Nerine's Second Choice

Auckland Star, Volume XXVIII, Issue 150, 30 June 1897, Page 6

Nerine's Second Choice

BY ADELAIDE STIRLING,

CHAPTER 11,

KIT'S secret.

Agatha gathered Kit's costly wraps under one arm, and slipped the other round Kit herself, who carried the candle, dropping wax plentifully by the way.

Along the empty, baize-covered passages the two pasied silently as two ghosts. The great house was strangely quiet to Kit, for there was nob a servant nor a light to be seen all through their journey to the room got ready in secrecy for the expected guest. Big aa ib was, ib was cosy and even cbeertnl. The old fashioned chintz hangings of the bed were gay with shiny roses and parrots. The screen between the door and the fire was embroidered with cherry - coloured ladies courtesyinsj to blue and yellow gentlemen in white wigs. An oldfashioned eheval glass, seb in carved flimsy mahogany, reflected the light, of the fire, and two candles burned in high silver candlesticks on the chintz-hung toilet table. , Ib was an enormons contrast to Kits little silk-eartained nesb at home, but she liked it. Who knew, she thought, looking round shyly as Agatha poured ont hot water for" her travel-weary face into the depths of a priceless basin, if some day Bhe might not have this very room for her very own and live in it always? If Kit hid her face in the depths of the basin and sponged away her hot cheeks with tbe hotter water. She and Maurice Lispenard were only nineteen, and besides Kit's heart beab a little faster aa she dried her renovated countenance. How mneh did Agatha know, she wondered, abont her and Maurice ?

* Kit,' cried Agatha, ' your skirba are all wet, and we haven't even senb for your boxes,' hearing bhe suspicious swish with which tbe guest's fur - brimmed Bkirts knocked against her ankles. * Yon can lend me aomebhing, can't yon!' Kib looked with some anxiety ab her pretty brown frock. She had wanted to look well to-nighb 1 And whab had poor Agatha to lend her thab was pretty ? * Poor Agatha,' in very truth, had nothing.

She turned over her frocks in vain. They were big enough for three such people as Kit. Then she went in despair to the big cedar-lined chest wherein such dresses of her mother's reposed as had not been degraded inbo everyday garments. On bhe top lay what was formerly called a pelisse. Made of dark sapphire blue satin, ib was trimmed royally with ermine and lined wibh white fur.

Agatha seized ib and returned from her chilly, barn-like chamber to tbe warm retreat of tho guest. Truly, she and Merino had spent a pound of their money in ' things wanted,' bub wanted only for the comfort of Kib Belton.

' Here, my dear,' Bhe cried, holding tbe sumpbnouß garment to the fire till the email of cedar came from its warm folds like incense.

The dead Mrs Mayne had been, like her daughters, a woman of heighb and presence. Her tight-fitting outdoor garment was very loose and long for the girl who pub ib on. Its wide, furlined sleeves fell away from Kit's pretty arms, and its ermine collar had to be lapped over ab the throab.

'Now, shoes. Mine will fall off your feet, but I can't do any bettor,' Agatha said, producing a well-worn pair of satin slippers long her ' best.'

Kib laughed as she shuffled paßb the chev&l glass in her ancient garments. Her throat) was whiter than bbc ermine, her deep eyes bluer than bhe satin of the pelisse. And her shoos could be hidden.

Agatha, the economical, extinguished the sinful luxury of wax candles and led the way once more through the tortuous passages back to the one room in Lispenara House where she and Nerine spent their waking lives.

The table was drawn up beside the fire. The cold chicken had a place of honour, while the smiling Jane took tbe cover off the mound of mashed potatoes browned bo a turn. The brass tea kettle sung cheerily on the hob. In tha lamplight the apricot jam and the clotted cream seemed begging to be eaten, and the royally-robed guest had a royal appetite after her long day in the train.

* We will wait on ouraolvee, Jane,' Nerine said, graciously, ignoring with delightful calm the fact thab Jana knew no more of waiting than of playing the yiolin, «and you musk go down to the station and tell them to sendnp Miss Bolton's boxes.' Jane, all eagerness to inform hor * young man' thab her master's absence would nullify for a month tbe decree of 'no followers,' dropped a courtesy and retired. The hostesses and the guest applied fchemselve. wibh the zest of youth to chicken and potatoes, to hob cakes and tea. Mr Mayne would have wrung his hands at seeing any human being so trifle with his digestion, bub then Mr Mayne was miles on bis road to Dover.

There waa a certain strangeness about the little group seated round the table in the corner by tbe fire. The room so bare, white walled, black beamed ; the huge fireplace, the wide, whibe hearth, the ancient leather-covered chairs high in the back, low in the legs. Kib surveyed the sisters over her last cap of tea in silence. • You are more alike than ever,' she said at last. ' Bub yon look so grand. So old, Bemehow V

They really were a stately pair, black haired, grey eyes, creamy skinned, wibh email, round waists and long limbs. As like to bhe dead Liapenards aa oo each other.

' Old 1' cried Nerine. 'We are twenty while Mr Mayne is away. When he is here we are forty-six, if you like. Anxious, suspicious, nagged at, we geb fresh wrinkles every day.' ' We are a litblo more than a year older than you—and Maurice.' Agabha said this in a matter of facb way. * You haven't even asked about Maurice, Kib.'

* No. How ia he ?' Very olowly into Kit's cheeks came a maddening colour. She felt it deepening, burning. ' I heard from him the other day,'she added, hesitatingly, not looking ab tbe sisters.

