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Her Dark Inheritance

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<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> A MAD PASSION. Cold and still in death, Frederick Lynne sat in his big arm-chair, one icy hand clutching the letter which bade Beatrix face an unknown and dreaded future—face it all alone. Mrs. Lynne stood near, crying aloud in terrified accents for help, for succor, her face as white as the dead man's, when Beatrix entered the room. One swift glance, which did not comprehend the situation—for poor Beatrix knew nothing of the horrors of death, and had never faced it before—one swift, terrified glance, and she flew to the dead man's side. "Papa! oh, papa!" she cried in an agonized voice, "what is the matter, dear? Are you ill? Are you—" "Hush!" Mrs. Lynne's bony hand came down upon the girl's arm with emphasis. "Be quiet, you baby!" she panted. "Can't you see that he is—is dead?" The girl fell back as though the heavy hand had struck her a blow; her great dark eyes dilated with horror; the small hands clinched each other spasmodically; her breath came and went in short, panting; gasps. Could it be true? Was this grim death before her? Was the kindly heart—the heart of her only friend—cold and still forever? It could not—could not be! "Dead?" she repeated, blankly, her lips quivering[Pg 31] over the awful word—"dead? Oh, no, Mrs. Lynne! surely you are mistaken! Let us try to do something for him. I will call Serena to stay with you, and I will go for help. I can ride the gentleman's horse—Mr. Kenyon's—it is here, you know. I will go over to town and get Doctor Stone." "Humph! You can not. The bridge is gone; and, besides it is utterly useless. I have seen death too many times, Beatrix Dane, to be mistaken. I tell you he is dead and has been for hours; he is quite cold. See!" With a slow, reluctant movement Beatrix ventured to lay her trembling fingers upon the cold, rigid hand of the corpse. She drew back with a low cry of terror. "Oh! how cold—how cold!" she moaned. "Oh, papa! papa! papa! cold and dead! It is true—it is indeed true. Oh, Mrs. Lynne! what shall we do without him?" Mrs. Lynne's thin lip curled. "What will I do, you mean?" she retorted. "It can have no effect upon you. See! that letter in his hand is a message for you. You are to go away at once to your own home, thank goodness!" The great brown velvety eyes met the cold orbs before her with a stare of astonishment. "Go home—to—my—own home, Mrs. Lynne?" she repeated, blankly. "Why, I have no home but this!" "Indeed! And pray, who gave you a right to call this home? Such as it is, it is the only shelter that you have had for sixteen years. You ought to be ready to leave it now. You are nearly seventeen years old,[Pg 32] and able to take care of yourself. Ah! there is Serena at last!" as a limp figure made its appearance in the open door—a tall, ungraceful figure in a calico wrapper, and muffled in a huge woolen shawl. "Mamma"—in a tone of consternation—"what has happened? What is the matter with papa? Is he ill?" Mrs. Lynne wound her arms around the angular form of her daughter, and burst into tears—the first real emotion which she had ever betrayed before Beatrix. "He is dead, Serena!" she faltered—"dead and gone! And Heaven only knows what is to become of you and me! Not even sufficient means in the house to defray the funeral expenses; and, of course, with his death, the small pension which he received from his professional brethren of the Medical Club expires also. Oh, dear—oh, dear! it was an unfortunate day when I married Fred Lynne and tied myself down to poverty!" "Well, well, that was long enough ago for you to forget it now," interposed her dutiful daughter. "Mamma"—putting away her mother's arms from about her neck—"whatever you do, don't be foolish. Have you tried to restore him? He may not be dead, after all." "He is dead. I have done everything that I possibly could before I called any one. When I found all my efforts useless, I gave up in despair, and I screamed so loudly that it awoke Beatrix, and she came to the room." "Beatrix! Ah!"—with a swift glance of malice into the girl's white face—"and so she heard you? She is always sneaking around where she is not[Pg 33] wanted. Mamma, have you—have you read that letter?" pointing to the crumpled sheet of paper which Mrs. Lynne had with great difficulty succeeded in removing from the cold hand of the dead man. "Yes. It contains the very best news imaginable. It is a letter from that girl's people sending for her at last." "Impossible! Why, I did not believe that she had any people. But—there is another letter upon the hearth. See! it is burned. I believe papa destroyed it as soon as he read it, for some purpose of his own. How very exasperating!" Serena was on her knees now upon the hearth, eagerly but carefully turning over the blackened sheet of paper which had been torn in four pieces and cast upon the fire. But the fire was at its last gasp when the deed was done, and the paper had not burned—only blackened and scorched until the contents of the letter were perfectly