The Storyteller. PROOF POSITIVE.

Waikato Argus, Volume II, Issue 94, 13 February 1897, Page 1 (Supplement)

The Storyteller. PROOF POSITIVE.

*— CHAPTER. I. It was the Professor himself, and no other. He was standing at the corner of the street beneath a lamp-post, and though his head was so far bent downward as to set his face in complete shadow, I recognised him by the queer old Noah's Ark coat he always wore, and the shapelessly picturesque, unmistakeable old hat. 1 stopped my hurried walk within three yards of him, but he gave no Bigu of any knowledge of my presence. The night was extraordinarily cold for London—the thermometer actually indicated zero—and the wind blew in ill-tempered gusts which sent an icy shiver through my younger blood, though I was stoutly wrapped against the weather, and had walked swiftly. At intervals between the blasts a fine dusty snow was falling. The sky was as black as ink, and it would have been hard to picture to the mind a scene mose desolate than this suburban street corner. Yet here was the Professor within thirty yards of his own cosy fireside, standing alone and dreaming wide awake, without knowledge of the frowning night. I made absolutely sure of him, and then, advancing, touched him on tho shoulder. ' Professor ! Dr Zeck !' He started and stared at me as if I had been a stranger, but in a minute the beautiful infantile smile with which he always greeted his friends shone in his face, and he stretched out his hand towards me. ' It is you, Alwayne V he said. A shiver ran through him from head to foot, and his teeth chattered as he spoke. ' But, by Heavens !' he added, hugging himself with both arms, ' it is cold.' ' You are waiting for some one ?' I asked him. ' Nein !' said the Professor ; ' I wait for nobody. I was thinking, that is all.' I gave him my arm, and we moved towards his house together. He walked stiffly, as if cramped by cold, and twice or thrice he shivered strongly, ' Come,' I said, quickening my pace a little, and almost dragging him forward. 'This will not do. This absent-mindedness of yours will be the death of you some day. How long were you standing there, dreaming in the cold V ' That,' he said, sbivering so violently that he could not walk, * I cannot tell you.' His teeth rattled like dice in a box, and with a momentary but genuine fear of his condition I put one arm about his waist, and half carried, half supported him to his own door. There I sounded a noisy peul at the bell, and (this being answered at once ) in less than a minute I had the old gentlemau in his own warm arm-chyir before the fire. I ordered hot coffee for him, and when it came, I gave him a stiff dose of cognac with the first cup. By-and-bye, under the influence of this timely stimulant, and the restoring warmth of the room, he grew quite comfortable again, and the colour came back to his face, which was first so leaden in its hue as to fill me with alarm. *' Ah !' he said, ' that is better. Do you know, Alwayne, I am very much, of an old fool V ' No, no, Professor,' I responded ; I I have never thought that of yon. But you need to be looked after. What were you so absorbed in when 1 came up with you V ' A little experiment I tried this morning,' he answered mildly. ' I will show you of it in a day or two. It failed to-day, but I think I have him by tho tail.' Then he smiled again, in his own childlike, loveable way, and fell to chaffing his hands above the fire. ' Give me my pipe, Alwayne, that is a good fellow. You are thanked. What should I have done had you not awakened me ? Should I have Btood still to freeze ? Do you know? —my grandfather was the same sort of old fool that I am. He was a great man, my grandfather, but a dreamer. I used to see him in my youth so buried in his own thoughts that you might have fired cannon about him without result. I used to envy that self-absorption. I used to say, •' What would I give to live so absolutely in my own thoughts ?" And now that I do it, and cannot help doing it, it is no boon. It is pure wool-gathering half the time, and 1 pass for a silly old man. Eh ?' I made no answer, for my mind was full of othor matter. But when he had packed the big porcelain bowl, had lit his pipe, and leaned back in his chair, puffing with an aspect of twinkling enjoyment, lie asked me a questton which gave me an opening for what I had in my heart to say. ' Where were you going, Alwayne, when we met just now?' 'I was coming here, sir.' I faltered, and my heart began to beat thickly. He must have caught something curious in the tone, for he looked up and took his pipe from his lips witii awakened attention. 'For any special purpose?' he asked. ' For a very special purpose,' I responded. I took my courngo iu

