The Amethyst Box

hat I said to them I hardly know. I only remember that it was several minutes before I found myself again alone and m

t to enter when a heavy step shook the threshold before me and I found myself confronted by the advancing figure of

ain amid its long wrinkles and indeterminate lines for the secret of that spiritual and bodily repulsion which the least look into this impassive countenance was calculated to produce. She was a woman of immense means, and an oppressive consciousness of this spoke in every movement of her heavy frame, which always seemed to take up t

contradictory feelings on the part of her dependent niece. Yet why should the old woman frown on me? I had been told more than once that she regarded me with great favor. Had I unwittingly done something to displease her, or had the game of cards she had just left gone against her, ruffling her temper and making it imperati

ying themselves. I wonder upon which of her two unfort

n. I hear," she impulsively continued, craning her neck to be sure that the object of her remarks was quite out of earshot, "that the south hall was blue to-day with the talk she gave Dorothy Camerden. No one knows what abo

nute he followed me, and in the corner facing the ocean, whe

a directness born

ections are engaged, deeply engaged, in a quarter where I find some mystery. You have helped make it." (Here a gesture escaped him.) "I allude to the story

I related that,"

irl; I also fear that I know what drove her into contemplating so rash an act. The

ay have been sensitive to it or he may have been simply goo

this dream-maiden in the moonlight her face was turned from me toward the ocean, and I did not see her features then or afterwards. St

hand and touche

man?" I inquired. "One of t

ied rel

ng cloak. My dream ends there. I can not

full heart to note them, for one was Mrs. Lansing and the other Dorothy. The aunt had evidently come for the niece and they were leaving the room together. Not amicably, however. Harsh words had passed, or I am no judge of the human countenance. Dorothy esp

, a person I had been most anxious to see ever since my last interview with Sinclair. It was Gil

realized how beautiful. Her rich coloring, her noble traits and the spirited air, wh

ips and the faraway look of eyes which had created a great stir in the social world when they first flashed upon it. I felt that if Sinclair could s

mine, and a startling change passed over her. Springing up, she held out her hands in wordless appeal-then let them d

her in such a state of suppressed excitement, and I had seen her many times, both here and in her aunt's house when I was visiting Dorothy. Her eyes

Sinclair's oldest and closest friend, I wish to tell you how truly you ca

oke her, something which she finally mastered, though only by an effort which left

one but myself knows how happy." And she smiled again, but

ing her name; evidently ou

"I have not seen the moon to-night. Is it

d dragged off by a knot of young people, and I w

post nor could any one tel

y lest it should appear more so before the evening was over. I found him at last

he asked

rned nothin

or

where it was. It may have been Dorothy who took the box and it may have been Gilbertine. But th

ked relieved. Before I could speak, however, he was sunk again in his old despondency. "But the doubt," he cried, "the doubt! How can I go through this reh

eside himself, but ventur

retains it will be the conventionalities of her position and the requirements of the hour. Any break in the settled order of things-anything which would

down there; listen to them. I even imagine I hear Gilbertine's voice. Is there unconsciousness in it or just t

" I said, "and she wears a v

ng to h

remains unopened and nothing ever comes of its theft, the seeds of distrust are sown thick in my breast, and I must always ask: 'Was the

ough the ceremo

othing happe

d t

of him, but of myself. But he evidently fo

murmured. "Well may a ma

rough the rehearsal very much as I had expected him t

n imperceptible gesture as he went up stairs. I knew what it meant, and wa

as soon as I had closed the door behi

or

ouse. I shall put out my light and then open my door as

do the

not alone in her room. Little

Dor

night and day. She sleeps in a little ro

ok my

ore the two doors we are most interested in. When

e well fixed in my mind, I went to my own room and prepared for my self-impo

of the morrow called for bright eyes and fresh cheeks, and these can only be gained by sleep. In this stillness twelve o'clock struck and the first hour of my anxious vigil was at an end.

ractical men thinking of, that we should ascribe to either of these dainty belles of a conventional and shallow society the wish to commit a deed calling for the vigor an

y feet? Had I

-the slow, cautious opening of a door, then a footfall

e. He was peering from the corner of an adjacent passageway, the moonlight at his back. Advanc

as my cautious whisper after

he

on of the house where the l

, "what I heard was a creak in the small stairway ru

ly relax again as that sound resolved itself into a murmur of muffled voices. Where there was talking there could be no danger of the special event we feared. Ou

e-a piercing and insistent scream such a