Mischievous Maid Faynie Part 6

"Stop!--stop right where you are, you mercenary wretch!" cried Faynie in a ringing voice. "I see it all now--as clear as day. You--you--have married me because you have believed me my father's heiress, and--"

"You couldn't help but be, my dear," he hiccoughed. "An only child--no one else on earth to come in for his gold--couldn't help but be his heiress, you know--couldn't disinherit you if he wanted to. You've got the old chap foul enough there, ha, ha, ha!"

"You seem to have suddenly lost sight of the fact that there is some one beside myself--my stepmother and her daughter Claire."

He fell back a step and looked at her with dilated eyes--despite the brandy he had imbibed he still understood thoroughly every word she was saying.

"A stepmother--and--another daughter!" he cried, in astonishment--almost incoherently.

"You seem to forget that you always used to say to me--that you hoped they were well," said Faynie with deepening scorn in her clear, young voice.

"Oh--ah--yes," he muttered, "but you see I was not thinking of them---only of you," and deep in his heart he was cursing the hapless cousin--whom he believed dead by this time--for not mentioning that the girl had a stepmother and sister.

"Had you taken the time to listen to something else that I had to tell you, you might have reconsidered the advisability of eloping with me in such haste," went on the girl in her clear, ringing tones, "for it has become apparent to me--with even as little knowledge of the world as I possess--that you are a fortune hunter--that most despicable of all creatures--but in this instance your dastardly scheme has entangled your own feet. Your well-aimed arrow has missed the mark. You have wedded this night a penniless girl. An hour before you met me at the arched gate my father disinherited me, and when he has once made up his mind upon any course of action--nothing human, nothing on earth or in heaven would have power enough to induce him to change it."

The effect of her words were magical upon him. With a bound he was at her side grasping her slender wrists with so tight a hold that they nearly snapped asunder.

Intense as the pain was, Faynie would not cry aloud. He should not see that he had power to hurt her, even though she dropped dead at his feet at last from the excruciating torture of it.

"What is it you say--the old rascal has--disinherited you?" he cried, scarcely crediting the evidence of his own ears.

"That is just what I said--my father has disinherited me," she replied slowly and distinctly, adding: "His money was his own--to do with as he pleased--he gave me the choice of--of--marrying to suit him or being cut off entirely. I--I--refused to accept the man he had selected for me.

That ended the matter. 'Then from this hour know that you shall not inherit one penny of my wealth,' he cried. 'I will cut you off with but the small amount required by law. There is nothing more to be said. You are a Fairfax. You have taken your choice, and as a Fairfax you must abide by your decision!' You will remember I told you I had something to tell you the moment you came up to me at the arched gate, but you would not listen. Now the consequence is upon your own head."

"I have married a beggar, when I thought I was marrying an--heiress!" he cried in a rage so horrible that Faynie, brave as she was, recoiled from him in terror and, dismay.

"You have married a penniless young girl," she corrected, half inaudibly.

He raised his clinched hand with a terrible volley of oaths, before which she quailed, despite her bravery.

"When the old man cast you off you thought you would tie yourself on to me," he cried. "You women are cunning--oh, yes, you are, don't tell me you're not; and you are the shrewdest one I've come across yet. You lie when you say you meant to tell me what had happened beforehand, and you know it. But you'll find out at your cost what it means to bind me to a millstone for a wife. But you shan't be a millstone. You'll do your share toward the support. Yes, by George, you shall. I'll put you on the stage--and you--"

"Never!" cried the girl with a bitter sob. "I'd die first."

"Don't set up your authority against mine," he cried, and as he uttered the words--half crazed by the brandy he had drunk so copiously--his clinched fist came down with a heavy blow upon the girl's beautiful, upturned face, and she fell like one dead at his feet.

CHAPTER VIII.

WHAT HAPPENED AT MIDNIGHT ON THE LONELY RIVER ROAD.

For one moment he looked down half stupefied at his work--the girl lay in a little dark heap at his feet just as he had struck her down--the crimson blood pouring from a wound on her temple which his ring had caused.

