ALL OR NOTHING.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 589, 30 July 1913, Page 6

ALL OR NOTHING.

A THRILLING ROMANCE,

Copyright

-By the Author of—-

"A fitter Bondage, - ' "Two Keys,' l "Stella," "The Unknown Bridegroom," &c, PART 20. CHAPTER XXXIII. Leonard was undoubtedly jealous. He hated at that, moment the army and every one in it —men with great tawny moustaches, like the gallant captain, and everything else that would attract Mabel's attention. He made no scruple of interrupting the conversation. He had met Captain Lomax once before, and on the strength of that be went up to him, greeting him with a polite smile, while in his heart he wished him a hundred miles away. " You were good enough to say, Miss Morton, that I should give you a lesson in croquet-playing," he said. "Will you join this game ?" The captain frowned. He had no wish to leave his lovely companion ; but Leonard offered her his arm, and the gallant son of Mars watched their departure with a lowering, half-sullen expression on his handsome, vacuous face. "The insolence of the civilians .almost passes belief," he said. "The world is changed when her Majesty's uniform is pushed aside for a black coat."

"I never heard anything of your giving me a lesson in croquet," said Mabel, simply ; and the two walked away together. He looked down in her innocent, beautiful face ; the wondering eyes were raised to his. For the whole world Leonard would not have told her then that he had made use, of a subterfuge—that he had spoken falsely—in order to secure her for himself.

'"Did you not ?" hj& said, with wellaffected surprise. "Then I must have made a mistake. Some lady asked mc for a lesson in croquet, which I faithfully promised, and I thought it was you."

A pang of disappointment shot through the gentle heart. "He confounds me with all others," she thought to herself. " I should never make the same mistake over lim." "Perhaps you are thinking of Miss Leyland, or Miss Lewis ?" she said. "I am a good croquet-player. Where is the ground ? This path leads to "he pineries. I have seen them." "If you are willing," he said, " we will forego the croquet. I want to talk to you, Miss Morton—l want to ask you a question. You have none of the common affections of young adies. Will you answer it 7" "Yes," she replied, simply. "Perhaps I ask you as a test of character, perhaps to mark the contrast with others, perhaps to please myself ; but I pray you, no matter what my reason may be, to give me a candid answer." "It will be candid if it be an answer at all," said Mabel. "I could lot be anything but candid. " That I am sure of," he said. 'Miss Morton, never mind the croquet —forget the fete. Come with me town this shady path here, and tell ne what is your opinion of love." "Of love ?" she said. A look of ieep reverence came over her lovely young face. "I could hardly tell you in one minute. I should be obliged to think."

"No," he said, hastily, "do not stop to think. Tell me now, on the impulse of the moment, what do you think of love."

The light that came into her face was beautiful to see. She raised her sweet, truthful eyes to his. "I can hardly tell you," she said, slowly. "It is something very beautiful, very bright, very holy—a glimpse of heaven, I should think —a light from heaven that brightens the darkness of life and makes its shady places light."

:,: What do you think of marriage?" he asked. "Pray—pray do not be angry at the question—l have my own reason for asking it." "I do not know," she said, more shyly, while the swret eyes drooped. "You will laugh, perhaps, lr.it my real opinion of it is that if one marries the best-Eoved, marriages must he like fairyland—a kind of paradise." "Then you would marry for love?" he asked.

"What else conld any one marry for ?" she asked, in sweet, simple wonder. *

"For money," Jia replied. "What has money to do- with love ?"

"It might buy it," he said. An indignant flush crimsoned the fair young face. "It could not !" she said, quickly. "Money is all very well in its way ; it cannot buy love, honour, truth, or faith, and they a'.:e of more value than all the gold in. the world." "Then you, for one, would not marry for money ?" he said, slowly. "I marry lor money ?" replied Mabel. "It would be the last thing —the last idea that would enter my mind."

