The Bad Lord Lockington

Mataura Ensign, 15 May 1912, Page 7

The Bad Lord Lockington

[Published by Special Arrangement.] j

4*» I by BY FLORENCE WARDEN. Author of "Settled out of Court," "The Love That Never Dies," "The Face in tlio Flashlight," "Tho Whit© Countess," etc.

CHAPTER VI. I In the first place Edna stood still in i < the. very middle of the room and looked'' slowly round her. She saw* nothing, she hoard nothing, however, to confirm her uneasy fancy that she was being looked.; at by unseen eyes; she began to recover herself a little and to laugh and to tell nerself that she had become fanciful andi silly as a consequence of her fatigue! and the excitement of the day's events. j There seemed to he no corner in the' room from which she could be spied,: upon secretly. The lights were bright—j there were no gloomy corners where! things could remain half-seen.' Large' as was the saloon from end to end,! there was nothing to obstruct the view ;j and although there was a pretty Lou> j Ouinze screen in one corner, a rapid, examination which she made of it, peep-; ing round it fearfully as if in fear th.it; a ghostly arm might wave about it as ; she did so, she found nothing behind it' to justify her uncomfortable fancies. ' It is true that the three windows had , their curtains drawn and that there I would probably be a space behind thsse hangings where a person might remain concealed. But when she timidly lifted back one of these she discovered, indeed, a wide space behind, the windows being each set in a bay, but no one hiding there. She was struck, however, by the cold look of the landscape, and of the wide river, which, showed like a silver thread in the moonlight- beyond the trees of the park. The sight was awe-inspiring, the sense of desolation produced by it intense. Hastily Edna withdrew again into the room itself, witli its lights and brightly-burning fire. J -She could not now, however, rest! satisfied until she had peeped into the s-paee between the two remaining windows and their long curtains; but each; time with the same result, and each j time with the feeling, as she looked into: that gloomy, dark space, that there was someone behind her in the room itself. She began to -have strange fears that this sense of loneliness, heightened bv the fancy that she was followed and, watched, would never leave her while 1 she stayed at Loekington Hall. She was not particularly superstitious, but she I began to think of all the ghost stories; she had heard, and to wonder whether j any of them related to this particular, mansion. I Many old country houses, as she, knew, had weird tales about them; and i surely it needed some such explanation | to make it comprehensible that La-Jy | Loekington should leave her invalid husband alone in this one for sj mai.'y long months together! -So argued the innocent Edna, with the feeling strong upon her th.it she would like to have done with the sphn,dors of the Hall and to be- back with her aunt in their modest and jerry-built residence in the suburbs, which wis haunted by nothing more spectral than the sound of the next-door piano em the one side and of the neighbors' cciVtron on the other! She ran back across the Hon' - to tae fireplace and spread out her ha rids to the" blaze with a fancy tint she mast be cold. Then the door which led. so the butler • said, into the other Ira vn.g-rooms - caught her eye. He had sail she might ■ sco them if she wished, so she might ■ as well examine them too. Summoning al.l_ber courage—for there would be no light in those unused rooms - and the visit- might be rather "slmd- - dcrv"—she went down the room and " tried the handle. 5 But- the door was locked and tbi-re t was no key on this side. She was 3 troubled by this discovery. She began 3 to feel that to see into these locked 3 rooms was the greatest desire of liev 3 heart: and to conjure up spectres glidI ing about in the dark, shut-up aparti' mcnts. p Aware that she was making much of i a very small trouble, the girl began tc 1 walk up and down the saloon, looking - about for some fresh occupation t<. s divert her. 4 There was a piano standing out from B one corner, an instrument- so handsome 3 that she felt it was too beautiful to be 3 touched except by special invitation. I For it was painted a very light sage--1 green, and on this ground, amid scrolls in relief lightly touched with gold, there ! were dainty pictures of graceful worrier i in hoop and powder, of dandies in swore ; and red-heeled shoes, surrounded b> ' garlands of pale roses. ' When she had begun to examine tliif r handsqme ease she became fascinated I and presently decided to find out wheV tlier the instrument were worthy of it: s , magnificent case. •! So she opened it and ran her finger:

daintily over the keys. Then she turned round quickly wiil the feeling upon her more strongly tlnu before that someone besides herself wai present in the room. Again, however, sho saw no one. And telling herself she was a goose, she gav< herself up to the delight of playing : piano which was a revelation of powei and sweetness. It was indeed an ex hibition piano of groat value, and a jo< for any musician worthy the name. With the true instinct, of a genuirn music-lover Edna soon forgot her fear: and her fancies as she played, andthei | sang, and then played again. ! But as she finished eno of her songs a little ballad in the modern style, child nil in sentiment but rather pretty anc ! tuneful, one she bad '.scarcely though' important enough to sing in the grea hail in the presence of the unseen am important liearcr, she heard a hunini ! voice which made her start up am j lis:en. Outside the house, she thought, tlr singer must bo, for the sound was nmf fled by distance and seemed to com* from tho direction of the park between tli" mansion and the river, j Faint as were the sounds. Edna dis ! tinguishod that they were the notes o a man's voice trying to repeat th melody of the ballad she- had just beei singing. Mellow they were, and deep with nothing; ghostly or uncanny abou them. And she felt quite comforted am relieved to hear a human voice and t imagine that this act of the unseo: singer's of trying to sing her little son; established a bond of human and hclplu friendship hetiveen her and him. Such was the state of mind to whie solitude and her strange situation ha reduced her, that Edna almost felt sui prised that anything so human as thi voice should reach her ears amid _ s much that, was mysterious, perplexin and ghostly. The voice died away in the distance and she >sat down to the. .niano again lipping that b"r mii*ht bring th singer back. I'-iv if he came he cam in silence, for ; i. j It.--:---; his voice n more. Weary of plityiissj. ::<•<] - m oointed i: this silly lit'.lc ,v':.h V the deep toned voice agai..-, Rina- tuto from th«

