THE DUKE'S SECRET.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 145, 21 June 1899, Page 6

THE DUKE'S SECRET.

(By BERTHA M. CI*AY.)

Xarffcerf of "Thrown oil the Wcrlfl,'1 '.Wife in Same Only/ 'Her Martyrsam)' 'Beyond Pardonj 1 'A True JMagtialeH^ 'Dora Theme/ 'A Mad iore/ 'A Golden Heart,' 'A Broken vWe&Sag j&iag,' 'Tnorns. and- Qrang.o Blossoms.'

CHAPTER LXVI.

AN lOLOQL'KNT PL. ISA

'In all that..followed 1 and 1 alone was to blame. 1 know' now that the duke nover thought of. lne but an iho child placed under his mother's and kow long iv vain; he Ir.uviy of my affection threw him oft! his guard; he laughed when 1 told him I did not care to go to a ball witihout him; that 1 would rather dance with him than with any one else. He laughed when I wanted to ride or drive with him, but the duc'hesa did not—she grew graver. I know the people began to talk about us, and I believe the duchess would have given anything if he would ask me to marry him; but, oh, .Naomi, even then his heart was full of you and the search ior you. Ido not'know what opened his eyes at last; but he began to understand that my worship of him had in it all the tragic elements of a woman's love; perhaps the duchess spoke to him; perhaps some of the many rumours about us reached him; for some days he was very quiet and grave; then he told me all the story of his love for you, of his marriage, and all that followed. Naomi, 1 would have given my life to be loved as he loved you. 1 would have died for it.

'I must, tell you all,' she continued. 'You had been twelve years away from him; you had given 'him no proof that you were living: I loved him with all my heart, and I clung to him, weeping in despair when I knew that between him and me was the barrier of a wife and child. He told me how long- he had looked for you, and how long in vain; he hardly thought you were living; but we agreed if no news ever came of or from you in the time to come, we ■would after a certainty think of each other. I do not think—and 1 speak the words with sorrow—l do not think he was so much in love with me ".s he was sorry for me. All-the great love of his soul was given to you. 'Ah, Naomi, you would know him better, and love him better, if you could 'have seen how gentle and kind he was to me. lie sure mj' humiliation was greater almost than I could bear, for I knew that he was telling me a story to show me that I must, not love him. While life lasts I shall never forget his promise to do all 1 could for him. All hope died in my heart from that hour. I said nothing; I did my best. I tried always to be bright and cheerful: to be hopeful when I talked to him; but Ihe -your.d in my heart never 'healed, and never will. Then, Naomi, you came upon the scene. If I had known that you were Bert-rand's wife, I would have trampled self under foot, and have l>een the first to welcome you for iis dear sake; but I did not know. I saw that he was attracted by yo\i more than I had ever seen him attracted by another, and I hated you for it. I* was madly jealous of you. What I suffered when he gave you the ■beautiful eucharist lily I had saved for him, no words can ever tell. [ was jealous of you, and I hated you,' she added, with a hot flush.

'I said to myself, over and over again, that to his own lawful wife Icould give him, and let him <go, blessing him, but not to a stranger like you. Naomi, the night you wore the dress like the eucharist lily, I coxild have slain you—l was mad with jealousy. The day that you were on the river with him I hated you with intense hatred—l was mad with jealousy and a desire for vengeance. I spoke to the duke about you; my heart was sore and heavy; and he told me that you were like his lost wife, Naomi; neither of ,us ever dreamed that there was the faintest possibility of your being Naomi; we never thought of it but as a chance resemblance.

'I can not tell you what I suffered when I saw" he, grew more and more Interested in you. 1 told him the jealous pain that made my heart ache. He talked to me kindly, and made me promise to be good. You know the rest—how the man who has been for so long tracing you brought him news of you at last. I shall never forget the moment in which he sent the folded card to me and I read on it, 'Michael Droski—with news.'

'The wonderful news came to him that his wife was living, was even then under his roof—was even then one of the most popular, and fashionable, and beautiful women in London.

'He was stunned, Naomi. He could not believe it —he could not realize it. He went to look at you, and came back to tell me it could not be. He spoke to you, and came to tell me that he could not believe it. Then it was proved true. But, oh, Naomi, how cruel you were to him —how you crushed him with your bitter words. You, who pretend to love, or have loved him so well, how could you refuse the pleading of his voice and his face?' 'He has injured me more cruelly than any man has injured the wife he pretends to love.'

