Mr. Potter, of Texas; OR, THE OLD LAG.

Auckland Star, Volume XIX, Issue 114, 15 May 1888, Page 6

Mr. Potter, of Texas; OR, THE OLD LAG.

BOOK Iv". CHAPTER XXIII. (Continued). SyKe! them to do their office, thong her voice seems to have changed and be come hard and discordant since he last spoke. And these are the woids she utters: T ' I-I stood by my father Sir Jonas Steven* deathbed, and listened to the confession of a dying thief!' , ~ On this there is a start from two of the

men. , . i v-,.,. Errol cries in an amasod voice: 3Com father ! my father's friend t Lincoln springs from his seat, murinn - ing: "Are you sane? Your father-bu Jonas Stevons-bhe great financier, tho respected banker!' . . But she cries at him: " Don't interrupt me ! you distract his attention ! 11 he does not listen to me how will he over forgivei. and gazes once more at Errol as it to drive her words home to his heart. While Potter whispers to the judge : I'or all our sakes, dout do anything but write her words on paper.' . She begins to speak again, punctuating her revealinga with tearless sobs. ' My father swore to me that while a young man he had stolen from tho bunk he was yet a clerk in a number ot sums o money The bank was determined to nml the culpit. For his own safety ho suggested that certain sovereigns be marked so that if stolen they could be identified, knowing that Ralph Errol was secretly going to Australia. On the morning of his departure he was about to place them all in Errol's desk in lieu of the savings your father, Charley, was to carry with him. Ho had not completed this when ho was seen by the office boy, to whom he gave thirty of the coins so as to aid him to emirate to America. That boy, Samuel Potts, took them innocently as ft loan from my father, whom years afterward ho repaid. That, -was my father* crime !' To this Errol says nothing. His eyes have a far-away look and are full of tears, his lips are trembling ; he is thinking of his father's years of miserable shame and cruel punishment. Ho doesn't seem to hear her. , Then she mutters hoarsely : ' You know the truth now. Give me the packet,' ami turns to take it from Potter's hands. But he whispers to Lincoln: ' Ssvear her to it, Judge. Swear her to it on the Bible, for the Lord's sake.' The Texan's manner impresses the judge, who hands her the statement he has written out and says : ' Lady Annerley, sign your name to this.' And she doing as he asks, he takes her oath that it is true. Then she mutters again : ' Give mo that packet !' which Potter does with a triumphant chuckle which she does not heed, for she crie3 to Errol: ' Now listed to my exPIATIOX ! 'On my father's death I immediately telegraphed, and found that you were in Eo-ypt en route to Australia. Disregarding the warnings of my friends and my own safoty, I hurried to Alexandria. There I waited—after all had fled—endangering my own life to do you justice ! You remember I tried to tell you, but you wouldn't listen, yuu were thinking how to save my life. Ah, how you did save ! How you fought for me ! Can't you remember ? Charley, my Charley, can't you remember? My God ! How nobly you fought for me and made' me love- you\' Seeing he made her no answer, she goes to him in a piteous, begging, pleading way, and touching his arm, trembles in fear of a repute, and says humbly, in one long, sighing whisper : ' Charley—can't—you— remember ?!

Her manner and despair make tears come into the eye 3of the judge who had sentenced fellow-men to death, and the frontier warrior who has butchered his foes without sorrow or remorse.

Bub Errol simply says, not looking at her : ' I did my duty ! How have you done yours ?' Then gazes at her sternly, for skc does not answer the terrible accusation, and cries : ' How have, you done yours V And now the scene becomes cruel, for she shrieks out at him : ' My God ! Don't look at me in that way. Have tome pity. How could, I tell the man I had grown to love better than my life, that my father had made his father an outcast and a felon for ©verthirtyyears? You would havedespised me for my father's crime, and hated me—as you do now. Don't think me all bad. I did the other sins when jealousy drove me mad. My Heaven ! \IIe don't evenl/dieve.' This last she screams in a kind of despair ing appeal to the world. Then seizing Errol and forcing him to look at her agony, she whispers: 'I intended to tell you the awful story at the first, but I'll prove that to you. That you shall know. That you shall believe by this. This, that I had meant for you to read if they killed me in Alexandria. This, that none but you shall ever see, for it tells of—of how much I adored you then —the first, the only love-letter I shall, ever write—THlS.!'

