Novelist. [ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.] TWICE TRIED,

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 2587, 9 February 1889, Page 1 (Supplement)

Novelist. [ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.] TWICE TRIED,

BY ANNIE S. SWAN, Author of "Aldersyde," "Cnrlmvrie," " Across Her rath," " Sundered Hearts, ' &c„&c. • ■ '

CHAFTER XV.—Very Oaiixous. " Vkky well, sir. Of course if you insist on turning a fellow out of the house, there's nothing for him but to go ; but J must say it is very hard." So said Rolfe Ttansome, in very sullen, aggrieved tones, his hansom'c face wealing an expression of injured innocence. Ho was alone with Mr. Angus the- elder in that gentleman's private room in the bank, and, as business hours were over, the outer office was deserted. The banker bit his lip, but made no reply, for he was determined not to bandy words with his wife's brother.

: ! " Why did you bring me here at all, hang it ' Did I ask you to let mo come ?" asked Ilolfe, kicking the liar of the fender with his foot. " It is not.fair, I say, to kick 1110 out like this after I've got acustomed to tlu? place." Mr. Angus took 110 notice of these disrespectful remarks, but went on serenely adding up the figures in the ledger before him. " On the 15th of this month you will receive your quarters salary in full," said ho, at length, leaning back in his chair and sticking his pen behind his ear. " I advised you before, and I advise you again to emigrate. Isabel tells me you have a distant relative in Sydney. I think the best step you could take would be to go out there." " Oh, I see 1 Isabel and you have been laying your heads together to get rid of me," he said, with a slight sneer. " Very good. lIJu t how am I going to get there 1 Do you think the Government will give me an assisted passage, eh 1" Again Mr. Angus bit his lip. He was a quicktempered man, and scarcely for his wife's sake could he calmly endure such gross impe.itince. " If you decide to emigrate to New South Wales, I will give you a hundred guineas," he said quietly. " It is infinitely more than you deserve. And 1 beg of you to consider'that it is sorely for your sister's sake that I am so generous with you." " And if I decline to accept your munificent oiler, what then ?" " Nothing, except that on the 15th of the month 'you quit your situation and my house,'' said Mr. Angus, quietly. " Had I done my duty to myself and others I would

have sent you about your business long ago. You have not been a credit to the Bank of Auchengray, nor to me, sir." "I'm sure I wrought for the beggarly pittance I got," said Rolfe, savagely. " Hush ?" said Mr. Angus, sternly. " You know as well as 1 do that you have-supplemented the ' beggarly pittance/ as you are pleased to call it, in certain very questionable ways. My pocket has materially suffered since you came, a fact of which my son is quite aware, and which, I fear, the others more than suspect, Do very thankful, sir, that you are getting oil so easily. I have in my power to place your departure from this country out of your power, ; so you had better keep a civil tongue in your head, lest 1 rue my indulgence. Uolfe Jiansome grew pale with rage and apprehension.

" It's Robert who has done this, lie hates me. He would do me a bad turn if he could. I-le lias been jealous of me since the, first night he took me to .Burnett's," lie fumed, angrilv. " I might have known he was at the bottom of it, but. I'll be even with him !"

Mr. Angus turned upon him, his eyes blazing with fury. liansome, an arrant coward at heart, quailed beneath that look.

" Don't insult my son by taking his name upon your lips 1" he thundered. " You are not (it even to breathe his name. Robert regards you with a contempt so immeasurable that ho would scorn to speak of you in any terms whatsoever. \ou have need to go to him, ay, on bended knees, and thank him for keeping you out of a felon's coll. There is not another in Auchengray who would have done so much for you." Paler still grew llolfo llansome's face, and he shifted uneasily from his position. He was utterly cowed now, for he saw that all his misdemeanours were fully known. lie need not have been surprised. Did he suppose that, in an ollice like the Bank of Auchengray, the heads of which were men of more than ordinary shrewdness and perception, sum after sum of money could disappear and not be accounted for 1 For his wife's sake hitherto Mr. Angus had refrained from taking any step in the matter, until he saw it \v,is quite impossible to stop liansome in his course of dishonesty, and that it would speedily become almost impossible to keep it from the public ear. Isabel more than suspected the true reason of her husband's increased anxiety to get her brother away from Auchengray, only she had never put that unhappy suspicion into words. Yet she was not less anxious to have him removed from all connection with the Bank and from residence in the house, for lie had been the one shadow on her own happiness, and she lived in a perpetual nervous dread of something happening through him some trouble which she could not specify or describe. Thereforeshehad eagerly and gladly acquiesced in her husband's desire to dismiss him, nay shsurged upon him to do so without delay. She feared, indeed thatßolfe was a hopeless reprobate, for she had never been able to reach or touch any finer feelings in him, nor to arouse him to any interest apart from self and sellish ends. She had pleaded with him, wept over him, and now only prayer for him was left. Her inlluence was utterly impotent to awaken in him any sense, of honour or gratitude, and his presence was like a dark shadow coming between her and peace.

