Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 January 1893 — TRVE AS STEEL [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

T RVE AS STEEL

BY MRS ALVARI JORDAN GARTH

CHAPTER Xll—Continued. There was a dreary lapse of silonce, but during its reign the gleaming, scintillant eyes of Beatrice Mercer toid that Lheir owner was not idle. She was thinking, plotting, preparing to act. Her quick mind* grasped the situation readily, the situation she had anticipated, and whioh she had come prepared to meet. She held the remedy —gold. To befriend the father of the man she loved in his dire extremity, to save an honored family name from reproach —would it not win the gratitude of the delinquent son, and gratitude pity, and pity love? She had other final resources in reserve. She had prepared plans calmly, systematically. This was but the first step. Oh! she could not fail. She arose and stole to the door; she peered in. There sat the stern-faced, implacable lawyer, the fatal documents spread out before him. There, too, wan-faced, wretched, lost, shrank the father of Raymond Marshall. She stepped boldly across the threshold of the room. Not until she had reached the table and her shadow fell across it did lawyer and viotim glance up, with a vivid start. “Madam! —why " began the former. “I have come to purchase those documents.” Her hand pointed to the pile of notes and securities, almost touching them. In profound wonderment the lawyer regarded her. With a gasp of hope, suspense, dread, Colonel Marshall stared at h -r veiled face. “You have come ” repeated the lawyer, vaguely. “To buy those documents!” “Why—l do not understand —by what right.” “Are they, for sale?” Her voice rang out sharply. “To Colonel Marshall or his authorized agent, yes, but to a stranger-—” Beatrice Mercer turned to the bewildered Colonel. “I am no stranger, but a friend,” she half-whispered in his dumfounded ear. “I came to save you,” and then aloud; “Colonel Marshall, you authorize me to act for you?” The half-stunned Colonel could only nod like an automaton. “Ten thousand dollars is the amount, I believe,” went on Beatrice, calmly. “There is the money. See that it is right. ” She had flashed a heap of bank-notes of large denominations before the lawyer’s sight. She took up the papers on the table. “This is the forged $2,000 note, I believe?” she said, selecting one from the many papers, “Colonel Marshall, it ■ shall never trouble you again.’’ With two twists of her dainty tut supple wrists, she severed the fatal document in twain.

“These other papers I shall keep for a day or two. The amount is correct?” she demanded of the lawyer. “Colonel Marshall, you are free from debt and dread alike. I trust we all know how to keep a secret. I would like to speak a few words to you alone. ” The lawyer had witnessed some strange scenes in his professional career, but the denouement of the present inexplicable one left him speechless. Colonel Marshall, like one in a dream, followed the woman who had mysteriously saved him from ruin and dishonor from the room. Then, realizing that he had been snatched from the brink of a precipice, he reeled to a table in the outer office for support, and burst into tears. “Woman, angelic deliverer!” he fairly sobbed. “Who sent you here? You have saved to me all I hold dear on earth. My tears, my prayers shall be yours till my last breath. I shall teach my own to reverence you. I shall repay you dollar for dollar. What can I say, what can I do to acknowledge, to repay this stupendous obligation that crushes, stuns, mystifies me?” “One single favor.” , “Name It-—oh! name it.” “Ask no questions, feel no obligations. I only ask that to-morrow evening at dusk you come to the hotel and to the apartments of Miss Leslie, and bring your son Raymond with you.” She was gone like a flash with the words. The Colonel stood staring after her as if she were some wraith. His eyes closed and he swayed like one in 3, dream. He hastened after her a minute later to demand a more lucid explanation of her strange intercession in his behalf, but when he reached the street, like the fairy in the story-books, she had disappeared utterly. Beatrice Mercer had hastened back to the hotel. Her face was flushed, her eyes hopeful, exultant, as she laid aside her wraps. ■> “So far all is well,” she murmured, confidently. “Now for the most difficult part of the plot.” When Dr. Simms came, she led him to a sofa, and for over aij hour In low, earnest tones she with him.

