A GOLDEN SORROW.

Waikato Times, 15 January 1874, Page 3

A GOLDEN SORROW.

I %\\ r\r, 'tin 'it ttor to be lowly born, A'lit ranpe with humble liver* m content. 1 tun to bo perked up in * glittering i^rief, And w car a trolden Sh ve^pea kt..

CHAPTKR XXTIt. — LETHE. 'Tni:rct vc two sides to proverbial philosophy,' said Daly, in the course of their long talk ; ' and we, afc Ica3t, are in case to bear witness '' if it never rains but it powvs," the shower is sometimes golden. How strange it is that this unpx) ected solution of your difficulties, t/ns fitting recog«nition of your wife* merits, and our own stroke ©f luck, should have occurred nil about the same time.' ' Our ov » stroke of lack !' repeated Walter. 'What do you menn ? Not our two fevers, surely: with all your cheerful philosophy, I don't think you can reckon them as lucky ' The slightest possible misgiving arose in Daly's mind, as he replied: ' FeyeM ! No, of couno not. Why, Walter, ■what (an you be thinking of? I am speauing of our nugget.' 1 Our nugijct! What nugget? Have you been finding a nunget ?' ' Certainly nor. One is enough, I should think, for us to eipecr especially with a run of luck to follow.' An indesci ibablfl fear •tirrul a'l.ong Lawrence's nerves as he -poke thus cheerily ' One almost enough! My dear fe'low, I have not tV wlichtest notion what jonaro talking pf. Do telj me. pray — lam prepared for anything after wsiat you have told me.' i 1 Yon are prepared! Why, Walter, you aro mcoinpKhern ble ' lam talking about the nugget winch we found, and which caused us to determine on your returning to England, in any case; of the nugget which jou concealed, you know, because yoircould not leave mo in the fernr, to go with it yourself to Placer Vdle.' A puzzled look in Walter's face, an uneasy straining of the eyes, but no light of returning memory or comprehension With increasing trepidation, Daly went on ; 'I am speak ing of that nugget. You *uroly retnember it, Walter? Don't you recollect the day we found it, and how delighted ive were — and how you were warned of the lad state < f of the valley. and that we had better send off our dust as soon as possible — and then I «w»3 taken ill, at|d Sppiled Five came to rou with another warning, and you hid the nugget ?' The tone in which Daly put these questions was full if distress and apprehension, mqro so than, he knew, and it was responded to by Walter's painlul, troubled, striving J ' I don't know what you wean,' lie said ;' I have not the. lp.i'-t notion of what you tire talking about I remember the dust, and I remember the time being fixed for sending it to Placer Vile, but I don't know anything more. Where is y poilod Five? Is ho not here? I have not seen him since I ]mve been ill ' ' Good God!' thought Lawrence, 'this is too terrible! Am T U> bring her Imshaud back to her a madman !' 'What it the matter, Lawrence? Why do you not nn«w<T me? Wh- re is Spoiled Five? And where is Sambo ? |Ie is not here, I know ; the dog's bark I sometimes hear is n«i in- ' Spoiled F vo hns gone a^nv.' replied Daly, preserving his calmness by a desperate effort, and moving into a position in which Walter could not see lug face. 'He has gone a lornr wot oil down tho valley to do some hnt-buildinsj. m You remember, I dare«ay, tint he was very imvli afraid of anyone who wns " off his head," and when we both took to lieim' «o, in the fever, it whs too much for Spoiled Five. S.imho is dead, poor fellow ; he was killed by accident.' ' Toor Sambo ! And so Spoiled Five is jrone ! What a queer thing fever is, nrij how it sets one off qn all sots of mmgina-y tracks ! I remember having a horrid not on that he had come to «onv' hnrm, and being haunted with a loneing to know all about it, and yet afraid to a«k — one of the phantom horrors of tho fever! I wonder when ho will »etum — befo'-e we- go, I hope Per'ians we cni'd induce him to come with us? Flc.