Queenie Hetherton

Margery found her mother in the library standing by the window, with that gloomy abstracted look upon her face which she had so often seen there before she learned the cause and knew of the keen remorse always gnawing at her heart-strings and making her life so wretched. Christine had done the worst she could do to Queenie. She had told her the truth; and though a great burden was lifted from her, and in one sense she felt freer and happier than she had felt in years, she was weighed down with a sense of remorse and regret, and filled with a dread of the future. That Queenie could ever love, or even respect her, was impossible, reared as she had been in a very hot-bed of pride and aristocracy, and taught from her infancy that such as Christine Bodine were creatures of an entirely different grade from herself.

“She may compel herself to be civil to me,” Christine thought, “though I ought not to hope for that; but if she only knew how much I love her and how the affection, smothered so long, has grown since I confessed myself her mother, she would forgive me, perhaps.”

“Mother,” Margery said just here, and with a start Christine turned toward her; “Mother, Queenie wishes to see you. Will you go to her now?”

“Yes,” Mrs. La Rue replied, in a frightened voice, for there swept over her a great fear of the girl to whom she must tell her story, and grasping Margery’s arm she whispered, “Does she hate me? Will she scorn me? Will she make me feel that I am but the dust beneath her feet? Oh, Margie, go with me. I cannot meet her alone. She is so hot, so imperious, so proud, so different from you, who have never reproached me, except for her sake. Come, Margie, you must go, too; and if she is too hard upon me, say a word for me, will you, Margie?”

She was like a child shrinking from the rod, and Margery’s heart ached for the woman who clung to her nervously as they went up the stairs together to Queenie’s room. Pierre had been there before them, full of concern for his young mistress, whose sudden and strange illness he did not understand.

As they entered, Queenie lifted her eyes to them, but made no sign of recognition to Christine, who, like some guilty culprit, sank into a chair, where she sat shaking in every limb.

After the first glance at her, Queenie shut her eyes and said languidly and slowly, as if speaking were wearisome, “I wish you to tell me of Margery and myself; tell me why she was deserted and left to live in the Rue St. Honore, while I was taken to Chateau des Fleurs and treated as the daughter of the house. That is all.”

While Queenie talked she did not once look at Christine, but sat with her eyes closed and her whole attitude one of extreme weariness. But she heard Margery as she was stealing from the room and called her to come back.

“You must stay with me, Margery,” she said, “I want to hold your hand so that I can feel there is something left when all else slips from me.”

So Margery came back and sitting down by Queenie took one of the hot, feverish hands in hers, and caressed it occasionally as Christine told her story.

“I must commence at a period prior to Margery’s birth,” she said, “or I cannot make you understand how ignorant of the world I was when I entered Mrs. Hetherton’s employ, and how innocent and unsuspecting too. And when Monsieur began to notice me, and speak to me pleasantly, and tell me what a good girl I was I thought nothing of it, but redoubled my efforts to please him. But when he flattered me and said I was more a lady than many a one who wore her diamonds and pearls, I was angry and told him he must never speak to me like that again; and he did not, though he was always very kind and polite, and I felt intuitively that he respected me as one superior to my class, and admired me, too, for I was pretty then, with ways something like Queenie’s.”

There was a slight sound like a moan from Queenie, and Christine continued:

