The Vital Flame

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 185, 4 August 1923, Page 25

The Vital Flame

I ]3ys?V\ayChristie

CHAPTERL On tie slippery deck of a. New YorkSouthampton liner, with the Atlantic running mountains high, Marcella Field —the young, gay, vividly-alive Marcella who for five enchanted days had been •ship's belle"—flung out a steadying arm as a super-roller hit the rcesel, grabbed at the nearest pillar of support (which proved to 'be a tall, good-looking man in no way averse to this attention) and I laughingly cried out: j "1 beg your pardon, Mr. Holden, but ,any old port in a etorm, you know!" Mike Holden — rising young English sculptor, whose visit to New York had been a professional triumph, but whose ! pulses could accelerate to Marcella's pretty voice wit* quicker beat than to the praise of all the art critics in the i world—flung back: "You're not afraid to face the rtorm?" His dark blue eyes, with the questioning light in them that sailors who have spent long years at sea possess, softened as they rested on the piquant little features with their frame of wind-blown curls. "Afraid!" She tossed her head provocatively. "I'm not afraid of anything." Subconsciously she knew that was a challenge, and, at any rate, exaggeration. For even the prettiest girl on board an Atlantic liner—home of ephemeral triumphs and of all-too-brief flirtations — may have her peace of mind assailed. ' And Miles Holden, despite her vaunted [poise and worldly wisdom, had assailed that hitherto in vulnerable fortress, Mies Marcella'* heart. "Let's go for'ard, then," suggested he, holding her arm more tightly, for the ship was rocking like a at a country fair. "There!" —as they reached the boat-deck in the first-class quarters, and clung to the forward railing —"Isn't that magnificent?'' Mountains of green water towered above them, like an avalanche. The liner's twenty thousand tons danced frailly like an egg-shell, up, and up, and up . . . then down, and down. . . . • "I love it," said Marcella, with little fronds of salt spray clinging to ber curls, and cheeks aglow." "It's like life .... a constant battle' . . . civilisation against the primitive. . . ." : "Yes?" He hoped ehe would go on again, although, reflected he, the average man would be quite content to watch Marcella'& beauty, without investigating her mental processes. "Life's just a sort of etorm," she added, tentatively. "It's the constant making of decisions that wears one down. Don't you agree?" Her thoughts winged to that all-too-immine'nt decision that, like the sword of Damocles, hung over her. And yet— a week ago—the thought of marriage with the rich and influential Warwick Tremain, who adored her, and would be waiting at the dock to claim her, was something she could view complacently, if without a thrill. For, hitherto, thrills were outside the scheme of well-poised Miss Marcella's life. Miles Holden moved a little nearer to her. "If I weren't afraid of being impertinent, I should say you were too pretty to philosophise." "That's just a cave-man's speech," she said reprovingly, yet with the eternal Eve a-glimmcr in her sparkling eye. "This is 1922, and if women haven't brains and cultivate them hard, it's devil take the hindmost." He laughed softly—the well modulated laugh that was one of especial charms "So men are ravening wolves'" His glance was quizzical. And just because ehe was afraid she loved him, and still more afraid that he might guess it, she made answer, womanlike: "Men are all right •Iα play with, and to amuse oneself." The statement ended in a careless shrug. That to Miles' sensitiveness was a "DANGER! STOP! LOOK! AXD LISTEN!" signal. . Marcella, then, had flirted wlfch him. Ensued a little pause. White gulls were wheeling overhead, calling and crying to each other, and the sound was dirge-like, on thia waste of waters. He forced himself to remark, lightly. "You w«re speaking about the making of decieions? But life must be very simple, for a girl like you." How hackneyed that must sound to her! Yet every man who met her must eurely be attracted. . . . It was her turn to laugh. "You've jumped from the cave-man period to the Victorian, when maidens sat at home with their fancy-work, and waited for some man to come along and change <>ne brand of monotony for another." Her tone definitely implied that life—Teal life—held other things in it than men—and love! "Xo. Nothing's simple, if one is ambitious." Ambitious? Yee, he understood the meaning of that word. It had been his lode-star np to five days ago when, after a long tete-a-tete that had been the commencement of his friendship with Mareolla ; he bad wondered if, after all, the achievements of a great career was everything in life? •'lf there's any way in which I can help you, will you look on mc as a—a friend?" he blurted out. "If there's anything worrying you. in a decision—some disturbing element, maybe " He broke off shyly. .Some disturbing element? With a i queer ache at her heart and a rueful little smile about her lips, Marcella knew that flip, disturbing dement in her big decision was none other than—himself! A week a:jo, how eas3 r to have definitely engafspd herself to Warwick Tremanl A week ago, how difficult to understand the meaning of the word "Eomance." The wealtii and socially secure position of a man like Tremain had attracted her, upon the material side. That alone, even in the old Marcella, with her poise and rather worldly outlook, would have been insufficient, were it not that the forceful personality of the man had held a sort of curious magnetism for ber in the past—a fascination that (as now Mureolla understood the meaning of the word) contained tio genuine love, but itat a product of pleased vanity that the socuH' -catch of many London seasons should poor out boautge *t her Inuo*ttm young f**W