Heard from him 1 Read, instead, had stood in a country lane with him—had let the wiaber rain Btream down on her unheeded. Mindful only of strong young arms aboub her, kisses from smooth annaou .bached yonng lips on her cheeks. •When? How waa he!' bhe twins cried in a breath.

Maurice was their nursling, their all-ma-ll, and they had had no letter from him for a fortnight.

'Lasb week.' To-day being Monday, Saturday tho date of thab secret tryst in the rain. 'He didn't say how he was, truthfully, ' bub I fancy he was very well.' Kemembering the browned, strong sace, #o manly for his nineteen years, the

masterful lips and the words of bhe young lover who had walked- fifteen miles each way to meet her. ' I wish he could come over,' Agatha said wistfully. * Bub it only means his losing time and he hates it here. The old man's meanness nearly kills Maurice. We —laughing—'are much tougher?' ' What was thab 1' cried Kit. She leaped from her seafe ab tha table and stood trembling like a leaf. Clang ! clang 1 Two heavy strokes froma brazen throated iron-tongued bell struck, pulsed and echoed through the great empty house. Kit's nerveß were nob at their besb. She grew pale and cold. Clang ' Nerine jnmped from her chair. « The old bell 1' she cried. ' Who can be ringing it ? Who knows where it is but ourselves —and Mr Mayne ?' In answer, the bell began to swing regularly to and fro. ' Come, Agatba—come and see 1' Nerine lighted a candle and harried out of the room, shielding her feeble light as she ran. Agatha quickly followed her. Whab if Mayne haß returned ? As they vanished in tbe chilly passage, the bell, wibh one final raverberabion, stopped. Ib was as old as the house and unused for years. To get ab its dust-clogged, spider-, webbed bell rope you pushed back a tiny panel in the old porch. Kib had naver known thab ib existed. She stood a statue ot fear, her eyes big and wido. For Kib waa a coward, an arrant and hopeless one, and the bhree girls were alone in the house. Terrors of burglars and murderers appalled her; chill, supernatural sborieß crowded to her mind; ghostly thoughts turned her cold. If no one knew of thab bell but the girls and Mr Mayne, and he was on his way to France and they safely in this room, whab mortal hand could have rung it 1 She stopped her ears. At least if it rang Bhe would nob hear it. Her yellow hair ngainsb the lamplight made a halo round her head. Her wide sleeves had fallen back from her upraised armß. She stared ab the black void passage through the open door. Someone hurried along it—a man's hasty, thick.shod feeb drew nearer. Kit shun her eyes. This was not the velvetfooted Clarence Mayne ! At the door tho newcomer paused ; he tried to speak, but only made an inarticulate sound of pure delight, bub ib was enough for Miss Belton. ■ Maurice !' she shrieked. She tried to run across the room to him in Agatha's shoes, which were so big for her little feet. They camo off; the lone gown tripped her. Maurice Li.penard made a spring and caught her te him. 'Dearest, dearest Kib I'he said. She had really been harribly frightened, and bbere had been a strain on hor nerves all day. What with getting away from a reluctant mother, evading Mr Mayne, secretly expecting Maurice, whom, after all, she had never connected with that awful ghostly bell. She clung to him all unnerved. For one instant 1 Agatha and Nerine's voices came beforo them up tbe passage. Kib pushed Maurice's eager hands and smooth, cool face away angrily—ungratefully. ' What on earth do yon mean,' she demanded, ' by coming and frightening us all like this ?' • Bub you know I was coming,' he replied, rather staggered. • I didn't know you were ringing that horrid bell,' artfully clasping her hands over her joyful hearb. ' I nearly died of fright I I thought you were a burglar come to murder me 1' she declared in thab tragic voice in which we aro won. to speak of our own death. ' Why couldn't you have rung the ordinary door boll?' ' I did ; bub considering thab there wero no servants in the house, thab you were all in here boxed up, and ' —with a significant glance ab the table—'gormandizing, old Wayne's electric tinkle didn't make much impreision. 1 was about tired of cooling myself in the delightfully seasonable weather.' Agatha and Nerine came in ab this instant, transfigured from bhe warlike Amazone who bad gone to investigate the unseemly summons of tho boll. ' Why dldn'byou knock ab the window ?' the latter demanded. • Because E_it would havo screamed !' ' Bat you didn't know she was here.' •I did.' Mauricoregarded the agonised Kib firmly. 'I saw her boxes at tho station.' 'And never brought them!' cried Kit, ungratefully. 'I wasn't allowed to have anything to do with them. A cheery-cheeked damsel and a young man who appeared to be in tho fishmonger way were just settling them on a barrow.' 'A barrow! Some of them will fall off and be lost.' Kib was still standing in the midrllo of the room, shoeless, with gathored-up raiment. ' How did you manage to time your v.Bib so neatly?' inquired Nerine, subsiding into graceless ease on tbo hearth rug. * Did you know the old boy was going ?' •Of course. You wouldn't see me here if I didn't.' He spoke with magnificent carelessness which reached Kit's'soul. 'How did you ever know? We didn't write,' Nerine persisted. Maurice grinned. 'Ask Kib. She was tho lasb person who heard from me.' He uttered this with such apparent candour thab his sisters wore completely deceived. 'I thought I would jusb slip over without letting any of you know and pee whab you weto up to. Come on, ladies, and consume jam while I take a burn ab thab chicken !' ( To be contiued.)