The Courage of Love

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 929, 24 March 1930, Page 5

The Courage of Love

COPYRIGHT PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

MARAMfr AIBANESI

Author of " Love's Harvest,” “The Road to Love,” “The Way to Win,'-' etc., •*«-

CHAPTER Vl.—Continued. “You may not be a patient man,” said Diana, with a touch of passion in her voice, “but you are not an honourable one. You are acting very wrongly. Until this matter has been thoroughly Investigated by Aunt Agatha's lawyers, I do not recognise your authority—not even though I have read what my father wrote in his letter. And so I insist that you give orders foi the car to turn round, and that you take me back to Middleston.” The answer was a laugh. And then Townley put out one of his big strong hands', and he gripped Diana by the wrist. The grip was so fierce and so firm that she cried out with a note of pain in her voice. “I ani taking you to London, Diana Ladbroke,” the man said, and he spoke deliberately. “Do you understand that? You are not going to see your Aunt Aga:ha again, nor are you going to see Re cbury, or Aliddleston again not at any rate for some time to come. You are going to be taken care of by me. and if I cannot get you to agree willingly, I shall have to use means to force your obedience. Am I speaking plainly?” The tore of his voice, the look in his eyes, anti the painful grip of his strong hand, though it sent fear suddenly rushing through her veins, and made hei heart beat, wildly, did not entirely c estroy Diana’s courage. As a matter of fact she struggled so fiercely with him that she managed to get free from his grip, and she banged on the window behind the chauffeur, making the man turn round in a startled way and slacken speed. a At the same time whilst Townley j tried to get hold of her she managed to elude him, and betore the man j realised what she had in her mind | she had caught the handle of the door j and had turned it. The speed had j been slarkened. but the motor was j still going - very swiftly, but Diana, only j e ager to escape from what she felt j now was something very evil and j terrible, jumped through the open door, or rather, she fell out. Then she rollec over on the s:ony road, and lay quite still. Townley, saying very ugly things, beckoned to the chauffeur to pull up. Sot out, and ran back along the road, j and the driver of the ca" followed him. This mar was trembling, and had turned very white. *Ts she dead?” he asked in a stifled Voice as ne looked down on Diana’s ' huddled form. Townley knelt down beside that , Hilent figure, and turning it round, put j

his hand on the heart. It was still beating, but it was evident that Diana was badly hurt. All the colour had ebbed out of her face, even from her lips; her < yes were closed, and as they lifted her, very carefully, they saw that blood was running down her neck; she had evidently cut her head. The car was Cyril Townley’s property and the man was his servant. “We must get her to town as quickly as we can,” the master ordered. “Is she lit to be taken?” queried the man. “Don’t you think we’d best get her to a doctor? Or, perhaps there may be a hospital near?” Townley almost struck him. “Do as you are told, you fool. 'She must lie on the floor of the car. We must get her to London, I tell you, as quick as we can. I’ll have her attended to there. She is not dead, nor is she going to die; you can put that into you stupid head. And pull yourself together, Garrett. I don’t want to have accidents, you know. This is upsetting enough as it is.” Together they put Diana on the floor of the car, and rolled up a rug and put it under her head. The blood was still running down her neck, and staining the light summer dress she wore. The girl was unconscious. Townley produced a flask out of his bag, and moistened her lips, and tried to pour some brandy between them, but it just dripped out. He chafed her cold hands, and he tried to stop the bleeding by using a large handkerchief as a pad. The car was now speeding on its way, and he was taking stock of the position. If Diana died, there was an end to the most wonderful, the most amazing scheme to possess wealth. All his life he had played for money, and money had never been so surely in his grasp until now! The life of the girl was necessary to him, so necessary that his plump face lost its smooth look and his eves took on a wild expression I as he realised the great misfortune it would be for him if Diana Ladbroke were to die. | The girl’s fierce struggle, her determined refusal to go with him, and ! then her crazy act in jumping out of the car without thought of whether [ s he would be injured or not, had taken him wholly by surprise. He had not imagined she would be so stubborn. or so difficult to manage, and he I wondered to himself, as he sat look--1 mg down on her white unconscious I {a( . e- whether he had taken the right steps in connection with this great I matter, despite the fact that he had spent weeks, and even months m [planning out what he had done. CHAPTER VIL The car in which Diana lay lost to consciousness of all that was passing ’ about her travelled as swiftly as pos- 1 sible to Loudon, making ‘ts "ay fhrmisrh the crowded traffic until it reached a northern part of the Metro- ; volis Then it came to a quieter I neighbourhood, and finally it turned in through' some gates, and drew up in . front of a fairly large house. j The door was opened by an ev>- i dent housekeeper, but inimedfatel^behind this woman qu xvhose j clean shaven face there came a look |

