THE INTERIOR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16300, 5 August 1916, Page 3 (Supplement)

THE INTERIOR.

BY LINDSAY RUSSELL, Author of "Smouldering Fires."' "'Straws on the Wind. " " The Years of Foreettmz." "Souls in Pawn." "Kathleen Marourneen." " Sands o' the Desert." " The Eternal = Triangle." etc.. etc. 5

j I I (COPYRIGHT.) 1 ; J j < HAPTER X.-(Continued. ,!■ You've left all the decorations until I the last, so you'd better get up," insisted • Jane. She gazed in the direction of the stores. 'There's a golden ton or more • of early wattleblossom that some of your . admirers have pjovided for you, "and . plenty of scarlet .sorrel-creeper." She brought in the tea-trav with its ; steaming burden and its spotless white i cloth, and drew up the blinds in both I. rooms, allowing the morning sunlight to , flood in. j "Its going to be fine weather, anvt; way,'. Gwendoline remarked. She sat, iip in bed. and lifting the lace curtain aside, looked out. The sea and the slope of the I pine ridge were plainly visible. i Jane looked out, too. A white tent I showed plainly against the dark pines. , ; The blue smoke curled lazilv up from a ! camp fire in front of it. A man's figure I showed against the whiteness of the tent tor a moment. i " 1 can't think what has come over Mr. \\arde," said Gwendoline crosslv. '• He hasn't been here for several days. I've never seen him near his tent as*l passed that way." ! Jane had returned to the tinv table that stood by the bed. She was bending over the tea-tray, her face turned from ; Gwendoline. j " 1 heard someone in the - post office say that Mr. Warde has been to Broome for a day or two. He must ha\e returned I last night."' i "" Whatever did he want to go to Broome for? " Gwendoline was "in a rather irritable mood. She grumbled at the tea, and complained that the bread and butter was too thick. Her yellow hair was confined in many pins. Later it would blossom out into" curls and the soft fluftiness about her face that was considered the latest and most fascinatiing thing in the circles of the south. She did not look half so pretty in the early morning light. The tight curling pins and the peevish, discontented expression on her face robbed her momentarily of all her pretensions to beauty. ! "To see about a lugger that was for sale. He intends to be his own master jin the coming season." Gwen shrugged her shoulders. ".Most ridiculous for Lionel Warde." she said crossly. " And without any need. I'm quite sure his relations and "friends have no idea that he has been doing the work of a common labourer. Some quixotic idea, I suppose." .lane said nothing. He had said nothing to Owen or Mrs. Dunkley then about the reasons that had brought him to Nyasha. A little thrill of gladness ran through her veins. At the door she turned and looked back at Gwendoline, hesitating. "Is Mr. Warde coming to help you ■with the decorations? " The younger girl looked at her sharply. A momentary and unwilling admiration j came into her eyes. Jane, framed in the doorway in the broad band of light that came through the window, looked very j fresh and sweet in her faded violet frock. Her hair was brushed back from the forehead, and hung in one long plait below her waist, tied with a prim bow. She j looked very young. "Of course," Gwendoline turned her I face away. She frowned. "If he has ! forgotten his promise 1 shall send a note ! down by one of the natives. Jane, why I do you wear your hair in that ridiculous ! plait? " ' "It is neater and much less trouble i when I'm working," replied Jane honestly. " It's so soft that when I wear it in the usual way it continually turn- ' bles down when I am busy or gets" in my eyes." * * I She brushed away now the little curling | strands that no amount of brushing i would straighten or keep primly in place, I Those tendrils of Jane's red-brown hair ' always danced rebellioiisly about her face : and ears. i "' Mind you see that the catering is all i right." the younger girl reminded her. ) She sipped her tea and daintily helped ' herself to bread and butter. j I *'" I'm going to beirin the baking as soon i las breakfast is over. For 20 couples I I think you said. Owen? There are surely ! more than 20 white girls in Nyasha." She i t waited, a little troubled. "Why could!; you not have asked them all. dear? Some . of them will be very hurt."' is Gwendoline shrugged her shoulders, ' i " Why trouble as to what their feelings ! j in the matter are? I can't ask every- J body." * I - Jane considered the matter doubtfully. I < "The sugar store is quite big enough for 80 couples." j "Is it your ball or mine. Jane?" the ( girl interrupted her angrily. "How you j ) do spoil everything. It is my ball, and ' therefore I am just asking whom I like." i " I wish you had included Talumeni." ] "A half-caste! Gwendoline's eye- j brows went out. " Really, Jane, you have the most common and vulgar ideas.", il " Nearly everybody here asks Tain- i i meni," persisted Jane stubbornly. "Meaning by everybody, Jane Dunk-| ' ley and C 0.," retorted Gwendoline bit- i terly. "I wouldn't be a bit surprised if j , you went to these people and begged , I them to include Talumeni." Jane flushed. She drew herself up. ! " Do go away. Jane," a voice from the ! adjoining room begged fretfully. " Why i I will you persist