THE HAND ON THE PLOUGH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11843, 21 December 1901, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE HAND ON THE PLOUGH.

[PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.]

BY JOHN STRANGE WINTER, : Author of " Booties' Baby," " A Magnificent Young Man," " Heart and Sword," " The Colonel's Daughter," "Every Inch a Soldier," Etc., Etc.

■ [COPYRIGHT.] CHAPTER X. ' B'etwebn' a very excellent dinner and the feeling thr he was on the high road to the discovery of Mrs. Meredith, and the fact that he had seen the most beautiful girl that day that he had ever seen in his life, Dick Vincent passed the evening in a very much happier frame of mind than he had imagined lie could possibly be in when he left London that morning.

He was up betimes— life in California does not tend to the formation of habits of laziness. He had a regular Blankhampton breakfast too— let me tell you that Blankhampton hotels are famous for their good cheer, especially in the earliest me >1 of the dayand then about half-past ten, feeling very , well fortified for carrying on his quest, he sauntered up the street, and once more knocked at the door of number nineteen, Ogledal. The little maid was ready, and answered his knock promptly. "Yes. sir, Miss Beazley is in. Step this way, please, sir." Once more Dick found himself in the little parlour, and almost immediately the old lady whom he had seen the previous evening came beaming, in. "Good morning! I knew my daughter would know," she remarked. " She has such a much better memory than I have. I can remember anything as happened when I was a little girl, but when you ask me about last , week I'm done. Here she is. Now, honey, this is the gentleman." " My name is Vincent," said Dick, with a very polite bow to the young dressmaker. She was a pale, slim girl some three or four-and-twenty, and (die addressed herself directly to the visitor. "You wanted to know about Mr. Johnson's daughter ried daughter?" "Well, I did and I didn't. Your mother was kind enough to tell me last night that she thought the lady would be able to give me the information I. require. I am really looking for a Mrs. Meredith —who lived in this house fifteen years ago. Whether she rented the house or whether she lodged in it I have not the least idea." " Oh. she must have lodged in it," said Miss Beaziey, "because the Johnsons lived here for about five-and-twenty years, and we took it of them— least, we took it after thev left." ' ""Ob, I see. Then you think she must have lodged with the Johnsons? ' ( " I think she must have done. I don t know anything about, it myself, but I'm sure Mrs. Johnson's daughter would know. She married a gentleman called Pilkington. He was in the choir at the parish; in fact, he lodged with the Johnsons." . "Oh, I see. And do you happen to know where they live now?" , , "Yes. His voice broke, and he got a place as organist at Bensehill, _ and .he teaches music, and so on. I think they go very well." " And where is Bensehill? ' "Well, Bensehill is about three miles from Blankhampton." "How docs one get there( You see, 1 am quite a stranger to this neighbourhood." " Oh, it's easy enough to get there. You can take a cab or you can walk," smiling at IVm, " or you can go by train ' " Oil,: I see. I can go by tram. _ That would be the quickest, woudn't it? "Yes. It's on the Rockferry line, and trains are pretty frequent. Anybody in Bensehill will, of course, tell you where the Pilkingtons live." "Oh, yes. Well, Miss Beaziey, I must thank you, and your mother too, very much indeed for your kindness to a perfect stranger. You perhaps would like to know why I am so anxious to find Mrs. Meredith. The truth is I have just come from California, and some relatives of hers there— least, a relative of hers there asked me to find her out if I could. So you see I am anxious to find her as quickly as possible." "Well, I'm sure," said Miss Beaziey, if anybody can tell you anything about her it "will be Mrs. Pilkington." " And to Mrs. Pilkington I shall go by the first train that will convey me. So good morning, and thank you both a thousand times." The old lady .stood on the doorstep and watched him go swinging away up the street. "That's a handsome young feller, Jenny," she said. " He's got the same look as the officers haveso clean and so smart. Well. I'm sure I hope he'll find his Mrs. Meredith." . "So do I," said her daughter. "And I hope he's brought good news to her, whoever she is." "Hey, dear," with a sigh, "it's a hard and weary worll." " Lor', "mother, I wish we had a smart young man-coming and inquiring for us." " Well, my dear," said Mrs. Beazley, " there's no knowing what fate won't do for you; but I'm afraid, though you're so genteel, Jenny, with yer nice pale face and yer slim figure, that if any smart young men came after you and they saw your poor old mother it'would sort of give 'em the cold shivers." . " uo along with you, mother," said Miss Beaziey. Meantime Dick had gone briskly up the street, across the cathedral precincts, and down St. Thomas'-street to the Golden Swan. A fresh inquiry of the buxom barmaid* elicited the fact that there was a train to Bensehill at five minutes to twelve. He determined to \go by that. He filled in • the time until the train was due "by taking a brisk walk around the city walls, and walked into the station with just time to buy a newspaper and take his ticket. He found Bensehill the usual little roadside station, with a pompous little stationmaster and one antiquated porter. "How far is the village from here?" he inquired of the latter as he took his ticket.

