The sunny South. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1875-1907, July 14, 1877, Image 1

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extinct print LOST—A Great English Story, Begins This Week. VOL. III. JOHN H. SEALS, [proprietor. ATLANTA, GA., SATURDAY, JULY 14. 1877. m-T7i-p-\*-Q 1 f3 PER ANNUM 1 HiXVA'lO, 1 IN ADVANCE. .NO. 110. ASTRAY. • . . . “A straggler from all folds, I roam in unclosed pastures. I have sought The bondage of a Faith, yet still am driven Hack to the unwelcome liberty of Doubt, llail to Utopia ! Happy golden Time That will, but will so slowly, come. I, too, Hear the glad music of the onward march. It comes this way. It dies upon the wind. It comes not. While I strain my ear, it sounds Fainter aud fainter —farther, farther off. All hail! celestial climes! Rapt on tbi* faith I rise; I, also, with the throng of saints, And take my place in Heaven. Trembling I sit, Conscious of dust aud mutability. Not mine these seats eternal of the gods: Mine nothing hut this trauce—this dreatn of thought, In which gods, too, appear and pass. Will Death, With soft mesmeric breathing on my brow, \\ ake to new life ? Or, with slow moving band. Touch this wild dream into the perfect sleep? ” Luxmore. fFor The Sunny South.] THE MYSTERY CEDAR BAY BY MARY E. UK VAN. CHAPTER XXI. When Marian returned from the funeral, she found the carriage of Mrs. Norris at the cot tage door. She had come to see Alice. She was sitting by her with her arm around the slender waist, and the girl’s languid head resting upon her bosom. “Ah ! ’ thought Marian bitterly, “She can be affectionate and motherly, now "that she knows Alice has broken her engagement with her son, and refuses to see him.” Mrs Norris was exceedingly kind. Perhaps something of remorse was mixed with the ten derness she lavished with such impressement. She could not look unmoved upon the sulfering apparent in that pale, yonog face. She had brought flowers, and cOnf AUkinery, and an arm ful of new books and magazines. Alice smiled gratefully, and turned the pages of the books, and tasted the delicacies, and smelled of the flowers, exerting herself to seem pleased and interested; but Marian saw that the effort was a painful one,—that the smile was languid and forced, and that the sick and weary heart re fused to be consoled by the tokens of an affec tion which had not scrupled to sacrifice its ob ject on the altar of family pride. Mrs. Norris’ resemblance to her son was to strong; her pres ence reminded the sad girl too forcibly of past happiness for her visit to be other than painful. Her caresses were endured rather than accepted, for Alice could not not forget that she was thought unworthy to be the wife of her son. Her spirit, though broken, was not destroyed. The elder sister was cold and haughty, scarcely speaking to their visitor, but feeling keenly through sympathy with her sister. It was an unspeakable relief when the lady rose to go. She requested Marian so pointedly to accompa ny her to the carriage that she could not refuse. The name of Ernest had not been mentioned before, but as soon as tney were out of the bouse, Mrs. Norris began to praise Alice for her prudence and resolution. “ I had no idea of such strength of character. She always seemed snch a gentle, child-like creature. She has shown herself truly unsel fish, and possessed of extraordinary firmness. Ernest tells me she refuses to see him. or to re ceive his letters. Poor fellow ! he is half heart broken about it, and very angry with me. Never mind; he will get over it,—they both will. In a few weeks he will be calm enough for reason. As for her, she is quite a philosopher; she bears her misfortune nobly.’’ “It is killing her!” said Marian, turning sternly upon the smooth-spoken lady. “You see it and know it. madam.” Mrs. Norris changed color. She looked at Marian with a startled and anxious glance. “Nonsense!” she said, recovering herself. “ She looks a little pale because of her recent sickness. She will get over this, depend upon it. She is made of sterner stuff 1 . t T nder that soft exterior there is a firm, elastic basis that will ” “ Spare me any further analysis, madam,” interrupted Marian. “I feel too much for my sister to follow you in your speculations on her disposition. ” Bowing coldly, Marian left her at the carriage door. Dr. Norris came the next morning but one to make bis usual inquiry after Alice. He bad not seen her since her removal to the cottage. See ing Marian at the window of the front room, he alighted from his buggy and joined her quietly without his visit having been announced to any one. He found her absent-minded and dispir ited. He himself was no less so; and after she had told him that Alice had passed a wakeful and feverish night, he stood looking out of the window in gloomy silence. At last he said: “ Mr. De Forest goes away to-morrow.” “To-morrow !” cried Marian, amazed almost aghast at the news, for she felt as if her slender hope of solving the secret of her sister’s fate was going with him. “ I—I thought he was too ill.” “He has strong vital powers, and a will that strangely enough, seems fast mastering a disease I had thought would bring him almost to the door of death. He will go away to-morrow, if the ship for New Orleans comes in to-day, as is expected. He goes first to that city on business, and thence North to embark for Europe. I saw him this morning. He was up. dressed, pacing the gallery with the monkey at his heels, as oi old. But his step was unsteady, and there is nothing about his face that looks like a living man except his eyes. Marian,” he continued, turning to her abruptly, “I begin not to won der so much at your suspicion of Mr. De Forest. Not that I think there is any ground of reality for that suspicion: I believe it was wholly un founded, and no doubt you see it so now. But there is something on that man’s mind. 