piano, shut, it carefully, and looked at a little gilt clock, with a long-robed angel of fame Hying on the top, which stood on a side-table. It was only halfpast nine. Should she go to bed? She felt as shy of leaving the room and venturing alone into that vast hall and those echoing corridors as she had been shy of entering it. But she was just nerving herself to make the attempt, and approaching the wall to ring the electric bell, when the door opened and Mrs Holland came in. The housekeeper seemed in high good humor, and Edna was delighted to welcome her. A visitor in this terrible solitude, to break up the fancies which seemed to people it, was unlooked-for joy. "Oh, I'm JO glad you've come!" cried Edna. "It's dreadful to be alone so long!" "Poor dear!" said the housekeeper, smiling b"nignantly, as Edna insisted upon placing her in a chair and came close to her, with relief in her young face. "You have begun to be bored already, I'm afraid. 1 was fearing how it would be. I told his lordship so. I put it to him that if mv lady, with her maids and her dogs..and her horses and her motor-car. and with the people who come to visit her and those l she brings with her, always complains <;f being bored here, what would a young lady do who has no friends here and who is so many miles away from her own people?" Tho irirl sat back and looked rather i disconsolate . "Perhaps it won't always be so bad!" said she, wistfully.* "When does Ladv Locknigton conn 1 back to the Hall?" The housekeeper, so it s< emed to Ed no, pursed up her lips- a don't suppose she'll be here belore Christmas," she said, j. "Christina*! Ob. 1 shall be away by ' that time, shan't I? 1 mean if I were to stay hero, if Lord Lockington were satisfied, with my playing, f should be allowed to e;o home for some holidays then, shouldn't 1 ?" M.sr Holland hesitated, and Edna be-i 1 c;an to look frightened, as if wondering whether she was to he looked upon as | having sold her very soul for eighty ' pounds a year. 1 "Bv the bye," she said, "have you s heard vet what Lord Lockington ! thinks?"' | There was a pause. I "What he thinks about what?" asked i Mrs Holland then, evasively. | "Why, about my playinti, of course, j I'm sure he must have heard me! For -Hievp was a sort of blind drawn down ill that- little gallery, in front of a door I that- onens out upon it. I'm quite sure that Lord Lockington must have been I behind it." ! And she put on an air of not intend- : ing to he trifled with. ! "Well, 1 IHieve, as a matter of fact, i thai 'his lordship has heard you play | and sing too," admitted the housc- ' keener, cautiously. I "Yes, I was sure of it; and now tell 'me, is he satisfied? Does he think I J play well enough, and sing, or shall 1 be sent away?" A faint smile, instantly suppressed, appeared on the housekeeper's face. "Do you wish to stay?" she asked, ievading the question, i "Why, yes, of course I do." > "In spite of the dulness? And 1 I warn you it will be no livelier!" | Tho housekeeper looked at her with a I frown, not of anger, but of earnest and | serious discussion. She seemed to have some anxiety in , her mind. Edna thought. I The girl sighed. "When- you've got '; to earn your own living," she .said, "yon ' can't have- everything that you would choose. I should have gone as coinpanion to a deaf old lady, to whom I i should have to read aloud every dav. if J 1 I hadn't come here. That would have been still worse, wouldn't it?" Although she had herself spoken ol *" 1 the dulness of the life, the housekoewr ! anpeared to resent the word "still" in 7' the girl's speech. ' j "For the matter of that," she said. e ! rather tartly, "his lordslrp gave ors' dors, particular orders, that you sboul. a be treated exactly like the ladies o .-} his family, her ladyship and his owi s-'s- ,. +ers, when they come here. And to tlic i_ best of my belief you have bet n s< treated." I Edna perceived the mistake site l;a< made in taking the housek.v. > v's cpo logetic attitude too literally. „ "Indeed, indeed," she said. hnmMy " "I'm very much too well treated. !'v< never had so much ceremony or so rran, l ! beautiful thine:? around me in nil n > life. But don't you see," she said in s 6 , coaxing tone, putting her pretty fa'" e j head on one side and sni'.'* ig with ])<•• i pleading blue eyes into Mrs Holland' . face, "that tip's very ceremony is railte s awful to me, since I am not used to it-' 0 • T even think, though it seen.s disgrace 'i fully ungrateful to say so, tlint 1 sluiih feel hanpier, or at least mors at hoim> ■ v j if I hadn't so many people to wait upo; I me and if T 'Verc not treated like ; 5 ; nrincess instead of like the insignificun '» little person I am." A smile of good humor anpeared one • s mere on the housekeeper's face. "We'l well," she said, "there's something ii s what you say, no doubt, my dear mean, ma'nrn. But as his lordship ha (riven his orders, all I can do is to so n that they're obeyed. In the mean+'in 18 T have to tell von something." SI looked at tb" szirl with a serious an | i'ook note of her pretty hair, of her 1 'u ■e | C yo«. of her sweet- little red-lipne a I mouth. "Hut mind, you're not to r'-i Jl '|avay with notions, my dear, just ; v 'y! lord«hir> <'>rdoml me. to -say." | Tho girl s'-it up, wondering. Ie | (To be continued.)