“That he could ever think of me for a wife never entered my brain till I sat by my dying mistress and heard her say, ‘I am so glad, for Frederick has wanted a child so much, and a daughter will make him very happy, and keep me in his mind. Christine, it may be very foolish in me, but I do not like to think that Frederick will marry again—that another woman will take my place, and possibly be loved more than I have been, and now that he has a little daughter to care for, there is not so much danger of it. He will be satisfied with little Margery, he will call her by that name. I have told him so in the letter which you will give to him. Stay with him, Christine, and be a comfort to him, you and Margery.’ These were nearly the last words she said to me, for in less than an hour she was dead, and I was alone with her baby in my arms, and the horrible temptation to which I afterwards yielded kept suggesting itself to me, making me shudder and grow faint as I reflected what a monster I was to harbor such a thought for an instant. And still it recurred to me over and over again until it did not seem so very dreadful, and I began to consider it seriously, as something which might be done. I was not then the simple peasant girl I had been when I first entered my mistress’ service. The familiarity with which she had treated me, the evident liking of my master whom I could influence at times more readily even than his wife, the notice I received from strangers, especially Americans who frequently mistook me for Mrs. Hetherton’s companion, rather than her maid, had turned my head and made me discontented with my position. I wanted to be a lady, and as I sat with Margery in my arms, the devil whispered to me that now was my opportunity to try for something higher, and test the power I knew I held over my master. He had made one misalliance—he might make another. If he was very proud he was very susceptible too—he liked to be cared for and petted, and I, who understood him so well, would make myself so necessary to him that he could not live without me, and would perhaps make me his wife at last. Thus I reasoned when suddenly it occurred to me that the baby was an obstacle in my way. He was passionately fond of children, and a daughter in his house would change everything. My mistress had said so, and I believed it. With the baby at Chateau des Fleurs I could never hope to be more than nurse and maid, as I was now. And then Satan told me to hide the child for a time, till I saw what I could do with the father. If I succeeded I would tell him the truth, and brave his anger, for I should still be his wife. If I failed I would send his daughter to him with the letter my mistress entrusted to me, and in which she told him of its birth and the name she had given it. In any event I did not mean to hide Margie forever, but I did not know then how one sin leads to another or what a hard master is the evil one when you give yourself to him as I did, for I resolved at last to do the wicked thing which was comparatively easy. Of Margery’s expected birth Monsieur knew nothing, for his wife had purposely kept it from him to make the surprise and pleasure greater. He had not seen her in some months, and would have no suspicion of the existence of the little girl. We had lived very quietly in Rome, and few knew or cared for the young mother who died alone with me. But when she was dead strangers kindly came forward and when they heard that Mr. Hetherton was away in Austria or Russia, I did not know which, they took the matter in hand and buried her in the Protestant burying ground, but left me to do what I pleased with the baby, which I took to Paris, to an old woman whom I had known for years, and to whom I entrusted it, telling her it was mine, and hiring her to care for it until I was in a position to claim it. She asked me no questions, for the gold I paid her was a conclusive argument in my favor and would, I knew, insure kind care for the child.

“My next step was to go to Chateau des Fleurs to await the coming of my master, for I had written him from Rome, telling him of his wife’s death, and my intention to return to the Chateau with whatever effects she left in my care. The letter was some time in finding him; but on its receipt, he hastened home at once, and for a day or two seemed crushed with grief and remorse. Then for a short time he drank hard and deeply, and kept his room, where bottle after bottle of wine and brandy was sent, and in his drunkenness he was more like a brute than a man.

“This drunken revel was succeeded by an illness of several weeks’ duration, during which I nursed him with the utmost care, playing my part so well that the result came sooner than I anticipated, but was not what I desired. I must be his wife or nothing, and at last weakened bodily and mentally by disease and the brandy he drank in so large quantities he promised to make me his wife on condition that I kept it a secret until he chose to tell of it himself. As there was no Protestant clergyman near Chateau des Fleurs he said we would marry ourselves, and he made me believe that by joining hands and promising to take each other for man and wife after the manner of the English Prayer Book, we should really become so. ‘Such things were common in America,’ he said, ‘when a priest was not easy of access.’ Of course, when it was convenient this private ceremony, though perfectly legal, must be repeated in public, and this he swore solemnly should be done, and I trusted him and went blind-folded to my ruin, but innocent—oh, Queenie, as innocent as you are to-day.”

“Yes,” Queenie rejoined, with a look of unutterable anguish upon her face, for now she had lost all faith in and respect for her father, but as yet had no relenting towards the poor deceived mother. “Yes, go on.”

