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THE MASTER OF "BERYL HEIGHTS
HE glad carnival of the Christmas
days, and the solemnities and de
lights of New Year week, had all
come and gone at Beryl Heights.
There had been some pleasant and
cultured people gathered within its
time-honored walls during the hol
idays, and though they had in-
ran 1
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—I dulged in nothing more exciting
than an oratorio, followed by historical tab
leaux, they had enjoyed themselves thor
oughly.
But this clear night in February finds the
master of Beryl Heights and his mother alone
at home. He sat by the square mahogany
center table, reading a theological work, while
she rested in a low rocker before the fire, with
her hands crossed over a colored confusion of
unwound wool in her lap. Presently the crip
ple glanced up at the old-fashioned clock, tick
ing solemnly between the portraits of his
grandparents on the high mantel piece.
“Mother,” he said, “It is time Paul and
Floyd should be here. The train was due at
the village an hour ago. I feel as if he had
been gone a year instead of four months. I
miss him so much, and yet I ought to be ac
customed to it. I am sure he stayed long
enough in Heidleberg to make me.”
“Yes,” she assented, and then went on with
the slightest imaginable evidence of impa
tience in her voice, “but what do you think of
this new addition to our household, which he
writes he is bringing to be a guest for an in
definite time?”
“Cousin Floyd? I do not know, mother;
she was such a little girl when I saw her last.
You remember I was at White Sulphur
Springs the summer she and Uncle Robert
were here.”
“Yes, but I had forgotten it.”
“As a young lady, how does Floyd look,
like a Gordon?”
“No, my son, she is every inch a Ross, a
beauty, as they all have been before her, with
the fatal Circe eyes and golden hair. The
type which men from time immemorial have
, gone mad about. And your uncle, with all of
his superiority, was, unfortunately, no excep
tion.”
His mother waited, as if expecting some
kind of comment from him, but he only look
ed at the page of his book and closed it. Then
she placed the crimson and gold wool on the
nearest chair and stood up, leaning slightly
against the mantel, and Schiller thought as he
looked at the commanding figure and grave,
intellectual face, that of all men he was most
blessed in a mother. Her next words startled
him.
“I am very sorry, John, that Floyd is to
come here. I do not care for Paul to be asso
ciated with her so intimately. He is so ex
clusive, and consequently so ignorant of
women, that he will be all the more easily fas
cinated, if his cousin should happen to under
take the task. No, hear me out, my son, I
do not hold her responsible for her mother’s
sin. I do not think that because she was
worldly and selfish in the highest degree that
her daughter is necessarily like her; but I do
say that I cannot understand her. Why has
she left her little sister at the North in spite
of my most urgent invitations to bring her
with her? Why is it that she answers my
questions about her in her letters in such a
vague and unsatisfactory manner? Is it be
cause she is a hunchback, and she is ashamed
to have her introduced here as her sister? or
■does she shrink from caring for her personally
since she has become a hopeless invalid? I
think the loss of both of their parents ought
to have made them dearer to each other,
By Odessa Strickland Payne, Author of the ”Mission Girl," "‘Esther TerralVs Experiment,” Etc,
CHAPTER VII.
The Oolden Age for April 13, 1011.
bound them inseparably together, and I shall
tell Floyd so, whether she likes to hear it or
not.”
The cripple sighed.
“Perhaps she intends to write for Ray.”
“No, my son I never expect to see the poor,
little afflicted darling again, unless I go North
after her, and if Floyd were not her guardian
I should do it, for I am sure she needs my
sympathy and care.”
“We must persuade Floyd to let her come
to us; we can do nothing less, and as my un
cle’s will is as it is, no more. Everything de
pends upon Floyd’s permission, and together
we can surely win it. So cheer up, mother,
you shall see Ray’s sweet face without jour
neying to New York for the pleasure, my
word for it.”
At that moment was heard the sound of
wheels, and it was perhaps significant that
the stately lady kept her seat by the glowing
fire, while the cripple made his way out into
the moonlight to welcome his cousin to Beryl
Heights.
CHAPTER VIII.
Floyd Gordon was a queenly looking girl;
blonde haired, blue eyed and beautiful, and,
in a quiet way, rather self-assertive. She was
courteously civil to her aunt and the cripple.
She seemed to accept their advances with a
mental reservation, very probably because she
understood that neither of them approved of
her strange disposal of her little sister. She
had stated to them both in a conversation that
occurred soon after her arrival, that it was
in accordance with the best medical advice in
the city that Ray had been placed in a sur
gical infirmary for treatment. She had curva
ture of the spine, but her case was not con
sidered hopeless. It was no doubt very sis
terly in her to provide a special nurse for the
invalid, besides allowing her a generous sum
of money to spend as she pleased, but Mrs.
