"Who is he?" whispered Charley, tiptoeing up to John.

"Ask him," whispered John, as the stranger slowly opened his eyes.

Charley advanced, then retreated a step--then, won by the beaming smile which irradiated the stranger's face, he asked,

"Did you come here to see my Aunt Gertrude's pictures?"

"No," replied the stranger, with the same bright smile.

"Did you come to see John?"

"No, my dear."

"Did you come to see me?"

"Yes."

"What did you come to see me, for?"

Drawing him closer to his heart, and kissing his brow, the stranger said, "See if you can not guess."

Charley looked at Cousin John, but the conflicting expressions which flitted over his face gave him no clew. He looked at the stranger--his dark eyes were br.i.m.m.i.n.g with tears, but the same smile still played upon his lips. Charley stood for a moment irresolute, then, with another timid look into his face, he said, "I don't know--_certainly_--who you are, but--"

"But what, my dear?"

"Perhaps--you are my own papa come home."

No reply--but a deadly pallor overspread the stranger's face as he glanced in the direction of the door. John, who was standing with his back to it, turned around--and there--in the doorway, stood Rose with her small head bent forward--her lips apart--and her dilated eyes fixed upon the prostrate form before her. It was only for an instant--with a piercing cry, in which fear and joy both found utterance, she bounded to his side--kissed his brow, his lips, his eyes. Oh, was death to divide them then? G.o.d forbid!

"Vincent--Vincent--my own Vincent!" and in that long, idolatrous kiss, her woman's heart absolved the past, whatever that past might be.

CHAPTER LXVIII.

"Sit down by me--tell me what you have learned from Rose," said John, the next day to his sister.

"His history is so singular," said Gertrude, "that in a novel it would be stigmatized as incredible, overdrawn, and absurd; in truth, a novelist who would not subject himself to such charges must not too closely follow Nature. If the gorgeous colors of our autumnal scenery were faithfully transferred to canvas, the artist would be considered a glaring, tasteless burlesquer. Both artist and novelist must learn to 'tone down' their pictures; but as my story is not for the critic's ear, but for yours, John, I shall tell it verbatim.

VINCENT'S HISTORY.

"Rose and Vincent were legally married by the Rev. Mr. Lehmann, a few miles from the boarding-school where Vincent first saw Rose.

Vincent took her from thence immediately to the hotel, where his friend, the Rev. Mr. Lehmann, was staying for a few days previous to his departure for the Continent. The rector's brother, who was with him, was the witness to the ceremony.

"Rose and Vincent then left for a few days' sojourn in a neighboring city. There Vincent received intelligence of the dying condition of his aged father. As his father had been unapprised of his sudden marriage, he thought it not best to take Rose with him at such a time;--providing, therefore, every thing necessary for her comfort, and expecting to be gone at farthest but a few days, he took a reluctant leave of her--he little thought for how long a time.

"Part of the journey lay off from the regular public conveyances; and Vincent, being anxious to return to Rose as soon as possible, hesitated not, though the road was lonely, to perform it at night on horseback. On this night he was met by a gang of desperados, who, unknown to him, herded in the vicinity, and who attacked him and left him for dead, after possessing themselves of his watch, pocket-book, and papers. There he was found the next day, by a pa.s.sing traveler, in an insensible state, and taken to the nearest farm-house. He was quite unable to give any account of himself; and not wishing to be burdened with the care of him, they put him into a cart and took him to the county poor-house. Here his sufferings, aggravated by neglect, a.s.sumed the form of brain fever, and from thence, after awhile, he was removed to the lunatic asylum, where he remained for a year without any symptoms of returning reason.

"His distress, when he finally became conscious of the length of time which had elapsed since he left Rose, was too much for his weak frame. A relapse ensued, and for months longer he vibrated between life and death.

"When consciousness again returned, though weakened in body and enfeebled in mind, he commenced his weary search for Rose. He could hear nothing except that part of her story which he gleaned from Mrs. Bond, and which only served to aggravate his distress. Since then he has traveled unceasingly in steamboats, railroad cars, and stages; haunted hotels, haunted villages, and loitered trembling in churchyards. There is no misery like suspense, and acting upon an already enfeebled frame, it sapped the very fountains of life, and reduced him so fearfully as to render him quite unable to bear the sudden shock of joy which so unexpectedly met him."

"Poor Vincent!" exclaimed John; "and I have grudged him his happiness."

"Dear John!"

"Where was Charley born, Gertrude?"

"In a Lying-in Hospital; in which poor Rose took refuge when the sorrowful hour drew near.

"Then," said Gertrude, resuming her story, "Rose's husband had a cousin of the same name as himself, extravagant, reckless, and dissipated, who, though only twenty-five, had run through a handsome property, inherited in his own right from his grandmother, besides making unreasonable demands upon the paternal purse-strings. The old gentleman at last remonstrated, and the young man's affairs being even worse than he had dared to represent, he became desperate and unscrupulous.

"The father of Rose's husband, who, spite of the profligacy of his nephew, cherished a warm attachment for him, had willed him his property, in case of his son's death. This the young spendthrift was aware of, and when he first heard of the old gentleman's illness, he planned with three desperados to murder his cousin, and remove the only obstacle to his immediate possession of the fortune."

"How was this discovered?" asked John.

"It was revealed by one of the gang on his deathbed, though not until after the instigator had met his own doom at the hands of a woman whom he had betrayed and deserted."

"Then," said John, after a pause, "Rose and her husband have no immediate means of support. It is happiness to know that I can be of service even now."

"But Vincent is not a man to incur such an obligation," said his sister, "enfeebled as he is."

"He must--he shall," said the generous John, "at least till he is stronger and better able to substantiate his claim to what is rightfully his own; he _may_ get even more than his own," said John, "when the old lady in New Orleans finds out that he is the father of the beautiful child she fancied so much; the family likeness must have been well handed down in Charley's face."

"That is not strange," said Gertrude; "cases have occurred in which the family likeness, after having been apparently wholly obliterated, has re-appeared in the third or fourth generation."

"Well, Vincent's story pa.s.ses belief," said John; "truth _is_, indeed, stranger than fiction."

CHAPTER LXIX.

Had cousin John no war to wage with self? Could the long-h.o.a.rded hope of years be relinquished without a struggle? Could blissful days and nights, in which to breathe the same air with Rose, win even the faintest smile, were reward enough for any toil,--could such memories cease at once to thrill? Could he see that smile, in all its brightness, beaming upon another?--hear that voice ten fold more musically modulated whispering (not for him) words he would have died to hear--and not feel a pang bitter as death? Tell me, ye who have made earth-idols only to see them pa.s.s away?

No--cousin John felt all this; Rose lost all was lost--nothing to toil for--nothing to hope for--nothing to live for.

Was it indeed so? He dashed the unmanly tears away. Was he, indeed, such a poor, selfish driveler that the happiness of her whom he loved was less dear to him than his own? Was it no joy to see that sweet eye brighten with hope, though kindled by another? Was it nothing to see the shadow of shame pa.s.s from that fair brow, and see it lifted in the world's scornful face in loving pride to him who rightfully called her "wife?" Was it nothing that Charley's little heaving heart had found his own papa?

"Shame--shame--was _his_ manly heart powerless to bear what _she_, whom he so loved, had borne in all her woman's feebleness?"

"I knew it would be so, John," said Gertrude, gazing into her brother's calm face, in which the traces of suffering still lingered. "I knew you could conquer"--and tears of sympathy fell upon the hand she pressed.