The Ironmaster's Daughter.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8289, 17 November 1906, Page 2

The Ironmaster's Daughter.

CHAPTER XlX.—Continued.

''Don't leave me in that way, MiBenson," she pleaded. "I think I must be a most wicked young woman. I did know that you were getting to like me, and I am punished, as I ought to be. I heard what Mr Tressidy said to you, I listened." Her face was white, and she clasped her hands. "Yes, I listened to the conversation. I know -that you can go back at any moment if you like, and I want you to go back, and tell Mr Tressidy that I am a bad, deceitful woman. It was I who stole and tampered with the papers it was I who sold them to Lucas &Co.!" ,",.,. Benson had straightenad himself, and was regarding her with amazement and disgust. •'I don't believe it." he blurted, out. "Now. you are fabricating. A girl with your angel face could no |___" He seated himself beside her, and took her unresisting hand. "Why did you do it, Hilda? What are Lucas & Co. to you? "Christopher Stanley is my father." - "Good Lord! I don t believe that the governor dreams of that, with, all his prescience. ' Aud you called yourself Craven. It was cleverly dolle -" n IT "My name is Craven—Mrs Craven! ) ' "A mairied woman!" he exClaimed' ihorror-stricken. "A widow—my husband died two years since, after a brief married life. I was adopted by a lady when a little child, and know very little about my father. I was poor, and wanted work; I had been teaching, but the pay is so little. My father showed me your advertisement, and later led me to believe that Mr Tressidy had done him a greyious wrong. I obeyed him for awhile—but you know"it all," "Yes," he said sadly. "And now?" „ , "I want to help your firm, she said eagerly. "I know that my father is linked with desperate men —that he has become a desperate man himself. I can help your firm." / "Dare I trust yeu, Hilda? He looked into her eyes. "You can, and I may learn to like you yet." ■ .= "More fooling!" he said fiercely. "Drop that." He considered for some minutes. "All right; I will trust you, but I shall have*you watched. Now I am dumb. I sha'n't return to the works for a bit; I'm too much cut up. I'll, write to Mr Tressidy. Good night, Hilda." The next morning Dick. Tressidy received the following letter from Benson: "DEAR SIR: You were perfectly right, and I was idiotically wrong. I have spoken to Miss Cravon, and she is merely sorry for me. I don't blame her, and we have parted on friendly terms, and upon the basis of a complete understanding for the future. I need a ~,, vacation, and mine is due. Let me go away for a month. I'll w T brk doubly hard afterward, and devote every ounce of my energies to your lousiness—if I may. '•' Yours obediently, "Cha.ei.es Benson." CHAPTER XVII. - , ■ ■. A COUNCIL OF WAR.' A council of war was being held •at the office of Lucas Isaacs & Co, with Isaacs in the chair. The double doors were locked, and the members of the firm spoke in excited undertones. "Your daughter has dene well, I admit, Stanley; but the result is like the proverbial mob sweeping back the tide. We have secured the Wellington contract only/ to lose money on it." The job is too big for / ns at present.''' '•With'our new machinery?" began Mr Weeks. "Too early—to discuss that. .No new machine can be installed here until Tressidy is smashed. Don't you see that we should destroy the powerful leverage we hold on the mob? To-morrow night I begin my political campaign, and you may be sure that I know where to drop in the right word. My agent, too, is doing good work—excellent work. But he must not be too energetic at present. The brick-throwirig episode was much too previous." He smiled at his partners, and rubbed his fat hands together. "There's only one thing to be done," gloomed Chris Stanley. "And that is to chrash him effectually—to put him out of actio'n. We'haveahard nut to crack, but I've heard that he's working on borrowed money, and, if we do him up completely, his financier won't have the heart to go on." "But-what is your proposed line of action?" asked Weeks. "You may as well out-with it." Stanley looked from one to the other and his face wrinkled into a ferocious smile. "You know all about it, Foxy; and you, Mr Grinning Isaacs have suggested it in a dozen ways, but it re-

Bv OWEN MASTERS. Author of "Clyda's Love Dream," "Nina's Repentance," "Her Soldier Lover," "The Mj/ster}/ of Woodcroft," " For Love of Marjorie," etc. T"The Ironmasteb's Daughter" was commenced on October 17th.] .

mains for me to put it into plain English." "You are amusing, if personal, Stanley," Isaacs remarked. "Still, I like a bluff man, who speaks his mind." Stanley glared at him contemptuously. "Your scheme, Mr Isaacs, and your scheme, Mr Weeks, is to destroy Dick Tressidy and his ironworks. Of course, you don't wish to have any hand in such diabolical wickedness. After it is done, Mr Isaacs will bowl from the platform and Mr Weeks from the Bethel pulpit, but, by Heaven ! if you attempt to break away from me, I'll clap the pair of you into limbo." Chris Stanley's partners were disturbed. "If I could only realise my share," thought Weeks, "I would sail for New York to-morrow" Lucas Isaacs showed his teeth in a smile. "Stanley, one would think that you meditated some crime. I have never yet advocated anything worse than making Tressidy unpopular with the lazy rascals and born loafers with whom this place abounds; I want their votes, and my agent is working hard to influence them in my favor. No machinery to do the work of a man—shorter hours, higher wages; in fact, I'd promise them paradise and a brewery if they'd swallow it." [to be continued.]