"The village? Three-quarters of a mile," was the reply. " Can you tell me whether a Mr. Pilkin"fon lives in the village?"-

" Oh, yes. Mr. Pilkington lie live in the village to be sure. Plays the music on Sunday, and teaches in the week-day. "Yes, that's the man," said Dick, cheer -

fully. ' " Yes, he lives—well, I doubt if I could make you • understand, sir. You'd better ask at the post office. You'll , find that right in the centre of the village." „ " All right; thank you very mucin. Good morning." : So Dick left the station with its oyster shells and its glowing red. ger?.!jmi.is behind him, and swung steadily away in the direction of the village. The post office was easy enough to find. The postmistress was a garrulous old lady, who at once I proceeded to give him the proper directions for reaching the Pilkingtons house, and also as much of the Pilkingtons history as she could cram into the two or three minutes that Dick remained in the little shop. . "Ah, yes, sir, a clever man—what 1 may say a genius; thrown away on this little village, I must confess, although I have lived in Bensehill all my. life-—a clever man and a genius. We've brilliant services on Sundays we never had before Mr. Pilkington came. The rector he said to me time and again: ' Miss Jenkins,' said he, ' you can play the piano, why can't you play the organ?' Which, as I told the rector more than once it isn't an organ but a harmonium. 1 Then,' said lie, ' the easier for you ,to play, because it a the nearest approach to a pis.no,' But its one thing playing the piano for your own pleasure and your friends' amusement, and it's quite another thing playing in public and for the service of the Almighty." " That's perfectly true!" said Dick. " But still, if one' does one's best, you know." "Ah, yes, yes; that was the argument the others used—particularly the rector. And then by some merciful chance, as far as I was concerned, Mr. Pilkington came along. A first-class musician! Been years in the parish choir—the parish, that is the cathedral, you know, sir, at Blankhampton. Something had happened to his voice; I don't know what, but he and his wife wanted a country place where the air would be pure, and where he could play the organ and pick up a living in the neighbourhood. Oh, they had a trifle. Mrs. Pilkington was a Miss Johnson. Her father was a very clever mannot to say a learned man—and she was an only child. Oh, she has a nice little tidy income of her own, and you know a tidy little income makes people independent." "I'm sure it does. They showed their good sense in coining here," said Hick. "And which is the way to their house.' " Well, you go down this lane here, and you take the second turning to the right, and you'll find the house—like a little bower it is now, all smothered in roses. Mrs. Pilkington is a very ladylike little person, quite genteel.' "I see,' said Dick, down the lane, and second turning to the right.'' Yes, that's it." "Is- there a name on the house'-'" "Well, there isn't a name on the house that I ever saw myself, and thiii 1 letters are simply addressed ' Dead Men's Lane, or just Bensehill; but there are only tiiree houses in that part of the lane, and the Pilkingtons' house has a mulberry tree right in the middle of the lawn. "I shall find it." said Dick. "Thank you a thousand times." "Nice pleasant-spoken gentleman. I wonder if he's an old lover of Mrs. Pilkington's come back again," said the romantic old postmistress. So Dick went down the lane and took the second turning to the right, speedily coming into sight of a small, rose-wreathed house, which boasted of a mulberry tree in the middle of the little lawn which skirted the road. Here lie stopped, satisfied himself that it was the house, thrust open the little gate, and scrolled up the gravelled pathway to the rose-covered porch. ' - A little maid-servant came to the door in answer to his summons. " Does Mrs. Pilkington live here?" asked Dick.' - _ "Mrs. Pilkington she do live here," was the reply. " Would you give her this card and ask her if she would see me for a few minutes on business?" said Dick. , He had been so long in California, and before that his life had run in channels well away from suburban London, that it' never occurred to him that had he been living in Clapton or East Croydon it was the last message he would have sent in to the unknown mistress of a house. Bensehill was also, presumably, too far removed from the beaten track of ladies and gentlemen who pay visits of a business kind to take fright at his message. The little maid left him standing at the door, and then came runmng back, saying - with an eager gasp that Mistress' would be pleased if you would walk into the parlour." So into the parlour Dick walked. It was a neat little room, a shade more refined than the similar apartment in the house of 'Mrs. Beazley. In one corner stood a piano upon which were some plants, and some nice green ones stood in the window. There was a broad couch covered with' immaculately clean chintz, and one or two illustrated papers on the table. Dick decided in his own mind that Mr. or 'Mrs.'' Pilkington, or both of them, must be distinctly superior in class to Mrs. Pilkington's original status. He had just arrived at this conclusion when the door opened and Mrs. Pilkington came into the room. In her hand she held his card. "You wanted to see me?" she said. " I wanted to ask you a. question," he replied. " Did you ever know a Mrs. Meredith?" She looked at him with an air of surprise. Yes, I did." "Is she living?" "I believe she is."

