Chapter XL: “the Poor Heart She Broke.”

They had thought that Delmar could hardly survive the excitement of that day for twenty-four hours.

But it almost seemed as if he had taken a new lease of life.

A week slipped away, and he lingered on, buoyed up by a strange exhilaration of spirits.

Maisie’s effects had been moved to the same hotel, and she shared with Mrs. French and Byrd the duty of caring for the invalid.

She could not watch his sufferings from his wounded lung without pity and sympathy, and a longing to alleviate his pain; so all lingering resentment passed from her heart, and divine pity and sympathy filled its place.

“How good you are to me, Maisie, when I deserve it so little,” he said to her gratefully. “Ah, if Josephine had been like this, so kind and tender and pitiful, I should have been well long ago. But she dragged me from place to place; she gave me no rest. And always the pain of this aching lung, and the weariness--ah, the weariness! But I loved her so, and I wished to give her pleasure, believing at first in her pretended love; so I sacrificed my life to her, for I shall never get well, I know! And she--she has not a regret! No doubt she has married Kingwood already, not waiting for the sod to cover the poor heart she broke!”

It was the first time he had named her name since his bitter outburst to Mrs. French, but they knew from this that she was never absent from his thoughts.

They were all agreed in believing that she had already married Kingwood. It was indeed all that remained to her after Delmar’s angry denunciation.

Since the hour when Kingwood had asked her to come out and speak to him alone she had been missing.

Her traveling-clothes, a small valise and all her handsome jewels--bought with Maisie’s money--were missing from the room, and her trunks all strapped and corded, never having been unpacked since her late arrival from Paris, were left awaiting the arrival of their mistress.

Smarting with anger at the rebuff she had received from the man she had treated so heartlessly, cast off with a stain on her name, and an empty purse, Josephine was indeed only too glad to listen to Kingwood’s proposal of marriage.

She believed that he loved her desperately, and was very rich--neither of which was true.

All his heart belonged to Maisie, and he had only a passionate fancy for the coquettish Josephine. As to his great wealth on which she counted, he had squandered so much of his fortune that the remnant left barely sufficed for his own extravagances, and he would never have proposed to Josephine had she not, in her arrogant pride, made him believe that she was independently rich in her own right.

Dreading lest he should find out her deception on this point, and eager to entrap him first, she acceded with joy to his proposal of immediate marriage, and, hurriedly packing up her jewels, with a change of clothes in her hand-bag, left the house with him, angry, humiliated, desperate, feeling as if fate had indeed played her an ugly trick, but wasting no remorse on her own share in bringing down retribution on her own head. Josephine was only Josephine--selfish and heartless to the core--and if she had had to go over the same experience again, would doubtless have acted in the same manner, sacrificing every one else to her own pleasure.

As for Kingwood, his sole object in marrying her was first to get revenge on Maisie, and secondly to share the fortune of which he believed the pretty coquette to be sole mistress.

He had heard of the rich Shirleys of Rosedale, and he did not know that since Josephine had married and come abroad her father had made an assignment in the bankruptcy court.

His sweet morsel of vengeance rested on the hope that if he married Josephine, Maisie must perforce remain with the husband she did not love, because Byrd’s high sense of honor would not permit her to secure a divorce. Thus parted from the man she loved, and forced to remain with Delmar if he lived, she would be as bitterly unhappy as Kingwood himself, in his union with Josephine. These poor crumbs of comfort tasted so sweet on his tongue that he hurried to the consummation of the ceremony that would set the ball in motion.

There awaited this scheming pair a very bitter future when the real truth became known to each other--confirmation of the old adage, “Those who marry in haste repent at leisure.”

But for the first few days all was “couleur de rose,” then Josephine, soon wearying of the neighboring town where they were spending the beginning of their honeymoon, proposed to Kingwood that they should go and get her trunks and proceed to Paris.

“You can write for them,” he said; but she answered, laughing:

“No; I wish them to see that I am happily married again!”

So at the very moment when Delmar was speaking of her so bitterly, she was sending in her card to him by the servant--Mrs. Burton Kingwood.

A spasm of emotion twitched his pallid face, and he opened his lips to refuse to see her, when the door unclasped suddenly, and she followed her card into the room.

Radiant, insolent, superbly dressed, and smiling in triumph, she had never looked more beautiful and alluring to poor Delmar’s hollow, dark eyes that fixed themselves upon her, recalling in that moment all his love, all his dreams of happiness, so cruelly blasted by this lovely, soulless butterfly.

