Pretty Geraldine, the New York Salesgirl; or, Wedded to Her Choice

Seems never to thrive in a world like this."

From bliss to despair—that was the story of Geraldine's one day.

But for the shining ring on her little hand she would have believed it all a dream, so swiftly had the brightness fled.

How she loathed and hated the smooth, smiling villain before her, who, while pretending to love her, had actually threatened her with death; who held at that moment, under his hand, a deadly weapon with which to compel her obedience.

The poor girl sat looking at him with angry tears in her large brown eyes, her cheeks alternately red and pale with the blood that rushed to and fro from her wildly throbbing heart. At one moment she would feel ill enough to faint, the next her burning indignation would drive away all weakness.

She did not believe one word of the smooth story he had related to her, hoping that her girlish credulity would accept it for truth.

And she was determined that she would die before she would marry the wretch.

But how was she to escape if he stood guard over her all the way to Chicago, with a deadly weapon in his hand?

If she shrieked out to the conductor for assistance, her abductor would kill her on the spot.

It was a situation to blanch the bravest cheek, and Geraldine was only a poor, weak girl. No wonder that the blood ran cold in her veins with despair.

She could see nothing before her but death—certain death at the hands of the desperate villain by her side.

For he was determined to marry her or kill her; and of the two calamities she resolved to choose the last.

But—and a faint spark of hope came to her—if she could only get him to leave her side a while, she might escape—might jump from the flying train in the darkness.

He was watching her changing face with eager anxiety as to what she was going to say to him now, and suddenly he saw it brighten with a thought he could not fathom.

There had flashed over Geraldine a remembrance of his last words:

"What could I do in my despair but oppose cunning to cunning, and fraud to fraud?"

Her sombre eyes brightened as she thought:

"He has taught me a lesson that I will profit by. Perhaps I can thus throw him off his guard."

Standish exclaimed, eagerly and curiously:

"What have you to say, Geraldine, to my story? Will you accept it for the truth, and renew your faith in my love and honor?"

Duplicity was a stranger to Geraldine's nature, and it was hard indeed to act the part she was planning, but her stage training enabled her to carry it off superbly.

Her lovely face softened inexpressibly, and she looked up at him with a shy yet tender glance that thrilled him with hope.

"Oh, what a strange story you have told me!" she twittered, sweetly, and added: "How can you forgive me for my unfaith?"

Clifford Standish started with blended surprise and joy, for he had not counted on such an easy victory.

He had expected that Geraldine would accuse him of falsehood, scorn him, flout him—do anything else but weaken in this simple way.

But his masculine vanity made the task of gulling him an easy one, for he thought instantly:

"How weak and silly women are! They will believe any garbled story a man chooses to tell them."

Aloud, he said, joyously:

"Then you believe me, Geraldine? They have not turned your heart against me?"

She answered, with seemingly pretty penitence:

"At first they did—for—for it all seemed so real on the stage last night—the arrest and all, you know. And I was wild with pain and humiliation; so I let them persuade me into anything. But, now that you have explained all to me, I see it in a different light, for of course you would not have wished to marry me if you had a wife already."

"Of course not," he echoed, smiling to himself at her innocent ignorance.

"So," continued Geraldine, smiling also, but at his gullibility, "you may put away your pistol, for it makes me very nervous to see it. And you do not need to stand guard over me, and I am ready to keep my promise to marry you."

"Geraldine," he cried, transported with joy at her sweetness, and bent to kiss her, but she repulsed him with shy grace.

"No, no—wait till we are married, sir!"

"Very well, darling; but—will you promise me not to speak to any one on the train but myself?" suspiciously.

"I promise you that," she answered, carelessly, hoping that he would leave her, but it seemed that he had no such amiable intention.

He removed the glasses under which he had posed as Jem Rhodes, the better to feast his eyes on her peerless beauty, and remained by her side, talking to her until she was wild with disgust.

Yet she had to wear her brightest smile, and answer him with seeming vivacity, to keep up the impression she had made of satisfaction with her fate.

Meanwhile the train rushed on to the first station and passed it without interruption. Hawthorne's telegram had not overtaken the fugitives. Poor Geraldine's fate was sealed, and Standish was triumphant.

"I wish something would happen," she thought, desperately. "I wish the train would get off the track and hurt him, and nobody else, so that I might escape!"

How strangely our impetuous wishes are answered sometimes.

Something did happen to Geraldine the very next moment.

The conductor came back from the Pullman coach, and, pausing at her seat, said, respectfully:

"I beg your pardon, miss, but there is a lady back in the Pullman whose husband has just died suddenly from a frightful hemorrhage. In her distress there is not a woman to comfort her except an unfeeling negro maid, who is too busy flirting with the porter to attend to her duties. Could you—would you go back in there and speak a word of comfort to the poor soul?"

His gruff voice was very kindly now that his sympathies were awakened, and he gazed almost pleadingly at the girl who looked, in turn, questioningly at Standish.

He hesitated a moment, as if about to refuse, then answered, quietly:

"Yes, go, and I will accompany you," and, like a jailer guarding a prisoner, he followed her to the Pullman coach.

CHAPTER XXX.

A STARTLING DECLARATION