THE FANSHAWES OF HAVILLANDS,

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 258, 11 May 1910, Page 4

THE FANSHAWES OF HAVILLANDS,

(All Rights Reserve!.* TRACKED BY FATE, O R

BY MAURICE SCOTT, Author of "The Pride of the Morays,* 1 ."The Mark of the Broad Arrow," "Broken Bonds," etc. etc. TWENTY-FIFTH INSTALMENT. Her hands had loosened their grip, and she had slowly though surely, sunk from her sitting position to a prostrate one on the floor of the carriage, where, on a luxurious rug, she slept as comfortably as others, in different circumstances, might do in bed. And so, all unconscious of his third passenger, Mr. Fanshawe drove his Panhard with unfaltering hands along the dark roads, slowing up occasionally to consult a sign-post or look at his road-map, but only for those purposes pausing in his grim determination not to stop until he had covered the ground between London and Exeter, and deposited the girl—whose very existence seemed a source of trouble and uneasiness—within the safe walls of Havillands. For it was Dorothy who,"seated beside her tjrant as the car seemed to fly through space, on, on, on unceasingly, wondered whether, for some unknown sin, she was doomed to pass the remainder of her life on earth travelling up and down its confines at lightning speed in company with this man, who seemed destined to be her evil genius. Her cup of misery was full to overflowing and she sat there silent, motionless, letting even ,her thoughts sink into a state of numbed apathy, from which she made, no effort to free them. If any conjecture could be said to cros6 her mind as to her destination, she supposed she was being taken to Havillands, back to Mrs. Fanshawe, and the hated attempts at lovemaking on the part of Clarence. Should she appeal to Mrs. Fanshawe ? Of what use ? The threat held over the head of poor, kindhearted Ju was the final stroke that broke down Dorothy's resistance. Better she should endure the worst that could befall than bring disgrace and unmerited calumny on her only friends. For once stamped as a gaol bird, Ju's means .of livelihood would be taken away. Branded as a thief, would she not be "moved on" mercilessly, where now her acknowledged bonesty gained her respect and freeiom from interference ? Yes ; that was indeed a sorrowful truth '; but now Dorothy could think no more. The pain had passed from the acute stage to that of passive, almost numb endurance. She was amply protected with wraps, and enveloped in a huge fur rug. Once or twice when Mr. Fanshawe slowed up, he inquired if she felt the cold ; but as she made no answer, he concluded she had fallen asleep and did not attempt to arouse her.

"I wish she slept the sleep that wakes no more," he muttered. " AnDther world ? Pshaw ! There is no other world as far as we are concerned. The dead are dead ; trouble is for the living." And then with a curse on the unwelcome thoughts that crowded upon him in spite of his efforts to repress them, Lemuel Fanshawe put the Panhard at her full speed, and as the first red streak of light in the east evidenced the dawning of another day although in the dark leaden sky night still struggled for supremacy, the grey chimneys, of Havillands could be seen in the distance, and the man endeavoured to still further harden his heartless, inflexible will to the task on which he was hent. It had been a long run, and Dorothy, her senses dumb under the oppression of helpless, hopeless misery, had during the last fallen in a condition of torpor bordering on sleep, from which she was aroused by the sudden cessation of the rattling noise and rapid motion to which in the long journey she had grown accustomed, She could scarcely at first realize her surroundings ; and then, pushing up the thick veil from her face, saw she was alone in the car, and that Mr. Fanshawe was endeavouring to unlock a gate which bore the appearance of having been disused foi years, and on which rust had been allowed to work its will. Strange that he should come this way, avoiding the main entrance, where the lodgekeeper could have been so easily summoned. Presently the lock yielded ; and then Dorothy saw it was not of sufficient width to admit the motor-car. " Let me assist you down," said Mr. Fanshawe. "It is not very far to the house." He offered no further explanation, and Dorothy passively submitted tc his outstretched hand. Leaving the car, he led the waythrough a densely-wooded plantation where the path was narrow and sometimes difficult to trace in the semi-darkness. Several times thf girl's cramped limbs stumbled and she would have fallen but for Lemuel Fanshawe's timely aid, thougt presently the revulsion produced b5 the touch nerved her to greatei powers -of endurance and she struggled on alone. At last the great granite walls loomed before them, and Dorothy, for the first time, began to experience a sensation of terror, for there was no sign of life about the placenot the least evidence of human habitation. They were approaching it by th< back entrance too—a part long disused, and suffered to fall into decay. And then her mind, recovering from its torpor ran rapidly over the secrecy with which she had been con-

