Beneath Their Feet.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 700, 3 November 1909, Page 2

Beneath Their Feet.

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

By Iza Duffus Hardy. Author of "The Lesser Evil," "Mac Gilleroy's Millions," "Man, Woman and Fate," "Oranges and Pomegranates," "The Butterfly," etc, etc.

COPYRIGHT.

GHAPIEB VHI-Coutinutd. Rhoda Frewen's suggestion had poured oil on the smouldering suspicions. Yes, it might well be "mental worry" that ailed Cara. And what cou-Id have occurred that day to upset her? What, but her interview with St. Quentin? Alice had no idea that Cara had even caught sight cf Rhoda Frewen's favoured suitor, much less that such a glimps couid have any disturbing effect upon her. If it had not been for the impression that interrupted interview had made on her, Alice would have followed Cara to her room with some affectionate and sympathetic inquiry. Without intruding or pressing questions on her, she would have given her an opening for confidence if she chose to confide. But as things were Alice felt her lips were sealed; a gulf of reserve seemed to divide her from her sister-in-iaw now.

she had never set eyes on, she was accrediting her husband with more perspicuity than was his due. She had seen that he was displeased by her lack of cordiality in the matter «.f his inviting Dusenbury to the dinner party, and she was afraid of any reopening of the subject. It was too dangerous to be touched; she dared not quarrel with Rhoda Frewen for fear of treading on the perilous

Meanwhile Cara was pacing round her room like a caged pantheress, every now and then quickening her step as if she could escape the horror that was on her track. She press-id her hands to her head and tried to think, but she was too distracted to be capable of any sustained thought. She could only ask herself wildly, m despairing iteration, "What shall I do? What can I do?" And no answer came to her bewildered brain. In her worst apprehensions hitherto she had never dreamt of anything so terrible as the appalling fact that had faced her to-day, and stricken her senseless at the sight.

The one thought that presently shaped itself and stood, out clear amidst the confusion and storm and darkness of her mind was the desperate determination that George, her husband, her beloved, should not know the hideous truth. At all costs the secret must be kept—yes, though secrecy was sin—though the keeping of it meant sinking deeper and deeper into guilt George must not know. Like a wild creature at bay she turned upon her conscience and clenched her hands upon the one determination —he shou'ld not know! But what was to be done? Cira was capable of silence, and reserve came the easier to her because she was never of loquacious habit. But she was lacking in the qualities that would have fitted her to play an active part in diplomacy. Her plan of campaign would be no more elaborate thau a policy of concealment. The plea of indisposition stood her in good stead when George presently came m with anxious inquiries. He accepted it as fully accounting for anything unusual in her manner, and during the long hours of silence she succeeded in evolving from the chaos of her mind one or two chief points for consideration. It was evident now to what St. Quentin had been alluding when he spoke of "latest developments." First, she must secure his silence, reason with him, plead with him, no matter by what humiliation of entreaty, seal his lips. And next, was there any chance of keeping out of sight of the man who now called himself Dusenbury? To avoid him now that he presented himself in the position of the fiance of Miss Frewen, her friend and guest, would be difficult almost to impossibility. Certainly illness would be a valid excuse for her non-appearance at the dinuer on Thursday, but it would be impossible for her to plead continued malposition without medical advice being called in. George would insist on that, he was already eager to send for a doctor. And a doctor might see that there was nothing wrong with her bodily condition, that it was only nervousness and mental shock that ailed her.

To refuse to receive Mr. Dusenbury would mean a quarrel with Rhoda Frewen, and that, it suddenly now occurred to her, would in all probability involve Miss Frewen's leaving the house in dudgeon, and consequent freedom from Mr. Dusenbury's visits. But then she could not quarrel with Rhoda without rousing George's certain anger and possible suspicions, she thought. A guilty conscience made her apprehensive of suspicion where none need exist; and in her tear that George might discover the cause of any indifference with Rhoda being her dread of being brought into conta>. t with a man whom, so far as he knew,

