Amends for All.

Auckland Star, Volume XLII, Issue 140, 14 June 1911, Page 9

Amends for All.

by E. R. PUNSHON. (Autlwr 6f "The Choice," "The Spin of the Com," etc.; ete.f

CHAPTER VL •• , THE FORGED LETTER. "My dear," said in a tone of mild re- , buke an elderly-lady who had followed Dora into the room, "if Wilton is joking, there is no need to impart the information to the whole street." Dora twisted up her little face into a protesting grimace, laughed when her aunt frowned—there was nothing the ' elder Miss Rose' disliked so milch or thought so unladylike as tho grimaces Dora was fond of making' On every possible occasion—laughed -again till her aunt had perforce to yield to the witchtry of her merriment and smile herself, and then went dancing back towards Wilton Mayne. Por Dora Rose -was a young lady who seldom walked when she «ould run and never ran when she could dance. That a man so prominent in intellectual and artistic circles as Wilton iiayne should have fallen in love with a girl who seemed to have little but her beauty and flow of youthful spirits to recommend her, was a fact which perhaps only surprised those knowing little of human nature and of the force of contrast. Left an orphan at an early age, Dora Rose had been brought up by her aunt, Miss Rose, and had first met Wilton Mayne at a small party of literary people at which she had attracted his attention by yawning so terribly and looking so extremely woe-begone that he : hnd felt it nothing less than a duty to try to amuse her. Discovering at once that Mr. Mayne, whom she understood to be one of the ] lion 9 of the party, was very like other j men in his admiration for pretty eyes ! and bewitchinc; smiles, she promptly lost' all awe of all literary people, decided | •that they were just ordinary mortals, and, asserting herself by the mere un-1 conscious force of her youth and her joy | in life, she very soon assumed her accus- j tomed part ns the admired of every one. What should have been a grave literary assembly devoted to the discussion of high ideals she succeeded in transforming into what perhaps may best be described in her own words, when, after it was all over, she remarked to her aunt that it had b?en "a ripping time; and whoever would have thought those spectacled old Johnnies had so much fun in them?" Of all those who swore themselves her hounden slaves on that occasion, none lad made his devotion more apparent ,than Wilton .Mayne; and his feeling towards her had rapidly ripened into a true and passionate devotion. At first She -had -hesitated, and she even shrank from his ardent wooing, frankly telling aim that all poetry bored her except when it was very sweet and full of loves and graves and moonlight—which his ■Wasn't, she interjected—and that she Sever had been clever and never would he, and didn't' he think -he to marry, someone from Girton? " Dora on to suggest that there wa3 Lucy Cripps, who was an A.B. or something ana awfully clever; what did Mr. Mayne think of her, for example? Mr. Mayne replied that he admired 'm*S S 3 ver y much; and then he Ifoceeded <to argue very seriously that

poetry was not an affair of the intellect at all, but of emotions. Dora admitted, thoughtfully, that' she had heaps of emo; •tion; and if it was at first chiefly her vanity that wis -touched by her conquest of a man so different from the general run of her admirers, it was not long before her heart grew responsive to the love he offered her so freely. | So they became engaged, and for once the course of true love ran • smoothly enough, for there appeared not even the shadow of an obstacle to impede their happiness. All through her life Dora had laughed the whole day long, but now, if possible, she laughed still more from ■ the sheer joy of her heart. Wilton Mayne, as be watched her, thought that no one had ever conceived so perfect -a picture of joy in life and youth. The lines of that poem of his, "Laughing Youth," afterwards perhaps the best known of all bis writings, began to run in his head, and then Miss Rose remarked: "Well, if Wilton were joking jus-t now, lie seems solemn enough at present." "He always does," cried Dora happily; "now, if I make a joke I always laugh so much I can't get it out, and no one knows what it is about. But when Wilton is funny he always looks more delightfully solemn than ever." "Perhaps," suggested Mayne, "that is because I don't know I am funny—as, for i example, at present I had no idea I was making a joke." "Then what do you mean 1" . asked , Dora, picking up the photograph and . ] waltzing -towards her aunt with it. - j "Aunt, isn't that' Joan Durand?" i i "Undoubted]}'," said Miss Rose, looki' ing at at closely through her eye-glasses. I "Very well," said Dora with another 11 ripple of laughter; "and here is Wilton • i asking mc if I know her, when twice ' I over he has written to mc in the most - j urgent manner asking us to call on her ' and be as civil as possible. And we i have, haven't we, aunt? for we got her ■ an invitation to Lady Martin's ball; and i oh, Wilton, I'm going to -wear a blush ' pink chiffon, trimmed with silver lace, , and "with a bodice of silver lace mounted I on pink chiffon and filled in above with ; white —you Understand?" she asked ' anxiously. ) ; "I understand you will be charming," !he answered, r ! "And it'll just be a dream," she rattled i on, dropping him a .low curtsey in ackt nowledgnieht of his compliment, .and - then whirling round in a sort of little x private preliminary dance, "and it'll t knock all the rest in the eye, too." ■i "My dear, my dear," protested her j horrified hunt. t "All right-, auntie sweet," cried s Dora, stopping her remonstrance s with a kiss, and then giving a c quick glance at Wilton as much as to d ask whether he did not wish he had been o in her aunt's place just then, a "Yes, I do," said Wilton Mayne. y "I don't know what you mean," said I, Dora blushing, c , "My dear child," said her aunt, reso- | lute to do her duty in spite of all bland ! dishments, "the tendency you show toe: wards the use of dang is in a young it I gjrl^-=^ M

