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Countless millions of women have enjoyed the works of this author. They are in great demand everywhere. The following list contains her best work, and is the only authorized edition.

These stories teem with action, and what is more desirable, they are clean from start to finish. They are love stories, but are of a type that is wholesome and totally different from the cheap, sordid fiction that is being published by unscrupulous publishers.

There is a surprising variety about Miss Clay’s work. Each book in this list is sure to give satisfaction.

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[Pg 3]

A WOMAN’S TRUST;

OR,

Lady Elaine’s Martyrdom

A NOVEL

BY

BERTHA M. CLAY

Whose complete works will be published in this, the New Bertha Clay Library.

STREET & SMITH CORPORATION

PUBLISHERS

79-89 SEVENTH AVENUE

NEW YORK CITY

[Pg 4]

Copyright, 1900 and 1902

By STREET & SMITH

A Woman’s Trust

(Printed in the United States of America)

All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian.

[Pg 5]

CHAPTER I.

“AT LAST I HAVE MET MY FATE.”

“How ridiculously provoking you can be, Harold!”

“I do not think my remarks are ridiculous, Elaine.”

“Your society is decidedly unpleasant when your conversation takes this morbid strain,” replied Lady Elaine Seabright.

“I only asked you a natural question, darling,” said Sir Harold Annesley, an anxious light in his blue eyes. “I am your accepted lover—your future husband.”

“And in consequence my life is to be made a burden to me!” the beautiful Elaine exclaimed, pettishly.

“Heaven forbid. Every moment of my waking thoughts shall be devoted to the happiness of my peerless darling!” He pressed her to him in sudden rapture.

“Harold, you foolish fellow, I wish that you were less demonstrative. The people on the lawn will see us. I am sure that papa is looking this way!”

“No, no! We are safe in this bower of beauty,” laughed Sir Harold.

He pressed another kiss upon her ripe lips, and thanked Heaven in his heart for the great gift of this girl’s love.

Two short months before, neither dreamt of the other’s existence. Sir Harold had just returned from an exploring expedition, and his name was mentioned in the papers. He was eulogized for his bravery in forcing a[Pg 6] passage to some outlandish place in Africa, and at the risk of his life rescuing a well-meaning but foolish missionary. He had been away from home for five long years, and it was hoped that he would now stay in England for good. He represented a grand old line; he was young, handsome, and wealthy. With all these advantages, it is easy for a man to become popular anywhere.

Lady Elaine Seabright had read this item of news with languid interest, and immediately forgot it. A week later it again recurred to her, for at the county ball she found herself being introduced to Sir Harold Annesley.

She thought that she had never before seen so perfect a man, and he remarked to his companion, Colonel Greyson, an hour later, that she was the most beautiful woman in the whole world.

“Did I not tell you so, Mr. Skeptic?” laughed the colonel. “Lady Elaine has carried all hearts by storm from the hour she was launched upon society. She has had a score of lovers.”

Sir Harold sighed and echoed: “A score of lovers!”

“Yes; all hearts that beat in manly bosoms pay homage to the most beautiful girl in England. But she has come scathless out of the ordeal, and is free as air after two seasons.”

“I am glad of it,” replied Sir Harold; and Colonel Greyson smiled, meaningly.

“Why should you be glad?” he said. “Why should you be glad? A confirmed woman-hater! Beware, Sir Harold!”

The young baronet blushed.

“I am not ashamed to tell you, old friend, that with me it is love at first sight. I have never loved before; I have never breathed words of love into any woman’s ear. At last I have met my fate.”

“Go in and win, my boy. You are worthy of any[Pg 7] woman,” the colonel said; then he looked away, adding, “this pleasure is only tempered with one regret.”

“One regret, colonel? I do not understand you. Be frank with me, as you have ever been, my more than father.”

“Boy, are you not aware that your cousin Margaret loves you? I believe that she has worshiped you from her very childhood.”

A shade of annoyance passed over Sir Harold’s face, but it immediately brightened again.

“Of course, Margaret loves me in a cousinly—a sisterly way, but it is nothing more, colonel, I assure you. Besides, I could not marry Margaret Nugent if she were the only choice left to me. I believe that it is wrong for cousins to marry.”

Just then he caught sight of Lady Elaine, and he had eyes for none else.