veyed from Rutland Gate, where she was confined to one room, seeing nc one save Mr. Fanshawe himself—not even a servant. Then the long night journey in the motor-car, followed by this surreptitious hack-door entry into an uninhabited house. There seemed only one explanation possible—he had brought her there to kill her ! She felt her cheeks grow pale, her heart almost cease to heat. Granting that her troubles were almost too great for human endurance, she was so young ; and she was almost surprised to find that she clung so tenaciously to life, and that in that dread moment life and hope were synonjmous terms. And there was horror in the idea of meeting death by violence. All this ran quickly through her mind while Mr. Fanshawe, with a second rusty key, had some difficulty in opening a small, unobtrusive door almost hidden in ivy and other creeping foliage. Should she dart back into the plantation, trust to her lightness, her youtb.ful activity, to escape from a heavily-built middle-aged man ? Of what use ? She was still stiff and sore, cramped after the long journey. She would scarcely get many yards ere he must overtake her and the attempt might infuriate him to commit still further violence. And he had got the door open now. She must follow or precede him, as he commanded ; at least, he should not see she was afraid. He stood back with a gesture, and she entered, apparently calm, though filled with inward apprehension. All was silent within—no sound oi life whatever. She followed unprotestingly along dark corridors and through galleries, the conviction growing and deepening in her mind that she was not intended to leave Havillands alive. And then Mr. Fanshawe ushered her into a large, lofty room, where dust and neglect conveyed the impression it had not been entered for years, and where now only a dim light' prevailed as the coming dawn struggled to penetrate the strip of windowpane visible above the tall, closelybarred shutters. Placing a chair for her he broke the silence : " You perhaps are wondering why I bring you here thus secretly, Ma'ra'selle Dorothee ?" " No," she replied, looking him in the eyes. " You mean to murder me I" CHAPTER XXV. MR. FANSHAWE OFFERS " AN ALTERNATIVE." " Murder is an ugly word," he returned grimly. " If you mean that I intend to actively deprive you of your life, you are in error." " And I know that you are quibbling—begging the question," cried Dorothj. "Mr. Fanshawe, I am beginning to think you would scarcely take all this trouble over a nameless girl. Your persecution inspires me with the belief that you have deceived me—that I am the legitimate daughter of Gilbert Fanshawe, and that my life stands between you and the unlawful possession of his estates.". " Does it, indeed ?" he sneered. " Assuming your belief to he well grounded do I strike you as a man likely to allow a weak, puling girl to stand in my way ? You are silent, but your threats prove to me you are dangerous, Ma'm'selle Dorothee. I would have married you to my son now I see that might not have been a conclusive solution to the troublesome problem created by your existence. You have chosen to pit your puny strength against mine. You cannot complain if you are worsted in the fray." " What do you intend to do to me!" asked Dorothy, bravely. " To you ? Nothing— absolutely nothing. I am going to leave you here to think matters over. In a week, perhaps less, you may have learned much by reflection. Solitude will do more to impress on you the futilitj of opposition." " You are not intending to leave me here alone in this enormous house ?" gasped Dorothy. " You were alone in your very inartistic and decidedly gloomy garret I in Soho when I gave myself the pleasure of visiting you there." " But there were people in the douse—within call," she urged. "Yet you did not avail yourself of their proximity on the occasion of which I speak," he said derisively. " And here you will be absolutely free from molestation by any one, unless the spirits of the departed Fanshawes disturb your meditations." " You mean to leave me here to starve to death," she said. " I mean to leave you here." " You withdraw the alternative, then. You no longer give me the option of " " No, Ma'm'selle Dorothee ; you know the old adage, ' He who will not when he may,' do you not ? By running away from Havillands you have raised a hornets' nest about your cars ; you are dangerous to my interests, and your associates are troublesome. But I have the whip hand. One word from your streetsinging vagrants, and I immediately prosecute the woman Andrews for being in unlawful possession of my property. And your interfering doctor will ask no further questions when once jou are —removed." She looked at him in dumb misery, hut spoke no word. " I will show you your one and only alternative," he said, suddenly. He went out of the room, and still Dorothy sat there almost as if turned to stone. Was it possible this man could be of her own blood—her father's brother ? What could be the difference in the two mothers to create such opposite natures ? And what a power must exist in wealth When, to preserve it. a man could so