A. Starring Serial of Primitive Passions

i CHAPTER 11. The pursuit had started just four years ago, when Maroella was eighteor She had met him at the winter sports in Switzerland. Whether she would actually have accepted him or not, was a moot point in her own mind. But— being etorm-stayed one night in a lonely mountain hut with Treman, after a moonlit ski-ing expedition of which her chaperone was unaware—'Marcella had agreed to the announcing of their enga™ement, believing that tho bond would only last long enough to satisfy the gossips. Since then, the courtship had been intermittent, due to the fact that Marcella had proved "difficile," Rnd that Treman'e business interests had taken him on protracted trips to various parts of the globe. But the man's ardour and determination had not cooled, and these New York and Long Island visits had been looked upon by him as Marcolla'e final bow to girlhood ere she entered the bonds of matrimony with himself. It wa 8 time the affair was settled, and Marcella was really much too pretty and attractive to "hop any longer on the single twig! All men were poachers, but it would go ill with anyone who tried to poach on his preserves . . . here Warwick Treman's jaw would set with the bull-dog look his business opponents knew so well. "Only two daye until we land." Miles Holden's pleasant voice cut into her meditations. "It's been a marvellous trip for mc." A wistfulnesa lay in the words that made his listener's heart leap with a new hope. Was it possible their interviews had meant anything to him? "You took Xew York by storm," sain she demurely, purposely misunderstand ing. "Every front page had your photograph, and the reporters' adjectives were so ecstatic that their repertoire wae really taxed to the limit, and—" "I don't mean that," he interrupted hurriedly, for praise of hi~ work made him feel awkward as a eoiioolboy. Besides, he longed (yet feared) for her to know just how "ho felt. "It's the— the voyage—and meeting you—that's been so wonderful. Your sympathy— and our talke —they've counted so mucn more than the New York success, gratifying of course as that has been—' His ehy stammering told a truer tale than all the glib phrases of Warwick Treman. And the girl"s heart thrilled within a bosom that, after all, was 'neither <cool mtor calculating nor as wordly as she once had thoujht it was. "I'm glad," she murmured, unconscious that she moved a shade nearer her companion, so that the wind swept a tendril of her curly hair across his cheek, and an electric current flowed from her elim young body through the point of contact at his shoulder ana, so, straight to his heart, causing a tumult there that never after could die 'lown. "'lt ha* been wonderful —Marcella!" The words escaped from him almost against his own volition. His big brown hand—with the <en«itivp, beautifully formed fingers of the sculptor — closed over tho email white one that clung so tightly to the railing. The blood humming in her ears was an accompaniment to tho snn; which the blue bird of happiness was carolling in her "breast. She had never lived before . . . the great miracle wae coming, coming, . . liff—so gay and amusing—had been merely a long waiting for this glorious climax. Then, like a black cloud blotting out the sunshine of her mood, arose a queer and eerie premonition, and she shivered, fitaring with lovely, troubled eyes focussed far ahead into tho gathering dusk. "Have you 'second sight.' MareeTlaT What do you see?" Miles Holden know that this girl's mother, long eince dead, had come from a lonely island in the Outer Hebrides, and perhaps the Celtic 'sixth sense' had been 'bequeathed to [her? Marcella shivered, then said queerly, cryptically: "All I can see is the etorm about us —and a bigger storm ahead." Two hours later, in the confines ol her pretty stateroom on the promenade deck, Marcella tried to drees for dinner —a none-too-easy feat with tho four walls jazzing up and down, the toilet articles on her dressing-table running like startled crabs in all directions, and the floor rising and falling like an elevator with the accelerando button pressed hard on. She struggled into a filmy frock of blue georgette, fastened a little diamondstudded watch upon her wrist, slung round her neck a slim chain of platinum, from which hung a large, gleaming diamond, ttien—ae a great wave slammed against the thick glass of her stateroom window —gave up the Btruggle and, ringing for her stewardess, informed the latter that she would have a little something in her cabin, and not go down to the saloon for dinner. ■It was good to be alone, to think over the miracle that had occurred. Miles Holden had not said bo, in so many words . . . but love had surely shone in those fine 'blue eyes 01 his. . Mareella started as a queer, stifled little sound of sobbing came from the next stateroom. It was a woman's voice, although it sounded almost like some tiny animal in pain. Marcella listened. The tenant of the cabin had been loolccil askance at by the other womon on the ?hip. "man's woman." and of the wrong kind, 'she had bom dubbed. Certain it was she was associated with a band of crooks who were plying their trade in the card-room of the vessel every ninhf and on till the BBa li hours of tVmorning "Peroxide blonde," "adventure™" and wo«e_tb* ultra-virtuous and back-biting lad.cß who adorn the ms senger- list on most Atlantic had taken pleasure in the exchange ™ epithets anent the thin, nervona „£ ously attired little ,'oZn PJtt strained expression on her face rose at lasted Hv e l'tTj ?* &' upon the panel of the tcntat,ve ta P flo P or_then P tn ed £, under the presure, revealing' Rave Httle picture in a kimono which, traiW J °£ d " ehoulder, revealed a w<, ,\ ? 5 ono v en tb* f10,,,

