WHO WINS?

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 9491, 21 April 1894, Page 3 (Supplement)

WHO WINS?

BY MAY AGNES FLEMING, Author of " Lady Evelyn ; or, The Lord of Royft Rest," "Magdalen's Vow," "The Vlneeen Bridegroom," "The Heiress of Glen Qower," " Estella's Has- ' band," etc.,. etc., CHAPTER XIV.—-{Continued.) | " Look ab Macgregor, Gwen," Charley said, in an aside; "he's as stern as Rhadamanthsis, and glowering aa only a blackbrowed Scotchman can glower. What do you suppose is the matter—his digestion or the widow ?" "I don'b believe Mr. Macgregor is a Scotchman," replied Gwendoline, " despite his grond old name. I thought all Scotch* men were flinty-cheeked, raw-boned, and red-haired, and with an accent as broad as their native Tweed. I don't} know what's the matter, bub I shouldn't wonder If it wero the widow ; she's capable of anything, that simpering little sorceress! And then, you know, he had her picture. Oh ! by the way, I must tell her about ib, and see what she says. Mrs. Ingram"— her voice —"did you ever meeb Mr. Macgregor in some other and better world ? Because he has your portrait in his portfolioa splendid likeness, isn'c lb, Charley?" " Stunning 1" drawled the Etonian. " If ib hadn't been so inconveniently large I would have taken it the other day to wear upon my heart. Ib musb be you, though Macgregor says ib isn't. I don'b believe there are two Mrs. Ingrams in the scheme of creation;" and Charley bowed to point the compliment. Mrs. Ingram looked across the table with startled eyes ; but Macgregor'a dark, impassive face never moved a muscle. " Impossible !" she said, sharply. " I never saw Mr. Macgregor before to-day, although, perhaps, Mr Macgregor may have seen me. Mr. Macgregor looked her full in the face with a pointed intensity that for the second time thrilled her with terror to the heart. " I never met Mrs. Ingram in my life until this evening," ho said slowly, and with a strong emphasis upon tho name, " and yet the picture Charley speaks of is strikingly like her. Bub it is the portrait of a woman dead these many years, or supposed to be — woman who in her lifo-time was so utterly lost and vicious that I would nob leb her approach a dog I cherished. The woman's name was Rose Dawson." He never took his eyes off her face—those cold, stern, pitiless eyes; and, for the second time that evening, the colour faded, and a dead, livid white overspread the widow's face, through which tho rouge gleamed ghastly red. Bub ib was only for an instant. Talleyrand himself might have envied Mrs. Ingram her admirable self-con-trol. Before the others could notice, tho corpse-like pallor was gone, and Mrs. Ingram was shrugging her dimpled shoulders, making a pretty, pettish gesture. "How very unpleasant! And I look like that poor dead person ? Ib is quite extraordinary, these accidental resemblances. Here is Colonel Trevanion, for instance, Mr. Macgregor; many say he resembles you." " Gad 1 he does, too !" said the baroneb, eying them critically, " and I never noticed it before. That patriarchal beard of yours, Macgregor, hides half your face; but what we can see certainly resembles the colonel. How are you going to account for it, Macgregor? You appear to have a theory for everything." The author smiled—a queer, doubtful smile—and lookod at Cyril Trevanion with a glance that, for some reason, made that officer writhe in his seat. Perhaps I have a theory for that, too, and may leb you hear it at some future day. Yes, although I cannot 'see myself as others see me,' still I fancy there is a resemblance ; bub it is not half as strong as his resemblance to another man I met once. In fact, I was staggered when I first saw Mr. Trevanion, so striking is it. The fellow's alive yet, for what I know—poor devil!