“Come,” said Greyson, “we must not hide in this recess like a pair of conspirators. You are the lion of the evening, Sir Harold, and people will be inquiring for you.”

They left the conservatory, and a deep sigh, that was almost a sob, fluttered in the scented air. From behind a mass of sub-tropical plants emerged the figure of a woman—young and exquisitely beautiful—a woman with a face that would have sent Titian into ecstasies of delight. She was of medium height, and her form was outlined in graceful, rounded curves. There was not an angle or a movement to offend the eye of an artist. Her face was oval, her lips red and full, her eyes dark and luminous, her hair as black as the raven’s wing. Among the coils of these matchless tresses was a red rosebud; about her snowy throat a necklet of rubies, and her dress was of amber silk.

“He could not marry Margaret Nugent if she were the[Pg 8] only choice left to him!” she murmured, her white hands tightly clinching themselves. “And is it for this I have loved and waited all these weary years? Oh, Harold! how can you be so cruel? You have been my ideal—my king! More precious than my hopes of heaven! And now—oh, God, I cannot stand it!”

She sank into the lounge that the gentlemen had just left, and covered her eyes with her hands, while her lovely bosom rose and fell with the bitter pangs of her emotion.

The merry strains of the waltz were maddening, and the laughter of the happy people in the brilliantly illuminated ballroom made only more apparent her own misery.

“He has met his fate in Lady Elaine Seabright, and I had thought him all my own!” she continued, inaudibly. “I have never liked my proud and haughty friend, and I now hate her with an undying hatred! She shall not take from me the man I love! If she does, I swear to fill her life with bitterness equal to that which I suffer now!”

Her eyes had grown black, and flashed gleams of fire; her tiny hands were clinched, and her beautiful form swelled with fury. In that brief space Margaret Nugent had changed from a warm-tempered, imperious girl to a determined and revengeful woman.

Just then some one touched the keys of the piano, and sang the words of a song that haunted her forever:

Margaret Nugent clutched at her heart, gasping: “I will not lose him—I will never give up my hero-king!”

Again the voice of the singer rose:

“I shall go mad!” murmured Margaret. “Can I get out into the moonlight unobserved? The cool air will soothe my throbbing brain.”

She looked back into the ballroom, and saw Sir Harold Annesley talking to Lady Elaine Seabright. Lady Elaine’s flower-like face was turned up to him laughingly, and Margaret Nugent shivered.

She turned, and gliding from the conservatory, almost reeled into the vine-wreathed piazza beyond, clutching at the wall for support.

Even here she could not be alone, for a recumbent figure started up from a low seat, saying, in anxious tones:

“Dear Miss Margaret, are you faint? I have just come out myself to escape the heat. Can I get you a glass of water?”

[Pg 10]

“No, thank you, viscount,” replied Margaret. “I am already better—much better. The heat is stifling.”

“Would you prefer to be alone, Miss Margaret?” went on Viscount Rivington, “or will you stroll with me in the moonlight for a few minutes? It is lovely out here, and we shall not be missed now.”

He spoke with a tinge of bitterness in his tones. Margaret looked at him sharply.

“I understand——” she said, gently, yet with a thrill of satisfaction in her heart, “I understand. Lady Elaine is as capricious as usual; Lady Elaine seeks new worlds to conquer!”

He laughed bitterly.

“Sir Harold is the social lion to-night. Every one bows to him,” he said, “but I will not have him come between me and the woman I worship, Miss Nugent!”

He turned suddenly upon her.

“You love your cousin—you love Sir Harold. Nay, how could I help but read your secret when my own heart is torn with jealous fears? I could curse the fate that brought him here to-night. Lady Elaine had promised to consider my suit; her father, the earl, was pleased to welcome me as a favored lover; but now I am extinguished!”

He glanced vengefully toward the gleaming windows just as two people in the room beyond paused to drink in the beauty of the moonlight. The brilliant lights behind them made every movement distinct.

“See!” Viscount Rivington whispered. “There they are, Miss Nugent—the woman I love and the man whom you covet. Are we to stand idly by while all that life holds dear drifts away?”

“No!” she said, and their eyes met. They understood each other.

[Pg 11]

CHAPTER II.

A RIFT IN THE LUTE.

“She is the loveliest girl in all England,” the papers said, when the engagement of Sir Harold Annesley and Lady Elaine Seabright was announced. “And Sir Harold is the lion of the season. Both are extremely wealthy, and it is in every way a most suitable match.”

