Her Day of Adversity

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 2298, 17 November 1925, Page 11

Her Day of Adversity

By MBS. HATRIOK MacGILL

“If thou faint In the day of adversity thy strength is small.”—Proverbs

FOR NEW READERS Carol Oliver returned to the poor homo In Bermondsey which she shared with her mother ifo find her—r dead. Realising she hadn't sixpence in the world with which to pay funer. al expenses, she went to a monoylond.. or. I Jacob Stone struck by the' girl's unusual beauty, saw possibilities of exploiting her, and lent her £.lO on the understanding she worked for 10 weeks in> his office, leaving Carol con. vinced of his generosity. On the first day a yong man. David Murray, arrived, knocked Stone senseless, and told Carol that her employer was a shark who ran poor people into debt through a tally business, then took everything- from them. Carol refused to believe the story. David Murray called on Carol at the Y.W.C.A. where she was living and was smuggled In by Lottie, the little maidservant. He gave Carol his card and offers of friendship, but had to bo. smuggled out at the hack door as the principal of the house, Miss Bllton, was entering. She saw him, and questioned him as to whom he was visiting. Chapter IV. (Continued). AGAINST THE RULES. Faced by Miss Bllton. who never in all her blameless life had been guilty of a wayward impulse towards a man David Murray felt suddenly and utterly at sea. 1 But his bright brain Immediately Jumped to the conclusion that it would make things uncomfortable for Carol If he admitted the truth — that she had been the object of his call at Miss Biltonhs frigidly run establishment. A passing taxi gave him a brilliant Idea. No doubt she would think him a lunatic. or possibly credit him with burg, larlous intentions, but he cared noth, ing for Miss BUton’s opinion, and, happening to catch the man's eye, whispered,,' ‘‘Drive like blazes—anywhere,” and before Miss Bllton had quite recovered from the shock of being treated In such a fashion he was driving furiously towards the Park. Miss Bllton’s lips were naturally thin but the manner In which she com. pressed them as she turned towards the front entrance to the Institute suggested that hdr mouth had been made by a dig with a shovel. Her first action after taking off her hat and .coat was to ring for Lottie. Miss Bllton eyed her stonily, and her voice was as solemn as that of a High Court -Judge as she put her momentous question: .‘‘Lottie, have you a young man?” A good.tempeml grin accompanied the little servant girl’s reply. ‘‘Bless you, Miss—half-a-dozen,” she admitted, cherrfully. Miss BUton’s face darkened. “You knew that I do not allow —er —visitors, Lottie. Who was the young man who just left by the side gate?" Lottie grinned again. “Oh, he’s my steady, Miss—that was Jim Adams, the ohap that takes the milk round for our ne\y dairy.” “Anything rather than let her poke hor nose Into Mias Oliver’s affairs," she told herself In excuse for the lie. Miss BUton who had been quite near enough to David Murray to hear him give hia order to the tajd.drivor, was unable to reconcile the owner of that voice, and the wearer of that well.cut tweed suit 'whh a milk round. Besides, a, dairyman's Assistant did not as a rule lift his finger and nod in such a casual fashion to taxi-drivers. Frankly, she disbelieved Lottie’s ex. planation, but, until she found out what she was hiding, there was noth. Ing for it but to let the whole thing slide. I( was certainly after eleven, and all lights had boon out for half-an-hour, when Lottie tapped cautiously on the door of Carol’s cubicle, follow, ing It by a few horasely whispered words, “Let me In for a moment, Miss I’ve got something to tell yer.” Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, Carol sat up in bed, and, stretching over to the small table at her side, felt for the matches inside the bowl of her candestick. Finding them she lit her candle and when Lottie crept cautiously Into the little strip of space that represented her bedroom Carol hurriedly stuffed the end of the sheet Into her mouth to stifle the laugh that rose to her lipsLottie looked so grave and quaint in the fitful yellow flame of the candle standing there with her bare feet on the bare boards, her head crowned with rag curlers, and her little red face shining from its bed.tim© wash with soap and hot water. “What is it Lottie? Are you ill, or—or anything?” asked Carol, scanning the health-flushed face with an anxious eye. Lottie’s reply came in a hoarse whisper that, unknown to herself och. oed right down the silent, sleep.hushed corridor! “It's about your young man, Miss I told MISS Bolton ’e Was my steady, but I’m awful sorry about the card that you dropped just as you was coming out of the dining room. I burned it by accident when I was shaking a duster over the fire—must ha’ fell out of my sleeve, I wrapped it in my hanky just for then, and I suppose It got loose and slipped down.” 1 The girl seemed so genuinely distressed that Carol broke a rule of the establishment, which was that no con. versatlpn was alio we after 10.30 p.m.

and consoled Lottie In a cautious whisper.

