For Her Sister's Sake; OR' THE LAVENDEN SECRET.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8321, 29 December 1906, Page 2

For Her Sister's Sake; OR' THE LAVENDEN SECRET.

CHAPTER 111. LADY LAVENDEN'S VISITOR. "My lady!" Julia Lavenden's maid leaned over her sleeping mistress. Her low' exclamation had not sufficed to awaken the slumberer. She spoke again. "Pardon me, my lady,'' she said, "but there is some one who insists upon seeing your ladyship." Lady Lavenden stirred and sat up among her pillows, brushing her hair out of her eyes. A dazed, almost terrified, expression glimmered in them. When she recognized the familiar features of the Frenchwoman, and the pleasant surroundings of the lighted boudoir, a sigh of relief broke from her. "What is it, Cecile?" she asked. "I —I thought Miss Lavenden was sitting with me." "No, my lady," answered the maid; "I found your ladyship alone and asleep. I was sorry to wake you, my lady, but there is a person below who demands to see you without delay. She will not give her name or her business, only that she is from Devonshire. Lady Lavenden passed a hand across her brows. "From Devonshire!" she repeated. "I'm sure I don't—" '

She stopped abruptly, and the Frenchwoman heard the sound of a sharply drawn breath. "Very well, Cecile," continued Julia Lavenden, "I will see her. Give me a dressing-gown." Cecile obeyed, and her mistress, in slippers and a loose silken garment, walked haltingly to the couch by. the fire. When the maid went away, she put out her hands to the dying embers and warmed them mechanically ; she was shivering. At length the door of the boudoir reopened,, and a sombre figure entered. It was that of a woman in the close caped cloak of dark cloth familiar to the outdoor garment of many nurses. She had on a bonnet with flapping wings, and her throat and chin were muffled in a Shetland wool wrap. Cecile followed her in. "Thank you for seeing me at this late hour, my lady," said the nurse, and her tones were harsh and vibrat-' ing. "May I have a few words in private with your ladyship? I—l I bring a message from—from the dead." Julia Lavenden had risen precipitately at the sound of the newcomer's voice. She leaned against the couch behind her, swaying like a reed in the wind. But she made a sign to Cecile, and the maid withdrew. As the door closed, the nurse strode to it, and turned the key in the lock, and swept the portieres over the panels. With a rapid movement the long blue cloak was unfastened and the shawl and "bonnet cast aside. ' Lady Lavenden's visitor was a man, gaunt and stern, yet with the remains of masculine good looks about the cldan-shaven face, closely cropped head, and supple figure. And the cloak, flung back, revealed the fact that he was clad in the arrow-marked garments of a convict. Julja Lavenden stood a moment aghast, and incredulous of her own eyes. Then she recoiled and uttered • a groan. "You!" she gasped. "Then lam lost!". The convict folded his arms and contemplated her with bent brows. "Julia," he said, "have you so little sympathy for me; in my danger and extremity that your first thought is for yourself? Ah! well, I deserve that you should loathe and fear me. Yet you loved me once, as I, Heaven help me, loved you once, and love you still."

She shrank from him at the word ''love," and he winced. "Not that I would insult you by reminding you of that," he added hastily—"l, a felon, hunted now like a wild beast through broad England, because, forsooth, my wits were better than those of my jailers! No; I have only come to you because my liberty is dear to me, and you represent my last chance of it." He- touched the cloak that lay about him. "Never mind how I came by this," he said ; "It would take too long to tell. But it and the return half of a Great Western ticket, have brought me thus far successfully. I got away from Dartmoor prison in the fog yesterday morning. A paper I bought on the . train had something in it about the romance of the Lavenden peerage. I saw then what had happened. The paper said that you and the Honourable Miss Lavenden were residing at the town house of the family in Audley Street. So I bluffed my way in." The convict held out his hands appealingly. "Help me, Julia," he begged; "I can't let them take me. I'd rather kill myself than go back. Help me to some sort of a man's rig, and I'll get away where you shall never hear of me again. I wouldn't have troubled you at all; I went to one or two of the old cribs first, but every one's moved, < and I daren't make enquiries. So I was driven to throw myself upon your mercy. I had to do something. It's ghastly to walk about London with only a woman's cloak between the convictmarked garment and a million eyes." ; He caught her arm, angered by her helpless inaction. "You shall help me," he said; "if you won't help your husband, you shall your child's father. Yes, your child's father. I told you a lie when I said it died. It didn't —I took it away and put it in safety." Julia Lavenden stared at him, deep lines coming and going about the comers of her mouth.

By R. Horman Silver, 1 < 1 of "A Double Mash," "A Daughter of Mystery," "Held Apart," "The Golden Diuarf," etc.

["For Her Sister's Sake " was commenced on December 20th.]

"The—the child!" she whispered. "It-nt didn't die?" The convict shook his head. "No," he answered, doggedly; "but you raved so much in your delirium about it being my child, the child of a—well, what I am—that we thought you'd be better with it away, if you you were told that it had died while you were ill. You remember you said you were glad—glad for its sake and your own." Lady Lavenden covered her face. "Not dead!" she murmured; "my little baby not dead! Oh! how I have wanted him back a thousand times, and tried not to hate the thought of his father because of him!" David Garth looked at her and his own face—the set, gray face of the social outlaw —softened. [To be Continued.]