The Error of Her Ways

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20950, 1 November 1939, Page 12

The Error of Her Ways

(By FRANK BARRETT)

CHAPTER XLI. (continued)

“I told you that if in spite of my warning you entrapped that unhappy girl into marriage I would openly denounce you as a forger, trickster, and scoundrel!” She turned to Sylvia: “You know now why he stole this letter, why he withheld it, why he entrapped you—yes, trapped you, villainously taking advantage of your simplicity—into this godless marriage; and you,” turning again with fine fury upon Tom, “1 defy you to give a reason for taking this letter—foi keeping back illegally, unlawfully, from Miss Harrowgate, to whom it was addressed.”

“I held it back for the simple reason that every word in that letter is a lie—every statement you have made a lie.”

“A lie!” screamed Mrs Stutter. “Is this a lie?” She brought from her pocket a foolscap page torn from a book. “Here is the page of a register containing a certificate of the death of Mr Malcom’s wife. It was torn from the parish book by your man Psani and sold to Mr Malcom’s lawyer for five pounds, after you had paid him to tear it out.” Sylvia had started from her chair, drawing away from Tom and looking at him in speechless horror. “This has gone far enough,” said Tom, catching the expression in Sylvia’s face. “Leave the room!” he added, sternly. “Not till I have told all—every villainy that you have committed.” “Leave this room.” “I’ll not, I’ll not,” screamed Mrs Stutter. “You infamous scoundrel!” “Then I must make you,” said Tom, facing the inevitable; and crossing the room, he laid his hand upon Mrs Stutter’s arm. She threw off his arm, retreating further into the room. In a moment he had wheeled her round, pinned her elbows to her back, and in this position he removed her screaming from the room. He marched her onwards, still struggling and vituperating, along the garden path, across the stable yard, and into the coach-house, and there he turned the key upon her. When he returned to the house Sylvia was gone. CHAPTER XLII. Tom Falls This last scene of violence, this opposition of brute force to argument —a man taking a struggling woman by the arms and hustling her from the room to the crash of falling glass and overturning furniture—added greatly to the success of Mrs Stutter’s carefully constructed and admirably played denunciation. It showed Tom in a new and certainly undignified character of the very kind calculated by Mrs Stutter to influence Sylvia’s sentiment and over-power her judgment—that of a man unscrupulous in the measures he employed for silencing an accusation. The balance of evidence—such as it was—told heavily against Tom, filling the girl’s mind with horror, and determining her fluctuating spirit to take the only course of freeing herself from an intolerable position. She resolved to fly the house at once and return to her father, whatever the consequence might be. It was not possible to stay for a single hour unde): the same roof with a man who who had resorted to such infamous means to trap her into this marriage. She must seek refuge with the only two persons in the world whose love and honour she could rely on—her father and Sibyl. Tom was yet in sight, struggling with the woman in the path as she left the house and passed into the open road. She bent her head to the cutting wind that whipped the sleet in her face, and ran down the hill, heedless of everything but escape. She scarcely noticed the fly drawn up in the middle of the road as she hurried past. She yearned, like a child in trouble, for her father, longed to be folded in his loving arms, to open her heart and weep out its grief upon his breast. Malcom had so little faith in the success of Mrs Stutter’s scheme that he saw Sylvia coming down the road with wonder and surprise—possibly underrating Mrs Stutter’s ability. “What a fool,” he said to himself, as Sylvia passed almost within arm’s reach of him. But Stutter allowed him no time for reflection.

“Out you come, Angus,” whispered he, cheerfully, opening the door. “Kemma’s done her share—and nobly, too, she has—now you’ve got to do your part.” Malcom stepped out of the fly. “Got your iron ready?” Malcom nodded.

“Then look lively, and yet behind the fly. I lay he won’t be long afore he find his missus has bolted, and he’s bound to come after herThis here snow’s all to our benefit. We can see him a-comin’, but I’m blessed if he’ll see a yard afore him in the blizzard.” When Malcom was stationed behind the fly, Stutter went to the horse’s head, and, having surveyed the position, returned to give Malcom a word of encouragement. “Don’t you make a mess of it Angus, because you’ll never hear the last of it from me if you do. Likewise the missus won’t be so pleasant with you as what you’ve had it the last week or so. Just you think of that, my good feller.” Malcom’s hand in the pocket of his overcoat played convulsively with the stock of his revolver. The temptation was great to shoot this brute, and leave Clifford alone; but he never lost sight of the main chance.

Enthralling Serial Story

CHAPTER XLIII Deeper and Deeper

] Meanwhile Tom, having locked up Mrs Stutter, called Bendall. The coachman at once stepped from the adjoining stable with the smile of unconsciousness which your good servant always assumes when domestic difficulties are strongly pronounced. “Is there a policeman in the village?” "No, sir; nothing this side of Wetherham.” “Then saddle the mare, go over to Wetherham and fetch one.”

