"Why didn't my brother save his money for him then--if he's his son?"

she demanded sharply, but breathing short as she spoke the last words in a tone that conveyed the venom of intense hatred.

"Almeda, don't; you know well enough 'why'; don't keep me in such suspense--I can't bear it; only tell me if you will help."

She seemed to gather herself together; she swept round the table; came close to the woman in the armchair; bent to her; the dark burning eyes fixed the faded blue ones. "Tell me quick, I say,--I can bear no more."

"Aurora Googe, I sent word to you by Octavius Buzzby that I would not help your state's-prison bird--fledged from your nest, not mine,--"

She did not finish, for the woman she was torturing suddenly laid a hot hand hard and close, for the s.p.a.ce of a few seconds, over those malevolent lips. Mrs. Champney drew back, turned in her chair and reached for the bell.

Aurora removed her hand.

"Stop there, you've said enough, Almeda Champney!" she commanded her.

She pointed to the portrait over the fireplace. "By the love he bore my son--by the love we two women bore him--help--"

Mrs. Champney rose suddenly by great effort from her chair. The two women stood facing each other.

"Go--go!" she cried out shrilly, hoa.r.s.ely; her face was distorted with pa.s.sion, her hands were clenched and trembling violently, "leave my sight--leave my house--you--_you_ ask _me_, by the love we bore Louis Champney, to save from his just deserts Louis Champney's b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

Her voice rose to a shriek; she shook her fist in Aurora's face, then sank into her chair and, seizing the bell, rang it furiously.

Octavius darted forward, but stopped short when he heard Aurora's voice--low, dull, as if a sickening horror had quenched forever its life:

"You have thought _that_ all these years?--O G.o.d!--Louis--Louis, what more--"

She fell before Octavius could reach her. Aileen and Ann, hearing the bell, came running through the hall into the room.

"Help me up stairs, Aileen,"--the old woman was in command as usual,--"give me my cane, Ann; don't stand there staring like two fools."

Aileen made a sign to Octavius to call Hannah; the two women helped the mistress of Champ-au-Haut up to her room.

Mrs. Googe seemed not to have lost consciousness, for as Hannah bent over her she noticed that her eyelids quivered.

"She's all wore out, poor dear, that's what's the matter," said Hannah, raising her to a sitting position; she pa.s.sed her hand tenderly over the dark hair.

Aileen came running down stairs bringing salts and cologne. Hannah bathed her forehead and chafed her wrists.

In a few minutes the white lips quivered, the eyes opened; she made an effort to rise. Octavius helped her to her feet; but for Aileen's arm around her she would have fallen again.

"Take me home, Tave." She spoke in a weak voice.

"I will, Aurora," he answered promptly, soothingly, although his hands trembled as he led her to a sofa; "I'll just hitch up the pair in the carryall and Hannah'll ride up with us, won't you, Hannah?"

"To be sure, to be sure. Don't you grieve yourself to death, Mis'

Googe," she said tenderly.

"Don't wait to harness into the carryall, Tave--take me now--in the trap--take me away from here. I don't need you, Hannah. I didn't know I was so weak--the air will make me feel better; give me my cloak, Aileen."

The girl wrapped her in it, adjusted the burnous, that had fallen from her head, and went with her to the door. Aurora turned and looked at her. The girl's heart was nigh to bursting. Impulsively she threw her arms around the woman's neck and whispered: "If you need me, do send for me--I'll come."

But Aurora Googe went forth from Champ-au-Haut without a word either to the girl, to Hannah, or to Octavius Buzzby.

For the first two miles they drove in silence. The night was clear but cold, the ground frozen hard; a northwest wind roared in the pines along the highroad and bent the bare treetops on the mountain side. From time to time Octavius heard the woman beside him sigh heavily as from physical exhaustion. When, at last, he felt that she was shivering, he spoke:

"Are you cold, Aurora? I've got something extra under the seat."

"No, I'm not cold; I feel burning up."

He turned to look at her face in the glare of an electric light they were pa.s.sing. It was true; the rigor was that of increasing fever; her cheeks were scarlet.

"I wish you'd have let me telephone for the doctor; I don't feel right not to leave you in his hands to-night, and Ellen hasn't got any head on her."

"No--no; I don't need him; he couldn't do me any good--n.o.body can.--Tave, did you hear her, what she said?" She leaned towards him to whisper her question as if she feared the dark might have ears.

"Yes, I heard her--d.a.m.n her! I can't help it, Aurora."

"And you don't believe it--you _know_ it isn't true?"

Octavius drew rein for a moment; lifted his cap and pa.s.sed the back of his hand across his forehead to wipe off the sweat that stood in beads on it. He turned to the woman beside him; her dark eyes were devouring his face in the effort, or so it seemed, to antic.i.p.ate his answer.

"Aurora, I've known you" (how he longed to say "loved you," but those were not words for him to speak to Aurora Googe after thirty years of silence) "ever since you was sixteen and old Mr. Googe took you, an orphan girl, into his home; and I knew Louis Champney from the time he was the same age till he died. What I've seen, I've seen; and what I know, I know. Louis Champney loved you better'n he loved his life, and I know you loved him; but if the Almighty himself should swear it's true what Almeda Googe said, I wouldn't believe him--I wouldn't!"

The terrible nervous strain from which the woman was suffering lessened under the influence of his speech. She leaned nearer.

"It was not true," she whispered again; "I know you'll believe me."

Her voice sounded weaker than before, and Octavius grew alarmed lest she have another of what Hannah termed a "sinking spell" then and there. He drew rein suddenly, and so tightly that the mare bounded forward and pulled at a forced pace up the hill to The Gore.

"And she thought _that_ all these years--and I never knew. That's why she hates my boy and won't help--oh, how could she!"

She shivered again. Octavius urged the mare to greater exertion. If only he could get the stricken woman home before she had another turn.

"How could she?" he repeated with scathing emphasis; "just as any she-devil can set brooding on an evil thought for years till she's hatched out a devil's dozen of filthy lies." He drew the reins a little too tightly in his righteous wrath, and the mare reared suddenly. "What the dev--whoa, there Kitty, what you about?"

He calmed the resentful beast, and they neared the house in The Gore at a quick trot.

"You don't think she has ever spoken to any one before--not so, do you, Tave? not to Louis ever?--"

"No, I don't, Aurora. Louis Champney wouldn't have stood that--I know him well enough for that; but she might have hinted at a something, and it's my belief she did. But don't you fret, Aurora; she'll never speak again--I'd take my oath on that--and if I dared, I'd say I wish Almighty G.o.d would strike her dumb for saying what she has."

They had reached the house. She lifted her face to the light burning in her bedroom.

"Oh, my boy--my boy--" she moaned beneath her breath. Octavius helped her out, and holding the reins in one hand, with the other supported her to the steps; her knees gave beneath her.--"Oh, where is he to-night--what shall I do!--Think for me, Tave, act for me, or I shall go mad--"

Octavius leaned to the carriage and threw the reins around the whipstock.