HIS GUARDED SECRET

Evening Star, Issue 19463, 22 January 1927, Page 14

HIS GUARDED SECRET

BY CECILS V. SAVER

Author of ‘ A Complex Crime’ ‘Sportive Gods,’ ‘The Labyrinth of Fate,’ etc. [Our readers are luiormed that all characters in this story are purely imaginary, and if the name of any living person happens to be mentioned no personal reflection is intended.] CHAPTER XII. Breakfast at The Fair ns was always eerved punccually at 8.30 a.m. ; with the exception of Sundays, when it was an hour latex - . It was a simple meal-—more simple indeed than that served in the kitchen among the servants. Roscoe considered that a heavy meal partaken the first thing in the day was likely to cloud a man’s faculties for business, as well as impairing his digestion, and he made it a point to have but one good meal a day after he returned from the city. Madeline always presided over the breakfast table, pouring out her father’s coffee, prepared by an excellent French chef, sorting his letters (which were not many as a rule, since most of them were of a business nature, and were delivered at his city office), and attending to his requirements generally. Conversation was ever only of a scrappy nature between them, for Roscoe as a rule read his morning paper while he was breakfasting. That was, the news which interested him and which was “ financial.”

On the morning following his visit to Cristo. however, Madeline was curiously awaiting “ the news ” which her father had told her she might expect to hear. But she knew better than to question him. and aired her patience by conjecturing the nature of it, according to her suppositions, in her own mind.

It was about ten minirys before lie was due to leave the house when he suddenly broached, the subject. “ I’m going to bo married, Madeline,” he said curtly, watching her covertly as he made the astonishing announcement. Just for a moment it almost took her breath away, but she controlled hcrsdf, and gasped rather than said “You —are—going to—be—married again, father? That is indeed surprising news. May I know thenamo of—of the lady?” Certainly, since, she is to be your stepmother—although she is younger than you,” ho replied, with a sardonic grin. “ She is the younger daughter of tha late owner of Cristo Manor—Miss Eileen O’Connell.”

. Eileen—O’Connell,” echoed Madeline, swinging round in her chair and staring at her parent with incredulous eyes. “ But I thought —I understood you to say that you disliked her intensely ; that she was most rude to you when you—when you told her and her sister about your claims to their homo?”

“ That doesn’t alter the fact that I’m going to marry her. I’ve mv own reasons, of course, for wishing the marriage, hut it’s no concern of yours. She’s a very beautiful woman, and she’ll do me credit to that extent, if in no other, as my wife. IT] give you to understand one thing; I won’t have any petty or jealousy between you and her whilo you are living beneath my roof. The marriage will take place in a month’s time.” And with this information he went out of the room, leaving his daughter to reflect upon the amazing news he had imparted to her.

Madeline, was rather glad than otherwise that she was to have a voung stepmother, bnt she was exceedingly puzzled how it came about that 'Eileen O’Connell was to fill the role. “ What could have induced her father,” she wondered, ”to choose so young a bride?” And she supposed that Miss O’Connell’s acceptance of an elderly suitor had_ been due to her unfortunate position. She hadn’t been able to refuse a wealthy match.” All through that mor-ung Madeline’s thoughts pinned themselves to the news she had heard, and she was curious to see the prospective bride who was to become her stop-mothei. She was quite prepared to love her, if she’d let her, and she hoped they might become real pais. The only fear which assailed her was the knowledge, formerly remarked upon by her father, that Eileen O’Connell possessed a tigerish temper. Eileen’s wedding day had been fixed for the 23rd of September, and a for/ days prior to it she and Maisie left Cristo Manor—which was in the hands of decorators—to take up their temporary abode at the house of Mr Carey, who, seconded by his wife and daughters, had kindly offered them shelter until the wedding was over.

Eileon had refused to be married from Cristo Manor. She much preferred that the ceremony, with its strange contract should take place in a neighborhood whore she was not known; and Mr Carey’s offer had been gratefully accepted. Maisie would bo going out to Africa almost immediately after her sister’s marriage, which was to take place at the Covent Garden Registry Office; and, until the contracting parties met there for the occasion, Eileen had refused to see her prospective bridegroom or to be introduced to his daughter.

Roscoe appeared to be quite willing to humor her capricious whim, and it was arranged that only Madeline and j Maisie were to witness the ceremony, | which was to be followed by a quiet | luncheon at the Charing Cross Hotel, ; after which the bride and bridegroom were to leave for Naples for a few days’ : honeymoon—or, rather, the mockery ot one, as Eileen herself put it. ! Mr Carey lived at Highgate, and he promised to drive Eileen and her sister ' to Covent Garden on the momentous i morning—which duly arrived. It broke with a sullen sky, black with jagged-edged clouds, and a chill wind which carried the scent of rain on its breath. Maisie was helping her sister to dress in the pretty bedroom which they : shared at the lawyer’s home; and as she ; did so felt a miserable foreboding at her | heart—a presentiment of coming evil 1 in connection with this hurried and 1 unholy bondage into which Eileen was selling herself, to a man of more than twice her years, and what was infiitely worse, to a man whom she openly admitted tnat she loathed Try as she would, Maisie could not shake off the feelings which obsessed her, although she knew it was too late now to attempt any more persuasions with a view to coaxing her perverse and obstinate sister to change her mind. Her silence and her sad visage irritated Eileen, who looked superb in her travelling dress of dark grey velvet (she had refused to be married in black for any consideration), and she flashed out suddenly: “ Upon my word, Maisie, you’re like a death’s head at a feast! You get on my nerves—with that solemn face of yours; and you haven't spoken six words since you’ve been fidgeting round me. _ I wish I’d asked one of the Carey girls to play the amateur maid. It’s rotten enough for mo to know that I’ve got to pay the penalty of my prospective position by having to share it with the bloodsucker who ruined our father, without your making matters worse by croaking.” Maisie laughed a soft little laugh. “I didn’t know I’d been croaking, dear,” she said. “You’ve just accused me of saying nothing.” “Well,” was the defiant rejoinder, “you were croaking all last evening, and your face expresses a lot more. 1 Jiate gloomy people.’-i

