A SORROWFUL SECRET.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 9040, 19 November 1892, Page 3 (Supplement)

A SORROWFUL SECRET.

BY CHARLOTTE MAY KINGSLEY, Author of "The Upper Ten and Lower Twenty

"The King's Daughters," etc

CHAPTER I. MAORA CON WAY'S LOVER.

Dunlob Asbkv, in the County Kerry, is one of the most beautiful and attractive places in all Ireland.

Behind it lies the picturesque Gap of Dunloe—from which it takes its name— upon either side of it are broad fields and smiling meadows, those to the left sloping gradually down to the banks ot a distant river, which is spanned by a quaint old stone bridge ; those to the right stretching away for a distance of a mile or more, until they terminate in the rugged grandeur of the mountains of Magillicuddy Reeks ; before it lies a level tract of grassy land, dotted with clumps of trees and sprinkled with wild flowers, and beyond that are the beautiful Lakes of Killarney, famous alike in song and story. The abbey (a picturesque stone building, which in the days of Ireland's glory had been a monastery) had for upward of two hundred years been the home of the O'Neills, a rich and titled family, noted as a race for the bravery of its men and the beauty of its women, but some twenty years prior to tho opening of our story the last of that famous race bad married tho Honourable Bernard Conway, of Belfast, and, after onjoying a brief, happy married life for six years, had diod on the Continent, and all that now remained of tho famous O'Neills of Dunioe was a memory.

Embittered by the loss of his beautiful wife, whom he had fairly worshipped, Bernard Conway returned to Ireland, bringing with him his little daughter Maureen, then a beautiful child of four years, shut himself up in Dunioe Abbey with his books, and lived the life of a hermit, receiving no visitors, making no friends, and, for some singular reason, taking but little interest in his child, whom he delivered over to the care of a faithful old servant, one Shelah Nolan, who became foster-mother to her, and worshipped her little charge even more than sho did her own daughter Peggy, who was very close to Maureen's own age. It must not be inferred from this, however, that Bernard Conway totally neglected the child and allowed her to grow up in ignorance. On the contrary, she was given every advantage in the way of education and accomplishments that money could procure. A governess was provided for her until she was old enough to be sent to a convent, whore she was schooled in all tho highest branches, and from which she was at length graduated, and returned to her picturesque old home a beautiful, graceful, and accomplished youug lady of sixteen years. " But of what avail are all ray accomplishments if I am to be cub off from all the world like this?" she would often say to herself as she wandered about the abbey grounds or strolled over the hills and meadow--.

" We never have any visitors, and beyond the peasant? and the tourists who make flying trips to the lakes, 1 see nobody who belongs to the world. It was bad enough at the convent, where hard study and stern discipline was the rule, but there I had companions, while here I have nothing ! lb is tho same story from day's end to day's end. A canter over the hills with Peggy Nolan, a stroll through the woods or a row on the lakes, and beyond these nothing, absolutely nothing. My father gives all his thoughts to his beetles and his books, but if poring over musty tomes and impaling bugs and butterflies, and collecting all manner of crawling things for his cabinet, is his idea of a happy and useful life, it isn't mine. I want to see the great world, I want to have associates, friendsthe companionship of young people whose tastes are congenial to my own and whose veins are filled with blood, not ice. I sometimes think my father doe.3 not care whether I live or die, and I am sure that he hasn't enough interest in my future welfare to waste one thought upon it !" But that she wronged him in this, and that, for all his seeming indifference, Bernard Conway really had a deep interest in her welfare and gave more than a passing thought to her future, Maureen was given an opportunity to learn within ten months after hor return to the abbey, and just one week prior to the July day upon which this story opens. It had come about like this :

Wandering along the banks of the lake.? one afternoon and gathering wild flowers, which she wove into a wreath as she walked, Maureen had come upon a handsome young man who lay senseless at the foot of a gnarled and vine-wreathed oak treo where ho had been thrown by a runaway horse. His misfortune, his youth, and his splendid, manly beauty, all appealed to her tender, sensitive nature, and hurrying to the lake she dipped her handkerchief into the water, bathed his face and succeeded in reviving him. It was the old story, told so many times before, and fated to be retold so long as youth endures and men and maidens meet. With him it was a case of love at firsb sight, mad, rapturous, eager love, and with her the dawning of a fancy, which was fated to be her curse.

