CHAPTER XVII.
JEALOUSY.
Leonard Yorke rode away from The Oaks with a heart full of angry resentment. So, Captain Venners was coming to call upon Violet that evening. Violet was evidently deeply interested in the handsome, dashing young fellow who had won the reputation of a flirt, and who was such an immense favorite with the ladies.
Could he have been deceived in Violet Arleigh? Could it be that she was not the simple-hearted girl that he had believed her? She was fond of admiration—too fond; and, worse than all, to Leonard’s jealous fancy, she was too fond of handsome, dark-eyed Will Venners.
With a sore heart, he rode away from The Oaks, angry with Violet and with himself, and detesting Will Venners with all his heart.
“So he is going to call there this evening!” Leonard repeated half-angrily to himself, as he turned his horse’s head toward home. “They will pass a quiet evening together, and she will never think of me at all, I suppose. But Violet is my betrothed wife, and I have a right to visit The Oaks. Why should I not call also?”
The idea seemed feasible and proper. He made up his mind at length that he would ride over to The Oaks again that night, at the same time that Captain Venners would call there.
Leonard rode up the long avenue leading to Yorke Towers, feeling a little better after he had made up his mind to this step.
At the entrance to the fine old house he was met by Miss Glyndon.
“Your mother is asking for you, Mr. Yorke,” she said, as soon as he entered the house; and there was a tone of relief in her voice at the sight of him. “She is better, but she seems to be greatly troubled about something. Please go right up.”
Leonard Yorke ascended the great staircase, which wound in a circular form up from the center of the entrance hall, and a few moments later he rapped at the door of his mother’s room.
“Come in!” called a faint voice; and Leonard turned the knob and entered.
The room, a great Gothic chamber, was in semi-darkness; the windows were draped in crimson hangings; the furniture was heavy and antique; the walls were hung with paintings and lined with books. It was a sumptuous apartment; but the woman who lay upon the bed, drawn up near an open window, looked as if nothing in the world could make her happy or contented. Her pale, delicate face was still quite beautiful. She had not yet passed middle age, and the soft, dark hair, drawn back from a broad, low brow, was scarcely touched with silver. Her features were delicate and high-bred, but worn and grave to sadness.
As her eyes—calm gray eyes which, in spite of their calmness, could flash with bitter anger and indignation—fell upon the face of her son, she held out her thin white hand.
“Where have you been, son?” she asked, gently.
His face flushed.
“Over at The Oaks, mother. Poor Violet is nearly crushed by her mother’s sudden and awful death.”
He hesitated, checking himself at the expression of suffering which flashed over his mother’s pale face.
“I did not stay long,” he added, swiftly. “I shall call there again this evening. Mother, I wish you were well enough to invite Violet and Mrs. Rutledge and Hilda over here for a time. Violet has never visited Yorke Towers; she has only called occasionally; and—and——”
His voice stammered into silence at the glance from his mother’s calm gray eyes. He had not yet broken to her the news of his engagement to Violet. How was she going to take it?
Mrs. Yorke sighed.
“I fear that I am too ill to entertain anybody,” she returned, slowly. “Yet,” starting slightly, as though a sudden thought had struck her, “perhaps it will be better for me to take your advice. I—I have a reason for—— Son, I believe upon the whole that I will try and arouse myself, and I will send the invitation to the ladies at once. There is no use in their staying at home nursing their sorrow; and we are neighbors and old friends, and, of course, here they will be perfectly at home. There will be no rules of ceremony to follow, and the change will benefit them all, I am sure.”
Low under her breath she was saying softly:
“I will get that girl here, and then I will try and find out if she knows anything of the past, of her mother’s secret and mine. But I will watch Violet well, for there must not be anything serious between her and Leonard.”
Aloud she added, gently:
“I believe I will write the invitation now.”
“But, mother dear, you are not able to——”
“I am able to write a few lines, and I am able to sit up and to get about my room a little. And I want them to come over here as soon as possible,” she added, her eyes lighting up, her pale cheeks flushing slightly. “Place writing materials on my desk, Leonard, and wheel it to my side. There, that is right!”
She seemed strangely elated and quite excited over the prospect of the visitors from The Oaks. Leonard could not understand it. But he silently obeyed her directions, and in a few moments the note was written, the most cordial and neighborly note that Mrs. Yorke had ever written to any one at The Oaks. She laid before Mrs. Rutledge what a benefit the change would be to herself and the young ladies, and then it would be a charity to Mrs. Yorke and Miss Glyndon to have them come to Yorke Towers.
The invitation was received in due time by Mrs. Rutledge, and promptly accepted without reference to Violet. This was too good a chance to be lost for Hilda to try and win Leonard Yorke.
Mrs. Rutledge smiled with a swift, furtive glance in the direction of her daughter when she read the invitation aloud. Hilda returned the glance with a significant nod.
“Strange that you have never visited Yorke Towers, Violet,” she observed.
