Little Golden's Daughter; or, The Dream of a Life Time

In about two weeks Mr. Desmond returned unexpectedly.

Ruby was overjoyed. She laughed and wept together, as she hung around his neck.

"Uncle Bertie must be better, or you would not have returned," she cried.

But her father shook his head gravely.

"No, dear, I am sorry to say he is not improving at all. Indeed the case is so critical that it may be weeks before your mother can return. That is why I have come."

"Shall you go back, then?" inquired Ruby.

"Yes, in about a week. Have you fretted for us very much, Ruby?"

"A great deal," she replied. "Oh, papa," clapping her little hands, "now I know why you have come back. You are going to take me to mamma and Uncle Bert."

"Nothing is further from my intentions," replied Mr. Desmond. "I have come to take you to the seashore."

"The seashore—while my uncle is so ill?" cried the child, a little surprised.

"Yes, Ruby. You must remember your own health is very frail. Your mother is very anxious about you. You will go to the seashore in the care of Mrs. Markham. Will that arrangement please you?"

"Very much," smiled Ruby. "I love Mrs. Markham. Of course I shall take my nurse?"

"Yes, of course," he replied, then inquired, carelessly: "Are you still satisfied with Mary Smith?"

"Oh, yes, Mary is a splendid girl—I do not intend ever to part from her," replied the child, enthusiastically, "I am quite getting over my sulky spells since she came. Mary does not tease and cross me as the others did."

Golden, who had sat sewing quietly by the window, without ever lifting her eyes from her work since Mr. Desmond entered, crimsoned painfully at thus having his attention drawn upon her.

But he took no notice of her except to say patronizingly:

"I am glad you have found such a treasure, Ruby. I hope she will remain with you. Are you willing to accompany Ruby to the seaside, Mary?"

"Yes, sir," she answered, quietly.

"Very well, I will go and see Mrs. Markham now. If she can go by the last of the week I will accompany the party and see you all safely settled before I return south."

Golden made him no answer, thinking that none was necessary, and he went out to call on Mrs. Markham.

It was all carried out as Mr. Desmond wished. In the latter part of the week he accompanied the party to the seashore, saw them installed in comfortable quarters, and after staying two days took leave again.

During his short stay, he enjoyed himself according to his flirting tastes with the lively seaside belles.

In her capacity of Ruby's nurse Golden was compelled to see him a great deal, but he treated her at all times with such subdued respect and delicate attention that the girl grew less afraid of him, and began to think that Celine was right when she said he would abandon his pursuit of her now that he had found out she was an honest girl. She did not know that Mr. Desmond's quiet respect and delicate courtesy was more dangerous than his former open advances had been. Still she was relieved when he was gone, and she was left alone with little Ruby and Mrs. Markham, who was very kind to the lonely girl though in a decidedly patronizing fashion.

When Golden and Ruby had been at the seaside a month with Mrs. Markham, the glad tidings that Mr. Chesleigh was beginning to improve, were conveyed to little Ruby in a short but affectionate letter from her mother.

"Your dear uncle has had a great fight for his life, but the doctor now says that he is likely to get well," Mrs. Desmond wrote. "If he continues to improve, we shall be able to start home with him in about two weeks, journeying slowly. We will join you then at the seaside, as the physician thinks that a month by the sea will quite restore Bertram's health."

It was Golden's task to read this letter to the little six-year-old, whose education, owing to her extreme frailty of constitution, had not yet commenced.

The child cried out noisily for joy at the welcome news, but Golden said not a word. Yet her thoughts were very busy.

"I shall see him again very soon," she said to herself. "Will he recognize, in his sister's servant, the girl that loved him so dearly?"

Then the thought came to her that he would not wish to see her again; she had no part nor lot in his life henceforth, by his own desire.

Musing sadly by the great, moaning sea, while little Ruby gathered the rosy-tinted shells along the sands, she murmured to herself those sweet, pathetic lines of Owen Meredith:

"Oh, being of beauty and bliss! Seen and knownIn the depths of my heart, and possessed there alone,My days know thee not, and my lips name thee never,Thy place in my poor life is vacant forever;We have met, we have parted,No name is recordedIn my annals on earth."