ground. The question now seemed to be, not "How could she avoid," but "Could she avoid," the man called Dusen bury. Though she might devise an excuse for not appearing at the dinner party, it would only be staving off the evil hour for a brief time. Yet something must be done. She must make up her mind to some course to take. She must not sit still and let herself drift to destruction—worse than death. Yes, far worse, she would sooner die tiian face George's discovery of the truth—the loss of him by a loss far worse than widowhood. Then as slowly the stunned powers of thought came back to her, gradually she began to think that if she could not avoid this man entirely the best thing would be to see him alone —see him, and secure his silence, a silence as vital to his interests as to her own. Once she was known to have met him, it would be easier to make some excuse for disinclination to the acqu<aintance. Even if she exposed herself to the charge of perjudice, fancifulness, whims, George would surely not force on her the acquaintance of a man for whom she professed a personal dislike impossible to assume until she was known to have seen him. She finally made up her mind that her only chance, her only hope, was to find an opportunity of meeting Dusenbury first without witnesses. And the opportunity came sooner than she had thought. The next day the excuse of the restoration of a morsel of lace-edged cambric -embroidered "R.F.," which had been found in the phaeton, brought Mr. Dusenbury again :o Hall, at a time when, -, it happened Miss Frewen and Mif Brantynham were ou* strolling in :Impounds and Lady Brantynham alone in the house. She heard who was the visitor, and Knew that her chance was given to her, suddenly, now and here. She must take it or leave it. There was no time for hesitation or deliberation. At any minute Alice and Rhoia might return. If she was to carry ou* the plan on which she had decided, she must act now, at once. Cara, whose first fatal error had been one of moral cowardice, too weak in her love to risk the loss of the man she loved, was capable in emergencies of the desperate daring of the weak. To have deliberately walked into a hungry tiger's den and given her tender limbs to be torn piecemeal by ravening teeth and claws, would scarce have needed more courage than she mustered now as she opened the drawing-room door. White as death, trembling in every limb, she closed that door behind her and faced the man whom Rhoda Frewen knew as Dusenbury, the very sight of whom was more terrible than the sight of the tiger crouching for the spring. For that at the worst meant only a physical pang, and death! He had looked up with a smile cs the door opened, evidently expecting the entrance of his fiancee, but as his glance fell on Cara he started, and an expression of incredulous amazement deepening to u-tter dismay chased the smile from his face. "Carrie?" he exclaimed, as if he could not believe the evidence of his own eyes. "Why, Carrie! What in thunder are you doing here?'-' with astonished emphasis on the last word. "I live here," she said, the desperate crisis dending her the force iO speak with some firmness, although her voice was hoarse and hollow. "You live here?" he echoed, still more amazed. "Why, what are you'!*' "1 am Lady Brantynham!" "You, Lady Brantynham? Oh, y thunder, Carrie! that's good!" He laughed, a laugh that Rhod.i Frewen had never heard. His ton", his manner, his very voice, was transformed. Miss Frcuen would never have known her fiance now! "I am as much Lady Branytnham ;.s you are Mr. Dusenbury,' she gasped,

with heaving breast, all but losing ho head in the horror of the position. "Yes, just as much! oh, lord! it's enough to make one die of laughing! Sir George Branynham has married you!"

CHAPTER IX. "So you were caught to-day?" Sir George observed, smilingly to his wife. "Caught, dear —how?" Cara smiled in return. She was leaning back in a low chair carefully arranged with her back to the light, her face and voice on guard, every nerve wrought up to play her part.

"You' had to entertain Dusenbury all by your lone little self till his lawful proprietress came in ! Too bad ! Poor old girl, when you were so seedy, and fight shy of strangers —but you're much better to-day, aren't you?" "Oh, yes, George dear, and I think I entertained the visitor quite successfully," she replied, feeling her foot firmer as she trod further on the path of falsehood, yet half inclined to laugh hysterically. "And what do you think of him?" with lazy interest. "To tell you the truth, dear," and she winced to think that the truth was the one thing she could never tell him, "I don't think much of him. I didn't take a fancy to him." "Not inclined to go in and cut Rhoda t, eh? Well, he isn't the sort of fel1. w I should have thought would have taken Rhoda's fancy, either."

"Perhaps it is a case of the crooked stick at last," suggested Cara, relieved to find by his tone that he was not enthusiastic about the new acquaintance. "I don't know about that," he demurred. "Rhoda's a good-looking girl still, and one would have thought she might have found a fellow more in her own set."