—and really, colonel, you and he might be twin brothers." A strange light came into the eyes of Cyril Trevanion at ' times —a wild, halfmaniac glare. That light gleamed in them now, and his swarthy face absolutely blackened. " Who was this man, and where did you see him ?" he asked, hoarsely. " Well, I hardly care to say. Like Mrs. Ingram's resemblance to the wretched dead woman I spoke of, ib isn't complimentary. But if you will have it—and, of course, it is only one of Nature's absurd freaks—it was at Toulon, and the follow was a galleyslave. He'd committed an atrocious robbery in Paris, and the poor wretch was chained by the leg to a big brute of a murderer when I saw him. I will never forget, to my dying day, the looked he bestowed on me—the wolfish, maniac glare. He was half mad, I fancy. It gave me such a thrill of terror—yes, terror and disgust—that I never forgot ' him since. And, singular to relate, colonel, tho galleyslave at Toulon was very like you !" For some reason dead silence fell —for some reason every one looked ab Cyril Trevanion. And the wolfish, maniac glare of which Macgregor had spoken could never have boen more horrible in the eyes of the half-mad galley-slave than ibglibberod in his eyes then. "Como, come !" Sir Rupert cried, rather startled; "this won't do, Macgregor. Really, you are singularly unfortunate in your topics for once. My dear Trevanion, for Heaven's sake, don't glare at us bo ! We see these accidental resemblances every day, and half of them are in our imagination. Your imagination, Macgregor, is I getting overheated, I think. You musb leave off scribbling, and bake bo the stubble and the partridges next month. I can promise you rare sport at Chudleigh." Five minutes after, Mrs. Ingram and Miss Chudleigh left the gentlemen to themselves. Ib was tho author who hold the door open for them to pass out, and as Gwendoline lookod up ab him in solemn wonder the smile that met her was rarely sweet. " You're not the gentleman with the cloven foot, are you, Mr. Macgregor?" she whispered. "You've frightened Mrs. Ingram and Colonel Trevanion oub of a year's growth. It will be my turn next; and you'll tell me I'm twin aiater to a murderess, I dare say." " Close up, gentlemen—close up 1" called the pleasant tones of the baronet. " Colonel! no backhanding so soon. You sib as prim as the Watcher on the Threshold, and aboub as silent. Charley, are they troing to banish you up to Oxford next term ?" Bub all the baronet's efforts to force the conversation wore in vain. Cyril Trevanion sat like a statue of stone at bhe feast. He peeled his walnuts and dipped them in his sherry, and glowered vindictively every now and then at his opponent across the way. But Macgregor book little notice of those black looks. He and his host had gob into some animated argument, which lasted until they joined the ladies. Mrs. Ingram sab ab bhe piano, playing softly. Cyril Trevanion crossed over and stood beside her. The baroneb and bhe author sab down to a game of cards, and Charley, who had, like the widow herself, an innate talent for flirting, made languid love bo Gwendoline, curled up on an ottoman at her elbow. "Who is that man," Cyril Trevanion asked, in a horase, breathless sorb of way, "who knows you, Mrs. Ingram, and who knows me ?" > ■ "Colonel Trevanion !" the widow cried, inexpressibly startled, "how dare you? What do you mean ?" Colonel Trevanion laughed—a harsh, mirthless laugh—and that wild light was in his fierce, black eyes again. " Let us take off our masks for a little, my dear madame, and look each other in the faco. When I told you, three days ago, that 1 loved you, that I adored you, do you think I took you then for what you pretend to be? You did mo the honour to refuse. But we know each other now, and you will think better of that refusal, I am sure. You are no more Mrs. Ingram than—" " Than you are Cyril Trevanion !" the lady said in a fierce, hissing whisper. "You see I know you as well as this horrible Macgregor. And you are— shall not bo ab all surprised—tho escaped galleyslave of Toulon !' _ <« Cyril Trevanion laughed again—a low, mirthless, blood-curdling laugh bhab absolutely frightened the woman beside him. " Whatever I am, I love you, I worship you, oh, beautiful Edith! and mino you shall be, in spite of earth and Hades! You wanb bo be Lady Chudleiebj don'b.you ?

