CHAPTER XXVII.
“WHERE THE CLEMATIS BOUGHS INTWINE.”
Uncle Rube had rambled on heedlessly as though he loved his subject while his hearers listened in painful wonder; but now Madame Ray brought him up suddenly by saying, nervously:
“That is enough, Uncle Rube. Drive on a few miles further and we will return.”
A strange terror was stirring in her breast—terror of some startling revelation that might shock Cinthia in the old man’s rambling talk. She dared not let him utter another word; but strange suspicions were awakened in her breast, and she resolved to have a private conversation with Uncle Rube to solve her doubts.
One of his statements had struck her with peculiar force.
He had spoken of Captain Varian’s youngest daughter’s marriage and divorce from her husband.
In the next breath he had called her Mrs. Varian, Varian being her maiden name.
Why did the divorced woman and her son both bear the family name? And who was the divorced husband? Of his name Madame Ray began to have a secret prescient dread.
Was she about to stumble on the mystery that had sundered Arthur’s and Cinthia’s lives?
She glanced nervously at Cinthia, but beyond a deep pallor saw no sign of shock such as she had secretly experienced. Feeling thankful that it was so, she exclaimed:
“Uncle Rube’s story has given me the horrors! How sad to think of such a happy family so broken up by the cruel, desolating war! But there were many such. One could almost fancy the ghost of the past haunting that desolate ruin!”
They looked back with troubled eyes at the wrecked home that had sheltered Arthur Varian’s forefathers and his own saddened youth. How strange that he should thus be recalled to memory again when Cinthia was just getting over their last ill-fated meeting.
She read Madame Ray’s perturbed thoughts and feigned indifference, saying:
“It certainly gives one a sort of ghostly chill to gaze on the ruins of such a home. Do you remember Byron’s lines on his old home?” repeating softly:
They rode on along the broad, level road, finding always something new to admire, but they did not talk so much or so brightly as before. Their faces were pale and thoughtful, and a shadow had fallen on their spirits—the shadow that always fell when they were reminded of the Varians.
Memory was poison to their hearts.
But when they were returning along the same road, both craned their necks eagerly toward the ruined home which had aroused in them so much painful interest.
They looked half questioningly toward each other, and Cinthia murmured:
“I—I—should like to walk among the ruins—should you?”
“I am always walking among ruins—the ruins of a life’s happiness,” the actress answered, sadly enough; then added: “But yes, we can easily spare time to go through the place. Uncle Rube, are strangers permitted to enter Love’s Retreat?”
“Oh, sartainly, mistis. De big gates ain’t never locked. Anybody is free to go in and gather all de flowers dey want. It seem to me like I seen some folkses dodgin’ ’bout de trees when we went pas’, but guess dey’s all gone now. Shall I drive you in at the kerridge road?”
“No; you may wait for us here in the shade of these trees while we walk. We will return in fifteen minutes.”
They pushed open the wrought iron front gates that clanged heavily to behind them, and turning from the broad graveled walk, plunged into the miniature thickets of blossoming shrubbery, shaking out odors of rose and jasmine with the slightest touches as they walked along toward a graceful little summer-house, heavily matted with rich purple clematis bells starring the dark green of the leaves.
“Let us go in,” said Madame Ray, stepping over the threshold closely followed by Cinthia.
Then both recoiled with a startled cry.
Two young men in cycling suits were in the summer-house.
They had slipped in there to hide when they saw a carriage stop at the gate and two ladies entering the grounds.
“Sight-seers whom we do not know, I suppose, so let us hide in here and finish our talk and our cigars till they leave. I care no more for womankind, be she never so fair, since I have lost the lovely queen of my heart,” one said to the other; so they fled the scene till it should be safe to venture out.
He was dark and striking in appearance, the other was fairer and younger than his companion by several years. His clustering locks were light golden brown, and the beauty of his face was enhanced by the expressive dark-blue eyes, where shadows of secret sorrow seemed to lurk in half-discovered ambush.
“Fred they are coming this way by their voices. Let us turn our backs to the door, so that they will see we are not anxious to be disturbed,” he said, presently.
“A good idea, Arthur,” and suiting the action to the word, they presented two broad backs toward the new-comers, who had barely stepped across the threshold ere they recoiled, each with a stifled cry of surprise.
The Mother Eve that is in all men just as much as in all women made the two smokers spring up and look around at the intruders.
Then there were more startled exclamations all around.
For the fate that seemed to pursue Cinthia Dawn with its cruelest irony had followed her even here.
She had fled from the far North to the far South to escape Arthur Varian, and she had hoped never to gaze again in life on his too fatally fascinating beauty—the manly beauty that had lured the girlish heart from her breast only to toss it back to her at the command of cruel parents, who seemed to have forgotten the fervor of youthful love, or they never could have been so harsh to their tortured children.
Yet, here stood Arthur Varian before her again—Arthur Varian pale to the very lips, Arthur Varian with unmasked despair in his beautiful, dark-blue eyes.