MRS BALFRAY'S NIECE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1611, 14 January 1903, Page 7

MRS BALFRAY'S NIECE.

51 (By Adeline Sergeant.)

"Nice for you to- have your niece staying with you, Mrs Balfray,” said Frank Lovell, cheerfully. He was quite a young man—not more than flve-and-twenty at most —pale, spare and scarcely robustlookrng, but remarkable for the agility and alertness of his every movement, and for a certain charming vivacity of expression which redeemed his features from the charge of ugliness. His eyes were blue and very kindly; and his smile was so bright and pleasant that it won favour for him wherever he went. Especially was he popular at the White Hart Inn, of which Mrs Balfray was the proprietress. He wa® fond, he averred, of “running down for the fishing,” which was abundant and excellent; and he was even fonder, although he did not avow the fact, of revisiting the old haunts of his boyhood, which were in the immediate vicinity of Mrs Balfray’s modest hostelry.

Eor Frank Lovell’s father had once been master of the great grey mansion which dominated the village of Selsby—a majestic-looking house, with a pillared front, and a terrace spreading out the length of the two wings, with flights of steps leading from it to the goodly* stretch of lawn, pleasance and covert, with which the house was surrounded. Frank’s father maintained his possession of Selsby Hall with great difficulty, for his predecessor had gambled away most of the property; but when he died the place had to be sold, in order to pay off long-accumu-lated debts, and Frank, who won golden opinions from the world because of his readiness to strip himself of every penny rather than not pay his father’s creditors, began life over again with a post in a London bank.

The pay was small, the work tedious, and the friends who had begun by commending him for hi s honesty dropped him one after the other (with few exceptions) when he had to drudge for his daily bread. “Yery lucky for him to get into Crossland's!" they said now and then. “Of course, it is a provision for life, and he is sure to rise/' With which remark they usually dismissed the subject from their minds. Frank's truest recreation, therefore, was found in the hours which -he spent in the country from Saturday to Monday; not always at Selsby, but at some pleasantly wooded and watered spot, where he could obtain real rest and refreshment after the toils of the week. He did not allow himself always to visit Selsby, for he had an idea that it was unwholesome to dwell too much upon the scenes of the past; but he thought that once or twice a month was not too mnch for his own peace of mind. Mrs Balfray gave him her best room, her best meals, and her honest affection, and she made her charges as low as he would allow her to do. So that the White Hart saw a good deaL comparatively speaking, of Mr Frank Lovell. Mrs Balfray—a comely woman of middle age, in a handsome silk dress half covered by a broad white apron—beamed all over her face at her guest's remark. “You may well say so*, sir. Why. the girl's a perfect sunbeam in a house! And she do love to- make herself useful." “Yes, she always seems busy. But where have yon hidden her all these years ? I've never seen her at the White Hart before.”

"Because she wasn’t in England, Mr Frank, that’s why. My poor sister married and went out to Australia before you were born; and there sbe died, and. this is her daughter, come back to the old country and spending a little time with me.” “Going to live with yon always, Mrs Balfray?” Mrs Balfray shook her head. “No, sir; more’s the pity. Her father wants her—and I don’t blame him. Naturally he wants his own daughter, and I’m glad enough that he lets her come to me for a few days, seeing that things are as they are.”

“That’s mysterious,” laughed Frank. "As they are, Mr s Balfray? And how are they ?” Mrs Balfray took up_a corner of her apron, and rubbed the shining mahogany of the parlour table with quite unnecessary energy. "I don’t mean anything in particular. Mr Frank. Of course, Matthew lias a right to do what he likes, and pleased I am to see her back in England, dear lamb. But it’s an anxious matter to have a pretty girl on your hands.” Frank burst out laughing. “I should think it was a very pleasant matter, Mrs Balfray,” he said. And he resolved to look at the niece more particularly than he had hitherto done; for he had only, so far, caught a glimpse of a pair of dark eyes and a hint of a delicate profile half hidden by a white cotton sun-bonnet tilted over the forehead and tied beneath the chin. He had also noticed the pretty feet and ankles beneath her short cotton skirt, and thought that a white bib and apron was rather becoming to a slight figure; but he was not very susceptible to women’s charms, and usually avoided their company. It did not fall in with his plans for the future to think of love and marriage.

