THE STORYTELLER.

Mataura Ensign, Issue 717, 29 March 1900, Page 3

THE STORYTELLER.

A FORFEITED PLEDGE. It was a bad night for trade in the open-air Saturday market in Edgwareroad. A boisterous wind swept, howling and whistling, along the muddy streets. Sleet, mingled with rain, lashed ' the faces of the passers-by. The lamps flickered drearily behind their blurred panes, the stout posts shivered as the gusts dashed furiously against them. The gas-jets flared above the barrows, where the hawkers were shouting themselves hoarse in futile advertisement of their stock-in-trade. But in a certain dingy shop hard by, in a narrow street turning off the thoroughfare, business was as brisk as usual, in spite of the weather. Wet or fine, all the year round, Saturday was a night of much activity with Mr Loom. This will be at once apparent in the light of the three brass balls suspended above the dark entry. It was half-past 10 by St Mary's. Sunday finery, which had reposed in Mr Loom's keeping all the week, and had been " taken out," to be re-pawned on Monday, after the fashion of the thriftless. Clients had come and gone entering from the wet and windy streets, plunging into the dim recessss of the pawning-boxes, and presently emerging with their bundles into the dark once more. The outer door of the shop was suddenly but softly pushed ajar. A woman's figure stood hesitatingly in the entry. " Well, ma'am, what can I do for you ?" inquired Mr Loom. " Thus encouraged, though the voice was not a melodious one, the woman advanced to the counter Even by the dull light of a solitary burner,the pawnbroker had no difficulty whatever in " placing" his new customer. Genteel poverty with its shrinking pride and sensitive shyness was stamped on every line of the slender figure. Her gloves were shabby, and tho imitation astrachan on her old-fashion jacket was worn in places, but no one would have taken Agatha Valey for anything but a perfect lady. "How much will you lend on this, please ?" At the sound of her voice Mr Loom glanced up sharply from under Ijis bristly, white eyebrows. What right, he should like to know, had this unbidden guest to steal in upon him out of the London night to stab him with the memory of days when he had other dreams than those which may be associated with pawnbroking ? And there was yet another blow from the past in store for him. A ring rattled noisily from Agatha's finger on the counter. It was a magnificent opal set with brilliants. Mr Loom picked it up and held it to the light. His hand shook so that the undertones of flame in the milky jewel leapt under its bluish surface. "Where did you get this — I beg your pardon, how much do you want for it?" asked Mr Loom, who had put on his magnifying glasses and was pretending to be examining the ring. In reality he was looking very narrowly at his client. She did not seem to be dishonest but he should very much like to know how this had come into her possession? " I don't know," faltered Agatha. "I thought it a very valuable ring." If only this shaggy-browed old pawnbroker knew its value. " Yes they're good stones," assented Mr Loom, with his most professional air : "but opals don't fetch much nowadoys. People will have it they're unlucky." Agatha's private experience certainly lent weight to the superstition. " I'll lend you thirty shillings on it," said Mr Loom. This was considerably less than Agatha had hoped for, but she felt that she could not afford to refuse the temporary relief which even this would bring. " Very well," she agreed, " I'll take that." "What name please?" inquired the pawnbroker, with pen uplifted as he proceeded to write out the ticket. " Jane Smith." Mr Loom accepted this fiction at its proper worth. No " Jane," and most assuredly no " Smith " ever had such a face and such a voice. But that was no business of his. " Jane Smith " went down on the duplicate. " Address ? " " Nine, Victoria Place, West." Of course there was no such street on the' map. " What will the interest be ? " asked Agatha, putting the slip of yellow pasteboard into her glove. " It's all on the ticket;" said Mr Loom. " Thank you," said Agatha; " goodnight." " Good-night," echoed Mr Loom, as the girl went out into the rain and wind once more. As she fought her way along in the teeth of the storm, Agntha would have been considerably mystified by the disturbance she. had left behind her in Mr Loom's mind. He was very angry with her, but still more angry with himself. The fact was that John Loom, though now decidedly elderly, with unpicturesque eyebrows and a tendency to rheumatism, had nevertheless not escaped romance in his youth. Its central figure had been a girl with " Jane Smith's " blue eyes and brown hair, and sweet, shy voice. They had shared a youth set, as every youth should be, in the heart of an English village. Those were days when the boy had dreamed of bringing his ship of fortune into port flying another ensign than that of the Three Golden Spheres. But these ~ dreams came to nought. London, in the person of Will Varley, bore down upon the Arcadian village one sumuaer, and Lil Evans, to her cost, chose the more brilliant town lover. After her marriage, John Loom had lost all trace of his faithless sweetheart, but he had never forgotten her, and the sight of her daughter — for be had made up his mind that with such eyes and hair, " Jane Smith" could be no other — had set his foolish old heart beating as it had not done for years. He had always believed that Mrs Varley was well-to-do, but " Jane Smith," poorly clad, and in the shadow of the Three Brass Balls, told a different tale. • Agatha, meanwhile, had reached Victoria Place ; for she had quieted her conscience by giving at least a jjartially correct address. . Her mother,