"Perhaps part of the attraction is the novelty that he is not," observed Cara. "Anyhow, if she's going to marry him, I suppose we must back her up," said her husband..

"Surely it is not as serious as that ? She can't really marry a man whom nobody knows anything about?" "She talks as if she meant business. She's a woman who knows her own mind, and I suppose she'll manage her own affairs," he rejoined somewhat drily. And Cara was aware that it would be indiscreet to go too far in criticism and disapprobation of Miss Frewen's taste. George's sturdy loyalty would make a point of "sticking to" his old time friend; still it seemed that he was personally not very favourably impressed with Dusenbury, and anyhow, as there was absolutely no chance of cancelling'the invitation to dinner, when that evening was over would be time enough to throw cold water on the development of the acquaintance.

on a hollow .shell which may give way beneath our feet any minute !" were the words that Cara, entering, caught in Rhoda Frewen's clear ringing voice; and they struck on her ear and down to her heart with a curious startling effect.

Living on a hollow shell! That was how she felt! as if the solid ground might fail at any minute beneath her feet!

"And what is the ground that is likely to give way? It must be an uncomfortable sensation," she said with feverish gaiety, when she had greeted the first arrival with a smiling apology for her lateness. Her husband looked at her smilingly, appreciating her appearance and well pleased with her brightness. She was evidently quite recovered ; he had seldom known her more gay and animated.

'"'Have you not heard of Mrs. Parkland's fright?" "No. It is nothing to prevent her coming to-night, I hope?" Cara rejoined with polite concern.

"Oh, she is coming 3 but, of course, she was very much alarmed and upset. Her carriage was just turning out of the gates, you know, where the Parklands avenue bends into the main road, when the earth suddenly caved ic jt.st as the carriage had passed ove; il". If it had not been for the horse : being frightened at the rumbling sound, and making a quick plunge forward, the hind wheels of the carriage would have gone over the brink and dragged the whole thing down !" "What an awfully narrow ecsape!" exclaimed Cara. "But what was the cause of such an extraordinary accident?"

"It seems there was an old disused pit shaft just there. There's a great chasm yawning now right across the avenue; they say the water's twenty feet deep at the bottom; they had to drive round by the back way." "To think, if it had collapsed a minute earlier!" exclaimed Alice with a shudder.

"The most cheerful part of it is," remarked Rhoda, always prone to point out the undesirable view, "that it appears there are supposed to be plenty more of those old disused pit-shafts strewn, promiscuous-like, about the neighbourhood." "But you need not be nervous, Lady Brantynham," said the bachelor guest reassuringly. "Brantynham Hall is not built over a shaft, and there can be no danger except where, the old mine-work-ings are." "And nobody seems to know how far they spread," suggested the Job's comforter.

Other guests now began to arrive in quick succession, and the strange and startling occurrence at Parklands was naurally first on every lip. When Mrs. Parkland herself appeared she was surrounded and all but overwhelmed with inquiries, congratulations, exclamations of C 'A special Providence!" "Miraculous escape!" "Evidently a sweet little cherub sat up to look - out for you !" etc.

On that evening too, she must be prepared to meet St. Quentin, who was also expected amongst the guests, and to grapple with the question of his silence. She stood between two dangers, whichever side she looked peril threatened. If she escaped shipwreck on Scylla, the black swirling gulf of Charybdis yawned on the other hand. It was small wonder that she wrung her hands and moaned to herself despairingly, "Oh, I wish I were dead and out of it all!" And yet if she thought that George would ever know—that he would live to tear her memory out of his heart as a shamed and blotted page —she would not rest in her grave. At all costs she must live, to guard her secret, and his peace—yes, ~ even though the secret were sin to keep! And she must stand alone, alone to fight this desperate and well-nigh hopeless battle. She could not turn to Alice for help, lean on her loving sympathy,-now. Alice was kind in her inquiries, failed in no practical duty of sisterly affection between .them, but a gulf of reserve had opened between them, a forbidden subject held them at heart apart, if not estranged. Alice was not misled by plea of indisposition. She felt sure that something more than physical weakness ailed Cara, that some secret mental disturbance had affected and unstrung her sensitive nerves, and beneath her suspicions, her real affection for Cara, her reluctant pity for her evident suffering, strove with the jealous doubting heart that held her aloof. Cara, however, seemed better as the time passed, and the evening of the dinner party came. It was the largest, indeed the first large dinner, at which Cara had officiated as hostess; and George, always affectionately anxious about her health, had been additionally solicitous on this account, wishing her to appear at her best on the important occasion. "Make yourself look nice," he had said, and Cara obeyed his instructions. If she was to be shipwrecked, she said to herself with a pitiful attempt at bravado, at least she would go down with all -flags flying. The Brantynham diamonds blazed on her breast and round her soft white throat, and in her golden hair. There were dark shadows beneath her eyes, but they were fever bright, and her checks glowed beneath the unnecessary touch of "rose-bloom" she had anxiously applied as a precaution against pallor. Her toilette was not to be hurried, and the consciousness of being a little later than she had intended deepened the becoming flush on her cheeks. Cara looked her best with a colour, and she had never looked more beautiful than when she entered the drawing-room, and found not only the rest of the house-party down before her, but that the first guest, one of the "odd men," a stray and punctual bachelor, had arrived. They were ail talking animatedly, apparently on some interesting and even exciting subject, "It's not nice to think we're living

