CHAPTER XII.
A PHANTOM AT DAWN.
“An Indian seeress in an alcove off the western corridor will tell everybody’s fortune.”
The whisper ran from lip to lip at the banquet table, where the players were being feasted and wined by the hospitable Bonairs.
The gay, impressionable people of the troupe were charmed with the idea, and when they left the table they went en masse to the alcove, chaperoned by the housekeeper, who under orders from her mistress was doing the honors.
As they were admitted one by one to the alcove, the others, waiting in the magnificent corridor lined with tall palms, statues, and pictures, strolled about, peering into rooms and admiring the splendor of the palace where they were for the moment sojourners.
The housekeeper, a portly, loquacious woman, kept by Berry’s side, having conceived a liking for the lovely actress.
“Would you like to see the folks dancing in the grand ballroom for a minute or two? Come, then, I’ll give you a peep,” she said, leading the willing girl quietly away from the others.
The next thing they were out of doors, going along a quiet alleyway bordered with fragrant blossoming trees, and the sound of dance music came to them in a wild blare of melody.
“Here now, look in at this window,” whispered the woman.
Berry looked, and gasped:
“It must be fairyland!”
“’Tis grand, ain’t it, now?” replied the housekeeper. She watched Berry’s dazed eyes taking in the immense room with its costly fitting, tropical decorations, and dazzling lights under which moved a hundred couples in each other’s arms, to the tilt of the intoxicating waltz music, and smiled at the young girl’s wonder.
“These Bonairs, you see, miss,” she explained, “are the richest folks in California—what you call multi-millionaires—more money than they know what to do with! I’ve been housekeeper to them these twenty-five years. I came when they were first married. I was here when the senator’s three children were born, and when his good wife died, and I expect to be here till I die. Have you ever seen any of the Bonairs?”
“Oh, no, never!” Berry answered absently, and the woman clacked on:
“Then I’ll point them out to you if they come in sight. See that fat lady, with the velvet gown and diamonds, and the white pompadour? That is old Madam Fortescue, the senator’s widowed sister, who chaperoned his two daughters, Misses Marie and Lucile, great beauties, both of them, and both engaged to marry rich New Yorkers. I think they mean to have a double wedding in the fall. It will be a great affair, you know. Their brother, Mr. Charley, is engaged, too, to a New York belle and beauty, and she’s here now, the guest of the house—Miss Montague! Why, what’s the matter, miss? You startled so!”
“Oh, nothing, don’t mind me! Go on, please!” Berry managed to articulate, feeling as if the earth had heaved beneath her feet.
The truth had burst upon her so suddenly that only by the greatest effort could she keep her self-possession.
With the utterance of Miss Montague’s name everything became clear.
She was under the roof of Charley Bonair!
She clung with both hands to the window ledge to hold herself steady, and listened with a dull roar in her ears, while the woman continued:
“Mr. Charley, now, he’s away on a long yachting trip, and dear knows when he will be back. They do say he is sowing an awful crop of wild oats, poor boy, but he’s good at heart, so he is. A dearer boy when he was growing up, I never saw! And that fond of pets, why he has a fine zoölogical collection on these grounds here. You wouldn’t believe it, maybe, but he’s even got two bear pits, miss, and in one of them the bear has two new cubs. She’s that savage over them, she would tear you to pieces if you touched one of them! And birds and smaller animals, now, you’d be surprised at the number. If you like to come here to-morrow, I’ll take pleasure in showing you around. The little bear cubs, my but they are cute! And to hear Zilla, their mother, growling over them, it’s a wonder!—makes cold chills run over one, sure enough!”
“They are running over me now!” gasped Berry, clutching the woman’s hand with one that was as cold as ice. “I—I must go. Please take me back to my friends; they will be going back without me!”
“Oh, plenty of time, miss—you must stay till you get your fortune told, sure.”
“Really, I don’t care. I mean, I’d rather not,” faltered Berry, trembling all over with a sudden nervous premonition of evil that shook her like an ague.
“Ah, don’t be scared at the old fortune teller, dear miss, she may tell you something pretty,” urged the good-natured woman, guiding the trembling girl back to the corridor and the alcove, where the last one was coming out, and the merry troupe were chattering like magpies.
“Oh, come, Miss Vane, she is waiting for you,” the gay girls cried, pushing her in, and pulling to the curtains behind her.
The horrible old Indian seeress enthroned among draperies of Eastern tapestries, worth their weight in gold, and hideous in theatrical red light, clutched the girl’s white hand, and peering at the rosy palm, began to mutter a sibilant jargon of fateful words.
And presently the actress, Vera Vane, who had risen from the ashes of Berenice Vining, flung aside the draperies and rushed from her presence, pale as a phantom at dawn.