tho dear mother for whose sake alone she could have brought herself to part with her beloved ring, was anxiously awaiting her in their wretchedly-fur-nished bed-sitting room. '' What a night for you to be out, Agatha ! Where have you been ?" " To get this for you, mother." As she spoke she counted thirty shillings into her mother's lap. "There mother ! Now you can pay that impudent old landlady." " But, Agatha, where did you get it, child ?" Agatha held up her ringlesslefthand. "My darling, you have never let Garr's ring go !" died Mrs Varley, with dismay. "Oh how could you do it?" "What wouldn't I do to save you one minutes ache or pain, my own mother? And we can easily get it out when better times come. You know I must get something to do soon." For days that grew into weeks, for weeks that grew into months, Agatha Varley trudged up and down London seeking the " something to do" she never found. When those dreadful days were over the Varleys could scarcely have told how they lived. Driven from lodging to lodging, each poorer than the last, they had parted one by one with all their little treasures, and, worst of all, they had not been able to redeem Agatha's ring. " It really does not matter, mother," the girl would say bravely, though her heart often ached to breaking with its loss. She had tried hard to put the thought of Carr from her, and persuade herself that she hoped he would forget all about her and marry some one else but she hadnot quite succeeded in banishing him from her mei-iory. She could not but remember that somewhere in this cruel London, where she was playing a losing game with life, he was living and working, and perhaps thinking hard things of her. Well let him think her what he would. All that she had done had been for the best. When she and her mother had lost their little income in one of those distressing finav cial catastrophes which occasionally stir the public mind to pity and indignation for the proverbial nine days, it' was for Carr's sake that she had made up her mind to put herself out of the reach of his comfort. She knew well what his loving, generous heart would prompt him to do. With barely enough to keep himself, he would insist on assuming the responsibility of their future. She would never consent to laying that burden upon his shoulders. So the Verleys had left their old lodgings with no clue to their whereabouts. " Gone away" was the landlady's curt dismissal when Carr Maliphant called to inquire for them. "Loom, where did you get that ring?" The speaker, a broad-shouldered young man with fair <bair and sunny blue eyes, wearing an Inverness and a low-crowned hat, rushed in excitedly upon the pawnbroker one foggy afternoon about eighteen months later. 1 Newspaper men, in search of copy, were fond of prowling about Mr Loom's establishment. If he liked a man he would be communicative ; if not he held his tongue, and the bailled journalist went away empty. ■ Among his 'fiends of tho Fourth Estate, however Carr Maliphant was prime favorite, and most of the studies of low life which were a feature of the evening paper to which Mr Maliphant contributed had emanated from Mr Loom's varied reminiscences. "Where did I get what ring?" asked the pawnbroker, eyeing Carr with some curiosity. " That opal in the window ? " " Which opal? " "Don't drive me mad, Loom. There's only one opal ring in the window to-day. It's ticketed, on "a forfeited pledge.' " "Oh, that!" " Where did you got it ? " " It's not my habit to divulge my clients' business." " I must know who pawned that ring Avith you." " If you must, a person of the name of ' Jane Smith.' " " Where did sbe got bold of it ! " " That's more than I can tell you. Perhaps she stole it." " Nothing of the sort." "If you know so much about the matter, why come asking me questions ? " "There, Loom don't be huffy. It's a matter of life and death to me ; it is indeed. I was engaged to a girl whom I was to have married as soon as I had made a homo for her. She suddenly disappeared, and I have been hunting for her ever since until I saw the ring I had given her in your window just now." " H'm ! You're sure it's the same ring?" " There's not another like it in the world." " Isn't there." Mr Loom shuffled across the shop to a safe thaf stood in the darkest corner. Unlocking the massive doors, he took out a small packet which he carefully unfastened, keeping his back to Maliphant. Then he went over to tho window, and took out Agatha's ring. " Which is yours ?" ho asked Carr, laying down on the counter before him two opal rings identical in shape and size. "I'm sure I don't know Loom" answered tho astonished young man. " But I do, Mr Maliphant. This is your sweetheart's ring, safe enough. The other I once meant to give to her mother." " You ? Well all I can say is it's a pity she didn't have you. Varley was a brute to her." " Varley ? Then I am right. And now, Mr Maliphant, you have every right to hear the story of these rings. They were made several hundred years ago, for two brothers who were engaged to be married to two sisters. Maybe these sweethearts of the olden lime had greater faith in their leve than in the bad luck which the opal is said to bring. At all events, they were married, lovers to the end. After they died the rings passed into other hands, but it soon became a proverb that wherever one turned up, the other was pretty sure to follow. I can't say I had much faith in the legend until your Miss ~?" " Agatha " " walked into the shop with the fellow to my ring in her hand." " A very pretty story Loom. But it remains to be seen what luck mine will bring me." " I'll tell you what it is," mused the pawnbroker, " I'll see if I can do you a good turn. You shall conic here