CHAPTER XXIV

In few more days Mrs. Markham received a letter from Mrs. Desmond. Her brother was so much better that she had quite recovered the tone of her spirits, and wrote, cheerfully:

"If nothing more happens, I shall be with you the first of September. Bertram will be with me, and I shall also bring a very charming young lady whom I have invited to spend the winter months with me in New York. She is the daughter of our host, and has been Bert's unwearied attendant throughout his illness. Between you and me, dear friend, she is so desperately in love with my brother, that she has neither eyes nor ears for anyone else. She has a younger sister whom I have not invited. I do not like her. She is the most abominable flirt I ever saw, and has done nothing but make eyes at Mr. Desmond since we came to Glenalvan Hall."

"Glenalvan Hall," mused Mrs. Markham, holding the letter in her hand, and drawing her eyebrows thoughtfully together. "How familiar the word sounds! Where have I heard it?"

She puzzled over it awhile, then gave it up. In the gay whirl of fashionable society, she had forgotten the pretty name of the poor girl she had befriended.

But she carried her letter into Ruby's room and read it aloud to her, and Golden's cheeks that had grown very pale and delicate of late, grew paler still.

"Elinor is coming," she said to herself, in dismay. "What shall I do?"

She thought at first that she would go away quietly before they came.

She could not stay and face her proud cousin, Elinor, and the man who had loved her, and then despised her for the stain upon her.

But the thought came into her mind, where would she go? She had never received any of her wages from Mrs. Desmond yet. If she went away she would be utterly friendless and penniless.

She clung to little Ruby because the child loved her very dearly, and without her love she was utterly alone.

And underlying all was a fierce, passionate longing she could not still, to see Bertram Chesleigh's face once more, to hear again that musical, luring voice, whose accents she had hung upon so fondly.

A few days before the first of September, she turned timidly to Mrs. Markham, who was amusing herself with little Ruby down on the sands.

"Mrs. Markham," she said, "will you tell me this, please? Are not green glasses good for weak eyes?"

"I have heard so," replied the lady. "Are your eyes weak, Mary?"

She looked into the girl's face as she spoke, and saw that the sweet, blue eyes were dull and heavy.

How was she to guess that sleepless nights and bitter tears had dimmed their sapphire sparkle.

"Are your eyes weak, Mary?" she repeated, seeing that the girl hesitated.

A blush tinged the pearly cheek, and Golden glanced out at the foam-crested waves rolling in toward the shore.

"I think that the glare of the sun on the sands, and on the water, is very weakening to the sight," she replied, evasively.

"So it is. I have heard others complain of the same thing. If the light affects your eyes I would advise you, by all means, to wear the glasses."

"Thank you. I believe I will try a pair," returned Golden.

"Oh, Mary, you will be a perfect fright, if you do!" cried out little Ruby, in childish disapproval. "You have covered up all your long, gold hair under that ugly cap, and now, if you cover up your pretty, blue eyes, you will be as horrid-looking as—as—I don't know what!"

"Never mind the looks, my dear," said Mrs. Markham, in her gentle way. "If Mary is kind and loving at heart her looks will not signify."

"But I do so love pretty things," said the child, "and I love to look at Mary. She looks like a picture at night when she combs out her shining hair over her shoulders. There is not a lady at the seaside this summer as pretty as my nurse!"

"Fie, my dear; you must not make Mary vain," cried the lady, half smiling.

"I want to ask you a favor, Mrs. Markham," said Golden, blushing very much.

"A favor! What is it, Mary?" asked Mrs. Markham, encouragingly.

Golden glanced down at her blue cashmere dress, which had grown very shabby and worn during the two months she had been in little Ruby's service.

"You see I had lost all my money when I went into Mrs. Desmond's service," she said falteringly, "and I have not received any of my wages yet, and—and I am getting too shabby to be respectable-looking."

That was little Golden's plea, but the truth was that she did not wish her Cousin Elinor and Bertram Chesleigh to recognize her, and so wished to lay aside the blue cashmere which had been her best dress at Glenalvan Hall.

"Oh, you poor child!" burst out Mrs. Markham, "why did you never tell me that before? I see, now; you want me to lend you the money to buy a new dress."

"If you will be so very, very kind," faltered Golden, gratefully.

"I will do it with the greatest pleasure," answered Mrs. Markham, whose purse was ever open to the needy and distressed.

