The reigning belle

Miss Ellen Post was taking in the waist of Miss Spicer’s white silk dress, and had altered the trimming till it really seemed as good as new. Miss Spicer, herself, had come down into the servants’ parlor to examine the effect, and had brought from her own room a quantity of tulle scarcely the worse for wear, which had once covered a trained over-dress, but was quite fresh enough for the wedding veil; especially as the breadths were joined neatly by a white wreath, which had been beautifully freshened up for the occasion.

Some deeper anxiety than the wedding dress had evidently brought the young heiress into the servants’ department, for she pushed aside a mass of silk tulle and fragments of lace from a couch which stood near the expectant bride, and seemed to prepare herself for a conversation of some length.

Miss Post was very busy with the bridal veil, and threw her whole energies so completely into the pleasant task, that she had little attention to bestow even on the young lady who had honored her by a visit, and from whom she expected so much.

Thus Miss Spicer was compelled to begin the subject that was resting heavily on her mind, without help from the waiting maid.

“You are quite sure, Ellen, that there is no mistake about the arrests,” she said, at length.

Miss Post was holding up the wreath from which a cloud of tulle floated to the floor, and did not answer for half a minute, but she spoke at last.

“Sure, Miss Spicer, of course I am. The young man, Boyce, came round and told us the minute it was done. They first took up the boy, then walked the old woman off between two policemen. Boyce waited to see it done, then come to inform Mr. Mahone, who is anxious beyond anything, knowing that our wedding depends on their being safely locked in prison.”

“Your wedding, Ellen, pray what has that to do with it?” questioned Miss Spicer, who was not entirely informed of the wheels within wheels which revolved in the kitchen department.

“Just as much as the five thousand dollars that you are to pay over for clearing these people out of the madam’s path.”

“Oh, you depend on that; but it will take some time before they can be safely disposed of, Ellen.”

“They are in prison this minute; by to-morrow, at farthest, they will be remanded—that is the word Mr. Mahone calls it—back for trial. That ought to be disgrace enough for one family, Miss Spicer.”

“But this money was to be paid on conviction, Ellen, you must remember that.”

“No, I do not,” answered the waiting maid, casting aside her veil and entering into the subject with spirit, “and if you take it so, it isn’t too late to draw back. The young man Boyce has only to clear out of the city, and they’ll have to be acquitted. Everything depends on him.”

Miss Spicer changed color and gave the fragments of silks and laces around her a spiteful toss to the floor. Her love of money was almost as warm as her attachment for young Lambert, or her dislike of Eva Laurence. She had, in fact, promised this large sum of money with a reserved hope of evading the payment after her vengeance was secured. But Ellen Post was not exactly the person to be so dealt with. She had no abiding faith in the honor of her confederate, and was resolved that the trust should not be all on one side. Another reason, still more urgent, gave her courage to be firm. Ellen had met with disappointments in her life, and she was in haste to secure herself from a mournful repetition of them by wearing the snow-white robe at the earliest possible moment. Before she could do that, the money which Miss Spicer had promised must be forthcoming. Mahone had expressed himself very decidedly on that point.

“It seems to me,” said Miss Spicer, “that you and your friends are going off from the terms of our agreement, Ellen.”

“Not at all,” answered the bride. “Mr. Mahone is the very soul of honor. At first he declined to act without the money in hand, but a word from me was enough to persuade him into waiting till these persons were in prison. Then,” says he, “dearly as I love you, Ellen, superior as you are to all other women, I must be firm; for your own dear sake. I should be prepared to support you like the lady you are. For this reason I must have the money down.”

“There was no resisting an argument put in this complimentary way, Miss Spicer. It went at once to the heart.”

“I should think it was rather intended to go to my pocket,” answered the young lady with a short, sneering laugh. “So if I do not pay the money down your Mr. Mahone will allow these people to escape. Is that what you mean?”

“I am inclined to think that was Mr. Mahone’s meaning,” answered Ellen, holding up her veil again and admiring it with her head on one side like a heron looking at his shadow in the water. “But it was all for my sake, so you must not think hard of him.”

“Miss Post, my Ellen!”

The voice which uttered these words came from the kitchen out of which a door opened. Then Mr. Mahone appeared.

“Your Adonis,” said Miss Spicer with a short laugh.

“No,” answered Ellen, innocently, “his name is Mahone.”

“I beg pardon,” said the footman, advancing into the room, “I thought this young lady was alone. Boyce has just come in, would you like to speak with him?”

Ellen looked at Miss Spicer, who nodded her head.

“He can come in if you desire,” said Ellen with dignity, “but first allow me to put these garments out of sight.”

Directly the footman entered the room again, followed by Boyce, who presented himself with an air of mingled awkwardness and audacity that would have excited either anger or ridicule in Miss Spicer at any other time; now her mind was occupied with the business in hand, so she watched him with keen interest.

“This young man has brought me word that the person whom you take so much interest in is safe in prison and will be examined to-day,” said Mahone, addressing Ellen, but looking at the young lady. “He has just come from the Tombs.”

“Then they are both shut up, the mother and the boy,” said Ellen.

