CHAPTER IX.
THE SECRET DIVULGED.
At the opening of the door, mother and daughter recoiled from each other with smothered cries of amazement.
Pansy, who had counted herself so sure of escaping, saw herself detected in the act of flight, forced to confession, shamed, disgraced; but after that one exclamation of alarm she hurriedly determined to brave it out, if possible; so, clutching her bundle tightly, she assumed an expression of calmness that she was very far from feeling.
“Why, Pansy, what does this mean? I expected to find you abed,” exclaimed her mother, staring in astonishment at the shrinking girl.
“I—I—wanted to go out a few minutes, mamma, dear. My new calico, you know, I must take it to that sewing girl on the next square, for I shall need it next week,” stammered Pansy, trying to push by her mother; but Mrs. Finley suddenly put her back against the door, exclaiming suspiciously:
“Going to the dressmaker’s at this time of night? I don’t believe it! You are up to some mischief, Pansy Laurens! Running away, perhaps, and it’s a good thing I caught you in the nick of time. Give me that bundle and let me look into it.”
There was a brief, short struggle, then Mrs. Finley triumphed, and Pansy flung herself, bitterly weeping, upon the floor, while her mother rummaged through the telltale bundle.
“Aha, just as I thought! Change of clothes—oh, you wicked girl! What is this? Oh-h-h, heavens! Pa-a-n-sy Lau-rens, what does this mean?”
She was holding up sundry tiny bits of soft flannel and linen trimmed with homemade crochet edging. Pansy did not lift her head. She knew without looking, and she moaned despairingly:
“Oh, mamma, mamma, if only you had let me go away in peace you need never have known!”
“You say that she will live, doctor? Oh, I am so glad! And yet it would be better, perhaps, for my poor girl if she had died.”
Pansy’s eyelids felt too tired and heavy to lift from her eyes, but she seemed to struggle back to consciousness and hear those words spoken above her head. In that moment, too, came a confused memory of the stormy scene with her mother when she had been forced to tell all her story and to bear such bitter reproach and shame as almost maddened her, so that she was glad of the unconsciousness that stole upon her, blotting out for a few weeks all the bitter past and shameful present.
Yes, it had been three weeks since that terrible night, and when Pansy heard those words spoken over her head in her mother’s voice she guessed aright that she had had a dangerous illness.
She opened her blue eyes with an effort, and saw the doctor standing with her mother by the bed.
“See—she is conscious at last. She will begin to get well very fast now,” he said, and gave her an encouraging smile; but Pansy had none to give in return.
It seemed to her that she should never smile again.
When he had gone, she looked wistfully at her mother, without daring to speak, fearing to hear again the scathing reproaches with which she had been assailed that night; but Mrs. Finley had been softened by her daughter’s illness, and she spoke to her very kindly:
“My dear, you have been ill three weeks of fever, but the doctor thinks you are going to get well now.”
Pansy thought of the words she had overheard:
“It would be better, perhaps, for my poor girl if she had died.”
She could not speak just yet, but her big, mournful blue eyes asked a question that Mrs. Finley quickly understood.
“Yes, it is all over long ago. It happened that night when I kept you from running away. You were so ill you never knew.”
She paused, but the big, beseeching blue eyes were still asking silent questions, and, putting her hand up to her face, Mrs. Finley said, in a broken voice:
“Your child only lived one day, Pansy. It was better so.”
“Dead!”
That one wailing cry broke the stillness, then low and bitter sobs heaved Pansy’s breast. The mother who had never seen the face of her child was weeping over its death.
“It was better so, my dear, better so. Had it lived it could but have added to your disgrace,” Mrs. Finley kept repeating, and at last the poor girl, stung by the words, answered petulantly:
“How can you talk of disgrace? I told you that I was the wife of Norman Wylde.”
“You were deceived, my poor child,” answered her mother sadly.
“Deceived!”
“Yes, Pansy. I told Mr. Finley everything. He went to Washington to find out the truth. My poor girl, that villain deceived you. There was no license taken out; there was no minister of the name you told me, and you had no marriage certificate. By your confidence in a villain against whom we all warned you, you have ruined yourself and brought disgrace upon your relations.”
There was a long, long pause of utter consternation, then the stricken girl moaned pitifully:
“Oh, mamma, why did you nurse me back to life? You should have let me die.”
One week later Pansy was sitting up, a pale little ghost of the bright, pretty girl who, just a year ago, had gone home with Uncle Robbins to find so cruel a fate. She had been watching the sun set, and turned with heavy, listless eyes when her mother entered with a slice of toast and some tea for her supper.
“Mamma, will you tell me why you always lock my door on the outside? Are you afraid that I will run away?” she asked sadly.
“Oh, my dear, do not be frightened, but—I am afraid of your brother.”
“Mamma—of Willie?”
“Yes, he is sixteen now, you know—old enough to feel keenly the disgrace that has fallen on the family. He is so angry, and he has been egged on, I know, by Mr. Finley. I—I—hope he will come to his senses some time,” sighing.
“Mamma, you said you were afraid. You locked the door whenever you went out. Why?” panted Pansy, with dilated eyes; and the wretched mother, leaning over her wretched child, whispered plaintively:
“Try to forgive him, my poor child, for he is half crazed now, and his passionate boyish temper all ablaze with anger. Poor lad! The disgrace has blighted all his future, he says, and he has sworn revenge.”
“Revenge—on me?” questioned Pansy faintly.
“Yes, on you. He has got hold of a pistol somehow, and he is no longer very steady at his work. I fear he drinks some. He vows he will shoot you on sight.”
“Oh, my Heaven!”
“But do not be frightened, dear. It is nothing but boyish bluster, I am sure. Only I am afraid of him just yet, while the drink fires his blood. So it is better to keep your room a while.”
“Every one knows, then, mamma?” with a burning blush.
“We could not keep it a secret. Every one suspected you,” sighed the unhappy woman, bursting into a flood of tears.
But she wept more bitterly still next morning, for, in spite of the locked door, Pansy was missing, and a tiny note on her pillow told the story:
Bless you, my faithful mamma, and help you to forgive me for my willful ways that caused you so much sorrow. Tell Willie not to drink any more. I will never come back, never disgrace him again.
UNHAPPY PANSY.