Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1870-05-19
Scleft Story.
Wy browe's Will.
BY "RUY." 7"

I,
On my way down to a garden party at
Fulham one fine afternoon, with my
friend Charley Twistleton, heard the
following story of a lady concerning
whom every body was just then talk
ing.
WybrOwe, Brazilian millionaire, 4tat.
seventy or thereabouts, marries Helen
Chetwynd, impecunious belle, etat.
nineteen, daughter ofa British diplomat
in those parts; and, after twOyears OfcOn-
nubial felicity, cor sideratIy dies. Wy
brOwe is as jealous as Spaniard; and
his jealousy looks beyond his own life.
So he leaves terrible will behind him.
This cunningly contrived document pro-
vides that his widow, then just twenty
one, shall receive and enjoy an Income
of some el5, 900 per annum so Iong-and
only so long-as she shall remain un-
married. That If she DO marry again,
she shall receive absolutely nothing
the entire estate of the deceased passing
10 two distant relatives, believed to be
living in obscure poverty in London.
Now comes the most curious part of
the story.
A good many men besides old Wy-
browe went mad about la belle Helen
out in Brazil; notably man who was
thought to be nearly as rich as Cyasus
"a half-Spaniard,a ahalf-Englishman, by
name Alvarez Smith. This hybrid was
said to have the temper of fiend, the
face of baboon, and the complexion of
a jaundice patient. TIE frantic vehe-
nence with which, when at last he did
speak, Smith, pleaded his case to her,
nearly frightened Miss Chetwynd into
Mysteries; the malignant black scowl
that twisted his ugly face till it grew
absolutely awful in its hideousness when
she Internationally declined his propo-
sails, and shrank away from him, haunt
ed her sleep for many a night after
ward.
Alvarez Smith went away and thought
out his vengence. This is how he took
It,: after waiting. patiently for athree
years.
During Wybrowe's lifetime lie kept
quiet, and made no sign. When the old
man was dead, Smith broke in upon the
widow and with full know ledge of the
provisions of Wybrowe's will, renewed
his former propositions. They were re-
jected again-this time with the addi-
ton of certain words that Helen Wy
browe would have been more prudent
not to have spoken to such q man.
The same steamer that brought the
widow home to England had among its
passengers Alvarez Smith. He never
once spoke to her, or molested her in
any way during the voyage; but his
hungry black eyes would rest upon her
in way that frightened her in spite of
herself
Those eyes watched her into the rail-
way carriage at Southampton; met hers
as he got out on the platform at Water
loo; and, again, as the door of her sis
.ter's house in Park-lane closed upon her.
Every time she went abroad she met
them; sleeping and waking, Alvarez
Smith haunted her. 1t was intolerable;
but what cOpld she do? She left town;
he followed her. She shut herself up in
the house for days; and the first person
she met when by day or nigh, she came
out again was-Smith; always Alverez
Smith. Mrs. Wybrowe grew nervous
and i'll under this implacable persecution
which it was impossible to put an
end to. And the worst of it was that
she felt her prosecutor was gaining a
power over her; that those terrible eyes
of his fascinated her like basilisk's.
She ever avoided mentioning this feel
ing to Lady Oswestry, her sister, but she
couldn't help cenfessing it herself.
A few weeks after her arrival in Lon
don, old Wyhrowe's lawyer communi-
Gated the following startling intelli-
gence: A person had bought ND the
reversionary interests of her husbands
two distant relatives in the income that
had been left her, subject to her remain
ing unmarried. Wy"rowe's kinsmen,
too poor TO be troubled with many scru-
Piles, and considering that it was barely
likely woman would give up fifteen
thousand pound a year when she could
keepit on such easy terms, and greedily
accepted the offer that had been made
them; had accordingly executed the ne
cessary legal documents; had received
sum down, and had emigrat-
ed to Australia.
The person who had bought them out
was, as,consequently,t the person who would
claim the heavy forfeit from Helen Wy
brOwe in the event Of her marrying
again. And it was hardly needfuI to tell
her that PERSONS name. Sheguesssed in
stinctively-Alvarez Smith.
This, then, was her position; she must
either, atone-and twenty, condemn her
self to life long widowheod, or relin-
quish magnificent income she detested.
True, court of law might, as her law
yer told her, set the will aside; and how
could woman petition such court?
Her woman's delicacy, at all events,
rendered that out of the question in her
case. Again, there might be men who
would think land who could afford to
think lightly of marrying a beggar;and
among them there might be one whom
she could love. But, wise in her gener-
alton, Mrs Wybrowe built no castles in
the air of this sort. She accepted the
situation telle qu'elle etait; shut herself
up no longer; went among her kind;
encountered her basilisk with an i'm
passable visage, and tortured her tor
mentor by an ingeniously arranged Sc
quence of filtration with passed masters
of the art.
L knew it, in that moment when our
eyes met. | knew that L, Francis
Drasdvl, world worn, case hardened,
poccocurantic cynic of sevenand twen-
ty, was to love this woman; that did
love her already.
Rather tall, graceful as Diana in her
statuesque summer draperies, a
"Helen of the low archd brow,
And amber hair, and dewey violet eyes,"
q woman with child's face stamped
-. 81 IA 4.