THE CURSE OF HER LIFE OR A DARK SECRET.
r CHAPTER XXXll.—Continued. 'Pat down that letter, you villi an !" shouted Frank TyrreU, us •Heathcote was unfolding it. "Not till I have read it, couiin, by your leave," returned Heath cote, proceeding to do so. "Aha!" he commented as he read. "The very thing! 1 couldn't have have done it better myself- Listen, Rial!" And he read some .passages from Frank's wild letter. But chancing to catch the expressrion of his victim's face at that moment, he laid the letter down and helped Rial to tie him hand and foot. After which he returned to the letter and read it from beginning to end aloud. "I'll see that it reaches .its destination," he said with .a sneer as he finished it "I think I'll send it abroad to be mailed. How would that suit you, my lord?" Lord Disbro made no answer, except a look of fury, at which Heathcote laughed like a fiend. "How glad my cousin will be to hear," he said, "and.gladder than all to read the letter & shall send with it, telling her that you are disposed of where you will trounle her no more. Your letter w.ill do to show to her friends in proof that you are abroad. Mine will rejoice h'er sweet heart with the assurance that the husband she now hates and fears is out of her way forever, and the lover she loves and owes so much to is on the way to .her arms." "Liar!" hissed Frank. "Liar! liar!" He knew that Heathcote was lying, and yet the words stung his jealous soul almost as if thtry had been truth. CHAPTER XXXUI. AN ADMISSION WRUNG FROM AN ENEMY. Lsdy Disbro had promised herself and Dorcas that Rose Altman should be watched if she went out alone again. Rose did go out, and in the same mysterious manner, leaving the house only at nightfall and shrouding herself in that long cloak which Edith had guessed was taken to disguise her from eyes that might recognise her. Every tame JSEioS Altman went out in this manner now a man who was idling carelessly near strolled slowly but watchfully after her. Twice Rose went to see Rial. The third time she took a hack and went farther, stopping at a house in Chaiges Street, which her watcher afterwards Jearned was a private boarding-house. Here a gentleman joined her, a description of whom he was unable at the time to obtain for his employer, partly owirtg to the obscurity in which he saw him, and partly to the fact that the gentleman kept his broad-brimmed hat well slouched over his face and his coat-collar turned up. He had only been able to see that the gentleman's .hair was black, or dark, and that he wore a heavy , moustache. The two.had driven some distance and returned without stopping anywhere, the gentlemau getting out where he had got in, and Miss Altman going hack as she had come. "I suspected all the time she might ba meeting Randal Heathcote somewhere," Lady Disbro said, commenting on this information., "but that deacription-doesn't apply to him. I wonder if Rose hasn't a lover? Or Mo, 1 (eel it within me that these secret trips of hers are for some more mischievous purpose." "My lady," suggested Dorcas, "have you ever thought of the possibility of your hushaud being somewhere here in town. Rose may be meeting him, and pretending to report on your actions." "I mean to know, at any rate, the person she is meeting in this mysterious manner," Edith said sternly. "I hate being a spy, but I cm forced into in self-defence. I've got the address, and I shall make an excuse tu call to-day where Miss Rose Altman did last night. If there, is anyone in the house that I know, it shall go hard, but I will contrive tn see him." ® The result of Lady Disbro's call at the private boarding-house in Charges fctreet may be summed up in a few sentences. . "I pretended to be looking for rooms," she said to Dorcas, "and so got a chance to inspect various rooms in the house. It was not Randal Heathcote's ghost you saw at Heathcote House, whatever else it was, for 1 saw him to-day. He has either dyed his hair or he had on a black wig, and he had tha heavy moustache Brixton told about. He was coming along the passage, and I fortunately, had taken the precaution to keep my veil well down. I knew him at once in spite of his black hair, hut he did not so much as glance at me. Oh, Dorcas, you don't know how my soul thrilled with joy at the sight of him. I wonder his soul did not quake and tremble at my nearness, unconscious as he was of it. At last, Dorcas, dear, 1 holtl that villian where I can repay a portion of the very heavy debt I owe him." in her excitement Lady Disbro got up and walked once or twice across the room. She was always deadly pale when angry, and that spark which lit her J black eyes at dangerous moments was in them now. Dorcas sat and watched her with puzzled and doubting looks. Meeting that glance, Edith stopped suddenly and laughed aloud—i> ii a wild and bitter laugh as her r.'lr ui'.-:e lad never heard from her Lciore. . 1
By HELEN COS WIN PIERCE, Ivt'-ur of "At His Own Game," "Came Emerson Wilde," "Badly Matched," "The Cheated Bride,'' Etc.
"I'm not going to break my oath to hire —the wrttch —oh, no! I've a curious respect for my pledged word, you know. I'm going to keep it, wured to the end. Did you ever ht-nrd ot Doctor Sanitas? I know you've not, so I'll teil you who he is. He's a doctor who makes a specialty of diseases of the brain - a mad doctor, iri short, ha, ha J and the most celebrated one in England. He has had my unfortunate cousin's case under consideration a long time. The facts, hii strange behav.ious, irrespective of his connection with any tiagedy —are against him. The law, my dear Dorcas —that wise department of British Jaw which considers the question of nan's sanity and deals with him relentlessly according to its decision —has had my wicked CvUiins case under discussion for some time. The only difficulty was to find him and obtain the opinion of Doctor Sanitas." "I called upon that gentleman on my way from Charges Street and told him where to find his .patient. That is not all, Dorcas. I'm a pretty good guesser, I think you know, and if I were a betting character I would not be afraid to lay a pretty heavy wager that Rose Altman is trying to marry my handsome cousin. I hope she may succeed. There is nothing I should like better than to see those two amiable people made one.'' "MissEdy," said Dorcas, "perhaps you had better tell James Rial your suspicions." "Do you think so? Why?" "Miss Altman-may be playing a double game—don't you see. And your cousin may know it. If you could convince Rialof this, he might confess the whole conspiracy, so far as he knows it." But Lady Disbro shook her head. "I couldn't convince him, Dorcas, dear. I don't know anyching mytelr; I only suspect. He wouldn't desert my cousin on the merest suspicion. He.has always been so deeply in his secrets, too, all except this one about >Captain Tyrrell's death. He's devoted to Randal, I'm sure; I don't believe I could gtt anything out of him. And .yet " tidith grew thoughtful. "If I had any proof that Rose was really .going to marry my cousin— — I'll tell you what I'll do, Dorcas, I'll go and talk to Rose herself." Rose reddened w.ith agitation at sight of Edith in her room, and then •—-a rare thing for her—turned very white. "She thinks I have found her out," thought Edith. "I come to remonstrate with you, on a very serious matter, Rose. As an inmate of my house and sj nearly related to my first husband, I am, i>) a manner, obligated to look after you, a.id when 1 see you committing yourto a course of conduct calculated to disgrace you, to say nothing of those connected with you, it becomes my duty to—well, to reason with you. London will be ringing with the scandal, if it is not already, for you have been seen. Rose, in .spite of all your studdied precautions." (To be continued).
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Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3107, 3 February 1909, Page 2
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1,439THE CURSE OF HER LIFE OR A DARK SECRET. Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 3107, 3 February 1909, Page 2
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