"Now, Uncle Walter, I want to hear the remainder of what you have to tell me about my father and mother."

CHAPTER IV.

MONA ASKS SOME PERTINENT QUESTIONS.

Mr. Dinsmore's face clouded instantly at Mona's request, but after thinking a moment, he threw back his head with a resolute air, and said:

"There is not so very much more to tell, Mona--it is the oft repeated story of too much love and trust on the part of a pure and lovely woman, and of selfish pleasure and lack of principle on the part of the man who won her. When your mother was eighteen--just your age to-day, dear--she fell in love with Richmond Montague, and secretly married him."

"Then she was _legally_ his wife!" burst forth Mona, with pale and trembling lips. "Oh, I have so feared, from your reluctance to tell me my mother's history, that--that there was some shame connected with it."

"No--no, dear child; set your heart at rest upon that score. She was legally married to Richmond Montague; but his first sin against her was in not making the fact public. He was just starting on a tour abroad and persuaded her to go with him. He claimed that he could not openly marry her without forfeiting a large fortune from an aunt, whose only heir he was, and who was determined that he should marry the daughter of a life-long friend. She was in feeble health and wanted him to be married before he went abroad, as she feared she might not live until he should come back. This he refused to do, although he allowed her to believe that he intended to marry Miss Barton upon his return. But he did marry your mother, and they sailed for Europe.

"They spent a few months traveling together, but while they were in Paris, your father suddenly disappeared, and it became evident to your mother that she had been deserted. To make matters worse, the people of the house where they had been living became suspicious of her, accused her of having been living unlawfully, and drove her away. She was desperate, and went directly to London, intending to return to America, but was taken ill there, and was unable to go on.

"Three months later I learned, indirectly, of her wretched condition, and I hastened to her, as I have already told you, only to find that I was too late--she had died just three days before my arrival, and only a few hours after your birth. Oh, Mona! I was heartbroken, for she was all I had, and the knowledge of her wrongs and sufferings drove me nearly wild; but--I cannot live over those wretched days--I simply _endured_ them then because I could not help myself. But, as time pa.s.sed, I gradually learned to love _you_--you became my one object in life, and I vowed that I would do everything in my power to make your life happy, for your mother's sake, as well as for your own," he concluded in tremulous, husky tones, while tears stood in his eyes.

"Dear Uncle Walter, no one could have been more kind than you have been,"

the young girl said, nestling closer to him; "you have been both father and mother to me, and I am very grateful--"

"Hush, Mona! Never speak of grat.i.tude to me," he said, interrupting her, "for you have been a great comfort to me; you have, indeed, taken the place of the little girl who never lived to call me father--and--have helped me to bear other troubles also," he concluded, flushing hotly, while a heavy frown contracted, his brow.

Mona glanced at him curiously, and wondered what other troubles she had helped him to bear; but her mind was so full of her own family history she did not pay much attention to it then. The remark recurred to her later, however.

"There is one thing more, Uncle Walter," she said, after a thoughtful pause. "What became of my father?"

Her companion seemed to freeze and become rigid as marble at this question.

"I wish you would not question me any further, Mona," he said, in a constrained tone. "Your father forfeited all right to that t.i.tle from you before your birth. Cannot you be satisfied with what I have already told you?"

"No, I cannot," she resolutely replied. "Where did he go? What happened to him after my mother died? Has he ever been heard of since?" were the quick, imperative queries which dropped from her lips.

"Oh, yes," said Mr. Dinsmore, replying to the last query; "he married Miss Barton--the girl his aunt had chosen for him--shortly after his return to this country. The woman had set her heart upon the match, and died a month after the marriage, leaving her nephew the whole of her fortune."

"Did he--my father--know that he had a child living?" demanded Mona, in a constrained tone.

"Certainly."

"And--and--" she began, with crimson cheeks and blazing eyes, then choked and stopped.

"I know what you would ask--'did he ever wish to claim you?'"

supplemented her companion, a bitter smile curling his white lips. "I have never been asked to give you up, Mona," he continued, apparently putting it thus so as to wound her as little as possible; "but I should not have done so under any circ.u.mstances."

"Did he never offer to settle anything upon me out of his abundance?" the young girl asked, bitterly.

"No; no settlement, no allowance was ever made, I alone have cared for you. But do not grieve--it has been a very delightful care to me, dear,"

Mr. Dinsmore said, tenderly, while he stroked her soft hair fondly with a hand that was far from steady.

"Is the--man living now?" Mona demanded, a cold glitter in her usually gentle eyes.

Mr. Dinsmore threw out his hand with a gesture of agony at this question.

Then suddenly pulling himself together, he hoa.r.s.ely responded:

"No."

But he turned his face away from her gaze as he said it.

"When and where did he die?"

"Do not ask me. Oh, Mona, for pity's sake, ask me nothing more. I cannot, I will not bear this inquisition any longer," the man cried, in a despairing tone.

The young girl's face blanched suddenly at this, and she turned a wild, startled look upon her companion, as a terrible suspicion flashed into her mind.

Had her uncle avenged her mother's wrongs?--was his hand stained with her father's blood, and was this the reason why he was so fearfully agitated in speaking of these things?

It was an awful thought, and for a moment, every nerve in her body tingled with pain. All her strength fled, and she dared not question him further on that point, for her own sake, as well as his.

There was a dead silence for several moments, while both struggled for the mastery of their emotions; then Mona said, in a low, awed tone:

"Just one thing more, Uncle Walter--is--his other wife living?"

"I believe so."

"Where is she?"

"I do not know."

"Did she care nothing for me?"

"No, she hated your mother, and you a hundred-fold on her account."

"That is enough--I have heard all that I wish," Mona said, coldly, as she started to her feet and stood erect and rigid before him. "You said truly when you told me that the man deserved hatred and contempt. I do hate and scorn him with all the hate and strength of my nature. I am glad he is dead. Were he living, and should he ever seek me, I would spurn him as I would spurn a viper. But oh, Uncle Walter, you must let me lean upon you more than ever before, for my heart is very, very sore over the wrong that has been done my poor mother and me. How good you have been to me--and I love you--I will always love and trust you, and I will never ask you any more questions."

She flung her arms around his neck, buried her face in his bosom, and burst into a pa.s.sion of tears. The sorrowful story to which she had listened, and the fearful suspicion which, at the last, had so appalled her, had completely unnerved her.

The man clasped her to him almost convulsively, though a strong shudder shook his frame, laid his own face caressingly against her soft brown hair, and let her weep until the fountain of her tears was exhausted, and he himself had become entirely composed once more.

"My dear child," he said, at last, "let these be the last tears you ever shed for the wrong done you. I beg you will not allow the memory of it to make you unhappy, my Mona; for as I have a.s.sumed a father's care for you in the past, so I shall continue to do in the future; you shall never want for anything that I can give you while I live, and all that I have will be yours when I am gone. I have made an appointment with my lawyer for the day after to-morrow," he went on, in a more business-like tone, "when I purpose making my will, giving you the bulk of my property. I ought to have done this before; but--such matters are not pleasant to think about, and I have kept putting it off. Now dry your tears, my dear; it pains me to see you weep. And here," he added, smiling, and forcing himself to speak more lightly, "I almost forgot that I had something else for your birthday. Come, try on these trinkets, for you must wear them to the opera to-night."

He took a case from his pocket as he spoke, and slipped it into her hands.

Mona looked up surprised.