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Lie there, poor fool! and suffer and die, for what I care, while I go and prevent your madly jealous husband from braining my precious fiancé. There is to be blood on the hands and the brand of Cain on the brow of the last of the Kingslands, or my oath will not be kept; but it must not be the ignoble blood of George Washington Parmalee!"
In stole and surplice, within the village church, the Reverend Cyrus Green, Rector of Stonehaven, stood by the baptismal font, waiting to baptize the heir of all the Kingslands. Stately, Sir Jasper Kingsland strode up the aisle, with Lady Helen upon his arm. No trace of the trouble within showed in his pale face as he heard his son baptized Everard Jasper Carew Kingsland. The ceremony was over.
At this time it was understood by nearly all the Simms, Candas, Cottons, and Kingslands that a great mistake had been made, and that the Cowperwoods were by no means admissible. To this particular dinner a number of people, whom the latter knew, had been invited. Uniformly all, when they learned or recalled that the Cowperwoods were expected, sent eleventh-hour regrets "so sorry."
There were the Norrie Simmses, Simms being secretary and treasurer of the Douglas Trust and Savings Company, and a power in another group of financial people, a group entirely distinct from that represented by Addison and Rambaud. Others included the Stanislau Hoecksemas, wealthy furriers; the Duane Kingslands, wholesale flour; the Webster Israelses, packers; the Bradford Candas, jewelers.
Then Sir Jasper gave the order, "Home," and the stately carriage of the Kingslands, with its emblazoned crest, whirled away in a cloud of dust. For an instant he stood looking after it. "Curses on it!" he muttered between set teeth. "After all these years, are those dead doings to be flung in my face?
Aileen feared that if this sort of thing continued it would soon be all over town that she had been a mistress before she had been a wife, that she had been the unmentioned corespondent in the divorce suit, and that Cowperwood had been in prison. Only his wealth and her beauty could save her; and would they? One night they had been to dinner at the Duane Kingslands', and Mrs.
He was her darling and her pride her earthly idol the last of the Kingslands. "Good-morning, Everard! I thought you would have done Mildred and myself the honor of breakfasting with us. Perhaps it is not too late yet. May I offer you a cup of chocolate?" "Not at all too late, mother mine. I accept your offer and your chocolate on the spot. Milly, good-morning! You are white as your dress!
She left the mirror, crossed the room, unlocked a trunk with a key she took out of her bosom, and drew forth a morocco scabbard case. The crest of the Kingslands and the monogram "E. K.," decorated the leather. Opening this, she drew forth a long, glittering Spanish stiletto, not much thicker than a coarse needle, but strong and glittering and deadly keen.
With fiendish composure Sybilla repeated the story she had told Sir Everard, while Lady Kingsland lay paralyzed and listened. The atrocious revelation ended, she looked at her prostrate foe with a diabolical smile. "My oath is kept; the prediction is fulfilled. In a few hours the last of the Kingslands dies by the hand of the common hangman.
It was a handsome, high-bred face the ancestral face of all the Kingslands that of this twelve-year-old boy. "Here, papa!" "My boy! my boy! whom I have loved so well whom I have shielded so tenderly. My precious, only son, I must leave you at last!" The boy stifled a sob as he bent and kissed the ice-cold face. Young as he was, he had the gravity and self-repression of manhood already.
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