Little Golden's Daughter; or, The Dream of a Life Time

"Perhaps she may think differently when she knows all," said Mrs. Leith. "Women are very tender and forgiving, you know."

"If she never speaks to me again, I shall still rejoice that she is living," he said, with a beam of gladness in his large, black eyes.

"Do you wonder how she was saved?" she inquired.

"Yes."

"I will tell you, then, briefly," she answered. "You remember how you bribed the grave-digger to open her coffin for you that night?"

"Yes, and then I was too ill to keep my appointment," he answered.

"That wild fancy of yours was the means of her rescue," said Mrs. Leith. "When the man opened the coffin to be in readiness for you, he discovered slight signs of life in Golden. Growing alarmed and impatient at your tardiness, he sent his son to look for you, and the youth encountered me. I went with him, and we removed her to the man's little cottage near by. Little by little we fed the signs of reviving life, and you see the result."

"For which I bless and thank you forever," he said, kissing her hand respectfully.

"I have but little more to say," she went on, smiling a little sadly, "and it is this: Golden is very weak and exhausted yet. She is not strong enough to bear the excitement of her mother's burial. I will remain here with her while they are bearing Mrs. Leith to the grave, and I will tell her your whole story. She shall hear how you came back here to seek her in two days after your ill-considered desertion of her, and found her gone. I will tell her how nobly you vindicated her honor beside her grave. She shall know that you forced John Glenalvan to reveal the hidden story of her mother's fate. When you come back I think she cannot fail to forgive you."

"You will do all this for me?" he said, with a strange moisture in his eyes. "I cannot thank you sufficiently. You are an angel."

"No, only a very faulty and sad-hearted woman," she replied, with a pensive sigh, and then they went back to the mourners.

She kept her promise nobly. While they bore the poor remains of Richard Leith's first wife to the grave, his second wife sat with his daughter and tried to turn the swelling current of her grief by relating the story of Bertram Chesleigh's repentance and atonement.

"Golden, if you could have heard his noble vindication of your honor beside your grave; how proudly he claimed you for his wife, and your child for his own, you could not fail to pity and forgive him for the one great error into which he was led by his own pride and John Glenalvan's evil counsel."

"I have suffered so much through his fault," said the wronged wife, with mournful pathos.

"Yes, dear, but you must show your own nobility of soul now," said the step-mother, gently. "You must remember:

"'To err is human,
To forgive divine.'"

The beautiful, pale face grew very grave and troubled.

"If only I could forget his cruelty," she said. "Ah, my friend, I was hurt so cruelly by that letter he sent me! I trusted him so fully. I believed in his truth as I believed in my God. I was almost maddened by the suddenness of my sorrow. Every word is branded upon my memory. See! I can repeat every sentence:

"'Though it almost kills me to forsake you, Golden, I must go away. The disgrace of your birth is so terrible that I can never claim you for my wife. Pride and honor alike forbid it. You must see for yourself, poor child, that your terrible misfortune has wholly set you apart from the world, and as you have sworn to keep our private marriage a secret until I give you leave to reveal it, I must beg you to hold the story unspoken in your breast forever.'"

She paused and looked at Mrs. Leith with a whole tragedy of sorrow in her violet orbs.

"Were they not cruel words to write to his own wife?" she said pathetically. "But I obeyed him. Through all the shame and sorrow that came afterward I kept my promise. Do you think I did not suffer more than death in keeping it? When Mrs. Desmond drove me out in such terrible disgrace do you think I did not long to say to her: I am as good and pure as you are; I am your brother's wife! And what did I not suffer when I knew she was separated from her husband on my account? Then when my own father disowned and despised me, how my heart ached to answer, I am Bertram Chesleigh's own wife! Oh, Gertrude, is it right and just that I should forgive him for all that I have suffered and made others suffer for his sake?"

