“Oh, Doctor Redfield was recommended very highly, professionally and otherwise,” replied his wife, “but you know,—well, Lucy and I had planned it differently.” She spoke in a slow and hesitating manner. Mr. Horton made no reply. Presently she said, “The death of Mrs. Osborn has been a great shock to me. I cannot bring myself to believe those shameful rumors about her and Lord Avondale; I really can’t.”
“My dear wife,” replied Mr. Horton, with more firmness than was usual with him, “it is proper to let the dead rest in peace. The atmosphere of strict propriety, as a matter of fact, bristled with interrogation points, though unknown to you. Mrs. Osborn’s death, however, calmed all into silent and mute forgiveness. It is best that it should be so. I do not regard it as strange that you should have been deceived by the machinations of a clever woman and of a consummate scoundrel. Avondale was a mercenary adventurer, and used his newly acquired title as a social ‘jimmy’ to break into the sanctity of our home. Let us be truly grateful for Ethel’s escape. That is one reason, I imagine, why she is so happy to-night.”
“And pray, do you think there are other reasons?” asked Mrs. Horton, apprehensively.
“There is one other reason,” replied her husband, “that I know of. Ethel is in love with Doctor Redfield. I have so much confidence in her judgment that I cannot question the wisdom of her choice. Her wishes and happiness, my dear, must be paramount to all else.”
Mrs. Horton had never before heard her husband speak so decisively about Ethel, and it began to dawn upon her that she had been cruelly deceived by Mrs. Osborn and Lenox Avondale. Even Ethel had not confided in her as a daughter should. It was too much for Mrs. Horton, and genuine tears filled her eyes. In her ambition for her daughter’s place in society, she felt she had been imposed upon, and it cut her deeply.
“Come, come, my dear,” said her husband, observing her tears, “I am sure Ethel does not blame you. She thinks, and, I believe, rightly, that you have been imposed upon by those far more designing than it was possible for you to imagine.”
A little later Mrs. Horton rapped at the door of her daughter’s room. Ethel’s face was flushed with the joy of her great love for Jack. He had given her the letters that had been intercepted by Mrs. Osborn, and also the letter purporting to have been written by her mother. She knew the handwriting, and imagined that her mother was ignorant of the intrigue that had kept Jack from her so long. As Mrs. Horton entered the room, Ethel saw traces of tears on her cheeks. The stately woman came close to her daughter and caressed and kissed her affectionately.
“Oh, Ethel, my child, why did n’t you tell me that you cared so much for Doctor Redfield?” Ethel was astonished. She looked up at her mother and saw the old-time tenderness divested of all ambition. “Oh, mamma,” she cried, resting her head gently upon her mother’s breast, “I have so often wanted to, but you would n’t let me. I can tell you to-night,” she sobbed, “for you are again the mother I knew before I went away to that horrid London school.”
Jack Redfield and Hugh were almost too happy for sleep, and talked far into the night, laying plans for Jack’s future. It was a bright moonlit night, and Jack Redfield declared, with a lover’s enthusiasm, that it was his reciprocated affection for Ethel that was turning the night into day,—a reflex glow of his deathless love lighting up the world.
The next morning when Hugh went to the bank he found Judge Lynn waiting for him. The latter pushed his hat well back on his head, as if in a sort of desperate and determined mood, and said: “Look ‘e ‘ere, Stanton, I want to borrow a thousand dollars. What’s banks for, anyway? I am ‘lowin’ if you’re doin’ a bankin’ business, you nachally want to loan money. Is n’t that so?”