And, with tea thousand a yoar in prospective, you are ready to throw over a hundred poor devils like .ma.... Think better of it, Edith Ingram ! Think twice before you make an enemy of Cyril Trevanion !" ' He swung round abruptly as he spoke, and came near her no more for the rest of the evening. It was late when the baronet and his antagonist rose from their game of cards, and Mrs. Ingram was floating out of the drawing-room as they made their adieus. She stood for an instant on the marble stairs, her silk robe and her emeralds gleaming greenly against the white statues, and looked defiantly into the face of Angus Macgregor, It was like the challenge of a big, powerful Newfoundland and a vicious little King Charles as their eyes met, or like the grave defiance of two duellists of the Legion | d'Honneur, as they used to doff their plumed hats and cry, " Guard yourself!" before begining the duel to the death. " We will meet again," the widow said, with her most insolent smile, " and you will show me the picture of that wicked dead person I resemble so much. Until then—good-night!" CHAPTER XV. IS THE PRIOR'S WALK. Colonel Trevanion rode homeward through the black, rainy August night on his huga black horse Czar, after bidding the widow the briefest and coldest of farewells. As he said good-night to Macgregor the eyes of the two men met — insolent smile of power in the tenant's, a glare of bitter hate in the landlord's. A child could have seen ib was " war to the death" between these two. Charley Lemox tooled the author home in his drag, and for the first two or three miles the hermit of the Retreat puffed away with vicious energy at his Manilla, staring silently into the wee blackness. . " Well," Charley said at last, " you might make an observation, I think, if only on the weather. Speech is silver and silence is golden, very likely; but still, when an auditor is by, capable of appreciating the profoundeab remark you can utter, you might break through the golden rule for once. There is the widow—suppose we discuss her. She's a safe subject; for, egad ! she's been pretty thoroughly dissected before this at half the dinner-tables in the county. Isn't she chic? Isn't she charming ? Isn't she brilliant ? You noticed her eyes, I suppose? Did you ever see their equal in all the slave markets of Stamboul, in the head of Georgian or Circassian ? And all those wonderful coils, and braids, and curls, and ripples of midnight blackness ! Isn't it a glorious head of hair?" The hermit laughed his most cynical laugh. "How old are you, Charley ? Seventeen or eighteen—which? My dear little innocent Eton boy, how much of that brilliant bloom is liquid rouge and pearl white ? How much of that starry lustre do those wondrous eyes owe to the ghastly brilliance of belladonna? And how many of those glorious—wasn't that your word ? —glorious braids and coils will Mrs. Ingram put away in boxes before she goes to bed ? You forgot to notice her teeth, didn't you, when you took stock ? And Heaven knows she smiles enough to show them ! They are white and even as two strings of pearls. But, my dear boy, I shouldn hin the least wonder if she keeps them in a tumbler of water by her bedside until to-morrow morning. Made up ! Your widow is a work of art, as pretty to look at as any other work of arb at the price. Bub, oh, my Charles, the toilet goes before, and great and mighty are the mysteries thereof!" Charley's face of surprise and disgust was capital, but the darkness hid it. "Juvenal! Diogenes! old dog in the manger ! You won't admire her yourself, and you won't let anyone else! Aren't the glasses of your lorgnette smoked, my friend? You see life through a black cloud, rather, and you hold women a little higher than your dog, a little dearer than your horse." "And why?" the author replied, coolly. " I hold them as I find them. They are all virtuous, untempted ; all faithful, untried ; all prudent, unsought. The best of them, the wisest of them, hold the product of the silkworm, and the skill of their Parisian modiste higher than all tho truth of earth, the glory of heaven. The most faithful and leal among them will throw over a lord for a duke, a duke for a prince ; and the best wife, the most devoted mother in wide England, would feel her head spin and her pulses beat at one smile of ' my lord the king.' " "I say, Macgregor," Charley exclaimed, rather aghast at this resume, " don't you go a leetle too fast? Who's done for you, and when was it? You must have been jilted in cold blood by half a dozen, at least, of the fair fishers of men to leave you so bitterly cynical and sarcastic as this. Suppose they are painted and powdered ? What does it signify, when it is so artistically done that wo don't detect it? If Mrs. Ingram in the sacred privacy of _ her chamber be toothless and scrawny, with a complexion like a tallow candle, then, by Jove ! let Mrs. Ingram paint to her heart's contont. An ugly woman is a sight to haunt one's dreams. If an ugly woman has the art to make herself ' beautiful for ever,' then let her crinoline and cosmetique to the end of bho chapter. A man don'b wanb his mother or sister or wife to kiss him with lips on which the rouge still glistens ; but outside of that—oh, by George ! leb 'em go it. We like it on the stage—brightens them up and keeps them perpetually young. Don't let us make a howling aboub ib on tne greater stage of life." [To be continued on Wednesday next.)