"Yes, dear, because his repentance was so quick and his remorse so deep," said the gentle monitor. "You must remember, Golden, that if you had not gone away that night you would have escaped all that suffering; your husband returned in twenty-four hours to claim you, and John Glenalvan told him that you had gone away with the deliberate intention of leading a sinful life. Do you wonder that it threw him on a bed of sickness that almost cost him his life? You must forgive him and love him again, dear, because he is so penitent and devoted now."

And when the mourners returned from that sad funeral, Mrs. Leith sent him in to his wronged wife.

He knelt down before the pale, golden-haired girl, and begged her to forgive him, not that he deserved it, but because he loved her so dearly.

With the meek tenderness of woman, she forgave him and there was peace between them.

Several hours later he had led her out to old Hugh Glenalvan who was dozing sadly in his easy-chair.

"Mr. Glenalvan," he said, "you see my darling has risen from the grave to forgive me. Will you keep the promise you made, and forgive me too?"

"Yes, grandpa, you must forgive him, for I love him dearly," said little Golden.

So the old man forgave him, and solemnly blessed them as they knelt before him, one withered hand resting kindly on the dark, bowed head, and the other on the golden one.

CHAPTER XLIX

Gertrude Leith having done what she could for the happiness of others, prepared to take her own departure.

"You will not leave us, my dear, true friend, my second mother," Golden exclaimed, as she came in veiled and bonneted, to bid her good-bye.

"Yes, dear, it will be better for a time, at least, that I should go away. I shall return north and go back to those quiet quarters in Brooklyn, where you and I spent those peaceful weeks before we came south. When you come to New York with your husband you will find me there."

"I will certainly seek you out," Golden replied. "But surely you do not intend to forsake my father. The doubt and perplexity are all over now. You know that you are legally his wife, my own mother being dead before he ever knew you."

"Yes, I know, dear," she answered, gently. "Yet it is best I should go away for a time. Your father must have time for his grief. After awhile, if he desires it, I may return to him."

Her words were too full of wisdom for anyone to gainsay them, so she went away.

Richard Leith's grief and remorse over his lost little Golden was as deep and passionate as if she had died yesterday instead of more than sixteen years ago.

He was too sorrowful to remember the fair woman he had put in the dead wife's place in the vain hope of stilling the fever and pain that had ached ceaselessly at his heart for sixteen years.

The time came later on when the first wife's memory became a sweet and chastened dream to him, and his second wife's new loveliness of character won its place in his heart.

Some years of quiet happiness and mutual love came to them after they learned to know each other better, but there was no year in which Richard Leith did not return south once, at least, to spend a few solemn hours by the low grave under the whispering cedars and broad-leaved magnolias, where the broken marble shaft bore the fond inscription:

"IN LOVING MEMORY OF GOLDEN, WIFE OF RICHARD LEITH."

There was one other to whom that green grave became like a shrine, a holy Mecca, to which his poor, faltering footsteps were daily bent.

It was old Hugh Glenalvan, whom old Dinah daily guided to the sacred spot, where he would sit for hours, his gray locks fluttering in the gentle breeze, meditating, or perhaps holding spirit communion with the sainted dead.

It was discovered on the day of Golden Leith's burial that John Glenalvan and his whole family had secretly left the house the night previous.

A week later a letter came from the villain to Bertram Chesleigh, offering to sell Glenalvan Hall on fair terms, and stating that he should never live in the south again.

A bargain was closed at once, and Bertram Chesleigh became the possessor of the old hall, which was speedily repaired and remodeled under the supervision of himself and his lovely young wife.

Before the work was completed a chance newspaper chronicled the fact of a distressing railway accident and among the list of killed appeared the name of John Glenalvan.

Bertram and Golden destroyed the newspaper, and old Hugh never knew that his wicked son had gone suddenly and without preparation into the presence of his august Maker.

The old man's life flowed on in sweet serenity. All his happiness was centered in the living Golden, and beside the grave of the dead one.