And with the telegram crushed in her hand, and only the thought of her approaching meeting with Chester St. John keeping her from giving way to that sickening sensation of weakness, she turned her steps in the direction of the house in Lexington Avenue, without a thought that any treachery had lured her thither, although St. John’s residence was not in that locality.
It never occurred to her to wonder how this Gerald Dare knew of her change of name, and the place where she worked.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
A CRUEL STRATAGEM.
Several of the friends whom Iris Hilton had visited in the days of her prosperity resided on Lexington Avenue, and she knew that the number mentioned in the dispatch was in the neighborhood of Twenty-third Street, so that she had not more than a dozen blocks to walk from Madam Ward’s establishment to her destination.
At last the goal was reached, and she stood still for one moment before she could ascend the high stone stoop, pressing her hands to her heart, and praying for strength to go through the ordeal before her.
“He must not see me looking so ill—as I feel I am looking now. Oh, my darling! My brave, strong, noble love, what can have stricken you down so soon?” she murmured; and summoning all her strength to overcome the faintness that was creeping slowly upon her, she ascended the steps and rang a soft peal at the doorbell.
A stolid-looking colored man opened the door at her summons, and the girl tried to read in his face some knowledge of the true state of affairs in his master’s household, but she might as well have sought to penetrate the countenance of a statue.
“I wish to see him—Mr. St. John—they—they telegraphed for me,” she said, with a quick, panting breath, and at her words the ebony statue smiled and opened the door wider, that she might enter.
“Oh, yes, missy, I have had my orders to admit you,” he said, and something in his careless, and even jovial manner gave Iris a hope that things were not so bad with Chester St. John as she had feared.
“Will you take me to him now—at once,” she cried. “Oh, please make no delay—I am very calm, I shall say or do nothing to excite him.”