A Wonderful Woman.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 434, 4 January 1890, Page 4

A Wonderful Woman.

By MAY-AGNES FLEMING

Author of “’Guy Earlescourt’s Wife, “A Terrible Secret,” “ Lost for a Woman, “A Mad Marriage,” etc

CHAPTER XVII. — (Continued). Sir- Peter Dangerfield sat alone in the library of Scarswood ; the silken curtains were drawn ; firelight and lamplight made the room brilliant; his purple easy chair was drawn up before a writing-table littered with deeds and documents, and Sir Peter, in gold-bowed spectacles, was trying to read. Trying—not reading. Forever between him and the parchment page, a lace menacing and terrible kept coming, the face of Katherine, as he had seen her last. Where was Katherine ? Dead or alive, she had sworn to be revenged. Was sne dead ? He shuddered through all his little craven soul and heart at the thought. Men had looked at him darkly and askance all day, and turned coldly away from him while he spoke. There had been whispers of suicide. What if while he sat here in this warm, lighted, luxurious room, she lay stark and frozen under the stars—dead by her own hand? There was a tall, smoke-coloured bottle on another table, with glasses. .He was usually a very anchorite ot abstemiousness, but he sprang up now, with muttered oath, filled himself a stiff glass of brandy, and drained it at a draught. * I wish to Heaven I had given her that infernal three thousand, and be hanged to it!’ he. muttered, flinging himself back sulkily -in his chair. * Curse the luck ! What’s the use of a title and a fortune if a fellow’s life is to be badgered out of him in this way ? There’s that greedy little devil, Mrs Vavasor, not a penny would she throw off. And now there’s Katherine. I wish I hadn’t said what I did to her. If they ever —I mean when they find her-I’ll give her that three thousand, if she takes it, and have done with the whole confounded thing. But she’s so confoundedly proud that likely as not she’ll turn cantankerous and refuse. There’s no pleasing a woman any way ; refuse it and you insult her, offer it and you insult her more. Gh, come in, whoever you are, and be hanged to you !' This pleasant concluding adjuration was in response to a rap at the door. A tall, serious footman in purple plush breeches and white stockings appeared. * Dr. ! Graves, Sir Peter,’ spake this majestic menial, and vanished. Sir Peter arose as Dr. Graves, hat in hand, very pale and solemn of visage, stood before him. News of Katherine at laßt. He grasped the back of his chair with one hand and faced his visitor almost defiantly, as one who should say, ‘ whatever has happened / at least have had nothing to do with it.’ * Well, sir ?’ he demanded. * Sir Peter Dangerfield, I bring news of —of Katherine. She is found.’ The little baronet’s heart gave a great leap. Found ! then she had not committed suicide. * Ah!’ he said with a look of sulky injury. ‘I knew as much. I thought she wasn't the sort of girl to take arsenic or throw herself into the nearest mill-stream. So she’s found, is she ? And'where has she been, pray, since she ran away from Scarswood ?’

He resumed his chair, folded his arms, and looked up at his visitor. But still Dr. Graves kept that face of supernatural solemnity. ‘ When she ran away from Scarswood, Sir Peter, she went to her old nurse at Bracken Hollow. About three hours ago, while I was at Otis’ cottage, seeing that unlucky chap Dantree, she came.’ • She did ! To see Dantree, too, I suppose. Extremely forgiving of her, I must 'say, but not in the least like Katherine Dangerfield. Perhaps she is going to turn romantic sick-nurso to her wounded cavalier, and end by getting him to marry—’ ‘Stop, Sir Peter Dangerfield ! said the old doctor, hoarsely, * nob another word. Katherine Dangerfield will never marry Gaston Dantree or any other mortal man. She is dead !’. ‘ Dead !’ Sir Peter leaped from his chair as though he had been speared. ‘ Dead, Graves ! Good God ! I thought you said— I thought— ’ His white lips refused to finish the sentence ; he stood staring with horror-struck eyes at the elder man. ‘ Yes, Sir Peter—dead ! Of heart-disease, no doubt, latent and unsuspected. This is how it happened : She cam'e to see Dantree before leaving Castleford—those were her words. She looked shockingly ill and haggard, and her mind seemed to wander a little. She fell into a sorb of stupor as she sat before the fire and complained of her head. We aroused her after a little time, and she went into the sick loom. She shut the door, and we heard her kneel clown. Then there was a long silence, so long, so profound, that we grew alarmed. Mrs Otis knocked again and again at the door, and received no answer. Then we opened it and went in. She had fallen on her face and was stone dead !’ * Great Heaven !’