Violet smiled.
“Oh, no, not at all. There was something unpleasant, I have always fancied, between Mrs. Yorke and my poor mother. What it was, I do not know. Aunt Constance, do you know anything about it? Or, perhaps, I ought not to ask.”
Mrs. Rutledge smiled an acid smile.
“There was something like jealousy between them, I believe, over Harold Arleigh,” she returned, in an indifferent tone; “but I do not think it amounted to much; and, anyway, Rosamond won him, and so she could afford to be magnanimous. But I must confess, Violet, that I do not think your mother ever really liked Mrs. Yorke. I am sure that there was no love lost between them, and that is why she opposed Leonard’s calling here so often.”
“Opposed Leonard—Mr. Yorke—calling here?” repeated Violet, in amazement. “Why, Aunt Constance, that is the first I ever heard of it. Why—the very last night that she—the night of my ball, she was speaking to me of Leonard in the kindest and most affectionate way, I am sure you are mistaken, auntie; mamma did like Leonard.”
“Well, well! you need not go into hysterics over it. I suppose it is so since you say so. But suppose, Violet, that there was really anything serious between you and Leonard—(why, you are blushing like a peony)—would you marry him against your mother’s wishes?”
Silence! Violet shook her head.
“No, I would not marry any man of whom my darling mother did not approve,” she said, slowly; “but then I know that mamma did approve of Leonard, for she told me so.”
“Mamma”—Hilda’s voice broke in upon Violet’s eager words—“why do you speak of such folly as Leonard Yorke caring for Violet? You know that he cares for some one else.”
Violet turned to her cousin, pale and trembling.
“Explain, Hilda!” she said, quickly. “I do not understand you.”
But Hilda tossed her pretty dark head and laughed derisively.
“Wait!” was all that she would say.
Just then the bell rang, and a servant appeared with a card for Violet. She glanced at it, and her face flushed. The name upon the card was Captain Venners. She rose at once.
“Will you come down, Hilda?” she asked, laying the card before her cousin.
Hilda glanced at it.
“He has called to see you,” she returned, shortly. “No, I will not go down. ‘Two are company, and three a crowd!’ You know the old saying.”
So, feeling a little uncomfortable, Violet went slowly down to the drawing-room, in her plain black dress with soft white ruffles at throat and wrists, looking very fair and mournful.
“A sweet, true little woman!” thought Will Venners, as he took her little hand in greeting.
“I am so glad to see you, Miss Arleigh!” he began at once, in his frank, boyish way. “I hope that you are feeling better. My poor little friend, my heart aches with sympathy for you in your great loss!”
Her head drooped. The great tears welled up into her soft dark eyes; her chin quivered; but she controlled her emotion. She sunk into a seat at her visitor’s side.
“Have you seen Miss Glyndon?” she asked, after a brief silence.
Will’s bronzed face flushed crimson, then grew pale and stern.
“I have seen her for a few moments,” he returned, coldly, “and she—she froze me out, Miss Violet.”
“I must tell you about the poem,” Violet was beginning, hesitatingly.
Poor child! she was half afraid to confess her delinquency and acknowledge that she had lost his precious effusion. But, still fated to go on in this odd game of cross-purposes, Will cut in sharply:
“No matter; I know. There is no need to explain, or, in fact, to mention it at all. Jessie Glyndon is a flirt—a coquette. She has never cared for me from first to last.”
“Oh, Will!”
“It is true—true—true!” he cried, rising to his feet and beginning to pace up and down the room in mad haste. “She has proved the truth to me this day. Violet, I believe that I shall go away from Louisiana—quit the whole country—cut it all—run over to Texas and turn cowboy or something. I’m dead tired of civilization as it is found here. And then, some day, when I hear that Jessie is married to some one who suits her—some one good enough and proud enough, and, above all, rich enough to please Miss Jessie Glyndon—I will come back.”
He paused, quite out of breath, his eyes flashing, his white teeth gnawing fiercely at the heavy dark mustache which shaded his handsome upper lip.
“Jessie is not mercenary,” ventured Violet, swift to speak in her friend’s defense.
“No? Well, I am pleased to hear it; but I must beg leave to differ with you there. I see it all. I am only poor Will Venners, a retired army officer; but I am only thirty-three, and I have won my shoulder-straps—won them in good, hard fights on the Colorado plains, facing the red devils, under Custer. I am proud of my record, Miss Violet, and I shall be proud of it should a dozen Miss Glyndons regard me with contempt.”
“She does not—indeed she does not!” cried Violet, warmly. “How could she?”
“Thank you, dear little friend! Thank God for your friendship, since I can not win her love.”
He had her hand in his, and had raised it to his lips, when just at that moment the door opened and Hilda appeared, and at her side, pale and wrathful, stood Leonard Yorke. He had witnessed the scene between Violet and Will Venners, and, of course, to his jealous nature, there could be but one inference.