'What done, that he cannot rest—that he knows eace by day or night ? His domestic mis fortunes may account for it in part, but only in part. Can it be remorse?” “Or is it fear?” answered Marian, musingly. i , ^ “Dread of discovery, together with a terror of ence in my behalf, that she may give me a righ * i.:- ’ ; 1 to go with her. Reason, persuade, plead lor me, as you value her happineess—perhaps her life. If she will not consent, she must go with out me. I have friends in Havana; her father had friends there, also. I will make what ar rangements I can for her and you.” With a few more words, he left, and Marian walked the floor with hands locked across her i Her expression underwent a change. The com municative look disappeared; the old grim, guarded aspect returned. “The light was dim; I was not near enough to tell,” she answered, and immediately relapsed into her habitual taciturnity. Marian only won dered that she had broken through in this in stance. She mast have been strongly moved by the strange sight she had seen; and perhaps the utterly gloomly and isolated life she now led bad caused a reaction even in her stern nature, and made it a relief to speak to someone. Ma rian had often asked herself if it was not prob able that this woman knew something concern ing the mystery which hung over the house in which she served. She had lived in the family for many years, yet no art of Marian had ever drawn from her any, except the most unimpor tant, reminiscence of the past. If she possessed any knowledge of the family secrets, she kept it close locked in her breast. It was true, how ever, that much of the later life of Aubrey De Forest and his adopted nephew had been spent abroad. Of one thing Marian was sure: the mu- lattress was ignorant of the one mystery that was racking her own brain. Jeannette could know nothing of Adrienne’s disappearance. She was away from the house when it took place. She had been away all night; and her look of amazement and perplexity when Adrienne De Forest was found to be missing was too natural to have been feigned. Marian was leaving the room, when Caleb passed the door, stopping to say that he was going up to his master’s room to make a fire. Mr. De Forest was resting in the boat-house. “He’s powerful faint-like and mighty used up,” was the boy’s report. “You went too far,” said Jeannette, with an j anxious face. “We only went to ‘Dead-Man’s Island,’and | coasted round her to the side where the fisher- I man’s cabin stands. He would git out there, and leave me in the boat till he went to the cabin to shut up things. When he come back, he was white as ashes, and he sunk down in the bottom of the boat a’most in a swound. I had done ask him to let me go and shet up the house - gc<>daes“ kcowjj ! I wouldn’t a-tetched a thiug belongin’ to that old witch-woman for all the gold buried on ‘Dead-Man’s Island’—but he wouldn’t let me.” “He was right not to trust yon,” Janette 1 said. “ Go on and make the fire. You talk too much.” So the visit of Mr. De Forest had been to “ Dead Man’s Island,” and he had left the serv ant in the boat and gone up to the house alone, and had returned faint and exhausted. Why had he been so eager to go to the island ?—so particular about locking up the house with his own hands? As Marian was opening the gate, she saw Jeanette coming behind her, a bottle of wine in She must go them And, Marian” hecontinued, j templating the harsh Indian-looking profile of o^heT wHnkfed face' aking her hand and pressing it tightly between , Le woman, who knelt belore a smal image of : showed u mor | snnken and cada verous than his, “I beseech you to use your utmost influ- ; the \ irgin, muttering “Hail Marys with rap- ; wa _ jts _ nnt Marian snoke to her kindlv. His attitude expressed at once weary wretchedness and anxious thought. the supernatural, acting on his morbid imagin ation ? A ” She stopped: her quick ear had caught the sound of approaching footsteps—Alice's step. She hastened to the door to meet her and warn her of Ernest’s presence in the room. She was too late. The girl's slender, black-robed figure stood in the entrance. Dr. Norris turned. Their eyes met, and, with the blood flushing into her pale cheeks, Alice made a quick step forward to meet him. Suddenly she stopped, remembering the barrier between them. Her color fled; her figure tottered as she turned to wards her sister. But Ernest was at her side. He caught her in his arms and held her there, kissing her tenderly. Then lifting her slight form, he placed her on a seat and sat down be side her. He held her hands in his and looked at her white, thin face. He tried to speak, but could not. His lips were held together in the effort to keep them steady. Tears stood in his eyes and choked his utterance. “Alice, my darling,” he said at last, “this must not go on. You must not drive me away from you. You are breaking both our hearts. You are mine -my own. Who has a right to stand between us ? Come to me; be