* She must have been dead some minutes —ten or more, for she was already growing cold. I left her there when I found life utterly extinct, and nothing more possible to be done, and came here. It is shocking, Sir Peter—it is horrible ! And only yesterday, as it were, this house was all alight for the wedding.’ And 4;hen the old doctor’s voico broke, and he turned his back abruptly on Sir Peter and faced the fire. Dead silence fell. The clock ticked, the cinders dropped, Dr. Graves looked fixedly into the ruddy coals, and Sir Peter sat still and'upright in his chair, quite ghastly to look at. ‘ Dead or alive, I will be revenged!’ The horrible words rang in his ear like his own death-knell. They meant , nothing perhaps ; they were but the passionate, impotent rage of an outraged woman, who' cowardly nature to the full, but', they did their_ work, Katherine was dead f and Katherine was vindictive enough to carry .her hatred and revenge into that world/of shadows whither she had gone, and come back from the grave to pursue hith., Greater and wiser than poor little Sir Peter Danger.field : have devoutly believed in ghosts Ae'was superstitious to the core. And : Katherihe ; was dead—dead —dead ! Great/ "heavy drops stood on his pinched, pallid face, and his voice was husky as he 7 , .77 ,7 * Dr. Graves, there must bo. some mistake AdRS I — Wffi'niusii 7 She couldn’t die in that W av—it’ f: is . tqo horrible —and she was so yOTfrig—Sod W strong- s^- never sick a day in her life; by,George ! ; Ob, it is impossible, yoninow - —entirely impossible. Ib.s a fit or a fainb/if you like —’ not death. Let us fo back and see what can be done for her If gawithybu. Let us be off at once. I tell|you she can’i be 'dead. l 7don t want, her to 4ie? TWi prolonged fainting fit, doctor —take l ’iny word lor it — : nothing mbtei" S’fcnJng-yhealthy girls I*® Katherine dbn’tf &rdt> off in a’minute like that. . , . sarai*: - " T. -■•••' -Vi'

quietly, ‘ I am sixty-five years of age, and lor the past forty years I have seen death in all its phases—lingering and instantaneous. And I tell you she is dead. But we will go to her as you say—you can convince yourself with your own eyes.’ But still Sir Peter would not be convinced ; would not—could not ‘ make her dead.’ He hurried from the room, changed his dress, ordered round his horse, and in fifteen minutes the two men were galloping full speed through the keen frosty night into Gastleford.

