SONIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVI, Issue 11202, 24 October 1899, Page 3

SONIA.

fHE red-roofed village lay low down in the hollow. Its grey-blue smoke rose against tho green and brown of the hills. The green was laced with silver threads when the sunlight caught the streams. It was a remote place where peoplo lived very slowly. Sonia came there— Livonia to England, from the romantic to tho commonplace, from the haunted castle to tho country rectory.

Tho rector was the Rev. William Hannell, A widower, precise, dogmatic, and kindly. His sister kept house for him—Adelaide, unmarried, moro precise, mora dogmatic, and lets kindly. His son Norton, a. youth in his seventeenth year, lived at homo. He had been educated at home, and possessed many of tho family disadvantages to be derived from such education. Yet nature had made him—though he did not know it—a youth who looked well and carried himself well. With them lived Lucie Barrant, a schoolgirl of 14, the rector's ward. Her hair was pale gold and she had no remarkable beauty, and she was at once meek and passionate.

To them entered Sonia, and remained for ono month. She went away laughing. Yet sho still writes to her godfather, the rector. She writes loss often to Miss Adelaide Hannell. She never answers the letters that Norton writes to her, but she refers to him in her letters to his father. There is never a word about Lucie Sarrant.

. Tho broken thread of their normal life has, in the ease of the old people at any rate, been joined again. To thein lifo rolled on as before, though they recalled things. "Sonia said. . . " 'Sonia did. . . " 0 you remember how she looked when. . . These are common phrases with them. They had never asked Sonia to come. They were hospitable, but they wore also humble, and they had 110 initiative. Sonia wrote and told her godfather that sho was coming to England, and would stay with them for a week if it was "not displeasing." Sonia's mother also wrote, apologetically, Sonia was anxious to see England, and the Rev. William Hannell wan so very kind and had always taken such an interest in his god-daughter whom he had never seen. By the way she enclosed Sonia's last photograph.

Aunt Adelaide cut the pages of her Edna Lyall novel with an olive-wood paper-knife jn which the word Gctli6emane had been painted in Hebrew character. She heard the two letters <-ead. She saw the photograph. She said very little, but Sonia presented herself to Aunt Adelaide's mind as a distinct opportunity for doing good. The boy Norton also said very little. Ho still held in his hand the copy of Soma's photograph which had been handed round. He stared at it with big eyes. What would she think of him? She looked rich and insolent in tlio photograph. Ho wished his clothes wero not so shabby, and wondered whether she would despise him. Lucie Sarrant looked over Norton's shoulder, and was angry at his absorption. "It is a very beautiful face," said the rector frankly. "Beauty is not everything," Adelaide replied. Her thin lips, were pressed together. She saw evil in the face, evil that might be co-reeled by judicious and aunt-like counsels. There was no instance of remarkable personal beauty in the village until Sonia came. Slid came red Pagan into grey Christianity. Her hair was dark brown; her eyes were wonderful, with long lashes: the laughter on her red lips contradicted the pathos of her eyes. Most of her dresses came from the highest civilisation, and most, of her convictions were frankly barbarian. She was a paradox from Hie land of paradoxes—the land where they still travel by coach and yet order their horses for the next stage by telephone. On tiio evening after her arrival Aunt Adelaide, who had been singularly silent during dinner, commenced her evening game of Patience. She liked a game of Patience but her conscience forbade her to use the deadly playing-cards. She had constructed a pack herself, in which circles, semicircles, squares, and triangles took the place of spades, clubs, hearts, and diamonds; the king, queen, and knave were represented by the numbers 13, 12, 11: the word " ace" was not used, it was called " one." Aunt Adelaide spoke of them not as playing-cards, but as jxiticnc-tickets. And baring thus with success extracted the tin from the apparatus of the game, slio could with a clear conscience enjoy the game itself. Sonia picked up the cards, laughing. " Now I shall tell your fortune, if I may." "I think, Sonia," said Adelaide, "that —well, really, should I not ho able to trust you better if you first of all told me my past?" She had meant to be much more ungracious than thisSonia had disarranged the cards just as they were laid out for the game—but it was not easy to be ungracious with Sonia.

