THE GIPSYS' SECRET.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1607, 15 April 1879, Page 3

THE GIPSYS' SECRET.

["Danebury News ] Continued, At last, however, I finished, and on the wings of impatience and love, iushed homeward. I reached within sight of Mowbray Hall at eventide, With a feeling of home love and happiness, never again to be experienced, I approached my birthplace. Servants alone greeted me. • My father, my aunt, my cousin,' I exclaimed, with an awful presentiment on my soul. ' We do not know, sir,' responded the butler in a respectfully-pained tone, ' master went away first, and then the ladies ; that is all we know; we have never heard Bince,'

' No mat-sage for me ?' I cried aghast. ' Oh, yea, sir—a letter,' continued the butler, and handed me an epistle, upon whioh he left me alone apparently as confused as myself. I opened it. How it was I did not die on the spot 1 now cannot say. •My son,' it began, I have sent you away, because if we are ever to meet again, you should know a sad secret, which ought to have been revealed to you years ago. But now I see it cannot bo kept a secret any longer. You think yourself heir to my fine property and estate; it is with deep and awful remorse I confess that you are not. No! Do not ask me to go into particulars, or to narrate the crime of my youth. I cannot. My heart is nearly bursting already. I have sent you away that you may learn this terrible history before we meet again, if we ever do. I am going a long journey; it may restore some of that peace which appears wholly lost. Under these circumstances you had better go to my bankers. They have orders to pay you an annual sum. It is your own. But the title, estates, all are gone, aad with them all happiness for me. Forgive me. Forgive me, if you can.

'Your Unhappy Father!' ' I was too enraged and horriiied to make any remark on this fearful letter. • Why did I not die,' groaned my wretched friend. ' But no, I Jived. How, I know not. I had a long illness, and when I was better, found myself in a kind of hospital. I had been there some months ; how I reached the place I neve* knew, but my mind waß made up. • I would never go near the old house ; my disgrace should never be known. ' I wandered about incessantly ; never stopping, never giving myself time for thought. • I heard accidentally that my father died after making this revelation ; but I never heard any details. 1 What was I that I should go near that part of the country from which I was an outoast ; and so I have never had the slightest news from home. Faugh 1 how dare I call it by that sacred name? I My dear friend,' I now began, 'in all this I think you have acted with the greatest precipitancy. I should have wanted proofs.' • What greater proofs could be required than a father's words!' he answered bitterly. ' Well, I came to England,' he went on ; ' I met you. In some way you cheered me up, and I yielded to a temptation for society. When you came this way I nearly left you. I was too reticent to give you a rea?on for declining the journey, so yielded to fatality.' • Here we are,' he continued; ' and strange as it may appear, the gipsies, to whom I was always favourable, recognised me.' ' I thought there wai something familiar in their look and manner,' I answered; 'but what is the news you have received which moved you so much ?' ' Ah ! you noticed that,' he said bitterly. •Well, Sir Roland Mowbray re : gns in my father's place, my aunt still acts as housekeeper, Emily Musgrove is Emily Musgrove still, but in ten days she will yield to the importunities and threats of my hated cousin. Ah! ah! ah!'

' What does she ask you to do ?' *To stop the marriage,' he continued. ' She says I can. The woman is very mysterious ; she insinuates that when I went away in such a harry ; and swore by an oath they seldom use, that if I would follow her advice, right shoald be done.' ' Well!' said I, musingly. ' One more day of misery can do no harm,' he continued, 'and if I can serve Emily 1 will. Poor darling, she says she is very changed. She has been faithful to my memory.' ' That is something,' I remarked gently. ' Yes, but what avails it; she can never by any chance be mine. Still,' he added with a sigh, 'if I can save her—if I can save her, 1 will. ' I bad no more to say, but, taking up a newspaper, left him to his sad and weary reflections

' We played at meals, at anything to pass the tim« away. Night seemed never to come. Still the longest day must end, and go did our<.

'At eleven we went out. I had secretly armed myself, but he had not. He knew his way to the rendezvous, and led me to it without a word. It was to a gipsy camp in the sand pit. 'As we reached it the moon was shining bright and clear on the whole scene, tipping every rise with its soft beams, and casting every del and opposite slope into deep shadow.

' A whistle, sharp and warning, greeted us as we came within view, and then a boy joined us and bade us both follow. We found ourselves walking amid scattered bushes and stunted hawthors, and then passed a with a clump of towering beeches, all which pressed themselves indelibly on my imagination ' Edward Mowbray saw nothing; his thoughts were too intense. We saw several tireß, but the boy did not take us in that direction. He led us past some pits and hollows glistening in the moonshine, but otherwise dark. ' Then we found ourselves the centre of a group, amongst whom we noticed the queen, the beautiful girl Nina, the chief and four men. 'Tis well, Edward Mowbray,' said the chief in a grave voice, 'that you have trusted us. But that you were hidden in foreign parts, all would have been explained and righted before.' 'Edward Mowbray made no reply. He was far too stunned for speech. All was Inexplicable to him. • The gipsies now ascended a pathway from the sand pit and soon were on the level ground, near the wall of a park, slightly in ruins. ' This way,' said the chief. •I cannot,' said Edward. 1 You must,' responded the gipsy, gravely. * Give us complete trust, or go back and repent all your life.' ' Repent aU your life,' said the queon in a hushed whisper. * Remember my promise !' ' Edward Mowbray waved his hand, and the gipsy loading through the gap, he too followed. 'Soon we saw a large house, resembling, and evidently belonging to, different periods, as some was in perfect repair and the rest in ruins. Mowbray clutched my hand, bo overcome was he with emotion. 'The gipsies kept steadily on, and the situation got indeed exciting as wo approached the house. 'Are we doing right?' I whispered to N ; na. ' AU this is his,' was the reply, given in the same of voice. 'What could I say? So I held my tongue, whi'h, when you are doubtful is the best policy. We mternd a courtyard I saw Edward Mowbray shiver, as with horror. 'The men will remain here,' said the queen, ' and wait until wanted. I and Nina will enter.' ' Then I saw the beautiful girl I had so muoh admired opening afsmall door with a key.

' She has the right,' remarked ithe queen, as she saw us stare.

' The door opened, and I and Mowbray entered, preceded by the gipsy women, The elder one lighted a small lantern and led the way. •I could see the big beads of perspiration on the young man's brow. I knew that his agony was all but unendurable. Still, his compressed lip aud hard look said he would go through with it. ' Suddenly the old gipsy put her fingers on her lips, and whispered—'ln five minutes,' she said, 'you will know some of the truth ; be silent and hear all. But, ' phe solemnly added, ' you must be quie and listen, until I give you leave to speak.' {lo be Continued.)