A SENSATIONAL CASE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9174, 25 August 1908, Page 2

A SENSATIONAL CASE.

By FLORENCE WARDEN, Author of "The Lady in Black," "An Infamous Fraud." "For Love of Jack," Terrible Family," "The House on the Marsh," etc. etc.

CHAPTER XV.—Continued. It was this last fact alone which enabled her to leave unanswered the questions which would arise in her mind as to the means by which they were able to maintain a large establishment like that of "The Firs" without any apparent source of income. To her timidly expressed questions on this point Litiley had made answer, in the dry manner she did not like, that the insurance companies had "behaved pretty decently, on the whole." And then Netelka made a mental calculation proving that to justify them in their present expenditure the insurance companies must have paid them about five times the amount for which they were insured. ~ - * She was sitting 1 beside the fire in the morning-room one afternoon in March, knitting odd-shaped ornaments in nasty fluffy white cottoij that made you sneeze if you stayed long in its neighbourhood. Waller was singing softly to himself at the piano, to an original accompaniment played with one finger, supported by an occasional chord with the left hand. , , JX. Presently Netelka, who had been silent for some time, let her hands drop into her lap. "Where's Mr Moseley?" she suddenly asked. "Have you seen him today? Do you know whether he's gone hack to town?" "Why trouble your head about him?" said Waller. "I never do. Isn't Linlev with him?" She shook her head. Then, after another little pause, she said: "Linley's gone to a sale where there was to be some old china. You know how frantic he is about old china. If he'd been Esau, he would have sold his birthright for a teapot, and been delighted with his bargain." "Well, it's consistent of him to like old china," said Waller, with condescension "I always think he is like a Dresden figure himself—he's so neat, and fio smooth, and has such pretty little white hands and pretty little pink nails, and he's so afraid of being touched. "It's very rude of you to talk like that about my husband," saidNetelka sharoly. 1 "No, it isn't rude. What harm is there in a neat bit of description like that? He's always saying worse things of me. He used to say, I looked like putty." "Well, he couldn't 3ay that of you now." Waller got up from the piano, and stood before her on the hearth rug, contemplating himself in the glass above the mantel with an air of stern criticism. "Putty!" said he at last meditatively. "No, I don't think he could. On the other hand, don't you think that that slightly haggard look I had give me a more intellectual appearance than I have now?'' "Very likely. I don't think I've given to the subject the consideration it undoubtedly deserves." "You are severe, madam, this afternoon. Linley's been cross, I suppose; and as you don't care to visit your resentment upon you make me the scapegoat. That's it, isn't it?" Now Waller had been observing Mrs Hilliard's face under cover of his idle chatter, and he saw that something was wrong. He had no desire at all to force her confidence; on the contrary, he dreaded it. But hi saw it was coming. "Gerard," she said, with a suddeness which would have disconcerted him if he had not been prepared for some sensational onslaught, "did you hear a noise last night?" Waller continued to look at himself in the glas3, and carefully flattened down a curl of his wavy hair above his right ear. "JNoise! What noise?" Netelka sprang up excitedly. "There, you did hear it, I know. I can tell by the way you answer me. Don't imagine that that studied careless manner deceives me, for it doesn't. What was the noise? Now, what was it? Was it Harrington Moaeley quarrelling with Linley, or __ } > "My dear Mrs Hilliard, I give you my word I haven't the least idea what it was. I did hear a slight noise but I didn't trouble myself to inquire what it was; and if I were you I shouldn't worry myself about it either." "Ah! I can't take things so indifferently as that. I must know." Gerard slid down into a seat and shook his head at her with a pretensa of playtulness which had in it a .touch <>f genuine seriousness. "That is so like a woman! No woman is ever satisfied just to be happy and le&ve the rest alone! There's more truth in the story of "Bluebeard" than in all the histories of England that ever were written. It happens every day." "It's of use to talk to mo like that!" said Netelka restlessly while a Hush rose in her cheeits. "I'm nut n child; I don't ask questions for the sake of asking; I only ask when I must have un answer." "But why? There is always soma question or other one can make oneself unhappy by asking and more unhappy still by getting an answer to! Ask as many questions as you like when you are unhappy; then it fills up the time. When you are happy, or fairly happy be content to exist and don't worry yourself until you're obliged to. That's what I do. And that's why I've left off looking intellectual and grown plump and bovine." § There was a pause. Then each stole a glance at the other and their eyes met. Then Netelka moved with quick steps toward the door. "How explosive you are this afternoon! Where are you going to now?"

"Down to the shops. I want some more cotton. I think I can be back before tea." "You can't it' you walk. Have the carriage round?" "No" answered she decidedly her face clounding "I prefer to w«lk." Gerard Waller followed her to the door, where she stood for a few moments as if she had not yet quite made up her mind. "Why do you never use the brougham now? A few weeks ago you were delighted with it. It was the 'dearest little thing in the world' and you said you never would walk any more. That was while it was a new toy 1 suppose?'' "Yes," answered Netelka coldly. "That was it. Now, I'm tired of it, and," she looked at Waller quite fiercely, "I'm going to have it sold." Gerard raised his eyebrcw.s and looked down. "Of course it is no business of mine," said he, looking, however, disappointed and displeased "but I think it's a pity. Linley will only spend the money you save on Worcester plates and Crown Derby mugs." "So he can, if ho likes," retorted Netelka. "At any rate, I " She was almost hysterical, and Waller, very much distressed himself took her hand and led her ba:k to the chair she had occupied. "Go on with the fluffy ornaments," said he gently. "I'll go and get the cotton. And when I get back, Linley will bo here, and'the tea, and you'll feel ever so much better." By this time Netelka had wiped away two tears which she had caugnt in the act of rolling down her cheeks, and had assumed a staid and matronly demeanour. "I sha'n't feel better," said she, with dogged dignity, "because I'm quite well now. I have something to say to you, Gerard. The Collinghams will tie here this evening " "Oh, bother the Collinghams! At least—l mean—they're very nice people, of course, and Jem's a dear girl, and I adore her, and I fully intend some day to lay my hand and heart at her feet. But " "I won't have you talking in that flippant manner about her," said Netelka. "Jem is a very, very nice girl, and a great deal too good for you, and I won't have you trifling with her affections. Either you must propose to her and have done with it, or else you must " "Not propose to her and have done with it," suggested Waller, with great buoyancy. "And if I choose that alternative?" "Why, then," said Netelka gravely, "I shall think that you have behaved in a veiy dishanourable fashion, a fashion which I had thought impossible in you!" There was a pause. Gerard wanted to tell her that Jem understood the situation better than she thought, better than she did herself, in fact. But this would have led to other explanations upon which he must not venture. He was above all things anxious *,o let things remain in all respects as they were; change could only be for the worse. "It doesn't do to rush these things," he said at last, with an assumption of thoughtfulness. "I have heard you say twenty times that marriage should not be entered upon haptily. Then why do you wish to make me transgress your own law?" "Oh, 1 want to see things settled, that's all," said Netelka restlessly. "Linley and I were talking about this last night." [ (To be continued.)