But she was sorry, because she had not memorised tbo address, but she dismissed the slight feeling of annoy, ance almost as soon as it arose, for it would be perfectly easy when she saw David Murray to make good her loss. It was unfortunate that Miss Bilton chos 6 that particular moment to jnake a round of the girls’ sleeping quarters; '

It was Carol’s light shining beneath her door, fijat first attracted her at. tention and then her sharp care prickeg Up at the sound of loud whisper, ing from the cubicle Showing the light. It was one of the rules that if a light were seen after hours any officer could enter the room without warn, ing.

Miss Bllton had been In her post for fifteen years, but never yet had she been given cause to exercise her right in that particular direction. She slipped along the narrow corridor like a- noiseless, revengeful shad, ow, and both Carol and Lottie gave a tiny scream when they saw her tall, thin form appear in thg small space Which already seemed overcrowded.

Miss Bilton treated both girls to an intensily penetrating stare, and “icy” utterly fails as a descriptive term for the tone of voice in which she asked what, from having overhead, she already know . ‘‘What’s the explanation of your presence in Miss Oliver’s cubicle, Lottie?” The young girl frowned, and eyes ana voice were equally defiant as she replied, “I came to tell Miss Oliver something I didn’t have no chance to tell her before bedtime.” “So I heai’d,” remarked Miss Bllton dryly. A question snapped simultaneously in the eyes of both glrle, and an ele. ment of hostility—the veiled hostility of youth for age—crept into the atmosphere. “How much did you overhear?” Carol and the little servant might as well have asked, for their whole attl. tudg demanded knowledge of that question. Miss Bllton soon enlightened them. She turned to Lottie. “You told an untruth when you Informed me that the strange man Whom I saW leaving the house to.day was your sweetheart. I will consider what it to be done with you.” She then turned her cold, accusing eyes upon Carol, who, sitting up in bed, with her glorious hair falling over her slim young shoulders, and her lovely eyes frightened and appealing, made a picture that few normal women with a grain of motherly in. stinct, could have resisted.

“Miss Oliver, I allowed you to come her on one reference, that of the gentleman who recommended you, beoaiise I felt sorry for your recent bereavement. I understood that you wore a stranger—a friendless stranger in London. But it seems that I have been mistaken. Who was that man and what is h e to you? If you cannot give a satisfactory answer I am afraid I must ask, -you to leave to-morrow morlng.” She paused, evidently waiting fop Carol’s answer. After a moment It came clearly and definitely truth stamped on the young face os the girlish voioe uttered the words. ’ !i A CHAMPION QOS ON STRIKE “I am so sorry if Mr. Murray has annoyed you by coming to see mo, Two little red flags waved wildly in Lottie’s cheeks, and if Carol had been an angleworm that had somehow got Into her cup of tea, the contempt In little servant girl’s voice could not have been deeper. “Nice one tell a whopper for, you are. Miss!” she said, reproachfully. “Lotttie, be quiet! and Consider yourself under notice.” Thus Miss Bilton. Two little imps of temper appeared In Lottie’s frank blue eyes to accompany the red flags still flying in her cheeks.

“Keep yer wool on, old cockalorum I’ll go.now, this very minute. I’ll lose the month’s money, blowed if I don’t. Don’t think I’m without a pound or two saved up! The young eyes blazed defiance at the faded secretly nonplussed woman who never would be able to under, stand life from the view point of somebody ripe for love and passionately in. sympathy with lovers. ' “B —but you can’t go like this—at this time of night, girl. And. what about the young ladles’ breakfasts to. morrow morning?”

Lottie laughed shortly ,and there was a young, musical ring in it despite, her anger. “Yes it’s that what troubles you, Miss, not. where I’m to spend to.nlght. Well, the yo.ung.ladies’ as all got ’ands samp ’as me, an’ they can get their own breakfusses. I’ve got a brother-in-law that keeps a pub over Bermondsey way’ an’ I can work in the saloon bar for as long as I care to stop. Goodbye, Miss,” turning to Carol, who was sitting up In bed, wide eyed, reproachful, and with little a worried crease between her brows.

