(Copyright.) THE Riverside-House Mystery.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 13 November 1914, Page 3

(Copyright.) THE Riverside-House Mystery.

*— • A Story of Love, Intrigue and Intense Dramatic Action. By BARBARA KENT. # INTRODUCTION : The story opens in New York. . Clyde Hastings and Sidney Raritan are rivals for the hand of a beautiful young widow, Vida Hetherford, who has, upon the death of her husband taken to the stage, and has enjoyed phenomenal success. Vida Hetherford is passionately fond of ■\/^f ritan ' and &eiltlv declines Hast--^V^gs attentions, with the result that f^PWatter has determined to work th^-utter ruin of his hated rival. Raritan has also been unfortunate enough to have incurred the ill-will of another wealthy and vindictive enemy in a mysterious recluse who, " with an old negro servant has suddenly taken possession of Riverside House. Riverside House is a weird, lonely, and deserted habitation by the river. It is given a wide berth by travellers owing to the legends , of a secret murder that had occurred within its walls 20 years before. Mr. Fairleigh, the new resident at Riverside House engages the services of Theodore Griggs, a New York detective to watch Raritan, and report every detail of his life. At the same time Clyde Hastings proceeds to entangle their common enemy in a charge of murdering a man named Allan Love with whom Raritan was last seen on the prairies of Mexico by Love's son, Felix, when taking their departure to inspect a mine in Mexico. To complicate matters .HFelix, a fine young fellow, devoted to his father, has conceived a consuming passion for Raritan's sister, Bebe. With consummate skill Hastings constructs false evidence, involving Raritan, . while at the same time playing upon the feelings of= the son of the missing man. Raritan and the /oung actress are quietly married, the latter being ignorant of the 1 :loud hanging over them. PART 4. As if they came out of a maze that muffled his senses, he heard Bebe's tones tell the story of their meeting in Canada, heard Vida's soft voice thanking him ; but Sidney Raritan sat silent, and Felix suddenly became aware that his eyes were fastened on him as if he would read his very soul. "Sid, why don't you tell him how brave and good he was ?" Bebe whispered, her cheeks glowing like a wild rose, her blue eyes flashing with resentment at her brother's unexplained silence. "Tell him what —er —what a brave fellow he was ! 1 might have been killed only for him. How can you sit there and not say a word ?" "I do thank Mr. Love for any kindness and care he showed my sister ;" and Sidney's voice was cool, courteous, perfectly self-possessed. "I thank him very much. By the way, Mr. Felix Love remembers that we have met casually now and then in the West?" Sidney asked, determined to learn something of the attitude his enemy's son held towards him. "Yes, I remember you very well," said Felix ; and under the healthy tan of his skin both Bebe and Vida could see how pale he had become. A reckless daring entered Sidney's heart, and every nerve thrilled with anger. "So this young fool suspects me, too, does he '? He is probably Hast-ing-'s catspaw—has come at his bidding to ferret out something he can use against me." i A sarcastic smile curled his lip as j he rose and lightly picked up his Jt:. gloves. "I believe I last saw you in San Francisco —let me see—one night, a snowy night, about a year or so ago, I think. Yes ;of course, I remember now. I was with your father, was 1 not ?" j "Yes," came in a hoarse breath! from Felix's lips ; and now all the | hatred he had felt but a little while j before for Sidney rushed over his ! heart afresh. He dared speak of that night ? He ---K-fdared smile as he flung that subtle challenge in his face ? j His heart seemed to swell to ' bursting ; and only the memory of ! where he was, and that Bebe's soft, ! seductively deep-blue eyes were fast- ! . ened upon him, kept him from saying something to express the storm ; in his soul. "Oh, yes !" and still the provoking smile deepened on Sidney's lips. "Kr—how is your father, by the way ?" Vida saw the young man's eyes flash ; his breath came in a laboured, repressed way, and when he spoke his voice was ominous. although the words he uttered were commonplace enough. "Don't you know ?" "Haven't an idea ! How should I ?" "Then I cannot tell you, as I have not seen my father—lately. By this time Vida had risen, and was looking intently from Sidney to this new acquaintance. She dimly felt that there was a suggestion in their speech she did not understand. Her beautiful J';j<'..^ v:r.r> ore*., my in its pallor, her velvety,

