DUNLEATH ABBEY; OR, The Fatal Inheritance.

Auckland Star, Volume XXI, Issue 156, 4 July 1890, Page 3

DUNLEATH ABBEY; OR, The Fatal Inheritance.

BY lIAttpON PMNN DILTZ, Autpor of' The Duchess Undine,' Etc. 1 CHAPTER L. THE SEARCH AT AN END. ;..: As Lord Victor paused upon the threshol|H the look of sternness that had been on hia. j face changed to one of haughty amaze when he saw who his father's companion Then he slowly advanced until close to olj Sarab, when he paused again. |]j; Ab firsb she had shrunk beneabh the _.er| glance of thoso accusing eyes—bhe ang«isl|j she had seen in them that nightlab J_lmft wood had never ceased to hauntbor; bu|| ifc was only for a moment; then she waji herself once more, and stood ascalmandjf motionless as if carved of sbone. lurmng suddenly upon her, Victor sternly del manded: %■'■ ' ~,, If 'Why are you here, .woman? WhyU must you again cross my path and darken! bhe life you camo so near wrecking? Am] I nob miserable enough to satisfy even your thirab for tbo blood of my slain love:' ,"•.,( . ' My son, she has told me how unavailingly she repented of her cruelty to you at a time when she had every reason to believe you wero the son of Cubhberb Mortimer,' interposed the earl, laying his hand upon Victor's arm in his anxiety to soften his anger towards old Sarah. ' Neither did she dream thab your wife was the child of her mistress ' , \, 4 i ' My little love, my little love ! of What avail is it all, since it cannob bring you back from bhe grave ?' murmured Victor. « Something tells me that I shall never saber sweetface again, that when Iparfced from ;• her thab nighb—so long, so long ago.it seems—l had looked my lasb upon her.' As he ceased speakiDg, he stood liko one i losb in reverie—all bhe hauteur had died 1 fi-Om his face, the anger from his voice, i He seemed at the moment unconscious of ■ the presence of others—his thoughts were ffl 1 in the past, that sweet brief summer's j that was like a dream, to him now. When .i his father, wondering at his silence, looked 5 into his face, he could see tears there. «My son, there is no occasion as yet for 1 such despair as you have given up to,' he 1 said, soothingly. ' Mrs Greenleaf ha 3 told * me the story of Hazel's parentage ' * 'There is one thing your son does 1 not know, my lord,' interposed the old t Anglo-Indian. 'The nighb I told him 1 bhe tale ot his supposed mother's blasted ,1 life, his degradation and shame seemed so i greab that I spared him the truth, partly ' for hia own and in part for Hazel's sake. The fact I did not tell him is—' V I Looking upon him, she still hesitated to j utter the words that she knew would be such a blow bo his pride and cause his old hearb wound to bleed afresh. - j Then, by the deadly pallor that suddenly overspread his face, she saw chab he had guessed what ib was she had kepb from; him. , ■ X; ' But, my boy, it makes no difference to us, and bhe world need never know,' whispered bhe earl, tenderly, grasping; Victor's hand. ' Poor Zillah was nob the Russian wife.' ;< ■ ■-•* Oh, my darling, if she could but know i thab ib only makes her memory tho Nearer ;: to me,' cried Victor. ' Her mother w||| i pure and true, 1 am sure. Was she, my " darling, told the story of her unhappy I mother ?' he demanded, addressing Sarah; %;; ' No, my lord, she is still in replied b,he old Anglo-Indian. 'Still' in ignorance?' repeated Vicbor, excitedly. " You mean ?' He could say no more, but stood pale and rigid, his heart* beating with .convulsive force, while everjj , sense was strained to catch the answer to ; his question. ' Yes, my lord, I mean that your wife is alive,' replied old Sarah, slowly, glancing from father to son, to note the eftecb of her words. Eor an insbanb Vicbor reeled, as if overcome by bhe' shock of her; j revelation; then by an effort he rallied, and stood erect, while a light never y before' seen in his eyes shone in their dark I depths, where for so long the shadows had lain, „ deep and brooding. ' The night she wandered from home, driven \ wild with despair,' continued ' she was followed by one who had her weir fare ab hearb, and who was bhere bo sate her, arid by whom she was borne., away in her unconscious state. Eor her mother's sake J '% [ ' You did this for my darling, my little' love, when I was so bitter against you;' murmured Vicbor, in conbrition, and coming forward, he book bhe old Anglbß; Indian's hand in his. Looking into her face, wrinkled wibh the cares and sorrows of fourscore years, bhe magnitude of the debb he owed her seemed suddenly to. da Wh upon him, and he asked himself how could he ever pay ib ? She had saved his wife from deabh, from a fate perhaps worse, when he} coward-like, had left her to her fate. But all other thoughbs were absorbed in bhe! one consciousness that she lived, and that the barrier that separated them had never existed save in imagination. The love that; he had nob been able to tear from his hear& when he believed it to be sinful and degrad) ing had never been a wicked or forbidden passion. As he lookedjback to the events of thab New Year's nighb, he wondered if ib was not all a hideous dream, and if Hazel would not presently enter and smile inbo his face, the same happy child he had known ere bhe aloe of his love had poisoned her sweet young life. f ' Bub I will make up to her all she has suffered through me,' he thought. Then turning abruptly to old Sarah,- he eagerly cried out: •'Bub tako me to her, my darling, who was true when all others were false—take me to her at once, that oh bended knees I may sue for her pardon* And for you,' addressing the old English- 1 woman, * you shall never again know what ib is to want for anything, because of what you have done for Hazel. Can I ever foit-i ■ get that bub for you she would have;i perished oub in bhe cold world, liko a little bird flung from its home under its mother's breast into the winter's snowsborm ?' •■ * My lord, what I did for your wife was done freely, from love for hor and her inbbher's memory,' responded Sarahigenbly, as if beneabh the influence of bhat': memory while speaking. ' No thought of compensation ever enbered my mind, nordoes now. I have all the things of this life I need, and I would accept of nothing for whab I do, in serving' my old misbress' daughter.' . ..'-.. . ;| Victor bowed—he was touched by the? brute-like fidelity to the dead, thab is so seldom seen in human beings. ' There willbe some way in which I can make ib up to her,' he assured himself. "And he again began pleading with her bo be taken at once to Hazel. He felb thab to look once more; into her eyes, and to have upon his brow( her forgiving kiss, would have made death sweet, and oh, what rapture ib would add to life! * You must listen to me [a moment first, my lord,' replied Sarah in answer to.his importunities, 'Can you not see the impossibility of taking you to your wife tonight? Then bhe .hock bo her, when she does not dream you are bo near ?' 'Is she in New York? Does she know •why I lefb her?' •No, my lord, as I said- she is in ignorance as to the nature or your griey-anceß,ibu..-.Bhepiaa-never -ceased to leas®