She told him all her plot, desires. She startled him with her boldness and shrewdness, she dazzled him with the promise of munificent rewards. “What a scheme!” he ejaculated, arising at last, “and all for the love of a man whose heart is buried in the grave of that lost, drowned girl. Beatrice, is the game worth the candle?” “I will have it so!” she cried, wildly. “Without Raymond Marshall, what is wealth to me! You will help me?” “To the last!” “You can give me the medicine to produce the effect I desire. You will help me carry out the imposition?” “Yes. Wait till Igoto my office.” In an hour he returned. Deep and subtle must have been the plots of the fair and false siren, for, as he handed her a tiny phial, he said: “ You can rely upon it. When Raymond Marshall comes to see you tomorrow, it will be as you desire. All the pity of his heart cannot fall to go out to woman who has saved his family from penury and disgrace for, to all seeming, through the agency of that potent drug, you will be a dying woman! ” CHAPTER XIII. A SUBTLE PLOT. “All is ready?” “_Evervthing. My housekeeper, whom we can trust, will act as nurse and is in the next room. I will receive the Marshalls when they arrive and pave the way for you.” "Make no mistake!” It was the afternoon of the day succeeding that which had witnessed Beatrice Mercer’s strange act of generosity. Beatrice herself, In propria persona, the disguise she had hitherto adopted

now abandoned, lay upon * couch In one corner of her sleeping apartment. She was no longer disguised, bht there was a. change In her from her ordinary appearance that was most remarkable. Her face looked thin and wretchedly white, her eyes heavy. As she lay back on the pillow, her labored breathing and hectic cheeks seemed to indicate a hot, burning fever. A hot, burning fever she had, but produced by artificial means. This ruthless schemer had paused at nothing to accomplish her ends. To further her schemes an assumption of mortal illness had been necessary, and her worthy coadjutor, Dr. Simms, had not prevaricated when he told her that the contents of the little phial he had given her th * day previous would bring about the result she desired. These two had plotted well in unison, and as he entered the outer room of the suite he assumed that grave, serious expression of face that the average physician wears while attending a patient in the last extremity. He opened the door with warning noiselessness as there came a tap finally. A servant stood there, two persons at his side. “Gentleman to see Miss Leslie, sir,” he announced, withdrew, and Doctor Simms ushered his two visitors into the room and pointed to chairs, his serious manner evidently surprising them. Colonel Marshall was the one, his son Raymond the other. The former was all curiosity and excitement. As to Raymond, as he sat gazing vacantly at the floor, his hollow cheeks, haunted eyes and dejected bearing generally told that the present visit had no interest for him. “Doctor Simms!” ejaculated the Colonel. “Why! I came to see ” “Miss Leslie?” “Yes.” “Miss Leslie is a dying woman, Colonel Marshall. “What!” With an incredulous gasp the Colonel started to his feet. “Yes, she has been ill for some time. 1 was summoned yesterday afternoon. 1 found her fevered, almost delirious. She asked me to receive you,” “Doctor, you amaze me! This strange lady ” “Has an iron wijl even in death. She r has explained everything to me. She insists upon seeing yourself and your son. even in her dangerous condition. I told her that the shock might kill her, but she insists.” “Doctor! I am at a perfect loss to understand this lady’s remarkable generosity in my behalf—the mystery surrounding her ” “Here are the notes she took yesterday. She bade me destroy them in your presence.”. “Wait! Don’t! I really cannot accept all these favors from a stranger. ” The Colonel spoke too late. The documents were blazing on the hearth. He was a free man! A stranger had liberated him from all the financial entanglements of the hour. “Doctor!” he panted, “this mystery is maddening. Who is this lady?'’