her blonde head upon the day-couch, was the peroxide little lady who for many days had afforded gossip to the "tabbies" of the shipI "I'm so sorry. Can I help you? I What's the matter?" stammered Marcella, taken aback. Was soul-sickness or sea-sieknees at the root of the affair?" OEAPTER HI. The woman raised a tear-stained face. Marcella's advent neither surprised nor embarrassed her. In a world of ups and downs (principally "downs") she was beyond that sort of thing. Nothing's the matter, except the appalling rottenness of life," she answered drearily With a weary gesture, she pushed back the thick, too-fair masses of her hair, drew her kimono closer around her slim figure, and rose to her feet "You'd better not stay here," she added laconically, though with a quick look over her bruised shoulder towards the other door. "I'm afraid you're in trouble," said I Marcella kindly, "torsive ray intruding in this way, but I thought I mifrht be oi some not" 7 Your shoulder—" f-he l.rnke off rather awkwardly. The woman re<Mencd. "Oh, that's nothing. I bumped it this morning against the wardrobe, for the ship was rolling so. It's good of you to offer, all the fame. There aren't many women aboard who'd be so kind. They all hate mc." On a sudden impulse, Marcella urged: "Come in my at 'eroom, and keep mc company for a bit. The sea's so rough that I'm not going down to dinner. I'm not too wonderful a sailor Are yon?" she knew this woman wag intensely lonely and unhappy, and here was a chanco to exercise real sympathy. Listlessly the woman followed her, remarking: "I've done thia crossing sixteen times, tend the sea doesn't worry mc a bit." Then glancing round Marcel'ii's stateroom, which the girl ha<l made extremely pretty with fresh flowers which came daily to her from the ice-chambers 01 the ship, and with photographs in silver frames, she halted before one of the latter, and with a sharp intake ot breath, said suddenly: "Who's this man , " "A friend of mine, in Tx>ndon." Marcella'e tones were cool. It waa onr thing to take pity on t!m semi-l>oycotted person, and quite another matter to be cross-exnmined by her. "D'you mind telling n:e his name?' . This almost breathlessly. "Of course not. He is Mr. Warwick Treman." She looked curiously at her interrogator. "Have you met him ?" (That, of courfe, was quite impossibl'-.i "Yot under that nami>," came the surprising answer. Then, hastily, as though realising the peculiarity of the reply: "This gentleman here must be the I double of the man I knew. It wni twelve years ago in Winnipeg—bur, of course, it's not the same—" Nevertheless, she looked long and keenly at the photograph. The stewardess arrived with a plate of cold chicken and some talnd, and 'Nfarcclla ordered a eccond portion 01" the same for her newfound gue~t. When Mr?. Tomkins had withdrawn, after a dubious pla-nce at the- visitor, Marcella pleasantly remarked; '■.Speaking ot* name, T don't know yours yet. Mine i.-t M.iivoT.i Held." ''And mine"? Di'irdrc." The woman'? glance suddenly rested on tlic> valuable pendant round t'.ie other's nt'ck, and then travelled in the diamntul-and-platinum wrist-watch that the girl was wearing. "It'a none ot' my bn-iness, ot course, but if you take iiiy ti;>, you'll deposit these in the purser's *m> for tlie remainder of the voyage. And —and ' don't let on to anyone that it "as I who 1 gave you the hint. Marcella looked astonished. "D'you mean to say that there's a thief aboard ?" 1 "I'm not eayinjj anything," said the. woman called Dicrdrc, relapsing into | apathy once again. | The stewardess brought her meal, and she partook of it in silence, sitting in a low chair near Marcella, with a tray upon her knees. The latter surreptitiously studied the pretty, common, rather peaky little face, of which the obvious makeup whs ravaged by recent tears. Marcella was at a loss for conversation. Something must be said, however, co— "Have you onjoyed tho voyage?" she asked banally. Deirdre gave a low mocking laugh. "Yee—like poison 1" She turned hor queer eyes on the speaker. Fires seemed to be smouldering in their depths, making them oddly beautiful, and Marcella gazed, half fascinated, half afraid. Was, the creature mad, or what? I As though the later had interpreted | her thought, sh« added quickly: j "It's only men J hate—not women —j although always they hate mc." j "Wbv should they"?" j