The town lay hushed and dark —it was close upon eleven now. Neither spoke a word ; the breathless pace did not admit of talk. They reached the Otis cottage, its whole front lit, and figures flittered to and f ro. And Peter Dangerfield’s heart under his riding-coat was throbbing so rapidly, he turned sick and reeled dizzily for an instant, as ho sprang from the saddle. The next he rallied and followed his leader in. On a sofa, in the little sitting room, where they had first placed her, Katherine still lay. They had removed her hat and cloak, and loosened all her clothes, bub over that rigid face the solemn seal of eternal sleep had fallen. They had closed her eyes and folded the pulseless hands, and calmly as though sleeping, and fairer than over in life, slm lay. The haggard look had all gone and a great calm lay upon it. So Peter Dangerfield saw her again. There were three persons in the room. Besides Mr Oti3 and his mother, the old exIndian nurse from Bracken Hollow, sad, gaunt, and grey, sab close by her nursling, swaying ceaselessly to and fro, and uttering a sort of moaning cry, like a dumb creature in pain. She lifted her inflamed eyes and fixed them with savage hatred upon the pallid face of the baronet. ‘Ay,’ she said bitterly, ‘you’re a nne gentleman now, little Peter Dangerfield, and you do well to come and look at your handiwork; for you’re her murderer, you and that dying false-faced villain lying yonder, as sure a? ever men were murderers. The law won’t hang you, I suppose, but it has hung men who deserved it less, I wonder you aren’t afraid as you look at her - afraid she will rise up from her death-bed and accuse you.’ He turned his tortured face toward her, quite horrible to see in its fear and ghastliness. • For Heaven’s sake, hush !’ he said. ‘ I never meant this ! I never thought she would die ! I would give all lam worth to bring her back to life. I couldn’t help it—i wouldn’t have had it happen for worlds. Don’t drive me mad with your talk !’ 1 Liar !’ old Hannah cried, towering up and confronting him; ‘ double liar and coward ! Who refused her dying father's bequest?—who offered her the deadliest and most dastardly insult it is possible to offer woman ? and you say you are sorry, and ask me nob to drive you mad ! I tell you, if the whole town rose up and stoned you, it would not be half your deserts. I say again, I wonder that, dead as she lies there before you, she does noc rise to accuse her murderer. Mr Henry Otis, this is your house, and she thought you her friend. Show yourself her friend now, and turn her murderer out !’ ‘ Hannah, Hannah, hush !’ interrupted Mrs Otis,scandalised and alarmed. ‘ Whatever Sir Peter might be, it was nob in this good woman’s nature to do other than reverence the Lord of Scarswood, the man of eight thousand a year.’ Bub her son stepped forward—pale, cold, stern. • Hannah’s right, mother,’ he said, ‘and he shall go. Sir Peter Dangerfield, this house is no place for you. You have come here and convinced yourself she is dead —driven to all by you and that man yonder. He is beyond the pale of justice you are not; and, by Heaven ! you shall go !’ He threw wide the house door, his dark eyes flashing, and pointed out into the darkness. ‘ Go, Sir Peter, and never set foot across threshold of mine again. She turned to me in her trouble, she came to me in her dark hour, and she is mine now —mine. Go!—you coward, you robber and insulter of helpless girlhood, and come here no more !’ The fiery words scourged him, averted faces met him on every side. And, calm and white, Katherine lay before him, with closed eyes and folded hands ; most awful of all! Without a word he slunk away like a whipped hound, tho door closed upon him, and he stood alone under the black winter night. Alone ! Would he ever be alone again ? Sleeping and waking would nob that terrible, white, fixed face pursue him? • Dead, I will come back from the grave if the dead can !’ Would the words she had spoken, the dreadful words he had laughed at once, ever cease to ring in his ears now? Would they not hunt him until they drove him mad ? Sir Peter Dangerfield rode home. Home ! What was Scarswood better than a haunted house now ? He shut himself up in his library, lighted the room to more than the brilliance of day, locked the door, seized tho brandy bottle and deliberately drank himself into a state of beastly stupor. When morning dawned, Sir Peter, lying on the hearthrug, was far beyond all fear of ghosts or goblins in heavy, bestial sleep. • And Katherine Dangerfield was dead. The papers recorded it, the town rang with it—the whole neighbourhood was utterly shocked. That little cottage on the outskirts of Gastleford awoke and found itself famous. Crowds flocked hither all day on foot and in carriages, poor and rich, to look at that placid, dead face. And so the tragedy of Scarswood had ended thus. Sir John Dangerfield lay in his tomb, Gaston Dantree, the brilliant adventurer, lay in his darkened,room hovering between life and death, and Katherine, so bright, so dashing, so full of life and hope and love and happiness only a few brief weeks ago, lay here —like this. ‘ln the midst of life we are in death.’ Everybody shook their heads and quoted that ; the funeral sermon -was preached from it. All who had ever known her bowed down now in reverence before the solemn wonder of the winding sheet. People came forward—two or three of tho county families, the Talbots at their head, and offered to take the bedy atd have tho obsequies of appropriate grandeur. But Henry Otis set those resolute lips of his, and doggedly refused. ,; ‘ Id was to me she came in her trouble, he answered, ‘ not to you. No main alive has a better right, or a stronger claim now than'l. And Til never give her up. She refused all your aid alive, she shall not seek it dead. >.From my house she goes to yonder churchyard—l will give her up to none of you.; 5 -. • \ s; & ;s : Edith Talbot never left the house. She sat byj her . dead friend, weepiDg incessantly, | tFeeling against the new baronet ran very high: and bitter. No one but old Hannah knew of the terriblo insult of that other nighr, but everybody suspected foul iplay. Ho made no appearance among them, but shut himself up in his gloomy mansion, and drowned thought in drink.

The funeral, took place two' days after, and they laid her in a remote corner of that little obscure churchyard, among the lowly of Casbleford. A fir-tree reared its gloomy branches above the grave—a grey cross marked the spot. They laid " her therein the twilight of a. wintry' afternoon, with;

bowed heads and sad, solemn faces, and the story of Katherine Dangerfield was toldandj done. One by one they dropped away to their homes, Edith Talbot among the last, still crying behind her veil, and led away by her brother. And then Henry Obis stood alone over the grave of the woman he loved and had lost. He stood with folded arms while the short, dark gloaming ran on, his hat lying beside him, the keen wind lifting his hair unheeded. He had loved her as he never would love any other woman, and this was the end.