“ I’m thinking only of you, Eileen. I don’t want to depress you, dearest, and 1 shall always pray that you will be happy in spite of everything, in your married life, and that wealth and position will compensate you for the lack of all else.' Our future Jives are to be so far apart, and I shall know so little of how yours is spent —unless you write and tell me everything. But I want you to remember always, dear, that if you need me at any time 1 will come to you, though continents and seas divide us.” A passing spasm of remorse filled Eileen’s selfish heart for a moment as she listened, and she impulsively leaned forward and kissed the speaker on the lips. “I’m not worth all your affection and worrying about,” she said. “ I daresay I shall get on as well as most women who marry for money. Lots of ’em do, you know Maisie, and lots of ’em hate the men they marry. Are you ready?” Maisie nodded, as sbe put a few finishing touches to her own neat toilet (she was dressed in brown velvet, edged with fur, as Eileen had persuaded her to discard black for the occasion), and then they left the room and went downstairs, where Mrs Carey and her daughters were waiting to give them a cheering send-off. The lawyer himself was to motor them to Covent Garden, after which he would drive straight on to his office in Lincolns Inn Fields. As the sisters got into the tonneau of the car a few minutes later, the rain which had . been threatening descended in a deluge.. The sky grew blacker and blacker, and by the time the registry office was reached the roads were running in rivers of water. Andrew Roscoe, dressed in a perfect-ly-cut frock coat, grey trousers, and a silk hat, and wearing an orchid in his buttonhole, accompanied by his daughter, who, like Maisie, was dressed in brown, had already arrived at the registry office, and ns the car drew up at the kerb he came forward and helped Eileen and her sister to alight. Then he introduced his daughter, first to her _ future step-mother and then to Maisie. Eileen was quick to notice the admiration shilling in Madeline Roscoe’s copper-hucd eyes as they rested upon her own faultlessly-bcautiful face, and she smiled her sweetest upon the girl, who from that moment became her loyal and devoted partisan. The marriage, was briefly consummated, and then the little party drove to the Charing Cross Hotel in Roscoo’s automobile, which would, after the luncheon, take Madeline back to Tooting, whither Maisie O’Connell had been invited to accompany her to see her sister’s future home.

Owing to the strike of ships’ stewards, Maisie’s passage to Africa had not yet been booked, and Roscoe had suggested that she should stay at The Fawns for a few days to keep his daughter company, an arrangement to which both Madeline and Maisie were very agreeable. Eileen appeared to be in excellent spirits after the strange wedding; and during the luncheon at the hotel—to which she did ample justice, remarking later to her sister that “it was the first good feed she’d enjoyed tr weeks”—she surpassed herself. Maisie wondered whether her high spirits were real or forced; hut she noted that Roscoe was grimly silent, a.nd that his white face was impassive while his young wife talked and joked, chiefly with her step-daughter. At length "the boat train was ready to depart which was to take ’.lie money-lender and his bride to Naples via Dover, Calais, Paris, and Marseilles; and after it had steamed put of the , station Maisie and Madeline started on their homeward journey. “I shall love your sister, Miss O’Connell,” remarked Madeline, as the car sped along the rain-slushed road. “ I think she’s just the loveliest woman I’ve ever seen. I only hope she’ll be happy as—as ray _ father’s wife. Why did she marry him, Miss O’Connell?” she asked, with unexpected candor. Maisie colored hotly, but she replied as truthfully as she could:,“That is more than I can answer, Miss Roscoe. My sister never _ explains her reasons for doing anything. She just does anything and everything, as die fit takes her. It will he a great relief to me,” she added quickly, “to Think that she will have a friend in you. Sha is rather trying at times. Please don’t think I want to say a word in her disfavor. _ T only wish to insure your friendship for her, against any possibility of its changing when she is given to moods. Do you understand me?”

“ Yes, I think I do. But I’m a very patient sort of person where those I love are concerned. I’ve had to learn to be content, you see. Father likes a quiet life. We seldom entertain or go anywhere, although we might so well do both; but he, my father, considers pleasures and entertaining a waste of money. So I do hope your sister will be satisfied with our method of living. I was quite surprised when he told me he was going to spend i short honeymoon in Naples, until ho explained that he wanted to buy s uu--famous pictures there. That’s the funny thing about him,” she rambled on; “he’ll spend fabulous sums ca pictures—works of old masters—and yet he’s positively miserly when it comes to spending money on what, in my opinion, is so much more cessary. I’m allowed a season in town once a year, but apart from that I’ve to be satisfied with a very humdrum existence —for all that my father is a millionaire several times over. “Of course,” she went on—while Maisie listened with a sinking heart, knowing her sister’s chief reasons for having married Roscoe—“ now that he has married again it may make something of a difference to our mode of living. I’m sure I hope so, for your sister’s sake, unless, as I _ said just now, she likes a quiet life, in a beautiful house. I know I’m jolly pleased at the thought of having her there—although my own marriage is likely to take place next year.” And then she told Maisie about her engagement to Sir John Fordham and the few particulars in connection with it. Maisie deemed it wisest to say nothing about her sister’s anticipations of a life of pleasure and excitement as the wife of a multi-millionaire; anticipations which, from what Madeline had just been telling her. were never likely to be realised, unless this extraordinary marriage was to change Roscoe’s nature. And again the thought recurred to her; “Why had he wished to marry her sister?” (To bo continued.)