“That’s so,” answered Boyce, seating himself on the edge of a chair and crushing his hat with both hands, “salt can’t save ’em after this. They’ve got to go.”

“Then these poor creatures are certainly in prison?” questioned the young lady, breaking out of all prudent bounds when she thought her vengeance on the fair way to completion.

“No mistake about that, Miss, you’d a thought so if you had seen how they took on—affecting, I can tell you, enough to bring tears from a common ball. Almost snivelled myself, if you’ll excuse the word, Miss.”

“Then it is certain?” questioned Miss Spicer.

“As bolts and bars can make it,” said Mahone. “This young man’s evidence is enough to convict a born angel.”

“And I have given it—and shall have to give it again—nothing but cutting loose and running away can stop that,” said the youth, adding the last sentence in reply to a wink from Mahone.

“Thank you very much,” said Ellen Post, dismissing the grocer’s clerk as if she had been an Empress. “I took an interest in these people on account of the boy, but if they are really guilty, of course all sympathy ends.”

“Guilty, I should think so,” answered Boyce, getting himself up from the chair, “good morning—good morning Miss. I hope I have not intruded nor nothing?”

“Good morning,” said Ellen blandly, as became a not very young lady so near the hymenial altar.

Mahone followed Boyce from the room, and the two men held some moments of eager conversation in the farthest corner of the kitchen.

“Did I do it up brown?” questioned the younger man.

“That you did,” answered the other. “Jared, I always have said you were a trump.”

“What is best, every word of it is true. I’m going down to the court now. The young lady has only got the news a little in advance. Good-bye, old boy. I’ll come up and give you particulars when it’s all over.”

“Good-bye, and see that you make no blunders,” answered Mahone, “they would be too costly just now.”

“I say,” said Boyce, coming back a step or two, “don’t take the screws off from that rich girl in there. Nail her before we are in too deep.”

“Oh, never fear, Ellen will do that,” answered Mahone, and the two parted.

Meanwhile Ellen Post was proving herself worthy of the confidence Mr. Mahone expressed in her. The moment those two young men left the room she turned to Miss Spicer.

“Now are you satisfied, Miss?”

“Yes, that the work you undertook is half done,” answered the young lady tartly.

“One thing is certain,” replied Miss Post quietly resuming her work, “the money we depended on must be paid within an hour, or that young man will come up missing at the examination.”

Miss Spicer started to her feet, and flushed angrily, feeling herself coarsely coerced.

“Ellen Post, I have made you a promise and it shall be performed. It seems that we cannot trust each other. Let that young man go on and I will pay you half the money now, the rest when these people are convicted, not a cent more. Take your choice, a check for two thousand five hundred now, the rest to abide the result of a trial, or nothing. Which will you have?”

“The check,” said Ellen Post, still going on with her work with a leisurely motion.

Miss Spicer left the room without a word. Ellen Post worked faster, and her needle flew. This was all the sign of excitement that she gave.

Directly the young lady came down again with a check fluttering in her hand. She flung it into the waiting maid’s lap.

“Will that do?”

Ellen took the check up, and examined it closely.

“Yes, it will do,” she said, “thanks!”

Miss Spicer flung herself out of the room.

The moment she was gone, Ellen Post dropped her work in a white heap on the carpet, and opened the kitchen door.

“Mr. Mahone!”

The footman answered the call of his lady love promptly. She closed the door and held up the check. He flushed crimson with pleasure.

“You don’t say so!”

“That is all we shall get till after the trial,” said Ellen.

“Let me look at it,” entreated Mr. Mahone, reaching out his hand.

“No, the ink is wet,” answered his betrothed.

“But, but when—”

Mahone hesitated, some coward thought, which might have been conscience in another man, checked the criminal proposition he was about to make.

“Did you ask anything?” inquired Ellen, slowly folding the check which she hid carefully away in her bosom.

“Yes, I did, Miss Post. What are we a waiting for? how long will you keep this ardent heart on the fence?”

“Mr. Mahone, you speak so metaphorically that I can’t quite understand.”

“When—when are we to be married—to unite our fortunes and share and share alike?”

Miss Post cast down her eyes and began to roll up one of her cap strings, feeling herself to be a young lady of romance with an ardent hero before her.

“When will that confounded—that gorgeous wedding dress be done?”

“It—it can be finished in an hour,” faltered the damsel, “I was just fastening flowers into the bridal veil.”

“Then what is in the way? Who is to hinder us from being married this very night?” demanded the lover whom a single glimpse of that check had rendered half frantic with greed.

“To-night! Oh! Mr. Mahone!”

“Yes, this very night. The dress is ready—I have got what would amount to a basket of champagne stored away, and my heart—my heart!”

“Don’t! don’t appeal to me in that way; you know my weakness, you know how impossible it is to refuse you anything.”

“Is that so? Prove it then, Ellen, prove it by having that dress on at eight o’clock this evening. I will have a carriage at the back entrance, and a minister ready. Promise now; if your love for me is the genuine thing, you will.”

“Oh, Mahone, I promise!”

“At eight, then?”

“At eight you will find me here waiting.”