THE MAN FROM THE WEST.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19626, 3 May 1927, Page 16

THE MAN FROM THE WEST.

BY EFFIE ADELAIDE ROWLANDS.

CHAPTER IX.— (Continued). When the coffee came and the poached eggs and toast, Collingford insisted upon Patricia making a good meal. " Seems like," he said. " I've only just got up from a very big lunch. My, .wouldn't the boys stare if they saw the kind of food I'm eating these days." " I am so glad you had a good lunch," Said Patricia. "I worried about you: I thought you'd be so upset you probably wouldn't get anything io eat." " Aren't you a dear ?" said Collingford. " Why, honey," he added quaintly, " it takes a lot to disturb a man's appetite, 'cept toothache. That's pretty bad. The Chink what cooks for our little lot, he always says it's nothing but toothache that puts a mar* off his food." " I don't know about toothache, thank goodness," said Patricia, " but I have had heartache all day." " Yes, }>ul you're not going to have hea/tache any more, see, sister?" said the young man with decision in his voice. And then he began to question her. " How old are you, Patsy ? Seventeen! My, that's a young thing, ain't it ? I'm twenty-two, you know. Well, very nearly that way; that means I'm a lot older than you. And there's heaps of things you've gotten to know before you come up to me. Seventeen," he repeated. " and had heartache till day! My, but that's mighty bad." His next question brought the colour lushing into Patricia's face. " Seventeen," he said, " and you was all set and ready to come forward to help your father, just anyways he wanted! That was fine! That was sweet of you, Patsy." "Was it?" queried the girl unsteadily. " Well, I don't know, but what I do know is I've always loved daddy. I've always fe!t like mother, that he wanted to • be taken care of, and. so I wanted to take care of him to-day." " And you was ready," said Collingford, ignorant that he was being very ungrammatical, " to step into your sister's shoes and take me on as a husband ?"

Patricia's voice was very small as she jeplied to this. "" I didn't stop to think very much about . . . about that," sho said. " I only wanted to do all I could to make things fcetter." He repeated this sentence: " To make things better. For your dad, for me ?" Patricia's voice was still small as she answered this. " Why, I'm afraid I ... I didn't think i*ery much about you." " Now that's what I call going through clear and straight. No, of course you didn't," he added. "Why should you? I'm nothing to you, am 1, Patsy V He was looking at the girl so intently, that she unconsciously drew back from him and he saw that the colour rushed once again into her pale cheeks. But apart from the fact that she was fearless when sho spoke the truth, there •was something mingling in Patricia's thoughts, Something moving in her heart, something new and strange that had never come into her feelings before. And all this was in her face as she answered him.

."I . . . I don't know yon very well, but I do care what happens to you. I care ;yery much!" His hand, big and strong, and sunburnt, itlosed over her little white one.

" Why, honey," he said, " that's about the only thing I care to listen to. You just go on caring a little bit about me. I'm that lonely, Patsy! I'm that lonely 1 guess I don't know what I'll do with myself right ahead. If so be it you were not the child you are, why I might be almost tempted to do what you proposed to do and let you come into my life, just to belong to me, to be my very own. But we're talking a lot of nonsense, I guess," he added a little abruptly.

And then he put another question rather sharply: " Are you just only seventeen ? or is it Seventeen and a bit?"

At this Patricia laughed. " Why, I shall be eighteen in March—that's next month."

"Eighteen! It's going on, you know. Tou are catching up to me. liave some more coffee."

A little silence fell upon them, and then 'Patricia spoke: " You said you would be s lonely, Kid. It hurts to be loneiy. I have not been able to get you out of my thoughts all day. If only mother were not so ill! Oh, I know she would fret about you so mueli, She liked you awfully, Kid. She told me .so herself. And, oh, you don't know how dreadful it hurt her when she knew that .Cathleen . had run away." " Why, see here, Patsy!" the young man said slowly, after a little pause, •" I'm beginning to think it was about the finest thing that could have come along—l mean lor me. Because I've been living in a dream since I came to this London town, and in my dream I got my Jiiind all mussed up with all sorts of queer things, mighty queer." He laughed. <•" Why, I was that foolish I kind of dreamed I was like some prince in a fairy story and that your sister was a lovely princess! She's very beautiful, Patsy. And I am real sorry I was butted into her life in the way I was. She must have a pretty raw opinion of me, I guess." " But then you see," said Patsy very eagerly, " she never knew you. If she had known you—" And then the girl broke off. " Cathleen does not count really, Kid. Do please try to grasp that," she said quietly when she spoke. ''Nothing counts except yourself: and you are so big. Oh, I don't mean so tail, I mean you have such a great big heart, and you're so kind, so generous Why I know that life is going to very good to you. I prophesy that. It couldn't be otherwise! "