"You are very patient and kind," he said. "Some ladies would have thought my questions rude. I wanted to know what young girls really thought, for it is not very long since I heard a lady say she considered money the key to love and marriage. She said it quite seriously, too." "She was jesting/' said Mabel, earnestly. "No girl—no woman—could ever think of such a thing. Do yoi: not know that what you call love U a beautiful instinct God has implanted in the human heart ? Why, Dr Ainsleigh, as you said yourself, th« birds and the flowers love each other Money is out of the question." He looked at the beautiful glowing face, and tfcie .contrast between tin

two girls struck him forcibly. The impulse was strong upon him to hold those littlo white hands in his own and tell Mallei Morton that he worshipped her. She was so fair and so true, so winsome and bright. "Are you enjoying the fete ?" lie asked, merely to change the conversation, for though the impulse was strong, worldly impulse was stronger. "Yes ; I never saw anything more beautiful," she replied, earnestly. "Do you like ihat tiresome Cap tain Lomax ?" he asked, abruptly. "He is very kind," she replied ; "but I have not known him long enough to tell whether I like him or not." "Those young officers are all a terribly conceited set," said jealous Leonard. "The study of medicine does not conduce to vanity, I suppose ?" said Mabel, with a little laugh. "I saw no conceit in Captain Lomax." He could resist no longer. He drew the little white hands in his own. He looked lovingly at the sweet, bright face. He would have given the world* to have kissed the sensitive lips. "Miss Morton," he said, "I wish you would teach me some of the beautiful lessons you have learned so well. Why Jo good thoughts come naturally to you ? Why does everything take » tinge of pootry and romance with you ? Why are you so different from others ? Teach me to be like you." She looked im at him with all a girl's worship for what she loves in her dark eyes.

"You !" she said. "Why, Dr. Ainsleigh, you are so much better, so much nobler than I. What could I teach you ?"

He bowed his head before the simple faith of the young girl. "You could teach me very much," he went on. "I have never met before with any one like you or like your mother ; you are different types Could you teach mc the same simple faith in others that you have—the same wise simplicity —the same poetry ? Ah, no ! And yet I should be so different, so much better, if I could learn from you." "I do not think you could be much better than you are," she said, shyly ; and the words fell very sweetly on his ear.

They came then to a pretty garden chair, and he made her sit down to rest—rest so sweet and still, with the sun shining, the birds singing, the flowers blooming.

"I wish," he said—"how I. wish that for you and mc, Mabel, this fete would never end ! I should like to wander with you for ever amongst trees and flowers." He had never called her by her name before and Mabel's heart gave a great bound. "I think we should Lc tired," she replied, trying to smile as though his words had been a careless jest. "I might tire of trees and flowers in time, but never of you, Mabel. You know that—never of you." Then a sweet, golden silence fell over them. Mabel's heart was full of happiness too great for words. It seemed to her that every vague hope and dim, delicious dream was realised at last. It was he who broke the silence, and it was well for her faith in human natare that she did not know the direction his thoughts were taking.

"I suppose, Miss Morton," he said, "you have lived all your life at Carsbrook ?" »

"All my life that I remember," she replied ; "but I have aj.ague memory, far off, like the music of a dream."

"What memory is that ?" he asked. "Of another life," she replied. "I could believe that I had lived once in a different land, with snow-cover-ed hills and a brighter sun than this. I see the very place at times in my sleep, and I have a memory of a large old castle, and of a handsome face that used to bend over me. Yet I can never tell whether it is only a dream or a remembrance." '"Do you remember your father ?" he asked, looking earnestly at her. "No, unless the face I sec was his. He died long before I could understand. I have no distinct recollection of him." He was ashamed more questions. There was something so unutterably dishonoarable in trying to make the child reveal the mother's secrets.

"Does Mrs. Morton never tell you of him—never describe him. Have you never seen his friends ? Of course, he was an Englishman ?" "Yes, he was English, but I do not know any relative of his. Mamma never mentions him. Once, years ago, I asked her some question about him, and she told me T must never do so again—she could not endure the pain."

"Then, decidedly," thought, Leonard Ainsleigh to himself, "there is something wrong—some mystery. One may easily guess what it is. for Mabel's mother wears no weddingring. Yet, poor child, how little she suspects it !"

"T saw your mother's books in Lady Mackin's drawing-room," he sa'd. ''Mow surprised they would all he if they knew who was the writer ! I can imagine the sensation it would make. It does seem a thousand pities that one so gifted, so royally beautiful as Mrs. Morton, should live apart from her kind."

"She benefits them, even though she does live apart from them," said Mabel. "My mother's beautiful thoughts have cheered, encouraged, and consoled a thousand drooping hearts ; her eloquent words have found an echo in thousands of worldworn, suffering souls. Such books as my mother writes arc like messages from iieaven."

And after that, even to win from her some chance word that should be a key to her mother's secrets, he could say no more.