my-wife; give me the right to care for you. Do not refuse me; do not stand upon a mistaken point of duty.” He drew her gently to him as he spoke. He looked down upon her with his pleading eyes with his tender, persuasive smile. one tortured by uncertainty and despair. “I must go away without having found her. The shadow of infamy must rest upon her mem ory forever. Alice must droop under it; Alice must die because of it. And I—ah ! God, I am powerless to do anything. I had hoped ” She hardly knew what she had hoped. A deep, unreasoned impression had stamped itself upon her mind that something would occur to clear up the dark secret of her sister’s disap pearance; that some clue would make itself ap parent, which she might pursue to a solution of the mystery,—mystery only to her, for to every other mind the fact of Adrienne De Forest’s idly moving lips. Marian had never supposed her to be devotional, and now there was none of | the calmness of piety in her face, but an ex pression of anxiety and fear. Tbe unquiet mood ! of the girl would not suffer her to wait. As J soon as Jeannette made a movement to rise, she I glided into the room, her long dress trailing and rustling as she walked. The mulattress started 1 up with a scream. She stared at Marian with a i Gradually recover ing. she curtseyed in an agitated manner. “Excuseme, miss,” she said. “I am not my- ! self at all this morning—and you came in so | suddenly.” “I am sorry I frightened you. I went to Mr. j De Forrest’s room, and finding no one there, I | came here in search of you.” “Mr. De Forest is out on the water.” “On the water! and he was just now so ill? Is he alone?” “He has Caleb with him,” she answered, still | trembling, and seeming so strangely unnerved j that Marian said: “It is extraordinary for you to be disturbed so easily. The unusual work and watching you have done of late have been to much for you.” was its wont. Marian spoke to her kindly. “Where is Maggie? Why do you not get some of the younger ones to help you? This is too much for you.” “ He does not like them. He sent Maggie away. He wants no one but me about him.” “ Did you know,” asked Marian, watching her, “ that he was going away very soon ? ” “He has told me that he was going to try a little change for the benefit of his health.” So, thought Marian, she does not know, then, of the sale of the place—of Mr. De Forest’s plans for going away, to return no more. Marian walked slowly home, revolving in her mind the strange story she had heard from the house-keeper. What could this apparition be ? It could not be a spectral illusion. It had been seen by different persons at different times. It had been seen each of the three nights that had passed since the death of the disguised woman of the island. True, the only witnesses were negroes—a race so imaginative and so prone to believe the marvellous that their evidence might be reasonably doubted. But Jeanette—tbe calm, tbe reliable, almost wholly unlike her race — some credence must be given to her story. Some- elopement was too plain for a passing doubt. She had ceased to speak even to Alice and Dr. uuc .u mwu .u. yuu . , , , - . , , , , , , Norris of her conviction that the disappearance “It is not that,” she said, shaking her head ^! n S strange and unaccountable she had surely of her sister was due to the agency of another, j mysteriously. “I am strong enough to bear seen - , , .. It was idle to do so, for they looked upon it as a work and watching. It is nothing any mortal ske reac hed c°ttag e > she looked down deluson, which it was strange could be cherished being has put upon me that is the matter.” I "' l ' ~ 1 ' J TI *~~ "What, then, is it? Why do you look and ! by the clear-brained Marian. Was it, indeed, a delusion ? Was all this ra agonized thought useless, and undeserved by She caught hold of the back of a chair, and uile. For a mo- j the sister sleeping under the blue gulf waves in j leaned upon it, looking doubtfully at Marian, ment. she rested passively in his arms, giving : the arms of her lover? For an instant the j “ I ought not to speak of it, maybe; but it lies herself up forgetfully to the content of being 1 temptation to believe it assailed her. She drove j so heavy on my mind. I can’t think of any- beloved. Then she freed herself quietly from it back in indignantly. She clung, with all her ; thing else. It was so white and awful. It was soul, to the conviction of her sister’s innocence his clasp. “Do not tempt me to turn from the way I feel to be right,” she said, standing before him. “ I know it is best for me and for you. Be re signed to it, dear Ernest. Believe me, I am wholly decided, when I tell you that, under the present sad, changed circumstances, we two can never marry.” He something from the other world. It was a spirit.” to the beach beyond and saw Captain Head just pulling to shore in his smaller boat. A thought came to her. She passed on and went down to the seaside to meet him. “Have you been fishing ?” she said. “No; there is no luck. The weather is too unsettled. I have been to the light-house to take a look after the ship that is due from Havana to-day.” “A spirit! Wherewasit? What was it like ? ’’ : “Did you see her? ... “ It was a tall, white figure. It was the same • ™ c0 " ld \ t “ ake her , ont ’ K 0331 ^ 6 that some of o„ peopled,, tbe nigh, before the tuneral. I saw it the same night of the burial,—I saw it then at a distance. I was stand