For Honor's Sake.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7938, 11 January 1906, Page 2

For Honor's Sake.

CHAPIER IV.—Continued. "He caught his breath in the agony of the sharp revulsion, aud sot his teeth like a vice, resolutely crushing down the wild impulses that warred so fiercely with honour—and this time, .at least, the nobler part of him was victor; but so near had been deteat that he must tamper no more with temptation. The song was finished,aud Stewart could thank the singer; only one word, certainly, but uo more was needed. There are so many ways of sayins, "Thank you." It may moan nothing, or a volume. Claude rose from the piano. "What are they doing in the other room?" Bhesaid; "playing whist?" "Yea; aud as they aro just a complete party 1 am afraid we could not join them if we would." "Oh, I don't play cards," she said, seating herself in the sofa. He took the vacant plaoo beside her "I am glad of tint," no said. He had himself in hand now; though all his pulses were throboing he could guard eye and voice. A little more of Paradise—a little more before he cloded the gates upon himself, if. indeed he must close them. ' "Why are you glad?" said Claude laughing. "You might want me to play escarte, for example, and I would rather talk with you." "Oh! is that it? Are you staying in Pnris?" "Not for long; at least, I think not. Are you?" , Claude shrugged her shoulders. "I cannot tell. Mr Davenant is erratic; we may travel, or go to London, or remain here." fa "1 hopo," Stewart said, "that wheraver you go I may nave the happiness of meeting you again." "I hope so too," said the girl, simply; "and very likely we shall meet. **The world is very small, isn't it?" "For knocking up against people you don't care about, yes; but if you lose sight of a friend it is years perhaps before you come across him or her again—that is if you leave things to chance," "But, then, with friends you don't; with new acquaintances you generally do," said Claude, and it did not atrike her until the words had passed ber lips that they almost sounded like a rebuff. She coloured, and turned aside. How she had Jhurt her own sensitive spirit in, perhaps, hurting his! "Generally," said Esric Stewart, a little dryly. "Not always." "No, I know," returned Claude I lather confusedly. "Captain Stewart I didn't mean " "What you might seem to mean" said he smiljing and speaking half lightly, half gravely. "Of course you didn't. There is no danger of my misjudging you though we are aew acquaintances." '.'flow kind of you to take it so," said Claude with that bewitching look of hers which while 'it made the blood leap in his veins was an irresistible appeal. "Kind of me?" he said, softly. "Isthatit? No, only just; and we must not remain new acquaintances, or it will not be my fault if, we do." "So then I have made my peace," said Claude, with an air of arch seriousness. She was soaroely more than a child in many things after all. "If it needed making," answered Stewart, and then he began to talk of something else. He knew he was in shoal water; he knew his danger and he daied not for an instant relax his grip on the helm. He was like some reckless navigator who loves to sport with peril and make it his servant, knowing that the deviation if a hair's breadth in his couise, the smallest relaxation of tense vigilance, will make that peril his master. No casual ofcserver would have thought that he was in any greater danger than most men would be in the society of a beautiful and fascinating erirl. if bis voice was soft and almost caressing, what then? How could it be otherwise, considering his temperament, when he talked to such a witch as this? What he said might have bne.n in the hearing of a dozen other people; jet ail the time his heart was crying out: "I cannot give her up! I cannot!" His will was hardening into the stern resolve to woo and win ber, come what might. His honour did J fierce battle with heart aud will, repeating ever: "Tour word ia given beyond recall; your faith is pledged and bound. You dare not, for love's sake, trample your honour underfoot." • ' But the strife could not end here to-night. When, at the close of the evening, Esric Stewart rose to go he only felt that he could not make this adipu to Claude final; yet he had not distinctly decided that he would see her again. When the little hand lay in his. and the exquisite face wa3 under bis gaze, how could he, being no angel, but a man aud a man of deep and fiery passions, say heroically: "I will be true to a woman I all but hate, and forswear from this moment the woman I love with all my strength!" 'What he did was to kiss the hand he held—devoutly, not passionately. He was able to master the impulse which might have startled her, and to say very softly, aud to mean the word 3, "Good-bye, but not adieu!" And Claude went to her room, feeling very, very happy, and, to some extent, owning it. Esric Stewart seemed to embody her idea of a hero; but there was an element in ber happiness that was wholly inarticulate, of which she was perfectly unconsoious. Captain Stewart went back to his hotel, going through the streets like a blind man, who knows the way by instinct, uot by sight. On the table in his room lay a letter from Pauline. Another letter within a

