THE STORYTELLER.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 164, 20 October 1910, Page 6

THE STORYTELLER.

A SCHEMER BAFFLED. Handsome, blue-eyed Corinthia Bethell reached her own door after an evening stroll, and was admitted by a young woman who had been in her service for some years, and to whom she had become much attached. -Why, tiarrent, are you ill?" she exclaimed, in surprise. "Why are you crying?" "■I can't help it, ma'am," the girl replied, with unsatisfactory ingenuousness. "Well, you had better retire for the night." was Mrs. Bethell's advice, "and I will send you something up to make you comfortable and give you sleep." "Thank you. ma'am," replied the girl, who seemed to be hysterical rather than ill. She was a good-looking young woman and in some" things she resembled her mistress. They were alike in stature and form; the eyes of both wi-re the same azure blue,' and the hair of similar shade.

But there the resemblance ended. Corinthia Bethell was a gentlewoman by birth and breeding—cultured, elegant and dainty. The servant belonged to the lower class —unpolished, uninformed und undisciplined. "There is a—a —party waiting for you, ma'am," she continued, as Mrs. Bethell turned towards the broad, curving stairs. ••[ couldn't get rid of him, so I took him to the small reception-room." "Didn't he state his business his name?" Mrs. Bethell asked, in surprise. "He wouldn't say anything, ma'am, except you'd be sorry, to miss him," the girl answered. With an annoyed look Mrs. Bethell walked into the room the girl had mentioned. In a lanre easy chair lounged a strange individual, who gazed at her with an insolent expression, without attempting to get upon his feet, or even to change his attitude. "So I have trailed my cunning vixen to- her lair, and a fine place it is, to be sure." he began, with a familiar air. With a look of disgust Mrs. Bethell turned to the bell. "jSo you'd get some underling to put me in the street, eh?" he interposed, with a malicious chuckle. "You'd better not try it, my dear, unless you want me to expose you to all the grand folks who're your cronies nowadays." She regarded the man attentively for a moment. "It is evident that you have committed some strange and unpardonable error." she remarked at length, "and if I am -willing to let you explain your errand, you will be brief." "If you're willing, eh?" he sneered. "Maybe you've forgotten the smart shopwalker, Benjamin Bannister? Maybe you don't remember that you pretended to love him, that you promised to marry him, and that you let him kiss you more than once behind the counter?" Mrs. Bethell's proud face flushed and then paled. Her eyes -flashed with disgust and aversion.

"Oh, I've only just begun," her persecutor continued, before she could utter a syllable. "Mfybc you don't'recollect the bag of money and jewellery which you pinched and I did time for, and on your evidence." He was interrupted by her shocked ejaculations. But it checked'him for only a second. ' "I lost you for a while," he resumed; "but I was tracking you day and night; I wanted my reyenge. I found you at last in Liverpool, where you had studied music. Afterwards you sang on the stage until you captivated old Jimmy Bethell, who considerately died in less than a year and left you the sole possessor of a million or'two. Since your widowhood .you have become a leader of fashionable and foremost among the rich women who amuse themselves with falling out of aeroplanes and the like. Y'ou see, I know all about you, Nell. Rather! For the past three years I have hardly let you out of my sight." He eyed her with some stubborn purpose in the expression of his dark, insignificant visage. "And now to business," he said. "I'm hard up, and unless you agree to my terms, your interesting history will appear in every newspaper in the kingdom." s

"A blackmailer!" retorted Mrs. Bethell, contemptuously. "I will have no dealings with you."

"You think it over. I will be here again to-morrow evening," he said, and abruptly departed. . For a few minutes she never stirred. "What shall I do?" she thought, in an anguish of perplexity and dread. "The world likes to believe the worst of everybody and everything. Whether innocent or guilty, the woman, once accused, is doomed to the scoffs and sneers and shrugs of the unreasoning mob." Just then the telephone-bell tinkled imperiously.