" Well, it'll be good to me, Patsy," said Kenneth Collingford, as he signalled to the waitress and had the bill made cut, "if so bo as you're somewhere running round in my life. I just can't go without you." " That's- being silly," said Patricia, >'ith a touch of roguishness. "Is it ? Well then I've gotten to be eillv. How would you like to come right away with me, Patsv? Back across the ocean, right out to that wild part of the yorld where I live." She answered him promptly. " I'd love it if it were not for mother. I couldn't go away arid leave munimie." Why, that's true enough," he said. *' Now 1 guess I'd better drive you back to your home. Don't want to one little bit. No, ma'am, but I just fancy you'd best be on the road and I'll take you back." Ho slipped a substantial tip under the plate, and as they walked out of the ten shop and the waitress picked up the plate and saw the tip. she called to one cf her companions. " Now that's the sort of guy I like to meet," she said. The other shrugged her shoulders. . " He's a little hit too lug for my taste. Whv. he's a giant! " " Maybe he is a giant." said the ■waitress, "but lie knows how to treat! She's pretty, too, but such a little bit ©f a thing." " Oh. she ain't- so little. She's young: most, probably she'll grow. She * won't catch up to him of course, for he's an outsize, he is. Well, you've had your bit of chance to-night, Flo. 'Tain't likely t<> come to my direction in a hurry." Kenneth Collingford did not drive Patricia right up to the door of her home, he stopped the cab a littie way off, and as lie found that she preferred to walk that short distance, lie helped her out of the cab, and then they said Good-bye." " I'll just ■ stand around." the young man said, " and see you get there safely.' He held her hand, and drew her hack as she was about to move away. " I want to thank you, Patsy." he paid " I'm afraid I'm an ornery sort of cuss, but I'll learn me to get a little bit better, more like your world, and then &avbe I'll be able to let you know just

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how much I'd admire to have you as a friend."

"Good-bye," said Patricia. "I'll always be your friend, Kid, if I am worth having."

" And see here! " the vourig man went on, still clinging to her hand. "You know where I'm to be found. You'll promise me to let me come in on anything if I can be of any use ? And you're not to think any more about me and your father. I guess we'll fix it right, me and him, and no one will be hurt."

With that he loosened his grip and Pafsv left him.

She did not run,, but she walked very briskly, and when she reached her home, she turned round and waved her hand. It gave her an extraordinary sense of pleasure to see him standing there so tall, and to know that ho was so reliable ; someone to whom she felt instinctively she could turn and never turn in vain.

At this period of her existence, young as she was, Patricia grasped what a comfort, what a practical consolation such a friendship as his was could prove to be. And then she stood on the step and rang the bell. And as she stood there, the doctor's car stopped at the edge of the pavement and its owner got out. As he saw the girl, Dr. Canton frowned slightly. "Hallo. Patsy!" he said. .Where have you been ? It's a little late for von. my dear, isn't it ? " " I had an errand to do." the girl answered him. And then she spoke of her mother. " Have you been sent for, Dr. Ganton ? "

The doctor shook his head. " No, I promised your old nurse I would come back again this evening." But with her hypersensitiveness, Patricia caught at the sound in his voice. " Oh, Dr. Ganton," she said, " please* please, don't keep things from me. Just let me know if mummy is really ill." The door opened at that moment, and they passed in together. By so doing Patricia evaded any curious questions from Brooks, who no doubt jumped to the conclusion that the girl had gone to fetch the medical man.