'If he had plunged a dagger in my heart I would have forgiven him; if he had given me poison, if he had trampled on me—his heel on my face, I would have forgiven him.'

'That is servility—not love,' cried Naomi.

'I beg j rour pardon. You are his wife; you have every claim on him, but nay love is truer and deeper than yours has ever been.' 'I do not believe, it,' said Naomi.

'But I know it,' replied Lady Valentine, dauntlessly; 'do you think that if I were in your place I should refuse to forgive "him? I tell f you this, no matter how greatly he had injured me, I should forgive him if he asked me to.'

Naomi looked into the fair flushed

face, her beautiful face full of disquiet

'Tell me, Lady Valentine." she said, 'if we could change places—if he had left you branded with shame and disgrace; if lie had refused to speak the one word which alone could clear you from the stigma of shame-—would you forgive him'?'

She was silent for a few minutes.

'Yes,' she replied; 'if 1 wore in your place now. 1 would forgive him. 1 tove him with deeper, truer love than yours If he killed me I would smile on him in dying—l would forgive and bless him in mv last breath."

'Yon love him. indeed,' said Xaoini with involuntary admiration.

"Yes: if is that very love that brings me here to plead for him: it is harder to plead for him than it would be to die for him. If I, who love him better than my life, can come to you and ask you to restore him to your love —ask you to go b;U'k to him —if 1 can so far trample self under foot, surely you. after twelve long years of silent resentment —suiv.ly you may forgive a wrong1 from which he has suffered (jiiite as much a;> you luive done. One noble mind paiik.-involuntary homage to another.

'You are a brave girl,' said Xaoini, "but you do not understand how that terrible wrong has corroded my heart

—all that was kind and gentle in me seems to have died a violent death."

"It is but fancy," said Lady Valentint. 'See I am your rival, yet how kind you are to me. \Vho could have believed that 1 would be kneeling by your side, holding your hands and reeling my heart drawn to you? Who could have forseen that? Why do you call yourself cold and unkind'.1 Such a face as yours never hid a cold heart vet.'

"That proud, insolent woman. Lady Valentine—the words she said to mo burned themselves on my heart and brow.'

•And that is another thing. 1 am not asking you to forgive the duchess. I can imagine that you feel very angry with her; it is for your husband I plead. He gave you the love of his life, he gave you his name, his fortune, everything that he had, and at the critical moment of your life he failed you. Xot from cowardice, I shall never hold that opinion, but because he was afraid of losing you altogether if lie told tin; truth. See all that he did to remedy his mistake; see all that he has done since; think what remorse, what sorrow he has suffered ever since, and can you hesitate for a moment about forgiving- him? Ah, if it were but me, 1 would run to him, I would go with outstretched arms, and bury my anger, my resentment, in the sweetest kiss 1 could give him. As for the duchess, be just, Naomi; perhaps had you or I been Duchess of Castlema,yne, we might, under the same circumstances hare done the same thing. She is proud, but if you knew her you would love her. Ah! Xaomi, 'you are more beautiful, more gifted, much wiser than I am; do not let me outdo you in love. 1 am so anxious to see Bertrand happy, that if, by the sacrifice of my life, I could atone to you for the wrong done, and win his forgiveness, 1 would die now and here. It would be easier for me to die than live,' she continued. 'I cannot realise what my life would be without him.'

'Yet you come here and ask me to forgive him and go back to him. Do you know that if I refuse and persist in my refusal he could perhaps in time get a divorce from me and marry yon?'

'Yes, T know it; but I know also you will not do it; I know also that my love for him is so great that 1 prefer his happiness to mine. I wiuld a thousand times see him happy than be happy myself; besides, you forg-et Naomi—his son —you forget his son.'

'I do not forget him —T could not forget him if I would,' she replied.

Lady Valentine rose from her knees and stood before her, erect, with a dignity new to her, her face shining with light and emotion.