He thought he understood it. Sc beautiful and so gifted, the chauee? were that Mrs. Morton's early lift was clouded with suffering, if not

shame. That would account for her wearing no wedding-ring. It might he that she had no claim to one ; and that would account also for her entire avoidance of all society. There must be something, and it behoved him to iind out what that something was before he committed himself to any spoken words of love. When Mabel sat by him, happy with the love and delight that only comes once in life, her heart full of grateful love to Heaven, full of a girl's purest love for him, he was steeling himself against her. lest the mystery that surrounded her mother should, be one that might bar his progress in the world's favour. For which blame his training mor' than himself. CHAPTER XXXIV. Mabel was gone, and Leonard Ainsleigh still sat dreaming under the shady trees. Captain Lomax had come to claim her, saying that she had promised him a dance, and a quadrille was being formed. How he contrived to find her Mabel could not imagine, but the fact was the gallant captain had watched most jealousy the long interview, and when he, could bear it no longer he interrupted it. Mabel remembered her promise with infinite annoyance—she was so supremely happy there with Leonard ; her dark, eloquent eyes said so. Still, a promise was sacred. The captain had asked for a qua: drille, and she had promised it. So she went away, leaving Leonard to his thoughts.

They were not altogether pleasant ones. He loved this fair young Mabel more deeply than he dared own, even to himself ; yet if there .-hould be anything wrong, any mystery that would not bear daylight, about the mother, his chances were destroyed.

So entirely had his own mother instilled into him the idea that "marriage was to makb him," he . never looked upon it in any other light. He loved this girl deeply, yet he could not see how marriage with her would help him on in life at all. She had no money, no connections, nothing but her own sweet face and pure heart. If there was something worse than this —if he was marrying one who had perhaps no right to her father's name —then his prospects were destroyed, and his mother would never forgive him.

They had pictured the time—this mother and son —when he should go boldly to the Romueys and claim relationship with them. But it» must not be until he had either wealth or name, and marriage was the only means by which they could be won. He thought of Alice Leyton and her money ; her plain, shrewd face rose before, him—her keen, ill-natured eyes.

"I could marry her if I liked," he sighed. "I am sure she would have me. But I do not care for her. Oh, Mabel, Mabel !" He walked away from the garden seats, intending to go quietly round the grounds of the lawn where the dancing and music were at their height. He was startled at Lady Mackin's voice sounding quite close to him, and she was just uttering his name.

"This youngf doctor, Leonard Ainsleigh," she saying ; and he, who had been taught more of policy than honour, stood quite still to listen. He was completely hidden from the speakers by the thick ilex hedge. "It would certainly be a most excellent thing for him," Lady Mae-kin continued. "He its very handsome. and has a distinguished, high-bred air about him. He is clever and quick. That young mam wu-;tld gee. on in London : and that would be his best chauee." Then followed a few words Uwl were quite inaudible. ft was Mrs. Welford he heard next, and she wat saying :

"I did not know how to aci . as 1 had never heard your ladyship express any opinion about, literacy peopie. I do not know whether they are visited or not." Leonard was highly amused. He had heard that Mrs. Welford copied her ladyship exactly, having, first contrived to learn her ideas. ' "The 'world has changed in thairespect," said her ladyship. ' " It. delights now in honouring nici:' "! letters and men of genius. I nca-lly think, too, that lady writers are. welcomed in the very highest society." " (if course," said -Mrs. W'ejifotd. that makes a great differen<<\ .-'tin. as 1 was saying, there really is-some mystery about Mrs. Morton. ;';" site writes, why not leil us. hor.c..;iy and openly, what she writi-s?" "Many persons preier to ke,.p ; henincognito." said her ladyship. "Tiere is a writer now whom a!' Kngland would delight to honour. if i hey could. You have read ' Spirit soi ■ ccs,' 1 suppose, Mrs. Welford 7" "I am not much of ;; reader my self, but 1 have heard the hook greatly praised." "If the writer of it were known. there is no honour to which he or she might not aspire," r.ontuued Lady Mackiu. And again Leonard smiled to think how very little they suspect<v : that the graceful, eloquent, gifted wr:ter lived unknown and unhonoured in their midst. " Still," said Mrs. Welford. '--. here must he somo reason why Mr... Mor ton so persistently shuns society. She cannot spend ail her time in writing. Why will sl?e neither pay nor receive visits ?" "'Mrs. Morton is a.: .perfeei lady." said Lady Mackin, vrilh great emphasis. "H she chooses; t ■-> decline society, she has her own reason;', -oi it." "Still." persisted .Mrs. Wclforu. ": cannot bei'p thinkir,g it a great puy if that young doctor shotnd he seriously thinking of ■marrying Mi;-* Morton." /-(To be nottiiiJuied'.