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THE MASTER OF BERYL HEIGHTS
By Odessa Strickland Payne, Author of the “Mission Girl”, “Esther Ferr all’s Experiment”, Etc.
CHAPTER XIV.
HE day that followed was gloomy
and dark; the rain fell with that
ceaseless monotony of sound
which is so soothing in some
moods, and so depressing in oth
ers. Dr. Gordon was out of sym
pathy with nature, and he felt the
cheerless air inaugurated by the
weather inside at Beryl Heights,
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as something of a personal grievance. He
threw away the paper he had been trying to
read for half an hour, and, putting an unlight
ed cigar in his mouth, turned toward the one
place in the house which, in his worst moods
in bygone days, was not entirely without at
traction for him—the cripple’s study. He
had already had a long talk with his mother,
and he was conscious of wondering, just a lit
tle painfully, why John had not sought him
for the promised chat; it certainly savored of
neglect after so long an absence. Opening
the study door he discovered, at a glance, the
cause; the cripple lay pale and suffering on
his couch by the window. Paul crossed the
room, and, bending down to him, said:
“What is it, old fellow? our ancient foe le
blue diable sometimes ycleped dyspepsia?”
“No, it is a severe pain in my left lung.”
Dr. Gordon had always been afraid of pul
monary developments in his brother’s case,
and this confession taken in conjunction with
the bright, peculiar flush on either cheek, was
not calculated to lessen his anxiety.
“My brother!” he said, after a pause, lean
ing his elbow against the pillow, with his dark
face in tender proximity to Schiller’s, “you
could never guess how I have missed you or
wh?.t a sore trial this long absence has been
to me. I have lugged this old study and its
saintly master around the world with me, and
if I had thought not to have seen either of
you again I could not have borne it.” And the
stateliest of all stately men, as he was, toyed
with the light hair above the blue-veined
forehead, while he spoke as caressingly as a
woman.
“You know what it is to me,” John replied
not unmoved, “to have you home again with
out my telling you. Strength and joy are in
your very presence, and you and Lynne to
gether will give my life a completeness which
will render intimate friendship with others
unnecessary.” “In fact,” he added, with a
smile, “the combination is sure to be nothing
less than a total satiety.”
“Always her!” he said gently, but with ev
ident dislike to the classification, then he
went on, “I did hope that girl would be mar
ried and out of my way. lam sure I gave
her ample time. Ido not like to confess it,
but I suppose I have always been jealous of
her; she has worn my rightful purple for so
many years, and I do not know how to for
give her for having made herself dearer to
you than anybody else.” John ignored his
words with a simple statement in answer:
“She does not belong to the class of women
who marry early.”
“Why?”
“Because perhaps she is extraordinary as
you will sometime find out.”
“I should not have supposed so,” he said,
indifferently, and abruptly changed the sub
ject to family finances.
At the supper table that night, however, as
John was not present, Dr. Gordon found him
self looking, with something like interest,
across at Miss Heywood. He was trying to
solve the mystery, if there was one, and have
it over. Lynne felt his cold, analytical glance,
and her sensitive soul recoiled out of sight.
She would rather, it was true, that he did not
misunderstand her, but she disliked him too
thoroughly to aid in his translation. Once or
twice she tried to talk about current events
The Golden Age for June 22,1911.
to the lady mother but there was an unstead
iness in her voice that betrayed self con
sciousness, and a brief experiment satisfied
her. Dr. Gordon’s mental verdict was his
old one revised; as he left the table he mur
mured, sotto voice:
“A white, spiritless face, an insipid man
ner! How in the name of wonder did she
ever charm away John’s common sense? Ul
tra? yes, in a most uninteresting degree; I
should say so.”
Lynne’s room at Beryl Heights was fur
nished with a set that had been bought for
her mother in the heydey of Millwood splen
dor, consequently it was old fashioned, but it
was also very handsome. The great high
posted bedstead, with its blue silk canopy,
the tall and elaborately carved bureau, which
boasted of an ebony-framed mirror, with a
half life sized picture of the Madonna on por
celain inserted in the oval top; the square ta
ble, inlaid with mosaics, all made quite an ar
ray of ante-bellum elegance, and the girl, in
spite of the broadness of her cultivation, and
consequent liberal-mindedness, had enough of
the Bourbon left in her to appreciate even
such dumb memorials as these, because of
their association with the past. Blue silk
curtains, with broad bands of gold—Lynne
had a horror of shades—and a few paintings
well arranged, gave the finishing of bright
ness to the apartment. Lynne spent much of
her time here, for she liked the quiet of the
upstairs, and unless she studied with Schiller
she rareiy staid down stairs until after din
ner. This morning she sat by one of the front
windows, writing. Her life had in it but one
purpose—a purpose that sternly battled all
things else down, and pointed upward with
an iron hand. A fixed determination that left
no glad room for enjoyment; that robbed the
days of rest ano the nights of slumber. A
something that at times touched her with the
sublime ecstasy of victory, and at others left
ner burdened with the weary weight of a
great despair. A life-work which absorbed
all the energies of an ardent, aspiring mind;
that called for much study as well as heroic
endurance, and almost tireless patience. But
she was subject to intrusion, even in her own
room; for there was a light tap on the door,
and Floyd, dressed very becomingly, entered
and took possession of an ottoman, then ask
ed abruptly:
“In the name of common sense, Lynne, do
you never tire of study?”
