"Mrs Lorrimer's Folly.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 13 June 1913, Page 2

"Mrs Lorrimer's Folly.

(OUR|SERIAL

By Charlotte M. Stanley. Author of "Edna's Vow," "His Country Cousin." "How an Oath Was Kept," "A Wo man Wronged."

CHAPTER XXVll.—Continued. Tho fortune could wait, of course; Lady H'olmo's wishes concerning Will's education 'night be,complied with, and ho thus be fitted for station and wealth whenever the time came for him to claim' them. But how about that unlucky fancy which Lillian had confided to her about Clarice? How if she should persist in the notion and imbue the young pesopie with it? Bertha trembled for the sorrow that might result. "I wouldn't ha.vo her say anything about it to them for the world!" she thought, and yet 1 can't tell her the reason why." And children are so precocious nowadays; and the girl—well, of course, she can be halt eleven, but she looks fully twelve. Heaven knows what mischief might come of the very suggestion! Oh, how Ido wish and pray that poor Fred may come homo!"

Not .many prayers are so quickly answered. Scarcely had the words—unconsciously uttered aloud—left her Jipa when she heard her name spoken softly. . "Bertha!" said a tremulous voice ; —"Qbusiu Bertha!" and turning quickly, she' saw Fred standing on the veranda locking ill upon her from the open door. He looked older,, of course, and greatly changed. Hi s figure looked broader and stronger, and his face had a beard and was bronzed and careworn nd pale; but the voice and the eyes were the voice and the eyes of Fred, in spite of their expression of utter sadness.

Only for a brief instant did Bertha hesitate; then, with a cry of welcoming gladness, she flew to, him and clasped hi*rt in her arms "Thank God!" she cried. "Oh, my dear, my dear! How could you stay away from us so long and suffer so —how could you*.have the heart, to do it? Oh, welcome home.! welcome homo!"

She dragged him • into the room, and closed and locked the verandah dopr behind him,,and forced him into the softest, easiest chair, and then sat down herself and fairly cried for joy. The welcome, to this poor fellow who had been an outcast from all his own so long, was sa overpowering that, after a moment's struggle for composure, he fairly gsive way and covered his face with both his hand s lest she should see how jjis tears kept her company.

"You don't reproach me, then. 9 " he said at last. "Although I'inay come between you and the child you have cherished so long, you don't reproach .me?"

"Reproach you?" She laughed the very idea of it to scorn. "Yes, I do; but only for not coming sooner. The boy will not love us the less, dear Fred —and how he will wel-, come you! He knows, Fred, for we have told him."

"Knows?" lie, turned paler at her words. "Knows what, .Bertha?". ''Knows that /foji are Fred Lorrimer. and not John B n, and that; Fred 'Loi'rimer s hi fithet!" "Is that so indeed M e saw a shade pass oyer his iace. "L am sorry for his mother's sake. f. would keep all sorrow from her, Bertha. But if the boy knows I ain jji s father and betrays it to her, I foresee all sorts of trouble." Thpy both sat silent for a moment —-he musing, she watching him. Then; she said suddenly : "Fred, do you love her still?" He started, and his pale' face flushed sudden crimson. . "Ask me do I breathe!" lie answered passionately. "Ah, I never knew how well until'tonight!"

And then ho told her had lmppenel in the garddii but just. now. "She thought it was a spirit, I suppose," said Bertha softly. "Fred, you were too harsh with her long ago; she has told me of your foolish quarrel.

x And then she tokl him the true story of the ball dress. He listened with his sorrowful eyes cast down.

"Too late!" ho said, raising tliem when she had finished. "All too late! Why do I hear this now? Better to never have known it. Can the knowledge wipe out the past or undo tho present? Can it alter the fitet that her young daughter stands between us forover, or make her any other than the wife of Sir Gilbert Holme and the mother of his child?" Bertha involuntarily started at that . name.

"Sir Gilbert is here—here in this house—now!" she exclaimed impulsively. Fred looked in surprise. "What brings him here?" he n;ked. "I don't know'," she answered him. "He is not very friendly with his wife, I think. I was only thinking," she added hurriedly, "how strange that you two should both be under the same roof. Hark! what was that?"

A tapping at the glass door which vshe had locked, and across which she had drawn the curtain—a tapping repeated quickly and urgently. "Who's'there ?" demanded yet speaking low. The answer camo hack, low also, yet distinct and clear: "Open the door to me, Bertha — it is f —Lillian—Lady Hohie. Open the door for God's sake!" CHAPTER XXVIIf. Bertha and Fred stared into each other's face as if turned to stono. She was tho first to recover herself. "What shall I do?" she asked, with her hand upon the door, at which the impatient tapping wa.s again repeated. "Will yon' sen her?" "Not for the vvido world," he answered vehemently. "What have I

to do with Sir Gilbert's wife? Let mo go, or hide mo somewhere." The tapping was continued all this time, and Lillian's low voice without pleaded impatiently: "Oh, let me in! let mo in!" Bertha glanced around her in bewilderment. Her eyes fell on her own bedroom door. "Go in there," s he whispered Fit "No one will com© there but Du 1 - and if you lock the door on the inside, not even he. Go quickly! I can keep her waiting no longer!"

The bedroom led off from the sitting room and again by that other door, of which Bertha had spoken, gave out into the hall. Bertha never paused to consider that every word spoken above a whisper in the sitting room would be perfectly audible to a person in the bedroom, if that person chose to hear:

. Even if she had remembered: it, it wag 'unavoidable. She only waited for Fred to close the door, and then hurried to answer Lillian's summons which had never ceased, but stilt sounded low and urgent at the verandah door. As Bertha opened this and gave admittance to a trembling figure, cloaked and veiled, that was followed into the room by a wild gusi of wind and burst of rain, she thought involuntarily

"Aye! there's be storm within ar well as storm without presently! To think of them—Lillian and her two husbands—all under this roof together, and neither knowing of the other's presence. There's a fate in it! Something strange will surely happen to-night!" She helped her visitor to take off her wet bonnet and cloak, and noticed how slio trembled.

! "You're frightened," said Bertha | kindly. "Did you come here alone? •I am sorry to have kept you so long waiting at the dopr, but*—" . ' She stopped, being at a loss for a plausible excuse, but Lillian did not net ice it. Having recovered breath and something of self-control, she began eagerly: "It is for me to apologise. I knew this room was yours, having been in it the other day, and it was then I noticed the glas s door. Seeing the light, I guessed you were here, and' thought I might come to you unobserved. T have something so terrible and strange to tell you! But I don't want anyone to see me here" . —with a, questioning glance at the door. "I should like to feel thatno one will interrupt us!"' Bertha rose .and locked the door.

"This is our private room," she said. "No mio is likely to come here for half an hour, but this will make sure of it. Now, what has happened?" (To be Continued.)