"The Chains of Bondage."

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10050, 26 July 1910, Page 2

"The Chains of Bondage."

CHAPTEK Vl.—Continued

"I hope you are really feeling better, Mibs Fairfax," Tr«vena 'said'in his pleasant well-bred voic••.• "You startled me; you looked sa white for a moment." Judith laughed. Her laugh was an outlet for the relief she ft.lt. Clearly Txevena had no suspicion that they had met before. The overwhelming relief of that thought! After all, why should he have recognised her?—a .woman in a very different sphere of life, to whom he had done a service that no doubt had passed from his mind within an hour. And yet the fact brought Judith a sudden new sense of confidence Sybil Ellstree was a little surprised at Judith's unusual animation at dinner that night; all the.afternoon, while shopping together, and at Miss Ellstree's club, wHere they had dropped in for tea, she had been oddly silent a' d pr-2-occupied To-nutji, aR tpe four\of s . them sat down to table, Judith seemed suddenly to have flung off the grave mood, as if responsive to the infectious exhilaration of her surroundings—the music, the ceaseless laughter and chatter of gay voices about them, the glitter of lights } learning on tne white shoulders if he radiant women,and catching t.e flash of diamoods in their tmi); ere. where life seemed ni rose Laves—a world of luxury x and pleasure, oent only on soar, hing-she delight of the p'-issiiig moment—it was difficult to t >rik that care could possible intrude. ■

Certainly no one. looking into Judith's face as she gave herself up to the spell of the hour and the scene, would have dreamed of'a'sso dating black care with her smiling, radiant beauty, to which bo many glances strayed from tables near, on which Ellstree'e. eyes rested again and again with a scarcely veiled admiiation. He thought Judith had never looked so beautiful; he had never known her so brilliant and charming—though perhaps a subtle observer might have detected a forced notenow and again behind her gay talk jnd laughter, for'this unexpected mi eti ig with John Trevena bad not beau her only reminder that day that she was living on the brink of a volcano.

More than once that night the four walls of it)is scene of life, and colour and movement—the surroundings she had dreamed of enviously whao her feet had been in the mirs—hßd seemed to fall away, and the ghosts of the past became like realities again. Ghosts of the past that would not be laid—that a word or allusion would recall; that had swept back on herewith this meeting with Trevena. Ljke, moving -pictures on. a Bcreen her memory would show he,r, as vividly as though she were living through it again, the events of that dreadful night which had been the breaking point of her old life—now '■her desperate flight from a flat wliere a man lay dead; now her dreary tramping of street after street, waiting until she would be able to find and get her boy away; then the sudden glimpse of a crowd —an excited crowd—outside a big building, with countless upturned eyes bent on the lighted window high up;;where the shadows of figures moved on the blind. And she could remember the very tones of the voice that she had heard: "His wife done it—not a doubt she murdered himlShe's bolted, but the police will have her befure morning!" Words that had brought home to this.desperate woman the realisation that she was suspected, was in dangei? of arrest—that she would never be able to claim her child now! "You are staying in town for the season, I suppose. Miss Fairfax?" ',.,' It wa3 Trevena speaking. Judith looked across at him as her light tones answered him. How little he dreamed of the ghosts of memory the sight of him had stirred i "Yes; I've just taken up myquar« ters in Green Street," Judith said. "A furnished house that Sir Wilfred was able to tell me of—quite a little band box of a house, but altogether charming. I was only too glad to move in at once. I suppose only Americans really enjoy living in hotels?"

During the past two months Judith and the Ellstrees had struck up a close friendship She liked Wilfred Ellstree, a big, good natured schoolboy of a man; whose whole interest in liie seemed to lis in racing and sport. That she had made a strong impression on Ellstree, a man who, as a rule, did not care for women's society, was obvious to John Trevfcna to-night, as, it had been nbvious to Judith herself almost from the beginning of their acquaintance. Sybil i.ad already contemplated the possibility of having to welcome Judith at some no distant date as sister-in-law; and since her brother's affairs were usually in a more or less involved state, the prospect was by no raeana Displeasing, tnough Sybil was less attracted than her brother by their; new acquaintance. Judith's strange moods, alternating irom an almost feverish gaiety to tt'ise of brooding pre-occupation, puzzled her.

