"Remember to be cautious for my sake."

"Don't fear on that ground."

Thus the interview ended, Duffel having accomplished more by it than he had expected. The more Mr. Mandeville thought on the subject, the more thoroughly he became convinced of Hadley's guilt. Did not Duffel's statement correspond precisely with that of his daughter? and how could it be so without being true? It was an impossibility. The more he reflected, the deeper became his conviction of the guilt of Hadley and of the existence of a plot to defame Duffel. Another idea suggested itself: "Was his daughter an intentional or an unintentional party to these transactions? Might not her dislike of Duffel and her preference for Hadley induce her to seek for some means to accomplish the disgrace of the former?" While he was weighing this supposition in the balance of his mind, he chanced to see his daughter walking with Hadley, and their manner of conversation and the evident good-will existing between them, led him, in his bewildered state, to conclude that Eveline was not as free from implication as she might be. After harboring this thought for a day or two longer, he charged her with the crime of confederating to injure Duffel, as already related. Had he known that Duffel's story was made so fitly apt, simply because he had basely eavesdropped and sacrilegiously listened to the sanct.i.tude of a conversation at the domestic hearth, how different would have been the result!

CHAPTER III.

THE INVALID.

When Mr. Mandeville entered the house, as related at the close of the first chapter, he found Eveline lying on the floor of her room, in a state of insensibility. All his efforts to arouse her were unavailing, and leaving her in the care of the distracted housemaid, he hastened off for the doctor. When the stunning influence was removed, Eveline was still unconscious. A burning fever was in her veins, and delirium in her brain.

All night long the doctor remained by her bedside, and when morning at length compelled him to visit other patients, he left with an expression on his countenance, which caused anything but a hopeful sensation in the father's breast.

Days of anxiety and nights of sleepless watching pa.s.sed away, and yet the father, with pale cheeks and heavy heart, sat by the bedside of the afflicted. No mother had she, that kind parent having several years before been laid in the cold grave; and the father strove to make up for the loss as far as he could understand the necessities of a sick-room; and, indeed, he became wonderfully gentle in his attentions. His touch was trained to be light and soft as a woman's, his step quiet, and his manner subdued. He would leave the room only for a few minutes at a time, and then return with an air of impatience, but it often happened that for hours together he would allow no one to share the duties of nurse with him, though the best of aid was always at hand. And he had a reason for this singular course of conduct. Eveline frequently raved in her delirium, and words would then fall from her lips which he would not have others to hear for the wealth of India. Why? Listen for a few moments:

"Oh, how dark! all dark! Nothing but clouds! No sun, no moon, no stars!

When _will_ morning come? Who made it dark? Oh, G.o.d! that my father, my own father, should do this!"

Thus would the unconscious child talk into the very ear of her parent, often wringing her hands and manifesting the utmost distress. Then her thoughts would take another direction, on this wise:

"What a load is on my heart; oh, so heavy! It weighs me down to the earth.

Who will take it away? Alas, there is no one to pity me! No one will come to me and lift this great burden from my bosom; and it is crushing the life-blood from my heart! Hark! don't you hear the drops fall as they are pressed out? Patter, patter, patter! Well, it will soon be over; they will see the blood; yes, and _he_, my once good, dear, kind father; oh, may he never know that _his_ hand wrung it out and wrenched my heart in twain!

Poor father! he knew not that he was killing me--me his only daughter. May he never be wiser! Ah, I am going."

She would sink down exhausted, and lay sometimes for hours in a stupor, after these paroxysms of excitement, and the heavy-hearted father often feared she would never rouse again. But a higher stage of fever would awaken her from the state of lethargy, and then the ears of the agonized parent would be greeted and his heart pierced by words like these:

"Oh, hear him, father, hear him! I know he can explain it to your satisfaction. How can Charles bear such charges? I wonder at his patience and self-command. Father, father! How unjust! How cruel! Do let him speak!

Convinced! Yes, on what grounds? Whose word is ent.i.tled to more credit than that of Charles? That's it! The name--the name of the base slanderer. I know it is some villain. Father! how _can_ you deny him the only means of defense? 'Unpleasant rencounter!' yes, to the vile miscreants, no doubt.

'Confidence!' My life! isn't Charles worthy of confidence, too? His word alone is worth a thousand oaths of such heartless slanderers as those that stab in the dark! Don't get angry, Charles, he's my father. n.o.bly done!

How respectfully he acts when so abused and insulted! All will yet be right. Ah! I'll tell him how I spurn the accusation! How my soul burns with indignation that his fair name should be a.s.sailed! I am so glad he is coming; I know he feels deeply the wrong--What!"

At this point the startled look of the poor girl alarmed the father. She bent her head, in a listening att.i.tude, as if eager to catch every word that was spoken by some one in the distance. Ah, too well the wretched parent knew on what her thoughts were running. Too well he knew where and when the blow had fallen that smote his child to the dust--perhaps had opened to her the gate of death. A deep, stifled, half sigh, half groan escaped from her lips, and she murmured in a hoa.r.s.e whisper:

"Father, father! you will kill your child. Oh, G.o.d! this is too much!