'You are a woman, Naomi,' she said, 'and a beautiful woman, too; but you have no true woman's heart if you condemn the man you love to be a lonelj', blighted, miserable man; you can have no idea of the depth and truth of love unless you understand forgiveness. I should call such love as yours selfishness, because you think more of yourself than of him. Even the old proverb rebukes you--"To err is human, to forgive divine." If you have in your love none of that divine element which leads men to mere}', then —why, then, I think Duke Bertrar.d had far better spend his life in loneliness and exile than spend it with you. Surely the worst that can befall a man is to have for his wife a woman without a heart. If yon cannot forgive, you have no heart—you know nothing of the divine element of love. You—though the words sound hard they are true—you do not deserve heaven; for those w'ho cannot forgive the trespasses of others do not deserve to be forg-iven themselves.'

'What do you want me to do?' whispered Naomi, in a low voice. 'Tell me and I will do it.'

'Will you? Then may Heaven bless you! Let me take that rose you have in your dress to the duke and tell him that you are waiting to see him. May I?'

And for an answer Naomi laid the rose in her hands.

CHAPTER LXVII.

FORGIVENESS.

.'Are you quite sure, Valentine?' repeated the duke, over aud over again. 'You have not fancied it or dreamed it? It is no good-natured ruse to draw me into her presence ? You are sure that she sent me this rose from her own. self, and said she was waiting for me?'

'Oh, man of little faith,' laughed Valentine; and he did not notice how white were the lips that laughed. 'How must I convince you? I have told you so many times over. She is now in her own boudoir, one of the most beautiful rooms in that superb house; she looks as beautiful as an empress. She wears a morning dress of white and blue; her hair is arranged with less artistic taste, but to my thinking- with greater elegance than ever. I can even tell you what she is doing—she stands by the window, thinking of all I have said to her, and waiting for you.'

'You must be a witch, Valentine,' he said, with great emotion.

'If I were, I should soon fly away,' she said. 'Now, Bertrand, go at once —lose no time. I am sure she will forgive you, and all will be well again. She has a noble soul, but she has been cruelly wounded.'

'If she does forgive me and all goes well, I shall owe my happiness to you,' he said.

'Never mind, my dear, to whom you owe it, provided only that it comes,' she said. 'Now, go this moment; take a cab and drive to Brook House. You will not be long going.

She fastened the rose to his coat,

and he failed to see how the little hands trembled. Yet some sense of the effort the girl was making must have come to him. for when he reached the door he turned back to her 'and. going to her. kissed her forehead, looking anxiously in the sweet face. 'You him* been to see her —you have | done all this for me, Valentine —and j why?" 'Because 1 love you. and 1 want to i sec you happy." she replied. 'Yon ! ought to fly to Brook House. BerI trand, instead of wasting precious ranI nients like this. 1 I He went, and then Lady Valentine j went to her own room, giving her maid orders that she was not to bo J disturbed. If Duke Bertram! could j have seen her weeping there he would j have known what the sacrifice cost I her. He went direct to Brook Tfous". j Everything was just as Lady Valeni tine had foretold. He was shown 1o ! Naomi's boudoir. She was there, look-

ing beautiful enough to bewilder any one: her golden hair loosened and lying in a rich, great wave on her shoulders. She was standing by the window, and when he entered the room she mci him face to face. Her eyes fell tirst on the flower she had sent him- wha I a faithful messenger Valentine was. even though the message she took was so much against her own interest.

'Naomi,' said the duke—his face flushed, iiis voice trembling with emotion, the glamour of the old love seeming to sweep over him again; the past years, with their long' burden of waiting and Borrow, fell from him. This was the girl-wife he loved with such wild passion, lie could have fancied himself away with her on the pleasant lands of Hood. 'Naomi, you are willing to see mi. lie cried; and then he stopped in wonder. All the pride and defiance had died from her face: she was the simple, loving N'aomi of old again. She seemed to take up the broken thread of her life from where he had left her. kneeling at his mother's feet. She opened her arms with a cry that he never forgot.

"Oh, Bertram), how could you do it — how could you—how could you—how could you?'

He caught her in his arms and clasped her to his heart, while she sobbed out the words on his breast.