dark eyes filled with a burning unrest. * i "I wonder who he is—this young stranger—Felix Love ? I most remember that name !He is hand- I some, and. all his struggles cannot | hide from me that he is suffering ! from some inward excitement. I j must watch and .r">lve this mystery. ! After all, who should know better ' than I the details of my husband's ' life ? It is cruel to me—cruel !" she thought. "I see him often in deep ' thought, pale, preoccupied. A chance mention of Clyde Hastings's name j makes him start. and frown ; and : now it is evident that this young | man from the West knows something of Sidney's past that burns like smouldering embers' in the heart of each." A light touch on her arm made her turn, and she saw Bebe, her pretty face aglow, her ripe lips parted eagerly. "Ask him to call, Vida. I can see ; that Sid won't, and you must, for —for I like him. Ask him to call." As they turned to leave the restaurant, Vida, looking very queenly in her lustrous, pale-grey draperies, held out her daintily-gloved hand to Felix. "We are ' stopping at Mr. Jlaritan's old family place—Applethorpe, on the Bronx, quite in the city's limits. You must come and see us, Mr. Love, when you have the time or inclination, or both." "I shall be charmed," poor Felix muttered, while a ghastly sorrowtugged at his warm heart and made him avoid meeting Bebe's -eyes. "Be sure you come," Bebe whispered ; and her laughing face, so like one of Greuze's fair heads, was lifted near his own. " Don't you remember at the farmhouse we said we thought we could be great friends ? Be sure you come —soon." "Thank you—thank you so much," was all poor Felix could say, as he wrung her hand so that the pretty rings she wore made small indentations on her fingers ; but she didn't mind that. No, indeed, she liked the stinging pain his impassioned grasp had left—it was a reminder of him that kept him near her for a good fifteen minutes afterwards. In the meanwhile, Sidney, pale and icily polite in his demeanour, walked by the side of the man he knew was accusing him in his heart. " Mr. Love," he said at last, " I want to put Mrs. Raritan and my sister in the carriage and have a talk with you. Is it convenient for you ? Or perhaps you have an engagement ?" "It is quite convenient for me," said Felix, coldly. So Vida and Bebe returned to Applethorpe alone, and Sidney led the way to his club, only a little distant. The place was almost deserted on this summer afternoon, and they found a room entirely to themselves. In the shaded place, his face as clear-cut as marble, his eyes burning, Sidney turned slowly and looked Felix Love over from head to foot. "There are a few things I want to say to you, if you will have the j patience to listen. I don't suppose j you'll take one of my cigars, by j the way '?" asked Sidney. j "No, I thank you," was Felix's reply, as he leaned moodily against | the mantelshelf, thinking' not of this j man he had been told was a murderer, and whom he himself suspected ; not 'of his father's fate, strange though it was ; not of Clyde Hastings and the compact they had entered into ; but of a girl's face, that somehow had come to mean to him the whole world and more. Such a winsome, merry, perfect face !It seemed retreating farther and farther into the shadows that surrounded his life ; and far away in a lurid gloom where the j knell of murder sounded, he saw it no more. Bebe must be lost to him ? Fate had said so. A dark story of treachery and death yawned between them. He had come to accuse ncr | brother, and that justice meant that | never might he stand with Bebe's hands in his and read the tender confession of her answering love in her eyes. "Will you answer a few questions ?" asked Sidney, as he lit a cigar, and then let its spark die out I without once raising it to his lips. | "Or, at least, I may presume that" if you answer them at all you j will speak truly ?" j "I never lie !" flashed from Felix, ' as he flung up his head, a stain of colour mounting to his brow. "The emphasis on the pronoun is an insinuation that I do, I suppose ?" "I can only speak for myself. I don't answer for any other man," was the independent answer. "Then will you kindly answer these questions, as they are of im- : portance to both of us ? Clyde Hastings sent for you, did he not ?" asked Sidney, quietly. "Yes, he did." "Before receiving that message from him, had you suspected me of any knowledge of your father's whereabouts ?" i-'or a moment Felix was silent, but his answer came coolly, emphatically : "1 did suspect you." A slight contraction passed over Sidney's brow. "And you do still, I suppose '.'" '■Nothing has occurred to make me alter that opinion. Still, 1 have no positive proof. 