Kidnapped at the Altar; Or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain — John Shaqi
Kidnapped at the Altar; Or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie BainLibbey, Laura Jean
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Kidnapped at the Altar; Or, The Romance of that Saucy Jessie Bain
Libbey, Laura Jean
Adventure stories; Dime novels; Fiction; Love stories
SOME YOUNG GIRLS FIND LOVE SO SWEET; TO OTHERS IT PROVES A CURSE.
It was a magnificent evening, in balmy June, on the far-famed St.
Lawrence.
The steamer "St. Lawrence" was making her nightly search-light excursion
down the bay, laden to her utmost capacity.
The passengers were all summer tourists, light of heart and gay of
speech; all save one, Hubert Varrick, a young and handsome man, dressed
in the height of fashion, who held aloof from the rest, and who stood
leaning carelessly against the taffrail.
The steamer was making its way in and out of the thousand green isles,
the great light from the pilot-house suddenly throwing a broad,
illuminating flash first on this and then on that.
As the light swept across land and water from point to point, Varrick
lightly laughed aloud at the ludicrous incidents, such as the sudden
flashing of the light's piercing rays on some lover's nook, where two
souls indulging in but one thought were ruthlessly awakened from sweet
seclusion to the most glaring publicity, and at many a novel sight,
little dreaming that at every turn of the ponderous wheels he was
nearing his destiny.
"Where are we now?" he inquired of a deck-hand.
"At Fisher's Landing, sir."
The words had scarcely left his lips ere a radiant flood of electric
light swept over the jutting bit of mainland. In that instantaneous
white glare Varrick saw a sight that was indelibly engraved upon his
memory while life lasted.
The dock was deserted by all save one person--a young girl, waving her
hand toward the steamer.
She wore a dress of some white, fleecy material, her golden hair flying
in the wind, and flapping against her bare shoulders and half-bared
white arms.
"Great heavens! who is that?" Varrick cried.
But as he strained his eyes eagerly toward the beautiful picture, the
scene was suddenly wrapped in darkness, and the steamer glided on.
"Who was that, and what place was it?" he asked again.
"It was Fisher's Landing, I said," rejoined the other. "The girl is
'Saucy Jessie Bain,' as they call her hereabouts. She's Captain Carr's
niece."
"Has she a lover?" suddenly asked Varrick.
"Lord bless you, sir!" he answered, "there's scarcely a single man for
miles around that isn't in love with Jessie Bain; but she will have none
of them.
"There's a little story about Jessie Bain. I'll tell it to you, since
you admire the girl."
But the story was not destined to become known to Varrick, for his
companion was called away at that moment.
He could think of nothing else, see nothing but the face of the girl he
had seen on the dock at Fisher's Landing.
This was particularly unfortunate, for at that moment Hubert Varrick was
on his way to be married on the morrow to the beautiful heiress, Miss
Northrup.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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