THE PRISONER'S SISTER

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 August 1938, Page 10

THE PRISONER'S SISTER

PUBLISHED BY ARRANGEMENT COPYRIGHT

BY

PEARL BELLAIRS

(Author of “Velvet and Steel”)

CHAPTER XI. Next day Rand departed at daybreak and all Julie saw of him was the back of his sports sar vanishing into the misty» morning. , He left a note, enclosing a cheque for ten pounds, “being one month’s wages in advance,” and asking her to apply to the manager of his London office, Mr Turrell, if there was anything she wanted in his absence. Julie and Mrs Bolton were left in charge. On the second of January a hurried man from Rand’s London office came to make the arrangements. There was an auction sale, and everything in the house, except the necessities of life for Mrs Bolton, Julie and the children, were sold. Julie moved into the rooms over the stables with the children, while Mrs Bolton had a room in the top of the house. All their provisions came from shops where Ell had opened accounts of what they spent with meticulous care, and now and again Mrs Bolton hinted that she didn’t think Mr Rand would expect them to live on such a very plain diet. Julie, however, took no notice. Then there were more arrivals. This time they were an architect from London, with two assistants! they all went about with notebooks and pencils, craning their necks at things. Julie perceived that, as might be expected, once Rand set a thing going, it went along briskly. A week’s quiet, and then the builder and ’ his workman arrived, and there was hammering and sawing and cement mixing from morning to night. It went on for the greater part of a month. Meanwhile Julie could not feel that she was earning her wages in the least. But there was nothing to be done about it. She sent half the rent she owed to Mrs Craddock out of the advance of wages Rand had left for her.

Only when she thought about Tom did she feel sad; and then it was impossible to be happy. What was happening to him now, how he must be suffering, what he would do with his future when at last this cruel twelve months was over —all this often recurred to her. But such thoughts were free now from most of the loathing of Rand that had accompanied them before.

She still thought Rand was wrong. In fact she spent hours puzzling over his character, and what he was really like, and what he had said and done, and why he had done it. She no longer disliked him as she had. 1 But it was impossible for her to think about him without emotion of some sort; and when she remembered things that had happened or had been said between them her eyes would shine, or she would frown or change colour. Once when she was far away in her- thoughts while she darned a sock for Will, Dolly said to her: “What’s the matter, Julie?” “Why?” said Julie, and felt as though she had been caught out in some guilty occupation. After the builders had gone came the interior decorator. He came from London in a car, and wore whiskers and a purplish-coloured hand-woven suit. He had a very exotically-dressed young woman with him, who followed him round with a blank expression and only woke up occasionally to say, “Oh, gorgeous!” in a tone of great vivacity whenever he asked her opinion on anything he proposed. “Don’t you think that this room should be green?” said the young decorator, mouthing all his words with terrific emphasis. “Yes, gorgeous!” “S-Sap green, with a theme of gamboge!” “Oh, gorgeous, yes!” The young decorator spent a long time on the job. Then the painters arrived; the' decorator and an elderly artist, who was going to do the mural decorations stayed in rooms near by. Julie often gave them, meals in the kitchen, when they talked about social evils and did not say very much to her; except that the artist said that he wanted to paint her. “That head!” he said.

■ And they both sat and stared at Julie as though she had suddenly developed bat’s ears. The artist, however, got no further than making a rough sketch of her with a piece of red chalk on the back of a strip of wall paper while he was having afternoon tea. He and the decorator managed to get terribly behind on their schedule and had to work frantically hard to catch up, and there was no time for painting anybody’s head, however amazing. Julie was looking out of the window one afternoon when she saw a stranger walking round outside the house. He was a young man, well dressed, rather tall, and he walked with a limp. Julie went down to see what he wanted. When she came to the side door he saw her, and said immediately: He came limping towards her. There was a smile on his face; it was rather pale, with dark eyes, not exactly handsome, but certainly appealing; and there was something about it that was vaguely familiar. “Are you Miss Moffatt?” “I am,” said Julie. “What can I do for you?” “How do you do?” My name’s Rand —Stuart Rand,” he said. “My brother asked me to have a look round here while he was away.” “Oh!” said Julie in surprise. “I see.” She looked at him again and his likeness to Rand became plain. He was much younger than Rand, and where Rand had an air of authority this young man looked rather shy. “He asked me to look in and see how things were going.” “Well, come in then,” said Julie. “Would you like to see the house? I

think the work is going on very well." Stuart Rand followed her inside, and looked round the hall. His eyes returned to Julie with a curiosity which made her think that he probably knew about Tom Moffat, and that Julie was his sister. “It was really to see that you were comfortable here, he said with a smile, “more than anything else.” “Mr Rand is very kind,” murmured Julie, flushing. “We’ve very comfortable, thank you.” He looked so awkward himself, and there was a sort of dog-like sadness in his eyes, that in a moment or two Julie found herself taking charge of the situation, and walking him round from room to room, showing him what had been' done. In the dining room the artist was standing on a board between two trestles, working frantically, putting some finishing touches to a wall painting. He looked at them so wildly through the hair hanging over his eyes, that Julie didn’t like to disturb him by introducing Stuart Rand to him. In view of his limp she didn’t ask the young man to climb the stairs. They ended up in the kitchen, where she showed him the chromium steel sinks and the washing-up machines, and the electric stoves. Mrs Bolton was making a cup of tea,‘and Julie offered one to Stuhrt Rand.