1 onlyknow that your mysterious errand with my father, which has never been explained, seems strange. Tf you are an honest man, why don't JO! speak out ?" cried Felix, suddenly forgetting discretion, and let-

ting his tempea-, which was a hat , 1 obm), get the better" of him. "Why don't you tell where you went that night, and why ?" | "My young friend," said Sidney, i quietly, suddenly rising and leaning forward across the table that di- | viried them, "I now have your whole j opinion on this matter. I know 1 where to pla.ce you. I know enough ;to make it necessary for me to tell , you that if you should dare take ; advantage of the invitation irmoJ cently given by my wife and sister j this afternoon, I shall have you : shown the door ! Never dare to speak |to my sister—never touch her hand while you 'have this opinion of me. j You have chosen to jump at a conclusion which I shall consider too absurd to need a denial. As to my movements on that night or any other, I don't choose to explain them to you or-anybody else who ' comes to me demanding an explana- j i tion as a. right. Do you quite | understand me, Mr. Love ?" I Felix looked into the intense. I glowing eyes before him, his own ! face strained and pale. | "You have made yourself reason- j ably plain, I think. You little j know me if you think I would have | crossed your threshold or accepted j any hospitality from you. As for j your sister—your sister—l' shall try to forget that we ever met." How hard it was to choke down the dry sob that came with the words ! Try1 to f orge^r Bebe ! What a task he had set himself ! —what a bitter, hopeless task ! "See that ypu do," was Sidney's grim answer ; and a moment later, I after a cool "Good afternoon," Fe- I lix went away. j For a little while Sidney sat | there, the unlit cigar between his I fingers, his face troubled, his lips I set in a stern, contemptuous ex- | pression. "So the war has begun. I know Hastings of old. What will he do ? ' What can he do ? Besmear me in ' the minds of my friends by his gos- , sip ? Suspect me ? Set the police to watch me ? Well, let him. My life will bear inspection. Until they find Allan Love's body, there can be no charge of murder. In case he has been made away with, I suppose my part of that wretched night's basi- • , ness would bring me under the sus- j picion of the law." j Flo started up and commenced to | pace up and down the room. | "I shan't bother myself, however, j I shall keep that night's work secret and safe, and.just live my daily i life as if I were not an interest- j ing figure watched by a number of amateur detectives. Bah for them i all ! Silence still —for a woman's sake —for a foolish, loving, unhappy little woman's sake. And now I'm off to put a notice of my marriage to Vida in the pa.pers. We've kept. ! it quiet long enough. What,a bitter dose that news /will be for Hast- i ings to swallow !" i CHAPTER XT. i Tt was more than a week later ; a breezy August afternoon, that presaged a cool, delightful night. The table was s set for afternoon tea , in the pretty pink drawing-room at j Applethorpe. i Bebe, among the crape pillows heaped on the low, bamboo couch, ': I was idly swingiug her dainty, slippered foot to and fro as she | watched Vida, so pretty in her cool, white India silk dress, presiding ■ oyer the spirit-lamp on the oval, ! lace-draped table. j "It's just this way," said Bebe, ; her pretty forehead gathered in a I frown, her blue eyes full of discon- j tent, her soft, curling, gold-brown ! hair ruffled by the constant move- j ment of her uneasy head, "he I doesn't like me, and he doesn't want I to know me. My self-esteem tells | me he must be a fool to feel this ! j way, as I flatter myself I am worth : knowing ; but he doesn't mean to j come. Any one with half an eye can see that." I Vida went to her side with a little \ gold-and-white cup of fragrant Pc- i koe, in which a bit of iemon in the ■ shape of a half-moon floated, and, ', smiling in her flushed