Gordon thought it all an affectation of affec
tion, because she had left her among stran
gers sick and helpless, perhaps to die alone;
and while she always treated her niece kindly,
and never forgot that she was her guest, she
kept her, as it were, in the vestibule of her
great heart, while the door to the holy of
holies remained locked.
Dr. Gordon had seen Ray while in New
York, and had pronounced her incurable; in
his opinion her disease was already beyond
treatment. But he had not thought to con
demn Floyd for leaving her at the infirmary
while she came South on a long visit. She
said she needed rest and recreation, and it
did not occur to him that she might be telling
a story, because she looked perfectly well. A
man engrossed in a profession rarely sees the
wrong and cruel side of things, unless he
should happen to stumble over them and soil
his own broadcloth and gloves, and then 'he is
aghast at the mud and devil’s dirt. Floyd Gor
don was twenty-one, an heiress in her own
right, and as she owed neither obedience nor
allegiance to anybody, she generally followed
the dictates of her own sovereign will. Schil
ler was obliged to see that she worshipped
and magnified herself in a certain high bred
way; that she was the heroine of every episode
of her school days, and that her devotion to
Ray had almost killed her, were her standard
themes out of which she composed melodious
variations in her own praise continually. Mrs.
Gordon saw with such anguish as only a moth
er can feel, that to the handsome Heidleber
gian, Floyd always unbent in her coldest
moods; that she studied to please and fasci
nate him. But she was too wise a woman to
say anything about her disapprobation and
fears to him. She told him, however, when
they were alone one afternoon, something of
what a miserable failure as a wife Floyd’s
mother had been; of the unspeakable wretch
edness she had brought to her uncle by her
foolish fondness for the society of other men,
and by taking a fashionable latitude in other
ways hardly less deplorable. Floyd kept away
from Schiller’s study and influence, as much
as possible. Spirituality, in such pleasant ab
stract as going to church, magnificently dress
ed, and listening or not, as she chose, to a
brief discourse, she did not object to,'but this
grand living embodiment of Christ-likeness
made her feel so uncomfortable that she half
despised the cripple because of it. But Floyd
Gordon was a member of the church, and gave
liberally out of her abundance to its support.
She did not profess to be very religious, and
except that her name had been recorded on
the church book, and she acknowledged it by
being liberal to its institutions, anybody would
have been troubled to find any other evidence
of piety. Her time, talent and heart she re
served to herself, apparently without a thought
or care as to the consequences. She seemed
to have no higher aim in life than to have
a gay and pleasant time in the world. Her
philosophy was altogether epicurean, and she
made no secret of it.
Floyd rested upon the stone of. the terrace
steps after a purposeless walk, with a cluster
of crimson roses in her hands, and the bits of
color clinging over her mourning dress be
trayed how she had been employing herself.
Ihe long veil of crape, which escaped from
the back of a coquetish little hat, made a
charming background of rippling darkness for
the cold face, with its crown of .'blonde hair,
and though it lay on the steps in heavy folds
behind her, it did not hide the perfection of
her figure, or the grace of her attitude. The
spectator for whom this well arranged tab
leau had been prepared, was a long time com
ing, and Miss Gordon had leisure granted her
to grow impatient, which she evidently did,
by the fold across her white brow, that van
ished, however, as the sound of horse hoofs
fell upon her ear. Dr. Paul, returning from
a visit to a patient, rode rapidly round the
gleaming curve of the fence, which circled up
to the gate of the avenue and reined up sud
denly, as he saw the picture made between the
great vine-hung marble vases on the terrace
steps. He lifted his hat. “Cousin Floyd study
ing our landscape by the glamour of sunset?”
“No,” she said, “I have been imitating you
in a certain professional sense —that is dissect
ing, or what is it I should say—anatomizing?”
“Indeed! Let me commiserate you,” he
said, with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
“What have you been employing your dainty
scalpel upon, insects or flowers? No? then
perhaps you have been cruel enough to sacri
fice the mocking bird of la mere. Alas! alas!
that our poor Beethoven should fall a victim
to such ultra aspirations. May the song that
you cut out of his silver throat haunt you until
your dying day!”
“Spare me your poetical maledictions,” she
said, lifting her white hand, “I was speaking
altogether in a metaphorical sense, and if you
must know, about myself.”
“A fine subject, verily; give me the result.”
“More weakness than strength,” she said,
after a pause, and with well assumed earnest
ness, “more sensibility than power to endure,
and deeper soul sympathies than the intellect
can balance. And not enough conceit,” she
added, with a coquettish nod, “to keep me
comfortable under my cousin’s searching
eyes.”
He answered with apparent gravity, as he
dismounted and took his bridle rein on his
arm, leaning carelessly down on the gate post.
“Analysis of self is necessary to development
of character and those who neglect it are
(Continued on Page 14.)
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