in trying to make a quarrel, and upsetting Gwendoline's day for I her? " j Jane vanished. Argument, she knew i by old experience, was useless. j An hour or two later when a knock ! sounded at the hall door. Jane, kneeling i in front of the kitchen range, was insert- j ing the tray containing the third batch , of pastry. She flushed as she shut-to the oven . door, and rose hurriedly, taking off her i apron with fingers that trembled a little, i She felt a strange tremour seize her at I. that familiar knock that of late had been ; absent. | , Gwendoline, however, opened the door j [ at the first sound. Jane heard her voice, j, " I happened to be looking out of the j' window and saw, you coming down the j ' road. Where have you been, naughty j 1 bov ? It is ages since you have been : ' here." j. Then deeper notes responding. To Jane, j standing in her kitchen her heart fasti 1 beating, his voice sounded —some ' of the laughing raillery seemed to have U gone out of it. The door of the drawing- < room shut. ' Jane, standing in the kitchen, had a ! strange feeling that it shut her out alto- < ' gether. " But he will come here before j I he goes." she said. She tip-toed into a ] room near and surveyed herself with a i new anxiety in the mirror, wiping the flour ! < off her face and hair. The long-lashed i; grev eyes in the mirror met hers with a 1 ' dawning understanding and grave sweetness. They regarded her very seriouslv. Then the wide mouth trembled into "a smile and all at once the eyes danced and ' . laughed back at her. The colour glowed ! , like fire in her cheeks. She sang softly [■ to herself as she bustled about in the! long low kitchen, with its smoke-blackened i roof and rafters, and its shining lids and pans gleaming in the leaping' firelight. , Outside, on the green grass where the dew diamonds still lingered and glistened, the sunlight drifted in quivering laths, and changing shadow patterns. The cows lowed softly knee deep in pasture. Under the trees and in the fields far beyond, flocks of sheep browsed. Their intermit- !• tent bleatings of content came faintly I back to Jane, the new-born lambs, as j small as white blots, bleating after the | ewes, and darting unsteadily here and j there on their weak legs. Jane's heart j went out to all these homely things with a rush of tenderness. There was the sound of the drawingroom door opening ?nd of Mr.--. Dunkley's voice, and then of Gwendoline's. j "We will go straight over to the hall now." She had dignified the store by | that title. Jane smiled. It was so like , Gwen. "It is all cleaned and scrubbed. i The. natives did it a couple of days ago, so that it is quite dry, and ready for i preparing."

Mrs Dunkley said something about the decorative effect of the yellow wattle and the scarlet sorrel creeper. Warde an, swered something that Jane could not fe'stllies! I ° UOWmS laUfih at one « tjwen k sallies. His footsteps sounded on the polished ° f , th^. ,w]L Wa *- he coming* to the k.tchen? J The colour flooded Jane's face. She stood - quite still, obsessed with a sudden desire to run away, yet unable to The footsteps paused. Lionel Ward* went to the rack and took down his ooat. Owen had > flung ", lde the door. Her light laugh floated back to Jane. The three went out of the door together. An air of merriment hovered over the threshold. Then the door closed. Jane stood quite still for a. moment. owl Un? \ 'u faillt uzzled lot crept i Z V Ih f e - VvS For the fir* l time since he had entered the home of the Dunkleys Lionel Ward * had ignored Jane, had not even called out to her as ne went. Jane went on with her work. There was not only the baking to be done. When the second Mrs. Dunkley and the family were at home the duties seemed to be unending. The old servant and the younger acted as useful help, hut were quite unable to cope with it. Jane's broad shoulders took uncomplainingly on the burden. & J Jane worked feverishly that morning. Outside from the direction of the sugar store she heard laughter often and the ! sound of hammering. Several girlish ath aPPeared and disappeared along the path. - * In the kitchen the heat of the range hltr\l ; , ° rder Calne from the dance hall that lunch was to be prepared and sent there. Two native water earners squatted in the sunshine outside and chatted, waiting till the lunch baskets were ready. At last, hot and rather wearv. Jane saw them trudging down the path, old Llgar following with the coffee and china. .. If?? 1 * came back with a message. 'The ruissee Gwendoline asked that' missee Jane would press out the evening dress that missee Gwendoline had left on the couch in her room." Jane said wearily, "Very well Elgar " She seemed too tired to laugh to-dav at fclgars quaint delivery. She put the pressing irons on the firs and went in search of the frock, Owen had several pretty gowns. Three or more of different colours lay on the couch. Jane turned them over and derided in view of her step-sister s changeableness, to press them all. So while the bright day died awav Jane added her humble quo to the success of the dance. When she had finished pressing the dainty silk gowns, she hunted from a cupboard in her own room something that might do for the occasion-. lnere did not seem to be anything that would do at all. At four o'clock Jane prepared and