CHAPTER VI.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 401, 11 September 1889, Page 4

CHAPTER VI.

ONK MOONLIGHT NIUHT. The pleasant days wont on — April went out — May came in. On the tenth of May, the Stuart family, Sir Victor Cathevon, and Lady Helena Powyss were to sail from New York for Liverpool. To Idith, fresh from the twilight of her country life, these days and nights had been one bewildering i*ound of excitement and delight. Opera, theatre, dinner and evening parties, shopping, driving, calling, receiving — all that goes to make the round of that sort of life, had been run. Her slender wardrobe had been replenished, the white Swiss had been reinforced by half-a-dozen glistening silks ; the corals, by a set of rubies and fine gold. Mr Stuart might be pompous and pretentious, but ho wasn't stingy, and he had insisted upon it for his own credit. And half-a-dozen ' spanky new ' silks, fresh from Stuart's counters, with the pristine glitter of their bloom yet upon them, were very different from the half-worn amber tissue of Trixy's. Miss Darrell took the dresses and the rubies, and looked uncommonly handsome in both. On the last night but one, of their stay in New York, Mrs Featherbrain gave a last 'At Home,' a sort of 'P.P. C party, Trixy called it. Miss Darrell was invited, and said n6thing at the time, unless tossing the card of invitation contemptuously out of the window can be called saying anything ; but at the last moment she declined to go. ' My head is whirling now, from a surfeit of parties,' she said to Miss Stuart. ' Aunt Chatty is going to staj' at home, and so shall I. I don't like your- Mrs Featherbrain — that's the truth — and I'm not fashionable enough yet to sham friendship with women I hate. Besides, Trix dear, you know you were a little — just a little — jealous of me the other night at Roosevelt's. Sir Victor danced with me once oftener than he did with you. Now, you dear old love, I'll let you have a whole baronet to yourself, for this night, and who knows what may happen before morning?' Miss Edith Darrell was one of those younj* persons— happily rare — who, when they take a strong antipathy, are true to it, even at the sacrifice of their own pleasure. In her secret soul, she was jealous of Mrs Featherbrain. If she and Charley carried on their imbecile flirtation, at least it would not be under her disgusted eyes. Miss Stuart departed— not the lilies of the field— nor Solomon in all his glory — not the Queen of Sheba herself, ever half so magnificent. Chavley went with her, a placid martyr to brotherly duty. And Edith went down to the family sittingroom where Aunt Chatty (Aunt Chatty by request) sat dozing in her atter-dinner chair. •We are going to have an *• At home" all to our two selves to-night, auntie,' Edith said, kissing her tlnn cheek ; ' and I am going to sing you to sleep by way of beginning.' She wa3 fond of Aunt Chatty— a meek soul, born to be tyrannised over, and tyrannised over, from her very cradle. One of those large women, who obey their small husbands in fear and trembling, who believe everything they are told, who 'bless the squire and his rotations, and live contented with their stations ;' who are bullied

by their friends, by their children, by their servants, and who die meekly some day and \go <to Heaven. < Edith opened the piano ; and began to play. She was looking very handsome tonight, in green silk and black lace, one half-shattered rose in her hair. She looked handsome — at least, so the young, man who entered unobserved, arid stood looking at her, evidently thought. She had not heard him enter, but presently some mesmeric rapport between them told her he was near. She turned her head and saw him. Aunt Chatty caught sight of him, in ! her semi-sleeping state, at the same moment. 'Dear me, Charley,' his mother said, 'you here? I thought you went to Mrs Featherbrain's ? 'So I did,' replied Charley.* I went— l saw — I returned— and here I am, if you and Dithy will have me for the rest of the evening. ' Edith and I woro very well off without you. Wo had peace, and that' is more than we generally have when you and .she come together. You shall be allowed to stay only on one condition, and that is that you don't quarrel.' '/ quarrel?' Charley said, lifting his eyebrows to the middle of his forehead. • My dear mother, your mental blindness on many points is really deplorable. It's all Edith's fault — all ; one of the few fixed principles of my life, is never to quarrel with anybody. It upsets a man's digestion, and is fatiguing in the extreme. Our first meeting,' continued Mr Stuart, stretching himself -out leisurely on a sofa, ' at which Edith fell in love with me at sight, was a row. Well, if it wasn't