He was an Englishman, he told her, and had come over to Ireland on a vacation trip, to view the Lakes of Killarney. His name was Phillip Donnithorno, his calling that of a clerk in one of the London banking institutions, and while possessed of but slender means, he could boast of fine family connections, and even a distant relationship with somebody who bore a title. That meeting was, of course, the forerunner of many others, and Maureen, who had found life drag so wearily before, welcomed the change which those meetings brought to her. There were no more dreary, lonesome days, and no more solitary wanderings In quest of something to kill time. Instead, there were delightful strolls with a very handsome young man, who looked like the hero of a novel, and talked charmingly—even brilliantly upon some subjects there were brisk canters over hills and dales, and happy hours spent in rowing upon tho lakes, and reading poetry amidst surroundings that were poems themselves. Then came a declaration of love which startled and surprised Maureen, for she had not thought of such a thing, and really did not know the nature of her feelings toward this handsome and impassionate wooer. All that she was certain of was that she liked him very much, that she enjoyed his society, and if, as he said, the whole voyage of her life would be made of such days as these if she would only marry him, it was certainly an enticing prospect, and so she accepted his offer and promised to become his wife.

"But of course you will have to a3k papa's consent, Phillip," she said. "I am under age, you know, and must be governed by his word. Still, I don't think you will have any difficulty in obtaining it; indeed, I fancy he will be rather pleased to get rid of me, for ho seems to think I am in tho way, and us I always manage to step on some of his precious beetles, or make him lose his place in his book whenever I intrude upon his privacy, I dare say he'll feel relieved to think that somebody wants to take mo away for good and all. You'd better call to see him to-morrow morning he's always more accessible then than ab any other part of tho day. And now, please £0 on with your reading, for I was so interested in the point when you left off to talk of this."

Accordingly Mr. Donnithorno took up the thread of the poem at the point where he had abandoned the impassioned appeal of the lover in Tennyson's " Maud," to make one on his own account, and resumed his reading with the look and air of a thoroughly happy man. Maureen's assurance that he need fear no opposition from her father filled him with feelings of the deepest joy, and ib was without the loast apprehension that he presented himself ab the abbey next morning and requested an interview with Mr. Conway. The request was granted. He was shown into the sanctum of the bookworm, and ten minutes later he was shown—the door !

Maureen, who was present during the brief, but exciting interview, had never believed it possible that her father could fly Snto such a rag© or exhibit ao much real