“Yes, occasionally,” Lynne answered,
pleasantly, but without lifting her eyes from
the paper.
“Then why don’t you rest sometimes?”
“Because—well, I do.”
“Haven’t you sat up every night this week
until two o’clock?”
“Yes. But how did you know?”
“Cousin Paul saw the light from your win
dow, and read me a moral lecture about phy
sical sin.”
“Verily, but you know I haven’t been fol
lowing my usual rule.”
“Oh, indeed! I thought it was a Mede and
Persian regulation. It seems to me you nev
er do anything but study, everlastingly.”
“Then you are not very observant, Floyd.
My rule is to study until two o’clock in the af
ternoon, and after that to practice, sew and
do anything like other girls.”
“Complimentary! But you break your rule
as often as you keep it; and, according to
Cousin Paul, no woman of delicate mould can
stand it.”
“Another Daniel come to judgment. Has
he been kind enough to consider the hope
lessness of my case already ?”
“No, he does not know anything about your
bookish propensities, but he thought I was
keeping late hours, and harangued me unmer-
cifully. Apropos of our Sir Galahad, will you
please enlighten me in regard to the anti
pathy which exists between you and him?”
“I do not understand you.”
“Oh, how innocent we’are! what in the
world is the reason you never talk with Cous
in Paul?”
“Because,” and how cold the tone, “he
never addresses himself particularly to me,
and I have yet to learn the art of arrogating
myself.”
“Did you never converse with him?”
“Yes, once when I was quite a child.’
“And you think him stern and unapproach
able, without doubt; he has such dignified
manners that any one with only a superficial
knowledge of his character would be obliged
to misunderstand him. It is so funny that
you and he should so thoroughly dislike each
other, when you both pretend to belong to the
intellectual order, and you might have such a
nice time. Well, I’m glad you do not frater
nize, for I like my exclusive Cousin Paul too
well to want to share him with anybody.
Dear me, if the hall clock is not striking nine,
and I promised to be ready to ride with Paul.
Au revoir.”
Lynne looked up as Floyd reached the
door. “Are you going to the village ?”
“No we will ride out to the factory to see
John’s new Sunday-school chapel. Paul
thinks I will be charmed with the gothic style
thinks I will be charmed with the Gothic style
into raptures over the stained glass window
above the pulpit. I, who have seen the ca
thedrals in Canada and Mexico.”
“I did not know that window was any hand
somer than any other in the house; they are
all of stained glass.”
“Impossible!”
“Oh, they were not costly; they were made
of scrap-glass from the manufactories.”
“Then they are not worth looking at.”
“On the contrary, Schiller assures me that
they are exceedingly pretty.”
“I don’t believe it; though, of course, I
admit his infallibility about everything else
under the sun.”
And with a slight smile and a wave of her
jeweled hand, Miss Gordon disappeared.
Lynne laid her manuscript down upon the
table with a quick impulse that told of
aroused feeling, and began to walk the floor
with locked hands. “Floyd evidently enjoys
tantalizing me about Dr. Gordon, and it is
growing to be a daily inquisition. She thinks
she is safe, because she sees how proud I am
and how insurmountable are the barriers
which divide us.” With a flash in her warm
blue eyes, she went on, “But, if ever the day
comes when I can remove this bar of silence
from my lips; if my intellect and heart only
once shall find utterance before him, so that
he shall see my true self, then you might pile
Alps on Alps between us, but his friendship
would be mine.” After this conditional pro
phecy, she locked the door on the outside upon
her unfinished labors and went down stairs.
She encountered the object of her thoughts
in the lower hall; he bowed with stoical readi
ness, but she passed on without so much as
lifting her eyes. She found his mother in
the old-fashioned sitting room, where it was
her custom to spend the morning.
“Oh, mother!” she said, as she threw her
self down in a rocking chair opposite the
placid woman; “I am come to ask an impos
sible favor.”
“Well, my dear, is not that rather a para
doxical statement.”
“No if you would only let me!”
Mrs. Gordon smiled—
“l am so restless! indeed I am in such an
alarming exuberant mood that I do not feel
(Continued on page 15.)
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