a row, it was an unpleasantness of some sort. You can't deny, Miss Darrell, there wa3 a coolness between us. Didn't we pass the night in a snow-drift? Since then, every other meeting has been a succession of rows. In justice to myself, and the angelic sweetness of my own disposition, I must repeat, the beginning, middle, and ending of each, lies with her. She will bully, and I never could stand being bullied — I always knock under. But I warn her — a day of retribution is at hand. In self-defence I mean to marry her, and then, base miscreant, beware ! That trodden worm will turn, and plunge the iron into her own soul. May I ask what you are laughing at Miss Darrell ?' ' A slight confusion of metaphor, Charley —nothing more. What have you dotoe with Trix V ' Trix is all right in the matronly charge of Mrs featherbrain, and engaged ton deep to the baronet. By the bye, the baronet was inquiring tor you, with a degree of warmth and solicitude as unwelcome as it was uncalled for. A baronet tor a brother-in-law is all very well — a baronet for a rival is not well at all. Now, my dear child, try to overcome the general nastiness of your cranky disposition, for once, and make yourself agreeable. I knew you were pining on the stem for me at home, and sol threw over the last crush of the season, made Mrs Featherbrain my enemy for life, and here 1 am. Sing us something.' Miss Darrell turned to the piano with a frown, but her eyes were smiling, and in her secret heart she was well content. Charley was beside her. Charley had given up the ball and Mrs Featherbrain for her. It was of no use denying it, she was fond of Charley. Of late it had dawned dimly and deliciously upon her that Sir Victor Catheron was growing very attentive. If so wildly improbable a thing could occur as Sir Victor « falling in love with her, she was ready at any moment to bo his wife ; but for the love which alone makes marriage sweet and holy, which neither time, nor trouble, nor absence, can change — that love she felt for her cousin Charley, and no other mortal man. It was a very pleasant evening — how pleasant, Edith did not care to own, even to herself. Aunt Chatty dozed sweetty in her arm-chair, she in her place at the piano, and Charley taking 1 comfort on his sofa, and calmly and dispassionately finding fault with her music. "That those two could spend an evening, an hour, together, without disagreeing, was simply an utter impossibility. Edith invariably lost her temper — nothing earthly ever disturbed Charley's. Presently, in anger and diegust, Miss Darreli jumped up from the piano-stool, and protested she would play do more. • To be told I sing Kathleen Mavourneen fiat, and that the way I hold my elbows when I play Thalberg's " Home " is frightful to behold, I will not stand ! Like all critics, you find it easier to point out one's faults than to do bettei\ It's the very last time, sir, I'll ever play a note for you !' But, somehow, after the skirmish at euchre, at which 3he was ignobly beaten, and, I must say, shamefully cheated, she was back again at the piano, and it was the clock striking twelve that made her start at last. • Twelve ! Goodness me. I didn't think it was half-past ten !' Mr Stuart smiled, and stroked his muostache with calm complacency. ' Aunt Chatty, wake up ! It's midnight— time all good little women were in bed.' ' You need not hurry yourself on that account, Dithy,' Charley suggests, 'if the rule only applies to good little" women.' Miss Darrell replies with a glance of scorn, and wakes up Mrs Stuart. • You were sleeping so nicely I thought it a pity to wake you sooner. Come, auntie dear, we'll go upstairs together. You know we have a hard day's work before us to-morrow. Good-night, Mr Stuart.' •Good-night, my love,' Mr Stuart responded, making no attempt to stir. Edith linked her strong, young arm in that of her sleepy aunt and led her upstairs. He lay and watched the slim green figure, the beautiful bright face, as it disappeared in a mellow flood of gaslight. The clear, sweet voice came floating saucily back : ' And Charley he's my darling, My darling— my darlinc. And Charley's he's my darling, The young Chevalier 1' All that was eauciesb' and most coquettish in the girl's nature came out with Charley. With Sir Victor, as Trixy explained it, she was "goody" and talked sense. Mr Stuart went back to the ball, and, I regret to say, made himself obnoxious to old Featherbrain, by the marked empressement of his devotion to old Featherbrain's wife. Edith listened to the narration next day from the lips of Trix with surprise and disgust. Miss Stuart on her own account was full of triumph and happiness. Sir Victor has been most devoted, * most cZevoted' said Trix in italics, ♦ that is, for him. He danced with me very often, and he spoke several times of you Dithy, dear. He couldn't understand why you absented yourself from the last party of the season — no more can I for that matter.* A person may hate a person like poison— l often domyself—and yet go to that person's parties. But this was a society maxim Miss Darrell could by no means be brought to understand. Where she liked she liked, and where she hated she hated — there was nohalf measures for her. The last day came. At noon, with a> brilliant May sun shining, the ship fired her farewell and steamed away for Merrie England. * Edith leaned over the, bulwark