"Well?" she queried, listlessly, over the wire. "It's I, Tom." was the reply. "May I bring a 'taxi' and take vo'u to the opera? I sadly want a talk with you, Corrie." "Oh, no, not to-night," Mrs Bethell called back. ''l'm not fit to talk to anybody; my—my head aches, Tom." Tom grumbled tenderly, and then they bad each other "Good-night." But in her heart Corinthia decided it must be for the last time. She meant to quit her beautiful home, and travei to some far country where she could seclude herself from everybody who had ever known her, where she should be safe from her persecutor, and where she and Tom Dawlish should never meet again. _ She dared not tell her trouble to Dawhsli. He was too proud, too uncompromising, where scandal was concerned. He. might credit all the dreadful things oi ivhieh she was accused. And even If lie believed that she was guiltless, he was like all other proud men; and the woman upon whom, he conferred the o-ift of his love must be, like Caesar's"" wife "above suspicion." ' "J might defy Bannister," she pondered, "and let him do his worst. Then I could hire detectives to unearth the mvs-

tery. But the world would never believe in my innocence. There would always be somebody to suggest that I bribed the detectives to concoct a plausible explanation, that inv exoneration was only a whitewash, produced by the power of money. It is either ignoble llight for me, or blackmail, persistent, unrelenting." But she did not then divine the price which Benjamin Bannister purposed to exact. "It isn't only money I want," he announced at the beginning of next night's interview, "it is you, Nell, 1 want. I swore revenge when you deserted me; but I have never stopped lovinc you. And you are handsomer now than ever; voir are different from the saucy little flirt who was my delight and my torment at Whiteley and Edgar's." '"You are mad!" she cried, in sudden desperation. "I never worked with you at Whiteley and Edgar's, or anywhere else."

"Oh, of course, you will deny everything," he sneered . "You are a line lady now? But my proof is here, in my notebook. And if you refuse to comply with mv demands, the story goes off to every newspaper editor in the kingdom to-mor-row. 1 intend to have either love and comfort, 61' revenge." "May I examine that notebook? somebody demanded, coolly. Corinthia gasped . But she felt a sudden sense of protection which was, infinitely sweet. "I am glad you have come, Tom," she exclaimed, gratefully. Dawlish had arrived just behind her persecutor. He had followed the latter to the threshold of the reception-room, and there he had paused, an unnoticed witness of the interview. At sight of thim Bannister appeared surly rather than concerned. -I might show you the evidence, only you have no right to meddle in other folks' affairs," he said, with an air of resentment. Dawlish turned to Mrs. Bethell. -Tell me the story yourself, Corrie," ho adjured her. "There isn't any story to tell," she replied; "or if there is one, I am not connected with it. I never saw this man before—never heard of him until lie forced himself in here last night.' Bannister's surly expression changed to something like" alarm. His stubborn nether jaw began to relax. "The safest thing to do with you, Bannister, is to have you locked up," Dawlish remarked, sternly.

At that crisis Garret, the servant, advanced timidly into the room.

"If you'll let me, ma'am," she faltered, "'maybe I can set things straight." She moved a step closer to Bannister, who was gazing from her to Mrs. Bethell, and from the latter back to the servant again with an air of puzzled indecision. •'Don't you know me, Jim?" Garret piteously asked. "I'm the Nellie Moyne who worked at Whiteley and Edgar's while you were a shopwalker there. But you know it was you who stole the bag, and you know I would never have given evidence against you, only they compelled me; f loved you too much." "If you are Nellie Moyne, then who is she?" *he queried, with a sheepish nod towards Mrs. Bethell.

"I was Corinthia Moyne before my marriage," the latter explained. Bannister muttered something forcible in his mortified disgust of himself. "And .all this time," he added, "I was tracking the wrong girl. I never suspected there might be another girl named Moyne, thought last night I felt that there was something queer somewhere. But if you'll let me off, I promise to go right away, and never interfere with either you or the girl again." The servant burst into loud sobs, and clutched at her erstwhile lover's arm convulsively. "Oh, do not leave me, Jim! Do not leave mo, now you have found "me!" she .moaned, pathetically. Corinthia and Dawlish exchanged glances, and walked towards the door. "Wait a minute, mister/' Bannister interposed. "I know that I have done something which ought to be punished. But now I've got my girl back, true and faithful, maybe you and the lady will be a little forgiving." "There will be nothing to punish, if you prove a good husband to the girl," Corinthia assured him. "But you must leave her here, in my care, until you are in a position to make her your wife. Now go, and do not return here until you are able to make good your promise." The crafty Bannister took the oppor-, tunity which presented itself to slink! silently outsof the house; nor, being already a much-married man, did he ever return.

When the tear-stricken but grateful servant had also retired from the apartment, Tom Dawlish placed his arm around the unresisting Corinthia. "Corrie, darling," he said, "you want a loving protector to safeguard you from the possibility of another such attack in future."

"It would be wise of you," he urged, as she looked down and remained silent. "Then I will do what is wise," she at length blushingly replied, and Tom Dawlish pressed her to his heart and kissed her.