"Well, then, I'll go. I won't wait till the 15th," he said, between his teeth. "I wish I had never seen this place. I've wasted too much time in it already. I wish you'd left liie alone, I say. Did I beg you to take me into your employment ?'

" It was to give you a chance to redeem your character, and to enable you, if you chose, to follow out an honourable and respectable path in life. It was for that reason, and for the sake of the sister whose heart you have nearly broken, that I took you against my judgment. Perhaps the day may come when you will look back with regret upon the time you have truly enough wasted here," said Mr Angus, gravely ; then, holding open the door, he signified that the interview was at an end, and that he had better go. In no amiable frame of mind, Mr Rolfe Hansome quitted the banker's private room, lie sauntered into the hall, took his hat from the stand, and went out of doors, with 110 particular object in view. Mr Angus was not surprised that he did not appear at the dinner table. " Well, my dear, I have given Rolfe his comje," he said to his wife, when at the sound of the bell he quitted his desk and hastened into the dining-room. " How did he take it?" Isabel asked, paling a little in her anxiety. " Much as I expected. It will bo an immense relief to us all when he is safe'y out of the way, Isabel. You, at least, will be infinitely happier." " You are right," Isabel answered, and yet an involuntary sigh escaped her lips. Her heart repro ached her a little, for when the ne'er do well was cut adrift from ail better influences and left wholly to himself, what might not be the result. ? "What troubles you, dear?" said the banker, quick to note the shadow on his wile's fair face. "Don't keep; it from 1110, Isabel. You know my ohiof earthly aim is

to miiko you luippv. There is nothing I will not do to accomplish that end. If you have any plan or thought in your head ahout liolfo, tell it me, and I will do my utmost to aid you in it. Although our past endeavours to help him have failed, ive may be successful in the future." Isabel Angus did not speak, but her beautiful eyes filled with tears, and stooping she touched with grateful lips tho kind hand resting oil hor arm. " I have no more to ask, Jlobert," she said at length. "You have done too much for me and mine already. Did Eolfe seem willing to emigrate ? " " lie did not say, but I fancy, ho will see that it will be to his own best advantage. Lie is not the fellow to refuse tho chance of a hundred guineas, and I told him ■ptrrrnly■ ■ thrrt "unless ho left tho country lie should receive nothing but his salary." " You are quite right. Unless there is an ocean between him and Auchengray he will bo a ceaseless trouble and annoyance to you,'' said Isabel, sadly. "I will write this very day to my mother's cousin in Sydney, and tell him the whole circumstances. For her sake I believe lie will trv and give Rolfe a lending hand. They wore deeply attached to each other in their youth." "That is satisfactorily settled then. Now lot me see you smile, wife; I like not that doleful countenance," said the banker; "you at le.ist can have nothing to rollout upon. You have borne his waywardness with an'angelic patience and loving kindness which would have touched any heart but his." "Robert., do you think there is any human being wholly bad ?' asked Isabel, almost wistfully, "I sometimes fear there is no portion of good in Rolfe." " There must be good, though we have not discovered it, my dear," said Mr Angus, gravely. "We must just hope that he may speedily be surrounded by inlluenees which will call it forth ; and yet, where could he meet with more kind and helpful consideration, more patient and long-suffering tenderness than you, my darling, have lavished upon him here V Isabel shook her head. " lie is so like poor papa. He has inherited all that terrible weakness—l dare not call it by a harsher name—which broke my mother's heart, and made our home the most miserable place on earth. Life is a great mystery, Robert. lam overwhelmed at times by the unutterable sense of thankfulness I feel when [ think of all tho secure and happy privileges you have bestowed upon me. My own deep happiness makes me very tender; very sorrowful for my brother, who seems bent on making an utter shipwreck of his life."

