The Flower of the Flock, Volume 3 (of 3)

She sank down.

--Byron.

When Mr. Grahame had locked the door, he flung the key upon the table, and motioned his daughter to a seat. She silently declined to accept it.

He paced the library for a few minutes. His emotions were terrible, but they were the strugglings of pride, vain, haughty, ambitious pride, not such as he would have been justified in possessing.

Helen stood motionless and faint. She dreaded the demanded explanation, which seemed each instant to draw nearer. Her heart throbbed painfully, so painfully it seemed as though each throb, depriving her of life, would be the last.

At length Mr. Grahame confronted her.

“Helen!” he exclaimed, “what have you to offer in explanation of the degraded and scandalous conduct of which you have been guilty in flying from your home, and the audacious presumption you have exhibited in presenting yourself here again?”

Her bosom heaved, and her throat swelled, but she spoke not.

“I demand to know,” he continued, fiercely, “why you quitted position, family, a wealthy home, in a manner so disgracefully clandestine, so utterly reckless of the honour or the pride of our house; I claim to know what you have been doing during your absence; and why now, like some spectre, you suddenly appear among us to bring further shame and disgrace upon us. Speak!”

Her tongue clave to the roof of her mouth. The events of the last few months raced through her brain. Oh, how was she to acknowledge one incident, at least, to him?

She remained silent.

He bit his lips and seized her wrist harshly.

“You must, you shall speak,” he cried, hoarsely, “or I will find a way to make you, that shall bring you upon your bended knees in supplication to be spared the torture. Tell me, girl, for whom and with whom you fled from home?”

He committed an error when he, thus acting, sought to terrify her into an explanation. He only roused her proud nature. By a sudden motion, she flung his hand from her.

“I acted alone, and without being influenced by any person,” she replied firmly, even haughtily.

“Your motive?”

“You will learn it some day.”

“Now--now; I insist upon hearing it now.”

“No, it would be premature. Nothing is to be gained by the disclosure but pain; it is enough that I did what I have done under the promptings of my own will. I have taken the consequences, and I am prepared to endure them. I ask nothing of you but to be allowed to depart.”

“What language is this? Am I not your father?--have I no title to control your actions. Preposterous notion!--you will find your error and repent it sorely, bitterly.”

“I have done so,” she said, with an earnestness which struck him.

He paused for a moment, and gazed steadfastly at her.

“What means this alteration in you? Why are you so pallid and thin?” he asked, abruptly.

“I have been ill.”

“Ill?”

“Very ill.”

“Tell me,” he asked with a choking utterance; “with whom have you dwelt since you left this house?”

“A young girl.”

“A girl,” he echoed, in surprise.

This was a question he had feared to ask, and he anticipated from her a direct refusal to reply. He was amazed at the readiness with which she responded.

“Humble, sir,” she continued, in a thoughtful voice, which had a singular tone of sadness pervading it; “but a model of purity, innocence, and faithfulness!”

“You have been with her alone, up to the hour you came hither to-night?”

“With her alone.”

“Will you swear this?”

“In the face of Heaven, it is true, sir.”

Mr. Grahame paced the room again.

There was intense relief afforded to him by her replies, for, heartless and selfish, he cared little what she had suffered during what he considered to be her madly capricious act, so that she had not disgraced his name. He would have looked over even her self-degradation, if he had been sure that the crime was confined alone to her breast and that of the partner of her sin, and it would not interfere with his new-formed scheme.

“Helen,” he said, pausing abruptly before her, “you must give me your promise that you will some day explain the mystery which hangs over the interval of your flight from home, if I forbear to urge it now?”

“I do, sir,” she replied, in a low tone.

Again he took several turns across the room before he could bring out his proposition; but at length he stopped, and recommenced speaking.