you nor to mourn your loss. Once only she mentioned your namo. "Heis my noble, true husband," she said, " and nothing, no.b even death, can rob mo of him. No other woman can ever be to him what I was." And the smile thab flittej, over her face ib would have broken your heart to see. She is brave as h-ar mother in suffering.' Victor groaned aloud as he listened. 'Oh, my.darling, with what cruelty has your fidelity been- repaid ! Who but you could have forgive-- such wrongs as were yours ? Oh, my lovo, will you indeed smile again, and be happy -when I return They saw that he Was talking to a picture he had taken from his.bosom, and that his eyes were full of tears. It was a portrait of Hazel, painted by himself in the earlier days of their marriage; ho had found it in his old chamber at Elmwood, swhere ho had lofb ib th. night thab he iwenb forth from his home, * a wanderer on 'bhe earth.' Now he pressed ib to his lips ! with word 3of rapture that could no longer bo suppressed. j 'You saw my advertisement calling on iyou to come forward ?' Lord Cecil, presently {inquired, when he and the old woman jfound themselves alone in one end of the {room. 'We have hunted and advertised jfor you everywhere ' \ J ' Yes, my lord, but prior to that I knew |the errors of the past had been brought to lighb, and that he whom 1 hated as son was yours. I guessed ab tonce what Zura had done the nighb I waa prugged. I then saw bhe error into ivhich. I had been led—how Victor and [Hazel would have conbinued to live happily, logether had I not told him tha Itory that I believed to be true. Peeling that ifc was my interference bhab had parbed Ihem, can you not understand my anxiety lo see them once more happily united? I lolieved that, whenever Lord Victor learned |he truth, the first place in which he would leek some trace of his wife would be Elm-is-ood.. " She must be taken back there," I laid bo myself. "If he still has it rented, ib Si with the expectation thab she will some ay wander back there, as to the scene of er dead happiness." So we sailed for New fork ' ' Ift wag you who visited the Police Headuarters yesterday V inquired Victor, ab I tnce interested in the old Anglo-Indian's l arrative. ' You were there twice ?' 'Yes,'she replied. ' You suspected who i was ? Later in the day I went a second tine, and bold them enough to get them interested, and to have them detain you, ab they did, until I could explain to your father the mysterious circumstances of your parting from your wife. Suspecting who it you could nob h&vo been surprised at seeing me here to-night.' jj| ' No; and yet I feared what you might have to telt, for I had built myself up in jjjopes that might never have fruition,' replied Victor. ' Oh, God, no one can realise what I suffered, when far down in the tangled heart of the wilderness whereour solo companions were the beasts and bhe birdß, for I knew if you ever hunted up Hazel and told her the same bale you had bold me, the shame of ib. would kill her. .And yet— [■there were times when, in my agony, I felb thab death would have been a sweet release for her, a mercy bo hei? ! Eor how could She have ever borne the i v ouch of her baby's hands, and known ib wt\s —bub ib is too ihprrible to think of—it is maddening ! If that knowledge has made L_e grey before my time, what would ib have done bo her, iffy poor, innocenb darling ?' F He was pacing the floor as Ahese words poured from his lips, and seein-g the intense excitement under which he-, was labouring, his father went to his sAdo, and •laying his hand on his arm, gently* said: :f The hour is late, and as we both need .rest—and you did nob sleep any lasb riighb we not' betber wait until morning--to 'hear What Mrs Gr__*>l«o £- -t-M_3"iti~_oi»__t^vr-*-Leijte to us ? X n th°' meantime she will pr_ppare your wife bo receive you. The shoek l - of your appearance before her without warning mighb lead bo painful results.' ; While lisbening bo his father, Victor remained standing, his hand pressed in a mechanical fashion bo his brow, bub he said ■ nothing, and ab the same time the eyes o£ the old English woman were upon his face, regarding it with a pitying smile. 'He looks like one who has drunk of the bitterest. cup that was ever pressed- to human lips,' she was thinking. 'And Iso he has. What a chequered career his has been! From the cradle to this hour his Ufa has been filled wibh sbranga events, thab no human wisdom could have foreseen and averted, and which have inflicted such suffering upon him as bub few have borne. Poor fellow 1 his love for his wife, and the belief that.it was a.guiity passion, have warred in his hreasb, until they have almosb driven him mad, and a few more years such as the past would have mercifully laid him in his grave.' {To be Continued.) ,