Countess Vera; or, The Oath of Vengeance

Earl Fairvale sees nothing. Day by day he grows more gloomy, more self-absorbed, and goes less into society. The only interest in his life outside of his adored daughter, centers in the occasional letters that reach him from America. But after each one he grows more sad and gloomy, losing flesh and color daily. Only Vera knows that the vengeance that is the object of his life is so long delayed that the strain on his mind is killing him. For though the most skilled detectives in the world are watching and working, they can find no trace of the secure hiding-place where Marcia Cleveland dwells untroubled by the vengeance from which she has fled.

Lady Vera's roses pale when she sees how her father is breaking down—how the mind is wearing out the body, even as the sword wears out the scabbard.

"Father, even if you found out her hiding-place, what could you do? What form could your revenge take?" she asks him, mournfully, as she has done many times before.

"I cannot tell—but some way would be opened. I should find some vulnerable point at which to strike," he answers, moodily.

She twines her fair, white arms about his neck, and presses her fresh young lips to his clouded brow.

"Father, this long brooding over your revenge, this hatred, nourished in your heart, is sapping your life," she sighs. "I beg you, for my sake, to give it up, dear father. Give it up, and leave it to Heaven!"

He looks at the beautiful, tearful eyes and the sweet face, pale now with its sorrow.

"Vera, you come to me with your mother's face, your mother's voice, and ask me not to avenge her ruined life, her broken heart, her mournful death," he answers, bitterly. "Child, you know not what you ask. What can you know of the pangs I have endured? Have you forgotten, too, the indignities heaped upon you in your young, defenseless life?"

The dark eyes filled with smouldering wrath.

"No, father, never!" she cries; "but it is all past. Mother is safe in Heaven, you and I are together. Let us forget those wicked ones. Surely God will punish them for the ruin they have wrought."

"I will not listen to you, Vera," he says, putting her from him, resolutely. "I have sworn to break Marcia Cleveland's heart if it be not made of stone. If I fail—listen to me, darling—if I fail, I shall bequeath my revenge and my oath to you in dying."

She pales and shivers through all her slight young frame, as if some dim foreboding came to her of the nearing future—that future in whose black shadow her feet already tread, it comes so near.

"I shall bequeath it to you," Earl Fairvale repeats, gloomily; "you will lack no means to accomplish it if only you can find out the serpent's lair. You will be Countess of Fairvale. You will inherit great wealth, and an enormous rent-roll. With wealth you can do almost anything. If I fail you will take up the work where it dropped from my hand in dying—you, Vera, will avenge the dead."

CHAPTER XII

One of Earl Fairvale's favorite amusements was riding on horseback. He had a passion for fast horses. He might often be seen mounted on some spirited and superb animal, riding in the "Row" by his daughter's side, who was herself a finished horsewoman.

Sometimes he drove a four-in-hand. Often he might be seen tearing along at a wild and break-neck pace on some fiery-looking horse that ordinary people would shudder to look at. But the earl did not know the name of fear. He seemed to take a reckless delight and gloomy satisfaction in those wild, John Gilpin-like races, at which others trembled with dread. He laughed at the fears of his daughter and her friends, and disregarded their entreaties.

Sir Harry Clive came home one day, his fine face clouded with anxiety.

"The earl has bought a new horse," he said. "It is a beautiful creature, black as night, glossy as satin, clean-limbed, superb, but with the most vicious eye conceivable, and a fiery temper. They call him King."

"I suppose there is no danger to the earl," said his wife. "He has a marvelous control over his horses. They seem to obey the least touch of his hand or sound of his voice."

"This animal he has now is not like to be tamed so easily," Sir Harry answers, gravely. "It is said that he threw his last master and killed him. Indeed, Nella, you could not imagine a more devilish-looking creature than this beautiful King. I told Fairvale that its true name ought to be the Black Devil, for I am sure he looks like one."

Lady Clive shudders.

"Has the earl tried him yet?" she inquires.

"He started out upon him an hour ago," Sir Harry answers. "There were a score of us who tried to persuade him not to mount the fiery creature. But he laughed at our fears, and went off in gallant style. King tried to prevent him from mounting, but he succeeded in first-rate style. Yet I doubt," gloomily, "if he ever returns alive."

"What will Lady Vera say? She has been so anxious over him, so nervous of late," sighs Lady Clive.

"You need not tell her," he answers. "No need to alarm her needlessly. After all, our forebodings may be vain. Fairvale is the most fearless and accomplished rider I ever saw. He may even conquer King."

But even then the loud and startling peal of the door-bell rings like a wild alarm through the house.

Sir Harry's fears have had only too good a foundation. They have picked up the earl from the hard and flinty pavement, where the maddened brute had flung him, and brought him home bleeding, senseless—mortally injured, all the surgeons agree.

And Lady Vera? The shock of the awful tidings had almost rent her heart in twain. Passing from one swoon into another, she lies on her couch, white and horror-stricken, shuddering sighs heaving her breast. At last they come to tell her that the awful stupor is over. He is conscious, and has asked for her.

"How long?" she asks, faintly, for they have told her that his hours are numbered.

"Calm yourself, for he cannot bear the least excitement."

But when Vera goes into his presence, and sees him lying so marble-white, with the black hair tossed back from the high, pale brow, and the eager, asking eyes fixed upon her anguished face, a great, choking knot rises into her throat—it seems as if she will choke with the violence of her repressed emotion.

"Father!" she wails, with a world of grief in that one word, and falls on her knees by his bed-side.

"I am going from you, dear," he answers, with the strange calmness of the dying. "The black river of death yawns at my feet. The pale and mystic boatman is waiting to row me over. Already the cold waves splash over me. Vera!"

"Father," she answers, placing her hand in the cold one feebly groping for it.

His hollow, dark eyes roll around the room.

"Are we alone?"

"Alone," she answers, for all the kindly watchers have withdrawn, leaving father and child to the sweet solace of this last moment together, undisturbed by alien eyes.

The dark eyes seek hers—sad, wistful, full of vain remorse.

"Vera, I was reckless, mad, defiant of fate. I have thrown my life away, my poor, blighted life. Can you forgive me, my poor, orphaned girl?"

Only her stifled sobs answer him.

"I did not mean it, Vera. I was tormented by my burning thoughts, and I only sought diversion. I thought I could hold the fiery brute in check. But the devil threw me. No matter; I am to blame. I was too reckless. But you forgive me, darling?"

She kisses him because she cannot speak.

"I have lost my life," he murmurs, sadly; "lost it before my work on earth was done. My daughter, you recall what I said to you so short a while ago?"

She shivers, and lifts her dark, foreboding eyes to his face.

"Yes, father."

"Bring me the Bible from yonder stand, dear. You must swear a solemn oath."

The beautiful young face quivers with nameless dread and fear.

"Oh, father," she prays, with lifted hands and streaming eyes, "leave it to Heaven!"

The dark eyes, fast glazing over with the film of death, grow hard and stern.

"Vera, child of my martyred wife, will you be false to your father's dying trust? Will you refuse to obey his dying commands?"