So on the first of September little Golden appeared in quite an altered guise. The pretty, blue cashmere that was so becoming to her rose-leaf complexion was laid aside, and she wore a sober, dark-gray dress, so long and plain that she looked a great deal taller and older. She had pinned a dark silk handkerchief high up around her white throat, thus concealing its fairness and graceful contour. She had fashioned herself a huge, abominable cap that hid every wave of her golden hair. Dark-green spectacles were fastened before the bright, blue eyes, and with her long, tucked, white apron, little Golden made the primmest-looking nurse-maid that could have been imagined. She looked in the mirror and decided that no one who had known her at Glenalvan Hall would recognize her now.

But little Ruby exclaimed dolorously at her strange appearance:

"Oh, Mary, you have made yourself quite ugly!" she cried, "and I had been thinking how I would show Uncle Bert my pretty nurse."

"Oh, Ruby, you must not!" cried Golden, in terror. "Promise me you will not."

"Will not—what?" asked the little one, surprised.

"Will not show me to Mr. Chesleigh, nor tell him that you think I am pretty," said Golden, in alarm.

"Very well, I won't," said the little one, disappointed, "but I am very sorry, for I am sure Uncle Bertie would be glad to know that I have a good and pretty nurse. He used to laugh at the ugly ones, and he said their faces were so horrid it was not strange they were bad tempered."

"There is another thing I want you to promise me, please, darling," said Golden, who was on the best of terms with her little charge.

"What is it, Mary?" inquired the child.

"When your uncle comes to sit and talk with you, Ruby, you must let me run away and stay until he leaves you."

"Why should you do that?" asked Ruby.

"I have some sewing to do," replied Golden, evasively.

"I know, but you always do your sewing with me," said Ruby.

"You see it would be quite different with a man in the way."

"Uncle Bert would not bother you one bit. I cannot see why you are afraid of him," rejoined the child.

"But I do not like men, Ruby. I do not like to be where a man is. Now, dear, will you excuse me?" pleaded Golden.

"Yes, I will, since you insist on it," answered Ruby. "But I can't see what makes you hate men! Now I like them. I like papa, I like Uncle Bert, and I shall like my husband when I grow big enough to have one. Do you ever intend to have a husband, Mary?" said the child, with a child's thoughtlessness.

CHAPTER XXV

The beautiful color surged hotly into Golden's cheeks at Ruby's artless question. She turned her head away to hide the pain that made her sweet lips quiver.

"Mary, do you ever intend to have a husband?" repeated the child.

"Hush, Ruby. You are too young to talk about husbands," answered Golden.

"Dear me, is my daughter contemplating marriage?" cried a gay, sweet voice, and, looking up, they saw Mrs. Desmond in her traveling wraps, dusty and weary, but looking very glad and eager at seeing her child again.

Ruby sprang to her arms, and Golden looked on with sympathetic tears in her eyes at the happy reunion of the mother and child. Mrs. Desmond did not seem to see her until she had fairly smothered Ruby in kisses, when she looked up and said, approvingly:

"How do you do, Mary? That is a very nice new dress—quite suitable to you."

After a minute she said, suddenly, as if the thought had just occurred to her:

"By the way, you have never yet received any of your wages from me. Here are twenty dollars for two months. I am very glad you have taken such good care of Ruby."

Golden thanked her and took the money, but the gold seemed to burn the delicate palm. It was hard to be receiving a servant's wages from Bertram Chesleigh's sister.

"Where is papa and Uncle Bert?" asked Ruby.

"Papa will be here directly. Bert is very tired—he has gone to his room to rest. You must not go to him yet."

"And the young lady, mamma—she came?"

"Oh, yes."

"Is she pretty, mamma? Has she blue eyes, or black?"

"She is decidedly handsome, and her eyes are black."

"Do you like her, mamma?"

"Quite well, dear. She is very charming. I will tell you a secret. Perhaps she will be your auntie some day."

"Is she going to marry Uncle Bert?" inquired Ruby, wide-eyed.

"Nothing is settled yet, dear. But it seems probable. Bert could not find a more brilliant Mrs. Chesleigh."

"I do not wish for Uncle Bert to marry. I shall tell him so!" cried Ruby.

"Fie, little selfishness, you will do no such thing! He ought to marry and settle down at home. We should not then have to be running after him in every out-of-the-way place where he chooses to fall sick. Here I have been by his sick-bed all summer, ruining my health and missing the whole season by the sea!"