But Mi’s Balfray’s niece—that was another matter. There was no reason way he should not look at her, why he should not admire her. The next tune he met her he raised hi 3 hat, and, as she made him a little curtsey, he glanced at her with careless curiosity. What was there in those dark, smiling eyes of hers that sent a. thrill through him—a thrill s nch a® he had never experienced before? Thinking it over afterwards, he came to the conclusion that it was more like an electric shock than anything else; and he was filled with a perplexed amaze as to the cause of it. Had May Balfray—her name was not May Balfray, by the way, but as she was Mrs Balfray’s niece, it wa® easier to call her so—had May Balfray some uncanny power, some personal magic, which made it possible for her to transfix him with a glance? It may sound very ridiculous, but there was something in the girl’s innocently inquiring eyes which made a man ask himself whether his life had been all that it ought to have been, and whether it would not show itself very black in that clear light in which she lived.

It was a secondary conclusion that she was very beautiful. She had delicatelycut features, with an aij* of breeding which took Frank Lovell by surprise; a charming complexion, pale rather than ruddy, but tinted with the rose-pink -of a sea-shell; her hair was dark, and her sombre and shadowy, yet shining as if with an inner light. Frank often wondered whether those eyes of hers exerted the same influence over other men as they did over himself. He saw her two or three times without speaking to her; then one day, when he met her, she was carrying a book as well as a milking-stool; she dropped the book, and he stooped to pick it up—Browning’s '‘Paracelsus.” What world was this in which dairymaids read Browning and blushed so beautifully when he gave the volume back?

“Thank you very much. X do not want to lose the book —it was a present," said the girl. *■. “Ah, that explans," said Frank to himself. Aloud he answered pleasantly—- “ Browning's poems are supposed to be rather difficult." “Yes, very." “Do you like them?” “Some of them," May answered, demurely, with down-dropped lids. “ ‘Paracelsus-' isn't the volume for a beginner, you know. You should read the lyrical poems first/' “What are lyrical poems, please ?" asked May. “Come for a little turn with me in the garden, and I'll try to explain," said 'rank; eagerly. And he explained for two hours. About the end of that time she observed, rather unexpectedly—“X did not know that you cared about books—especially poetry. I thought you were fond of fishing and shooting—of killing things—and of nothing else." “Who gave you so low an idea of me ?” “I suppose my aunt did, but she did not mean it to be a low idea, Mr Lovell. She only spoke as if you and the fishing were inevitably associated in he** mind. “Ah, wejll, you must forgive her. She only sees me when X come down with my rod; but I assure you I don't do much harm to the fish." “What do you do, then ? Yon go off for hours at a time —you mush forgive me for noticing it." “Oh, I moon around," said Lovell, light ly enough. “I like to look at the old place now and then ; I lived here once, you know, when I was a little boy.” “Then yon like Selsby ?” “Don't you ?” said Frank, smilng. ..“I think it perfectly lovely. But why don't you live here, if you like the place so mucK ?" “Duty calls me elsewhere. To tell the ' trutn, I am poor, and X have to earn my living. I am a miserable banker's clerk.” May looked at him meditatively. “I have seen bankers’ clerks before now,'* she said, “and I always thought' they were considered a very enviable class of beings. To get a post in a bank—l have heard it held up as quite an honourable ambition.” Was there a touch of mockery in her tone ? Frank drew up* his head and looked her full in the face. “Excuse me. Miss Balfray,” he said. “Do you think my life enviable ? Then I assure you that vou are very much mis-

taken. The only momenta of my life when I consider myself happy or enviable are those in which I can get away from my vile drudgery and forget that London exists/* He parted £rom her with scant ceremony after this speech, but the girl forgave him. She saw that she had flicked him on the raw, that she had inflicted a wound where she had meant only to touch ■with a finger. She was sorry, and she was ashamed, for she had misunderstood him from her aunt's account. Frank left the inn without an opportunity for any more conversation with her; but on the following Sunday, to Mrs Balfiray's great surprise, he returned. "Well, I never," she exclaimed to her

niece. "If here isn't Mr Frank again! I don't know what he will do, May, if I give up the inn as you want. He'd not have a place that .would be half such a home -fco him as this." ‘'The people who take the inn could be told to pay him every attention," said May, in a low voice. "Don't say anything to him, auntie, about leaving." "Not if you don't wish it, my dear," said Mrs Balfray meekly. If Frank had heard her he might have wondered at the submissiveness of her tone. Instead of taking his usual tramp across the fields and through the woods, Frank Lovell lounged about the inn that afternoon and evening, avoiding the front doo.r. with the bar and bar-parlour, and chiefly frequenting the old-fashioned garden and the poultry-yard at the back, where the long, low farm buildings and outhouses gave an air of rural domesticity to the old village inn. Here at last he came upon- May feeding the chickens, her arms bare, her dress tucked up, her sunbonnet tilted as usual on the back of her ruffled dark head.