feeling upon any subject, and least of all one that bad to do with her. " Eagles do not mate with pigeons, Mr. Johnny Thorn or Donny Thorn or whatever your infernal name may be, sir !" he cried; " and, with my sanction, Maura will never mate with you. Confound it, sir, are you aware, you miserable whipper-snapper of a clerk, that Miss Conway is heiress to a fortune of two hundred thousand pounds ? But of course you are—of course you are, and that's what you're after you prosumptuous scoundrel !" "On my word of honour, sir, I never knew that she was an heiress until this minute," Donnithorne responded — and truthfully. " I care nothing about her fortune, nor do I want it. Alter your willdisinherit her— her to me without a farthing, Mr. Conway, and I will be content, yes, and happy, sir. It is love—not money, which brings me here to-day." "Then lot it take you away again," stormed the irate old aristocrat. " Confound your infernal impudence ! Cats may look at kings, but they can't mate with them, and by the Lord Harry, sir, you can't even look at Maura Conway with my sanction !" " But, sir, I love—" " Then love in your own sphere—and get out of this as fast as you know how ! Maura, show that fellow the door and never spunk of this affair again— never have any more to do with him or any of his confounded class. Do you hear ? "Good heavens above ! is there no refining influence in education and association after all, and will water always seek its levol in spite of—horn ! 1 didn't mean that, of course ! I—l—l'd forgotten that you are my daughter and naturally above that fellow's level" (this with a sudden change of colour and a swift, nervous glance at Maureen). " What I did mean was that he—that you, I should say— Oh !oh! oh ! Good heavens and earth ! he's stepping on that splendid specimen of the Scarabacus coleoptera I caught last night! Drive him out! drive him out, the hound ! and never let him come near the place again. Oh, my beautiful specimen ! my beautiful specimen ! To think of it being crushed by the feet of a beastly clerk ! Get out of here—get out of here, you low-lived adventurer ! Ireland is no place for snakes, therefore you'd better leave it as fast as you can 1" So the interview ended, and Maureen ' hurried her suitor out of the presence of the ma" who had insulted and repulsed him. But it is doubtful if old Mr. Conway could havo chosen a worse course than this ; for instead of lowering Donnithorne in Maureen's estimation by pointing out the fact that the man was socially far beneath her, he only awakened in her bosom a feeling of intense indignation for the treatment her suitor had received, and inspired her with a spirit of rebellion. In her secret heart she felt that her lover had been treated most unjustly, been maligned most cruelly, and when he tore himself away and rushed like a madman from her forbidden presence, he took in her thoughts the shape of an injured hero, and it needed but his absence for one whole week (and the consequent return of her loneliness and despair) to make her believe that she really loved him, and could only be happy while he was by her side. For several wretched days she heard nothing of him, and yet thought of him constantly, and wondered if he really had killed himself, us he swore that he would do as he rushed away and left her, then, when she had given him up as lost, a note was put into her hands, and opening it she read these words :— My Darling,—l must see you, if only for a moment, ere I part with life ami you for evermore. 1 shall be at the mini of Muckross Abbey until noon to-day, Maura darling, and 1 bog, 1 implore yoi: to grant me one last 10->k at your beautiful a. d beloved face. If you care for me, come, and grant me that small favour. Oh, my lovi, my love, I cannot live without you, and I entreat Ueaven and you that I may not die until I have looted into your sweet eyes again. Come to •e, icy precious one '. come to me, if only for a moment, and spiak to me if only one word. Oh, Maura, I love yon, I love you as man never loved woman before. Ah, come to me, my sweet, and gladden the last hour of your adoring and unhappy Philip. It was under the clustering rose trees in the quaint old abbey garden that Maureen read this letter, and in reading it her lovely eyes grew dim with sympathetic tears, and all the tender depths of her sensitive nature were stirred with pity for the man whose greatest fault was that he loved her. Still, as though some prescience of the future weighed upon her heart, she hesitated ere she decided to grant his request, after she had been forbidden ever to speak to him again. She made a lovely picture as she sab there at the foot of the rose tree pondering over this all-important point, but there was nothing strango in that ; for to make a lovely picture under any and all circumstances was nature's birthright to Maura Conway. Her pure, high-bred face was one of surprising beauty, but her rippling nut-brown hair and her great, luminous liquid eyesblue in some lights, grey in others—would have redeemed any face from the charge of plainness, and only served to make the loveliness of hers a thousandfold more entrancing. She was tall and slim, and as graceful as a fawn ; her dainty hands and dainty feet bespoke gentle birth, her complexion was as delicate in its colouring as the tints of an ivory miniature, her teeth were like pearls, her lips like coral, and from the top of her queenly little head to the tip of her tiny little foot she was simply the embodiment of all that is perfect in womankind. For »everal minutes she sat there under the white and yellow roses and pondered over the question whether it was better to go to Philip Donnithorne—as her heart dictated—or live up to the precepts of the good Sisters of St. Bridget's, who had taught her that a child should always obey the commands of a parent; then her thoughts travelled back to that stormy scene in the library when poor Philip had been so cruelly repulsed and insulted, and between the recollection of her father's injustice and her lover's desperate threat to annihilate himself she grew desperate and reckless. " I will go 1" she said, as sho sprung to her feet and hid Donnithorne's note in her bosom. " Papa was most unjust, most unkind, and if Philip means to kill himself, it is my duty to prevent him committing an unpardonable sin." Inspired by that thought, she ran up to her own room, and after sending Peggy Nolan to the stable with orders for the groom to saddle her horse and have it at the door as speedily as possible, she proceeded to exchange her muslin gown and straw hat for a riding-habit of dark-green cloth and a jaunty black velvet cap, ornamented with a long white ostrich plume. Twenty minutes later she came down looking as beautiful as a vision, and hurrying to the block where her house, a superb chestnut mare, stood in charge of a groom, she sprung lightly into the saddle, touched the mare with her silver-handled whip, and rode away like the'wind to meet her forbidden lover. Dashing out of the abbey gates into the verdant meadow lands, she rode on in the direction of Killarney, then skirting the lower lake, turned swiftly into the Pass of Ken more, and presently came in sight of tho ruins of Muckross Abbey. Under the shadow of a crumbling arch whose mossy stones were only held in place by the thick tendrils of the ivy vines, which for hundreds of years had rioted over the picturesque and world-famed ruins, her lover was standing beside the horse which had conveyed him to the trysting-place, and shading his eyes with one uplifted hand, was looking down the sunshiny pass in quest of her. He was a tall, well-built young man of some eight-andtwenty years, handsome as an Apollo, with curling hair clustering in jetty rings about his temples; a drooping moustache that was as glossy as silk and as black as night, shaded a mouth that was decidedly weak, and by contrast made his white teeth appear like pearls. He was arrayed in a costume of grey cloth, and wore in addition thereto a pair of black riding-boots and a tall silk hat. Ho had never looked handsomer to Maureen than he did at that moment, for tho knowledge that he had been cruelly maligned and martyrized for love of her, threw an air of romance about him, which, coupled with his melancholy and poetic style of beauty, made him seem in very truth a hero, and under the glamour of that spoil she rode to the spot where he stood, and before she realised it had thrown herself in his arms. Oh, Philip ! —oh, Philip you mustn't do anything rash !" she cried, her voice trembling with girlish terror at the thought of Death and this dark Adonis entering into terms of intimacy. " You mustn't kill yourself, it's cowardly, sinful, horrible, Philip, and you mustn't dream of such a thing. Oh, I should never be able to forgive myself if you were to take your life because of mo."