face, said, \ merrily : j "Well, my dear, I have a pair of ' very good, clear-sighted eyes, and I ; don't see that at all." ! "Then why hasn't he come ?" de- ! j manded Bebe, as if that question I j settled the whole matter. J I "Perhaps he's out of town." ! "Well, he shouldn't have gone !If ! ! ever a man acted as if he were '■ smitten by a girl, that man was Felix Love. Why. when we were Nat the farmhouse, he scarcely took his eyes off -my face ; talked of the days when we were to be friends— ; know each other so well ; said'there was an affinity between us—and —that he could feel it—and all that rot. :' burst out Hebe, in a mixture of regret and disgust. "And when we fairly knock our heads together in Fifth Avenue, and he has a chance of meeting you and Sid, gets an invitation to call, nearly wrings my hand oil', looks unutterable tilings, he simply disappears—doesn't come l!l11"' ""■' •' He hasn't, e\ en been in the neighbourhood !" "Why. how do you know that ?" An! Vida lifted her Greek brows, while her eyes filled with quizzical questioning. -'.Vow, how on earth can you make the sweeping assertion that Mr. Love has not been in the neighbourhood ? Are you a sphinx, a bit of a clitirvovtint, or —you pretty, wilful little creatureare you just trying to make your- : self as miserable as possible ?"' and Vida laid her fingers under her sis-ter-in-law's chin, and looked deeply and long into the eyes that were so marvellously like Sidney's. " Flow do I know ?" asked Bebe, slowly, a dimple coming suddenly in- '

to her cheek as she sat up, a coquettish mixture of tumbled laces, tumbled bronze-gold hair, her eyes half ashamed and half defiant. "Well—just to make a clean breast of it—l've been on horseback up and down for hours and hours every day—just—just hoping to catch a glimpse of him ; I've walked my feet off ; I've kept my eyes rolling, trying to look in both directions at once ; but there hasn't been the ghost of him —there !" She flung her arms around Vida's neck, and, between angry little bursts of laughter and sounds that ! were suspiciously like sobs, called j herself a fool, a creature without pride, and that it would be no wonder at all if Vida hated her, and that she supjjosed she did. A tenderness that swept like a veil over Vida's beautiful eyes ' made them look like great velvet I pansies, as she laid her cool, white j hand on the childish head and | touched all that was visible of j the flushed cheek. I "Dear child, you may tell me ! ! Bebe —Bebe—do you care for him so ; much ?" she asked in a whisper j that invited a young heart's seI cret. j There was no answer, no movel ment, but the half-sad laughter ceased. "You don't want to tell me? Well, never mind. But remember, Bebe, remember always that I love you dearly, and that I want you to be happy. Remember a week is a little while to a man whose life is crowded with business details, as I your young friend's may be. He i will come to Applethorpe yet, I j feel sure of it. Besides—l dislike to say it—but you know, dearie, he may have been iU ; it's been such | wretchedly hot weather until this morning." Bebe looked up, her face all conj trition and concern. j "Oh, do you think so, Vida ? 11l ! The poor dear, and I abusing him i this way ! Couldn't we find out some way if he were ill, and send him some —some jelly ?" she quavered . It was hard for Vida to remain properly serious, but she managed : it. [ "I'll see, dear ; I'll ask Sidney i about the jelly." j "Oh, no, no ! Not for worlds !" j "Why not ?" "Why, couldn't you see that Sid I didn't like him ?" J The words aroused a tormenting | doubt, a sense of unrest that of i late had tormented Vida. Was this true ? Did Sidney disI like Felix Love ? If so, why ? What hidden event in the past were they both thinking of that day in Delmonico's when they were so ; icily, ominously polite to each : other ? She had thought at first that this might be her fancy, but '■ since Bebe noticed it, too, it did exist. For days after that meeting she i had tortured herself—for Vida was as jealous as a Spaniard where she loved—she had fretted her heart in questions that gave back no anj swer. Then she had remembered that l crimson evening by the sea, when she had clung to her lover, kept him at her side, promising to trust him blindly, to ask no questions, to believe in the face of all doubts, if he would but stay with her. j Surely that was a compact that :no passing suspicion could break I down ! She had kept him when he I would have gone on some vital, se- | cret errand ■■ she had promised to j believe in him, and she would. 