A Dreadful Temptation; or, A Young Wife's Ambition. Alex. McVeigh Miller
he answered, with a formal bow.
"You expect to find me a most loving relative, no doubt?" she said, with exasperating coolness.
"I hope to do so, at least," he said, with calm frankness, "I cannot afford to quarrel with my uncle. I shall hope to keep on good terms with his wife."
"Ah! you don't wish to quarrel with your bread and butter," she said in a tone of cool contempt. "Well, mon ami, what do you suppose I married your uncle for?"
"The world says that you married him for his money," said the handsome young man, coolly.
"Yes, that is what the world says," she answered, with flashing eyes, and cresting her graceful head as haughtily as a young stag. "But you, Howard Templeton, you know better than that."
"Pardon me, how should I know better?" he rejoined, watching her keenly, as if it gave him a certain pleasure to irritate her. "The money seems to me the only reasonable excuse you had for taking him. My uncle, kindly be it spoken, for he has been my kindest friend, is neither young nor handsome. I credited you with better taste than to love such a homely old man!"
"You are right," she said, writhing under the keen sting of his words; "I did not marry him for love! Neither did I marry him for his money. I have never craved wealth for its own sake, though I have always known that a costly setting would befit beauty such as mine. I sold myself to that old man in yonder for revenge!"
"Revenge?" he repeated, inquiringly.
"Yes, upon you!" she repeated, with bitter frankness; "you sacrificed me that you might inherit your uncle's wealth. Love, hope, gladness, were stricken from my life at one fell blow. There was nothing left me but revenge upon my base deceiver. So I sold myself for the heritage you prized so highly that you might be left penniless."
"Yet once you loved me!" he muttered, half to himself.
"Yes, once I loved you," she answered, looking at him in proud scorn. "When my aunt brought me to the city two years ago a simple, unsophisticated country girl, you saw me and set yourself to win me by every art of which you were master. She encouraged you in your designs, for she knew that you were the reputed heir of your uncle, John St. John, and she thought it would be a fine match for the pretty little country girl. In the spring I went home with your ring upon my finger, the proudest girl in the world, and told mamma that you had promised to marry me. Then you came down to my country home and found out that the rich Mrs. Egerton's pretty niece was as poor as a church mouse. So you went back and told John St. John that you wanted to marry a girl who was beautiful but poor, and he—the old dotard, who had forgotten his youth, and transmuted his heart into gold—he bade you give me up on pain of disinheritance."
"And I obeyed him," said Howard Templeton, as she paused for breath.
"Yes, you obeyed him," she repeated; "you broke your plighted faith and word, you ruined my life, you broke my heart, you sold your truth and your honor to that cruel old man for his sordid gold, and now, to-night, you stand stripped of everything—and all because you turned a woman's love to hate."
She paused breathlessly and stood looking at him with blazing eyes and crimson cheeks, and lips parted in a smile of bitter triumph.
She had never looked more beautiful, yet it was a dangerous beauty, scathing to the man who looked upon her and knew that his sin had roused the terrible passions of revenge and hatred in her young heart.
"But Xenie, think a moment," he said. "I had been brought up by Uncle John as his heir. I did not know how to work. I never earned a cent in my whole life! When he swore he would disinherit me if I married you, what could I do? I had to give you up. You must have starved if I had married you against his will!"
"I would have starved with you, I loved you so!" she exclaimed passionately.
"Would you, really?" he asked, with a slight air of wonder; "well, they say that women love like that. For myself, I have never reached a stage as idiotic, though I own that I loved you to the verge of distraction, Xenie."
"Well, and what will you do now?" she asked, sneeringly. "You will have to starve at last without the pleasure of my company, for my husband shall never leave you one dollar of his money; I will poison his mind against you, I will make him hate you even as I hate you! I have sworn to have the bitterest revenge for my wrongs, and I will surely keep my vow!"
"I defy you," he answered, looking down at her from his superb height, his proud Saxon beauty ablaze with wrath and scorn. "I defy you to rob me of my uncle's heart or even of his fortune. He shall know what a traitress he has taken to his heart. I will dispute your empire with you and you shall find me a foeman worthy of your steel. You will find that it is a terrible thing to make a man who has loved you hate and defy you!"
"'The sweetest thing upon this earth is love.
And next to love, the sweetest thing is hate.'"
She quoted with a wild, defiant laugh. "Well, Howard Templeton, I take up the gage of defiance that you have thrown down. We will wage the deadliest feud the world ever knew between man and woman! From this moment it shall be war to the knife!"
"So be it," he answered with a scowl of hatred as he turned upon his heel and passed through the lace hangings to mingle with the gay and thoughtless throng outside, while curious glances followed him on every side, for all knew that the foolish old bridegroom had promised to make Howard Templeton his heir.
CHAPTER III
The beautiful bride remained motionless where Howard Templeton had left her until the rich lace curtains parted noiselessly again and her lawful lord and master looked in upon her.
He did not speak for a moment, so beautiful she looked standing still and pale as a statue beneath a tall rose-tree that showered its scented petals down upon her night-black hair with its crown of orange blossoms.
No subtle instinct warned her of his presence as it had when that other came.
She stood silent and pale, the dark lashes shading her rounded cheek, her white hands loosely clasped before her until he spoke:
"Xenie, my darling!"
She started and shivered as she looked up.
Mr. St. John came slowly to her side and drew her hand through his arm.
"My dear, I have been seeking you everywhere. Supper is announced," he said.
"I only came here just a little while ago for a quiet minute to myself," she said, apologetically.
"Ah! then, you like quiet and repose sometimes," he said; "I am glad of that, for I am not fond of gayety myself, at least not too much of it. I suppose I am getting too far into the sere and yellow leaf to enjoy it, eh, my dear?"
"I hope not; sir," she said, making an effort to throw off her preoccupation and enter into the conversation with interest.
After the splendid banquet had been served, he led her to a quiet seat and begged her not to dance again that evening.
"I am too old to dance myself," he said, "but I am so selfish I want to keep you by my side that I may feast my eyes upon your peerless beauty. Can you be contented with my society, love?" he inquired, giving her a curious look.
"I will do whatever pleases you best, sir," she said, with an inward shudder of disgust.
"Very well; we will sit here hand in hand like a veritable Darby and Joan, and enjoy each other's company," he said, giving her an affectionate smile.
The bride looked at her lord in surprise. She had not known him long, for their marriage had followed upon a brief acquaintance and hurried courtship.
Xenie had never thought him very brilliant, and, indeed, she had heard people say maliciously that the old man was getting weak-minded, but after all, the proposition to hold her hand before all that brilliant array of wedding-guests nearly staggered her.
She made some plausible excuse for keeping her hands in her own possession, and sat quietly by his side, watching the black coats of the men and the bright robes of the women as they fluttered through the joyous mazes of the dance.
"Do