Sharing Her Crime Part 31

"Glad to hear it, I'm sure. And now _do_ go away, Archie, and don't bother me any longer; for I must pack up my things and start for home to-morrow."

"You little tyrant! Well, I am to accompany you, mind."

"Just as you please--only _do_ leave me."

"Little termagant! Accept this ring as a betrothal gift."

"Well, there--put it on, and for goodness' sake clear out."

With a glance of comical despair, Mr. Rivers took his hat and quitted the house.

CHAPTER XIX.

GIPSY'S DARING.

"It is a fearful night; a feeble glare Streams from the sick moon in the overclouded sky, The ridgy billows, with a mighty cry, Rush on the foamy beaches wild and bare.

What bark the madness of the waves will dare!"

--BYRON.

Gipsy was once more at Sunset Hall. Archie had escorted her home and then returned to Was.h.i.+ngton. He would have mentioned their engagement to the squire, and asked his consent to their union, but Gipsy said:

"No, you mustn't. I hate a fuss; and as I don't intend to be married for two or three years yet, it will be time enough to tell them all by and by."

So Archie, with a sigh, was forced to obey his capricious little love and go back, after making her promise to let him come down every month and see her; for she wouldn't write to him--it was "too much bother."

It began again to seem like old times at St. Mark's. There was Gipsy at Sunset Hall, keeping them all from dying of torpor, and astonis.h.i.+ng the whole neighborhood by her mad freaks. There was Minnette--the proud, cold, but now beautiful Minnette--living alone at Deep Dale; for the doctor had gone from home on business. There was sweet Celeste, the Star of the Valley, in her little cottage home--the fairest, loveliest maiden the sun ever shone upon.

It was a lovely May morning. The air was made jocund with the songs of birds; the balmy breeze scarce rippled the surface of the bay, where the suns.h.i.+ne fell in golden glory.

Through the open doors and windows of Valley Cottage the bright May sunbeams fell warm and bright; they lingered in broad patches on the white floor, and touched gently the iron-gray locks of Miss Hagar, as she sat knitting in her leathern chair in the chimney-corner, as upright and gray as ever. Years seemed to pa.s.s on without touching her; for just as we first saw her at Lizzie Oranmore's bridal, the same does she appear to-day.

In the doorway stands a young girl, tall and graceful, dressed in soft gray muslin, fastened at her slender waist by a gold-colored belt. _Can_ this young lady be our little, shy Celeste? Yes; here is the same superb form, the same dainty little head, with its wealth of pale-gold hair; the same clear, transparent complexion; the soft, dove-like eyes of blue; the broad, white queenly forehead; the little, rosy, smiling mouth. Yes, it is Celeste--celestial, truly, with the promise of her childhood more than fulfilled. The world and its flatterers--and she has heard many--have had no power to spoil her pure heart, and she has returned the same gentle, loving Celeste--the idol of all who know her, radiating light and beauty wherever she goes, a very angel of charity to the poor, and beloved and cherished by the rich. More hearts than Celeste likes to think of have been laid at her feet, to be gently and firmly, but sadly, refused; for that sound, unsullied heart has never yet been stirred by the words of man.

She stood in the doorway, gazing with parted lips and sparkling eyes on the balmy beauty of that bright spring morning, with a hymn of grat.i.tude and love to the Author of all this beauty filling her mind.

Suddenly the sylvan silence of the spot was broken by the thunder of horse's hoofs, and the next instant Gipsy came bounding along upon the back of her favorite Mignonne.

"Good-morning, dear Gipsy," said Celeste, with her own bright smile, as she hastened to open the gate for her. "Have you been out, as usual, hunting this morning?"

"Yes, and there are the spoils," said Gipsy, throwing a well-filled game-bag on the ground. "I come like a true hunter--a leal knight of the gay greenwood--to lay them at the feet of my liege lady. I fancied a canvas-back duck and a bright-winged partridge would not come amiss this morning. I know my gallop has made me perfectly ravenous."

"You shall have one of them presently for breakfast," said Celeste, calling Curly, their little black maid-of-all-work. "Tie Mignonne there, and come in."

