Lady Trebor's Secret, OR THE MYSTERY OF CECIL ROSSE.

Patea Mail, Volume III, Issue 286, 12 January 1878, Page 4

Lady Trebor's Secret, OR THE MYSTERY OF CECIL ROSSE.

fßv Mas. Haiiuiet Lewis.]

CHAPTER LII. — could. There was a little trembling of the girl’s figure, but no exclamation, nor sign of grief. Cecil bid her sorrow bravely in her ov.n heart, as something too sacred for others’ eyes to behold. YYt the pitying angels, knowing all her anguish, all the bitterness of her despair, must have wept for her in that hour of supreme agony ami desolation. “Married?” said Gretchen. “He is married?” “ And to Lady Trevor!” affirmed Craftm. “ Lady “Glenham, the dowager countess, is delighted with her now daughter-in-law. And Lord Bt Leonards was present at the ceremony and gave away the bride. He presented her with the Bt Lcomuds family diamonds, and showed conclusively that he was on the best of terms with her at last!” The old woman groned heavily as she glanced at her young mistress. “ Perhaps, Lady Trevor has made sure of both lover and fortune, she may let Miss Cecil alone now! she muttered. “ -No one shall ever harm Miss Rosse agiau while 1 live,’ said Crafton, earnestly. “1 shall make her safety and happiness my chief care! ’ Cecil hid her face in her shawl and was silent. Crafton became thoughtful, and brooded cxultingly over bis success. He bad found Miss Rosse! She was in his charge! He had persuaded her that Lord Glenham was lost to her forever! “ And now,” ho said to himself, “it will be easy to persuade her to become mv wife! But if she refuses, I will try force! Mine she shall be within a week!” He set his teeth together in a hard and grim expression that augured ill for Cecil’s future in case she opposed bis will. They rode on for some hours, arriving about the middle of the afternoon at the little mountain inn at which Crafton had spent the preceding night. Here ihov alighted. Refreshments were j-.rocurccl, and alter a two hours stay, during which Grafton had brooded over las future plans, Miss Rosse and Gretchen were again preparing to resume the journey. “ I shall put my fate to the test before reaching Inverness,” thought Cralton. “This afternoon shall decide her future and mine ! Hark ! What is that ? The clatter of a horse’s hoofs had reached his ears. Ho went to the window and looked out carelessly. He started back upon the instant with an oath. A horseman had just halted at the watering-trough in the yard below, arid was eagerly questioning the hostler. Tliis horseman, as Crafton recognised, to his utter horror and dismay, was the young Earl of Glenham. CHAPTER LIII. A DKCLA RATION OF LOVE. The consternation ot Crafton as he beheld Lord Glenham in front of the lonely mountain run in the .Scottish Highlands, was too great for description. He could scarcely believe the evidence of fus senses. He had left the young carl in London. What had brought him hero, so close upon his own track ? Tlud the carl discovered his perfidy ? Did he know that Miss Rosse was living—was here ? Crafton concealed himself, by a rapid movement, behind one of the windowcurtains, and held his breath, while he stared at the horseman below in a wild excitement and alarm. __ The tones of Lord Glcnham’s voice floated up to his ears. rustling sound in the iuuei loom aroused new terrors within him. If Cecil should return to the parlor, should hear Lord Glcnham’s voice, or chance to look from the window and see him, all would he lost. A cold sweat broke out upon his forehead. His legs trembled beneath him. A strange dizziness seized upon ' " But the success that had attended him so far in his wicked schemes did not desert him now. Cecil did not enter the ** After enquiring his -way, Earl Glenham said to the landlord, who proffered the hospitalities of his house, I may stop on my return to-morrow. Just now Lam in. haste. I must reach the MacDon gal place befoie nightfall. He tossed a coin to the hostler, bowed to the landlord, and touched up his horse, riding away upon the road leading to Loch Low at a good rate ot ; Cralton watched him out of sight, with blank amaze, standing like a statue by the window. , , a What brought him here ? he asked himself “He must have seen the signature of Gretclieu’s letter when lie tucked it lip and handed it to me in my chambers. But why did he not accuse me of double-dealing on the spot? Whv did be not call me a traitor and demand explanations ? He attended me To the station and went home. But he mast have started on my track the next day. It would have been easy lor him to track me to Inverness, and thence to Loch Low. I have left a distinct trail behind me—curse my stupidity.”