1 But 'a woman's heart ! Is there jin life anything more inconsistent, j more illogical than that very necesj sary organ ? j Oh, what allegiance to this vow j was costing her ! Like Fatima, | who risked her life to peep into j Bluebeard's secret chamber, passI ing by all the others without in- ! terest, so the question kept haunt- , ing Vida : i "What leaf in my husband's life is , turned down to me ? What is the ', secret ? Who are his enemies ? j Who is Felix Love, and what does Ihe know of Sidney's past ? Is the | secret shameful for him, or for an- | other ? Is_ it the old story of cher- | chez la femme ? Will he tell me ; some day ? Will he tell me ?" ! Before she could reply to Bebe, the ; footman entered. | "If you please, mum, there's a per- ! son here wants to see Mr. Raritan." "Have you the gentleman's card ?" "No, mum," replied the servant, his chin well'tip. "This isn't a gentleman. F i_hink he's come to engage himself to Mr. Raritan. He's foreign—! might say that he's French." "Oh, it's probably the new valet," said Vida, languidly. "I'll see him here, Ruggles." "Yes, mum." He withdrew, and after a moment there entered a funny little man tliat almost made Bebe laugh outright. He was a creature of shrugs and grimaces. From the most pointed hair standing upright v ith pomatum, to the tips of his highly-pol-ished little boots, he was indeed a Frenchman. "You have come to see Mr. Raritan in regard to his advertisement for a valet, I suppose ?" asked Vida,, standing up straight in her slender, regal beauty, and looking at the affected little man without a grain of the amusement she felt showing in her eyes. "A leetle more zan zat. Oh, yes ! Meester Raritan have sent me a lf-ttair to cal! — yes, madame—and! I present myself for hees inspection. So !" ,\ n d lie bowed very low with impressive dignity. "Ah, indeed ! What's your name ?" "Etienne Oudry."

"I suppose you have references and , experience ?" she asked. 3 " Qui, certainement, madams. . Voila !" And he plunged into his ; pocket, keeping his small, pompous I little body bent almost to a right r angle as he did so. i "That will do. I merely wanted to I know. Mr Raritan will engage - you if you are satisfactory. He ; may not be home until dinner, but 3 you may stay and see him. Ruggles i will take care of you." ; 3 : She rang the bell, and Ruggles, I ; wearing his most condescending- ex- [ ; pression, appeared. i i "This man comes as the new valet. ; See that he has dinner with you, >if by that time Mr. Raritan has not ' , arrived," she said. ! ! And the Frenchman bowed himself j i | out. i 5 j "What a' queer-looking man !" j t \ said Bebe, with a little laugh. " I 3 ' say, Vida, you'll never let him curl ! I ! the front of Sidney's bronze locks f j that way, will you ?" I "You absurd child ! For all his j !.; affected airs, I shouldn't wonder if ! > he made a splendid servant. These * Frenchmen generally do. Have - another cup of tea. ?" As she settled herself among the - pillows, Bebe ran from the window ■* j and whispered excitedly : "There's a man just come up ? the garden walk ! I wonder if it , might be—he ?" 3 "Dear me ! Has it come to pro- ) nouns ?" laughed Vida. "It is alt ways a bad sign, my dear, when a J woman, be she young or old, begins sto talk as if there were but one 3 man in the world ; that he had no F name, being labelled just ' he' in > capitals." i There was a step at the door— i Ruggles again, this time with a ' card. "Mr. Clyde Hastings." The delicate colour flew to Vida's soft, oval cheek as she read that ! name. Why did he come uninvited i to Anplethorpe ? She did not like '- him. She did not want him. 1 Yet when he appeared, dark, pale, tbe marks of suffering around his eyes, a faint throb of pity for him 1 did animate Vida's heart. It was * love —a vain love for her —that had j saddened his face. She knew that. While she had no touch of sympathy with him, this knowledge now that she was quite happy herself did lend him some interest in her * eyes. "You did not ask me to come," he > said, as he bent over her hand, "but f I dared to make my way here uninvited, nevertheless. It is not too - late to congratulate you on your ? marriage, is it ?" he asked. And 3 just for a second an expression of i agony and bitterness looked from his ) eyes that thrilled her almost with l fear. : "I