And she tears open the packet Potter had given her, and is about to hand it to Errol ;■ but gazing at it her face ehapgea from awful despair to amazed astonishment. She gasps ; ' He would never have known if I had not confessed ; now he'll never believe all!' Here the passion of a tigress comes upon her ; she screams, ' Tricked at the last! Betrayed by you P then, staggering towards the Texan, utters an awful shriek and falls like a dead woman ab his feet, the pages of the open packet scattering about her senseless form. Picking one of these up, Lincoln says astounded : ' Why, they're blank !' ■ 'Yes!' remarks Potter. 'Ye see, judge —I beg your pardon, Peer—l couldn't get enough of- the fragments to make sense. Her emissary had destroyed the document, though he'd left the wrapper whole, and so I tricked her and busted the slate !' and stooping down would pick Lady Annerley up. Bub Errol is before him and lifts her very tenderly, for the memories of Africa are back in his hea.rb as he looks upon this woman who has sinned so against him, and mutters, ' Poor devil!.' So, placing her inanimate form upon the sofa, he gives this woman who has broken her heart over him his first and last embrace.

Lady Annerley's shrieks have drawn Arthur and the rest to the door, and Mr Potter, calling his daughter to him, says : 4 She was once kind to you, Ida ; give my lady what care you can. Thar's been a funeral of a heart in this room.'

Going to her, Miss Potter cries out : ' How she must have suffered ! She's grown old since I saw her last. Father, what have you all done to her V ■ No more than justice demanded,'returns the old man. ' Quit moralising, and bijing her to !'

So with the American girl's kind arms about her. Lady Annerley is borne but of the room, punished by the fact that she never knows the man she has wronged arid loved forgave her.

While this is being done the men hold a hurried consultation, Lord Lincoln telling them that his resignation from the bench not being as yet accepted, and no successor to the office' having been appointed, Lady

1 Annerley's affidavit taken by him will be sufficiently binding for the purpose he shall uTit! that is, to quash the indictment aeainst Samuel Potts, and he makes such representations to the Home Secretary as shall obtain the Queen's free pardon tor Ralph Errol, and so much reparation as it is possible to make for the stigma placed for over thirty years on an innocent mailIn conclusion Lord Lincoln says : ±™ nidge who sentenced your father shall oe the Hrst to call upon him and offer him his sympathies and apologies. And as tor any injustice or wrong done to you by any ot my family, I can make an atonement that you at loast, Mr Errol, should think sufficient; for my daughter, who has been the joy of my life, will now I. presume, become the blessing of yours. You ye been a "ood son, and that is tho best guarantee you'll bo a good husband. Come, let us go to your father !' Then Lord Lincoln puts his arm over Charley Errol's shoulder. But Potter stops him by saying : 1 ear, I shar'n't go back to England till you get that ay indictment squashed ! I don t want to be arrested, and I'll take my darter and have a quiet time in Pane.' At this Miss Potter comes running to her father, and says : ' Of course I'll with you ! Dear papa, I'll never leave you till ■ Here the Honourable Sampson makes Arthur and tho girl blush, for ho crios : 'Till tho weddin !' We'll get tho trousseau in Parse. Pane is the place for trousseaus ! Peer, you'd better send that little darter ot yours along with us !' . But Errol here mutters to Lord Lincoln : 1 Think of my father—of his uncertainty— of his agony ! Come, wo must toll him at once.' And the two aro about to leave together ; but on getting to the door the judge suddonly pauses, and turning to the Texan, who stands with his daughter's arm around him, ways : ' You'll excuse me asking you a lawyer's question, but how and why did you change your name V 'How' returns Potter proudly. 'By act of the Texas Legislature ! Why ? Bocause tho Democratic Tarty thought Sampson Potter a moro high-toned namo to run for Congress than Sammy I'otts.^ That's what makes mo Mr Potter of Texas.'

THE END,