PRIMROSE DELORAINE

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10305, 4 August 1911, Page 2

PRIMROSE DELORAINE

OUR SERIAL.

THE MISER'S DAUGHTER.

By MAISIE PENDENNIS. Author of "Sir Reginald's Whim," "The Forgotten Heir," "Rival Beauties,' 'etc.

CHAPTER XX—Continued

"Am I to understand," he asked, and his voice shook a little, "that this is your husband, Valerie? And am I to understand that you thought he was dead—had had news of his death —although you let me go on believing he was stall alive? Have you been so untrue to me as that?" His eyes met and held hers in a grave, appealing gaze, and she looked back at him ; but she said nothing. Not a word. And the silence over which tragedy brooded grew tenser and tenser. Poker Bill laugher malevolently as ho watched the scene. "I've no doubt that you are to understand all that," he said, addressing himself to Sir Gerard, "and a good deal more. Yes, lam hor husband, she's my wife. We're a nico wellmatched pair, aren't we. We got married in the irresponsible way that young fools do get married, te nyears ago; and wo were equal then in social position. My name in those days was —well, never mind. That doesn't concern you. It's Poker Bill now, and that's good enough. Our marriage wasn't a success. She said it was my fault, I said it was hers; anyway, it wasn't a success. And I wish the fool that wrote that marriages were made in heaven could have had a taste of

mine. "In the'end I went to the bad altogether. Perhaps I hadn't far to go, but that's a detail. Gambling and drinking and racing began my downfall, and ahigh-kick dancer at a music hall completed it. Then I bolted, and finally landed up in Australia, and drifted into the Bush; and there I've lived for more years than I care to count, and my experiences have been what the writing chaps call 'something varied.' " He paused for a moment, then strode forward, and put his great hand heavily on Mrs Vivian's shoulder, laughing with brutal amusement. "Don't look so down in the mouth, my girl," he went on. "Things will go wrong sometimes. What's your little game ? What have you been playing at with this friend of yours? I suppose he's all on the square, and wants to. marry you; and you don't want to marry him, and are not on the square ,and so you've been keeping him hanging on to serve your own ends. I shouldn't mind betting that there is another man in the business, a man you want to marry, but you've found this one too useful to give • up. ;I,jShould.,sayy; judging from .what I used, to know of you, that you have been spending his money pretty freely. "That's about the size of it, isn't it. You see, I haven't forgotten you and your little-ways though it is seven years since I saw you, and a lot can happen in that time. Have I hit the right nail on the head? Speak up." He laughed again. But still Mrs Vivian was silent. Then she turned slowly and looked at him and if looks could kill Poker Bill would have faded out of existence at that moment.

knowledge that the man whom she hated with a deadly, consuming hatred —the man who had spoiled her life, and heen the ban of her existence, still lived —she went nigh to losing all control of herself. She knew that the coming of this man —her husband in tho'eyes of the law —meant the end of all things for her. With one fell blow ho would send all her hopes and ambitions crashing to the ground. With one fell blow he would bring all her carefully laid plans to naught. And more than that, ho would delight in the doing of it, would revel in her undoing, as such cruel, fiendish natures will. He would never rest till he had ferreted out all the most cherished secrets of her soul, and then he would do his utmost to, as he would phrase it, "spoil her little game." And how well he would succeed only she, who long time ago had plumbed all the wicked depths of his diabolical' nature, could guess. As she thought of it all, he whole being seemed set aflame with a seething fury terrible in its impotent helplessness. A fury that sent her mad, and swept over her like a swilling, tempestuous whirlwind, overmastering her completely. All her life since he had first come in it this man, who had once been what the world calls a gentleman, and now was better known as Poker Bill, J had been her evil genius. She had J fallen on her knees,in swift thanksgiving when he had left her six years before. But even then his hated shaddow had still loomed over her in the shape of threatening bullying letters, sent to her from time to time demand- ■ ing money. Up till a year ago ' e had ! been a constant drain upon her; but a '■ year ago she had received the news of his death, and life had stretched before her free. Gloriously free and unfettered. For a whole year she had reveled, in secret, at the knowledge of her freedom. And now

Now he had turned up again, just at the crisis of her life, to change the joy and triumph that might have filled the scales of fortune for her, to torture and despair. To thwart her, to set all the house of'cards that she had built with such cautious care tumbling about her ears. To make all her plots and schemes vain, useless, null and void. ' It was a thought calculated to send a stronger soul than the frivolous, butterfly soul of Valerie Vivian mad. And, as in one blinding flash of desperate understanding she realised it all, a tremendous tempest of wild, ungovernable emotion swept o.ver her, goading her to a perfect frenzy of insensate fury.

"I wish," she said, in a low, tense tone, that yet sounded oddly unemotional, "I wish you wero dead, and I wish I had something to kill you with —I would do it." And yet again there was silence, heavy, pulsating, electric* while the shadow of tragedy brooded nearer: still: , „ • the .silence turned quietly away,, and went out of the room. The sound of the closing door cuti the: waiting stillness like a knife, and Mrs Vivian drew a quivering breath. "I wish you were dead," she said again; "I wish I had something to kill you with." Her face, aa she turned it towards him, was absolutely colourless, a mask of ice; cold and Avhite as a marble stone; Her small figure was still and tense and rigid, and one small hand pressed heavily down on a little round table, littered with a miscellaneous assortment of bric-a-brac and quaint Eastern trifles that stood by her side. She looked like a rare, fragile piece of exquisite porcelain, so still, so coldly, lifelessly beautiful was she, standing there in lovely, frozen sweetness. Only her eyes—those large bright eyes of hers—burned with a fevered, frenzied light. The light that speaks r of a desperate woman at bay, goaded to the verge of madness by a vision from out a past that she had thought and prayed was dead. Only her eyes burned and burned. . ' In that moment, distraught by the

In that moment her feeling swamp- f ed her, overwhelmed her, mastered 1 her,. In that moment only one desiro ' possessed her heart and mind and soul, and set them aflame with a flame that is kindled at the fire of hell. In that moment she was mad—mad —mad! Unconsciously her, fingers gripped the table tighter, and as they did so. they closed over a hard cold substance. Looking down, with wild, half-seeing eyes, she saw that it was a small, quaint glittering dagger that her hand touched—a dainty, dangerous thing of';carved ivory and gleaming steel. It looked just like a child's toy as it lay there, glinting in the light, but she knew that'it was no'toy. ' She knew that it was as fatally deadly as many a larger weapon; she knew that its pointed, fine blade was sharp as a poisoned 'arrow, and "that once, .it struck home to a human, heart that heart would beat no more in this world. That heart would beat no more in this world! One stab, one swift, piercin gthrust, and the mocking fiend who faced her. with the smile of an incarnate devil on his lips, would troublo her no more. One swift stab, and the sneering evil tongue would never sneer in evil words again! One swift stab, and the man who, if he lived, would ruin all her future life, would be hulled into another world —cease to exist for her! *> The mad flame that seemed to hold all her tortured, frenzied being in a glowing, fiery furnace scorched fiercer and ever fiercer within her, leaping about her with stinging, poisoned fangs—tongues of hot, consuming fire s (To be Continued).