"Then save me from myself, Maura, and give me something to live for, strive for, fight for in this great, empty world 1" he cried, holding ber close to his heart and looking down into her lovely face with eyes whose look of passionate idolatry actually frightened hor. " Oh, my love! my love ! life will have no brightness left to offer me, if I must give you up, my treasure. I cannot live, I cannot fight against fate unless I am sustained by the knowledge that I may one day call you mine. I know that lam not your equal in point of wealth and position, Maura, but I am well born, dear, and I love you, and what is money compared to that? If I had gone to your father with the power to write a draft for fifty thousand pounds ho would not have dreamed of calling me a fortunehunter, and yet I could nob love you more passionately, more truly, nor more honestly than I do now, with twenty pounds only to my name. But listen, Maura, listen. A chance has been offered me to make a fortune. I have written to one who has the right to help me along, if only for the evil ho has done me heretofore, and he has promised to supply the money to take mo to America, and establish mo in business there, that I may make sufficient money to come bank one day and claim this dear hand, and prove to your father that 1 am not a fortune-hunter, by refusing to accept one shilling as your dower." "That is a noble resolution, Philip, and I honour you for it," she answered. "Do more—do more 1" ho cried, as he strained her to his bosom and looked into her eyes, his own filled with a yearning, eager light, and tho passion of his heart thrilling through his pleading voice—"do more than that, my darling—givo me proof tha* I shall not have to work in vain - proof that I may really claim you when I come back, Maureen." " I will wait for you, Philip, if that is what you mean," she said, in reply. " I will wait for you, and when you return to Ireland, I will be your wife." ' "My darling, a fortune is not niado at once, and it will take yoars for me to accumulate sufficient money to come back and claim my brido." "I will wait years," she said, with the simple faith of seventeen—" I will wait for you, Philip, no matter how long you remain absent."

"Yes, you would, but your father will nob. Do you think he will permit you to waste your life in waiting for tho man ho turned from his doors with insults and derision No, no, he will awaken to the fact that ho is growing old and that you are becoming a superbly beautiful woman Ho will plan some splendid alliance for you, find means to prevent your fulfilling your promise to me. You will be , coaxed, cajoled, harassed, and finally driven to consent, and when I return it will only be to find you the wife of another."

«' Maura!" his voice grew husky with agitation, and tho wildness in his eyes terrified her—" Maura, I want a better pledge than this, or so help me God, I will end everything now and here with—this !'' As ho spoke he pub her from him, his hand moved swiftly from his hip to his head, and Maura, looking up, saw with horror that ho had pressed the muzzle of a revolver against his right temple.

"Philip," she gasped, a deathly faintness born of woman's instinctive dread of firearms coming over her and making her face grow white is pearl. "Philip, 1 bog — 1 entreat Ah, my Heaven ! will nothing stay your hand ?" "Yes," he answered hoarsely. "The possession of yours !" " You mean ?"

" That you must either part from me as your husband or—a corpse !" " Philip !" " Oh, my love ! my love ! forgive me if I frighten you, but it is the only alternative, and I summoned you here that I might know my fate, and leave nothing to the uncertainty of chance. Listen to mo, Maura. I am prepared for either event —the possession of your hand or the loss of my own life. "Do you see this paper, darling ? It is a special marriage license which I procured this morning and which authorises tho clergyman of the little chapel in the village of Ballyhoo to join in lawful wedlock ' Philip Vail Donnithorne, bachelor, and Maureen Conway, spinster, a pair of tourists who are unable to remain long enough in Ireland to have banns published in the usual way.' The village of Ballyhoo is twenty miles from this spot and neither of us is known there ; the clergyman of the chapel is prepared for our arrival, and will perform tho ceremony without question, and as soon as it has been performed, Maura, I pledge yon my word that I will leave you and start at once for America, content to know that I need nob labour in vain and that I shall have a wife awaiting me when I come back to Ireland It will cost you nothing to givo me this assurance that nobody can ever divide our two lives, my darling, and I shall go away contented and happy. Nobody need know of our marriage, Maura— that can bo our secret, and you need never tell it unless you are driven to do so to escape a compulsory union with some man of your father's choosing.