Turned from our door! without a word of comfort! How deadly pale he is! My own parent to call him 'unworthy!' and then forbid him to speak!"

At this point a shriek from her lips would lift the father to his feet, the cold drops of agony on his brow. That soul-rending cry he had heard before, but it lost none of its horrors by being repeated. Alas, it told but too plainly of the wreck his cruel words had made, and he trembled lest only the beginning of sorrows was upon him. How he blamed himself for being so rash and precipitate; and, as Eveline sunk back in exhaustion, the awful thought kept forcing itself into his mind:

"If she dies, I am her murderer!" What a reflection for a parent over an almost dying child! Who can measure the anguish it created in his breast?

There lay his precious child before him, prostrated by his own act, hovering on the very brink of the grave, life trembling on a breath--and he, oh, he might never whisper a word of comfort in her ear! Poor man! For all this there was no repentance in his soul; it was only regret and remorse--but oh, remorse how bitter! Not that his belief was changed as to the guilt and innocence of the parties, for he still had confidence in Duffel, and was fully persuaded of Hadley's evil intentions. He was glad that the designs of the latter had been frustrated, but blamed himself for the manner in which it had been done.

But the reflections of the unhappy man, whether of reproach, sorrow, or regret, were ended for the time by another phase in the ever-changing condition of the invalid. In tones expressive of the deepest wretchedness, the daughter, once more arousing from the stupor of exhaustion, would piteously exclaim, in low, sad accents, whose inexpressible woe pierced the afflicted watcher's heart as with scorpion daggers:

"Gone! gone!--gone without a parting word or look! Gone, and my aching eyes shall behold him no more! Gone, and the darkness comes over me! Oh, this horrid gloom!--this load on my heart! Father! Charles! why do you both leave me in this dreadful place?"

"Eveline, Eveline, my dear; your father is here; he has not left you; see, I am by you; give me your hand."

"Did somebody call me? Who is there?"

"It is I, my child, your father. Come with me; let me lead you from this place."

"Ah, it's a strange voice! I hoped it was dear father or Charles; but, no, no, Charles was driven away; he is gone forever! Oh, my poor heart!--and father, he has left me too: they are gone, and I shall die here. Oh, what will father say when he finds me dead? Well, it is best that he is away, for now he will not know that he has killed me. Poor, dear, kind father! I would so much like to say farewell before I go. It might be some consolation for him to know when I am gone that I love him still!"

Every word of these last sentences went to the father's heart. How strong must be that affection which could still cling to him so tenderly, though he had committed such an outrage upon her feelings with regard to another!

The distressed sire bowed his head and smote his breast. Then he knelt down by the bedside and prayed. It was the first prayer he had offered up for years; but, oh! how earnestly he suplicated that his child might be spared to him. In his agonized pleading, so great was the commotion in his spirit and the emotions of his heart, that tears, the first that had bedewed his eyes since the death of his wife, streamed down his face. May we not hope that his prayer was heard? But the horrors of the sick room were not yet over. Eveline kept sleeping and waking, or rather, she lay in a state of stupor or raved in a delirium of fever, with occasional intervals of quiet, which sometimes lasted for hours, and excited delusive hopes in the heart of the father, that she was better, only to plunge him again into doubt and fear when the fever fit returned. He arose from his knees, and bending over his child, imprinted kiss after kiss, "with all a mother's tenderness,"

upon her brow and lips. O, how rejoiced would he have been could those kisses have conveyed to her an understanding of his feelings at that moment! How a knowledge of his affection would have gladdened her heart!

But, no; for all the return manifested, he might as well have pressed his lips to cold marble. After a time, the fever returned in violence, and she resumed her distempered and broken discourse:

"Never! never! I will stay with you, if you wish me to; but marry Duffel, I never will! Force me to? No, father, you cannot! You may drive me from your house; you may turn me off and disown me, but you cannot make me perjure myself before G.o.d at the altar. No, father, I will obey you in all else; in this I cannot, and will not. If I were to go and forswear my soul in the solemn rites of marriage, my adored mother would weep over me in sorrow, if angels _can_ weep in heaven. No, never, never!"

"My child, my dear Eveline," said the father, tenderly endeavoring to quiet her, "you need not fear that your father will be so cruel"--and he laid his hand gently upon her, to a.s.sure her of his presence; but it had a contrary effect from that he intended; she seemed to apprehend violence, and cried out:

"Help! help! They are dragging me away to marry a villain! Will no one help me? Where is Charles? Leave me! help!" She began to scream very loudly, and Mr. Mandeville knew not what to do. The doctor, however, opportunely came at this moment, and administered a soothing potion, and she became quiet.

This was the recurring succession of events in the sick chamber for the first ten days of Eveline's illness; then there was a change; the violent symptoms of disease were reduced, and a state of dreamy languor succeeded, with rare intervals of excitement, and those of the mildest type; but consciousness did not return, and the father had the satisfaction of knowing that the secrets of the place were his own. He had now but little fear that others would learn them, but this gleam of comfort was overshadowed by the increased apprehensions that his child's sickness must prove fatal. Indeed, hope had almost fled from his bosom, but he clung with a death-grasp to the desire for her recovery, if for nothing else, that a good understanding might exist between them. He could not endure the thought of her leaving the world under a wrong impression of the _motives_ by which he had been actuated in the course he had pursued. As his long and continued watching had worn him down, he now left the bedside frequently to s.n.a.t.c.h a little rest, and recuperate his exhausted powers.

