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Annunzio will take charge of you, Cousin Rita, I think that will be the best thing. Uncle John will send some one to meet you in New York and take you to Fernley. How does that suit you?" Rita was silent. She had grown very pale. Delmonte looked at her eagerly, but did not speak. "What do you say, little cousin?" repeated Montfort.
For some time things continued to go smoothly and pleasantly at Fernley. The days slipped away, with nothing special to mark any one, but all bright with flowers and gay with laughter. The three girls were excellent friends, and grew to understand each other better and better.
But now her suspicions had taken definite shape, and Rita herself had confirmed them. There could no longer be any doubt that she was planning to take advantage of their uncle's continued absence to aid her brother, who was in New York, as Margaret knew, in spite of Rita's recent declaration that he was in the mountains, and to conceal arms in Fernley House, and have them shipped from there.
Nay, Aunt Faith had spoken of him as "a good friend," simply and earnestly. He knew Uncle John's address, no doubt; he would give it to her, or write himself, as seemed best. It was dreadful to betray her cousin, but these were not the days of melodrama, and it was quite clear that Fernley House could not be made a deposit of arms for the Cuban insurgents during its master's absence.
Burton knew this. He delivered himself up to the government; and he gave information against Fernley and Elizabeth Gaunt. They were brought to trial. The villain whose life they had preserved had the heart and the forehead to appear as the principal witness against them. They were convicted. Fernley was sentenced to the gallows, Elizabeth Gaunt to the stake.
The rise of the land hides it from Fernley, but you will notice that we are near, by the sound of it; and you have been down to the shore a number of times, I think." "Yes; oh, yes! I know it is very near. I was only thinking John, would it be easy for persons to come here from the shore, without being seen? I mean, could a vessel lie off here and not attract attention?"
"You were one of them," said the damsel. "I wasn't," said Peter. "You were with him," she rejoined. Whereupon Peter exclaimed "S'w'elp me God, I never knew him." Surely if self-interest made Peter commit flat perjury in the bodily presence of his Savior, it is idle to assert that the oath in any way promotes veracity. * The Influence of Scepticism on Character. Being the sixteenth Fernley Lecture.
Indeed, I fancy they were never used until after your grandfather's death, when the property was divided, and your Uncle John took Fernley as his share. Then one of the first things he did was to throw open these rooms, send for a painter, and have them painted white from floor to ceiling, as you see.
Cheriton said that must be for another time. "I must not keep you too long," she said, "for I want you to come often. I will call Janet, and she shall show you the way through my green parlour to the garden. The Fernley garden is the pleasantest in the world, I think."
She went through the garden, and found some consolation in a talk with John Strong, who, always the pink of courtesy, leaned on his hoe, and told her many valuable things concerning the late planting. Her questions were shrewd and intelligent, for Peggy had not lived on a farm for nothing, and she already knew more about the possibilities of Fernley than Margaret or Rita would learn in a year.
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