A HEART'S TRIUMPH.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9152, 27 July 1908, Page 2

A HEART'S TRIUMPH.

By Effie Adelaide Rowlands, Author of "Hugh Grotton's Secret," "A Splendid Heart,'' ''Bravo B irk.r-i," "The Temptation of Mary Barr," "Seliruv's Love Story," etc.

CHAPTER XXllL—Continued

Paul Dpmley did not speak immediately. When he lifted his face it was ashen-white, even to the lips. "There—there is no doubt?" he said then. "The man >s dead?" Michael bent his head. "The man is stone dead. Ho must have died immediately. There will be an inquest, of course." The expression of anxiety in Michael's fnce seemed instantly to touch the other man as the question was put: "Mr Darnley, do you think they—they will want to bring that poor child into this?" Paul shook his head. "I should think not but one can naver say in a case of this sort. The law probes deeply." He shuddered slightly as he spoke, for a new presonal horror dawned for him in these words. If Cecil's name should be dragged into this most miserable business, then his wife's name must come forward, too! He rose from his chair with a halfstaggering movement. "I feel ill, Everest," he said faintly; "this—this is all so horrible—so new to up. To think of that man as we saw him only last night, and to realise now that he is dead! The matter seems impossible to be grasped at first. I—l am not a coward, I hope, Everest, yet there are some things that make us cowards. This is one of them." He stood with his face covered with his hands a moment, and then he looked a:ross at Michael with a wan smile. "We are selfish in all the workings of life, I believe. I am thinking mw far more how we can stand between the prying law and those things dear t > us than I think of that poor dead wretch sent to his last account, with no chance of repentance, no hope of m^rcy." Michael coloured a little. "Can we ever question the mercy of the Almighty?" he said gently. "For such good as was in Felix Bingham -and in every one of us I firmly believe there is good—he will ba judged. God's justice, happily, is broader and sweeter than man's." Paul Darnley stretched out his hand to Michael. "Your words say more to me than you know," he said half-fain tly. "God bless you, Everest, for the good, true heart jou are! Now we must think no more we must act. There is one to whom this tragedy will be, I fear, something like death. One of us must go to Sebastian Thorold at once. Shall it be you, or I?" Michael paused an inttant only. "I will go," he said. "I am a stranger to him now, but if it please God he should be spared, I will prove a help and a comfort to him. It used to cost me something very hard, Mr Darnley, in my working days, when I , saw the old man come to White Abbey, to feel I must stand on one Bide and be nothing to him. Long ago, before my mother spoke out the truth, I knew that I had a right to claim regard, and perhaps affection, from Sebastian Thorold but, out of respect to my mother's pride, I never dreamed of revealing myself. Besides, I had a wrong view of the old man then. I feared he was hard, and I knew that his whole heart was given to Bingham, who never would have been a triend to me.' Hence I said nothing," Michael added again, "and I never even told my mother how near my new life brought me to her brother, for I was afraid she might have imagined I desired to go against her wishes and make myself known to my uncle; but she will not think that now " "I am glad you will go," Paul said warmly. "I know Sebastian Thorold well. It may be that ha will never grow out of lamenting Binghtfm'd death, that you may never take his place; but, nevertheless, I firmly believe you will bring new happiness to the poor old man. How he worshipped his 'boy,' and what a pride he.had in Bingham's success! You will go from here direct to Minchester?" * Michael coloured again slightly. "No, I must go home first. I have y been out since the morning, and my mother will bo anxious. Besides, we have to think of Miss Lacklyna; this maybe," Michael said, in a low tone,' "more of a shock to her than we imagine." He could say no more. Ppul agreed to what he said.

"I think, perhaps, I hacl better go with you, Everest. Poor Cecil!" he remarked, as he summoned hip cleric and made hia preparations to leave the office. "How she used to long in those old, strange days to see the world that lay outside the White Abbey, to meet life in its real sense! She has met life, indeed, in theso past few weeks. It almost goes to prove that Lacklyne's theory of rearing her had more than passing wisdom in it. The man, for all his curious nature, would have suffered terribly. I am sure, if ho could have foreseen all that was going to happen to the child; for though we know no>v she wa3 no child of his, he loved her aa far iu it was possible for him 1 to love any living creature." "She his faced one tragedy; now she) has to face another. Though this death S3td her free," Michael said, a3 they p-jsaed out into the streets together, '''l almost fear to tell her of her freedom." Thev walked along some time in silence after this, till Paul woke .from heavy thought. "I have changed my mind, Everest," he said. "You shall go home tlone. I—l must go to my wife. I fear that this news may have reached her, a-id, ill as she is, it mua*: do her harm. Moreover, I must go and make many inquiries, and 1 muse communicate with Bulstrode without delay. At all hazards, wn must endeavour to suppress the fact of poor Cecil's connection with the

dead man, and Bulstrode will see to this. I will go to Cecil, perhaps, tonight. Sho will not understand my absence. Let me have news of poor Thorold as soon as you have semi him. We—wo have all our work cut out for us just now, Everest," Paul added, with a wan, fleeting smile, as they clasped hands and parted, "and we must try to forget ourselves in doing our best for these others that will have need of us." He walked away slowly after Michael had left with the memory of the part his beloved wife had played in the drama of the day before, but something had worked a change i n his feelings. Instead of shunning her, he felt drawn to her. She was no longer what she had been—his wife was all that was sinless and beautiful; but she was a suffering woman, and she was utterly alone, crushed to the dust with a sense of her weakness and the indignity of her position. "God's justice," Michael had said, "is broader and sweeter than man's!" The words ran like soft music in Darnley's troubled brain as he turned his steps homeward. Hia bitter anger dropped from him as he went. Life would never be quite the same again, but he must piece together the fragments of what was left, and who could say whether the future would not bring its healing happiness? At least, he would not forget that he himself was but mortal, and that sin came easily to him, and in so thinking he would remember that broad white justice which Heaven meted out to all sinners for the good that lay beneath the evil in their natures, and he would set aside condemnation of his poor wife's fault. He said a prayer earnestly for her and for himself as he drew near to her; and once he found himself thinking of the dead man, and praying, too, that all that was black against him might be forgotten given by the one who alone gives mercy and covers the sin and shame of the world with a garment of white charity! (To be Continued).