A Changed Heart: A Novel

by May Agnes Fleming

"Get up, Harriet," she distinctly heard her say, though she spoke in a low voice; "I cannot bear to see you like this; and do not speak so loud—some one may hear you."

If they had only known of the pale listener at the door, hushing her very heart-beating to hear the better. But Miss Henderson would not rise; she only knelt there, white and wild, and holding up her clasped hands.

"I will never get up," she passionately cried. "I will never rise out of this until you promise to keep my secret. It is not as a favor, it is as a right I demand it! Your father robbed my mother and me. But for him I would have never known poverty and misery—and God only knows the misery that has been mine. But for him, I should never have known what it is to suffer from cold and hunger, and misery and insult; but for him I would have been rich to-day; but for him my mother might still be alive and happy. He ruined us, and broke her heart, and I tell you it is only justice I ask! I should never have come here had I not thought you dead; but now that I have come, that wealth and comfort have been mine once more, I will not go. I will not, I tell you! I will die before I yield, and go back to that horrible life, and may my death rest forever on your soul!"

Catty Clowrie, crouching at the door, turned as cold as death, listening to these dreadful words. Was she awake—was she dreaming? Was this Olive Henderson—the proud, the beautiful, the queenly heiress—this mad creature, uttering those passionate, despairing words. She could not see into the room, her ear was at the keyhole—strained to a tension that was painful, so absorbed was she in listening. But at this very instant her strained hearing caught another sound—Rosie, the chambermaid, coming along the lower hall, and up-stairs. Swift as a flash, Catty Clowrie sprang up, and darted into her aunt's room. She did not dare to close the door, lest the girl should hear her, and she set her teeth with anger and suppressed fury at the disappointment.

Rosie had come up to make her bed, and set her room to rights, and was in no wise disposed to hurry over it. She sang at her work; but the pale-faced attorney's daughter in the next room, furious with disappointment, could have seen her choked at the moment with the greatest pleasure. Half an hour passed—would the girl never go? Yes—yes, there was Mrs. Hill, at the foot of the stairs, calling her, and Rosie ran down. Quick as she had left it, Catty was back at her post, airing her eye at the keyhole once more.

The scene she beheld was not quite so tragic this time. The heiress and the governess were seated opposite one another, an inlaid table between them. There was paper and ink on the table; Miss Henderson held a pen in her hand, as if about to write, and Miss Rose was speaking. Her voice was sweet and low, as usual; but it had a firm cadence, that showed she was gravely in earnest now.

"You must write down these conditions, Harriet," she was saying, "to make matters sure; but no one shall ever see the papers, and I pledge you my solemn word, your secret shall be kept inviolable. Heaven knows I have done all I could to atone for my dead father's acts, and I will continue to do it to the end. He wronged your mother and you, I know, and I am thankful it is in my power to do reparation. I ask nothing for myself—but others have rights as well as you, Harriet, and as sacred. Two hundred pounds will pay all the remaining debts of my father now. You must give me that. And you must write down there a promise to pay Mrs. Marsh one hundred pounds a year annuity, as long as she lives. Her daughter should have had it all, Harriet, and neither you nor I; and the least you can do, in justice, is to provide for her. You will do this?"

"Yes—yes," Miss Henderson cried; "that is not much to do! I want to do more. I want you to share with me, Olly."

"No," said Miss Rose, "you may keep it all. I have as much as I want, and I am very well contented. I have no desire for wealth. I should hardly know what to do with it if I had possessed it."

"But you will come and live with me," Miss Henderson said, in a voice strangely subdued; "come and live with me, and let us share it together, as sisters should."