^rould give him free quarters at the Firs. J am HirnP' Lawrence could not command his Toice sufficiently to reply. The wooden cross in the green G->d'<-acre which had b^en jpnr-'d to tho dead out of the swarming valley, with f its rough inscription, seemed to stnn'l before his eves Wall or went on epeaking a few disjointed sentences before he could interpose with another effort to arrest his attention. ' But, to return to the nugget. Try and reca'l those dnvs before you were t.iken ill. You remember Deering, the doctor whom \ou brought to see me, and who went away vrilli the dust-wagons to Placer Ville ?' ' Yes,' answered Walter, hesitatingly ; I have tome recollection of him.' ' And yet none of the nugget ? None of your coming in and finding him with me, and giving him your letters to your wife and your sister, and walking with him as far as the blufl?' 'No ' said Walter ; ' nono.' ' And yet you were, to all appearance. quite well that day, and for some days later. Have yon no remembrance of telling me where you had been that morning, and what }ou had done ?' 'T have no remembrance of anything about that time,' Walter answered slowly, after painful searching m his mind Dilv took up his rieht hand, and looking carefully at it, found on the wa«ted wri*t a white nvirk, th'> c citnx of a healed cut. He mide Walter look at it, and u*kod him if ' it did not make him remember something — how he had cut himself with tli*» rough rock in burying the nugget, and how Dpcring had dres«i ¥ d the cut with li^ and plaster ? But Walter, looking wistfully at the scir, and with the same painful groning in his unresponsive mom irv, declared that he re^iombered nothing of the matter. And, as he repeated tins assurance ana in and again, there eam,e a utrnnge nervousness and avoidance ino his manner, which Lawrence observed, but could not interrupt. He shaded h ; s eve* with h s hand, and then, wWii Lairr-n™ cwp within his sight again, hoked at him from beneath thataheUer, with a keen, searching, anxious glance, in which there was suspicion. 'Tell me this storvof a nuzEret, which I ought to know, and have forgotten,' he said ut length, when a long series of questions from Lawrence had been severally answered with the Bame protest of oblivion. Lawrence complied ; and all the time he was relating the incidents which had preceded the murder — of which he cnrrfullv kept clear — Wtdter watchrd him closely from under In? hand, and by degrees a look of comprehension came inio his face, the expression of one who has arrived at a conclusion, painful indeed, but with the grim satisfaction in it of lhe solution of doubt, th« termination of uncertainty 4 And where was it I t^ld you I hid buried the migsct, in obedience to Spoiled Five's warning?' asked Walter, •when Dalv had recapitulated all that hnd occurred. 'You did not tell me an} thing about that,' «aid Dnlv ' T was only getting well at the time, and you «aid very little about it, only jii'fc enough to rut my mind at rest Then camo your own illness ; and now you must do your bes to remember where the nugget is, »o that as soon as you are able to be about, we may get it, and wind up our affair* here without delay.' ' Very well,' said Walaer ; ' I will try to recttl the place and the civeumstanoei, when my mind is a little clearer ; hut I am tired now, and I really can-iot think of anything but Flo 's letter. So, supposo we don't talk about it for the prespnt.' • All right,' said Daly, who w»s tprribly disturbed mnd perplexed, and wholly unconcious of the anxious and apprehensive, regretful affection with which Walter was at that moment thinking of him, to the exclusion of the strange events which had befallen. 'What a dreadful thing thw, is!' ran Walter's thouglit" ' lie has never recovered that fever — ho has a fixed delusion in ins mind! What shall I do? T'lere is nothing for il bu to humour him, nd keep hi n fj net, and to get him jtwav as toon as possible.' Nothing more wa» said anpul tho nugget that (lay. On the diy following, and two or three duccfcd ing day*, Lawrence tried by many indirect means to strike the dumb chord into sound, but in yum Walter avoided all attempts to lead up to the subject wi'h* «;k ; ll the origin of which X/"vr*Mce was far from suspecting, and which "omplofely baffled him. for some timo fhe distress which tVs peculiar mental aflVetion of Wnltei'« cim«-ed hii friend was *j Iwon that lie could think of nothing but its significance ai regarded Walter ninwelf ; but »s he lay iwak«, ponderin? cfriv it, be