"Oh, auntie, .nterrupted Dora, "why, only yesterday I heard you tell Lady Martin that no girl could be more free from the use of, colloquial and unladylike expression than mc." "I know I said so," said Miss Rose, sticking to her guns valiantly, "but I am sorry to say " > "Oh, aunt," cried Dora; deeply shocked, "you don't mean to confess you were telling Lady Martin fibs? But there, it ■was in a good cause, so I'll forgive you, and you need say no more about it, and Lady Martin is a horrid, stiff, prim old thing, isn't she, not a bit like my own auntie sweet." "Oh; dear," groaned Miss Rose, half in resignation, half in despair, "it. is always the same when I try to scold her." "Well, I don't like being scolded," laughed Dora. "Wilton, you'll never scold mc, will you?" . . "Xever," promised Wilton promptly, "but; dear, just be serious for a moment." "Oh, I can't, I can't, I can't," sang Dora in a kind of chant; "the world is full of serious people, do let mc be frivolous just for a change." "Yes, but this Miss Durand?" persisted Mayne. "Oh, we called yesterday," answered Dora, "and I don't like her a bit. She is so grave and sad, and her eyes frighten me—they make mc cold, they chill mc. So I ran away as fasi, as I could—ugh, I always run away from sorrow." "Take care, take care, child," said Miss Rose with a sudden gravity; "take care! lest when you run from sorrow you run j so fast you meet it on the way." "There, now you are being solemn," protested Dora, looking as if she were going to cry on the spot. "Don't let's ■be solemn—laugh, let us laugh;" and throwing back her head she emitted a peal of laughter so free, so happy, so like the merriment of some delicious child as yet untouched by sorrow, that the other two could not help joining her. "There, that's better," Dora cried, "now we are happy again." "Yes," said Wilton patiently, hut Dora, dear, do listen for one moment. What is this about this letter to Miss Durand? I know nothing of any letter about any Miss Durand." "But we have your letter," said Dora, looking guzzled, but with a smile lurking in her eyes and at the corners of her mouth, as though she still suspected BOrne hidden joke at which it was necessary she should be in instant readiness to -itugh; "it was so urgent and imperative, too." "Have you it with you," inquired Mayne, who by now was looking very troubled and disturbed indeed; "may I see it?" Dora possessed, attached to the skirt of her dress, a hanging pocket, from which she now produced an extraordinary multiplicity of objects. First came a reel of silk and then an old glove; next a paper bag containing two rather squashed chocolates, which Dora paused to eat lest she should forget them and so they -were wasted; an unpaid bill; a five pound note neatly folded in four and tied round with black thread for safety, a silver, thimble; a description of a recent fashionable wedding cut from the ''Morning Post," a piece of silk tD be matched in Regent-street that- after--noon; and finally the letter in question wedged in among several pictur- postcards. "Oh, here it is at- last," she said with a sigh of relief, and proceeded to return her various possessions to her pocket. Mayne took the letter and read it over slowly and' "with, a very grave expression of countenance-

"This is a forgery," he said; "I never wrote this." "A forgery?'' the two ladies cried together, looking at him in bewilderment. "A forgery," he repeated. "A very good one, I admit, but a forgery all the same. Look. You can see how careful and laboured the writing of it is. Look at that flourish under the signature. 1 It is an exact copy of mine, but it has been done slowly and carefully you] can see how deliberately nhe curls and twists have been made, ivnd see how carefully it stops. It is a forgery," he repeated. "But a forgery," the two ladies said again, looking at him in undiminished astonishment, and even with some alarm. Dora continued in rather a subdued tone: "Do you mean that, Wilton?" "Certainly," he said very gravely. "Well, I am sure," said Dora slowly, "Miss Durand knew nothing about it — she was so plainly astonished to see us." "But if it's a forgery," said Miss Rose, "who can have done it? and for what object? Really this is most uncomfortable. Has some one been playing a joke upon us or on Miss Durand? She seemed a very pleasant, lady-like person, and I thought the mother charming, so gentle, so reserved. But if there is any mistake, it will be most awkward about the invitation to Lady Martin's ball. What shall we do, Wilton?" and Miss Rose looked the very picture of bewilderment and distress. "Nothing, nothing," said Mayne slowly, his brows drawn together in deep reflection. "You see, one cannot tell— there may be something —it will be wiser not to act hurriedly. There is a friend calling to-night who may be able to— at any rate, I should wish to consult him before _doing anything." (To be continued dairy.)