“Yes, here. And just here, I may as well tell you of another circumstance. On the day which came so near being your last our old time friend with her two little girls and myself were out driving in her carriage when through the throwing of a stone our horses took fright, and like mad they dashed through the streets and—Well, do you understand the rest? I was in the vehicle that caused you a broken arm and an almost broken head.” Cora smiled sadly.
“A pity it was not wholly broken,”—for which she was reproved by Imelda.
“Don’t let me hear such words again. I will not listen; but first tell me why you should use them and then let me judge.”
“Let you judge,”—fell in bitterest accents from Cora’s lips. “Chaste, honest, truthful, will you be able to judge me?”
“I hope so, and as I hope that I am all that you say, you must not forget to add ‘just.’ That is another attribute to which I aspire. Now trust me, little sister, and ease that aching heart. You will feel better when it is all over; I am very sure.” So at last Cora gathered up courage and began the confession that in the last few days so often had hovered upon her lips.
Cora told how short the dream of happiness had been that had enticed her to leave home and listen to the tempter’s words. How the promised marriage had been put off from day to day, and from week to week, until the truth burst upon her that he never had had any intention of making her a wife. A scene similar to that recorded somewhere near the beginning of this narrative was again enacted. Cora was no less emphatic in her demands than her mother had been before her. But there was a difference: Herbert Ellwood was a gentleman; one of nature’s noblemen. But Tom Dixon did not know the meaning of the word “honor,” and when he was tired of his plaything he simply cast it aside. Neither threats, tears or prayers could avail anything. Alone, a stranger in a strange city she was helpless. He had taken her as far as New York, and for a while the disgraced girl was tempted to end her life in the quickest way possible. Desperate indeed was her position; without money; awaiting an event which, if nature had justice done her, should be the crowning joy and glory of a woman’s life, but which, instead, made her a wretched outcast, a homeless, friendless wanderer.
Her voice was husky and her cheek fever-flushed as she proceeded with her story, not daring to meet the eye of her sister.
“I had been considered pretty, I know, both of face and form, and these drew the attention of a man who had protected me from the brutal insults of some roughs, and who, noticing my condition and circumstances, and, attracted by something that even now I cannot account for, took me under his immediate care and protection. I soon discovered that he possessed a tender heart, as well as a well filled purse. Placing me in the hands of a skillful physician he procured a nurse, and, when my baby was born, saw that I had every attention.
“At first I hated the little innocent because of its father, but after it had lain in my arms and at my breast the unnatural feeling gave way to one that might have brought me some happiness if I had been permitted to keep it. But just two weeks from the day I first felt the touch of the baby lips the little unwelcome life went out, and I was left more wretched than ever.
“I did not love my new lover, (for such he was). I don’t think I was then capable of love. My heart was so full of bitterness. But Owen Hunter had been kind to me when he who according to nature ought to have protected me had cast me off. This stranger had cared for the despairing outcast and tided her over the stormiest waters. But there came a day when he seemed to expect a return, a compensation.