Nothing could have been more different, Julie found, than talking to Stuart and talking to his brother. When she talked to Ferris Rand, she had always felt that she was being led along unknown routes and ambushed at unexpected corners. He had things all his own way. But Stuart’s manner was diffiident. If he hadn’t looked so grateful for anything she said, Julie might have thought that he didn’t want to talk.

He told her that he had stayed in the house once when he was a boy, with a great aunt; he discussed the countryside, and said that when the place was finished he was going to come and stay there. He mentioned that he was working for his medical final. Juliq was a little surprised, because it seemed unusual for the brother of a millionaire to be bothering about work. “My father was a doctor,” she said. “Really?” Again that speaking look came into his eyes, as though he knew about her sorrows, but couldn’t possibly mention, them. The family did not want me to go in for medicine. They think I’m cracked, anyhow! He sounded a little bitter. “They think, you know, that a chap like myself should be content to sit in a bath chair, and let Ferris give me a few stocks and shares to gamble with. Ferris was the only one who stood up for me;” He smiled; and then, as though recollecting himself,, sat back in his chair, and said: “Really—l don’t know why I’m talking about myself to a stranger.” And he looked at her in an apologetic but in such an interested way, that Julie realised that she had made an impression on him, though she was not quite sure how it had come about. And then they went on talking, in a very easy, friendly way. Julie had seldom found it so easy to talk to anyone at first sight. There was something about him, she supposed it was his crippled leg, and the look of wistful exasperation that came into his eyes sometimes, that was pathetic. She fancied that he was in some ways an inadequate sort of person, who had suffered all the more through having such a tremendously positive and successful elder brother. He seemed reluctant to go. Finally, when at last he looked at his watch it was halfpast six. “Now, how on earth am I going to get back to town to dinner?” “Well, I suppose we could give you dinner here,” said Julie with a smile. “Would you really? You know that’s awfully kind of you! I’d love to stay.” When they were eating the very simple meal which Mrs Bolton served in the kitchen, he said: •‘You know I wish I were you, living down here away from the noise and all London's silly people! Though I suppose you'll have a rough time when the place is opened and it swarms with idiots!” ' “I think it will be rather fun!” said Julie. “Do yo’u? Then I’m afraid that’s one thing about which we differ. I hate people. Just loathe ’em —except a very few. I couldn’t live as my brother does,” he told her. “Is Mr Rand very social—?” Julie ventured to ask. She was slightly surprised. “Oh, he’s inhuman in some ways!” said Stuart. “He lives for his work. And then when he has worked himself thick in the head and almost too stiff to move he entertains himself by mixing with a crowd of completely soul-less, brainless people, who are all about as stiff with money as he is with work!” Julie could not help laughing a little. “No, really, it’s true!” said Stuart Rand, smiling. “He’s a great chap, is Ferris. But he hasn’t time for the human side of things. He doesn’t like thege people. They’re just a relaxation, and they’re there, ready to lionise him, and he hasn’t time to be bothered finding the sort of people whom he could really like. At least, you know, that’s how it appears to me!” “He’ll be back from the Sudan soon, ■ won’t he?” said Julie, wanting to make sure. “Yes; he’s expected next week.” At half-past eight he decided it was time for him to go back to town. “I say, you know,” he said impulsive- . ly, “I do wish I’d come down here before! Ferris rang me in town half an hour before he left the country and asked me to run down some time if I could and see that everything was all right. I’m afraid I rather looked upon it as a duty, and I didn’t really hurry

about it. I wish I had now!” “I’m glad you came,” said Julie, frankly. “I was feeling rather dull and lonely this afternoon.” “Could I come again, do you think?” he said. “Or would you be awfully bored?” “No, of course not!” “I’m supposed to go to a cocktail party on Saturday afternoon —coming down here w'ould make a marvellous excuse to get out of it.” Julie said she would be very pleased to see him. He went, limping away into the dark to where his car was standing, and left Julie feeling flattered by his obvious pleasure in her company. He was nice —and rather pathetic. She felt she could have had a sisterly regard for him, though not, perhaps, any other. And how utterly different from Rand! She did not know what it was that would have made it so totally impossible for her to have a sisterly regard for Rand. (To be Continued).