and watched the receding shore, with her heart in her eyes. *"Good-by to home,' shesaid ; 'a smile on her lip, a tear in her eye. ' ' Vyho knows when and how I may see it again. Who knows whether I shall ever see it ?' The luncheon bell rang ; everybody — a wonderful crowd too — flocked downstairs to the saloon, where two long tables, bright with crystal and flowers, were spread. What a delightful thing was an ocean voyage, and soa-sickness — bah ! — merely an illusion of the senses. Alter lunch, Charley selected the sunniest spot on deck for his resting-place, and the prettiest girl on board for his companion, spread out his railway rug at her feet, spread out himself thereon, and prepared to be happy and be made love to. Trix, on the arm of the baronet, paraded the deck. Mrs Stuart and Lady Holona buried themselves in the seclusion of the ladies' cabin, in the expectation of the wrath to come. Edith got a camp stool and a book and hid herself behind the wheel-house for a little of private enjoyment. But she did not read ; ie was delight enough to sit and watch the old ocean smiling, and smiling like any other coquette, as though it could never be cruel. The afternoon wore on ; the sun dropped j low, the wind arose — so did the sea. And presently — staggering blindly on Sir Victor's arm, pale as death, with speechless a K oli y imprinted en every feature, Trixy made her appearance behind the wheelhouse. * 0 Edith, I feel awfully— awfully ! I feel like death— l feel—' She wrenched her arm from the baronet's, rushed wildly to the side, and — Edith's dark, laughing eyes looked up into the blue ones, that no effort of Sir Victor's could quite control. The next moment she was by Trixy's side leading that limp and pallid heroine to the regions below, whence for five mortal days she emerged not, nor did the eye of man rest on Miss Beatrix Stuart. The weather was fine, but the wind and sea ran tolerably high, and of course everybody mostly was tolerably sick. One day's ordeal sufficed for Edith's tribute to old Neptune ; after that she never felt a qualm. A great deal of her time was spent in waiting upon Aunt Chatty and Trix, both of whom were very far gone indeed. In the case of Miss Sbuart the tortures of jealousy were added to the tortures of sea-sickness. Did Sir Victor walk with the young ladies on deck? Did he walk with her, Edith? Did he ever inquire for herself ? Oh, it was shameful — shameful that she should be kept prostrate here, unable to lift her head ! At this juncture, generally, in her excitement, Trixy did lift it, and the consequence was — woe. It was full moon before they reached mid-ocean. How Edith enjoyed it, no word? can tell. Perhaps it was out of merciful compassion to Trix, but she did not tell her ot the long, brisk twilight, midday, and moonlight walks she and the baronet took on deck. How, leaning over the bulwarks, they watched the sun set, round and red, into the sea, and the silver sickle May moon rise, like another Aphrodite, out of the waves. She did not tell her, how they sat side by side at dinner, how he lay at her feet, and read aloud for her, in sheltered sunny nooks, how uncommonly friendly and confidential they became altogether, in these first halfdozen days out. People grow intimate} in two days at sea, as they would not in two yeais on land. Was it all gentlemanly courtesy and politeness on the baronet's side?' the girl sometimes wondered. She could analyze her own feelings pretty well. Of that fitful, feverish passion called love, described by the country swain as feeling 'hot and dry like— with a pain in the side like,' she felt no particle. There was one, Mr Charles Stuart, lying aboufi in place?, looking serene and sunburnt, who saw ib all with sleepy, half-closed e>es, and kept his conclusions to himself. ' Kumvt !' he thought ; • the will of Allah be done. What is written is written. Sea-sickness is bad enough, without the green-eyed monster Even Othello, if he had been crossing in a Cunard ship, would have pub off the pillow performance until they reached the other side.' (To be Continued)