sent over afternoon tea. A few moments afterwards she went out into the garden and lound her way to a seat. She leant against the trunk of a tree, round which the circular garden seat was built, and closed her eyes woarilv. There Lionel Ward-, who had insisted on being the bearer of an urgent message for hot water, found Jane. He had been into tl>e kitchen and found it deserted. Ihe long table was piled with mounds of cakes and eatables and covered with a. white cloth. The floor was freshly scrubbed still damp. It looked as if someone had been working indeed. I hrough the window he caught sight of Jane wealing her apron, her sleeves rolled up. her eyes still closed, and a line of pain between her brows. He came noiselessly across the long lush grass Standing in front of her. his hands clasped behind him. his eyes searched her face thoughtfully. "Jane ! " he said. With a sty it she opened her eves. "' Are you tired, Jane," he asked gently. "o r are you dreaming? " The long lashes showed blackly against Jane's cheeks as she answered. Her | voice was a little strained. " I think |it is a little, of both." j Her eyes were very tender as he looked jat her, then suddenly a shadow as if of j some remembrance came into them. His mouth set in a grim line. She looked up at him slowly. A faint puzzled wonder came into " the grave | sweetness of her grey eves. ' I He had changed in some way. How and why she could not put into words. It seemed that new lines, hard lines, had rome into his face, about his eyes, and his mouth had an unhappy look". " Did you come hack for anything? The old smile, a little tremulous, came back to Jano's face and swept away the tiredness. "" For hot water." ],<? said. He had an impulse then that might have changed the course of his life, have saved many a black and bitter day for himself and lane Dunkley— impulse to throw himself on her merry, to kneel at her feet »nd say quite honestly, with all his soul ;n his words : " I came back for you, Jane, I cams demise I could stay' away no longer. I • mid not bear to think of you working, slaving in the kitchen." But Gwen had carelessly informed him lhat Jane had refused to come. She preferred to stay in th<? house. Resides, on Thursdays, as a rule, Gwen had added with a significant smile, the red giant rode out of the east and down to Nyasha, in all the glory of his Sunday best" So all he said, while the hunger of his heart fought against the growing recklessness and bitterness in his eyes, was : "We had not enough hot water, Miss Dunkley? " Jane rose promptly. Her face looked tired, her eyes a little dazed as if the sun shone in them. She felt as if a strange chill wind had blown from hitherto unknown ways into her world, and had set the little half-built house in the shifting sands of dreams toppling. CHAPTER XI. Above the, murmur of the sea and the wind on the trees came the swinging lilt of music and the beat 'of the dancers" feet. As yet there were none of the luxuries of the south, such as string bands and orchestras. The folk of Nyasha were limited to the old, white-haired fiddler, or a lad merrily playing a concertina, and were quite content as long a3 they kept perfect time. So the piano-players of the gathering took it in turns to preside on the platform, where branches of eucalyptus and the glory of yellow and scarlet "sorrel hid the weather-blistered wood of the ancient, piano, that had been dag out of the dim recesses of the council hall. The piano, in its bower of greenery, held place of honour in the centre of the raised platform. On either side towards the footlights, provided by six oil lamps set in a row and punctuated with tins of scarlet sorrel, sat the old fiddler and the concertina player. Sometimes a genius with a mouth-organ chimed in, or took the place of the latter, while he danced. The dance began with a few preliminary musical skirmishes from the musical trio. The old, white-headed fiddler, his bald head bent, tuned up the yellow violin that was of more sentimental value to him than a Stradivarius. The red-faced, sandy-haired youth drew the concertina out in a long," protesting note, followed by a few blood-curdling quirks ; the proud and perspiring owner ofj the mouth-organ would clamber up on to the platform, knocking over a few unnecessary plants in the < way, and drawing the hack of his hand' across his mouth, and his coat sleeve across the mouthorgan, shakily produced a bar or two. The girls of the district sat on seats around * the hall, arrayed in the gorgeous best that a limited wardrobe provided. What they lacked in the latest creations from Paris they supplied in their contributions to the colour scheme. Joseph in his coat of many colours was not arrayed more gorgeously than these. The men gathered in groups near the door, hanging back avid furtively eyeing the wall seats with their feminine occupants. They wore ordinary walking suits, with the subtle difference, however, of a white shirt and a new black or coloured tie; slipper"; with a bow completed the scheme of decoration. The red giant was M.C. He stood, a large but lonely figure in the polished oasis of floor, and at the first note of the tuning-up process called aloud, in a terrible voice, on *he young men of the community : " Lancers! Select partners." (To be continued cm Wednesday next.)