THE HOUSE ON THE BOGS

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 96, 24 April 1922, Page 10

THE HOUSE ON THE BOGS

By KATHBRINE TYNAN.

CHAPTER XIV. ■ " DEAR INTIMACIES. Doreen was sitting in the lounge, somewhere between nine and ten o'clock the following morning, writing a letter to Miss Hamilton —a carefully-worded, colourless letter except for the warm affection it conveyed—when she saw an outside car drive up, from which Kit I—very sprang with an air of joy and youth.' - She was well aware of him; but.when he came into the hotel and glanced in her direction, she was apparently absorbed in her letter. He passed through th? hall and disappeared in the direction of the lift.

It was a wet morning, and rain can b» nowhere more depressing than in Dublin. The rain splashed in the puddles outside and beat against the windows. People went by under umbrellas, and ragged urchins, with no protection at all from the weather, scurried by. their wet rags flapping in the cold wind about their bareness. The sky was. one unrelieved muddy grey. The horses in the cab-stand by the railings of the Green hung their depressed heads, while the rain streamed from their coats or the sopped rug laid across their withers.

A miserable morning, but to Doreen it was aa though the sun had come out and the-world had been irradiated with shining rose-colour. When she had finished her letter with a hand that had grown somewhat unsteady because of the.nervous excitement within her, she could hardly keep still.

She guessed that he had gone to" wash and; change. He hadeome in grimed from the wet cattle-market. Presently he

arrived fresh and shining, and made a bee-line to her across the lounge, where

various people were engrossed in their newspapers or letter-writing, and she

sat composedly reading a hack number of the "Windsor Magazine." She looked np with an air of surprise as he reached her corner. "Had any breakfast yet?"- he asked _■_ fresh, cheerful voice. ] *_T© 1 ; 1 waited a little in case you: ■light come." r j "That was adorable of you!" "I shrank from' going into the dining- ] room alone and meeting all those eves." "Come along now; you must be fear-; , fully hungry. 1 am: Fve been out since j fonr o'clock. It was a beastly morning! in the market." The dining-room was emptying fast - when they went in. Very soon they had the place to themselves, except for the waiters, who were clearing away. He read out the menu to her saying that he proposed to go through everything, porridge, fish, bacor. and eggs, sausages. "Tea or coffee?" he asked smiling across the table at her. She noticed that his hair was wet from his bath. A nice clean, soapy smell came to her across the table. _Haw clean you look!" she said, and realised that clean was the adjective for him. "" \ ..."Ob, do 3 S I'm glad. I looked an awful ruffian, when I came in a' while ago. . I was glad you were too busy lo • see mc. I did my-bath, shave and dress* ing in less than ha If-an hour. Quick work, wasn't it?" She agreed that it was quick work. The. : waiter brought the tea —they had decided on China tea—and laid down -the pot in-front of her. . "By Jove," said Christopher Lavery, j

"it is nice to have one's tea poured out by a lady again. My sister Betty, with whom J stay sometimes, in Leicestershire, lets her husband pour out the

tea. , Esther rotten, isn't it? I can see my mother now—she died'eight years ago, .and I.have; never ceased to m_s her—sitting behind,the silver, teapot pouring, the tea into the big cups •prayed with green shamrock. -That,