The heroine of the occasion, a large, fresh-coloured woman with a presence, proud of her nerve, seemed to accept her escape ■as a kind of merit; there are some people who are always convinced when the lightning flashes past them and strikes and slays their neighbour that it is directly due to their own superior discretion.

The party was nearly complete when Mr. Dusenbury arrived, and as none of the rest of the outside company had any reason to watch the hostess's reception of this particular guest, and Sir George, on hospitable duties intent, had neither time nor thou'ght to spare for observance at that moment, it was only Miss Frewen's sharp eye, which littl" ircleed escaped, that marked the met iny.

With one of those efforts of whit the weak woman often proves as capable as the strong at a supreme crisis, Lady Brantynham stood steady and erect; her lips did not tremble nor her eyes waver; she even forced a set smile as he approached. There was a-momen-tary flash of half-astonished, reluctant admiration in his glance as it fell on her. As she stood drawn up to her full height, her sweeping train, the dainty high-heeled shoes, the raised masses of the diamond-studded golden hair, all combined to make her look taller than she really was. Queenly, beautiful radiant hostess standing amongs her guests, could it indeed be "Carrie" who dared to face him, cool, defiant, even with a smile, who gave him her finger tips with stately graciousness. As a matter of fact, she rather overdid her coolness; her exaggerated self possession conveyed an impression of hauteur curiously in contrast with her usual habitual gentle courtesy. Rhoda Frewen noted this with a certain offence. Why should Cara Brantynham give herself airs with Frank Dusenbury? she thought resentfully, a*s she herself set her sweetest smile ready to greet him.

Greatly to Cara's relief, he did not linger to inflict his conversation on her, but passed on and dutifully devoted himself to Miss Frewen. Next, and last, to arrive were the St. Quentin party. Cara had braced herself for the reception of Dusenbury, but all her cool hauteur had vanished as she turned to receive Douglas St. Quentin. Although no one else observed their meeting, it seemed to him that the tender hand clung almost tremblingly in his,' that he caught for one rnoment a look of almost piteous pleading and appeal in the gazelle-like eyes. Indeed she knew too well that while it was Dusenbury's interest to be silent, there was no such motive in St. Quentin's case. Dusenbwry might be threatened or bribed, but neither influence, could be brought to bear upon Douglas St. Quentin. Her heart sank within her as she saw him approach Rhoda Frewen by whose side Dusenbury stood

in devoted atendance. Was it chiefly in mercy to the one woman or consideration for the other that he vouch-j safed a slight stiff bow in recognition j of Dusenbury, and made no other sign ? Cara breathed again. At least for the moment, the danger was tided over. Fortunately for her, during dinner time she was safeguarded from both St. Quentin and Dusenbury by the presence of two guests of higher rank, Lord Dorincourt and the veteran General, Sir Giles Germaine, who, ol course, occupied seats of honour on either .side of the hosess. But looking down the table between the flowers and the lights, the sparkling jewels and smiling faces, she could see on the one side of the table Dusenbury's head bent towards Rhoda in animated conversation, and on the other St. Quen. tin making himself dutifully agreeable U> bis partner—only dutifully, as tha* partner was not Alice. (To be continued.)