"Ah, be kind, bo merciful, bo generous, my darling and save mo from destruction. I can't live without you, and I would rather die than fight fate with no certainty of a reward. My darling, I have not always done that which is honourable and upright. I will freely confess it, dear. I havo been weak, foolish, the tool of nn unscrupulous relative who has made me his cat's-paw and his scapegoat. ' But I have never done anything that 1 cannot easily undo when I havo acquired a fortune. It is simply a money matter, Maureen -nothing moro. Let me go to America, dear, lot me mako a man of myself and a name of which you will one day be proud. I will only go as your husband, Maureen, I will only strive to livo, when I know that a wife awaits me here when I come back to Ireland.

"If you cannot do what I ask of you"— ho cocked the pistol and once moro pressed the muzzle to his temple—"you havo only to speak, Maureen, and I will trouble you no more in life."

" Philip she gasped, in an agony of terror. " Philip, put ib away ; you frighten me, and—

" Which will you give me—life or death —ho cut in with a look of terrible earnestness. " There is no other alternative, Maureen ; you must eithp become my wife, or I'll blow out my brains before your eyes. Oh, my love! my love ! I want to redeem myself, and I want to livo for you. Can't you save me, Maureen won't you save me, dear ?"

" Yes," she answered, with a feeble, frightened cry. " Put away the pistol; pub it away, I implore you. It shall bo as you say, Philip. Wo will go to Ballyhoo, and I will become your wife. Ib may nob be very right," she added, as he thrust the pistol into his pocket and catching her to his bosom, rained tears and kisses upon her pure, pale brow, "it may not be very right to do this thing, but nothing can bo very wrong that saves a human life."

CHAPTER 11. THE LOST HEIRESS OF LISMORE.

Upon the very day, and almost tho very hour that tho incident narrated in tho preceding chapter occurred at Muckross Abbey, in the south of Ireland, an event of equal importance to the development of this story took place in the County Antrim, in the far north, at Eagles' Nest, the county seat of Terence, Earl of Lismore and Marquis of Clare.

Ib was a magnificonb property, perched high on grand old cliffs at whose base tho waves of tho North Channel boomed and roared, and of his many estates in town and country, was the one which the old earl loved best of all, and around which clustered the tendoresb associations and sweetest memories of his life.

Here he had brought his young bride in the days of his now long-vanished youth, here his only child the son he had idolized and lost—had been ushered into the world, and here, too, his beloved wife had closed her eyes in death, after a happy union of two-and-twonty years. At the time of the countess' death, her son, Lord Redmond O'Donnell, was in his twentieth year—handsome, happy-go-lucky lad, whom the tenant fairly worshipped and his father prized as the apple of his eye, centring all his hopes upon him, all his ambitions, and mapping out for him a great and glorious future. '• Ireland's glory can only be restored by the efforts of Ireland's sons, Redmond," he used to say to him. " We must build up our race and ally it to those who are noble, powerful, and great, not let it deteriorate, for our redemption lies in becoming a greater people, not a weaker—until we are in power in the House, and must be recognised. Marry into a lofty family, ally more

power to ours, and increase our strength, our greatness, our glory, and this dear land will rise again. I live in the hope of seeing you become a great statesman, Redmond, and something tells me that that hope will But, alas ! for that hope 1 Before his eon had attained his majority all the earl's hopes wore dashed to earth, and Lord Redmond O'Donnell was an exile from home, his portrait was taken down from the wall and hidden away, and his very name was tabooed in the household where it had once been the pride alike of the servants and the master. Youth is rash and love is sweet, and these had wrought a change. In Oxford, where he was completing his education, Lord Redmond had met and fallen madly In love with a beautiful English girl—an orphan, well born but absolutely penniless, had wooed and won her, written to obtain hie father's consent to their marriage, and that boing flatly refused, had married her without it, and been instantly disowned. "I can't prevent your succession to my title," the old earl had said to him when he came down to Eagles' Nest to break the nows, " but my estates are unontailed, and nob one shilling of my money, not one stick or atone of my property shall ever own you for a master. You have been a traitor to the cause of your country and a traitor to me. Ireland has lost a hope, buried a son, and bo have I. There is the door, Lord Redmond O'Donnell, and remember that when you have walked out of it to-day, you have crossed its threshold for the last tirao in life. Go, sir, I never want to see your face again as long as 1 live 1"