“You will be surprised when you know. Come; you, too, Mr. Marshall,” to Raymond. He advanced to the door of the sleep-ing-room and tapped lightly. The nurse opened it. Awed, startled, Col. Marshall stood in the center of the apartment, gazing dubiously at the figure lying on the couch, its face turned from him. Quite as curious and interested for the moment, Raymond Marshall looked up, too. , “Miss Leslie has asked me to explain to you why She has interested herself in your behalf,” spoke the Doctor, in calm, measured acoents. “Hermet has been one in a measure of atonement, of compensation for a wrong done a member of your family.” “Ha!” exclaimed the Colonel with a start, “she must be, then, some relative of the wretch who robbed me—who encompassed me in all this trouble, my former partner!” “Not at all. She simply deceived a member of your family. She is familiar with the troubles of your son, as well as yourself, and she desires me to impart some mournful information to him. Mr. Marshall, will you kindly read that article?" The Doctor had handed to Raymond Marshall the newspaper which had first set Beatrice on the trail of Edna Deane. It chronicled her death at the snowladen bridge. So accurately did it describe Edna and her attire, that, as Raymond Marshall perused it, with distended eyes and ashen face, he could not mistake the truth. With a wild cry he sank to a chair, the paper fluttering to the floor. “Dead! dead!” he wailed. “All hope, then, is lost!” “What may all this have to do with the lady here?” began the astounded and mystified Colonel Marshall. “Much. This ordeal is trying, fatal to her, but she insists. Nurse, turn up the lamp. Colonel—Mr. Marshall, your benefactress, the lady who makes an atonement for a great wrong, is ” “Beatrice Mercer!” In surprised accents from the Colonel’s lips, in a gasp of incredulity from those of Raymond Marshall, rang ihe name simultaneously, as the pretended invalid turned her wan features toward them. Dying features they were, to all semblance. The Doctor’s art and her own deft acting carried out the intended effect completely. “Raymond!” she fluttered, in a weak, wailing voice. “Say that you forgive me. I did wrong in deluding you. I even sought to find Edna and restore her to you after my cruel deception, but she is dead. A distant relative heft me a fortune. The only restitution I could make was to aid your father. lam dying. The only reward I ask is that you take my hand and forgive me for it all. ’’ Raymond Marshall stood like one in a dream. All the past flashed over his mind. This woman had, indeed, wronged him, but still she was not accountable for Edna’s death. As he thought of all she had done for his father, as he fancied he read a noble remorse in her words and deeds, a generous impulse drove him forward. He felt her burning hand twitch in his own. He did not doubt, after all the Doctor had said, that she was a dying woman. “You did me no wrong except to torture me with a passing belief in the faithlessness of the woman I loved," he said. “For love of you!” murmured Beatrice, fervently. “Raymond, I can tell you now, for I shall soon die. I was not to blame for my love, and I had not. Edna’s gentle nature to endure in silence. I loved you so hopelessly, yet so fondly!” His eyes dimmed with tears. Love was surely no sin, even when hopeless. His great heart stirred with honest pity. “I can die in peace, now,” she said, “for your eyes tell me that I am forgiven Raymond, good-by—good-by!”

Her eyes were raining teals. , Oh; actress deft and subtle! oh, hypocrite strong and confident! pitting all the issues of life upon the frail cast of a die. She turned her face to the wall, her sobs carusing the sympathetic Colonel to wince with honest pity. Raymond looked concerned, grieved. “Can we do nothing to make her happier?" spoke the Colonel, deeply affected. “Can I not tell her how grateful I am—how some arrangement must be made for the repayment of the money advanced?” “She would refuse to consider it,” responded the Doctor. “But—no!- I had better not mention it. ” “Speak, Doctor!” urged the Colonel, eagerly. “You were about to make some suggestion?” “It concerns your son. This morning this poor creature wailed her heart-siok-ness over her love for him. She cannot survive the night, and yet I think she would be infinitely happy for that brief period of time if she knew that you Forgive me, gentlemen, my task i 3 too difficult to complete.” “If sho knew what?” demanded Raymond, softly. “If you would consent to wed her. Nay, sir, do not start. A dying child’s wish; you need not gratify it, only she has left all her fortune to you.” “I will never accept it!” dissented Raymond, indignantly. “The law will make you. This poor girl’s devotion is pitiable. Give her your name, render her dying moments happy. It is not much to do, for before morning you will be a widower. ” The plot was out. This wa9 the deft design two clever schemers had planned. The unsuspecting Raymond Marshall never dreamed of a new deception. “Raymond, do it; it will quiet talk when ner will is read. Poor creature! her devotion is indeed pitiable, ” spoke the Colonel. Raymond Marshall thought of the woman dead and of all his love for her; of the woman dying and his pity for her forlorn helplessness. “What does it matter!” he murmured, dejectedly. “My life is gloom—the future aimless. If that small ceremony can brighten this dying girl’s moments, Doctor, I will marry her! ” The clever actress on the couch thrilled wildly. At last, reward; at last, success! Her hour of triumph had come. Ito be continued.!