"By the way, Celeste, you don't seem to think it such an appalling act to shoot birds now as you used to," said Gipsy, springing from her horse; "it was once a crime of the first magnitude in your eyes."

"And I confess it seems a needless piece of cruelty to me still. I could scarcely do it if I were starving, I think."

"You always were--with reverence be it spoken--rather a coward, Celeste.

Do you remember the day I shot the bird that Louis saved for you, and you fell fainting to the ground?" said Gipsy, laughing at the remembrance.

"Yes, I remember. I was rather an absurd little thing in those days,"

said Celeste, smiling. "How I _did_ love that unlucky little bird!"

"Oh! that was because Louis gave it to you. There! don't blush. Apropos of Louis, I wonder where he is now?"

"In Rome, I suppose; at least Mrs. Oranmore told me so," replied Celeste.

"Yes; when last we heard from him he was studying the old masters, as he calls them--or the old grannies, as Guardy calls them. I shouldn't wonder if he became quite famous yet, and--oh, Celeste! where did you get that pretty chain and cross?" abruptly asked Gipsy, as her eye fell on the trinket.

"A present," said Celeste, smiling and blus.h.i.+ng.

Gipsy's keen eyes were fixed on her face with so quizzical an expression, that the rose-hue deepened to crimson on her fair cheek as they pa.s.sed into the house. And Gipsy went up and shook hands with Miss Hagar, and seated herself on a low stool at her feet, to relate the morning's adventures, while Celeste laid the cloth and set the table for breakfast.

After breakfast Gipsy rode off in the direction of Deep Dale. On entering the parlor she found Minnette sitting reading.

Minnette--now a tall, splendidly developed, womanly girl, with the proud, handsome face of her childhood--rose and welcomed her guest with cold courtesy. The old, fiery light lurked still in her black eyes; but the world had learned her to subdue it, and a coldly-polite reserve had taken the place of the violent outburst of pa.s.sion so common in her tempestuous childhood.

"Don't you find it horribly dull here, Minnette?" said Gipsy, swallowing a rising yawn.

"No," replied Minnette; "I prefer solitude. There are few--_none_, perhaps--who sympathize with me, and in books I find companions."

"Well, I prefer less silent companions, for my part," said Gipsy. "I don't believe in making an old hermit or bookworm of myself for anybody."

"Every one to her taste," was the cold rejoinder.

"When do you expect your father home?" inquired Gipsy.

"To-night."

"Then he'll have a storm to herald his coming," said Gipsy, going to the window and scanning the heavens with a practiced eye.

"A storm--impossible!" said Minnette. "There is not a cloud in the sky."

"Nevertheless, we shall have a storm," said Gipsy. "I read the sky as truly as you do your books; and if he attempts to enter the bay to-night, I'm inclined to think that the first land he makes will be the bottom."

Minnette heard this intelligence with the utmost coolness, saying only:

"Indeed! I did not know you were such a judge of the weather. Well, probably, when they see the storm coming, they will put into some place until it is over."

"If they don't, I wouldn't give much for their chance of life," said Gipsy, as she arose to go; "but don't worry, Minnette--all may be right yet."

Minnette looked after her with a scornful smile. Fret! She had little intention of doing it; and five minutes after the departure of Gipsy she was so deeply immersed in her book as to forget everything else.

As the day wore on and evening approached, Gipsy's prophecy seemed about to prove true. Dark, leaden clouds rolled about the sky; the wind no longer blew in a steady breeze, but howled in wild gusts. The bosom of the bay was tossing and moaning wildly, heaving and plunging as though struggling madly in agony. Gipsy seized her telescope, and running up to one of the highest rooms in the old hall, swept an anxious glance across the troubled face of the deep. Far out, scarcely distinguishable from the white caps of the billows, she beheld the sail of a vessel driving, with frightful rapidity, toward the coast--driving toward its own doom; for, once near those foaming breakers covering the sunken reefs of rocks, no human being could save her. Gipsy stood gazing like one fascinated; and onward still the doomed bark drove--like a lost soul rus.h.i.+ng to its own destruction.