THE DOUBLE SECRET.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9601, 22 September 1909, Page 2

THE DOUBLE SECRET.

I CHAPTER I.—Continued. I "I noticed this chill, this sodden B shrinking, almost aversion, occasion- | ally, as if you were, an accusing I ghost" I gee it now —you ware the | unconscious accusation of tier crime. | It has always seemed to me part of I the usual facts of her lite, for I slie never had a mothers heart, reg member when her child was first I dressed, I took it to her myself, t saying, 'Charlotte here is your little gill,' snd she gave the babe a weak push, saying,'Do take it away.' Hoping to move her feelings. I said. '1 he babe looks very dalicate,' and she merely turned her face away in silence P'or a year and a-half she al no3t ingored the child, a puny thing that no one expected would live. Then all at once she charged and became the most assiduous of others; every one said her devotion saved its life." But as for the lost fifteen years, I have seen this untendcrness which you mention. I have associated it with that early lack of loving, and felt that she peiformed . carefully her duties toward her heiress, rather than bestowed mother devotion on her only child." "Yes," said Persis, "that is what 1 have felt, and you canno*; tell how it has pained me to find that I gave care for care, duty for duty, and that 1 had not a daughter's passionate fondness for a mother who denied me nothing, who loaded me with every benefit. I felt that I could not do enough to atone for this lack of heart. I was shocked to find that all her faults stood out before me unveiled by tender excuses, that I evan preferred others to her. Since I realised this I have been at war with myself, for my unfilial hardness of heart. I could not understand what I thought of such a baseness in my soul. And then there is another thing, a mighty abyss of misery and future pain seemed by her disease opened at my feet, Her mother and her grandmother died of the same disease: the doc • | tors said surgery would be useless. as the taint was hereditary, and I shrank with horror and loathing from thinking that this taint was in my blood—that months of torture, when I would be a torment to mys.-lf and to others, would mark the closing of my life. I said it was cruel in her to j marry with such an inalienable heirloom, and that 1 would never hand on the curse. When 1 heard her say I was not her child, the very first thing I felt was relief that this double burden had rolled from my heart. I did not fur the moment realise thai I had taken instead the ( burden of nau.elessnesj and pov- j erty " "All that can be removed ty silence,'' said Lady Astrata. "But silence means robbery!" returned Persip. "And do you know this youne man, Dugald Probyr, on whom fortune seems disposed to heap her favours, inasmuch as being by bis grandmother seemed cousin to Mr Ormesby, he inherited his fortune in default of heirs, and being by his grandfather second cousin of my son, Lord Harcourt, he inherits-the title and estate, unless, the most unlikely of events, my son marries again and has an heir.?'' "I only .saw him once," said Persis? "I was six years old, and he must have been fourteen. His father brought him to us, in a hideous King's College dress—bareheaded, hair cropped; short waisted, longtailed blue coat, yeljow stockings to his knees, no visible breeches, low shoes with buckles. I thought that his actions corresponded to the ugly apparel devised by our royal Blue- ! beard; he pulled my hair and pokid j out the eyes of my best doll; and ' when we were given a plate of. peaches he gobbled them all but, two small ones, which I secured. I wanted to beat him, or maltreat him in some way. I ne\er thought that I .should or.e day resign two hundred thousand pounds to him. Nor do I to him; he is aside from the question; if it belonged to a negro I would not keep it unjustly." "And you found the father as detestable as the son?" "Oh, more so; for the son had the makings of a handsome boy in him. but the father had the little red eyes; of a ferret, a sneaking way, a bitter < voice. He used :o say, right to my face, that 1 -was delicate, and he did not believe I would live to grow up; and when he took my hand he felt my pulse always. Then he had a way of peering at me and saying, 'She doesn't look at all like her mother,' and'l can't see the Ormesby'; and all these insults combined to anger me so, that I gat a lovely habit as a child of crooking my elbow over my face the instant he looked at me, and giving him a view of nothing but a red tongue maliciously stuck out at him from the triangle thus formed. I have not seen him since I was eight. In fact, he died before I was ten." Lady Astraea laughed. "He was an avaricious, bitter man, but hu had a long head, and he was honest. As for his son, my son got him his place in the.ltalian Legation, and he is now a most presentable young fellow, quite above 'gebbling' all one's peaches. He was at our house for a week last hunting season. I hope to see him my granddaughter's husband. I would not wish her father's death to exile her from her birth place. However, now

V BY DUNCAN McGKEGOR ? If Author of "Kennedy's Foe," 'Tshmael Reformed," V "A Game of Three," "Edna's Peril." / Etc, etc.

they are merely jolly young friends." "The carriage is coming;; back," said Persis. "Ladyl; Astraea, what ought we to do nuw?"

"Nothing during the few months your m<thcr has to live. She will attest this statement nf the substitution of a stranger's child for her own and her lawyer will see that all arrangements are properly made, that late justice shall be done. Poor Charlotte, with all her resolute battling with disease she will hardly live out the summer."

CHAPTER 11. CHARLOTTE ORMESBY BEQUEATHES HEK SECRET. Again Astraea :;,H?rcourt was sitting by the cou<'h"*of Charlotte Ormesby. Once more the sick woman had rallied all hc-r powers and had set death at bay. and by all meretricious aids was striving to cheat herself and her friends as to the steady advance of disease. Persis, while with sad eyes she stood by watching Adelaide ruuge the faded cheek and lips, sprinkle perfumes and dispose flowers, ribbons and baubles, felt a secret relief that these were not the pitiful follies of her mother. But now Adelaide had been banished, and Mrs Ormesby was alone with Lady Astraea and this honest girl, whom so long she had placedjn a false position. She had resolved to tell her story. There is no satisfaction in a half confession; it affords neither the triumph of concealment nor the relief of restitution. "Lady Astraea, do you remember that 1 was at your son's wedding at the home nf your daughter in-law's grandmother, at Bayswater terrace:" "Yes, I remember, and your child was then a year and a-half old. and very delicate, and you had lst't her at Lyme Regis with a nurse. I know I spoke to you about neglecting her, and you were vexed, and then I congratulated myself that you had taken my advice to heait, for; you went for the child, brought her to London for advice, and became the most attentive of mothers. Six month? later Mrs Ormesby died." "I knovy changed, changed sud' denly, completely; but not your repi oof, but Peter Probyn's sneers did the work. Some one said to me that I did not seem to be enjoying myself, and hastily retorted that I I hated weddings. I felt a little ashamed of that, and went into the conservatory and sat down behind a mass of ferns. Presently Peter Probyn and Sir Walter Ware came up. Probyn whs saying: I TO RE OONTINCJED.'i