BY EMILY B. EETHEEINGTON. , Author o£—"His College Cham," " Pledge," "A Sepenant Fog," eic.

"And thertfs something about her t-yei that's almost ci'sgsc at times," Sybil had £Bid to a confidante. "Oh, | no doubt It's natural, with her bitter memories of the ruin to which her faiher brought -himself and his daughter, 'and of the dull existence as a governess to which she was doomed' in consequence until her uncle's rieaih; but it gets on my nerves some times." S.vbil ratbfr affected nerves. Tieve.na thought tonight of what Jim BalMon had said in reference to this bear.tiful woman to whom he had been introduced: "The eyes of a woman for ever looking back into the past, into some great fear or some deep sorrow." Yes;; those dark eyes held a secret. ; Even when she was laughing and i talking her lightest, .that expression: \ was Ptill in Judith's eye?, like the watchful look of a woman always on her guard That was how Trevena..interpreted that expressnn in their inscrutable depths,which other observers had-read differently, and each, perhVps in part at least ripht. 'We atked Jim Ralston to dine with us, but he had an engagement." Sybil said, aa they sipped Turkish coffee, and began to think of the theatre where Ellatree hadtaken a box. "We've scarcely seen anything of him lately, and I know he's in town. He speaks as though he was very busy: but what's the'good of having a rich father if one pleads work an an excuse for neglecting one's friends?" she added plantively to Trevena. "Ob, Jim's ambitious, 1 think! I know he's been working rather hard lately," said Trevena. "I saw him a day or two ago, when he looked me up on the river at Cookham." "The upper Thames somehow suggests a companion of the opposite sex —•and my impression is there's a lady in the casp," laughed El t«.e; and Sybil's lips tightened. "Anynuw, I saw him talking to a girl ot Derby Day—don't know who she was, but she was uncommonly good looking, though I can't get Sib to agree with me on that point. Who ia she, Trevena?"

Trevena laughed in a noncommittal way. He had seen Sybil's expression, and he was; a man of tact.

"Oh, I'm not in Jim's secrets!" he said lightly. "I don't know about Jim's sec-i-eta; but no one seems to be in his father's," said Elistree. "How does old Paul Ralaion make his money? I wish I had bis secret, anyway, for there's no doubt he does make itonly the recipe's a mystery, like old Paul himself!" he added with a laugh, as they rose from the table; A mystery! The words lingered in Judith's mind, as she walked by Ellstree's side through the crowded dining hall, with many eyes turned to look after her as she passed, if have,known how his ! description of Jim Kalstbn's father would have fitted her!

Only,this woman told herself suddenly to-night, she was going to steel herself; she bad been a fool to let herself look back, to give rein to her tears, 'irevena ,had not iecognised her. that unexpected encounter had seemed like a test; it gave her confidence. Why need she fear that any one would recognise her? She would tench herself to forget the past, and those phantom dangers that had tortured her—to give herself up to the full enjoyment of the present, filled with its heaped up pleasure, try to drown in the whirl of tx.'itement those memories of her child tbat'racked her heart.

;They walked through the vestibule; in the covered courtyard an attendant whistled for two taxicabs.

fAs they stood waiting, a long glas the wall mirrored for a momen Judith's full length the superb figure, the striking face, with the brilliant, almost black eyes. As she looked for a fleeting instant at her mirrored reflection, it struck her how amazing was the change the last few months had made in her; it was a different woman frcm the Judith who had stared out at the storm on Epsom Downs; the sullen expression which had marred her beauty then was gone, with the cheap, tawdry clothes of Gilbert Hardress' wife—no wonder Trevena had failed to recognise her! TO BS CONTINXTBO