By Bertha US. Clay. Author of " Wife in Name Only," «« Wedded and Farted," "Dora Thome," (t A Queen Amour/ Women," if A True Mmjdalene," ete., etc.,

few days' He tore it into fragments, the threw it, unread, into tho lire! CHAPTER V. PUZZLED. "I can't make it out," said Maida Westmore; "there's a screw loose somewhere! I have only met Captain Stewart twice, but J should say he was just the soit of man to bo a very ardent lover—the lover you read about, and rarely see—and here is his intended bride in Loudon, ana he in Paris!" What is ho doing there? Aud she, presumably, singing tbe song of the 'Forgotten.' And Major Westmore's pretty little widow looked across the gypsy tea table nfc her visitor, as if Lady Meldune could explain the mystery. To be sure, Lady Meldune had known Esric Stewart from the day whon the young chief bad won the prize at tho liraemar Gathering for bis dancing of tho sword dance; but, between his foreign service and his travelling abroad, they had not met very often, alter all. Besides, Stewart was not the kind of man whose inner life is open to hiß friends. Lady Meldune, therefore, shook her head, aud answered: "I know as mucb about it as you do, Maida. I haven't seen Mrs Arnold ; but I hoar she is very lovely, and all right as regards birth, and the rest." "That might be taken as read," observed Maida. "Captain Stewart is as proud as—a Stewart; aud that is saying as much a3 need bo said. He wouldn't marry a woman of vulgar origij and shady antecedants. Besides, l know who Mrs Arnold is, fast enough—Pauline Lowell; very good Worcestershire family. She married Dick Arnold, tho Aco of Spades, thoy used to call him, because he was about as black as they make them." "What a nick-name. N[ never knew him," said Lady Meldune. "I live so much in tho country." "Oh, I have met him lots of times," returned Mrs Westmore, I "rather a good-looking fellow, only [ that hia nose was out of drawing, | somehow, and his eyes close set—--lit gave him such an odd look. But Ihe was an awful scamp. I don't bo ; lieve ho had a pound, yet he lived as if be had thousands, and got trusted right and left. They said Miss Loveil fancied he was well off, and that's why she married him." If she did, she was nicely sold, for he was sold out within a mouth of their marriage; they had to go abroad. Afterward he deserted her and died in America; and I heard no more of her till she turned up as Captain Stewart's good angel, nursing him while be was wounded. and next—natural corollary!—as his promised wife." "1 hone it is love," said Lady Meldune anxiously, "and not tbe mere enthusiasm of gratitude. Cap tain Stewart, is a splendid fellow. It would be a real grief to me, and to a great many other people, if he threw himself away on a woman who couldn't make him happy." "It looks more like tffte last, though, doesn't it?" said Maida; "or Mrs Arnold might have, practically, trapped him into an engagement. She is poor—he, very rich and a somebody to .ooot. She might really have fallen in love with him, eaßy enough—such an attractive man!—and worked on his sense of obligation, his honour, and the rest of it; you know these Highlanders have a quite fantastic sense of honour," concluded Mrs Westmore. "My dear Maida! How you do po on!" "My dear Lady Meldune!" interrupted the little widow "I am a woman of the world, and when I see a man aud a woman engaged, and. the r*an apparently finds Paris more to his taste than his adored one, 1 conclude that there is, as I elegantly expressed it just now, a screw loosb somewhere. It's no business of mine, but I give my opinion—and 1 am sorry for Captain Stewart. He's a brave soldier, a delightfully handsome man, and waltzes divinely ''• "Take care, Maida! I shall think you are taken with him." "I should have been, seriously, bad I seen more of him. He certainly possesses that Stewart gift of personal fascination;if he were a ne'erdo well you'd like him. All the eligible girls are mad at this engagement of his to an 'outsider.' No wonder. He might have given me a chance," said Maida, concluding with a melodramatic sigh. "I wouldn't say no!" Perhaps the merry widow had been somewhat smitten with the handsome soldier, who "waltzed divinely" and said many pretty things to hor in that soft voice of his, which often expressed more than its ownor intended. (To be Continued).