He conceived a theory nearly in accordance with the facts of the case. Lord Glenham had arrived at Edinburgh and had searched the hotel registers for Grafton’s name, and had pursued his journey with all speed hoping to catch up to Grafton. When the earl had passed beyond the range of the traitor’s vision, Grafton drew a long breath of relief, as if an immense burden of apprehension and anxiety had been removed from bis soul. “ We must be off at once !” bo muttered. What a frightful risk of discovery I have run ! If he wore to meet some one who has seen ns, he would turn hack and Had ns here. We must not delay a moment longer I” He smoothed his anxious brows and iulormcd Cecil that the chaise waited. The rumble of wheels confirmed his statement. He offered her his arm, and led her down to the court-yard, just as the vehicle drew up before the door. Grafton helped Cecil in and piled shawls and rugs about her, and then handed in Gretchen. “ Now we’re off,” he said, cheerfully, springing into the chaise and slamming the door. (Jecil sank back among her impromptu cushions and was silent. “ I’ve escaped that peril by the merest chance,” he thought, with a shudder. “ Another question on Glenham’s part, another minute’s delay even to listen to that hostler, and the fact of my presence at the inn, with Miss Rosse, would have been discovered ! Who would have dreamed of Glenham’s appearance here? Well, lam upon my guard now; I will be prepared for him.” Flinging aside his anxiety and care, he exerted himself to make the journey less tedious to his young charge. He told her of his winter's search for her, carefully avoiding to state that Lord Glenham and Lord St. Leonards had joined in that search, and shared in ail his anxieties and terrors, and that the carl had done even more than himself in the endeavour to further Cecil’s recovery. Ho rehearsed his interviews with Lady Trevor, and asked many questions in regard to Black Rock and Cecil’s jailers there. “ Pulford must have known of that old, deserted lionse,” ho commented. “ And you have spent all these months of my captivity in searching- for me, Mr. Grafton ?” said Cecil, mnderingly. “ I think I should have been happier if I had known that even one person was looking for me !” “ I have not known one minute’s happiness since your disappearance, Miss Cecil,” said Grafton, ardently—- “ until to-day.” The girl s white cheek flushed faintly. She shrank back among her shawls. “ I have devoted all my time and energies to the task of finding you,” continued Crafton, unable to control himself longer, giving himself up to the passion that filled his being. “ I have had no enjoyment, no satisfaction, no peace since the hour in which I heard ol your loss. I have travelled every were, by night and by day; have followed up false clews, have left no stone unturned, as I might say, in my search. And in the hour of my despair, when I said to myself that you must be dead, Gretchcu’s letter came, and I lived again ! I started by the first rain, Cecil; I came straight to you, and I found you! You are safe now, Cecil. No one shall harm you again while I live!”

“ I knew you would protect my young mistress, sir,” sobbed old Gretchen, in her joy at this assurance. “ I will guard her with my life !” declared Crafton, solemnly. “ Cecil, since the day I met you in the shadows of the Black Forest, I have loved yon. It -was not your beauty alone, splendid as it is, that won my admiration. I did not fall in love with you in a fit of pique, nor abandon you when I heard the story of your origin. My love is true and steadfast as eternity ! I love you with all my soul—l shall love you always. Lord Glenham is married to Lady Trevor. There is no one to care for you—no one but me. You are tired with your struggle with life, my poor little bird ; you have beaten j our wings against prison-bars until you arc worn and strengthless. You are alone in the world, utterly alone, helpless, friendless, with bitter enemies that seek your life !” Cecil’s lips quivered, but she did not speak. “ Alone, did I say ?” cried Crafton. “ Helpless ? Friendless ? No, not while I live ! You are not alone while I can defend you ! You arc not friendless while my heart continues to beat. Yon are not homeless while I have a roof that I can call my own. Cecil, accept my love, my care, ray devotion, my home ! Be my wife ?”

He bent towards her and caught her hand in his, His dark face was full of agitation. His black eyes were pleading and anxious and full of ardent love.

Cecil was frightened. “Mr Crafton—” she said,- trying to draw her hand away. “ Call me Maldred, darling-. Yon must have seen that I love yon, Cecil. It was love that made me search all Europe for you—love that brought me to yon so promptly at Grctcheu’s bidding. Cecil, give me the right to protect you always from your enemies. I have a •pleasant country homo, I have just dismissed my tenant from it; let me take you to it, as my wife !” “ You are very kind, Mr Crafton,” said Cecil, in a troubled, faltering voice. “'I suppose I ought to have foreseen

this, but I never dreamed of you as a lover. I thought of yon as Lord Glenham’s friend—” “And so I was until he trilled with your innocent heart and flung it from 'him like a broken toy. If he had loved you, Cecil, I should have taken my secret down to my grave untold. But he is married to another. Barely you will not wear the willow for him who does not love you, who is the husband of another -woman ? Reward my love and devotion, Cecil, with your hand in marriage, and let me have the privilege of making your future life safe ami happy.” “ What can I say ? I do not love you, Mr Grafton—” “ 1 will undertake to win your love, il you will give me time,” urged Grafton.

Cecil twisted her fingers together nervously.

“ Yon force me to tell the truth, Mr Cralton,” she said, brokenly. “In spite of all that has passed, Hove Lord denham still, with all my soul—” “ Hush, Miss Cecil,” interrupted old Gretchen, in a tone of distress and warning. “ You know not what yon say. It is not maidenly to avow your love for a man who is married to another woman. Besides, he never -was betrothed to yon.” “ Not in words,” answered Cecil, her passionate young eyes all aglow ; “ but he wooed me in the Black Forest as men woo the women they seek to marry. He told my dear uncle, the Herr Pastor of Zorlilz, that lie loved me, and wanted me for his wife. We wore not betrothed, but if over eyes spoke love to eyes Ins spoke love to mine. If ever soft and loving tones wooed, bis wooed me. ‘ Unmaidcnly ?’ Perhaps I am; for I believed—l believe still—that lie loved me then, and I loved him in return. He lias learned how to unlove. The story of my birth frightened him from me. But I cannot so easily learn to forget. And how can I become your wife, Mr Grafton, with this love for him still warm and strong within my heart ? I have risked your scorn in telling you all the truth ; after your generous avowal I was in honor bound to tell you.”

fTO DE CONTINUED. J