"How gladly I would have exchanged places with you," moaned little Golden, to herself.

"Mamma, did you like Glenalvan Hall?" inquired Ruby.

"Oh, very much, though it is little better than a ruin. It must have been quite a grand place once. It is beautiful still in its decay. The owners were ruined by the late war."

Oh, how anxiously beautiful Golden longed to hear one word from her old grandfather and her black mammy. She listened with a beating heart to the lady's words, but she never named the two that little Golden loved so dearly, and after awhile she rose and said that Celine was waiting for her, and she must go.

Little Ruby clung to her dress.

"Mayn't I go?" she pleaded, and Mrs. Desmond yielding a smiling assent, they went away together, and left Golden alone in the room.

Alone, with her young heart full of strange, troubled joy. Bertram Chesleigh was here, under the same roof with her.

She should see him, she should hear him once again. There was a bitter, troubled pleasure in the thought.

She could not bear the tumult of oppressive thoughts that rushed over her mind. To escape them she went in quest of Mrs. Markham, and paid her the money she had borrowed from her a few days before.

Then she went back to the room to wait for little Ruby, but the child was so preoccupied with her friends that she did not return to her room during the day.

At twilight she came flitting in joyously as a little fairy.

"Oh, Mary, I have had such a charming day! And you must dress me now in my white lace dress over the pink satin slip, and my white satin slippers, and embroidered rose-silk stockings. I am going to stay up for the ball to-night. Won't that be splendid?"

Golden looked a little anxiously at the moist, flushed face and shining, dark eyes.

"Darling, let me persuade you to lie down on the sofa and rest awhile," she urged. "You have had such a busy, exciting day, that you need rest. To-morrow you will have one of your bad headaches."

"Oh, no I am not tired one bit. And mamma and Miss Glenalvan are gone to dress now. I must be ready when they call for me," urged Ruby.

"I suppose Miss Glenalvan is very pretty, is she not, Ruby?" said Golden, as she combed and brushed the little girl's long, shining, black ringlets.

"Oh, yes, she is very pretty—she has large, black eyes, and rosy cheeks, and splendid hair, but she is not beautiful like you, Mary," was the prompt reply.

"You must not let Miss Glenalvan hear you say that," said Golden. "She would be displeased."

"Hump!" said Ruby, carelessly, then she flew to another subject, while Golden trembled nervously. "Uncle Bert is looking wretchedly ill. Ouch, Mary, what did make you jerk that curl so? His eyes are as big as saucers. Are you almost done? You pull my hair dreadfully. I asked him if he was going to marry Miss Glenalvan. He said that was a silly question. Mary, what has come over you? You were never so rough with my head before."

"There, it is finished now. I did not mean to hurt you; excuse me, dear," faltered Golden, as she laid out the white lace dress and satin slippers for the eager child.

"All right, I am not angry," said Ruby. "I told Uncle Bert what a kind girl you were, and he was delighted to hear it. I wanted to tell him you were pretty, too, but I didn't, as you didn't want him to know that. But I can tell you one thing, Mary, if he ever sees you, he will find out for himself."

"What! in this great cap and glasses?" cried Golden, alarmed.

"Yes, indeed; you can't hide your round cheeks, and your red mouth, and your dimpled chin!" cried the child, in pretty triumph.

"I can keep out of Mr. Chesleigh's way, anyhow," Golden replied, as she buttoned the pretty dress and clasped a slight gold chain around the white neck of the child.

"Now you are quite finished," she said. "You look very sweet, and I hope you will enjoy yourself very much."

"Thank you," said the little girl, impulsively kissing her; then she added, a little pityingly: "It is a pity you cannot be dressed in white, and go to the ball, too, Mary. Do you never wish to?"

"Sometimes," admitted Golden, with her sweet frankness, and a soft, little sigh.

Ruby studied her attentively a moment, her dark head perched daintily like a bird's.

"I should like to see you in a ball-dress," she said. "It should be a white lace over blue satin, and looped with violets. You should have large, white pearls around your neck, and your hair hanging down and a bandeau of pearls to bind it. It is a great pity you are not rich, Mary. People say that you are too pretty to be a servant."

Something like a sob rose in Golden's throat and was hardly repressed. They had told her this so often.