of consternation, not to say of fear, as Townley got out of the motor and • he caught sight of the girl lying on the floor of the car. “Come along, give a hand here!” said Cyril Townley, roughly. The man addressed, called Burke, drew back. “What’s the matter?” he said. “What have you done? Is she hurt? Oh, I don’t like the look of this.” It was the housekeeper who went forward. “I’ll give you a hand,” she said. She was a very tall, strong-looking woman. Townley said something very ugly under his breath to the big stout man, whose face had turned very white, and whose big hands were trembling, and then he, and the chauffeur, and the housekeeper' lifted Diana off the floor of the car on to a long canvas chair, one that had evidently been used on board ship. “Gently does it,” said Townley. The woman’s, face blanched_a little as she saw the blood on the girl’s neck and also saw how deathly white Diana was. “Now then,” said Townley, “we must get her upstairs as gently as possible, and then we must get the doctor here. Garrett, you had better set about it and ring tip the first man. Or perhaps you had better go round and see who you can get.” The chauffeur paused to look at Diana as she was put on a bed, and he gave .a shrug of his shoulders. Like the big man downstairs, he was by no means pleased with the position of affairs. “There’s a doctor just a little way along this road. I might be able to get him.” “Well, hurry!—hurry!” said Townley, and he spoke harshly; he evidently was master of the house, and master of these other people. “Now you had best leave her,” he said to the housekeeper, “until the doctor comes. Perhaps we ought not to move her about too much?” “It’s to be hoped she isn’t dead,” said the housekeeper. Townley withered her with a glance. “I’m out of luck sure,” he said. “What a lot of jibbering yellow! creatures you are! Dead! No, of course, she isn’t dead. She is young; she’s had a bad fall, and she has cut j her head, but she'll be all right in a | little while.” “May be,” said the housekeeper. ] She had slipped off Diana’s shoes ! from the small feet, and as she felt | that they were icy cold, she said: “I’ll j get a hot-water bottle.” And as she i went out of the room, she said under j her breath to herself, "Poor child ! ” , The doctor came very quickly, and he gave it as his opinion that it was \ very serious case of concussion. About the cuts on the head he could | give no opinion as yet, but he said i that Diana must have a nurse. But Townley Vetoed this. “I have a most excellent woman in the house who will be quite prepared to attend to everything that need be done. Of course, if the condition of your patient gets a little more serious, well, then, we shall have to have a nurse, but 1 don’t want to have one in just yet.” This arrangement, however, was i upset bj" the housekeeper, who an- ; swered to the name of Stanton. Al- | though she saw the black look gatherj ing on the face of the man whom she had to serve, she declared boldly j that a nurse was required, so the ; j doctor, when he left, said ha would | send one in. i “I'm not going to take this on j single-handed and that’s just I j straight! ’ the woman called Stanton 1 said to Cyril Townley. “You may not f mind what is going to happen, but I ! ! have to think of myself. This is a I rotten job, anyhow! I wish to God I had never come near this place!” “Well, it’s quite easy for me to give information to the police. You can go I to another place if you want, someI where that they will find for you, and l don't know how you would like that, j lor how it would do for your beloved , I boy that you think such a lot of! |