Katiiejiine, vEtat. 17. Resurgam. That was all; no second name. Who knew what that name might be, or if she really had a claim to any name whatever ? And so, while he stood there, the twilight fell, and it was his mother’s voice, calling plaintively, that aroused him at last. ‘Henry! Henry! come home, dear ! You will get your death standing there bareheaded in the cold !’ An hour later, when the slender crescent moon lifted her sickle over the blue seaine, another pilgrim came to that newmade grave, fearfully, and by stealth. Peter Dangerfield had nob dared come to the funeral, but he came now to the grave. He was horribly afraid still, but all the same, he could not stay away. It was like a hideus dream to him. Katherine dead ! that bright, dashing young Amazon, whose eyes had flashed so bright! Katherine dead ! And they call him her murderer!

He made his way along the little pathway, worn by humble feet, to the spot where they had laid her. The faint new moon flickered on the granite cross. He knelt on one knee, and read the inscription : Katherine, JEtat. 17. Resijrgam What a brief record it was. And Resurgam —what did that word mean,-he wondered, stupidly. Then it dawned upon him ‘ Resurgam ’ meant shall rise again.’ ‘ I SHALL RISE AGAIN !’ From her very grave the dead girl spoke and threatened him. How long he lingered there he never knew. He felt half stupefied, partly with the liquor he had been drinking,partly with abjocb fear, partly with cold. He was all cramped and stiff when at last he arose to go. His horse stood outside the little gate. He mounted him, let the reins fall upon his neck, while his head sank upon his breast. How the animal made his way home —how he got into the house, into his own room, into bed, he could never have told. All that shone out vividly from that night in his after life was the dream that followed. He was. wandering through a dark and unknown country—bleak and forsaken. He could see the stars in the sky, the new moon, a eolitary fir-tree, and gravestones everywhere. It was one perpetual graveyard, and a spectral figure, with long, floating brown hair, and waving white arms, beckoned him on and on. He could not see the face, but he knew it was Katherine He was tired, and sick, and cold, and footsore. Their dismal road ended at last in a ghastly precipice, where, looking down sheer thousands of feet below, he saw a seething hell of waters. Then his shadowy guide turned, and he saw Katherine Dangerfield’s dead face. The stiff lips parted, and the sweet, strong voice spoke as of old :

‘ Living, I will pursue you to the very ends of the earth. Dead, I will come back from the grave, if the dead can ! ’ The words she had spoken in her passionate outburst she spoke again.. Then her arms encircled him, then he was lifted up, then with a shriek of terror he was hurled over that dizzy cliff—and awoke sitting up in bed, trembling in every limb. Only a dream ! And was this night bub the beginning of the end ?