and a roaring fire, and the dogs lying in , a circle .on the hearth, make 'such, a comfortable picture for mc. Which reminds mc, I must fetch Mick. The liftman, takes care of him. It amuses Mick,' being a- country dog, to go up and- down in the lift and sea the people." "Isn't there a notice?" ■ She pointed to the wall where a card informed all and sundry that dogs were not allowed in the public rooms of the hotel. ••'• "That's only a precaution. I expect • hy this time Mick's head is getting giddy from the lift. I shan't be 'arf-a-mo." He came back with Mick at bis heels and set a-chair for him between them, ' on which the dog immediately jumped. The head-waiter looked at Mick as . though he did.not see him and went on superintending the folding of the cloths from the tables. "Rules, in Irish hotels, even the Shelbourne, are made to be broken," said Christopher Latery. "Of course if anyone objects—they don't, aa a matter of fact —I have only to take Mick, on my . _ne«. and justice is. satisfied. He's a ridiculous creature on anyone's knee much too big for class." "I've been thinking," said Doreen, "how little we really know about e*ch Jther. Your sister Betty now? Is she ;fl.yo'u have?" "Betty? . Yes, she's the only girl. . ?even: brothers of us and all scattered, _cept mc." ,'Tm glad you're not scattered," said Doreen. . ,"How many does it take to make a ■ scatter in -Ireland ? Guess ?" "Fve been too long away and too • short a time back." "Two. I heard two men talking to . each, other at.a fair, and one said to ' the other: It's time we were scatterin" By the way, I know lots about you up to the day of our happy meeting—at— Sehwartzberg, was it? You told mc a deal-in that long talk of ours. So.v you want to know about mc? Where shall I\begin?" .-'*__■ you get a good price for your cattle?'% * •. • "♦"Thirty bullocks at twenty-four 1 pounds-apiece." . -'!T B that a good pries?" /'lt is tbe Christmas market and they were, prime beasts. It was a fair price. Bow nice of you "to be interested!" ."More tea?" She held out her hand for his cup. Tbe last waiter hid gone, closing the door. As he took the cup from her hand their'fingers touched. Suddenly he had a thought' that, they might" be a honeymooning couple, she; pretending, with such' a question as that about the cattie, that "this breakfasting together was- no riew thing- By Jove, how pretty she was * and how delightfully the dimples cam* when she smiled! She had a Quakerish little tucker about her neck, a ,Xhe :fas_io_ of tfcoa* unemancipated Hya. • Her neck', , mUk - coI * , sweetly .abovs it. What _ a i- - fou_d>_it.chh,s*__rtr ith ™™

He rang to have his plate taken away and for the bacon and eggs to follow.

"Those poor waiters," she said. "How long do you mean to go on?"'

"Oh, a good while yet. The waitere know that I'm a glutton on market mornings. You don't want to go away, do you? If you do, I'll close down before I've half-finished breakfast."

He said it pathetically. "That would be too cruel. When do you lunch?"

"Whenever you like.. We can lunch somewhere else if you like it better. Not that there's any choice of restaurants. Dublin discourages the lunching and dining-out habit."

"We." She coloured, for the pronoun. but her eyes met his frankly. "How long are you staying in town?"

"Till your business is concluded. You'll want mc to shake up old Deane for you, to give him some straignt talk that will disturb his Kip" Van Winkle slumbers. Afterwards, there will 'be Dockrells'. The sooner that eerie place js stopped rotting the better. They'll say it is too near Christmas to begin. I'll tell them to start to-morrow. They'll say it's impossible, but they'll find it's not so impossible when I've talked to them. I daresay the garden will want digging out. Better leave that till the house Is done." "Yon won't need to go home then?" "I'll send a wive, to my housekeeper. I'm all alone at Curraugh. Just fancy— and three of my brothers are married. Not one of the selfish brutes would come home and settle at Currau«»h and give the house a mistress. They prefer governing the Empire in Darkest This-or-That.'^, "Wouldn't you want the house again if they did?"*

"l might \v_nt to get married myself, but hitherto I had not thought about it. I suppose I ought to. I'm twentyeight. I don't like the idea of Currai.'gh being shut up, or maybe sold, if I was not there to look after it."

"Have you finished V she asked, is twentv-h've minutes to eleven!"

'"Time was made for slaves. 1 haven't had my sausages yet. After that. 1 shall have some dioney. Are you thinking that I would be an awful brute to feed?"

"Oh, no,"' she said. laughing and flushed again, though her eyes did not sink before his.

"Luckily Curraugh supplies most articles of food," he said. Then, as he helped himself to honey—"l wish you would come and see Curraugih one day! It is no end of a jolly old place, though ;of course it needs a woman's hand over lit, or perhaps a woman's, presence. I I don't let it go to rack and ruin, you 'know—and there is Margaret, .my l mother's old maid, who acts as my 'housekeeper. "" Say you will come. 1 have an. aunt, a real pal, who lives only a few miles from Curraugh. She comes when I want to entertain ladies."

I Oh! Doreen nad a sense of chill, of misgiving. io she was onfy one of "ladies." No, she would not go "to Curraugh just to be one of a number of ladies. . -She expected he had that way with several ouher people. Perhaps he was even a flirt. It was not likely he would have come to twenty-eight years of age -without many love affairs.

"As a matter lof fact, I very seldom entertain ladies," lie said as '.hough he divined 'her-, thoughts.

__ere was no flirtatiousness in his direct and simple gaze. Of course she bad -known all the time that be was not a flirt. He would be kind and courteous to women, but she did not believe be was to other women as 'he was to her.

j The momentary gloom, with which indeed she bad only -played, passed from her mind. The sky was lightening. Was that a gleam of sun?