Lord Redmond had only bowed his acquiescence, opened the door and gone his way, and the last that his father saw of him -the last that he ever saw of him in this world—was when he turned at the gates to look back on the home he was leaving, then passed through them and disappeared. Where he went, how he lived or what became of him from that moment the old earl never learned until sixteen years had passed and tho softening influence of time, added to tho death of a widowed niece, who had for twelve years been his housekeeper and general factotum, had awakened in Lis lonely heart a feeling of tenderness, a desire to forgive and forget and to have someone near who belonged to him to gladen the closing years of his life ! The old love for his handsome, wayward boy came back, and he resolved to find him and restore him to his old position. Detectives were employed. Lord Redmond's wanderings were traced from one cheap lodging-house to another; the discovery was made that in the second year of their wedded life his wife had borne him a little daughter, who was christenod Collice, in honour of her graudmother, the late Countess of Lismoro ; that shortly after the child's birth Lord Redmond had fallen in with an Australian named Murdock, and with his wife and child and this new acquaintance had emigrated to the goldfields, and within four months after his arrival there had contracted a fever and diod, leaving his widow and child to tho charge of the man Murdock. Six months spent in tracing their movements had elicited the discovery that Lady O'Donnell had fallen ill, and that the man Murdock had gone on into the interior alone after sharing with her what money he possessed, and leaving hor in the care of an Englishwoman—the widow of a miner named Jack Narrwho possessed ah infant daughter very near the age of little Collice. In that woman's cottage the hapless Lady O'Donnell had subsequently died, and a few days later Mrs. Narr had sold out and departed, taking both children with her, and going nobody knew whore. In vain the detectives employed by Mr. Murtagh, Lord Lismore'a solicitor, had endeavoured to traoe her movoments; in vain had been all inquiries—had the solid oarth opened and swallowed them, Mrs. Narr and the two children could not havo disappeared more completely, and although nearly two years had passed since the search had been begun by his lordship's orders, and no money spared to bring it to a successful conclusion, no trace of Mrs. Narr had been discovered, and nothing that could shed the least light upon the fate of the little Lady Collice O'Donnell had come to gladden tho old earl's heart until—this morning when you and I look into the grounds of Eagles' Nest, my reader, and find him pacing up and down the wide west terrace (the Sea Terraco, as it is called by the servants and members of the household) with a look of restless eagerness upon his rugged, white- bearded face, and in his nervous hand an open telegram received just twenty minutes ago. It was from Mi. Murtagh, and ran thus : Belfast, July Ist, —. News of Mrs. Narr. Shall be with you before noon to-d«y. (Signed) Michael Murtagh.

" And it is eleven o'clock now 1" muttered Lord Lismore, as ho glanced at his watch ; " he will be hero soon, and, thank God, I may bo on the track of Redmond's child before nightfall. Oh, the joy of it! oh, the joy of it. To find the daughter of my boy and bring hor to the home from which I so cruelly exiled him. Sho shall be my heiress, my pride, my delight, and 1 will atone to her for the wrongs I did her father. " Oh, will Murtngb never come ? Ib neems years since I received this telegram, and— Ah ! there is Lafferty, and that reminds mo that I ought to tell Trafton the news. I dare say ib will not make him very happy to learn that ho won't be my heir after all, but then ho has known that there has been a possibility of that ever since I first bogan to search for Redmond's child, and declared that she should be my heiress, if I could only find her. Hera, Lafferty !" ho raised his voice as he spoke and called out sharply and loudly, "Lafferty, Lafferty, I say. Find your master at once, and tell him that I wish to speak to him 1" Lafferty s solo response was a tug ab his forelock ; then he faced about suddenly, and tore away. The man he went in quest of— his master—was the son of Lord Lismore'a late niece and housekeeper (Mrs. Donnithorno), of whom mention has been made before.

Prior to her death she had been the widow of an army officer whose twin brother had, by a singular coincidence, married her twin sister.