Just before he went upstairs, Patricia drew Dr. Ganton into the dining room. " Tell me truly, are you anxious about mummy He looked at the girl, and he answered her curtly. " Yes, Patsy," he said. " I am anxious. She had another very bad heart attack late .this afternoon. I was not able to get here just when Nannie rang up, but I came as soon as I could, and I have come back because I am going to bring in a specialist this evening. I am not satisfied. Now," he added quickly, as the girl sat down and covered her face with her hands, " I want you to be of some use to me, not give way and go to pieces. I've got a good deal of faith in you, Patsy. I know you can stand up to tilings. Well, my dear, this is going to be a test for you, because you've got to look after your father and above all you have to consider your mother." With that, he turned on his heel and went out of the room. , And despite the anguish which crowded On her heart, Patricia, only pausing just •a moment or two, followed him up the stairs ready and eager to do anything in her power to give help in the darkest hour which had come as yet into her young life. CHAPTER X. True to her determination to clinch matters as-quickly as possible with this newfound relative, instead of ringing him up, Miss Westover called at the hotel in the course of the next morning and left a little note.

" Dear Cousin Kenneth," it ran. VAs I gather that you liave not many acquaintances in town, I have come to offer you myself as a companion for this afternoon. Of course you are going to dine with us to-night, but it must be rather dreary for you being alone so much. I wonder? Would you like to go to a matinee ? If so, please get them at the office to ring up for any show which you would care to see, and also ask them to ring me up and I'll come round for you in the car. It is so nice to feel that we have met you. Father was very devoted to your father, and that ought to make a great bond between us." At the bottom of her note she added: "I am going to leave this letter myself, and if you are in, perhaps you will come and speak to me." She waited, therefore, in the car, and when the porter brought her the information that Mr. Collingford was not in the hotel, Miss Westover frowned. She felt all on wires to be able to get hold of this young man and control him. He was much too good-looking, and had far too much money to be allowed to wander about in an unrestrained way. However, there was nothing for her to do but to drive about, do some little bits of shopping and then make her way home, there l-o sit and plan out a future which was to lift her out of her present life of debt and difficulties. She lunched alone. Her father, she surmised. had gone to the city to see if he could raise some money in some way.

And Evelyn smoked cigarette -after cigarette waiting for the telephone bell to ring. As nothing happened, she got on to the hotel herself and asked to be put on to Mr. Collingford. She was then givtn the information that Mr. Collingford was not in his room, and, as far as the office knew, he had not returned for luncheon. This meant, of course, that he had not received her letter, and therefore the idea of spending the afternoon in a theatre was out of the "uestion. Opposition to such a nature as Evehjn Westover's was quite sufficient to whip up her every energy her woman's wit; arming her to combat any and every difficulty which should present itself iii the pathway of her ambition. In a bad temper, furious with her father and herself and her fate, she went out and sat sullenly enough in a cinema, scarcely realising what the picture was at which she looked, so intent was she on planning out a line of action. And all this time, utterly ignorant of lU i fact that there should" be anybodv anxious to get in touch with him,' Kenneth Collingford had spent some real hcrrs of trouble and of anxiety. Late the night before, Patricia had rung him up on the telephone. She had given him the news in a broken voice that her mother was very, very ill, and that her father was quite prostrate. She told him that a specialist had been to see her mother and, that another doctor had also been called in, and that everything that medical science could do was being done. She promised she would ring him up the next morning and she kept her promise. But she had no good news to give him. And all his sympathy went out with a rush to the girl whose courage and spirit, were , being crushed by the suffering which he knew she was enduring. He walked about for a little while, and then his eagerness to be of some use, to stand by this girl in reality and perhaps to shoulder some of the burdens of the moment, pushed aside all the thoughts and feelings which had combined to keep him awav from the Lerrington home the day before. As soon as possible after his breakfast, therefore, he left the hotel and drove to make personal inquiries for Mrs. Lerrington. Brooks admitted, him: her manner was very subdued. She told him that she thought the news from the sickroom was just the same. But I'il send Miss Smithson to von, sir.;' she said. And then she added: on know Miss Cathleen's gone away?" And he nodded his bead, and said quietly: " Yes, I know." (To bo ton tinned daily.)