both hands and stumbled on. ' I have been through my books tonight. I iind that my practice is increasing in a steady ratio. In the last year I have earned two thousand pounds !' ' Good !' he said emphatically ; ' Good !' 'This,' I continued, 'is an income on which I can venture to marry. Apart from inclination, marriage is a prudent thing for a medical man of thirty,' ' Undoubtedly,' said the Professor, emitting a great cloud of smoke. 1 Prudent, if the choice bo prudent.' •'I have made up my mind about the choice, sir. these two years past. I came here to-night to ask your permission to offer myself to your grand-daughter. ' God in heaven !' said the Professor in his native tongue, It was spoken so quecrly that to my nervous fancy it sounded like an unqualified, amazed rejection, but in another second the old man was shaking me warmly by the hand. ' My dear Alwayne, I have loved you this fifteen years,' ho said with much warmth and feeling, 'ever since you virst game to me to study ghemisdry.' Ho was very German for a moment in his excitement, but he cooled down almost at once, and after a renewed hand-shake he walked back to the chair he had quitted, and sat there, his pipe pendent from his lips, a hand on either knee, and his face one cordial, delighted beam, «I am flattered by your kindness,' I began, but ho spread out both hands against me, 1 You have any idea V ho asked. ' You have not spoken to her 1 Listen ! that is she. 1 A ring sounded at the front door, and in a minute the door was bright and terrible with the presence of my beloved. Anybody is welcome to laugh at the words. They are true. How sweet she looked, with her hair just powdered with snow, and the white wollen cloud she wore setting off the rich colour of her cheek? Her eyes shone like twin stars, beauty to an astonishing brightness. * Oh,' she said pantingly, ' such a struggle homo ? I have been only a dozen doors away, and I had to tight to got there, The wind blows like a hurricane, and the snow is blinding.' The Professor arose, laid down his pipe, walked round the centre table to where she stood, and took her in his arms and kissed her. 'Stay here !'he said. 'Alwayne has something to say to you.' She looked at me with some surprise, and hor colour altered. The old man left the room, and we both stood embarrassed. She had half thrown off the wollen cloud of white. which had obscured her head, and her beautiful chestnut hair was a little disordered, Her eyes were shy, and their lids were heavy. She had nocoura«e to look at me, and I gathered fire from her shyness, and passing round the table took her unresisting hand in both mine, and spoke to her. ' Kathryn,' I said, ' I have j ust asked your grandfather if he would be willing to see me your husband. I have his full consent to speak to you. I have worked all the while to be able to speak to you. Now I can offer yon a home if you will sharo it with me. Can you care for me at all, Kathryn ? She laughed slyly aad happily. She made no pretence of coyness. ' I care a great deal,' she said. 1 Do you care enough to be my wife V I asked her. She looked up, and her beau tiful eyes met mine. The rich blood was mantling in her cheeks again, and I drank the warm fragrance of her breath. I drew her hands nearer to me and sideways, outward, and she swayed towards me until her lips touched mine. J took her in my arms, and I covered her with kisses until she escaped from me, ' Oh, for shame V she said, ' to use a poor girl so ! Look at my hair.' It was indeed in such delicious disorder, that I should have been less, or, more than human if I had not kissed her again, Rut at this she fairly ran away from me, and I heard her silvery voice, as clear as ever, but with a sort of ringing tremor, calling : ' Grandpapa ! Mr Alwayne has something to say to you.' This was followed by a little laugh which spoke a thousand things of happiness and shyness to my heart, and then with a soft storm of rustling skirts she ran up-slairs to her own room. The Professor came to me with open eyes, wondering, as it turned out afterwards, what had broken up this conference so quickly. In the very midst of the excess of delight, I was conscious of looking embarrassed and absurd. I shook that feeling off, however, and I took the dear old man by the hand. I had always loved him and revered him, but never had such a full sun of friendship warmed my breast. I could have thrown my arms about him and hugged him to my heart. 1 She is mine, Professor.' That was all I had the wit (o say, 'Good !' he answered, shaking my hand hard , ' good ? I would not have it otherwise. You are a good fellow, Alwayne—a good man. For Kathyrn, no barter girl was ever born. Ah, to-night my friend how she shone upon me like her mother! Her sacred mother, my dear Alwayne. She is with God these many years, She went bei'or;! my wife. And sometimes, they are