"Is she married again?" " Oh, no, certainly not. She never had any proof of her husband's death." " Can you give me her address?" "I think I can."

" I don't want it for any unpleasant purposeindeed, rather the contrary," said Dick. " I shall at least have the pleasure of bringing the mystery of her husband's long silence to an end." " You knew him?"

" I knew him very well. We lived together for seven years." "In America?"

"In California. .We were partners. I never knew until quite recently that Mr. Meredith was married. I am.looking for his wife on his behalf."

" Then," said Mrs. Pilkington, " I will give you her address. You will find her at Gatehouses. ■

"Gatehouses? Where is that?"

" It is a village about' a mile and a-half from Blankhampton. Anybody in the town will tell you in which direction." " I thank you very much," said Dick. "She lives there?"

•"-Yes, she has lived there for some -rears. Her daughter is the mistress of the infant school."

" Oh, I see. Her daughter is not married then?"

' "No, she is not married; she is young." " Yes, she must be young from what Meredith told me," said Dick. ."Well, Mrs. Pilkingfcon," holding out his hand, "I am extremely obliged to you —more than I can say. I expected to have much more trouble in finding my old friend's wife, and you have made "the" way very easy for me. Good-bye. Thank you again." So he was soon striding away-down the lane again. He found when he got to the post office that lie would have ,to wait an hour and a-half for the next train back to Blankhampton, so instead of going straight back to the station, there to cool his heels until the train should arrive, lie went across the street to the village inn and asked the apple-cheeked landlady what she could do for him in the way of lunch. CHAPTER XL When Dick Vincent, found himself once more at Blankhampton, he lost no time in inquiring the road to Gatehouses; in fact, he got into a cab at the station and told the man to drive to Gatehouses. It was then nearly three o'clock.' " llow far is it? A mile and a-half?" "Thereabouts, sir." To Dick it seemed a very short mile and a-half ; but then, although he was determined to find Mrs. Meredith, he was not at all anxious for the 'interview to begin. "Find out," said he to the cabman, when they approached the village, " where Mrs. Meredith lives." " All right, sir."

■ The house of Mrs. Meredith "was not difficult to find, and before Dick knew where he was the cabman had drawn up at its door. • " You had better wait for me," he said, He felt somehow as if he would not want to walk back into the city again. /.♦ 7 - / He knocked at the door. It was opened by a lady whom he at once recognised as the original of the portrait which Meredith had shown him. "Are you Mrs. Meredith?" said Dick, taking off his hat. " Yes, I am." Her tone was one of slight surprise. May I come in?" "Oh, certainly." "My name is Vincent —Richard Vincent. I have just come from California." Mrs. Meredith, who had preceded him into the dainty little sitting-room, turned with a start and a gasp. "You have come from him?" she said, sharply. " Yes," said Dick, simply, "I have." " After all these years—after" all these years!" said the little woman with a sob in her breath. " And he hasn't forgotten me!"