Christine flushed a little as she went on rapidly: “I believe I was his wife and wished to remain at the Chateau, but he would not hear to me. ‘We must go to Marseilles,’ he said, and thither he went, and he hired a suite of rooms for me, but did not remain there himself, though he came often to see me, and treated me with kindness and consideration, but did not bring the clergyman as he had promised to do. ‘He had not met one of the right sort,’ he said, and there was no haste as I was really his wife. And so matters went on until a great fear took possession of me that all was not right, and then you were born, and when you were three or four weeks old he came to me and seemed to love you so much, and was so kind to me that I begged him on my knees to acknowledge me to the world, and take me with him to Chateau des Fleurs. Then it was that he undeceived me and told me how I had been duped, and did it as coolly as if to ruin an innocent girl was nothing but pastime for gentlemen like him, and he laughed at me for taking it as I did, for at first I raved like a mad woman, but it did no good.

“‘Christine,’ he said, ‘you must be very weak to suppose for a moment that I was in earnest, or that you could ever live at Chateau des Fleurs as other than a servant. Men of my stamp do not marry girls like you, or in fact marry at all in our sober senses. I will admit that I am far more to blame than you, but you can never be my wife, though I will care for the child. It is lonely at Chateau des Fleurs; a baby’s voice and baby’s prattle will make it more endurable. I have wanted a child so much, and if Margaret had left me one I should never have done what I have.’

“You will not believe me if I tell you that when I heard this my first impulse was to fall at his feet and tell him of the little girl in Paris, thoughts of whom had haunted me continually, making me sometimes cry out with pain and remorse. But I had gone too far to confess. He would never have forgiven me, and all my ambitious dreams for my own child would have come to naught. I had no hope for myself; his imperious manner and cold, disdainful words crushed all that; but there arose in me an intense desire to see you a lady, and I begged him to take you, whatever he might do with me, and he consented at last, but bade me stay where I was until I heard from him again. He wished to make some change in his household, he said, for if he took you home it would be as the child of his dead wife. I was only the nurse, who might or might not be retained; it would depend upon myself.

“Then he left me, and I knew I was no more to him than a cast-off garment, of which he was tired, and that in whatever arrangements he might make, no thought for me or my comfort would actuate him; and in my anguish I felt that my punishment was greater than I could bear, and I even thought to kill myself and you too. But a thought of little Margery prevented me. Somebody must care for her, and so I lived on and waited and hoped the time might come when I could restore her to her rights.

“On quitting Marseilles your father went to Chateau des Fleurs, and, on one pretext or another, dismissed all the servants in his employ, filling their places with strangers, who knew nothing of his past life, and who readily believed him when he told them of his wife who had died in Rome, and of his little daughter whom he was soon to bring home. A huge nursery, which communicated with his apartments, was fitted up with every possible luxury. And then he bade me come; and I took you to him as his lawful child, while I was only the head nurse—for he hired another woman to look after you, giving me the post of looking after her.

“I remember so well the day I took you to the Chateau and waited for his coming, but waited in vain, for though he knew I was in the house, he kept aloof from me and took his dinner, and read his paper, and smoked his cigar, and then at last he sauntered into the nursery with that air of elegant indifference and superiority so natural to him. I had not seen him since his visit to Marseilles, when you were a few weeks old; but he simply bade me good-evening, and asked if I had found everything in readiness. Then he walked up to the cradle, and when you raised your little hands toward him as if asking him to take you, he lifted you in his arms, kissed your lips, and laying your head upon his shoulder said: ‘My daughter, my heiress, Reinette Hetherton.’

“I knew he had adopted you as his own. But I was only your hired nurse, who was entitled to consideration in the household because I had been the trusted maid of his wife. This raised me somewhat above my fellow-servants, who treated me with a great deal of respect, and asked me many questions concerning my late mistress and Mr. Hetherton, who puzzled them with his cold, quiet, haughty manner.

“With your advent at the Chateau all his former habits were changed, and he seldom left home except to go to Paris, where he never stayed more than a day or two. All his old associates were dropped, and few ever came to see him. And yet he did not seem to be lonely, so great was his love for you. From the moment he took you in his arms and kissed you, he was perfectly devoted to you, and had you brought to him in the library every night after his dinner was over. I generally took you to him myself, but he never noticed me by a word or look, and this so enraged me that I spoke out to him at last, and threatened to go away and take you with me, if he continued to treat me with so much contempt.

