Rosamond, or, the Youthful Error: A Tale of Riverside; And Other Stories

by Mary Jane Holmes

NEWS.

Nearly two weeks had passed away since the exciting scene in Mr. Browning's library, and during that time Rosamond had kept herself aloof from her guardian, meeting him only at the table, where she maintained toward him a perfectly respectful but rather freezing manner. She was deeply mortified to think he had won from her a confession of her love, and then told her how useless—nay, worse—how wicked it was for her to think of him. She knew that he suffered intensely, but she resolutely left him to suffer alone, and he would rather it should be so.

Life was growing more and more a wearisome burden, and when, just one week after the library interview, he received a note in the well- remembered handwriting, he asked that he might die and forget his grief. The letter was dated at the Springs, where Miss Porter was still staying, though she said she intended starting the next day for Cuyler, a little out-of-the-way place on the lake, where there was but little company, and she could be quiet and recruit her nervous system. The latter had been terribly shocked, she said, by hearing of his recent attempt at making love to Rosamond Leyton! "Indeed," she wrote, "it is to this very love-making that you owe this letter from me, as I deem it my duty to keep continually before your mind the fact that I am still alive."

With a blanched cheek Mr. Browning read this letter through—then tore it into fragments, wondering much who gave her the information. There were no spies about his premises. Rosamond would not do it, and it must have been his sister, though why she should thus wish to annoy him he did not know, when she, more than any one else, had been instrumental in placing him where he was. Once he thought of telling Rosamond all, but he shrank from this, for she would leave his house, he knew, and, though she might never again speak kindly to him, he would rather feel that she was there.

And so another dreary week went by, and then one morning there came to him tidings which stopped for an instant the pulsations of his heart, and sent through his frame a thrill so benumbing and intense that at first pity and horror were the only emotions of which he seemed capable. It came to him in a newspaper paragraph, which in substance was as follows:

"A sad catastrophe occurred on Thursday afternoon at Cuyler, a little place upon the lake, which of late has been somewhat frequented during the summer months. Three ladies and one gentleman went out in a small pleasure-boat which is kept for the accommodation of the guests. They had not been gone very long when a sudden thunder-gust came on, accompanied by a violent wind, and the owner of the skiff, feeling some alarm for the safety of the party, went down to the landing just in time to see the boat make a few mad plunges with the waves, and then capsize at the distance of nearly half a mile from the shore.

"Every possible effort was made to save the unfortunate pleasure- seekers, but in vain; they disappeared from view long before a boat could reach them. One of the bodies has not yet been recovered. It is that of a Miss Porter, from Florida. She had reached Cuyler only the day previous, and was unaccompanied by a single friend, save a waiting-maid, who seems overwhelmed with grief at the loss of her mistress."

This, then, was the announcement which so affected Ralph Browning, blotting out for a moment the wretched past, and taking him back to the long ago when he first knew Marie Porter and fancied that he loved her. She was dead now—dead. Many a time he whispered that word to himself, and with each repetition the wish grew strong within him—not that she were living, but that while living he had not hated her so bitterly, and with the softened feeling which death will always bring, he blamed himself far more than he did her. There had been wrong on both sides, but he would rather now, that she had been reconciled to him ere she found that watery grave. Hand in hand with these reflections came another thought; a bewildering, intoxicating thought. He was free at last—free to love—to worship—to marry Rosamond.

"And I will go to her at once," he said, after the first hour had been given to the dead; "I will tell her all the truth."

He rose to leave the room, but something stayed him there, and whispered in his ear, "There may be some mistake. Cuyler is not far away. Go there first and investigate."