" He had never forgotten you," said Dick, " although he had not spoken of you until the other day to his best friend." That was you?" she said. Dick's nervous face relaxed into a half smile. " Yes," he said. " For seven years Meredith and I were partners. We lived together; we were everything to each other." " And he spoke of me at last. Sit down, Mr. Vincent. Tell me everything," she entreated in a shaking voice. " This has come upon me very suddenly. • I had begun to think that lie had forgotten me perhaps, and that he had formed new ties." '"Never!" said-Dick, "never! I never knew him look at a woman. It was a revelation to me when lie told me of your existence, when ho showed me your picture." " My picture?" " Which he had carried about with him all these years, and of which I never suspected the existence. I'd better begin at the beginning, Mrs. Meredith it will make it easier. Meredith went out there to seek his fortune."

" Yes, yes." "He sought, God knows, poor chap, he sought it earnestly enough, but he didn't find it. He had left you in a cock-a-hoop sort of way, prophesying that in a few months there would be a palace ready to receive you. There has never been a palace, Mrs. Meredith. There is a corrugated iron hut on the ranche — is called Santa Clarabut it is no palace." " It would have been a palace to me," .said Mrs. Meredith, in a broken voice. "Well," Dick went on, "he took it to heart. He was ashamed to write and own up that he had been a failure out there as lie had been a failure over here. And he drank more than was good for him." "My poor Roger! It was his one failing." "Yes, he was his own enemy," said Dick. " So lie went on, year after year, and at the end of eight years he had only managed to scrape together, just at the end of that time, a poor little capital, that wouldn't have been of much good to anyone unless pure chance had come in and turned it into fuck. There we met. I had been in a cavalry regimertmy father is a squire down in Kent- lungs were dickey, the doctors told me if I didn't get into a certain kind of climate i .shouldn't live through a second winter. ; Tier recommended California, and I was never' an idle beggar, and so ■ I left home and went to try a ranche. I was young, .1 was green. I met your husband. He took a fancy to me, and i took a fancy to him. I put my bit of capital together with his less bit of capital and his experience, and we threw in our lot together. It's very hard work is ranching, Mrs. Meredith, it's a process of disillusionment; and we only kept body and soul together. I had help once or twice from home, and at last we turned,the corner, and began to think that one day our ranclie might- be worth having—as a ranche, you understand." " Yes, yes," eagerly. "Go ou." " Well, that year we made a profit. It wasn't much—any farmer at. home would have turned up his nose at it. We didn't ; and next year we made a better profit, and at the end of that year, when we had put six years':of hard work into our ranclie all the ! year roundwork, mind you, not just riding j about neatly togged up and giving an order i here and an eye there, but hard, laborious, manual, back-breaking labour —then For- [ tune smiled upon us. We discovered oil on our ranche —or the oil discovered the ranclie, I should say, for it bubbled up one morning, a stink of paraffin, and Meredith knew that our fortunes were made. I don't say that the ranche is worth millions, but at the end of that year we had ten thousand pounds to divide between, us." " And then he thought of me?" "Then Mrs. Meredith, I determined to come home. I had been, out seven years, 1 hadn't seen any of my own people, and the way was perfectly clear for one or both of us to come home for a spell. I begged Meredith to come back and stay with my people, and then he told me about you." The little woman shut her eyes and leaned her head back against the chair in which she was sitting "He hadn't forgotten me," she said. " No, he hadn't forgotten you. But I couldn't get him to come back." "But why not'?" "I think," said Dick, hesitatingly, " that hp felt a certain amount of reluctanceor at least, not exactly reluctance, Mrs. Meredith, but a sense that he had no right to come home to claim you. You see, he had, been away fifteen years; he hadn't written to you for the greater part of that time, and" it was more than possible that you might have married again." "I?" she cried. "Oh, surely Roger knew me better than that." Ti "Well, he alternated between hopes and fears. • He felt somehow that you would hi as he left you, and yet again that you might have been tempted into marrying once more."