“Lottie, there really Isn’t any need to she began.

"Oh, that’s all right, Miss I was getting out of this lively little grave, yard, anyway. You ought to suck up to that nice young fellow that came We to-night—a proper gentleman every inch of him.”

Chapter V, THE' DAY AFTER., Carol stared fixedly at h«p ledger, and a frovrn creased the white Smoothness of her forohad, while hpr milky little teeth bit hard oh her lower Up in vexation. Everything Seemed to be going wrong. Thre o tlmefe during the morjl. ihg had she been “on the carpet" for some Idiotic mistake which, as Jacob Stone Was careful to point out, could quite easily have been prevented. As he spoke there was not the slightest hint of friendliness In hpr employer's manner, rather the reverse Her work d urin g the morinlg had Consisted of the filling in of a number di forms, with certain, figures copied from other fortas, the posting of the totals to a large ledger, and finally the filing of the forms In alphabetical order so that any one could be found ! at a minute’s notice.

Carol exercised the most meticulous care, verifying figures and totals at least twice, anq making perefctly sure that no forni frent astray In the filing cabinet.

And yet each time that she returned from some trifling errand in the other office when she was aeked for some Information for Jacob Stone, She was called in and reproved because of the mistakes that she had made. “But I couldn’t have been silly, Mr. Stone. I’m certain that I cast up the figures corfectly. Why—” There were tears,— bravely repress, ed furiously winked-backed tears, It is true —' in Carol’s grey eyes as, in response to her employer’s coldly.spoken Invitation, she bent down and examined her own handwriting. “I’m ever so sorry,” she murmured os utterly confused, she was obliged to admit her mistake.

Jacob Stone’s eyes dwelt greedily on th e exquisite Whiteness of Carol’s down-bent nock as, her back to him. self, she'scanned his ledger, staring as if fascinated at hor alleged error.

Everything about the slim, dainty little creature intrigued him, aiid coloured his every waking thought. Carol raised her head, and he smiled, as he looked into her virginal face, so innocent, so penetrating in Its inno. cence that, in some Intangible fashion her purity seemed to enter Into him for a moment, driving olt some of the dross, bathing his world.sollod consciousness in a strange ethereal loveliness that was soft and cool,' and ex. quislte as starshlne.

But he allowed no hint of these feelings to reveal itself in his voice as he said, in the same curt tone that he psed when speaking to Franks, his confidential clerk, and Markson, the office boy, “Don’t , make any more Miss Oliver, If you please,. They mean money to me, you know. 1 can’t possibly keep In. my head the amount of each individual loan, and If. you cut off a couple of hundred by miscalculation, it lessens the interest that I demand from my client. Do you see what I mean?” Murmering humbly that she did, and she was very sorry, Carol went out of the office, dejection in every lino of her poor unsuspecting little body.

She gave herself a, bad headache through concentrating too intently, but even then she made two more blunders, to her own absolute mystification. « ,

How could she know that Jacob Stone’s confidential clerk had clone a long “stretch” for forgery, imitating other peoples handwriting so marvell. ously that even the greatest experts refused to pass the word which would convict, and it was only an accident that revealed the truth. 1 '

Carol was gla<j that it was nearly six o’clock, glad that the nightmare of a day was nearly over. She had not allowed her personal troubles to obtrude ■ during office hours, but as she reached for her hat She ?aced the problem that had subconscifcxiely worried her all day. She had to find a place in which to sleep that night. Miss Bllton had made it quite clear lo Carol when she lelt in the morning that she did not wish to see her that or any other night.

“I wonder that she did not ring up Mr. Stone,” l murmured Carol, who knew that no telephone message re. garding last night’s chapter of accidents had reached hor employer. But Miss Bilton, haggard.eyed after a sleepless night, worn out with the effort of helping the girls to get thenown meals that morning, had visited the moneylender personally, almost bofore he had finished shaving for the day. That interview was directly responsible for the mistakes that had so puzzled Carol during the" day. She was still worrying over the problem of where she wan to sleep that night when, just as he had put on her hat -and coat, the office boy brought her a message that she was wanted in Mr. Stone’s private office. “Oh, dear, have I done something else wrong?” Carol asked herself fearfully, as taking off her hat and coat with, fingers that trembled, she went into the Big Room, as it was called, for the fourth time that day. Her hearth sank as she glanced at Jacob Stone’s face. (To be Continued.)