after dark every evening and I'll put a seat for you in my parlour, where you can watch all comers. And maybe, i you watch long enough, your sweetheart will come along to look after herring." For a week Can- watched and waited in vain. Then Agatha came at last. The pale face was thinner,the shabby jacket shabbier, but she was still, as Mr Loom said to himself with a suspicious lump in his throat, " every inch a lady. " I have called about a ring of mine," she faltered. "Is it too late to redeem it ? Its more than the time since I left it with you ?" " Then I am afraid it must be forfeited." said Mr Loom sternly, "you see, business is business." " Oh, I can't lose it, I can't indeed" cried Agatba, "it's my engagement ring I wouldn't let it go for all the world. I only pawned it because we were starving, and I always hoped to be able to pay the interest. Won't you give me a little longer ?" My poor darling, mused Carr in his hiding place, how weak and ill she looked ! How he longed to rush from his corner, and take her in his arms ! " Oh, I can't stand this," he cried suddenly springing out of concealment in open deliance of Mr Loom's warning cough. " Agatha, my darling, what has become of you all these weary months ? " " There, now," said Mr Loom severely, " see what you've done." For the sight of that dear face and the sound of that dear voice had proved too much for Agatha. She had fainted from sheer happiness. She awoke to cousciousuess on the couch in Mr Loom's prim little parlur with Carr kneeling beside her, chafing her thin, cold hands. " My ring," shemurmured dreamily. " Is it to late to redeem it ?" " Not if I know it my dear, said Mr Loom, fumbling in the pocket of his greasy waistcoat. " Hero Mr Maliphant, put it back on her iinger.' The colours seemed to leap with the joy of a living thing as Carr slipped it on the wasted hand. " You forgive me, dear ?" whispered Agatha. " Hush, my darling, hush. The bad times are all over. Loom, opals are the luckiest stones in the world !" Agatha Maliphant's opal is even dearer to her than her wedding ring. For other lovers, it maybe, the old superstition still holds good, but to her and to her husband their ring seems to bring nothing but good luck. For what curse can rest on that which has been consecrated by the faithful, selfsacriiicing love of daughter and sweetheart ? — E. M. Hewitt, in the ' Home Notes.'