The issue of both marriages had been a son, and those children of parents who wore twin sisters upon one side and twin brothers upon the other, wore so startlingly alike that although Trafton Donnithorne was full two years the sonior of Philip they might themselves have passed easily for twins, although widely dissimilar in charac ter.

A few minutes after Lafferty had darted away in quest of his master, Trafton Donnithorne strode up to the Sea Terrace and presented himself to Lord Lismore. " Lafterty tells me that you wish to speak with me, my lord," he said, in a voice singularly like that of Philip Donnithorne. " May I ask your lordship's pleasure ?" "Yes," responded the old earl. "Sit down, Trafton, if you have time to spare me. I want to have a talk with you— serious talk, if you have nothing very pressing which summons you elsewhere. I seo you have a letter in your hand, bub I hope it is not of such importance that you cannot spare me a few minutes of your time." "It is of no importance at all," returned Trafton nonchalantly. "It is merely another communication from my unhappy cousin Philip, and as usual he asks me for money to help him along." " You'd better cut that scoundrol's acquaintance for good and all," responded Lord Lirfinore, with a frown of displeasure. " He's a disgrace to your name, and I wonder that you allow him to write to you." " Ho is my cousin, my lord, and blood is thicker than water. However, I don't think that he will bother me any more. The letter I received from him the other day announced that he had fallen in love with a girl down in Kerry, nad wanted to reform and make himself worthy of her. He asked me if I would lend him enough money to emigrate to America and set himself up in business, and us I responded that I would, this letter was merely written to thank me for doing so. But pardon me, I am wearying your lordship, and wasting your time. May I ask of what you wished to speak that you have summoned me here?" " Yes," replied the old earl. " I wish to speak of Redmond's child—my granddaughter, Trafton, the girl who, if found, must of course supplant you as my heir." Donnithorne smiled serenely, and his black eyes glittered. "She never will be found," he said. " Depend upon it, she is dead, my lord, and you will never hear any more news of her. If you might do so, I would gladly relinquish ray position as heir and accept instead the three hundred pounds per year your lordship so generously offers me as a recompense—for Toeing the annual tbirby-

six hundred—but I fear ib is hopeless, and that no further trace of this Mrs. Narr ever will be discovered."

"Further trace of her has been discovered !" exclaimed tho old earl. " Here, read this telegram, and share with me the joyous hope that the lost heiress of Liimore has been found at last." Donnithorne seized with nervous bands the telegram held out to him, read it and grew white as death. "I am glad—l am very glad," he said, with a sickly smile, as he returned the scrap of paper and then averted his face that Lord Lismore might nob behold the look of baffled desire and furious wrath that burned in his dark eyes. "Let us pray that this may nob be another false clue, my lord, and that we really shall learn something of importance when Mr. Murtagh arrives. If this is indeed a promising clue"

" We shall know it now— shall know ib now !" broke in Lord Lismore, excitedly, as he pointed to a carriage which had just swung through the gates of Eagles' Nest, and was speeding up the drive. " See, Trafton—see—see, my lad ! Murtagh has arrived at last, and now we shall know the truth."

A few moments later the fly which had conveyed the solicitor from Donegal Station to Eagles' Nest reaches the edge of the Sea Terrace and Mr. Michael Murtagh, a bristling, chirping little cricket of a man, sprung down, paid and dismissed the driver, ana rushed like a small, fat, human cyclone up the steps and along the terrace to bear his message of hope and glad tidings bo the trembling, white-haired old man who could only put out two imploring hands as a sign of hie eagerness and in lieu of the voice which failed him.

" Good news, my lord 1 good news, good news 1" announced Mr. Murtagh as he approached. " Sure, I may call it wonderful news when ib comes to the truth, your lordship, for we've hit two birds with the one stone and we're on the track of the little Lady Collice at lastthough, by the soul of me, she must be almost a woman grown by this time, and nigh on bo soventeen years of age. Bub young or old, we're on the track at last, and the clue that was lost in Australia is found again in Ireland." " Murtagh 1" " It's true, my lord—as true as that there's nob a snake in Ireland bub those that have feet and legs. Of all people in the world, who do you think I found but Murdock."

" Murdock !"

" Himself, and no other, and just this morning I met him in Belfast and was introduced to him by Corporal Rufferty of the Guards, and never suspected that he was our Murdock till he let fall a mention that he had mado his fortune in Australia and come back to Ireland to find his sister — that he'd loft a woe sprig of a girl, years and years ago, and had found her as the mother of Rafferty's six little gossoons But sure, it's what I learned, and not how I learned ib, your lordship is caring to hear, so I'll skip the particulars and tell you the facts, my lord. Aro you prepared bo hear it? Mrs. Narr is in Ireland—in Dublin, no less, for Murdock saw her thore nob a week ago." " And the child !" gasped Lismore. "Did he seo my granddaughter ? Is she living? Is she well ? What did the woman say of her ?"

