My Pretty Maid; or, Liane Lester

"Liane? Where was she?"

"At her work, sir, at the store."

"Where is she now?"

"It is thought she has run away with some rich young man, sir. She is missing this morning, and all her clothes gone!"

"The old woman—where is she? I must see her at once!"

"Lordy, sir, the poor old creature ain't here this afternoon. She went out to look for Liane, vowing to kill the fellow that persuaded her away!"

Mr. Clarke had always liked Sophie when she was a member of his household. Her kind, intelligent face invited confidence.

"Do you think that her distress was genuine, or was she playing a part?" he asked, adding: "To be frank with you, Sophie, I have a deep and friendly interest in Liane Lester, and I suspect foul play on the old woman's part."

It needed but this to make Sophie pour out all that she knew of the old hag's cruelties to Liane up to last night, when the sounds of a supposed scuffle had penetrated to her ears, causing the family to intrude on the old woman en masse, to find that granny had only been driving a nail, and that Liane was asleep in bed.

"You saw her asleep?" he asked.

"Yes; we all tiptoed to the door, and she lay peacefully in bed, with the covers drawn up to her chin."

"You are sure that she was breathing?" he asked hoarsely.

"Why, no, sir—but—my God, do you think there could have been anything wrong?" cried Sophie, alarmed by his looks.

He answered in a voice of anguish:

"I suspect that you were looking at the corpse of sweet Liane; I suspect that the noise you heard was old granny beating her to death, and that she has hidden the dead away, and put out a hideous lie to account for her disappearance!"

Sophie was so terrified that she burst into violent weeping.

But Edmund Clarke's face wore the calmness of a terrible despair. He felt now that Liane had been foully murdered, and that nothing remained to him but to take the most complete vengeance on her murderers.

He exclaimed hoarsely:

"Do not weep so bitterly, my good girl; tears will not bring back the dead. All that remains to us now is to take vengeance on her enemies. To do this we must find proofs of their crime. Come with me, and let us search Granny Jenks' room."

It was not hard to break open the locked door, and they went into the gloomy apartments, Sophie opening the window and letting in a flood of light.

Then she saw what had escaped their eyes last night—stains of blood on the bare, uncarpeted floor. In the bedroom, the pillow where Liane's head had rested last night was also marked by red stains that told in their own mute language the story of a terrible crime.

Their horrified eyes met, and he groaned:

"It is as I told you! She was murdered, sweet Liane! Oh, I will take a terrible vengeance for the crime!"

Sophie replied with heartbroken sobbing, and they remained thus several moments, shuddering with horror in the bare, fireless room.

But not a tear dimmed the man's eyes. He was stricken with despair that lay too deep for tears. His heavy eyes wandered about the room, lighting on a small black trunk in a corner.

"If I could only find the proofs!" he muttered, and unhesitatingly broke the lock, scattering the contents out upon the floor.

It was filled with yellowing relics of a bygone day, and he turned them over rapidly, saying to Sophie:

"I am searching for something to prove a suspicion of mine—a suspicion of a deadly wrong!"

She dried her eyes and looked on with womanly curiosity, while he picked up and shook a little red box in the bottom of the trunk.

A dozen or two trinkets and letters fell out on the floor, and he searched them eagerly over, lighting at last on a slender golden necklace belonging to an infant.

He held it with a shaking hand, saying to Sophie:

"See this little clasp forming in small diamonds the word 'Baby'? It belonged to my wife in infancy, and when our little Roma was born she clasped it on her neck."

"And Granny Jenks has stolen it!" she cried indignantly.

"Worse than that! She stole also the child that wore it!" he answered, with a burst of the bitterest despair.

His heart was breaking with its burden of concealed misery, and Sophie's eager, respectful sympathy drew him on till he could not resist the temptation to tell her all, sure of her sympathy.

It was like reading a novel to Sophie—the story of the lost babe, the spurious one substituted, and all that had happened since to the present moment.

"Oh, my dear sir, I believe you are quite right! Sweet, beautiful Liane was surely your daughter, while as for the other, she never had the ways of a lady, for all her grand bringing up, and she had the same cruel spirit like granny, always wanting to beat any one who displeased her. She slapped my face several times when I was her maid, and maybe you know, sir, that I left her service because I saw her push a man over the cliff one night."

"I have heard it whispered that you fancied something of the kind. My wife said you were crazy," returned Mr. Clarke.

"Crazy—not a bit of it, sir! It was God's holy truth! I can show you the man! He escaped the death she doomed him to, and lives in this very house!" cried Sophie, glad that she could defend herself.

"I should like to see the man!" cried Clarke, who was eager to get all the evidence possible against Roma.

"He will be coming in directly from his school," cried Sophie; and, indeed, at that moment a step was heard in the hall, and the dark, bearded face of the new boarder appeared passing the door.

"Come in!" called Sophie imperatively, and as he obeyed: "Mr. Clarke, this is Carlos Cisneros, the man Miss Roma pushed over the bluff."

Cisneros bowed to the stranger and scowled at the informer.

"Why did you betray my confidence?" he cried threateningly.

"Because I knew you wanted to get your revenge on her, and this man will help you to it."

The two men glared at each other, and Mr. Clarke asked:

"Why did she thirst for your life?"

"I held a dangerous secret of hers, and she believed me dead. When I hunted her down and threatened to betray her, she tried to kill me. She pushed me over the bluff, but I was picked up by a passing yacht, and my life was saved."

"What was that secret?"

"She has promised to pay me richly for keeping it," sullenly answered the man.