“Oh, tell her, tell her at once!” cried Cora, springing up, with a face like an April day, all flush, tears and smiles. “Tell her it was your wife who ran away from you, like a naughty, wicked, jealous little wretch, as she was. Zana, dear Zana, we were married all the time, but I had promised him, and could not tell, you know, because he was quite sure that Lady Catherine never would have given up any of the property, if she found out that he had fallen in love with such a poor, foolish-hearted little good-for-nothing as I was. There, Mr. Morton, do sit down and tell her all about it. Remember she is Lady Clare now, the best, most generous, the—the—well, well; no matter if I am wild, that awful secret is off my heart; I feel like a bird. Oh, if I had but wings to fly away and tell my blessed, blessed papa.”
Morton sat down upon the sofa, gathering that beautiful young wife to his bosom, and hushing her into quiet with his silent caresses.
“It was wrong and cowardly, I know,” he said, “but we were both madly in love, with no one to heed us. Lady Catherine was determined that I should follow her to Scotland, where she promised to have papers prepared, returning a portion of my old uncle Morton’s estate to me. Separation seemed dreadful to us both. It was a wild, rash act; but I persuaded Cora to come with me, forgetting all the evil that might spring from concealment, and afraid of Lady Catherine’s displeasure, for she seemed anxious for some excuse to delay the transfer. I persuaded Cora to conceal our marriage, and stay quietly in the old farm-house, till Lady Catherine’s caprices could no longer affect us; but my visits were necessarily few, for some vague rumor of her presence in Scotland reached Lady Catherine, and I was compelled to be cautious. The poor child grew restless, sad, and at last doubtful of my integrity. She was pining herself to death when you found her, and innocently completed her belief in my faithlessness.”
“I had made up my mind to brave everything, and avow that she was my wife, on the very day that Cora left Scotland. It was a desolate reception that the old people gave me. Cora, I could feel for the loneliness of your father, then.”
“Let us go—let us go to him!” cried Cora, starting up, “it will never be quite heaven till we get home.”
“Not yet, wait a little, and we will all go together,” I said, turning to leave the room, and without waiting for a reply, I stole away, leaving those two young hearts with each other, too full of my own exquisite happiness for anything but the selfishness of solitude. * * * * *
We entered Greenhurst quietly, and after nightfall, Lady Catherine, Cora, Moreton and myself. Irving was to follow us in a few days, but Chaleco, to whom I had given all Papita’s gold for the use of his tribe, remained behind. We drew up at the parsonage. The curtains of the parlor were drawn apart, and sitting in the twilight within, was the shadowy presence of a man stooping downward, in sorrow or thoughtfulness, as if the position had become habitual.
Cora drew close to her husband, and by the faint light I could see her eyes dilate and darken with excitement. She saw that shadowy presence and struggled forward, pushing impotently at the carriage door with both hands, and crying out—
“My father! my father!”
The shadow gathered itself suddenly up, and opening the window, called out in a low, wild voice:—