The wooing and winning had been short and decisive. It was love at first sight on both sides, and the Earl of Seabright was gratified that his beautiful but capricious daughter was at last conquered.

He was an easy-going nobleman of the old school, intensely proud of his ancient line, but indolent to a selfish degree where the best interests of his only child were concerned.

He wished to see her well married, but did not care whom to so long as there was no blemish on his prospective son-in-law’s name. The man’s private character was nothing to him if he could boast of wealth and an ancient pedigree.

“I congratulate you, my boy,” he said, genially, to Sir Harold. “My willful beauty has been endless trouble to me. All the men at her feet, you know, and if you had not come upon the scene so opportunely, she would have struck her colors to Viscount Rivington, I verily believe. Poor fellow! It will be no end of an upset for him.”

Sir Harold frowned.

“I do not think that Elaine ever dreamed of such a thing,” he said.

“Well, well,” laughed the earl; “if you are satisfied,[Pg 12] what does it matter? One word, my boy; deal gently with her. She is very young, and has never yet been thwarted. ‘Happy’s the wooing that’s not long a-doing,’ you know, but these sudden engagements are apt to be as quickly broken.”

Sir Harold could not forget the words of the earl for some days. The impression left from them was far from pleasant. He was giving all to the woman he loved—the past, the present, and the future—and he expected an undivided return.

So rapid had been the wooing that the plans of Margaret Nugent and Viscount Rivington had not been permitted formation. It was as impossible to keep these two apart as to keep the needle from the magnet.

An early marriage had been suggested by the impatient lover, and Elaine was not averse to anything which would please Sir Harold. She worshiped him as a being far above her, though at times his jealous fears pained her bitterly.

This takes the reader back to the opening words of our story.

Sir Harold was an almost daily visitor at Seabright Hall. His own estate was but ten miles distant, and, mounted upon his favorite horse, his had become a familiar figure to the rustics of Seabright.

It was a warm July day, and the few visitors at the Hall were sunning themselves on the lawn, and listening to my lord’s sporting reminiscences, while the lovers had wandered to a bower festooned with roses and fragrant clematis.

“But you have not answered my question, Elaine,” Sir Harold went on, and there was an earnestness in his tones that surprised her.

She turned her eyes toward him—lustrous eyes, like[Pg 13] pansies wet with dew, saying, “Harold, I believe that you are jealous, and I dislike jealous people.”

“Then I am to understand that you dislike me?” he smiled; but there was an undercurrent of sadness in his voice.

“Oh, my darling! how foolish you are! Why will you tease me so?”

Lady Elaine clung to him in a passion of love, and yet he was far from being satisfied.

“I believe that I am of a jealous nature,” he said. “It is one of the misfortunes of my race.”

“I am glad that you call it a misfortune,” the girl observed, her lips trembling, “and I sincerely trust that you will never be jealous of me, Harold. Where there is jealousy there cannot be true love. You must trust me all in all, or not at all!”

He was silent for a few minutes, and gnawed his mustache impatiently.

“My darling,” he said, at last, “I have laid bare my life to you. My notions of love and marriage may seem peculiar, but the thought that the woman I love had ever willingly accepted the attentions of another man would be torture to me. I have never had a sweetheart before, I have never pressed my lips to those of a girl, or written one line of nonsense to any woman living. I give you all—unreservedly—my first and my last love.”

She waited for him to continue, her heart burning resentfully.

“I know that I am accounted the luckiest and most enviable mortal on earth because I have stepped in and taken the prize that so many sighed for in vain; but, Elaine, my darling, now that we are engaged, it maddens me to see such men as Viscount Rivington forever dancing attendance upon you.”

[Pg 14]

“Harold,” she said, calmly, “what am I to do?”

“You must show by your manners that—that——”

“I cannot be rude to my father’s friend,” she replied, decidedly. “You are asking too much, Sir Harold. You insult me.”

He had seized her hand in a moment, and was showering kisses upon it.

“No, no, Elaine, a thousand times no! It is only my great love for you that makes me so exacting. You will forgive me, darling, when I tell you that I have heard from several people that you were all but engaged to Viscount Rivington, when I arrived in England, but two short months since. I want you to deny this, and I shall be eternally satisfied.”