" And if I had?" " If you had, I was to find out if you were happy. He had no wish to be a second Enoch Arden, making things unpleasantafter so long a silence. If you had married again—and you were quite young enough to have married many times over would have stayed on the other side of the Atlantic for ever." _ . ' " But you see I. am not married again, said Mrs. Meredith, looking at him with a triumphant smile. "I am a little older, but then so is he. I have not altered towards him in the very least, and evidently by what you tell me neither has he." "He is older," said Dick. He felt that he was getting very near to a disclosure. His heart beat to suffocation. He did not like to look at her. "He is older, Mrs. Meredith. You see, he has lived a hard, wild life out there not wild in the way of women, but wild ill the way of haying 110 refinements, no comforts. From time to time he drank pretty hard." . "And the life hasn't told upon you, Mr. Vincent," she said, deliberately. "No, not much. But then I was only three-and-twenty when I was out there; Roger was over forty." lie thought that she would notice he spoke in the past tense, but she did not do so. " Then again," he went on. finding that she did not "take the cue from him as he had intended, " I have always been a very temperate man; drink was never a temptation to me. Drink leaves its mark on a man; it left its mark upon him. Not as it would have done if he had been a steady sort, and it was not as apparent to others as it seemed to me. When he began to think of the possibility of your seeing him "Then he did think of the possibility?" "He did.. He talked it over with me several times." , . " He wanted me? said the little woman, eagerly. . _. , "He always wanted vou, said Dick. Then, Mr, Vincent, since my. husband is now on the high road to wealth, there is no reason why I shouldu t sell up my things here and go but to California' to join him. I can easily raise the money for the cost of our journey." ■, " , _ v..i „ -i "So far as that goes, Mrs. Meredith, said Dick," there's 110 need for yon to think twice about the money. I told you that Roger . and I had a sum of ten thousand pounds to divide between us. His. half he paid over into a bank for transmission to England in my name ; I have come over here empowered to' hand it to you—that is to say if I found you under circumstances in which I could; if you were not married again." "Roger—my husband sent me five thou- . sand pounds?" . % . "He sent you five thousand pounds. I've < not . got the . papers jon me, because I don't think it quite safe to carry them about with me but I can pay it over into yourinto any bank you like, in a few hours." " I shall certainly go out to—what is, the place allied?'"

"It is called Santa Clara," • "Santa Clara? My .name is Clara," she said. . " Yes. it was called so after you." " I shall certainly go out," said Mrs. Meredith. "Oh, my dear sir," she burst out, "'how am I ever to thank you for the trouble you have taken in finding me out, in coming so delicately to break the news of my great joy? Do you think—you have been so guoii, I can safely ask you a question.' I wouldn't put to many others you think I shall find myself welcome at Santa. Clara . ' . "

" Meredith lived on the hope of your coming out to him," said Dick. Again lie spoke in the past tense again Mrs. Meredith failed to note the fact. By this time Dick bgan to feel himself in desperate straits. Here was this little woman, and a right pretty little woman she was, too, ready for any scheme which would result- in taking her back to the man who had basely—no, not 'basely, but deliberately deserted her.

Dick Vincent had not had a very wide experience of women, but he was quite certain that if his own father had abandoned his mother to fifteen years of absolute,, silence, and had shown himself at the end of that time, his mother would have had none of him. He felt that he might say the same of either of his sisters. This little woman seemed to feel nothing except that she was at one end of the journey and Roger was at the other; that the sooner she could make the two ends meet the better. He had to break it to her somehow or other ; that it was no use her going out to Santa Clara, that the money had come too late, that there was no Meredith at the other end of the journey. My daughter," Mrs-. Meredith said, breaking in upon his thoughts—" I have a daughter, you know ; she is eighteen— ly nineteen, in fact; she will be in presently. I. am perfectly certain that; she will be as eager as I am to go out and begin an entirely new life in a new country. . We have been very happy here ; I think we have the respect of everybody in Gatehouses. We visit at the vicarage ; we are quite, in •a* modest way, in society ; but when you have only about three pounds a week, and you have to keep up a, decent appearance on that, it is very poor fun being in a. kind of society. It's a narrow —a pinching life. I don't say that we haven't been happy together, because my girl is everything that the most exacting mother, could desire; good as gold, and unselfish to a degree. She doesn't remember her father; she will be so glad to find —almost, I think, as glad as I am." Mrs. Meredith.'' said Dick, " I haven't quite told you everything." " But you have told me enough." she .rejoined, " more than enough to make me eager and anxious to go out and sec my husband in his own home, in the home that lie has put together, he and you. with years of hard, almost unrewarded toil."

