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Page 127
"I thought my heart was broken, for something told me my father was
dead. This was true."
"What!" I exclaimed. "You don't mean--"
"I don't know, I don't know," she answered, brokenly. "He died on his
way to Havana. They said it was an accident. Well--at last, Se�or
Menendez offered me marriage. I thought if I agreed it would give me my
freedom, and I could run away and find Ah Tsong."
She paused, and a flush coloured her delicate face and faded again,
leaving it very pale.
"We were married in the house, by a Spanish priest. Oh"--she raised her
hands pathetically--"do you know what a woman is like? My spirit was
not broken still, but crushed. I had now nothing but kindness and
gifts. I might never have known, but Senor Menendez, who thought"--she
smiled sadly--"I was beautiful, took me to Cuba, where he had a great
house. Please remember, please," she pleaded, "before you judge of me,
that I was so young and had never known love, except the love of my
father. I did not even dream, then, his death was not an accident.
"I was proud of my jewels and fine dresses. But I began to notice that
Juan did not present any of his friends to me. We went about, but to
strange places, never to visit people of his own kind, and none came to
visit us. Then one night I heard someone on the balcony of my room. I
was so frightened I could not cry out. It was good I was like that, for
the curtain was pulled open and Ah Tsong came in."
She clutched convulsively at the arms of her chair.
"He told me!" she said in a very low voice.
Then, looking up pitifully:
"Do you know?" she asked in her quaint way. "It was a mock marriage. He
had done it and thought no shame, because it was so with my mother.
Oh!"
Her beautiful eyes flashed, and for the first time since I had met
Ysola Camber I saw the real Spanish spirit of the woman leap to life.
"He did not know me. Perhaps I did not know myself. That night, with no
money, without a ring, a piece of lace, a peseta, anything that had
belonged to him, I went with Ah Tsong. We made our way to a half-sister
of my father's who lived in Puerto Principe, and at first--she would
not have me. I was talked about, she said, in all the islands. She told
me of my poor father. She told me I had dragged the name of de Valera
in the dirt. At last I made her understand--that what everyone else
had known, I had never even dreamed of."
She looked up wistfully, as if thinking that we might doubt her.
"Do you know?" she whispered.
"I know--oh! I know!" said Val Beverley. I loved her for the sympathy
in her voice and in her eyes. "It is very, very brave of you to tell us
this, Mrs. Camber."
"Yes? Do you think so?" asked the girl, simply. "What does it matter if
it can help Colin?
"This aunt of mine," she presently continued, "was a poor woman, and it
was while I was hiding in her house--because spies of Senor Menendez
were searching for me--that I met--my husband. He was studying in Cuba
the strange things he writes about, you see. And before I knew what had
happened--I found I loved him more than all else in the world. It is so
wonderful, that feeling," she said, looking across at Val Beverley. "Do
you know?"
The girl flushed deeply, and lowered her eyes, but made no reply.
"Because you are a woman, too, you will perhaps understand," she
resumed. "I did not tell him. I did not dare to tell him at first. I
was so madly happy I had no courage to speak. But when"--her voice sank
lower and lower--"he asked me to marry him, I told him. Nothing he
could ever do would change my love for him now, because he forgave me
and made me his wife."
I feared that at last she was going to break down, for her voice became
very tremulous and tears leapt again into her eyes. She conquered her
emotion, however, and went on:
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