PART 11. CHAPTER I. LA KEINE BLANCHE. The place was Her Majesty’s Theatre—the opera the ‘Figlia del Regimento,’—the hour after the first act—the time, the last week of the London season—and the scene was beautiful beyond all description. 1 All the world’ was there, and the prima donna was that sweetesb.of singers, that loveliest of women, that most charming of actresses, Mademoiselle Nillsson. Her Majesty’s was full—one dazzling blaze of light from dome to parquet, tier upon tier of magnificently-dressed women, a blaze of diamonds, a glow of rainbow bouquets, a flutter of fans, a sparkle of bright eyes, a vision of fair faces, and lights and warmth, Donizetti’s matchless music sweeping and surging over all. The house had just settled back into.its seats, for a few moments the whole audience had risen, f-11 nicttsse, at the entrance of royalty. In the royal box now sat the Prince and Princess of YVales, Prince Arthur, and the Princess Louise. The bell had tinkled for the rising of the curtain upon the second act of the opera when a fashionably late party of: three entered one of the proscenium boxes, and a thousand eyes and as many ‘ double barrels ’ turned instantly in that direction. You saw at once that these late arrivals were people of note, and looking towards themyou would merely glance at two of the party; and then your eyes would have fixed, as countless eyes there did, upon the third face—a wondrously fair face. The party were the Earl of Ruysland, his only daughter the Lady Cecil Clive, and his niece Girievra, : Lady Dangerficld. And the Earl of Ruysland’s only daughter had been ; the, most brilliant belle of this London season, as she had been of the two preceding, and not in all that dazzling house, not in the royal box itself, looked forth a fairer, sweeter face than that which looked with perfect selfpossession over the audience now. V.s; She had advanced to the front, at once with high-bred composure, drawn back the , curtain with one slim, .gloved hand, and leaned, ever.so slightly forward, with a half smile upon her face. In that musical interlude before the rising of the curtain for the second time, countless bows and smiles greeted her, whichever .j way she turned. All the lorgnette sin the house seemed for an instant aimed at that one .fair, face and queenly head, upheld with stag-like grace.; but to my Lady Cecil that was a very old story, and, with all her woman’s love of adoration, something of a. weary .one. j,She lay back in her chair, after that first ; sweep of the house, threvy back her opera .cloak, all silk swan’s-down, and sno.w pashmere, as. seemingly indifferent to ..-all those .eyes .as though she sat in the theatre alone.. A belle of Belgravia—yes, Lady Cecil was that. It was a marvellously; brilliant •face on which the lamplight shone, .with its complexion of pearl, its soft, large, lustrous, brown, gazelle eyes,-its trailing hazel hair, bound back with -pearls ;,«nd • roses, the ■haughty carriage- of-.the dainty-head, the pure Greek type of feature, the swaying grace of the tall slight .form., A rarely perfect face, and as sweet as perfect, with its dreamy tender eye 3, „. its gtavely gentle smile. ,/You ’would .hardly; haye- dreamed, looking at its delusive’iunocence/howmuch mischief.my Lady Cecil had done in her day, how much,’the gods willing, she yet meant to dP* serene eyes, had ~ j : , . ' ■ : i • . . ; --A ■ . ;

‘ slain their thousands and tens of thousands,’ that delusively gentle smile-had driven men blind and mad with, the insanity called love. A pearl-faced, hazel-eyed Circe who led her victims down a flowerstrewn path with words and smiles of honey, only to leave them stranded high and dry on the desolate quicksand of disappointment where tne bones of her victims bleached. A flirt by nature —a coquette ripe for mischief, a beauty without mercy and without Heart—that was her character, as half the men in London would, have told you. And yet—and yet—how lovely she looked to-night! how radiant! how spotless! Dressed for some after ball, the loose-falling opera cloak showed you a l’obe of rose silk, decollete , of course; soft touches of rich point-lace, a cluster of rich moss roses in the corsage, and lace draperies falling open from the large pearly arm! Looking at her as she sat there, you were half inclined, knowing all the enormities, to forgive the deeds of darkness wrought by so peerless a siren. Fair and fatal; and when in repose, oven with a touch of sadness, there was some thing in it that made you paraphrase the words of the southern sculptor, speaking of Charles Stuart, ‘ Something evil will befall her, she carries misfortune on her face.’ Her companion was a very excellent foil to the fair, pale, pensive beauty of the earl’s daughter. Lady Dangerfield was a brunette of the most pvonounced type, 'petite, four-and<thirty years old, and by lamplight, in diamonds and amber silk, still young, and still pretty. Her black hair built up in braids, and puffs, and curls, by tho most unapproachable of Parisian hair-dressers, was a marvel of art in itself. There was a flush on either sallow cheek—art, or nature? who shall say’—and if the purple tinting under the eyelids made those black orbs any longer, bigger, brighter, than when they came first from the hand of a beneficent Providence, whose business was it but the lady’s own ? For the Earl of Ruysland—tall, thin, refined, patrician, and fastidious—he was fifty odd, with a venerable bald head, shining like a billiard ball, and two tired, grey eyes. He had been a handsome man in his day, a spendthrift, a gambler, a dandy, a member of the famous Beefsteak Club, iii his youth. He had run through two fortunes, and now stood confessed the poorest peer in Britain. Two young men in the stalls had been among the first to take aim at the newcomers, at I.ady Cecil, rather, and the longest to stare. ‘La Reine Blanche is looking her best to-night. Few reigning beauties stand the wear and tear of three seasons as the White Queen does.’ : ‘La Reine Blanche !’ his companion repeated. ‘I always meant to ask you, Delamer, why they called her. that. A pretty idea, too. Why?’ ‘ From some real or fancied resemblance to that other La Reine Blanche, Marie Stuart—dazzling and doomed.’ Starer No. Two pub up his lorgnette and took another survey. ‘ Not fancied, Delamer—there is a resemblance -quite striking. The same oval face, the same Greek type, tho same expression, half-tender, half-melancholy, half-' disdainful. If Mary the Queen had a tithe of that beauty, I can understand now how even the hardheaded Scottish commoners were, roused to enthusiasm as she rode through their midst, and cried out as one man, “God bless that sweet falce !”’ ‘ That will do, Wyatt. Don’t you get roused to enthusiasm ; and don’t look too long at Ruysland’s peerless daughter; she is like those —what’s their names—sirens, you know, who lured poor devils to death and doom. She’s a thorough-paced flirt; her coquetries have been a 3 numberless as the stars, and not half so eternal. She’s the highest-priced Circassian in Mayfair, and you might as well love some bright particular star, etc. ; and besides, it. is an courant at the clubs that she was bidden in and bought ages ago by some tremendously wealthy Cornish baronet, wandering at present in foreign parts. He’s a sensible fellow, givesQueeriie—they call her Queeiie —no end of margin for flirting, until it suits his sultanship to return, pay the price, and claim his [property. Look at Nillsson instead. Sho’a married, and a marchioness ; but it’s not half so dangerous, believe me, as gazing at La Reine Blanche.’ ‘l’m not looking at your La Reine Blanche,’ Wyatt answered ; ‘ I’m looking at that man yonder— you .see him ? vgrv tall, very tanned, very military. If iCedmond O’Donnell be in the land of the living, that is he.’ Delamer whirled around, as nearly excited as the principles of his life would allow a dandy of the Foreign Office bo be.