“Yussir,” and he started upon this errand with commendable alacrity. Tom went back into the house, wondering what on earth could be the object of piling up a mass of lies which would not stand examination. In a couple of days, he believed, he could disprove everything she had affirmed, but until then he foresaw considerable difficulty in convincing Sylvia that this tissue of falsehood had not one thread of truth for a foundation. Some of those lies she must have swallowed and assimilated, he felt sure; notably the sentimental story of Malcom’s death; her tears had proved that. Was there anything she could not believe with such cunning evidence as this woman had placed before her?

Not a servant was visible, of course; they were all whispering calculations in the kitchen. Sylvia was not in the room: he scarcely expected to find her there. It was more natural that she should go up to her room to think it out.

He set the furniture straight. His letter and the unopened one addressed to Sylvia lay on the floor; he picked them up, as also the foolscap page on the table, crunched all up in a ball, and flung them on the fire. Then he removed his overcoat and hat, hung them in the hall, and with his hands in his pockets ran upstairs. The door of Sylvia’s room was open. He tapped, received no answer, and entered. The room was empty—no fur or hat or any sign betrayed her having entered it. This sprang the alarm, and with quickened step he went from room to room, glancing in each with growing conviction of the truth. He called Sylvia’s maid as he ran downstairs, and asked if she had seen her mistress leave the house. She was not sure, but thought she had seen Mrs Clifford go down the conservatory entrance. He seized his hat and ran into the road. “She must have taken the road ‘o Sevenoaks, and cannot have gone far yet,” he said to himself, buttoning his coat as he faced the sleet. “Pst!” signalled Stutter between his teeth. Malcolm drew out his revolver, peering up the hill from the back of his fly. Tom was clearly visible coming down the road with long strides—not twenty yards off. Malcolm glanced in the rear, down the hill. Not a thing was visible through the thickening drift. “Have you seen a lady pass?” Tom asked, checking his pace as he neared Stutter, who was now bending down examining his horse’s near foot. An Unforgotten Event “About three minutes ago someone passed, guv’nor,” Stutter answered, without lifting his head. Malcolm tightened his Anger on the trigger, raising his revolver. So far the course of events had almost exactly followed the scheme laid down by Mrs Stutter, and the end aimed at in her combination was about to be attained; but with it an unforeseen event approached, which was to entirely change the consequences, and involve complications of quite another character. At the foot of the hill where the road bends sharply towards Sevenj oaks, Sylvia caught sight of a hollyi bush, to which Tom had directed her attention as they passed in the brougham. It brought back a memory that appealed to her reason and her heart at the same time. She remembered how at this point some gentle words and the pressure of hand had sent a thrill of love and i gratitude through her soul, moving her more than the ceremony of the morning to vow fidelity and : loyalty to this man, to honour and love him faithfully all her life. And 1 now at the instigation of a woman she had cast off loyalty and fidelity, ! dishonouring him in thought and iu i this last act. Was the evidence of that woman to be taken before the word of her husband—was she to ! believe the accuser and not the accused? A flood of remorse and shame overwhelmed her for an instant; and ! then as heedlessly as she had fled she turned to retrace her steps. At a bend in the road she saw him coming down the hill. A carriage stood between them. Behind the carriage stood a man whom she recognised at a glance—Malcolm ! supposed to be dead. She saw him step forward and raise his hand with a weapon in it. She gave a wild scream and darted forward.

Too late! The shot was fired, and the report reached her ear as she saw her husband fall face forward in the snow.

Sylvia rushed past Malcolm, who stood dismayed and stupefied with the revolver still in his hand, and throwing herself on the ground beside the body of her husband passed her arm under his neck and raised his head. The blood welled from the side of his head, trickled over her hand, and melted a glistening hole in the white snow. “Tom, Tom!” she cried, looking in the still face. “Speak to me, darling I love you, oh, I love you!" The closed lids lifted a little, the lips just curved in a smile, and then relaxed as the eyes turned upwards showing only the sclerotic. “Dead, dead!” cried Sylvia in agony. “And I—” The rest died on her lips as she fell forward senseless on his body. “Messed it, messed it—l thought you would!” exclaimed Stutter, turning on Malcolm. "You silly brute, why couldn’t you look behind you? Well, now, whatcher goin’ to do. Put a bullet through her head or bundle her into the fly? One or the other you must do sharp. That shot'll bring someone up from the village or down from the house. I’m not goin' to stay here to be nabbed as an accomplish in this job, so I tell you.” He made as if to mount to the box and drive off. Malcolm, awake to his peril now, flung down the revolver beside Tom's body and wrenched open the door of the fly. He was about to spring in

when Stutter, more clear-headed, stopped him. “You must take her or do for her, you blamed fool,” he said. "She saw you do it, and she'll split on vou if you give her the chance.” “Catch hold of her shoulders," muttered Malcolm, gathering up Sylvia’s skirts in his arms. In a ccuple of minutes they lifted

! the insensible girl into the fly. Malcolm took his place beside her, and , Stutter, springing on the box, lashed ’ the horse into a scrambling gallop up the hill. i 'Thank Ivins!” gasped Stutter. when, having passed the cottage unseen, they were fairly on their wav to Wickmere Moat 9 * (To be continued)