The Unseen Bridegroom | Page 8

for you here."
Mr. Walraven took his hat and left, delighted with his success.
The manager was at the bar, as Miss Dane had predicted, and eyed Mr.

Walraven suspiciously from head to foot when he found his business
concerned his star actress.
He was accustomed to gentlemen falling in love with her, and quite
willing to take little bribes from them; but he stared in angry
amazement when he heard what Carl Walraven had to say.
"Carry off Mollie!" exclaimed Mr. Harkner, "and adopt her as your
daughter! What do you take me for, to believe such a story as that?"
Mr. Harkner was pretty far gone, and all the more inclined to be
skeptical. Mr. Walraven saw it, and knew that appearances were dead
against him, and so swallowed his wrath.
"It is the truth, upon my honor. Miss Dane believes me and has
consented. Nothing remains but to settle matters with you."
"I won't settle matters! I won't hear of it! I won't part with my best
actress!"
"Yes you will for a fair price. Come, name the sum; I'll pay it."
Mr. Harkner opened his eyes. Mr. Walraven opened his check-book.
"You do mean it, then?"
"Don't I look as if I meant it? Quick, I say! If you don't look sharp I
will take her without any price!"
"She's a priceless treasure!" hiccoughed the manager--"worth her
weight in gold to me, and so--"
He named a sum that made even Carl Walraven wince; but he was a
great deal too reckless to draw back.
"It is a most cold-blooded extortion," he said; "but you shall have it.
And at your peril you ever interfere with my adopted daughter
afterward."

He signed the check and flung it to the manager, turned and went out,
and left that individual staring in blank bewilderment.
Golden-haired Mollie was pacing impatiently up and down the parlor
when Mr. Walraven walked in again, his face aglow with triumph.
"It is all right, Mollie. I told you I was more than a match for your
manager. You have trod the boards for the last time."
"Excuse me, Mr. Walraven; I am going to tread the boards again
to-night. It is Cricket still. Don't you want to be enchanted once more?"
"Just as you please. Once is neither here now there. But you will be
ready for the eight A.M. train to-morrow, Mollie?"
"I have promised, Mr. Walraven, and I always keep my word. So Mr.
Harkner has consented? Now, that is not flattering, is it? What winning
ways you must possess to make all the world do as you say!"
Mr. Walraven held up his purse, gold shining through its silken meshes.
"Behold the magic key to every heart, Cricket! Here, you shall be my
purse-bearer now."
He tossed it into her lap. Mollie's blue eyes sparkled. She was only
seventeen, poor child, and she liked money for what money brought.
"I shall leave you now," Mr. Walraven said, looking at his watch.
"Three o'clock, Mollie, and time for rehearsal. I shall go and see
Cricket to-night, and to-morrow morning Cricket must be ready to go
with me. Until then, my adopted daughter, adieu!"
That night, when the green curtain went up, the strange gentleman sat
in the front seat for the second time, and gazed on the antics of Fanchon,
the Cricket.
The girl played it well, because she played her own willful, tricky self,
and she kissed her taper fingers to the enraptured audience, and felt
sorry to think it might be for the last time.

Next morning, as demure as a little nun, in her traveling suit of gray,
Miss Cricket took her seat beside her new-made guardian, and was
whirled away to New York.
"Pray, what am I to call you?" she asked, as they sat side by side. "Am
I to keep at a respectful distance, and say 'Mr. Walraven,' or, as I am
your adopted daughter, is it to be papa?"
"Well, Cricket, personally I have no objection, of course; but, then,
'papa'--don't you think 'papa' might set people asking questions, now?"
"Very true; and some clever person might get investigating, and find
out you were my papa in reality."
"Mollie!" said Mr. Walraven, wincing.
"That's the way in the melodramas, you see, and you are very like the
hero of a five-act melodrama. Well, Mr. Walraven, decide what I shall
call you!"
"Suppose you say guardian. That will hit the mark, I think. And we will
tell people who ask troublesome questions that you are the orphan
daughter of a dead cousin of mine. What do you say?"
"As you please, of course. It is all one to me."
The train thundered into the depot presently, and there was the usual
turmoil and uproar. Mr. Walraven called a