"I believe it's going to be tint after all," she said. "Have you finished!"

"Qui£e. I feel very lhappy. May I have a pipe whale you are getting ready ? You will find mc in the lounge."

She came down in the lift, looking delicious in her fi/rs. Tbe sun had really come out, but the north 'wind blew icily through tne streets. "Now, w'jfct would you like to do? Will you have a car to Hardress Street? A : cab is too fusty." "May we 'walk a little way? 1 haven't seen a. shop for months. There is Gr_fton Street, is there not?" "Yea, there is Grafton Street." "And you won't be horribly bored?" "1 shall be tremendously interested." She was' conscious as t'key walked down Grafton Street, that the women looked at Christopher Lavery. .She was glad to have him by ncr side. He was so tall, and yet he looked the right height: it was only that the other men were short by comparison with him. He had that indefinable air of tlie country and country pursuits. ?she remembered their first meeting, how she had thought that _is homespuns smelt of new hay. He looked so shiningly clean and fresh, and his blue eyes were so honest.

He was very patient about letting ncr look at the shop windows. Some of the passers-by smiled at the big-youngi man waiting so patiently while the pretty girl went from window to window, admiring, appraising. "Don't you want to buy something," he asked, while she looked in at Slynes' windows, which were beautifully dressed in bats and garments of all the shades of purple.

"They make mc feel shabby," she answered, her eyes riveted on an evening dress of pinky lavender. He had an irrational desire to buy her the frock she was gazing at with'such evident longing. Of course, he mustn't —but, still, she might wish to buy it and be short of money. "If you want to buy anything let mc be your banker," foe said. "You can pay mc afterwards, you know." He ended in a violent hurry for fa_r of being misunderstood.

j "Oh, 1 have plenty of money." she Baid. "1 could buy "it if I -wished, but what use would I have for such a thing? I have an old black taffeta I wore at the convent. It does very well of evenings."

"I daresay you'd Snd some use for it soon," ho said, as though he too coveted the dainty thing. "Anyhow.. you might as well have it if you want ft." "Do you .think I might?" she asked, with large considering eyes. "I'm afraid it would be a ruinous price." "Come in and ask," he suggested. It had suddenly come to him for the first time that it would be a delicious thing to pay for somebody's clothes. He had heard men jeer at the extravagance of their wives and daughters. He woudered if it was a pleasure that could: stale. After all, some men were curmudgeons. TV men who had jeered l were connoisseurs in wine and cigars; greedy fellows.

He held open the swing door for her and then went in. her face still wearing the look of indecision, which the astute and charming saleswoman had seen on so many faces and knew so well how to counter. She came to meet them with an inviting, insinuating smile. Was there anything she could show to Madame.

Doreen asked in a. very small voice the price of the frock she admired. She had an uncertain wavering air as though she might slip away. It was a mood Miss Nolan was well acquainted with, and an adept at frustrating. £he named the price. "Madame should try it on." she said. "It is a most charming gown. We expect to sell it before the day ( is over. It exactly suits Madame's complexion and hair. It is quite a creation. Do you not think so?"

The lust question was addressed to Kit Lavery, who was wearing a somewhat thoughtful air. A second or two later he and Dorocn were being led upstairs by the irresistible Miss Nolan, who had answered his suggestion of waiting downstairs by an assurance that there was no reason why he should not wait, for Madame upstairs.

"You will perhaps like to see the •Town on Madame," she went on. "We find that gentlemen as a rule have most excellent taste. We have customers who will not choose a dress before their husbands have seen it."

Suddenly Christopher l.avery was shy and conscious, and withal triumphant. Doreen was swept away from him by the irresistible woman. He stood for a second irresolute. All about him were lovely garments on stands, in cupboards. There ' were a number of screened spaces in which some Mysteries of the women were being carried out. He would have loved to see Doreen in the peach-lavender frock, but he mustn't. Apparently the smiling lady took them for husband and wife. It was an intoxicating thought. He escaped from Miss Nolan into the street, where he waited patiently till Doreen came forth. "Well ?" he asked. "I'm so sorry to have kept you. Indeed, 1 nevep thought of such a thing as buying a frock. But —it really did suit mc. They are artists. I could not resist so 'beautiful a thing." "One of these days I shall see you in it. T hope." he said soberly, and wondered if she-felt his thrill. " ' (To be continued daily.)