Worth was silent, her features working with emotion.
"You are very kind," she said at last. "I wish I might confide fully in you, but you are so young: too young and free from care to understand my—"
She broke off abruptly and with a groan, dropped her face upon her folded arms, on the table at which they had been sitting.
"Perhaps so," Mildred said in gently compassionate tones; "I could almost wish for your sake that I were older."
Miss Worth lifted her head, and with almost startling suddenness, and a feverish eagerness in her tones, asked, "Miss Mildred, where is Miss Juliet Marsden to-day?"
"She has passed the greater part of it in bed, I believe," Mildred answered in utter surprise.
"Has—has her lover been here since—since he left her last night?"
"The Count? No."
"Can you tell me if she is to go out to-night? and where? and who is to be her escort? Ah, I see you are wondering at my curiosity and it is only natural that you should; but believe me, it is not the idle inquisitiveness it must seem to you," she went on rapidly and in anguished accents; "for I have a reason; there is much at stake—I—I have tried to be indifferent—to say to myself that it is nothing to me if—if that vain, silly girl should meet with the fate her folly deserves; but I cannot; I must try to save her—and him. Oh, if I could but save him."
And again she hid her face, while sobs shook her from head to foot.
"Him!" Mildred cried in increased amazement, "what is he to you? No, no, I do not ask that. I have no wish to pry into your secrets."
Miss Worth lifted her head, and wiped away her tears.
"Thank you, for withdrawing that question," she said in a broken voice, "I cannot answer it; but—but this much I will tell you in the strictest confidence. I have known him in other days, and he is not what he professes to be; and it would be ruin, ruin to her!"
"Is that so?" Mildred said, with a startled look. "Then surely you will warn her?"
"I have done so, Miss Keith, though it was like drawing my eye teeth to do it; but my sacrifice was unappreciated, my motives were misconstrued; I was treated with scorn and contempt, and have said to myself, 'I have a just right to be angry and indignant, and shall leave her to her fate.'"
"But you will tell my uncle? He might be able to prevent the mischief by setting a watch upon them, and forbidding the man the house."
"No, no, I cannot betray him!" cried Miss Worth in a startled, terrified tone, "and you—you will respect my confidence, Miss Keith?"
"Certainly; but—surely you will not suffer Juliet to be sacrificed?"
"I have warned her," returned the governess, coldly, "and since she refuses to heed, on her own head be the consequences."
It was Mildred's turn to be troubled and perplexed. She stood for a moment in anxious thought.
"Will you not make one more effort?" she said at length. "Would you not save him from this wrong doing? May not the consequences be dreadful to him, too? may not her father take a terrible revenge, as men sometimes do on the deceivers and betrayers of their daughters?"
Miss Worth started, and her wan cheek turned a shade paler.
"I had not thought of that!" she said, drawing a long breath. "Oh, what shall I do?"
They consulted together, but with no more definite result than a mutual agreement to keep a strict watch upon the movements of Juliet and her pseudo nobleman.
Mildred was again about to withdraw, when Miss Worth stopped her.
"Pardon me, Miss Keith," she said, "but you have not answered my questions."
"They all go to the theatre to-night, and, as I happen to know, Mr. Landreth is to escort Miss Juliet."
"Not the count? but she will meet him there; I am sure of it. You do not go, Miss Mildred?"
"To the theatre! oh, no!"
"Then I must go myself, and watch them."
"Surely that is not necessary," reasoned Mildred, "Uncle, Aunt, Reba—all close at hand."
"Ah! perhaps not," assented the governess, "Possibly it were wiser to leave the task to them."
Mildred went to her room to ponder and pray over the matter, for she was sorely perplexed, and not a little anxious for Juliet.
She asked help and direction for herself and Miss Worth; and that the latter might be led to do her duty, however difficult and painful.
Greatly she wondered what was the tie between her and this spurious count, till it flashed upon her that his familiar look was a strong likeness to the governess. Then she knew it was that of relationship.
Her own duty in the affair formed a serious question in her mind.
Much she wished Miss Worth's communication had not been made in confidence, and that she were free to carry it to her uncle, who would, in that case, be sure to interfere effectually to save Juliet from falling a prey to the schemes of this false, designing man.
She could not break her word to the governess, but at length, recalling the fact that she had heard Reba say her father was suspicious of Count De Lisle, she determined to repeat that to her uncle, and thus put him on his guard against the villain, and his probable plot to inveigle Juliet into a clandestine marriage.
It was not a pleasant thing for Mildred to do; she would much rather not interfere, but Juliet must be saved at all risks, and neither she nor Reba had seemed to make a secret of their father's sentiments.
She went at once in search of Mr. Dinsmore, but learned that he was closeted with a gentleman on business. Then a summons came for her to drive out with her aunt; tea was ready when they returned; after that she was occupied with company in the drawing-room, then in assisting Juliet and Reba to make their toilet for the evening.
Thus the time slipped by, and when the carriage had driven away with its load of theatre goers, she retired to her own room, without having had the least opportunity for a word in private with Mr. Dinsmore.
Chapter Fifteenth.
"It is vain
(I see) to argue 'gainst the grain."
—Butler.
Juliet had scarcely taken her seat in Mr. Dinsmore's box when a sweeping glance around the theatre showed her Count De Lisle occupying another at no great distance.
She telegraphed him behind her fan, and during the interval between the first and second acts he joined them.
When Juliet re-entered the carriage which was to convey her home, she carried within her glove, a tiny note written on fine, tinted, highly scented