She bowed to them all with airy grace, crying gaily:

“Ah, good morning to you all. I have come to receive your congratulations. I have been married a week to Mr. Kingwood. It is a real love-match on both sides, you must know. I am free to own to you, Delmar, that my girlish fancy for you died long ago. When your good looks faded in your illness, there was nothing left to admire, and your peevish jealousy evoked contempt, not pity. I am glad I am free of you, so you did not score much of a victory when you cast me off, to take Maisie back--Maisie, who is in love with your brother, and hates you! Good-by; I wish you all much happiness!” and with a mocking curtsy the little fiend swept from the room before the startled listeners could catch their breath to reply.

They looked anxiously at Delmar, but before her silken skirt had rustled through the door he had turned his face over to the wall and closed his eyes.

Byrd bent anxiously over him touching his cold hands with warm, strong fingers, crying:

“Do not mind her malice, Del. We all love you--we will do all we can for your happiness!”

But no answer came from the pale, twitching lips.

Aunt Constance darted out for the doctor, and Maisie leaned over her husband, repeating Byrd’s words:

“We all love you--we will do what we can for your happiness!”

He groped for her hand without replying, and when she placed it in his he joined it with Byrd’s, that was clasping his other one.

His cold, trembling hands held Byrd’s and Maisie’s close clasped together, and he gasped faintly:

“I--I am going! God--bless--you--both!”

Aunt Constance entered hurriedly with the doctor, who stooped over the still form reverently a moment, then exclaimed:

“Poor fellow! He has gone suddenly--died from a shock. But the end was not far off at the best!”

* * * * *

Josephine was just going down the steps to her husband, waiting outside, when she heard excited voices proclaiming the death of the young soldier. Her high color did not even change, nor her cold heart beat the faster; she only said carelessly, to Kingwood:

“Delmar has just died--since I came out of the room. I dare say it was a shock to him, learning that I was really lost to him forever. What a pity Maisie ever came back. I should have been a rich young widow now, instead of losing all those millions!”

“No use grieving over spilt milk,” he answered hoarsely, but the words were as much for his own consolation as hers. He was thinking with a pang of furious rage that he was cheated out of his vengeance after all.

He had not dreamed that Delmar was going to die so soon, and he guessed well that Byrd would very likely marry Maisie soon. She had been Delmar’s wife in name only, and even the censorious world would not expect her to pose as a disconsolate widow.

He was right.

The Warrens and Mrs. French talked it over when Delmar’s brief funeral was ended by the depositing in a vault of the remains, to be eventually taken home to Virginia.

They agreed that even the slight sensation over the marriage might be avoided if the ceremony were performed abroad, and Byrd brought home his bride to Castellane.

Within a week they had confided their opinions to Byrd and Maisie.

“It can do no good to Delmar for Maisie to pose a year as his widow. He would not wish it if he could know. Remember how he joined your hands in dying,” said Aunt Constance, with a stifled sob.

They talked it over together, and decided to take their friends’ advice.

A few weeks later, on a golden June day, under smiling English skies, Byrd and Maisie were united in marriage by a quiet ceremony, of which the Warrens and Mrs. French were the only witnesses. Then the party of five remained abroad until late in August, when they journeyed homeward, bearing with them the remains of Lieutenant Barrington to his native land.

In the meantime, Byrd had written home to his lawyers, and the news of all that had happened abroad was so well known in Rosedale that the nine days’ wonder was over before the travelers reached there.

At the cemetery the marble shaft bearing Maisie’s name had been taken away, and the unknown tenant of that little grave had been removed to an obscure spot.

Beside Delmar’s mother a new grave had been opened, and after appropriate ceremonies at Castellane it received into its calm embrace the mortal remains of the young soldier, whose passionate heart and wilful temper had made shipwreck of his own life.

In the short span of his life he had known the heights of bliss and the depths of pain; he had drunk the feverish wine of love to its bitter lees, that had poisoned him at last. For one woman’s sake he had sacrificed all else in life, but the grass upon his grave was never watered by her tears. Other truer hearts breathed there the tender regrets that must have pleased the freed spirit if it lingered near to hear them pulsing softly on the summer air, while reverent hands brought their daily tribute of fragrant flowers to deck his grave.

And the hands that he had joined in dying with blessings on them both, remained clasped in a love that would never fade in time or eternity. Byrd and Maisie would go hand in hand together through life and down to death, their hearts linked in a love born of sorrow that would bear its fruitage of joy, while gently chastened by the shadows that had clouded over its dawn.

THE END.

No. 1045 of the NEW EAGLE SERIES, entitled, “Love Will Find the Way,” by Wenona Gilman, is a tale of intrigues and jealousies, with love triumphant at the end in spite of all obstacles.

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Transcriber’s Notes:

Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected.

Table of contents has been added and placed into the public domain by the transcriber.

This novel was also serialized as _Barrington’s Will; or, A Legacy of Hate_ in the _New York Family Story Paper_.