“Bring everything that is in the Sea View box straight to me, Letty, before you let any one else see it. My cousin, Mr. Sherwood, wanted me to get out of it some private mail for him.”
Letty Green returned in an hour with a budget of letters, books, and papers for her mistress and her guests; but she had made sure, with feminine curiosity, first, that there was nothing for Royall Sherwood; also, that there was one very dainty-looking perfumed letter for Dallas Bain, bearing the town postmark, Gull Beach.
This was what Mrs. Fleming expected, and as soon as the maid’s back was turned she opened and read it, laughing to herself:
“She has planned with Annette to get him back; but Dallas Bain will never see this letter, and the two young misses will be disappointed this evening.”
CHAPTER VII.
TEMPTED TO END IT ALL.
Words are too weak to describe the feelings of Dallas Bain as he rushed with frenzied haste from the presence of the beautiful girl so lately worshiped as the queen of her sex, only to learn that she was the most heartless coquette in the world.
Never was there such a rapid transition from rapturous joy to the depths of misery—misery and anger, for how could any proud man bear with equanimity to be made a fool of, as Daisie Bell had just fooled him?
To be engaged only two days ago to Royall Sherwood, although of their intimacy he had had no inkling until now, and then to accept another’s suit with the most complacent smile and the sweetest blush, pretending a tenderness she, of course, did not feel—it was the most shocking thing he ever had heard of. He loathed, execrated himself for falling so easily into her wiles.
He was strong, passionate, and proud, and only twenty-five—this hero of ours—so who could blame him for the pride and resentment that fired his blood as he rushed from the scene of his humiliation, not heeding the piteous cry of woe with which Daisie sought to recall him to her side?
He strode down the village street in hot haste, looking neither to the right nor left until he reached the beach, where he sought a secluded spot by the sea, where none could intrude upon his rocky retreat, and flung himself down to brood over his cruel defeat in love.