You 'wouldn't like it," said Dick. "Santa Clara' is no place for a lady." His conscience smote him as the words passed his lips, for he remembered now persistently he had buoyed up Roger Meredith with his pictures of the difference that a lady would make to Santa Clara.

" Oh, I should like it, she exclaimed. "So would my girl. You mustn't misunderstand my life here, we are not like two women who have lived in the la pof luxury. And by all accounts Roger will have plenty of money now from this oil well of yours, so that the place, even if it- is rather rough, can be improved and made more like a home. I am not a useless, fine lady, Mr. Vincent. I can do anything. I can cook, I can carpenter, I can house-paint, I can do anything." "I didn't quite mean that," said Dick. " There's money enough and to spare now, but. you think it's a wild, free, happy, joyous, devil-may-care sort, of life out there. It isn't. It's very sordid ; it's hard work all the time ; even at the best—even with an oil well. There's nothing romantic about California ; it's the grave of all hopes !"

CHAPTER XII. As Dick uttered the words " It's Ihe grave of all hopes" Mrs- Meredith looked at him fixedly. "The. grave of all hopes she repeated. "Why, what' do you mean? I don't say that some of my hopes have not been buried there these fifteen years, it wouldn't be true if I did ; but they are not all buried, Mr. Vinccnt. Roger is there ; Roger has ' struck ile:' Roger has sent home a fortune. Don't say that it's the grave of all hopes." "I do say it," said Dick. " I know that we shan't want money in the future, whatever else we may want." " You are keeping something back from me. Isyou don't want me to take this journey?" " I don't!" he said, candidly. " Why not? Didn't you tell me Roger wanted me?" "I did." " Mr. Vincent, did he come with you, after all? Is he in England? Is he in--Elankhampton ? . Is he in that cab that is waiting at the door?" "No, Mrs. Meredith, Roger is not in England. Roger is not in California." " What do you mean?" "I don't quite know how to tell you," he said, very gravely. "To tell me? What? Not that Roger is dead .

"I am afraid I can't tell you anything else." ,

"Dead!"' She repeated the word like one stunned. "After all these years to find him only to lose him again in the same moment. Oh. oh, how hard life is! When did he die? Tell me about it. Don't leave out a single detail; tell me everything."

" Well, I'll begin at the beginning. As I told you, Roger was most anxious that I should trace you out; that I should find you, alive or dead. If alive, that I should pay you over the five thousand pounds of which I told you. I have told you that on his part he cared as much as he had ever done, but that a sense of shame held linn back from coming to seek you out himself. He loved you all these years, but was not. sure that he would find a welcome now. I assured him to the contrary"

" Oh, you good fellow!" she cried, stretching out her hand. - Dick took the hand and held it within his own. "I assured him. One look at your face was enough when he showed me that portrait of you. I knew that you wouldn't have changed ; you are not the kind of woman that ever changes. I couldn't convince him ; I couldn't persuade him to come home and stay with my people while I made inquiries. And at last I came without him. He saw me part of the way down; he was very moody, very unlike himself from the time that we left Santa Clara. I thought that he was upset with the anxiety ' ox not knowing whether you would bo the same or —and I believe that I was right. " But when he got down to Freeman's Rock he began drinking. I did everything I could to stop it; I offered to go back, but no, he came on with me to Midas Creek. HeOh, Mrs. Meredith, I did everything I could. I took the landlord into my confidence ; I coaxed and threatened and persuaded ; I did everything possible. It was useless. For two years lie hadn't touched anything ; he had been living entirely on the square. It might have been the excitement fit might have been the temptation; anyway, one evening when I was down at the store getting something, he went off his head, He--drew his revolver on—those that' tried, to restrain him, and in the scrimmage that followed he was shot-dertd." ... ;

" And he is dead!"