ing on the back gallery of the wing, and I saw baseless dream as it seemed, with all the probabilities against it, and the belief of all others opposing it: But now days had length ened into weeks since the calamity had befallen her. She had stayed on the scene of its occur rence, watching, waiting, praying; believing that here something would take place, that the < it moving slowly down the path thatleads to the She turned to go. He made a passionate ’ hand of Providence would throw some light ; river. It was before my eyes for a moment, and movement to detain her, but she motioned him j upon the mystery which maddened her. But j then it disappeared bfhind a clump of trees. I back. She bent her head with a slight, graceful now circumstances were peremptorily forcing I saw it last night again. The clock had just motion, so like Adrienne, and kissed his hand, her away; and Mr. De Forest, with whom, in , struck twelve. I had a toothache, and couldn’t that was stretched out to keep her. She looked her own mind, this secret seemed so closely ; rest in my bed. I was walking down by the or- at him with eyes that foretold a life-time of un- linked, was about to escape her—was about to chard fence, when I saw the thing again. It dying love; then turned and went from the leave his old life behind him, and enter upon came gliding slowly up from the pine thicket thinking: “ The ship is notin. Mr. De Forest room with a step so faltering that her sister | that new existence in the far Orient which his by the path that runs back of the orchard, will not leave for another day. Something may sprang to her side and accompanied her to her j desperate soul had painted in colors of hope. , When it came out from the shadow of the fence, take place in that time.” chamber. ! And still nothing had been discovered; no hand I saw it in the moonlight almost as plain as I j “When shall we have the vessel from New When Marian returned, Dr. Norris started up, : of Providence had parted the curtain of mys- j see you. When it reached the place where the Orleans ?” and, approaching her, said, in agitated tones: tery. Adrienne’s name was a word of shame two paths met, it stopped and stood as if hesi- “About three days from now. The two vessels upon every lip; and Alice, innocent Alice, must tating which way to go; then it turned around usually meet and pass each other about Apa- suffer for it the shipwreck of hope, happiness and went down the path towards the river.” lachicola. The ‘Lavaca’ is due next Thursday, and health. ( “Why did you not follow it, and see if it were She'll probably come in a day later.” Her thoughts were torturing. The four walls j not flesh and blood?” “ We are going to Havana on her—Alice and God forbid !” said the woman, crossing her- I—because of Alice’s health. It is a sudden line of ships are like fashionable ladies—always a leetle behind time. I wish she’d come along, for my part. I’ve got a little business back in the country, and I won’t leave the ‘ Spray ’ for any other hands to manage. She’s a leetle del icate -not rickety; that’s all slander, he'll last many a good year yet; but she’s a trifle past her prime—jest a trifle.” Marian was not listening to the Captain’s ac count of the “Spray’s” condition. She was She cannot stand it. She has changed even since I saw her last. Since nothing can shake her determination in this matter, you must do all you can to call off her mind from dwelling upon it. She must have change of scene—gayer seemed to stifle her. She threw on her hat and society. Here she will assuredlv die by degrees; ] rushed out into the open air. Her steps were self with the forefinger of her yellow, bony arrangement. Dr. Norris only ordered it to-day.” she will fall into a decline, and the consump- j drawn, as ever, towards that gloomy house, hand. “No good comes of following spirits “ Well, miss, I shall be sorry to have you go, tion that destroyed her father will seize upon around which her thoughts revolved continually, and prying into their secrets. I have had bad for mv own sake, but glad from inv heart if the her. Do you not see how transparent her All without and within it was still as the grave, luck enough in my life, without wanting to change is to do Miss Alice any good. She’s too cheeks are? and her eyes, how feverishly ! She knocked at the door Mr. De Forests's room, ! bring more on myself. As for seeing if it was quiet and nun-like, by far. I hope the weather bright?” | and received no answer. It was partially ajar, flesh and blood, flesh and blood never looked may change for the better before you get off. “I see it all too plainly. What can I do?” j and looking in, she found it unoccupied. She j like that—so white, and rigid, and awful! It We’re likely to have a storm.” cried Marian, clasping her hands in despair. ! went down to the rooms in the basement, ten- “ You must go to Havana. You must take her j anted by Jeannette. Pushing open the door, to Havana in the next steamer. The ‘ Lavaca ’ I she paused upon the threshold. The house- is due from New Orleans in four days from now. j keeper was praying. Marian stood still, con- likely was the face of a dead woman. _ “A storm ? Why, we have already had almost “Of a woman i IVas it—was it like any one every species of disagreeable weather—clouds, you had ever seen alive! ” wind, rain and lightning. It is time it wasi^ The mulattress looked sharply at Marian, clearing up.” P°°IT7K9.iu