"I--I've killed her," he muttered, setting his teeth together hard--"she--she provoked me to it--curse her! My G.o.d! the girl is actually dying." Then, through his half-dazed brain came the thought that his crime would soon be discovered, and his only safety lay in instant flight.

It was but the work of a moment to hurry from the room, making his way through the inky darkness as best he could to the barroom, where he knew he should find Halloran and the cabby dozing in the big armchairs.

The full realization of his crime had quite sobered him by this time.

The innkeeper had left a dim light in the barroom. By the aid of this he made his way quickly to his friend's side. A few rapid words whispered excitedly in Halloran's ear told him the condition of affairs.

"You are right," exclaimed Halloran, springing to his feet. "We must get out of here without a moment's delay. The cabman must go with us, taking his horses, even though we have to pay him the price of them."

"I--I--will leave everything to you, Halloran," muttered his companion, huskily, "your brain is clearer and a thousand times shrewder than mine."

"Nor must the girl be left here," went on Halloran. "She must not be found dead in this house."

"Why, what in Heaven's name could we do with her?" returned the other, sharply. "I tell you she is dying, any one could see that."

"Put her effectually out of the way, and past all human possibility of any one finding out how she came by her death. I have a desperate plan.

I cannot explain it to you now. All I say is, be guided by my directions to-night--leave everything to me," said Halloran, with a grim gaze.

"I put myself in your hands, Halloran," was the husky reply.

The cabby was hurriedly awakened. At first he demurred angrily against the idea of starting off again; but when a roll of bank notes was pressed into his hands as the price of his complying with their demand--a sum that would more than cover the price of the horses if he lost them--he no longer found grounds for complaint, but agreed with alacrity to do their bidding.

Besides, Halloran knew a little secret of the cabby's past--just how he came by the money to buy that outfit--and as it was done in a particularly shady way, the man dared not make an enemy of him.

In less time than it takes to tell it the coach stood at the door again.

It was Halloran--nervy, cool-headed Halloran, whom the other had always dubbed half man, half fiend--who stole up to the room above, found the girl lying in the exact spot his companion had described, and, catching up her cloak, wrapped it about her, bore her noiselessly down the stairs and out to the coach in waiting.

"Is it all over with her yet?" whispered the other in a strained, husky voice, showing intense fear.

"Almost," returned Halloran, briefly, jumping in and closing the door after him.

For some moments they rode along in utter silence. Then, as Halloran made no attempt to break it, his companion leaned over, asking breathlessly: "Where are we going--and--and--what do you propose to do with her?"

"I am just trying to solve that problem in my mind, and it is a knotty one. I must have more time to think it over," replied Halloran, tersely.

Before his companion could reply, the coach came to a sudden standstill, and both of the men within heard their driver's voice in earnest colloquy with some one standing by the roadside.

"It is the girl's father, or friends, who have just discovered her absence and have been scouring the country about to find her," gasped the fraudulent Lester Armstrong, and the hand that grasped his companion's arm shook like an aspen leaf.

"Don't be a coward!" hissed Halloran. "If worst comes to worst, whoever it is can share the girl's fate," and with these words he opened the door of the coach, asking sharply, angrily:

"What is the matter, driver?"

"Nothing, save a poor old fellow who wants me to give him a lift on the box beside me. He has lost his way. He's an old grave digger, who says he lives hereabouts, somewhere. He's half frozen with the cold tramping about. I told him 'Yes, climb up;' it's a little extra work for the horses, but I suppose as long as I don't mind it you'll not object."

"Ha! Satan always helps his own out of difficulties," whispered Halloran to his companion; and, without waiting for a reply, he was out of the coach like a flash, and his hand was on the old grave digger's arm ere he could make the ascent to the box beside the driver.

"Wait a moment, my good friend," said Halloran, "we have a little work which you of all persons are best fitted to perform for us ere we proceed."

Old Adam, the grave digger, looked at the tall gentleman before him in some little perplexity, answering, slowly: