THE LILY OF MORDAUNT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7258, 21 February 1885, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE LILY OF MORDAUNT.

BY MRS. GEOKGIE SHELDON, Author of "The Forsakon Biido," "Brownie's Triumph," " Dorothy Arnold's Esc»pa."

CHAPTER XXXVlL— (Continued.) THE STRANGE LETTER. With trembling fingere she removed the wrapper from her package, and found a small box, with quite a bulky letter, within. She opened the letter first, and as she did so two bank notes, one for a hundred, the other for twenty pounds, fluttered into her lap. A startled cry broke from her at the sight of them, and all the blood in her body seemed for a moment to rush into her face, making her ears ring and her head dizzy. Then a look of horrow came into her eyes as Miss McAllister's excited assertion, " He utole it. I know he did," suddenly flashed intoher mind. vVith a wildly beating heart and panting breath she broke asunder the ribbon which bound the box, lifted the cover, and lo ! her own lost jewels lay before her! It was true, then ; ho had been the thief, after all; and with a law, shuddering cry she dashed them down, covered her face with her hands, and broke into nervous weeping. She would almost rather never have re covered those keepsakes, precious though they were, than to have learned this bitter, humiliating truth; to have discovered that the man to whom she had surrendered her fondest affections was no better than a common thief. "Oh, Philip, Philip! how was it possible for you to sink to low ?" she cried, a perfect tempest of grief, shame, and horror shaking her slight form like a reed. But it wat> not for long. All at once she sat up, stern and resolute. "Every atom of sentiment should be dead," she said, bitterly ; "my heart ought to be but a charred and blackened cinder, for I have surely suffered enough to consume my very vitals. I will be guilty of no more .weakness like this; I will read what he has to say for himself, and then I will put him out of my life for ever ; I will have done with all regrets and all thoughts of him for all time, and try to get what comfort I cad out of the future by imitating Elaine's example and devoting myself to others." She then unfolded those closely-written sheats—her face as colourless as the paper itself, her lips set in a tight, livid line, a cold, ateely glitter in her eyes—and commenced to read. But by-and-bye her brow began to relax its rigid lines ; a softer light ehono in her dark eyes, and—reading still further on—her inflexible lips seemed slightly less etevn and even grew tremulous, aud when at length she : came to those last appealing lines,'when Philip begged her to " let a little divine compassion into her heart and breathe one single prayer for him," she broke down again, and sobbed like a grieved and wounded child. It was like a warm spring rain after the frost, and ice, and snow of the dismal winter, mellowing and enriching her hardened heart, as the earth is mellowed and enriched, and made once again to yield forth the treasures so long hidden within its bosom. She had thought that she was steeled against all pleading; she believed that her

heart was so hardened and calloused against Philip, that never again in this life could ahe have one kindly thought or feeling towards him. She had vowed in her soul that she would never forgive him,. and she had meant it through and through. She had grown to feel a bitter scorn for the love that ahe had. once born him, and had trampled upon it, until she believed that every atom of vitality had been crashed out of it. Bat' his letter comforted - her somewhat, even though his confession had been horrible beyond description, and it drove out something of the bitterness from her heart, for it had the ring of true humility and penitence in it. It made her feel as if he might not become the wreck which she bad believed him—that perhaps he might, after all, be saved from ruin. '* But she did not believe that ahe could ever reach out her hand to him and say, " I forgive you," no matter how sincere his repentance ; she had been too severely bruised and crashed for that; she did not feel as if she should ever desire to see him again, though perhaps when she should be done with earth, and her nature purged from all its dross, she might rejoice to find him among the redeemed. However, if he really wished to become true and noble again--to retrieve his lost manhood, she could not refuse to breathe the prayer for which he had pleaded, or to ask God, who was infinitely more kind and tender than she could ever hope to be in this life, to pardon and give him peace. She took up her letter and read it through again—more calmly this time, and though she shuddered at the depravity which it revealed, there came a glow of thankfulness over her, as she recognized in it indications for a change fof the better in its writer. He surely had not spared himself ; he had laid bare the corruption of his whole heart in a way to show that he had not the least hope of ever being restored to her favour. Arley wondered ■ what Lady Elaine had said to him to arouse him so suddenly and also so effectually ; to make him " see himself as he really was ?" It must have been a rude awakening and a bitter experience to the stubborn, arrogant man to humble him like this. Her cheeks burned and her eyes flashed ae she read how audaciously he had made proposals of marriage to her friend; and ahe could almost see the regal "Lily of Mordannt" draw up her slender form, and spurn him from her in contempt. How had he ever dared to be so presumptuous ? "It is a strange, atrange letter," Arley sighed, as she folded and returned it to the envelope, "and it makes me feel very strangely—it arouses anew all my former bitterness, anger and scorn, while at the same time I am moved to the deepest pity."