UNWILLING WITNESS.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 7072, 18 February 1893, Page 4

UNWILLING WITNESS.

literature-

TCONTINtreD.) J. Bodewin got up and went to the j door. Ho leaned in the open doorway, with his iaee towards the eool night, j while a faintness that bad overcome him passed. He felt the woman’s j hand on bis arm. ‘ Here, drink this! | You look like you was goin’ to be sick.’ . She held a tumbler half full of whisky ( towards him. Ho asked for water, and j ahe dipped' him if glassful from beside the door. i * You’d-befrer-not see her to-mgh f , the woman persisted, following him into the room again, * though she don't look bad. She ain’t been rick long. Did yon know there was a little baby ? It’s dead, too, poor thing! I expect bis mother’ll be glad it didn’t live. There's enough of ’em to leave for other folks to take care of.’ •Whose mother?’ Bodewm asked, lifting hia bead to look at the speaker. * Frank’s mother. She’s bsi-n sent for. Didn’t you know?’ • Who lent for her?’ ‘The Colonel did.’ • Will yon tell me who is the Colonel ?’ , •Ain’t yon acquainted with Co’onel Bill Harkins? It was lucky for Frank s wife he didn’t stand on ho ceremony. Ttey rode in the same coach from the end of the track. Wbv, man, he done everything for her 1 Fed her and kep bet warm, and tended her young ones, and abe not lit for travellio'. He’s paid her way e*er. since she got in. This here house he’s rented for her, and everything in it was bought with his money, though be never let her know it. You don’t know the Colonel I Well, it's about time you did I’ ‘Will you let me see my sister?’ Bodewin said, rising He was taken into the cold inner chamber, where on a clean white sheet, smoothly spread, covered withont concealing a motionless woman’s form. Bodewin kneln on the floor by the bedside, smitten hard and deep in the very spot that anguish knows-—crushed, broken utterly. And the woman beside him-—whom no one wept for, though she was more dead than deaih itselt to all that makes a woman’s life hid with her thin hands the roses that stared on her white cheeks, and sobbed aloud. Bodewin would Lave found it impossible to escape from the details of his, sister’s last hours, bad he wished to do so. They were in the mouths of strangers, who made them the meduim of intercourse unsought by him and unspeakably barrowing. He knew, ftqm various sources, the full extern of his indebtedness to Colonel Harkins, through bis sister. The conjunction was torture to him. He tried in vam to get rid of the pecuniary part of tbo burden at the least, but the Colonel refused to overhaul his back accounts. * it’s all right,’ he repeated. ‘ 1 haven't . spent aby money on her to hart anybody—nothing more than any man would do for a lady passenger.’ The orphaned children bad been taken home by a respectable matron of the neighbourhood, whose offer ot assistance had come too late to benefit the mother. The possibility had never occurred to Bodewin that his sister’s children might be left to any one’s care but his own, in case of their father’s death or failure to provide for them. But, between the day of the funeral and that of Mrs Eustis’s arrival in the

camp, he had time to think overhis lister’s last expressed wish, and to endeavour to reconcile himself to its provisions. She bad chosen f o leave her children to h«r husband’s relations, ignoring her own blood. It was bin the finishing touch to the devoted consistency of her wilehooi. T&ey were his children as well as hers; though by biß life he had forfeited a father’s right, in death she would not deprive him of

a father’s place in his children’s memories. His own mother should not exonerate him and atone for bis short coming's in the new generation that carries with it always the seed of the last one’s blighted hopes. Bodewin accepted bis sister’s decision—not without a forlorn pride in her ■teadf-stneas. But it left him objectless, purposeless, with his atonement on his hands. He had waited I *ng, bad kept the chambers of his heart empty and ready for the guest who had failed him at the last—who he now knew had never meant to code. It remained for him now only to see Mrs Eosti# and settle on his sister’s children an annuity from the money he had kept intact for her use, and to say good-bye to Colonel Burkina. He needed'no one to tell him who Colonel Bill Harkins was. It was only as * the Colonel ’ h« had failed to recognise him. He would have parted with his right band if he could so hare sundered the connection between them. Did the Colonel perceive how it galled Bode: win, and privately enjoy his helplessness under the obligation P When the two men shook hands at patting, Bodewin asked Harkins to remember that the mao who bad been as a brother to his sister should be as as a brother to him in so far as be - might be able to serve him or his in the future. •All right, brother *Bjdewio,’ Harkins replied cheerfully, renewing his hard grasp on Bodewin’s band, and meeting bio eyes with a look as hard as his grasp* ‘ I hops yon will know yonr brother when yon see him again.’ AH this was three years ago. Bodewin end Josephine were not eften albna together, but when they were, Bodewin found it more difficult than he would have, believed to tell his story to this young girl. Tber was an :: appalling egotism about it. One opportunity after another he let slip. ; nntil a day came which found him kjfaic aiott|? in his riddle ft

Josephine’s side. He told his story badly, touching reluctantly on the points where be was sorest, omitting parts of it altogether, and in his dread of over-statement consciously making the worst of bis case.

• You Understand,' he concluded awkwardly, ‘that when I surveyed Harkins’s two claims it was not a business transaction. He did not employ me. I am not a surveyor of mineral claims. Harkin’s discovery was one of the first in tbe camp, and at that time there was not an accredited surveyor within a hundred miles. I offered it as (be first service it came in my way to do for him—the first instalment on my debt. You see what « thing-it would be to use it against him in court—the record of this affair between us—not of business, but of honour —to defeat him by means of it. It would be like trapping him in tbe name of my boasted gratitude. 1 would rather be shot than do it.’

* Still, I think you will do it,’ Josephine said. ‘ "Would you mind telling me why you think so ? ’ ‘ Because if you had been satisfied not to do it, those words* of mine would have been forgotten as soon as they were spoken.’ • I never said I was satisfied no* to do it, but that is very different thing from doing it.’ Josephine was silent.

• Many things,’ Bodewin continued, ‘ which are purely matters of private get aboard m a place like this. Harkins knows I have once positively refused to testify against him. Be also knows that I ha »e since b*en offered in set terms a large sum of money by tbe parties who wish me to do so.’ Josephine blushed painfully at these words, but Bodewin went on without perceiving her embarrassment. ‘ Stating tbe situation roughly as a man like Harkins would see it, wbat motive, do you think be would be likely to impute to me were I now to change my mind ? Would he not think I had consented to do for money wbat 1 bad refused to do from an honourable motive P’ • Would he think yon had been bribed P ’ asked Josephine. Bodewin subdenly remembered that he was on dangerous ground. It was iso difficult to keep tbe fact of Josephine’s antecedents in view. He avoided th& question. {To be continued.)