'How could 1, my darling, my sweet wife? That is the very question 1 have been asking myself ever since— how could 1? 1 do not know. 1 was mad with the fear of losing you. My mother to me even was the very embodiment of aristocratic power. My darling, if I sinned. Heaven only knows how I have suffered. No one can tell, no words can tell. I would give my very life to undo it. After all these years of sorrow and pain have you no word of forgiveness for me?' 'I never intended, 1 never thought of forgiveness," she replied. 'it is Lady Valentine that has made me see that I must forgive if 1 would be forgiven. The words .seem hard to say, Bertraud, when for twelve long years 1 have brooded in silence over my wrongs."

'Naomi, have you any of the old love left for me in your heart?' he asked: is there one thing that pleads for me? Ah, yes, surety the face and the voice of the child that calls me father, surely that will not plead to you in vain.' The golden head sunk lower on his breast.

'Twelve long years ago,' he. said. 'I have loved you, longed for you, missed you, sorrowed for you, searched for you. Ah, my darling, perhaps it ia all on my side, not on yours. Naomi, neither ray rank nor wealth have brought me joy. I have been a mystery to everyone, and a misery to myself; do you not think 1 have suffered long enough—-more than you? You have had the love of our boy to console you: you have not been desolate at heart as I have been. Naomi, does he live, this son of mine, of whom you have never spoken to me yet? Say, my darling, that you forgive me, and that you will tell me about my son.'

For some few minutes there was silence, unbroken except by her bitter sobs, and it was the first time that he had beaten down the last of the barriers raised in her heart against him; he did not try to check the bitter weeping; he soothed the golden head; he caressed the fair, shilling hair with his hands and his lips, murmuring sweet and loving words, such as he had whispered years ago. But for the passionate fit of weeping, but for this tender, dreamy comfort he gave her who knows how this story would have ended? His kindness conquered her.

'Thank heaven, my darling wife," he said, 'that if you have any tears to shed you can shed them here.

He tightened the clasp of his arm round her: he whispered such loving words to her that no woman could listen to them unmoved. The bitter sobs ceased, the passionate tears fell no longer; she lay in his arms tired, vet at rest, like a wearied child.

'My wife, my darling, have you for-o-iven me?" he asks. 'Say that one word to me. It was a grievous wrong —a deadly injury, but 1 will atone as no man atoned before. Whisper to me one word of pardon, and I shall be the happiest man in the world." She thought of Yalentiue's words, of the light in her fair face, the flash in her violet eyes, the true, firm voice that had at first persuaded her, then told her pitiless truths; surely her love was not less noble than this girl's, who declared that even if he slew her she would forgive him and bless him in dying. She looked up into his face. 'Do you know,' she said, solemnly, 'that there is one who loves you with a deeper and truer love than mine." 'I will not believe it,' he replied. 'It is not now a question of any other love, but entirely of you,r own. 1 want your pardon, will you give it to me, Naomi?' 'Yes,' she whispered. 'I never intended to forgive you. Just as you had cast me out from your life, I intended to remain outside it. I never meant that you should recognise me or claim me again; but forgive you, Bertram!, and the past shallbe buried between us.' *

His eyes were dim with tears. Heaven had been very good to him after all. He had made the most terrible mistake a man could make in life, and now it was all happily ended. The ormolu clock struck one before they remembered time was passing. Naomi looked up in dismay. 'Why, Bertrand, you have been here two hours, and it does not seem two minutes!' she cried. 'It was always so —hours flew like minutes when we were together, and they lengthened into days when we were apart.'

'May it always be so,' cried the duke. 'Oh, Naomi, all the old love for you comes back to my heart. Do you remember how I used to watch for you and wait for you? I begin to wonder how I have lived through all these long years without you.'

And seeing that there was great i danger of the love-making coming \ over again, .Naomi said: i 'My uncle will be at home at two i for luncheon.' "May 1 stay and join you?" he nskI cd. 'No.' And she looked up al him ■ with serious, loving' eyes. "Not toi day. Liertraud. i am not so cold nor Iso heartless as you think. I have gone through as much as 1 can bear to-day—jusi as much.' 'But, Naomi, must 1 leave you iv i suspense?' he asked. 'No, that would not be kind, either, j Come back this evening. I will give lup all my engagements. I will slay ;at home to receive you; and I will tell I you my story since we parted.' "You will come back to me, Naomi?" !he said, wist fully. i "Yes. 1 will come back." she replied. i 'Come this evening, and 1 will arrange it all: but go now. because 1 can not bear any more." And with that he was fain to be ] content.

(To be Continued.)