"We will leave him in a higher Hand, my wife," said the banker, quietly. " Sometimes when human beings lay down the work in despair, God takes it up and finishes it." " I will try to be hopeful, but it is not easy," said Isabel; for she was haunted by a perpetual brooding sense of coming trouble, a feeling that the worst had not yet come. Mr Ano'us was obliged to ride out to Strathblane 011 business that evening, and after he was gone his wife put on her bonnet nnd walked down to Sunset Cottage, where she found Joan among her flowers. The weather was exceptionally warm and pleasant, even for genial April, and flower and leaf were rapidly approaching perfection. Joan's little plot was gay with hyacinth, polyanthus and crocus and the air about her was laden with the perfume of the sweet narcissus. She looked up, with a ready smile, to greet her friend —'for those two women were friends in the truest sen ; e of the word. They had an absolute faith in each other. " You look troubled, Isabel. What is it ?" Joan asked, leaning upon her garden rake, and looking enquiringly at her friend as she came up the path.

"Yes, I am troubled, Joan. It is the old story. I want to speak to you about my brother, if you. are I not too busy to listen." " No, I am never too busy to listen to you ; but why should we sit in the house on such a glorious evening? Just look at yon purple light upon the moor - beyond Fairgate. I have been looking at it longingly for the last half-hour. Do you feel equal to the climb 1 You look as if the fresh moorland air would do you good, and we shall see a glorious sunset over the Ben to-night." " How eloquent you have becomo since you began to exercise your literary tastes," said Isabel, with a glimmering smile. " I fear I do not see with your enchanted eyes, but I shall be grateful for the walk up to the moor, and we can talk as we go. I shall just wait here till you are ready. Ilow lovely your flowers are ! Mr Angus says you are the most capable gardener and the cleverest woman in Auchengray ; there now !" "Tell Mr Angus that he talks treason against his own accomplished wife," Joan laughed back, as she disappeared within the doorway. She did not spend a long time over her toilet, and ere half an hour was passed they had left the quiet town behind, and were slowly mounting the winding hillpath to the moor. It was a wide

stretch of waste ground, covered with heather and bracken, and dotted here and there by clumps of sturdy t-irs, a pleasant place, for a walk una line summer evening, the, sense of freedom and breezy freshness being enough to sweep the cobwebs away from mind and heart. As they walked, Isabel tol l Joan the whole story of her brother's waywardness and sin, the'greater part' of which was known to her already. She was sympathetic and kind, but she could not be very hopeful or comforting, for her antipathy to llolfe liansome was so strong as 'to surprise herself, and she feared he would be little else than a heartbreak and trouble to those connected with him all his days. We do meet with such weak, faulty, erring, human Wings sometimes, who seem either to be devoid of any higher, better impulses, or who have allowed the baser part of their natures to gain the mastery, to the annihilation of the good. They ate a heartbreak, truly enough; a constant martyrdom to those bound to them by the Lies of kinship.

"•I feel 1 letter after a talk with you, and this air is delicious,,' said Isabel, when they had reached the, wide pleasant tableland, and could look down at the little town clustering at their feet. Joan took in a full deep breath, enjoyingthe whole prospect and surroundings to the full. Away over the lofty peak of the Ben the sky was rosy red, fringed by a rim of burnished gold where the sun was dropping to his royal rest. There was a feeling of life and promise in the air, flower and bud were springing everywhere, and the green fulness of the heather tops gave promise of a glorious autumn bloom. The cuckoo was. calling sweetly and clearly in her haunt in the fir trees, and somewhere down in the vale a thrush was pouring out all its heart in a glorious burst of song.

" We are not quite alone," said Joan, presently, with a little smile. " I see a white gown gleaming through the tree. A pair of lovers, probably seeking the kindly shelter of yon copse. We had better be merciful and retire."