“‘You can do so to-morrow, if you like, I shall be glad to have you,’ was his reply, and I knew that he meant it.

“But my desire to see you a lady was stronger than my resentment, and so I stayed, content to be trodden down, if by that means you might rise. But those foolish words of mine sealed my fate, for from that time I think he began to plan how to be rid of me. The sight of me was distasteful to him, and when you were about a year and a half old, we had a bitter quarrel, which ended in a final separation; but I could not take you from all the luxury with which you were surrounded, and when he offered to settle upon me a certain sum of money if I would go away quietly, and promise solemnly, never to come near you, or let you know that I was your mother, I consented, and left you at Chateau des Fleurs the acknowledged and petted child of the house.

“How well I remember you, Queenie, as I saw you for the last time in your embroidered white dress, with coral clasps at your neck, and your hands full of flowers, which you offered to me when I bent over you, crying as if my heart would break. You were so beautiful and bright, and I loved you so much, that for a moment I was tempted to break my vow, and, defying my cruel master, publish to the whole world my wrongs, and, if possible, carry you off in triumph. But when I remembered the home to which I must take you, and how different all your future life would be, I abandoned the project, and left you there in the sunshine, with wealth and luxury all around you, and went out into the darkness, where only toil and poverty awaited me, with a constant sense of my wrong and the sin I had committed in hiding Margery.”

Here Christine paused, and with closed eyes and clenched fists seemed to be living over again the scenes she had described, while Reinette raised herself from her reclining position in the chair, and winding her arms tightly around Margery’s neck, rested her cheek upon the bowed head, and said:

“Well, Christine, you have let me see one side of the picture, have shown me myself, surrounded with riches and love, and sunshine and flowers, to which I had no right. Now show me the other side; take me to the garret where Margie, to whom belonged the sunshine and the flowers, was struggling with cold and hunger, and shrinking it may be, from harsh words and cruel blows.”

“No, Queenie, never,” Margery exclaimed. “Never hunger or cold or blows or harsh words. The woman who cared for me was always kind, and my childhood was a happy one, for I knew no other life, and the children of poverty are as much pleased with a toy which costs a penny as are the children of the rich with one which costs many francs; and after mother came and took me to live with her, I was very happy, for if she defrauded me of my birthright, she made it up in love and tender care.”

Margery’s generous defense of the woman who had wronged her so deeply, touched Queenie, and her voice was softer and her manner less imperious as she continued: “I know she loved you, Margie—know she has been kind to you, and I thank her for it; but I wish to hear about it all the same—wish to know where you lived, and how, after she left Chateau des Fleurs and went back to you. Tell me, please,” and she turned to Christine: “tell me of Margie when she was a baby.”

Christine was quick to detect the change in Queenie’s voice and manner, and her face was brighter as she replied: “After I left you I went to Paris, to Florine’s apartments, where I found a healthy, beautiful child, whom no one could see and not love. My heart was very sore and full of a great longing for my own baby girl left at Chateau des Fleurs, and when she toddled to my side and put up her sweet lips to be kissed, as was a habit of hers, I took her in my arms and into my heart and made a solemn vow to be true to her and never let her feel the want of a mother’s love. I told her to call me mamma, and the name came prettily from her lips. I was younger and better looking than Florine, and she took to me readily, and slept in my arms and cried when I left her to look for lodgings and employment. I found both: the first with a hair-dresser in Rue de Richelieu, and the second on the upper floor of number —— Rue St. Honore, where you came to us one day and changed Margery’s whole life. Had I chosen to use the money your father paid me annually, we might have lived in much better style, but I shrank from touching more of it than it was absolutely necessary, and took pleasure in supporting her by my own hard labor. I would lay the money by for her until she married, if she ever did, or until she needed it more, I thought; and should she marry now she would not go empty-handed to her husband, for there are many thousand dollars invested for her in France.