" Mrs. Meredith, lie is dead. Youyou —I—words cannot express what X feel in having to come and tell you this. I don't know how to break it to you ; I. daresay I have bungled it; we men are such fools.''

"No, you have been everything that is good and kind."

"I have tried to be," said Dick, "and I have succeeded none too well. It's true that I told Roger himself that if you'd only come out to Santa Claraand I felt that I should find you just the same and that I could easily" persuade you to come back with me that' vou would be the making of the place, that you would be the making of him and me, that it would be a home, that it would bo a totally '.different place. But now— don't - you understand? Santa Clara is no placo for you. It would be like going to find th£ husk when the kernel had been taken out of it." :

Ho spoke excitedly. The little woman, whose hand he still held, sat like a creature turned to stone. , «."

"Dead!" she murmured, "my Roger dead! And after all these wasted' years, when we might have begun life over again

been everything to each, other; when the way had been made clear and easy. Oh, it is hard. Oh, how hard! Oh, Mr. Vincent, Mr. Vincent, when a woman loves you, have faith in her; that's the great thing.. He hadn't faith enough ■in me. He thought that I was'like the woman of tradition— a creature who cared only for the loaves and fishes, for the downy cushion, for the way made smooth and clear. Oh, how mistaken ! Didn't lie understand—had lie lived with me for years not to > know . how cheerfully I would have baked his bread and cooked his meat- how I would have toiled to make the bare iron hut pretty, how I would have coaxed the flowers to grow, and kept bird*, and loved the dogs and the horses and everything that had life in it? >■ <0, he never knew me- You knew me better than he did. And yet—ho cared."

"Oh. he cared." said Dick, "there's no] doubt about; that; from firstto last you J need never doubt that he cared. I think . that he cared so much that he was afraid—*! his very love made him afraid; it seemed i too great a thing to him that you should! ever consent to go half across the world to . find him." . . i

The widow looked at- him with tearless eyes, staring out of her while face. "I would have gone ten times round the world. I would have gone through fire and water, to find my husband at the end of the journey."

For a moment Dick could not speak. He pressed the hand that he still held within his own, then set it free, and getting up from his chair strode to the . window, where ha stood; looking out ; over the wide village street, at the shabby cab, the sleepy 'coachman. and still sleepier horse, which was awaiting him at the door.

At last he turned round. _ "Mrs. Meredith." he said; ''after all, isn't it much better that yon should know that all the time poor old" Roger was thinking about you, that he had never forgotten you, that you had never been supplanted in his heart by anyone? It's hard to find out only when he is dead, but still, it's better than not knowing, isn't it';"

" Yes, it's better than not knowing." "Oh, yes. And, of course,'' he went on, " you needn't live such a narrow life .'now, because the half of Santa Clara. is yours, and there will be plenty of money for all of lis as time goes on. You can go away from this, you can travel where you" will ; everything will be quite different to you how." j i. ' ■.. . *;. ' - :■ "

" I suppose so." She looked round the pretty little room in a scared kind of way. "I wish,"' she said, "J. almost wish that Roger had not sent to me."

Oh, but certainty is better than uncertainty any day."

" Not when the certainty means the "end of all your hopes. Oil. Mr. Vincent, you were right when you 'spoke : of California as being the grave of all hopes. It has proved itself the grave of mine. Oh, think of the wives who go on living year after year, tied to men that thev have never cared for, men who have ceased to care for them ; think of the husbands and wives, fettered to each other like prisoners chained to a log, while we, who only wanted each other, were kept apart, by circumstances—Fate. Oh, it's cruel—cruel! And then, when we might be together, and as happy as ever we had been, to find all one's hopes dashed to the ground ; to find the cup of joy held to one's lips, and dashed away before one could taste the draught it contained. 01), how luui life is!"