And where was Hadley all this time? No fond mother ever hovered about the cradle of her sick darling with deeper solicitude, than did he about the residence of his beloved. He made friends of the nurse and maid, and from them and the doctor kept himself advised of her condition. Oh, how his heart ached to be by the bedside of the sufferer! How, at times, his spirit rebelled at the injustice of the father! But when he was told of his devoted attention, tireless care, and deep distress, he forgave him in his heart and blessed him for his devoted kindness to the invalid.

But where was Duffel? Let the sequel tell.

CHAPTER IV.

DUFFEL--THE SECRET CAVE AND CLAN.

For the first few days of her illness, Duffel came to inquire after Eveline. Finding that she was likely to remain sick for a length of time, if she ever recovered, he excused himself from further attentions by pleading the necessity of a previous engagement, which would probably require his absence for a week or possibly a fortnight. With apparently the deepest solicitude for the recovery of Eveline and of sympathy for Mr.

Mandeville, he took his leave.

When a little way from the house, he muttered to himself:

"Well, I am free from the necessity of keeping up appearances here any longer. Now for the _cave_!"

In a short time, he was threading his way through the forest, mounted on a fine animal. A narrow path lay before him, which he followed for some miles, and then turned into the untrodden wilderness and wound his way through its trackless wastes. There were no signs indicating that the foot of man or domesticated beast had ever pressed the earth in those solitary wilds; yet Duffel seemed familiar with the place, as was evident from his unhesitating choice of ways and careless ease. He knew by marks, to others unseen, or, if seen, their significance unknown, that he was moving in the right direction. Having traveled several miles in this way, he at length came to a beaten path, at right-angles with the course he had been going, into which he guided his n.o.ble beast. After pursuing this latter course at a rapid rate for more than an hour, he again turned off into the woods, and, guided by the same mystic signs as before, shaped his course with unerring precision, notwithstanding the forest was so dense and overgrown with underbrush as to render it almost impervious to sight, and to an utter stranger a bewildering labyrinth, from whose mazes he might labor in vain to extricate himself, unless, indeed, he possessed the almost instinctive tact of the Indian, or the thorough knowledge of the most experienced backwoodsman.

Why Duffel was so obscurely careful in selecting his way, will presently be seen. In the direction last taken, he traveled on until the sun was bending to the western horizon, when he came to a thicket of bushes and vines, so compact in growth it seemed an impossibility to enter it, even in a crawling position, without the aid of an ax and pruning-knife. Glancing this way and that, as if to a.s.sure himself that no one was near, a precaution that might almost be set down as a useless exhibition of timidity in that wild out-of-the-way place, so far from the habitation of civilised man. Duffel, when satisfied that no human eye was upon him, dismounted, and leading his steed by the bridle a short distance to the left, paused, looked around him again, and then lifting a pendant p.r.o.ng of a bush, with a very slight exertion of strength, he moved back a large ma.s.s of vines and branches, which had been with great care and ingenuity, and at the expense of much labor, wrought into a door or gate of living durability.

Through this gate-way he first sent his horse, then entered and pa.s.sed through himself, carefully shutting the verdure-hidden door behind him, and no eye could discover the place where he had disappeared.

From this entrance, a road, some five or six feet wide had been cut out into the middle of the thicket, which was a large open area covered with gra.s.s and shaded by bushy trees, of small alt.i.tude, with wide-extended branches. Arrived at this spot, Duffel unsaddled his horse and turned him loose to crop the luxuriant gra.s.s. A dozen others were there before him, and as it was impossible that they should get there unaided, their riders were no doubt somewhere near. But this was something expected by the new-comer, as he manifested no surprise thereat, but appeared well pleased at the discovery.

After looking about to see that all was well, Duffel bent his steps toward a certain point in the environing thicket, and lifting a small bough, opened another verdant door, but this time of such small dimensions as to barely admit a single person. A narrow path led away from this artfully-contrived entrance into the dark and tangled recesses beyond. It was now growing late; twilight was over the world, but it was quite dark where the intertwined foliage of vines and branches wove their impenetrable net above and at the sides of the lonely path, and Duffel was obliged to feel his way with care. A few minutes' walk, however, brought him to the border of a stream of some considerable size, the banks of which formed the boundary of the thicket. Precisely at the spot where he reached the stream, was a projecting rock, covered with a luxuriant growth of underwood, vines and flowers, which overhung its outer edge and draped down, like a thick curtain, to the depth of eight or ten feet. This rock extended some fifty yards up the stream from the place where Duffel stood, and outwardly about an average of four feet. Its peculiar formation, however, was hid from view by carefully trained bushes at its lower extremity. This care had been taken to hide a secret pa.s.sage, which led along the bank, under the table-leaf rock just described.