“Then they are not your relatives,” he said. “But tell me, Bel, if you can keep a secret.”
She nodded, silently and wonderingly.
“What is my name?” he asked.
“Claud Morrillo,” said Arabel, proudly.
Claud smiled sadly, and said, “Yes, to you I am; but I have two names. Now, mind what I say, Arabel,” he said, sternly grasping her arm; “my father and Lord Etheredge are one and the same person, and I am now to take his title, and be Lord Etheredge in his stead. But, by the acquaintance we have had with each other, Arabel Ortono, and by the remembrance of our many meetings here, I warn you to tell no one of what I have said tonight.”
Then tearfully they parted, that warm, soft night; Arabel to weep until slumber closed her weary lids, and brought gay visions of future happiness; Claud to return to the fortress, arrange his father’s business, snatch a single hour of deep, unrefreshing repose, and, as the bell on the high tower rung out the mystic midnight hour of twelve, to see his father’s form placed in his own private carriage and whirl rapidly away, drawn by his own splendidly caparisoned horses.
As morning dawned, Claud left the fortress in the care of the banditti, and went in a disguised conveyance to his home in Rome, and spent half the hours of that long day in pacing up and down the gorgeous rooms. Friends called, but he steadily refused himself to them; relatives arrived, but he kept from them in scorn. At last another guest was announced. It was Fay Ortono, Lady Emelie and Luella having accompanied him to the burial. Deeply and truly did they sympathize with the young lord, and he appreciated their disinterestedness; for were they not Arabel’s nearest friends; and might he not, through them, become better acquainted with her?
At sunset, that night, Lord Etheredge was buried. Waxen tapers were lit in the damp tomb, and heavy, mellow-toned bells tolled out the last requiem of departed worth.
“He is not an infidel!” murmured Arabel, joyfully. “Mother in heaven! Claud is good; for he believes, and the monks have said mass for him.”
Another half-year went by with magic rapidity. Again came the luscious harvest-time, and again the girls were needed more than ever at the vineyard, when death came again; and this time, O terror, Uncle Fay was called. The girls worked nobly, so said Lady Emelie; they should be rewarded for it, and so they were; but when winter came, they could stay no longer, and, by Claud’s invitation, they went together to the fortress, and determined to make it, for a short time, their home. There was but one female there at the time, and she was the most silent of her famously loquacious sex. The girls lived very pleasantly together, sometimes for whole weeks seeing no one besides themselves, and again having company every day, when Claud was about. But all this time Luella was fading. Her breath came quick and painful, her pale cheeks wore a bright flush, and her firm step faltered. Claud was first to make the sad discovery. He had been away on a cruise, and, upon his return, had taken the fortress for his home once more.