Yes; her frolic was brought to an eternal end. She saw at a glance that something fatal, irreparable, had happened. There was blood upon his hands and wrist-bands! Oh, more--far more! There was the unmistakable mark of Cain upon his writhen brow! Before now she had seen him look pale and wild and haggard, and had known neither fear nor pity for him.

But now! An exhumed corpse galvanized into a horrid semblance of life might look as he did--with just such sunken cheeks and ashen lips and frozen eyes; with just such a collapsed and shuddering form; yet, withal, could not have shown that terrific look of utter, incurable despair! His fingers, talon-like in their h.o.r.n.y paleness and rigidity, clutched his breast, as if to tear some mortal anguish thence, and his gla.s.sy eyes were fixed in unutterable reproach upon her face! Thrice he essayed to speak, but a gurgling noise in his throat was the only result. With a last great effort to articulate, the blood suddenly filled his throat and gushed from his mouth! For a moment he sought to stay the hemorrhage by pressing a handkerchief to his lips; but soon his hand dropped powerless to his side; he reeled and fell upon the floor!

Jacquelina gazed in horror on her work.

And then her screams of terror filled the house!

The family came rus.h.i.+ng in. Foremost entered the commodore, shaking his stick in a towering pa.s.sion, and exclaiming at the top of his voice:

"What the devil is all this? What's broke loose now? What are you raising all this row for, you infernal little hurricane?"

"Oh, uncle! aunty! mother! look--look!" exclaimed Jacquelina, wringing her pale fingers, and pointing to the fallen man.

The sight arrested all eyes.

The miserable man lay over on his side, ghastly pale, and breathing laboriously, every breath pumping out the life-blood, that had made a little pool beside his face.

Mrs. Waugh and Mary L'Oiseau hastened to stoop and raise the sufferer.

The commodore drew near, half stupefied, as he always was in a crisis.

"What--what--what's all this? Who did it? How did it happen?" he asked, with a look of dull amazement.

"Give me a sofa cus.h.i.+on, Maria, to place under his head. Mary L'Oiseau, hurry as fast as you can, and send a boy for Dr. Brightwell; tell him to take the swiftest horse in the stable, and ride for life and death, and bring the physician instantly, for Dr. Grimshaw is dying! Hurry!"

"Dying? Eh! what did you say, Henrietta?" inquired the commodore, in a sort of stupid, blind anxiety; for he was unable to comprehend what had happened.

"Speak to me, Henrietta! What is the matter? What ails Grim?"

"He has ruptured an artery," said Mrs. Waugh, gravely, as she laid the sufferer gently back upon the carpet and placed the sofa pillow under his head.

"Ruptured an artery? How did it happen? Grim! Nace! speak to me! How do you feel? Oh, Heaven! he doesn't speak--he doesn't hear me! Oh, Henrietta! he is very ill--he is very ill! He must be put to bed at once, and the doctor sent for! Come here, Maria! Help me to lift your young master," said the old man, waking up to anxiety.

"Stay! The doctor has been sent for; but he must not be moved; it would be fatal to him. Indeed, I fear that he is beyond human help," said Henrietta, as she wiped the gus.h.i.+ng stream from the lips of the dying man.