“How I toiled and slaved for her, and how I loved her as time went on and she grew more and more into my heart; loved her so much, in fact, that your image gradually began to fade, and I could think of you without a pang. I saw you occasionally—once in the grounds at the Chateau, where I came upon you with your nurse, and several times in the streets of Paris, after your father brought you there. I used to take Margery out upon the Champs d’Elysees on fine afternoons when the streets were full of people driving out to the Bois, and hiring a chair I would hold her in my lap and watch for your father to pass. Though not the most showy—for his taste was too good for that—Mr. Hetherton’s turn-out was the most elegant and probably the most expensive of all the private carriages in Paris, while his splendid thoroughbreds were the talk of the city. I always watched anxiously for him, and when he appeared, sitting up so proud and erect, with that look of haughty indifference and selfishness on his face, and with you beside him on the cushions, clad in dainty apparel, I used to hold little Margery tightly to my heart and bite my lips till the blood almost forced itself through the skin, so fearful was I lest I should shriek out the truth so loudly that he would hear it above the roll of the wheels and the tramp of the horses’ hoofs. Something impelled me strongly to hold you high in my arms, and, making him see you, say to him: ‘This is your lawful daughter, the child of your wife who died in Rome. Her place is there beside you, and not far up in the tenement house on the Rue St. Honore.’

“But it was too late now to confess, so I let you go by in all your splendor, and if at night I kissed Margery more tenderly than usual and held her closer to me as I undressed her for bed, it was by way of atonement for the great wrong I was doing her.

“It was about this time that I fell in with Gustave La Rue, who offered me marriage. He was a good-natured easy-going man, who would never trouble me much with questions concerning the past, provided I made his home comfortable and his life easy, and so I married him, and gave Margery his name, and said to strangers that she was his daughter. He was fond of children and always kind to her, and never pressed me hard with regard to her parentage but once, and then I swore to him that she was not my child; but he did not believe me, though he never suspected the truth.”

“And when I went to your room in the Rue St. Honore, you knew I was Margery’s sister?” Queenie said; and Christine replied:

“Yes, and kissed the chair you sat upon, and in my poor blind way thanked God for sending you there, and thanked him again when, through your influence, Margery was placed at the same school with you, and her education paid for by the man who never suspected the truth, or even knew that the little girl in whom his daughter was so interested was anything to me until her education was finished and she was a grown young lady, then he learned it accidentally and was very angry and bade me keep you apart, lest in some way you should learn who I was.

“It was then that the idea of emigrating to America was suggested to my mind by some ladies for whom Margery had worked, and who gave such glowing accounts of the country and the prospects for dressmaking that I began to consider the matter seriously, and finally made up my mind to go, without communicating with Mr. Hetherton upon the subject. I wrote him, however, from Oak Bluffs, and directed to the old address in Paris, but possibly he never received my letter.”

“Yes, he did; I am sure he did,” Queenie exclaimed. “There were letters forwarded to him at Liverpool, and one of them made him very angry, Pierre told me. He was present when papa read it, and after that he was very nervous and excited, and suggested to me that we give up America and go back to Paris. But I would not listen. I made him come, and he died on the voyage, and you were the cause of his death. He dreaded meeting you here, and the dread and the remorse killed him. Oh, papa—I can see him so plain as his eyes followed me, and he made me promise to forgive him if something ever came to my knowledge, and I promised; but it is so hard. Oh, Margie, if it were not for you, I could not keep my promise, and I don’t know as I can at all, he was so bad—if all she says is true. It would have been better to have left me in Marseilles where I was born—left me to poverty and want—for then I should have known nothing better, and might have been as happy as the girls I have seen dancing on the street for the amusement of the crowd. But now, to fall so far—it makes me dizzy, and sick, and dazed, and there’s a buzzing in my head, and a feeling as if I were crazed and could not understand it at all.”

She was very white, with a drawn look about her lips, which alarmed Margery, who bent over her and said:

“You have heard enough. There can be nothing more to tell which will interest you. Mother must go out now, and leave you to rest.”

“Yes, yes, Margie; tell her to go; I am so tired and sick,” Queenie whispered, and without a word Christine left the room, and the two girls were alone.