But listen to me, Stanton; No hankypanky tricks! When she comes round you are not to tell her a word; you are just to do as X tell you. Don’t forget I’ve got you in my power, and I’m your boss.” I When the nurse came, Diana was undressed, and . Mrs. Stanton produced some night-clothes. She had evidently been prepared for Diana to arrive without luggage, though she had certainly not been prepared for the condition in which the girl had arrived. CHAPTER VIII Bill Thorp called, as he had promised Diana he would, at the old Abbey ruins, but though he asked in every direction for Mr, Waverley, he could | not find the young man. He was j given the information that some very i important person was due to come j down from London that morning, and Mr. Waverley had gone to meet the train in which this important person was travelling, at a station a few miles away. “I can give him a message when he comes back,” a foreman said. And Bill quite frankly gave that message. “Will you tell him, please, that my mother will be home this afternoon. I suppose she will be very pleased to see him. At any rate I was told to tell him that.” “All right,” said the foreman. • And Bill trotted off on his fishing excursion. It' was not until well .after lunch time, which meal Waverley had partaken of at the hotel in the town from which the train had conveyed the big man from his office back to London, that he got this message. He had been obliged to return to his work, as there were certain directions to be given, and he never let anything interfere with his duties. All the time he had been discussing business, and more particularly while lie had been driving to and from the station, his thoughts had been with Diana, The knowledge that she was troubled, that she took his question of her aunt’s indisposition so seriously, said nothing to Hugh Waverley except that it was a proof of the girl’s sweetness of character, for from what he had heard of her life, he quickly convinced himself that some other girl less sensitive, and less thoughtful, would not have bothered herself ! about Mrs. Thorp’s temporary illness. The more he came in contact with j Diana, however, the more he thought ! about her, the more he admired and l loved her. He was determined to | write that night to his' mother and | to ask his parents if they would be j so good as to invite Diana Ladbroke : to stay with them? He told himself quite frankly that he would probably have some diffi- | culty in getting this through with Mrs. Thorp, but all the same he was not going to be put on one side. And after he had arranged everything connected with his work, and settled everything that would be done on the morrow, he got into his little car again, and he drove to the Thatch House. When he rang the bell, Ellen came to answer It. She gave a little gasp when she saw Mr. Waverley. “Oh, sir, will yo l please walk in? I’ll tell the mistress, she’s out in the garden. She’s a bit fretted, and upset like, because, you see, Miss Diana, she hasn't c(yne back yet. Not but what I keep telling the mistress that she will wait for the bus this afternoon, seeing that there is no other way that she can get back.

Waverley looked at Ellen in surprise. “Oh, has Miss Ladbroke gone to Middleston?” "Yes, sir. I thought as you would know that because I overheard her telling Mr. Bill to be sure to let you know that she had gone to the town.” “I didn’t see young Thorp,” Mr. Waverley answered. “I have been busy all the morning.” Then he smiled at Ellen: “If Mrs. Thorp is in the garden, I think I will go and find her.” He came upon Diana's aunt almost at once. She was walking to and fro under the apple trees. Although he had seen her many times, and recognised her, of course, quickly, Hugh Waverley felt (just as the driver of the car had felt the day before) that he was looking on a woman who was either ill, or had undergone some great shock. He took off his soft felt hat as he came near. “Mrs. Thorp,” he said, “I hope you will forgive me for coming out into the garden, but your maid said you were here, and as I am very anxious to talk to you, I thought I would venture to come to look for you.” • Agatha Thorp stood very still and looked at the young man. “What Is your name?” she said. And then she added quickly; “Oh, yes, you are Mr. Waverley. You are working on the old ruins. Yes —yes, what can I do for you?” “You can do a great deal, Mrs. Thorp,” Hugh Waverley said. And then in the simplest, almost in a touching way lie spoke about Diana. "I love her,” he said, “and she loves me. I want to make her my wife, but X cannot do this, of course, unless I bring the matter to you. We are both so anxious to do everything that you would like done, and we are anxious to have the matter settled.” Agatha Thorp’s face contracted sharply. She paused so long before answering him that he looked at her, and as he saw her expression, a wave of pity passed through Hugh Waverley’s heart. “I—l am afraid I have taken you unawares. Perhaps I have given you a shock?” "I have had a shock,” Mrs. Thorp ] answered, after another short pause, “but it has not come from you. You | ask me to give my consent to your i marriage with my niece. You are the 1 first person to whom I tell the truth, j I have no further authority where ! Diana is concerned. She is being j taken from me almost immediately, i This is her father’s wish. Oh, you ] look surprised. You thought, as ! everybody else has thought, that my | brother was dead, but I only learned j yesterday, and in the most cruel and I unexpected manner, that Diana’s i father has been alive all these years. | and only died a year ago.” j She had come to a standstill, and

her hands, gripped together, were j pressed against her heart. Waverley stood and looked at her; a sudden feeling of nervousness and a sense of uneasiness, and something like a pain went through his own heart. “But/’ he said, “if her father is dead, surely ” “I know what yoii are going to say,” Agatha Thorp answered, “but that is just where you are wrong. She is being taken away from me. She is to be given into the care of utter strangers to me—people whom I know nothing at all about, but whom I am given to understand are great friends of my brother.” She spoke halfwildly, then she calmed herself. “I have had my lawyer here already today, and I have given him instructions to have the whole of this most mysterious matter thoroughly investigated.” “But where is Diana?” queried the young man who loved her. “You sent her to Middleston?” “I had no other option,” the old woman answered fiercely. “it was that, or it was going to be a terrible scandal here in the village. Of course the whole matter was talked out between Diana and myself, and when she knew that I had to give a promise that she would interview this man in Middleston this morning before noon, she never hesitated. I am learning to know Diana in a way I had never known her before. She has courage, she has strength, she has honour. I am sure she will not leave me without a struggle, because she considers she owes me a big debt.” Mrs. Thorp shrugged her shoulders—- “ There are some who would quarrel with her, I suppose. But one cannot take out of Diana certain things which belong to her nature.” “She has gone to Middleston,” Waverley said, “that means she cannot get back until the bus brings her back. That won’t be for another hour or so, or is there any other way in which she can get back?” “I don’t know,” Agatha Thorp said, wearily. “Sometimes she has come back in one of the tradesman's carts; I have watched these as they have gone through the village, but none of them has stopped at the gate here.”