**Afo, that's a long story. No time juet now to tell It. Besides, ife not a very pretty one, although a man—' , her dilated glance turned for an instant to the photograph of Warwick Treman, seemed to turn a thought round, then dismiss it as Improbable —"a man was at the bottom of the tale." She suddenly drew out a cigarette-case in wrought gold, and queried: "©'you mind if I emoke? My nerves are snot all to pieces, and it eort ot soothes 'em." "Why certainly not. May I have one. too!" eaid Marcella, anxious to put thie Btrange Deirdre at her ease. But the other drew back instantly. "I'm sorry—no. These cigarettes ■wouldn't suit you. You'd bette ratipk to your own kind—l mean, if you're aot a Rood sailor —and the cabin's pitching so—" She had flushed up, and the hand that held her cigarette-case shook a trifle. "You're quite right. I shan't smoke at all," replied Marcella quietly, yet bewildered. Then Bhe added: "You were telling mc that women hate you. WhyT Is it because they're jealous?" "Not so much jealous, as afraid. Oh, not your kind, of course. I couldn't hold a candle to a girl like you. But —" —frankly—"in a hard school I've learnt the art of pleasing men. Ajid generally 1 do succeed—although I hate them,' She blew a ring of smoke into the air, and watched it circle. "But sometimes 1 let go, and tell 'em so— p'li'onrrh it never pays—" and she hitched the georgeous kimono over her bruised eliouider. "Bah; They're like children, if you go the right way to manage them. Flattery i 3 all they want." (To be continued Saturday next.)