She was beautiful, but it had only brought her sorrow. To her, as her mother, had been given—

"The fatal gift of beauty which becameA funeral dower of present woes and past."

"I am very sorry I am so pretty, Ruby," she said, sorrowfully, and the child answered, quickly:

"I would not be sorry if I were you, Mary. Some good man will fall in love with your pretty face some day and marry you."

Golden made no reply to this well-meant solace, for the door opened to admit Mrs. Desmond, followed by her young lady guest.

Golden retreated shyly to the furthest corner of the room. She was face to face at last with her haughty cousin Elinor. She drooped her head a moment sadly, while a flood of memories rushed over her, then bravely lifted it again and looked at the young lady through her disfiguring green glasses.

Elinor Glenalvan only glanced with careless indifference at the prim-looking figure of the nurse, then her large, black eyes turned away again, so that Golden had time to observe her with impunity.

The Glenalvans had exerted themselves to the utmost to secure an outfit for Elinor. The result did credit to their efforts. The girl was certainly dazzling.

She wore cream-colored moire, trimmed with rich Spanish lace and cardinal satin. Great clusters of Jaqueminot roses burned on her bosom and in her shining, raven hair.

The costly pearl necklace that John Glenalvan had taken from Golden was clasped around her white throat.

A throb of resentment stirred the young girl's breast as she observed it.

Mrs. Desmond wore white lace looped with diminutive and richly-colored sunflowers. Her jewels were diamonds, and she was as usual brilliantly beautiful and graceful. Golden caught her breath in awed admiration of the two beautiful women.

"Are you ready, Ruby?" inquired Mrs. Desmond.

"Yes, mamma," said the child, blithely.

All three went out then, and Golden threw a dark shawl over her head and went out upon the seashore.

It was a moonlight night, calm and still, with that slight chill in the air that comes with September.

She sat down, a quiet, forlorn little figure on the lonely sands, and watched the great foam-capped waves rolling in to her feet.

Something in the immensity and solemnity of the great ocean seemed to calm the turbulence of the fevered young heart and whisper a gentle "peace, be still," to the passions that racked her wronged and outraged spirit.

CHAPTER XXVI

As Golden had feared, little Ruby's day and night of excitement proved too much for her. She was unable to rise from her bed the next morning, being prostrated by one of her nervous headaches.

To add to her ill-feeling, damp, rainy weather set in during the night, spoiling all the pleasant plans of the newly-arrived party for the day.

Golden darkened the room, lighted a fire on the hearth, and carefully tended the little patient who dozed fitfully until mid-day, when she awakened and declared herself better.

"Has no one been in to see me, Mary?" she inquired, and Golden answered:

"Yes, your mamma came to the door while you were sleeping, but went away again, saying that she would not disturb your rest."

"You may go and tell her to come now, Mary."

"I think she is with your uncle just now, dear. Cannot you wait a little while?" said Golden. "She said she would go to him a little while, as you were asleep.

"No, I cannot wait," replied Ruby fretfully. "Tell mamma to bring Uncle Bert with her."

"If you have too much company your head will ache again, Ruby."

"No, it will not. It is ever so much better. Why don't you do as I ask you, Mary?" cried the spoiled child.

Golden went out without any further objection. She asked Celine, whom she met in the hall, to deliver Ruby's message to her mother and her uncle.

Celine looked into the sick-room a minute later to say that they were engaged just at present, but would come in about fifteen minutes.

"Oh, dear," fretted the ailing little one, "that is a long time to wait. Give me my dolls, Mary. I'll try to amuse myself with them."

Golden brought the miscellaneous family of dolls and ranged them around Ruby on the bed, chatting pleasantly to her the while in the hope of lessening the weariness of waiting.

"You must keep your promise and let me go out when they come," she said, presently, feeling that she was growing so nervous she could not possibly remain in the same room with Bertram Chesleigh.

"Very well; you may go into the next room," replied the child.

"You may leave the door just a little ajar that I may call you when I want you."

"I hope you will not want me until they are gone out again," replied Golden.

When the expected rap came on the door, the girl opened it with a trembling hand. She did not look up as Mrs. Desmond and her brother entered, but softly closing the door after them, glided precipitately from the room.

Bertram Chesleigh saw the little, retreating figure in the huge cap and gray gown, and laughed as he kissed his little niece.