The Error of Her Ways

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20922, 29 September 1939, Page 3

The Error of Her Ways

(By FRANK BARRETT)

CHAPTER Vll—(Continued) “That is taking a rather exaggerated view of the obligation, isn’t it?” “Why, to be sure, the boatman who hiked me out of the water was perfectly contented with afi’-pun note for the job, and I’m about five times as big as Sylvia.” “And if that boatman asked now for all you have, simply because you wouldn’t have it if he hadn’t hiked you out, what should you say?” “Tell him to go to a lunatic asylum.” “And Sylvia, despite the romance of maidenhood, would be just as practical if she did not love the man. She must love him to sacrifice the ideals natural to every young and healthy mind, and sell herself for a mere title. “Excuse me, he added, checking himself, “I fear I am saying more than even our old friendship warrants.” “Not a word, Tom. Go on, my boy > —l like it. Think a thing, and say it out’s my maxim. You wouldn’t be my friend or her’s either if you were careless of her welfare. Go ahead—you were saying you didn’t like him.” “I may be prejudiced—l believe I am. I know him too little perhaps, but I think I know Sylvia too well to feel that she deserves no greater happiness than this.” “Don’t like his system, eh?” Harrowgate asked, with a provocative glance of his small grey eye. “No, I don’t,” Tom replied savagely. “It’s a craze, Tom, like bridge or golf or any other fashionable fad. It’ll be grouse and moors, when he’s got ’em; and that estate in the Highlands, when the old man dies, will give Angus enough to do, I warrant, to keep him out of mischief.” “A negative sort of virtue,” growled the other, flinging his cigar in the fire. “Don’t like that either, eh?” “Can’t Abide the Hon. Angus” Tom shook his head, and Harrowgate, seeing he was not to be tempted mto further aggression, said presently with emphasis: “Neither do I. Thought I’d just sound you a bit before chirping up. But now I see we’re both of one mind, I don’t mind telling you candidly that I can’t abide the Honourable Angus. Never did like him. He ahd his system are pretty much alike, but of the two, I prefer his system. But I’ve never done enough for Sylvia to stand in the way of her welfare—or what I’ve been talked into believing is her welfare. The Honourable A. is as good as any of the men she’s met, and perhaps it’s my fault she’s met no better. If you had only come along about three years ago, Tom!” “I wish to God I had,” said Tom, with energy. “Eh!” with another quick glance of shrewd little eyes. “Don’t mean to say you’d have whipped her up for yourself?” “Rather!” “What without cash, Tom?” “Oh, rot! If a good little woman gives herself, body and soul, to a man, isn’t that good enough? Why Lazarus might think himself rich as Dives who had such a wife as Sylvia.” “Give us your hand, Tom. Young fellows seemed ashamed to open their mouths now, but it does me good to hear the honest expression of good feeling. It’s like the ring of good metal. Do you feel like that now, my boy?” Tom nodded assent, subduing a sigh. “Then why don’t you cut in? Put the Honourable A.’s nose out of joint.” “Too late—too late.” “Not a bit of it. [’ll back you up and put a spoke in t’other’s wheel. You’re three or four years younger than him, and ten times more pleasant to look at—to say nothing of your having wholesome feelings, and a clean record.” “If Sylvia loves him, she’ll not give him up. And I’ll not attempt to come between them—unless—” he hesitated. “Unless what, Tom?” “Unless he is something worse even than a needy gambler.” With that Tom shook the hand that grasped his, and with a nod and good-night, left Harrowgate to his meditations. As a result of these meditations Harrowgate asked Sylvia to drive him to the station the following

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morning, and when he had his unsuspecting child well away from the house, he opened fire upon her. “Well, what do you thing of our old friend Tom, Sylvia?” he asked. “Awfully nice.” •“Well set-up, well groomed—strong, healthy, vigorous sort of fellow—what you may call a splendid specimen of the honest English gentleman. Looks you in the face with those fine, steadfast eyes of his as if he’d never done a mean thing in his life, nor feared who should look into his record. And there’s a sort of kindness in ’em, as if he would do a good turn for anyone. But, perhaps you haven’t noticed ’em.” “Perhaps not,” said Sylvia guardedly, as if already smelling a rather large-sized rat. “And what seems a little odd is that though his eyes are so soft the lower part of his lace is full of firmness and resolution. Sort of Napoleon Bonaparte look about it.” “ ’Mpse.” “Something uncommonly agreeable is the grasp of his hand—strong, and firm, and warm!” (The Honourable Angus had fingers which were cold and flabby like so many sausages). •‘Has he lent you any money, dad?” “Well, as a matter of fact, my dear, he has; but why do you ask?” “Because you see so particularly fond of him this morning.” “He has lent me four thousand pounds, and with a bit of luck I shall make forty thousand of it by Christmas, and do you know what 1 mean to do with it, then?” “Can’t guess.” (A fib.) “Give it to you for a dot.” “Dad!” she exclaimed, the colour mounting in her cheeks. Then, her pretty nose whitening a little, she asked: “Did Tom, Mr Clifford, know what it was for?” “Well, yes. I told him tbe Honourable Angus would not have you for less.” Lightning flashed from Sylvia’s eyes as she turned them on her father, and shrivelled him up for the moment. “I don’t know which is the kinder —you or he. You both seem very anxious that I should be married out of the way,” with disdain in the toss of her head and curve of her lip. “I must tell you though that he lent the money before he knew what it was for.” “That excuses him,” said she, with a lash at her pony, which she would quite as readily have bestowed on her father. CHAPTER VIII. More Plain Speaking “Tom’s the kind of man, my dear,” said Harrowgate, in reply to Sylvia’s exception, “who never stands in need of excuse. I wish I could say the same of myself.” “It wasn’t nice of you to tell him that,” she said in a tone of remonstrance. “Well, if it’s a thing we have both to be ashamed of, it wasn’t. But I am prepared to take all the blame on my own shoulders. I see now, Sylvia,” he pursued, drawing eloquence from the storehouse of memory, “that I ought not to let you sacrifice the ideals dear to a young and healthy mind, and sell yourself to a needy gambler for the sake of an empty title.” “Did Mr Clifford say that?” she asked quickly, flushing again with anger. “Never mind who said it, my dear; the sentiments are mine. I see now that, with all your faults, Sylvia, you are worthy of a husband with a nobler object in life than that of swindling blacklegs.” “He saved my life!” exclaimed Sylvia, her eyes filling with tears, chiefly of vexation. “I remember that, and also that a a boatman fished me out with a boathook. But”—again he had recourse to memory—“we must not take an exaggerated view of that obligation. A five-pound note satisfied my saviour, and if he were to come now and ask me for all I possessed simply because I should possess nothing if he hadn’t hooked me at the right moment—what should I say to him?” “I have promised Angus to be his wife, and I will keep my promise,” she said, setting her teeth, and projecting her chin with desperate resolve. (To be continued)