Daisy Brooks: or, A Perilous Love

Too late! The words sounded like a fatal warning to her. No, no; she could not, she must not, be too late!

At the very moment Daisy had left the detective’s house, Basil Hurlhurst was closeted with Mr. Tudor in his private office, relating minutely the disappearance of his infant daughter, as told him by the dying housekeeper, Mrs. Corliss.

“I will make you a rich man for life,” he cried, vehemently, “if you can trace my long-lost child, either dead or alive!”

Mr. Tudor shook his head. “I am inclined to think there is little hope, after all these years.”

“Stranger things than that have happened,” cried Basil Hurlhurst, tremulously. “You must give me hope, Mr. Tudor. You are a skillful, expert detective; you will find her, if any one can. If my other child were living,” he continued, with an effort, “you know it would make considerable difference in the distribution of my property. On the night my lost child was born I made my will, leaving Whitestone Hall and the Hurlhurst Plantations to the child just born, and the remainder of my vast estates I bequeathed to my daughter Pluma. I believed my little child buried with its mother, and in all these years that followed I never changed that will–it still stands. My daughter Pluma is to be married to-morrow night. I have not told her of the startling discovery I have made; for if anything should come of it, her hopes of a lifetime would be dashed. She believes herself sole heiress to my wealth. I have made up my mind, however,” he continued, eagerly, “to confide in the young man who is to be my future son-in-law. If nothing ever comes of this affair, Pluma need never know of it.”

“That would be a wise and safe plan,” assented the detective.

“Wealth can have no influence over him,” continued the father, reflectively; “for Mr. Rex Lyon’s wealth is sufficient for them, even if they never had a single dollar from me; still, it is best to mention this matter to him.”

Rex Lyon! Ah! the detective remembered him well–the handsome, debonair young fellow who had sought his services some time since, whose wife had died such a tragic death. He remembered how sorry he had been for the young husband; still he made no comment. He had little time to ruminate upon past affairs. It was his business now to glean from Mr. Hurlhurst all the information possible to assist him in the difficult search he was about to commence. If he gave him even the slightest clew, he could have had some definite starting point. The detective was wholly at sea–it was like looking for a needle in a hay-stack.

“You will lose no time,” said Basil Hurlhurst, rising to depart. “Ah!” he exclaimed, “I had forgotten to leave you my wife’s portrait. I have a fancy the child, if living, must have her mother’s face.”

At that opportune moment some one interrupted them. Mr. Tudor had not time to open the portrait and examine it then, and, placing it securely in his private desk, he courteously bade Mr. Hurlhurst good-afternoon; adding, if he should find a possible clew, he would let him know at once, or, perhaps, take a run up to Whitestone Hall to look around a bit among the old inhabitants of that locality.

It was almost time for quitting the office for the night, when the detective thought of the portrait. He untied the faded blue ribbon, and touched the spring; the case flew open, revealing a face that made him cry out in amazement:

“Pshaw! people have a strange trick of resembling each other very often,” he muttered; “I must be mistaken.”

Yet the more he examined the fair, bewitching face of the portrait, with its childish face and sunny, golden curls, the more he knit his brow and whistled softly to himself–a habit he had when thinking deeply.

He placed the portrait in his breast-pocket, and walked slowly home. A brilliant idea was in his active brain.

“I shall soon see,” he muttered.

His wife met him at the door, and he saw that her eyes were red with weeping.

“What is the commotion, my dear?” he asked, hanging his hat and coat on the hat-rack in the hall. “What’s the difficulty?”

“Our protégée has gone, Harvey; she–”

“Gone!” yelled the detective, frantically, “where did she go? How long has she been gone?”

Down from the rack came his hat and coat.

“Where are you going, Harvey?”

“I am going to hunt that girl up just as fast as I can.”

“She did not wish to see you, my dear.”

“I haven’t the time to explain to you,” he expostulated. “Of course, you have no idea where she went, have you?”