‘What! Redmond O’Donnell? the man we met two years ago in Algiers —Le Beau Chasseur, as they used to call him, and the best of good fellows. By George ! you’re right, Wyatt, it is O’Donnell ! Let us join him at.once.’ A few minutes later, and the two embryo diplomats from the F. 0. had made their way to the side of a tall, soldierly, sunburned man who sat quite alone three biers behind. ‘ What? You, O'Donnell! I give you my word I’d as soon have expected to . see Pio Nono sitting out the opera as Le Beau Chasseur. Glad to see you in England, dear old boy; all the same. When did you come ?’

The man addressed looked up—his dark, grave face lighting into sudden/ brightness and warmth ' as he smiled. It w'as a handsome face, a thoroughly Celtic face, despite the golden tan of an African sun, with blue eyes, to which long, black lashes lent softness and depth', profuse dark’ brown hair, and most desirable curling moustache. It was a gallant figure, straight, tall, and strong as a Norway -pine*: and with the true trooper swing. • , . ,; v< : ‘ Delamer—Wyatt—thisYVindeed a surprise !’ He shook hands cordially with the two men, with a smile and glance pleasant to see. * When did I come ? Only reached London at noon to-day, after a smooth run from New Orleans of twenty five days.’ 7 ‘ Nevv Orleans ! And what the deuce took Captain O’Donnell, of the; Third Chasseurs-d’Afrique, to. New Orleans ?’ ril'm ‘A family matter —I’ll tell you later. - ..As we only remain a day or two in London/I, thought I would drop in to her Majesty k and hear Nillsson for the first time.’ ‘ We! O’Donnell, don’t tell me that there’s a lady themadness of matrimony ’ has seized , 'you have taken to yourself a ivife 'of the! daughters of the land. Y'ou Irishmen "are all alike, fighting; and.love-making—love; making and fighting. Ah.!’ Mr Delamer shook his head and sighed, faintly ;‘ ‘ she isn’t an Arab, I hope—is slid?’ •snJnstn. . O’ Donnell laughed. ■ .no'iqmori 1 ‘ There’s a lady in the-case, but Dpt .-ft, wife. >Don’fc you .know ..L ; have a sister, Delamer ? * Have no fears for, me—my : weaknesses ’* are ’ fnahy 1 and great—fbr fighting, if you like, bub nob for-;>love-> making. A brilliant scene' thisrand faces fair enough to tempt even so austere an anchorite as Gordon Delamer.! r*'/ ‘ Fair faces surely,! Wyatt said.. What do you, fresh from the desert’; think of La Heine Blanche —that-brown-haired goddess; whose earthly name is Cecil CUverf 2?.' [ t ; I ' Whol\ 5 <vr f t 'rwi&i /■ Jioriyi S>*\ : Suddenly, and .sharply /the captain of, Chasseurs' asked thequestiori.’ ; J j: " 1 ' \ j ‘ Lady ! CeoiL'Clive^‘ -Wha'ti O’Dohiiell! has the spell of the enchantress . stretched

all the way to Africa, and netted you; too, in her rose chains ? Is it possible you know. La Heine. Blanche , V, .