"Ah, yes! that is true. Sec. I tell your past." She shuffled the cards, still laughing feverishly from time to time. Norton watched her openly with very serious eyes; Lucie Sarra.nt took a book rather ostentatiously and began to read. Sonia had talked with her mother about Miss Adelaide Hannell. Also as she talked she watched Miss Adelaide Hannell's face and read the signfieance of every shade of expression. She told Adelaide many things that Adelaide believed that nobody knew but herself. She di.l more—she brought Adelaide into the lomantic atmosphere, enlarged the mean fact that she had once jilted a curate into a beautiful story of a noble passion. She introduced Adelaide to herself in a new, roseate, and romantic light. And the plain middle-aged lady was fluttered and flatto ed. " You have certainly made some , good guesses, Sonia," said Adelaide. flow prettily, she thought, the name Sonia sounded. "Guesses? Why, it was all true. And now 1 will tell your future, and that also shall be quite true." "No, no; I am afraid of you. You are & witch." " You may tell mine," said Lucie Sarranfc, suddenly looking up from (he book. Soma laughed again. " I need no cards. I read it in your eyes, Mademoiselle Lucie: "' Les mix verts Vont. . •' How does Hint go on?" . "I do not know," said Lucie coldly. 1 am not French and do not understand it. 1 told vou that at dinner." "Ah, I forget I I do not. know why I thought that you were French. You must lardon it." . , ' Suddenly she went to the windows and drew back the curtains. "It is too lovely a summer night—we must all come out into the garden." „ ... They went nut meekly, oven gladly. Miss Adclaido Hannell forgot to mention that the night air wa3 dangerous and came, too. In the "anion Sonia told ghost stories. She had -con the f ;lrost herself in the haunted castle. Her mother had seen it also. It was the ghost- of a baron who had shot himself, and 'all for love. When Soma saw him it was at dawn. He stood at the foot of her bed and bowed low; she could hear the click of his heels as they came together. thinking that lie must be real she called out-and at" (he sound of her voice lie vanished. " How old 's she?" Adelaide asked the rector afterwards "Sixteen, 1 believe." " And so much confidence and self-posses-sion. Chatters French like English. I hope j I may be able to influence her. : But she never was able; she never trie' very hard. And in the meantime Soma influenced her. She also influenced le recto and l.is ward Lu.ie. And the boy Norton | ivt-ni head over ears in love. : She had brought from her home a pile of , luggage, a l.eao of money, an excellent Ln - lish maid and her own atmosp.:ei<.. She drove the rectory people into that atmos pheri and made them live in it. , The boy Norton could not often find her I alone. He was full of dumb eloquence, un- : comprehended desires, very rest e=., - sometimes unintentionally amusing. Lucie t Sarrant, as she watched Norton and Soma, , felt daily mo.-? murderous, yet by the time that the week was at an end the bojand Sonia had r.ever bee 1 alone toget ,cr » , raid one word wh>:h had not been o\6 i ■ At the end of tlu week they would not ot her go. Though she was irregular at family prayers, neve: attending church in t ie moining, did-and made them do-a hundred new things of which they had never Uiouglit- hQfore, iliey would not let her go. Even Lucie .fatalist at 14-sa.d: "Please stay longer, Sv'ia." ft would be the end of everything, but Lucia would not let Soma see that she was afraid of her—if she could help it. Then one morning after breakfast bonia said: "Norton, I want you to late thraeh the pine-woods on tiie lull there. ' ■ glanced at her brother, but lie did no « - her eye. Lucie rose and went from the • Norton drew a long breath. If no her Ins father nor his aunt prohibited that walk, the gates of heaven were open. mere was no prohibition. . „ " Thank you, Sonia, ' said Norton. • As they walked through the pine-WOOtl alone, Sonia asked him a hundred ques i about his life. What had he done before she " Nothing," he said. She spoke of Lucie, "Nothing," he said. She spoke of Lucie, praising her. Then for a while they w. on in silence. She sat down on 11 ban rest; and as lie stood before her their eyes met. • • • , '.>> - "Do you know that I like you very much. lie said suddenly. ~ , „ qi, "Yes," she said, "I knew that- She laughed, and then: "Why have you told me?"

' "I cannot help it, I meant to tell you When you asked me to come out this morning. 1 would have told you before if I could Are you angry?" I am very glad. How much do you like me; _ , "M 056 than anyone in the world. So that there is nothing I would not do for you, if you wanted it. Thoro is nobody like you, and there never has been. We were all dead until you came. I love you, Sonia." " No," she said, " you must not love me. Une day you will marry Lucie." "No, no." Yes, you will; I am going away soon, and I shall not come back to Engl;.jd any more.' 1 " Don't you like me at all?" " I shall not toll you." 1 pleaded vainly. Not for days would sue let h:m be with her alone again. When she did, the raid, " Tell me once moro how much you like me." And when at the last he was saying good-byo to her she asked him it again. But this time sho said, Tell roe again how much you love me." And in return? He was not to write letters to her, and lie was not to kiss her nothing, in fact, in return. So olio went back to the haunted castle, having acquired in England a fair knowledge of the nature of a compromise, the affection of two elderly people, the love of a boy, and the hatred of a girl.