She broke down and began to sob, -with tears that wrung Dick Vincent's heart, with sobs that penetrated his very soul. And then she stretched out; her poor trembling little hand and laid it upon his—the hand tli-fc had brought Roger Meredith's life to a close. '! . "

For a few minutes the little widow sobbed unrestrainedly on, and Dick sat there watching her with fascinated gaze yet perfectly powerless to say or do anything which would be a comfort to her. Then she sat upright again and began to dab at her eyes fiercely with her handkerchief, which she hiui made into a bail.

"I mustn't let Cynthia find me crying when she comes in." she explained. '" No, I mustn't let her find me crying. Cynthia is such a good girl, and she is always tired when she comes in at tea-time. Won't you send that cab away until she comes? ' Won't you stop and have tea with us? It'swhat is the time?" " It's nearly four," said he.

" She will be home in a few minutes then. She comes immediately the school closes. . It closes at four. I should like you to see her. It won't be such a blow to her as it has been to me, because she has never really known her father. But you will stop, won't you?" • '

"Oh, yes, certainly J will stay. But don't you think, Sirs. Meicdith, that if I stay and have a cup cf tea with you, you had better come back into the town with me and have some dinner at my hotel?''

* "I cannot go out merry-making," she said, shrinking back. *

"Oh, it wouldn't be merry-making. And whatever one's griefs, one. must eat-. I have photographs, of a sort, of Santa Clara; you would like to see them. The change would be good for you. At all events, I'll keep mv old cabman, in case you want to."go into Blankhampton later on. I'll tell you what I'll do; I'll tell him to put up for an hour." .

As soon as said carried into effect. Dick Vincent went out and told the old cabman that he was to go to the inn and get himself a, drink, and"a feed, if necessary, for the horse. *

" Come back at five o'clock,"' he said. "Come back here. Here's the money for you. At five. Don't be much later." " All right, sir," said the old driver. "I'll give my horse a bit of feed, and, since your honour is so generous, I'll take a bit of a snack mvself."

Then Vincent turned and went back into the house again. As he entered the sittingroom something, reminded him of the newspaper which he hud in his breast pocket.

You will perhaps like to see this, Mrs. Meredith," he said, taking out and folding it so as to show the account of Meredith's death. "It's the paper that had the account of poor Meredith's end. • I thought you would like to see it."

"Oh, yes, let me see it." She read it eagerly. "Oh, what a verdict! How strange! What curious creatures men are when they get on a jury. And they called a death which was brought about by drink the ' Visitation: of God!' Mr. Vincent, somehow I can't think of Roger like that. I have seen iiim a little merry, you know, just a little, when he had a little too much, but I never saw him ■ drunk, never. By this account he could not have known what he was doing; he must have been delirious."

" And so he wasdelirious. He was mad for the moment— was out of his mind for the time." : : - 1

"He must have been. It's dreadful to think of him like that. Do you think, if I had gone out there, that I should have kept him straight?"

" For a time," said Dick. "Anybody who devoted herself to him would and 'could for a time keep him straight. I did us long as 1 was with him, as long as I watched him, as long as I kept a tight hand over him. So you would have done. But there is a fate in these matters, Mrs. Meredith. I believe myself that Roger's hour was come ; that it had to be; and it was "the fore-shadowing of the end : that ;made him so strange and so unlike himself from the moment that we turned our backs upon Santa Clara."

The little woman was restless and excited. She wandered about the room, put imaginary untidiness into order, went several times to the window, and finally, murmuring something about seeing after tea, departed, and left him alone.

That to Dick was worse than if . she had remained sobbing and crying; because alone it suddenly occurred to him that- if Meredith's widow had.accepted his story without question, had indeed put no questions to him beyond the all-important one to her of the state of Meredith's heart so far as she was concerned, her daughter might prove to be a young woman of a very different calibre. : i What if she were to cross-question him as to the last details of her father's .; life and the circumstances ,of his death! What if she were to put certain point-blank queries to him concerning that fatal , scrimmage? How could he answer? What could he say? " Would the girl never come ? The i 'lurch clock-—he could hear it, although ue coul-'i not see the churchstruck the quarter after the hour. She was never so late as" this. Stay! what was that? A step—a lifting of tike ' doorlatch —and Roger - Meredith's daughter stood before him. I

CTo be continued.)