' No,’ the chasseur answered) with a touch of impatience. ‘ I don’t know your La Heine Blanche. I know-that is, I once knew, very long ago, Lady Cecil Clive.’ ‘My good fellow,’ Wyatt murmured plaintively, ‘don’t call her : mine—she isn’t. The cakes and cream of life are not for me. And it’s all the same—Lady Cecil, the White Queon, Delilah, Circe, any name by which fair and fatal sirens have been known. There she sits, “Queen rose of the rose-bud garden of girls.” . The laureate must have had her in his eye when he wrote “ Maud.’” The African officer raised his glass and looked long and earnestly at that brilliant vision, rose-crowned and diamond-decked. Then his glass dropped, and he turned away. Delamer looked at him curiously. ‘ The trail of the serpent is over all still ! And you know my Lady Cecil. How was it—where was it ?’

‘ It was in Ireland—many years ago.’ *ln Ireland, and many years ago. One would think the lovely Queenie were a centenarian. flow many years ago? Don’t be so sphinx-like. Before you went to Algiers ?’ ‘Before I went to Algiers—over six years ago.’.. . ' v ‘I hope she had nothing to do with your going—it is a way of hers, sending doomed men to exile ! Anywhere, anywlieie out of the world her slaughtered victims rush. She must have been young six years ago, but , then some of these .sorceresses are fatal from the hour they cut their first teeth. Say, moil brave, are you too in her list of. killed and wounded ?’ .‘ Is she so fatal then ?’ O’Donnell asked, shirking the question. ‘ Fatal! fatal’s no word for it! Ask Wyatt, ask Lord Longlands, ask Godfrey Vance—ask —ask any man in Lcndon. The most merciless flirt that ever demoralised mankind.’ ‘ And still at two-and-twenty—Lady Cecil Clive is Lady Cecil Clive.’ ‘ How pat he has her age ! Yes, at two-’ and-twenty the conqueress still walks “in maiden meditation, fancy free.” But the talk of club and drawing-room is, that early next season we are to have a brilliant wedding. Sir Arthur Tregenna, towhomshe has been pledged since childhood, comes to claim her. One might say woo and win, only there was.no wooing in the,case. It’s a family aflair he'has the purse of. For; tunatus, she the beauty of the Princess Perfect’; what need of wooing in such a case ? And yet,’ with a second curious look, ‘ do you know what she told me one night not very long ago ?’ * Not being a wizard—no.’ ‘ We were at Covent Garden ; there was an Irish play—a new thing, and I was behind her chair. We spoke casually of Ireland, and she told me she had been there and —“ mark it, Horatio’’—that the happiest days of her life were those days in Ireland. Oh Ino need to look like that ! I don’t insinuate by any means that yon had anything to do with it. Apropos of nothing, where’s that prince of followers, that paragon of benchmen, that matchless servitor of the last of the O’Donnells, your man Lanty ?’ * Ah, yes, Lanty,’ Wyatt said ; ‘ haven’t laughed once, I assure you, since I last saw' Lanty. Don’t say you have left him behind you in Africa !’ 5 , ; 1 ' 4 Lanty is with me,’ O’Donnell laughed ; ‘ he’s like Sinbad’s Old Man of the Sea. I couldn’t shake him off if I would. I’ll tell him you asked.’ ‘And you only remain a day or two in London ?’ said Delamer. ‘ Where do you go—to Ireland ?’ 4 Nob at present. Wo gOj my sister and I, to Sussex for a week or tw r o ; after that to France, then back to Algiers.’ * Then dine to-morrow with me at Brooks’s. There’s a morning party at Kew, the last of the season, and La Heine Blanche graces it, of course. No doubt she will be glad to see an old friend; you will come?’ ‘No.’ He said it briefly and coldly. 4 Certainly not; my acquaintance with Lord lluysland’s daughter was one of the slightest. ! I should never dream of resuming it. Call upon me to-morrow at my quarters. Here is my card. It is pleasant to see a familiar face in this, to me, desert of London.’ ' ( To be Continued.)