all so alike, I forget. I could almost dream that I am not an old man, and that Kathryn is the little girl I made love to so very long ago.' He was moved to tears, and ho mado no disguise. He mopped his eyes unaffectedly, and then having blown his nose with a stentorian sound he took up his pipe and relit it, and leaned back, smiling, in his chair. Tho moisture iu his eyes made his smile more childlike and bright and endearing than I. had ever seen it. My own happiness at that moment was so warm and tender that I had no resistance this time for the impulse which overcame me. I stooped above him and kissed his cheek. ' You won't lose your granddaughter,' I said. ' There will be room for all of us, and ru> dear old master shall have a lifelong welcome.' He pressed my hand in answer, and with a tap at the door before she entered, Kathryn was back again. ' I am goiug to the kitchen,' she said, thrustiug her head round the door, and laughing and blushing at once with an exquite prettiness. Her happiness made my heurt ache with joy. It was the certainty of my love which lent that new charm to her beauty. She had loved me. I divined it all with a pleasure which was pain. She had loved me long bofore I had spoken, and now our hearts ami our wills were one. It was ail as real as the solid earth, and yet, I had a fear lest I might awaken and prove it a dream. ' I am going to the kitchen,' said Kathryn, laughing and blushing and shy and saucy in the same breath. ' For grandpapa will allow no one else to make his omelette. You shall have some if you're good—Robert.' It was the first time she had over called me by my Christian name ; and there was something so captivating in the grace of it, it was done with so rosy and harmless aud dimpled a mischief, that if 1 had not been fathoms deep in love already, I should have dived at that instant. ' Sans adieu 1' she said, nodding to each of us, and so was gone, leaving me staring at the blank door as if heaven had gone from my gaze. That ' Robert' was like a gift of herself. It was as if she had hidden the name in her breast till then, and dared now to own it for the first time. The Professor had very simple aud old-fashioned habits. He dined at two, took tea at six, and supper au hour before going to bed. I had often sat at these innocent banquets —these nine o'clock regales of fish or omelette or the like—some simple, inexpensive thing which it was Kathryn's delight to prepare for the old man's enjoyment. Ho had but one costly taste. His cellar held the best Berncastlor I ever saw poured, and he took a glass or two of it at supper-time unfailingly. ' Come !' he said. ' We will commemorate this great hour, Alwayne. I will ring for a candle, and you shall light me to the cellar. There is a dozen such wine—well, I will not boast. Emperors drink it, kings and kaisers, aud among common men I am tho sole possessor. I saved tho life of the grower, and ever since, for fifty years now, I have had yearly half-dozen—my tribute. Come! Wo will fetch out the oldest of them all.' The maid had entered whilst he was still speaking, and she now returned with a lighted candle, which she left upon the table. I led tho way which I had travelled many a hundred times before, for the bringing up of the bottle thrice a week or so had been rry duty when I had lived with the Professor as his pupil, and the old man, chatting excitedly, followed in my footsteps. By some little bit of ignorance or carelessness the vvay to the bin had been bocked by a heap of dusty firewood, and we had to clear all this away before we could get at the precious vintage on the lower shelves. Wo mada merry over this, but we grew very grimy in the process both of us, and on our return to the sitting-room each laughed at the other's aspect. ' This is soon removed,' said the Professor. ' Come up-stairs.' I followed him and when we had made ourselvos presentable once more belaid a hand upon my shoulder and said rather gravely that he would like to show mo something. He led me to another apartment which I knew at once belonged to Kathryn, and for a moment I hesitated to stay in it, for my mere presence there seemed almost like a desecration of its virginal privacy. It was beautifully ordered everywhere, and there was an odour of lavender which reminded me tenderly of its occupant, The Professor took the candle from my hand and moved before me. ' I do not earn much of late years,' he said, ' but I spend so little. One of these days this will be yours, Alwayne, and even if I am not proud, I do not like you to think that Kathryn is portionless.' I noticed an iron safe let solidly into the wall. It proved to be without a key, for, when the Professor laid a hand upon the brass knob of the door, it yielded to the tug he gave it, and opened. He took from it an unlocked common cash-box, and showed me layer upon layer of Bank of England notes. ' There was four thousand pounds there,' he said simply as he closed the box and returned it back into the safe. ' That is for Kathryn when I am gone'. ' Hub surely,' 1 caid, ( it is unwise