" Sure she said nothing, and for tho reason that the momont she clapped her eyes on Murdock and the two of them recognised each other, sho gave a jump and a screech, and away she darted as though all the fiends were after her.

"It was at tho corner of Laffan-atroeb and George's Road, nigh to tho Shamrock concert-hall, he met her, and although he rushod after her tho minute she started to run, and she turned into Dogall's Mews, where he thought he'd havo her fast, she slipped him somehow, and although he paid well to be allowed to investigate all the buildings about tho enclosure, he found no trace of Tier, and discovered nobody who know aught of a woman answering her description. He is of the opinion that she must have doubled upon him by slipping into tho nearest doorway, and as soon as ho dashed into tho mews sho darted out again, and while he was blundering about the dark onclosuro in tho effort to pursue her she was making her way to »omo other quarter of the city. He says that she seemed to be very poor, was in fact dressed like a beggar, and ho strongly suspected that that was her calling." " A beggar !" groaned Lord Lismore, covoring his ayes. " Oh, my Heaven 1 a professional boggar, and that is the woman who has had the care of Redmond's daughter for all these years. Oh, it can't be possible, ib can't, ib can't! This man Murdock might have been mistaken in the woman, Murtagh. It is years since he saw her, and ho may have made a mistake." "Ho says not, my lord. According to his story, tho woman has a hideous scar upon hor left cheek—the result of a ga»h mado with a broken bottlo in the hands of her drunken husband—and that scar, Murdock says, would serve to identify her anywhere. Then, too, she screamed when she saw him, and ran away as fast as she could fly. If she were a stranger she would never havo done that, my lord." " But why should sho do it, anyhow ?" queried tho earl. " Sho never committed any wrong against him, did she? and if she is a beggar it seems only natural that she should appeal to the charity of ono whom she knew. Besides, she is aware that be knows that the child has rich relatives and is of noble birth, and one would suppose that she would endoavour to make capital out of that." "Murdock thinks that such is her intention, my lord," responded Murtagh. " In short, that she has recently come to Ireland in the hopo of discovering the relations of the little Lady Collice and making money out of them, and that she fled when she saw him."

" And in either event," broke in Donnithorne, " the boat plan is to go to this man Murdock, obtain a full description of this woman, then journey to Dublin, searoh her out, and wring the truth from her lips. My lord, will you depute that task to me ? No one in all the world has your interest at heart moro closely than I, and if you will sanction tho effort and Mr. Murtagh will introduce me to his Australian friend, I will dedicate mysolf bo the task of hunting that woman down and finding the lost heiress of Lismore."

"Do it—do it, Trafton, and I will bless and reward you 1" exclaimed tho old earl wringing his hands, and looking the gratitude he felt. " Yours is a younger head than mine, and perhaps a shrewder. Go to Belfast with Murtagh, meet this man Murdock, persuade him, if you can, to accompany you to Dublin and to assist you in the effort to find this Mrs. Narr. Spare no expense, my lad, and let no such paltry thing as money stand between you and success. Draw upon mo for whatever sums are necessary, and take with you my blessings and my prayers." " Thank you, my lord," responded Donnithorne, then turning to the solicitor he asked : " Can you be ready to start at two o'clock, Mr. Murtagh? If so, I will pack my portmanteau at once." "I can be ready, Mr. Donnithorne," answered Mr. Murtagh, with a bow. "Very good ! I will pack my effects at once and bo propared to begin the quest," said Donnithorne in reply. " Have hope and have courago, my lord, and leave all this in my hands. If the heiress of Lismore is on the face of the oarth, I will never rest until 1 havo discovered her.

" And," he added, under hi* breath as he wrung the old earl's hand and darted indoors, " I will either mako hor my wife before she knows the good fortune in store for her, or I will kill ner. Low, ignorant, and coarse—as she must be if brought up under the influence of that woman—she will leap at the opportunity to marry a man like me, and if she is so placed that she cannotif by any chance she is already married —her life shall pay the forfeit and give me the wealth I covet. I have set my heart upon inheriting the Lismore fortune, and I will have it, be the coat what it may. I'll find you, my Lady Collice O'Donnell— find you and marry you, or I'll take your life 1" (To be continued.]