Lady Elaine had turned as pale as death.

“I do deny it, Sir Harold, unequivocally.”

She looked at him fearlessly, and his heart smote him.

“My dear love,” he whispered, remorsefully, “I am satisfied. I will never doubt you again. This has been a bitter torture to me. Your father hinted at it long ago, and—and——”

“Well?”

Her tones were cold and hard.

“You told me that it was not true.”

“And you have listened to other falsehoods—to other childish tittle-tattle. Oh, Harold! what will my future life be if I wed a jealous man?”

“It shall never occur again, my darling. Do not punish me more, I beseech you!” cried Sir Harold.

“Why do you not question the viscount?” she demanded, scornfully.

Then she bowed her head and sobbed bitterly.

Sir Harold returned home that evening with a heavy heart. For the first time since their engagement he and Elaine had not exchanged a kiss at parting.

[Pg 15]

She had persistently remained in her own apartments, and at a late hour he had ridden away to Annesley Park, his heart torn with conflicting doubts and fears.

And Viscount Henry Rivington saw through it all and smiled.

[Pg 16]

CHAPTER III.

“MY GOD! ALL IS AT AN END.”

Sir Harold Annesley was the most envied of men among his kind. He was young, wealthy and famous; possessed of a splendid physique, and the representative of an old and honorable line. There was no blot on the escutcheon of the Annesleys; the men had ever been noble and brave, and the women good and virtuous.

In addition to these splendid attributes and honors, Sir Harold had won the fairest and loveliest woman in all England. Dukes and princes had sighed vainly at her feet. She had been the beauty of two seasons, and had nearly turned the brains of a score of men, but to one and all was Lady Elaine the same. Kindly and gracious, but as cold as an icicle when there was the danger of an avowal.

Some of these disappointed lovers declared that she was a coquette; others that she had no human passions—no heart.

At last her father, my lord of Seabright, spoke to her seriously upon the subject of marriage.

“It must come some day, Elaine. Surely among all your acquaintances you must have some preference?”

“No,” the girl replied. “All men are alike. It is dreadful that they must all pretend to fall in love with me.” Her lips curled with scorn. “I do not think,” she added, “that one man in a hundred knows anything of the professions he makes use of so glibly.”

The earl stared at her in surprise. “Why should you think so, Elaine?”

[Pg 17]

“They are passionately in love to-day, and speaking unkindly of me to-morrow. Is that love?”

The earl did not feel competent to argue the point, so he wisely evaded the question by saying:

“Well, let us hope that you will be able to return the affection of some one before many months are past—Viscount Rivington, for instance. He is young, handsome, and comes of a great family. He will be a duke some day, and is very much in love with you.”

“So that these men are of ancient lineage, papa, it does not seem to concern you whether it is possible for me to love them or not,” Lady Elaine replied.

“My dear, I sincerely hope that you could not bring yourself to care for what is termed a man of the people,” the earl exclaimed, in alarm.

“And why not, if he were a gentleman?” laughed Elaine. “There, papa, why should we talk of these things? I like Viscount Rivington better than any one else, because he does not rave about broken hearts and suicide; but as for the love that poets sing about, I fear that I am incapable of experiencing it. In my early girlhood it was a beautiful dream that lay before me like an enchanted garden. Now I am becoming worldly and skeptical. I have not met my prince, and fear that my ideal lives only in my dreams.”

“What nonsense these poets put into the heads of girls!” my lord remarked. “Their trash does an incalculable amount of harm, and ought to be made a bonfire of. However, I am glad that you are beginning to see the value of it, my child. Try and think well of Rivington. He is a capital fellow.”

After that Lady Elaine treated the viscount kindly, and he at once fancied that he was her favored suitor. Then Sir Harold Annesley appeared, and the beautiful Elaine knew that her prince had come at last! With one glance[Pg 18] Sir Harold won this peerless creature, and to all his other honors was added this victory. And yet he was not happy!

No sooner was the prize assured than he began to make himself and Elaine miserable by his quixotic notions of the love of twin souls. The words of the Earl of Seabright haunted him when he spoke of Viscount Rivington in connection with Lady Elaine, and while congratulating him, his cousin Margaret had expressed astonishment that the earl’s daughter could so quickly transfer her affections from one to the other.

“But it is not true,” Sir Harold had said; “she never cared for the viscount.”