undecipherable. Serena examined the written sheet attentively, and her face grew dark with intense disappointment. "How provoking!" she muttered, savagely. "There was, no doubt, something of importance in that letter. I believe in my heart that the news it contained has killed my father. Yet he has destroyed the letter, and there is nothing left to tell the tale." She rose to her feet and glanced furtively around. Beatrix had thrown herself upon the faded sofa, and was sobbing softly, her face hid in her hands. Mrs. Lynne was beginning to make some attempt at arranging the poor body—an attempt which must be made alone since they were so isolated from neighbors. No[Pg 34] one observed Serena's movements. Her eyes glittered with a curious, brassy light. With a swift, gliding movement, she hastened to an old-fashioned cabinet which stood in a corner of the room, and opening it, removed an empty tin box from a shelf. With hands that trembled a little in spite of her efforts to control herself, she carried the box over to the fireplace, and going down upon her knees once more, she lifted the fragments of the smoke-blackened letter and placed them as carefully within the box as though that letter had been worth many times its weight in gold. And so it was. A thousand times over, as Serena Lynne was destined to discover some future day. Securing the lid upon the box, she rose softly, and hastened away upstairs to her own room. Once there, she hid the tin box in her trunk, and locked it carefully. Then, with an inscrutable expression upon her pale, cold face, she glided swiftly down the stairs once more. On her way back to the apartment where her dead father lay, she paused at the door of Keith Kenyon's room. It was standing ajar, and she ventured to steal inside. He was sleeping heavily under the influence of the strong opiate which Doctor Lynne had given him. Serena stood gazing at the sleeper, her plain face all aglow with rapture, her pale eyes gleaming with a look of devouring love and passionate adoration. "Oh, my love! my love!" she murmured, softly. "I would lay my life down for your dear sake! I would die a thousand deaths—I would suffer martyrdom to win your heart! Oh, Keith! Keith! my hero, my only love! whom I have loved all my life, ever since my[Pg 35] childhood's days, when you were with us; and I have never forgotten you—never ceased to care. Your little sweetheart, you called me then; and you used to tell me that some day, when we were man and woman grown, I should be your wife. And so I shall! You shall call no other woman wife! Oh, Keith! if you do not love me I shall die—I shall die!" The sleeper moved uneasily upon the pillow, and the beautiful lips parted slightly, while, low and sweet, but clear and distinct to the ears of the listener, came the one muttered word: "Beatrix!" It was enough to arouse the slumbering devil in the woman's breast. She started as though she had been shot. A moan of bitter anguish passed her lips, and fell upon the dead silence of the sick-room. She turned blindly, like one groping in the dark, and fled back to the death-chamber. Her mother glanced up from her grewsome work as Serena entered, and her ghastly face and flashing eyes made the mother start with a strange alarm and terror. "What is it?" she cried, wildly. "What else has happened?" "Where is that girl?" demanded Serena, glancing wildly around the room. "She has gone for assistance," returned Mrs. Lynne, slowly. "Some one must be found to come to my aid tonight, and Beatrix offered to go. She said that Keith's horse had been brought here by the men who drove them home, and she would ride it over to Burtonville, to the Rogerses. Some of them will come[Pg 36] immediately, I know. Serena, in Heaven's name, what is the matter? You look as if you had seen a ghost!" "So I have—so I have!" sobbed Serena, bitterly. "I have seen the ghost of my dead love—my broken life! Listen, mamma. Unless you get rid of that girl Beatrix Dane—or whatever her right name may be—my happiness will be ruined forever. Mamma! mamma! I have reason to believe that Keith is falling in love with her already!" "What? You are mad, Serena!" "I am not. I wish I were. He is muttering her name over and over in his sleep even now. She saved his life, you know; and that, of all things, would serve to attract and draw them together from the first. Mamma, I tell you I am lost—lost! I love him! I love him! I do not deny it, and if I can not win his love and be his wife, I shall die!" "Hush! Be quiet. Control yourself. You shall be his wife. We will keep Beatrix away from him, and in a few days, when her money comes, she shall be packed off to New Orleans, and good-bye forever to Miss Beatrix Dane. And before Keith leaves this place to return to his home he must make you his wife. We will try to bring that about, Serena. It must be done!" "It shall be! He shall care for me!" repeated the heartless girl. "Here, by the side of my dead father, I swear that I—and I alone—shall be Keith Kenyon's wife!" <hr class="chap" /> [Pg 37] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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