“Wait a bit, Harvey,” she replied, a merry twinkle in her eye. “You have given me no time to tell you. I do know where she went. Sit down and I will tell you all about it.”

“You will make a long story out of nothing,” he exclaimed, impatiently; “and fooling my time here may cost me a fortune.”

Very reluctantly Mr. Tudor resumed his seat at his wife’s earnest persuasion.

“Skim lightly over the details, my dear; just give me the main points,” he said.

Like the good little wife she was, Mrs. Tudor obediently obeyed.

It was not often the cool, calculating detective allowed himself to get excited, but as she proceeded he jumped up from his seat, and paced restlessly up and down the room. He was literally astounded.

“Rex Lyon’s wife,” he mused, thoughtfully. “Well, in all the years of my experience I have never come across anything like this. She has gone to Whitestone Hall, you say, to stop the marriage?” he questioned, eagerly.

“Yes,” she replied, “the poor child was almost frantic over it. You seem greatly agitated, Harvey. Have you some new case connected with her?”

“Yes,” he answered, grimly. “I think I have two cases.”

Mr. Tudor seldom brought his business perplexities to his fireside. His little wife knew as little of business matters as the sparrows twittering on the branches of the trees out in the garden.

He made up his mind not to mention certain suspicions that had lodged in his mind until he saw his way clearly out of the complicated affair.

He determined it would do no harm to try an experiment, however. Suiting the action to the thought, he drew out the portrait from his pocket.

“I do not think I shall have as much trouble with this affair as I anticipated.”

Mrs. Tudor came and leaned over his shoulder.

“Whose picture have you there, Harvey? Why, I declare,” she cried, in amazement, “if it isn’t Daisy Brooks!”

“Mrs. Rex Lyon, you mean,” said the detective, with a sly twinkle in his eye. “But for once in your life you are at sea–and far from shore; this portrait represents a different person altogether. Come, come, wife, get me a cup of tea–quick–and a biscuit,” he cried, leading the way to the kitchen, where the savory supper was cooking. “I haven’t time to wait for tea, I must overtake that girl before she reaches Whitestone Hall.”

CHAPTER XXXVI

The shade of night was wrapping its dusky mantle over the earth as Daisy, flushed and excited, and trembling in every limb, alighted from the train at Allendale.

Whitestone Hall was quite a distance from the station; she had quite a walk before her.

Not a breath of air seemed to stir the branches of the trees, and the inky blackness of the sky presaged the coming storm.

Since dusk the coppery haze seemed to gather itself together; great purple masses of clouds piled themselves in the sky; a lurid light overspread the heavens, and now and then the dense, oppressive silence was broken by distant peals of thunder, accompanied by great fierce rain-drops.

Daisy drew her cloak closer about her, struggling bravely on through the storm and the darkness, her heart beating so loudly she wondered it did not break.

Poor child! how little she knew she was fast approaching the crisis of her life!

She remembered, with a little sob, the last time she had traversed that road–she was seated by John Brooks’s side straining her eyes toward the bend in the road, watching eagerly for the first glimpse of the magnolia-tree, and the handsome young husband waiting there.

Coy blushes suffused Daisy’s cheeks as she struggled on through the pouring rain. She forgot she was a wretched, unpitied, forsaken little bride, on a mission of such great importance. She was only a simple child, after all, losing sight of all the whole world, as her thoughts dwelt on the handsome young fellow, her husband in name only, whom she saw waiting for her at the trysting-place, looking so cool, so handsome and lovable in his white linen suit and blue tie; his white straw hat, with the blue-dotted band around it, lying on the green grass beside him, and the sunshine drifting through the green leaves on his smiling face and brown, curling hair.

“If Rex had only known I was innocent, he could not have judged me so harshly. Oh, my love–my love!” she cried out. “Heaven must have made us for each other, but a fate more cruel than death has torn us asunder. Oh, Rex, my love, if you had only been more patient with me!”