to keep so large a sum of money in so unprotected a place. Tho safe-door is open.' 'Ah ! the Professor answered with his innocent smile, ' 1 have lost the key. That is my fault. But nobody knows of it except Kathryn and myself, The two servants have been with us for years, and are as honest as the day. There is no danger.' ' Surely it would bo safer to send it to the bank,' I urged him. 1 1 daresay,' he answered care lossly, 'lt can go,' he added 1 There is no reason why it should nob go. It is the saving of my life. Whenever I have had money I did not want, I have put it there. Some of it is there for forty years.' I might have given him the advantage of a little business eommonsense on this matter, if he hud not told me that one day the money would come to Kathryn, who, many years before that happened, would, I hoped, be my wife. That consideration kept me silent, hut ib seemed a pity to have kept money unproductive and idle all that time, Wo went down-stairs together, and by-and-bye Kathryn summoned us to the dining-room, and there, with her own hands, served the omelette she had made, Tho Professor himself uncorked the precious bottle and poured out the wine, and we all three touched glasses and drank. ' I mado songs once,' said tho Professor, ' when I was young and foolish. I made a song about this wine : ' Not a moonbeam ever fell On the stream I know so well, But the wine has kept its sp?ll. ' Never lover strolled along Moselle's leafy woods anions, But the wine preserves bis song, 1 There was more of it, but I forget. But all the kindly Moselle valley, all the pretty stream, and the green banks, and the quiet little towns, and the girls and the boys with their pretty little fancies—they are all in that bottle. Eh ?' It was a happy hour, and I can see Kathryn yet as if she were actually before me in all the guileless pride and beauty of her youth. It was a happy hour, and it came to an end. I had to rise at last, and make ready to go; but Kathryn was afraid of the night, and prophesied that I should never reach home. She accompanied me into the hall to say good-bye, and how shall I ever forget the joy and sorrow of that parting? It was hard to surrender such a rapture as her presence gave me. At length I took my last farewell and threw open the door. The blast drove me back, and my head came into unpleasant contact with the wall of the corridor. Tho snowrushed beating in, in flakes as large as a child's hand, and in a mere instant the floor of the passage was covered to the depth of an inch or more by the blowing in of the drift which had piled itself outside. 1 Close the door !' cried Kathryn, and I set myself to do it, but the wind blew so fiercely that she had to come to my assistance. The inrushing tempest had tumbled half-a-dozen objects in tho hall, and amongst the rest had thrown down an engraving and a weather-glass. The tumult brought out the old Professor, who looked about him with amazement. ' You must sleep hero to night, Alwayne,' he said. 'lt is not a night to turn out a dog.' I made some little objection, but I was over-ruled, aud, to tell the truth, I was not sorry to b?, housed. I was threo miles from home, and that blinding storm would have cleared the streets of every vehicle. There was a little bustlo whilst the corridor was swept and the debris which bestrewed it cleared aw ay, and then Kathryn ran off to superintend the preparation of my chamber, which had not been occupied for years. She came down with laughing reports of a smokiug chimney, and as she opened the door I had a siijht of the two females of the household in the act of mounting the stairs, the one currying a great pile of blankets, and the other a heap of folded hedlinen. Then, when all the preparations were completed, we had a quiet halfhour together, which, to me, was like a bit of heaven. Weseparated but not for the night, for the old man came to my room and sat with me. By-and-bye we heard Kathryn's voice calling softly at the door of his room. ' I am here, my treasure,' said the Professor, opening the door. ' What is it you want V ' You will find all that carbon paper on the chest of drawers,' she answered. 'lt blackens everything that touches it, and I want to take it away to my own room.' ' Good !' said the Professor, ' 1 will bring it to you. I have been teaching my little girl how to take carbon prints of the skeletons of leaves,' he explained. ' You know the process? No. Ib is very simple. Sou.' Pie held up against the the light a skeleton leaf of e.\tju*te filmy texture, like the very finest lace. 'You prepare your paper with swecfc-oil and candle smoke. That is plain enough, eh ? You macerate your leaves in water until nothing but the skeleton is loft. You rub your skeleton leaf on the carbon, so. You transfer it to a sheet of clean paper, so. Then you rub again, and you have a print of the leaf. A pretty toy, eh ?' ' Kathryn is waiting/' I said, and the Prosussor, gathering all the

blackened sheets and tho whiteleaved book and the skeleton leaves together, carried then, out to her. >Slie took them from him, and smiled a last good-night to me. I did not see her again for many terrible and agonised years, and but for those sheets of carbonised paper, I should never to the day of my death have known what it was that parted us. (To be continued).