The Senator's Favorite

Suddenly Hetty began to recover her dazed senses, and moving a trembling hand touched Precious gently.

"My dear, my dear, don't sob so hard. Try to collect yourself and listen to me," she breathed faintly, and the nervous girl lifted her head, murmuring:

"Oh, Hetty, Hetty, can't we get out of this horrid place? I'm stifling, dying almost of fear and horror."

"Yes, we will get away as soon as possible," and Hetty with sudden strength crawled out of bed and dragged on her clothes.

"Now, my dear young lady, I have a plan for you," she panted. "You must not be known at all in this dreadful affair, for it would make a dreadful sensation very unpleasant to your folks. Here is my plan: There is a side entrance on an alleyway to this place, and I'll creep down and let you out of it. Then you must go away quietly back to your home, and say nothing, unless you choose to confide in your parents. I'll stay indoors awhile, then I'll creep out in the street and give the alarm that my husband and his mother have killed themselves scuffling over a handsome revolver. No one need ever know anything more, for they cannot doubt my story. The neighbors all believe that I was Warwick's wife, as I should have been. So go now, dear, and Heaven bless you, poor child."

Her poor face was already beaded with death-dew, and she staggered so that she had to cling to Precious as they made their way down to the alley, just inside the door that she was to go out by. Precious paused and looked anxiously into the ghastly face with its glassy eyes.

"Oh, Hetty, you do look so ill! I can't bear to leave you like this. I shall tell mamma, and we will have you cared for kindly."

"Thank you, thank you, dear Miss Precious, but don't worry over me. I'll soon be all right. Now go, for every moment you stay is perilous."

"Bless you, Hetty, for your goodness to me. I shall tell mamma about it. She will be so grateful, and we will do everything for you. Now good-by, and God keep you till we meet again."

She pressed the cold, damp hand fervently, and hurried away, little dreaming that it was a dying woman she left, and that her fervent "God keep you till we meet again," meant for all eternity.

With the thick veil over her face, she darted unobserved out of the noisome alley, gained the street, and turned the very first corner into a side street. Ten minutes of rapid walking brought her back to Madame La Mode's, where the carriage still waited, although she had been gone almost two hours. The obsequious footman helped her in, and she sank half-fainting among the cushions.

"Saved! Saved!" she thought, with silent gratitude to Heaven as the carriage rolled homeward, and she wondered bitterly what Ethel would say on her return and escape from the fate at which she had connived.

"Ah! my sister, to whose happiness I sacrificed my own, how could you be so cruel?" she wept convulsively.

Meanwhile the dying Hetty, too weak to walk, crawled through the narrow alleyway out to the street, a most pitiable object with her wasted form, ghastly face, and glassy eyes already dim with approaching death. Very soon a crowd collected about her, to whom she told an incoherent story that her husband and his mother, while struggling over a revolver, had both come to their deaths. Then having exhausted her feeble strength in explaining the tragedy, the poor creature's head drooped heavily, and with one or two convulsive gasps her spirit fled from its earthly tenement.

The evening papers, in glaring head-lines, told the story of the tragedy enacted in the humble tobacco shop, and did not fail to add that the man had been discovered to be the notorious Lindsey Warwick, who had abducted Senator Winans' youngest daughter from the Inauguration Ball, and for whose apprehension the statesman had offered ten thousand dollars. It was added that he had afterward married a girl in his own rank, and had beaten her so cruelly that she had never been able to leave her bed since, and had now died of her injuries.

Some relatives of poor unfortunate Hetty came forward, claimed her body, and buried her decently. Lindsey Warwick and his mother were interred at public expense, and when those three died there was but one living soul that held the secret that lay so darkly on Ethel's conscience—the secret that twice she had betrayed her innocent sister to a terrible fate from which the mercy of Heaven had delivered her safely. At last Precious knew all her sister's guilt. Would she take revenge for her wrongs by denouncing Ethel?

She reached home with a prayer of thanksgiving on her lips, so glad of its peace and security again after the perils of the last few hours; but as soon as she crossed the threshold she saw that there was an unwonted commotion and excitement about the house.

