Sweet Violet

“It is quite strange how long Judge Camden stays away!” Mrs. Shirley remarked to Amber, when the old man had been absent two days.

“I am sure it is quite as pleasant without him!” that young lady returned, flippantly.

Truth to tell, she found it pleasanter, for half of her time was now spent at Bonnycastle, and no one questioned her movements. She knew that a grand explanation must come some day, but decided to defer it as long as possible.

So she rejoiced in her grandfather’s absence, and the letter that came from him that day contained very gratifying intelligence, as it stated that he would not probably return for a week, owing to the dangerous condition of his sick friend. He also requested that all letters that arrived for him might be promptly forwarded to the general post-office in Washington.

Mrs. Shirley was quite curious over the mysterious sick friend on whom the judge was attending with such assiduous care.

But Amber disclaimed all knowledge of the name and estate of the interesting invalid, and, absorbed in her own affairs, she had no interest in the matter, little dreaming how vitally it affected her own future.

But Mrs. Shirley fretted more than ever.

“What if it should be our Violet who is sick?” she said, uneasily.

“Nonsense! Violet has arrived in Chicago long ere this,” Amber said, carelessly; but she did not think it necessary to tell the old lady the falsehood that she told Cecil about receiving a letter from Violet. She cared nothing for the meek and gentle old widow who in that stately house scarcely dared claim her soul as her own.

So she turned away rejoicing in her grandfather’s absence, and went away gayly to the piano, where she spent an hour playing brilliant operatic gems, trying to while away the time until she could start on her afternoon visit to Bonnycastle.

“How I wish that Cecil could come to visit me here!” she sighed, and then fell to wondering how she could re-reconcile her grandfather to her marriage with Cecil.

She did not wish to lose her chance of inheriting jointly with Violet the large fortune of Judge Camden, but she did not see how she could retain the old man’s favor and still achieve her heart’s desire.

She brooded often over the subject, thinking how proud she would be to carry a fortune to her husband, so that Bonnycastle could be restored to its pristine splendor, and herself become the great lady of the county, as Mrs. Grant had been in the palmy days, before the war had desolated old Virginia and swept away her fortune and her husband’s health.

A dark thought came to her one wakeful night, and haunted her with horrible persistence.

What if the old man should die soon—die before he found out that she was betrothed to Cecil?

Amber knew that the judge’s will had been made long ago, and that, after a legacy to Mrs. Shirley, all his wealth was divided between her and Violet. She bitterly begrudged her cousin her share; but she knew that no effort of hers could divert it from her.

The thought of his death grew into a secret, guilty wish.

What a fortunate thing it would be for her, how it would smooth out all the difficulties in her way.

And he was old, too—past seventy. He had lived out the measure of his days, grown feeble, grumpy, disagreeable, his headstrong temper making him the terror of the whole household at Golden Willows. Decidedly his death would be a relief to all. Amber began to wish for it with a desperate longing. Her hopes made it seem possible, probable.

In the meantime she kept secret her betrothal to Cecil, and her stolen visits at his home, waiting for Death to seize the old man who stood between her and the wealth she was eager to inherit.

It almost seemed as if Fate was going to grant her wish, for at the end of a week the old man returned to Golden Willows, so ill, so harassed, so changed from his usual pompous self as to fill every one with surprise.

“No, I have not been ill, but I have had a great shock,” was all he would answer to their anxious inquiries; and he took to his bed at once, saying that he must stay there till he grew better.

His first inquiry, on reaching the house, was for his letters, and he turned them over with a groan of disappointment.

“Has no one heard anything of Violet?” he asked, looking anxiously from Mrs. Shirley to Amber.

“Not one word,” answered Amber, quickly.

“Not one word!” echoed Mrs. Shirley, dejectedly.

“It is very strange!” he muttered, and his old gray head drooped dejectedly on his breast.

Some great trouble had surely come to him, they thought.

He declared that he was not ill; he would not have a physician summoned. He repeated over and over that he had sustained a great shock, and must have time to recover.

“Did your sick friend die?” asked Amber, carelessly, one day.

“Yes, he died,” replied the judge, and quickly turned the subject to something else.

This aroused Amber’s curiosity, for it seemed as if he must have loved the deceased very much to suffer so keenly over his death.

But no clever hints could elicit anything further about the mysterious dead man.

Judge Camden’s sole anxiety now was over his letters.

He dispatched a servant to the post-office for every mail that arrived, and he invariably groaned with disappointment when he turned over his batch of letters.

Amber watched him with blended curiosity and dread. She could not understand this strange anxiety over the girl he had treated so harshly and cruelly.

She said, on the third day, almost petulantly:

“Grandpapa, why are you so anxious for a letter from Violet? You cannot surely expect her to write to you after the cruel treatment she received from you.”

They were alone in the old man’s bedroom, where he lay very pale and feeble among the pillows, while Amber sat near in an easy-chair, having volunteered to read the morning papers aloud for him.

How bright and beautiful she looked in her warm, crimson morning dress that set off so exquisitely her olive skin, hazel eyes, and wealth of satiny brown braids. You would not have dreamed that such a beautiful body could have harbored such a wicked soul; yet at that moment she was thinking that her grandfather certainly looked very ill this morning, and that the secret anxiety that seemed to be consuming him would soon wear out his feeble life. Oh, how she exulted in the thought that at his death all her deep-laid schemes would be crowned with bright success. Violet was wedded to another, and out of the way, and she was betrothed to Cecil. Soon the old man would be dead, and she would inherit a fortune and could marry her lover whenever she chose.

All these bright thoughts were passing through her mind as she uttered the petulant complaint, and she hoped that the words would silence his strange anxiety over Violet; for why should he worry over the girl’s silence, when he had so doggedly doomed her to the fate of an unloving bride?

She was startled when a bursting sigh heaved the old man’s breast, and he cried out, with strange agitation:

“Ah, Amber, I treated Violet very cruelly in letting her be deceived into that dreadful marriage!”

Amber’s eyes dilated in angry surprise. She thought he had surely fallen into his dotage.

“That dreadful marriage!” she cried, indignantly. “Why, how you must have changed your mind! You thought all along that it was a very fine thing for Violet to marry a millionaire!”

“I was a doting old fool!” suddenly thundered the judge, in violent self-denunciation, and his wan, wrinkled old features writhed with keen remorse.

“Grandpapa!”

“I was an old fool!” repeated the judge, in a lower key, and in dreadful self-abasement; and he continued, sadly: “Amber, I believe I have been half-mad the last few months, and it seems to me as if you have boldly aided and abetted me in my meanness. In fact, you went further in devising deviltry! Girl, girl, why did you do it? Why did you put that wicked thing in my head? Why didn’t you take your cousin’s part?—sweet Violet, who was so pretty and gentle and tender that we ought to have worshiped her instead of driving her to her death!”

“Dead! Dead! Is Violet dead?” gasped Amber, her lips paling in genuine horror, though there was a throb of wicked joy at her heart.

With a deep groan, Judge Camden answered:

“I did not mean to distress you with the bad news yet, Amber, but my remorse is greater than I can bear alone. Yes, yes. I fear that pretty Violet is dead! We have hounded her to some dreadful fate—suicide, very likely!”

She gazed at him in consternation and wonder.

“Grandpapa, you must be raving! You look every day for a letter from Violet, and then forebode that she is dead. What can you mean? Is not Violet safe with her husband, the millionaire?”

“No, no, Amber; she ran away from Harold Castello the same night she was married, and her subsequent fate is wrapped in blackest mystery!”