hope it will never be too late t for that," she said, in her mellow, 1 velvety tones ; and, turning to Bebe, presented them. 3 Clyde Hastings's glance swept over 3 the young girl, but it was sphinx--3 like. No one, to watch him, would i ever dream how much he had heard - of Bebe from , poor Felix during the past week. i "Pretty ?" he thought, as he look--3 ed at the unlined face, the dreamy, '- | childish eyes of little Bebe. "Well, *I I suppose so !If you want a com- - I plexion of rose and snow, there it j ;I is for you ; big, blue eyes, with j ; trailing gashes—you have them, too; : | a dear, rosy, babyish mouth—it's : j right before you; a round, satiny 3 I chin, cleft by a dimple, a fuzz of - ■ gold-bronze hair above a low, white > i brow —yes, dainty Miss Raritan has | all these delightful and fortunate ■. gifts. I suppose it's only natural ! j that Felix should have fallen in j . I love with her—the young fool ! j Love !" he thought, bitterly. "As j ri if he was beginning to know what :it means in its deepest sense !To i , know love, one must have suffered . . until the agony mounts, a voice- . i less protest, to Heaven. I have . I loved —I know !" | "You'll have a cup of tea ?" asked 3 j Vida. "It's Pekoe, fragrant as a . I rose." * j "Thanks ; I will." ; | Tea ? As if he would not have , j drunk poison from those hands al- j . j most as willingly ! i - i His haggard eyes watched Vida as \ she bent over the pretty table, a | ! heap of pink roses on the mantel- 1 » shelf behind her making an entranc- i I j ing background for her golden head, j ■ ! pale, cameo-like profile, and graceful, j ■ white-robed figure. ] I "Is Mr. Raritan at home ?" he | asked, as he took the pretty Wedg- . ; wood cup from her hands, while . Bebe at the piano in the shaded cor- j j ncr trilled out soft melodies that I ' j breathed of love and passion. J j "No, he will be in shortly," she -j I said, seating'herself, and, picking up I ' a big fan, commenced to wave it j ! slowly to and fro. ; "I may as well tell you," said | , Clyde, watching Vida narrowly, as ! he stirred his tea, "that Sidney ', jlikes me none too well. But I want ! to change all that—now that he is I your husband !Do you understand?" he asked, passionately, eagerly. "Hardly ;" and there vas a slight ' chill in Vida's tone. "I can j fancy Sidney being sought for himself alone." j "Ah, well, he is a good fellow ! I'm willing- to let bygones be bygones, if he is ;" and he looked down i mysteriously at the pattern of the ' Persian rug at his feet. "Do you mean that you and he j had quarrelled ? I did not know that." j "We had a few words —when I \ found he was a suitor of yours. I taunted him with something in his ' past." - IHe let it appear that the words had slipped out unconsciously, looked down as if in chagrin and con-

fusion, whrle all the while he noted the stern whiteness that settled round the mobile, curved lips of this woman he loved so madly, so hopelessly. "In his past J" The words were like a torrent ir Vida's brain. Was this something that she might not know to rise and confront her at every turn ? As much as possible, she hid the knowledge of how deeply his words had cut. "Please say no more, Mj. Hastings;" and her dark eyes flashed. "What you may have felt for me belongs irretrievably to the past. Even to speak of it as in the past offends me now. As for my husband, please understand that lam quite satisfied with his past and present. His friends are mine ; his enemies mine." How beautiful she looked as these cold, scornful words left her lips, and how mournfully the music came from the shaded niche where Bebe sat ! The scene affected Hastings strongly. Villain though he was, there was one real feeling in his life —the love for this woman that was no more conquered than is the lion which is made a captive by force, who lies silent and brooding merely because he sees no promise of freedom before him. But Clyde Hastings had come to Applethorpe that afternoon with a well-conceived plan in his mind. He was going to get the entree of the house; he was going to insinuate his way into Vida's confidence. The time would come when he would be her friend. Her friend ! The man who would quietly and relentlessly ruin and brand her husband ! Her friend — the snake in her Eden ! He had not despaired yet. Vida was proud and cold now, but when the world had turned its fickle back upon her, the wife of a convicted murderer, how would it be then !