"Have they missed me already? Have they found out anything?" she thought in alarm; but directly she heard the servants confiding to each other that Miss Winans had been taken dangerously ill, and that the wedding now so very near at hand would have to be postponed, they feared.

Then Norah came to meet her pet.

"Oh, my dear, how ill and pale you look! What has happened to you?" she demanded anxiously.

"Oh, Norah, they are saying that Ethel is very ill!" faltered Precious, and when she reached her own room she sank tremblingly upon a sofa.

"Miss Ethel has an attack of hysteria," explained Norah. "She had a long swoon, and when she revived went into wild hysterics. The doctor and your mother are with her now, and when I came out awhile ago she was shrieking for you as though she thought you were in the greatest danger somewhere. I think if you will go in and see her that the sight of you will do her good."

"I will go at once!" cried Precious eagerly, and glided pale as death into the sick-room, her heart beating with great strangling throbs of emotion.

She crossed the floor to the bed, and saw Ethel writhing among the pillows like one distraught, her dark eyes glaring wildly on the anxious faces around her, while from her ashen lips came over and over one yearning cry:

"Precious! Oh, bring Precious home!"

When Precious heard that entreating cry she felt that Ethel had repented of her sin, that she was not as wicked as she had tried to be. The knowledge brought keenest joy to her heart.

"Oh, Ethel, dear sister, I am here!" she cried in a voice of heavenly forgiveness.

Until that moment Ethel had seemed not to recognize any one, had called no one but her sister, but as that sweet voice came to her ears she looked up with a wild cry and clasped Precious in her arms.

"Oh, my darling, you are safe! You have come back to me!" she cried, and fainted for the third time that morning.

"She has had some strange hallucination about her sister, but she will be better now," said the physician, and he was right, for when she recovered she was calmer, the light of reason shone in her dark eyes.

"I am better now. You may all go away but Precious. I want her to stay by me a little while," she murmured faintly.

They all withdrew but Precious, to whom she clung with eager hands.

When they were alone they looked eagerly into each other's eyes, and Ethel saw that Precious knew all. A deep and heavy sigh breathed over her lips, and she murmured:

"You have escaped your enemies, thank Heaven! Nothing else matters now, but tell me how it all happened."

And the trembling Precious, in low, agitated whispers, told her all that had transpired except Hetty's death, of which she did not yet know.

Ethel listened in silent joy. She rejoiced in the death of her enemies, and she realized that her guilty secret belonged to no one now but Precious. In those small, white hands rested her fate.

Her dark, anguished eyes searched the pale, lovely face with eager inquiry, and she faltered:

"You know all my sins against you now, Precious—all my envious hate and jealousy. Are you glad that revenge lies in your hands?"

"Revenge!" exclaimed Precious, and Ethel answered:

"You will betray me now to Arthur, to papa and mamma, to the whole world!"

Precious looked searchingly into the dark eyes, circled with heavy purplish rings since morning.

"My sister, do you repent?" she asked solemnly.

"Repent! Ah, Heaven, I should have died or gone mad if harm had come to that little golden head!" breathed Ethel huskily.

"And you will never hate me any more?" sighed Precious.

"Never! never!"

"Then let us speak no more of that wicked thing—revenge. Try to be good after this, dear sister; try to be worthy of Arthur, and I will forgive you everything," noble little Precious answered, sealing the promise of forgiveness with a gentle kiss.

"You are an angel!" sighed Ethel from her overburdened heart, and drew from under her pillow the sealed letter she had sent to Madame La Mode's by the maid.

"Read this and you will see how soon I repented of my sin!" she said eagerly, and when Precious had read it through her blue eyes filled with tears and she cried:

"I am glad you repented so soon, and if I had not left the modiste's in such a hurry to perform a charitable deed I would have received your message in time to have been prevented from going."

They talked earnestly together some time longer, and it was decided to keep to themselves the story of that morning's adventure. Poor Ethel, she still clung to Arthur and the hope of becoming his wife, and in the safety insured by Lindsey Warwick's death and her sister's forgiveness, she thought that no further obstacle could come between her and happiness. Although sincerely repentant for her cruelty to Precious, the leaven of selfishness still worked in her nature, and she could not resign the joy within her reach—the joy of becoming Arthur's wife, and trying to win back his heart.