12
THE COURIER.
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HEWH&M VIESiCMMl UHWERSYN COKSHWOTORV OF MUSC
oxb op the: jCargest aiusio schools iiv the: west." 0 ,
The remarkable growth of this conservatory is due largely to the rapid and intelligent advancement of its
pupils through the same methods of instruction which are pursued in the leading European Conservatories.
All branches of music taught, with many Free advantages. Fall teim begins Wednesday, September 12.
Send for new circulars giving full information to
OREN . IOCKB, DIRECTOR. University Place, JXTetor
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dearest! It is terrible poor Helen!
Tell me how it happened."
Even then I did not lose my head. I
crept cloeer to him. "I bad juet come
in," I said, "and we had scarcely spoken
when she grew faint and it was all
over before I could call anyone, It
must hate been her heart.
"Tee," be agreed, and led me into the
death-chamber again. Hand in hand
we stood and looked at her lying there
so peacefully. Fates Lorimer gazed
into the dead face of his wife, and I
held my breath in terror. There were
tears in his eyes, but they were not
those of anguish. "Poor little Helen,
my sister!" he said, softly and, bending,
kmed her forehead. And that was his
farewell to the woman he had loved
madly with the one love of his life
and I stood there with clenched hands
and did not tell him! Surely, I did not
have the power to do all I had done that
afternoon unaided Satan himself must
have stood by and prompted me. Not
once did I get confused. From the min
ute I had been seized with my idea I
was no longer Helen. I was Louise,
and Yates was mine. Still striving to
comfort me in his great-hearted gentle.
boss, he took me home.
He was so good to me, so kind and
thoughtful in the days which followed,
because of the great blow that had fall
en upon me, that I had ha-d work to be
sad enough for my part. How could J
mourn for Louise when she had had for
a year the perfect happiness that was
now mine? How could I be doing
wrong to take this happiness, now that
she bo longer claimed it? With a cun
ning and a cleverness I had not sus
pected in myself I played my role. So
successful was I that I think I grew
even gentle and sweet as Louise had
been- I could not be otherwise in my
life with Yates. Sometimes he would
hold me at arm's length and shake his
head. "You are changing, Louise," he
said once. "There is a strange, new
Ere and sparkle about you. You are
growing more like poor Helen;- she was
always the gayer of the two. Forgive
me, dear," for I had bunt into wild
weeping. My nerves were not so firm
as they had been.
I had my fool's paradise, and I lived
in it fiercely, unthinkingly, grudging
every minute of it. I dreaded no blow,
yet I feared the end of all things,
What it Yates should die? Or I? Then
I would pace the floor with doubled
fists, as I had in those days when I was
nerving myself to stand and Bee Yates
married to another woman. All lies!
He had never been married to anyone
but me and at such moments I would
rush in upon him as be eat reading, juBt
to hear his voice and feel it calm my
fears.
And Yates was happy, even happier
than he had been, I think, because he
was more interested. The infinitesimal
differences between my character and
Louise's piqued him and kept his at
testion. Yet his happiness was not of
the old, quiet order, for at times be was
restless and moody. As the weeks went
on I began to lose the grip on myself,
sad the wretched fear of his finding oat
Mt me. There were times when I
actually believed I was Louise, and
again, when I remembered my identity,
I took a grim pleasure in my talent as
an actress. One day Yates asked:
"Where is that little brown mole on
your ear I always liked?"
I laughed. "You have heard of beau
ty doctors?" And be was satisfied.
Again it was: "Why don't you play
Chopin lately?"
"I am tired of Chopin," I answered,
carelessly, when, in truth, I could no
more play his fairy music than I could
have written a symphony. These little
danger reefs made my heart beat un
pleasantly, and I fancied there was a
dawning wonder in his eyes when he
looked at me.
Who knows the recesses of the bouI?
Once he waked, crying wildly, "Louise!
Louise!" .with a fear and yearning in
his voice that were terrible, and when
he came to himself and saw me he
smiled wanly. "A dream," he said.
"Such a dream I thought you "were
stretching out your hands to me from a
great distance and calling me, and your
face oh, your face was pale with a
blinding woe! And I could not come
to your
I shrank away from him, sick and
trembling. Could Louise, away in an
other world, could she, did she know?
And some time I must face her with
all my guilt. How would she look at
me? And Yates tor the first time
since my living lie began I remembered
that sometime, somewhere, Yates must
know, and he would look at me
I knew every line, every shadow, on
the face that some day I must confront,
and it poisoned and blighted my hap
piness and killed my heart, and slowly
began to kill me. A barrier fell be
tween Yates and me. I shunned him,
shuddering, and he was afraid of me;
yes, afraid.
It was one evening in the dusk. He
came and put bis bands on my should
era. His voice wbb hollow and bia eyes
were sombre and burning. "Louise,"
he said, huskily, "what is it, what is
this nameless thing, that has come be
tween us, that is ruining our happi
ness? I love you, I love you, and yet'
your presence chills me, your touch
frightens me. I jearn for you, and I
am afraid of you I think I must be
going mad! Help me, Louise! "Louise!"'
He staggered, .strong man that he
was, and stood clutching a chair, with
his bewildered gaze still upon me. I do
not know how my face looked. I only
know a thousand tous were pressing
upon my heart and lungs, and my brain
was on fire with hysteria. Any relief
was better, any crash, any upheaval,
than the hideous agony 1 had been en
during in the weeks Bince the night of
Yates' strange dream. Should I tell
him? Louise, far off in the distance,
might forgive me. Perhaps even Yates
would mercifully veil that look he was
to flash on me, the look that had been
before me so long, night and day. I
grasped the chance. Then I beard my
self speaking in a cold, even voice.
"It is because," I said, with partic
ular pains to speak clearly, "I am not
Louise. I am Helen, you know, and it
was your Louise who died. I dressed
her in my clothes and put on hers. It
k very simple."
Then I waited for him to look at me,
and I hoped I would drop dead when he
did. But the horror in his eyes was of
a new kind, and he was horribly calm.
There was deadly fear in his voice and
.movement Gently he put me in a
chair and tried to quiet me with sooth
ing words. It flashed over me at once
he thought I had gone insane! I strug
gled, but I could not help it. I laugh
ed, I shrieked.
"My God!'' whispered the man -beside
me, and hurried' cut of the room
for help. I heard him carefully lock
the door behind him. I realized then
that my sacrifice, my truth-telling, was
unavailing; that he would never believe
me when 1 told him I was not Louise;
that I was still doomed to see that look
on his face, to hear Louise's reproaches,
sometime, somewhere.
Perhaps I might endure it when it
came, but I knew one thing positively,
and that was I was not able to bear
thinking about it the rest of my life.
There are some trials even the Su
preme Being has no right to ask of us
weak mortals. And that is why 1
snatch the little bottle of Indian poison
from my bosom, where I have carried it
Bince the night of his dream, and why I
sit behind the door Yates locked, wait
ing for his returning step with the help
he has gone for, because he thinks I,
his wife, his Louise, have lost my mind.
He would never believe the truth if I
reiterated it from now till his death.
In a way it is comical.
1 have the cork out of the bottle and
there comes Yates and some others up
the stairs. They are hurrying hurry
ing Poor Yates! ugh this stuff is a
bitter streak" of fire
The Dream-Monger.
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