Isabel looked in the direction indicated, and her face began to Hush. Iler vision was clearer than Joan's, and she could see more than the gleam of a woman's white gown'. " Joan, look again !" she said, grasping her friend's arm. "Can't you see them now? Don't you know them 1 Perhaps I am mistaken."

J 0:111 looked again, this time aided by her eye-glass. Thou her arm fell helplessly by her side, and she looked speechlessly into her companion's face. The pair, standing in the attitude of lovers, absorbed in very earnest conversation, were 110 other than Rolfe Ransoine and Robert Angus's wife. CHAPTER XVl.—Husband and Wife. "When aro you going to take your wife away for a holiday. Robert V" It was Isabel "who asked tho question, next afternoon, when he. dropped into tho liouso for a few . minutes, as he ofton did before going home to dinner. She suiilod as she spoke, but it was a tremulous, uncertain smile, which, had Robert Angus been particularly observant at the moment, might, have suggested to him a little uneasiness of mind. "My wife! don't you think she needs a holiday, Mrs Angus ?" lie asked, gaily, for that day he happened to be in the best of spirits. " Why, I was telling you this very morning she was looking as fresh and sweet as the spring flowers! Rather a pretty speeeh for mo, wasn't it? Seriously, though, what makes you ask such'a question ?" '•T was only thinking a cli uige might be good for Amy just now," said Isabel, and her eyes dropped a little, for she felt uncomfortable in tho"extrem"o. "She leads a quiet umventful life at Fairgato." "I assure you she is perfectly content :d, Mrs Angus," said Robert, blithely. " She told me so this very morning. Shall I tell you a secret ? I never hoped that Amy would turn out such a pattern wife. We suit each other admirably, and wo are very happy." Isabel turned, her shadowed eyes towards the window ; and for the moment she could think of nothing to say. Were they mistaken, after all, in thinking Amy Angus was swerving from her wifely faith, and might not that evening stroll on the moor be capable of a very simple ex-

planation '? She felt in a maze of bewilderment and perplexity, not unmixed with an indefinable dread. She had . resolved to do the only thing she could do—counsel Robert to take his wife away from Auchengray for a week or two —-but in the face of his remark she could say no more. "So your brother is going off?" said Robert, more gravely. "I sympathise with you very much about him." "I know you do. You have acted a brother's part towards me and mine, Robert," Isabel said, in tones of emotion. "I only wish. 1 could repay you with aught besides my deep gratitude. "That and your sisterly love have repaid me over and above, it' I need payment," answered Robert, with a sunny smile. " Has Rolfe decided where to go V' " Yes ; he gave your father his decision to-day. It seems .that one of the Royal Mail line sails from

lion lon on the 10th, and lie. seems inclined to go with it instead of Waiting anotherjnolilh ] " <_ "Sydney is .his destination, then. . "ye ; . I wrote to out' relative last night, and the letter will arrivein time to prepare him for Ilolfe's coming." ■ " lie may do better there," said Robert. "You must keep up your heart about him." "I will try to do so, but I m.tist confess L do not feel very hopeful," answered Isabel. " Are you going already? There was something' I was going to .speak to you about. Oil,, yes; it was Joan"Laurence. Did you know"she had turned liUem/nur ?" • " ' •" Amy. was tolling me something to that effect the other day. Mrs iialfour had h. in tod it toiler, but I did not pay much attention to what she said. Is it really tnte'f. ' " Yes. She'has got her book-dis-posed of, too, very advantageously, considering that she is quite an amateur. 1. am afraid Auehengiwiy • will not long, hold .Joan 1/uironeOi" " I should, say not. Well, 1 ain not surprised. I have always known Joan to be a woman by herself. I wish we saw more of her at ,hairgate, but Amy and she do not seem to pill! well together. Tell Joan I congratulate her,, and wish her continued success with my whole heart, will you ?" "If you wish mo to do so, but good wishes lose half their value whew uttered by proxy," said Isabel, with a slight smile. "Well, good afternoon. Give Amy my love and tell her I will be up one of- -those line days." " We shall be charmed to see you. Good afternoon," said Robert, and went his way.. (To be ctiiifiititcrl.)*