deliberately encompass the death of his brother's child ! And now an even more terrible fear suggested itself to her. Her father's mysterious disappearance ; his seeming desertion of his wife and daughter whom he loved so well. Was it—surely it could not be. Had he come to England to find his stepbrother in possession of the estates which should have been justly his own ? And—and—the thought were terrible, but had he been murdered ? For a man sufficiently fiendish to doom his brother's child to death in cold blood would have been capable of killing the brother whose birthright he had stolen. Nothing else accounted for his silence ; nothing else could account for it. But would an all-seeing and allmercifnl Providence permit a human being to pile crime upon crime for the mere sake of self-aggrandisement? Such a wretch were capable of murdering his own wife —even his own son ! No longer did Dorothy wonder at the blood-curdling atrocities among the lower and less enlightened orders the accounts of which she had been privileged to read to Ju out of the daily papers during her ministrations in Brick-street. Mr. Fanshawe returned to the room after a short interval, a carafe of water in his hand. And into the clear water he poured a few drops of colourless liquid from a small bottle in his breast pocket. " There," he said, "is your alternative, Ma'm'selle Dorothee. You will naturally be thirsty ; meditation is dry work. One draught of this and all your troubles will be over. You can rejoin your mother in the theological heaven, if that prospect appeals most to your intelligence, or, as I prefer to believe, subside painlessly, unconsciously, into oblivion—a state of nothingness, free from all future care ; so that you need not suffer one moment longer than is your wish. Believe me, for the drug is absolutely certain and instantaneous in effect. But I merely leave it at your disposal after informing you of its presence. Y'ou take it, or otherwise of your own free will ; so that in no case can I be said to murder you. Comprenez, ma chere Ma'm'selle Dorothee ?"

" Are you human, I wonder ?" she said, half to herself. "So much so that I am doing my utmost to protect my own interests. You threw down the gauntlet—et voila !" "Go, please," said Dorothy, quietIj. "I would rather be alone." " Do not imagine you can get out. I do not do things by halves, and Havillands can keep its secrets." "Even that of my father's murder ?" hazarded the girl, trembling as she saw how the dark face turned a greeny hue. " Even that. My young lady, you are daring, and had I entertained a scruple, those words would have signed your death warrant. You know, or suspect too much, and must be silenced. You can relate jour theories and suspicions to the Havillands ghost if you like ; but if you are wise you'll fly to the alternative." And with a muttered curse he left her. She heard the key rasping in the lock, heard the loud banging of the door, which awakened slumbering echoes throughout the house, and then —silence. Such utter silence as she hardly deemed possible. In Rutland Gate, also at Havillands, when the family was in residence, there was always some movement about the corridors, some sign of life, and in Brick-street her ears had grown acclimatized to the ceaseless rumble arising out of the stream of traffic along Shaftes-bury-avenue. But to feel herself alone—alone in that great house, with no human creature to aid her should she lose her reason and beat out her brains against the walls ! Wait—she must not encourage such thoughts ; that was not the way to preserve sanity ! And there was that deadly carafe of clear water staring at her, at the very sight of which her throat seemed on fire. The roof of her mouth parched as if her tongue clave to it. Oh, the temptation to pour out a tumblerful and drink it to the dregs ! Had not her persecutor relied on that temptation as a certainty which should put her out of existence ! She must disappoint him, must go away from that room into some other where the carafe would be no longer visible ; must also reconnoitre and endeavour to find some way of escape. She went out into the corridor, and her heart fell as she realized herself to be entirely cut off from that part of the mansion • ordinarily in use. Strong doors of communication barred her passage into the rooms she had known during her residence beneath its roof. She was trapped amid a network of passages and apartments, all the windows of which were very high up. and strongly shuttered, the heavy iron bars across the shutters secured firmly by padlocks, (To be Continued.)