“But aren’t you anxious?’- Waverley queried, and his own voice was full of anxiety. She looked at him, and he saw that there were tears in her eyes, and her voice was not steady as she spoke. “Yes, I am anxious,” she confessed. “I shall know no peace of mind until I see Diana again. I am counting the minutes until she comes back.” « “But you need not do that, Mrs. Thorp,” said Waverley. “I will go to Middleston, I will go to the hotel. I will find Diana, and I will bring her back to you. No doubt she has gone to see Mrs. Slater, the confectioner. I know that is where she generally does go when she has to wait for the bus. Mrs. Slater is very fond of Diana, as everybody else is. Will you allow me to go to find her?” He held out his hand as he spoke, and Agatha Thorp put her cold one into his; it was trembling. “Yes, go,” she said. “I can do nothing about the matter which you have brought to me, Mr. Waverley. This is something which will have to be settled by reference to others. But I will tell you this much; it is not what 1 would have said to you yesterday, but it comes now from my heart of hearts. I would glady see Diana your wife. I have heard about you, I know that you are well thought of, L knovr that you are a steady and industrious worker, and a man who has brains ard gifts, and therefore 1 am convinced that you would take care of the child. But everything is changed for me,” Agatha Thorp said, and her voice broke, “and until Mr. Crossman, my lawyer, forces me by the result of his investigations to realise that I must give way to these strange people, who come to me on my brother’s authority (and are deputed by him to carry out his instructions), are proved to be rightly the people to take charge of the child. I am not going to give way to them. Go, go quickly, Hugh Waverley! And I pray to God you will bring the child back with you.” CHAPTER IX Waverley drove to Middleston at a rate to which he had never put his ■ car before. And the first place he went to inquire, was, of course, to Mrs. Slater. She shook her head when he asked for Diana. “I haven’t seen her today, Mr. Waverley. She came over you say, by the bus this morning? Well, 1 didn’t see her get out of the bus, but she often stops just as the bus is coming intc i the town. She likes to walk thiougl the Cathedral grounds, and if she die - that today it will explain how I missec | her of course,” said Mrs. Slater * j “Well. I can’t tell you where you ar< . 1 likely to find her, but the place isn’ - 1 very big, you are sure to run acros: - ; her.” Waverley did not tell the kindl; ' woman that Diana had been sent t< m , keep an appointment at the Count;

Hotel. He felt it was desirable that as little should be said as possible about about this strange, and most disturbing matter which had come suddenly into the girls life. When he got to the hotel, and he inquired for Mr. Townley, he was informed that the man he wanted was no longer staying there. “He left for London this morning n his car.” Waverley frowned and then he smiled. “There was a young lady who was coming to see him for her aunt on business,” he observed. “Oh, yes, the young lady did come. Mr. Townley and she went away together in the car; he motored back to London.” The news sent a thrill of fear through Hugh Waverley’s heart. Pressing the matter he was convinced that the information given was correct, and so it would be useless for him to look for Diana; she was not in Middleston. Just to give himself time to collect his thoughts, and try to grasp all that was passing, he ordered himself a cup of tea. and went into the lounge to drink it. But the tea was never poured out. And the young man felt not only fear growing closer about his heart, but anger, apprehension, and above all that terrible sense of helplessness which always comes when one faces a difficulty, longing to deal with it, and yet compelled to .stand on one side and do nothing. What was passing w’ith Diana? Why Lad she been taken to London ? This was not what had been arranged with Mrs. Thorp, otherwise she would not have been watching the tradesmen’s carts, expecting the girl to get out of one of them, and come back to her at the Thatch House. He longed to ask a great many questions. He knew the manager of the hotel, and before he went to find his little car, he took this man on one side. “You have l ad a gentleman named Townley staying here; does he come here often?” (To be continued tomorrow.)