"You here again, Mr Lovell ?" she said; simulating surprise. "Yes, Miss Balfray. Can. I help you to feed the chickens?" "I'm afraid not."

''Or give you another lesson in Browning?"

May looked across the yard and hesitated. but a smile hovered at the corner of her lips. , "My father is coming the day after tomorrow," she said, with curious inconsequence.

"Monday? Well. I should generally be gone by that time," said Frank, "but as it happens we have a holiday on Monday, so I can stay until the early train on Tuesday." "In that case," said May, with a brightening smile, "there will be plenty oft time for Browning." And for a good deal more than Browning. as Frank was soon to know. They sat out in the orchard that night, and the light of the moon came to them through the flickering leaves, and the nightingale sang in the wood close by. Frank could not see to read: but he had a good memory and a sweet voice, and he repeated some of the "easiest" lyrics, such as even a village srirl might understand. with very great effect. May said little, but her silence was full of comprehension. Frank felt that he had never met with a nature as congenial to his own as hers.

He flung back bis bead and looked up at tbe moonlit sky, “Wbo knows but tbe world may end to-night P” be quoted dreamily. ''Would you like it to end?’* she asked.

"Ab. that depends/’ said Frank, waking out of bis reverie and looked at her significantly. "I do not wish to die before I have lived—and as yet I have not lived.” "You have not lived?” she said, looking at him inquiringly.' And he, with a new look in kisi clear blue eyes, answered softly—“No, for I have not loved —till now,” be added; but the last two words Avar© spoken in so loav a tone that she did not seem to bear. Perhaps that Avas the reason why she changed Abe subject almost immediately. "You are,, fond of this part of the world, are you not, Mr Lovell ?”

"Yes,” be answered, m a curiously changed voice. "Very fond of it; and no doubt you knOAV Avhy.”

“Do I? But I should like to bear. Perhaps,l have not been told tbe story.” "There is no story,” said Frank, rather gloomily. "My grandfather gambled and betted beyond his means, that is all. and my father Avas unable to mend matters. At his death the property came to the hammer.”

"Yes. But I have heard,” said the girl, "that you might ha\'e kept at least part of it back; that there Avas no need for you to surrender your mother’s fortune, and that you gave it up to the creditors entirely to save your father’s name. That was true, wasn’t it?” "You have got hold of one version of the story, certainly; but there is nothing in it. really. I might not be legally bound to pay my father’s debts, but I think I Avas morally bound. So, you see, I could not help it.” "I knOAV a good many people avlio Avould have helped it,” said May, pursing up her pretty lips. "But you are Avhat my father calls 'a white man,’ and, of course, you do more than the ordinary person.” “Not at all. Any honourable man would do as much.”

"And you are just as fond of the old house as ever, I suppose?” Frank laughed a little, but the laugh suddenly broke'—much to his OAvn surprise. He did not speak, but the broken laugh was sufficient for May, and tears rose to her dark eyes as he turned his head aside and pretended for a moment or two to be absorbed in the blades of grass that he was plucking at Avith his left hand. Presently, liOAvever, he recovered himself sufficiently to say Avith a manner of great unconcern : : — "The old place is very difficult to sell. My father’s debts Avill not be paid in full until, it is bought outright, and it is still in the hands of trustees.” “Is it for sale?”

“Yes, and tA\ r o or three people have entered into negotiations about it, but Avithout result 50 far. The house is falling to rack and ruin. _ One can’t expect anyone but a' millionaire to buy it, and it Avould not b? worth his while.” "Some rich At 1,” said May, thoughtfully. “would be pleased to rebuild the

house entirely—or at least to put it into good repair." "Spoil it probably!" said Frank, in his grimmest tone. "Not if he took good advice," said May, almost pleadingly. "How could he take advice? How could he know?" exclaimed Lovell, quite angrily. "He would be a stranger. No one knows the stories connected with the house but the old servants and myself; and the old servants have gone away, and

I shall never dare to come here again when the process of renovation begins. Do you think I shall stand and look on when they tear down the old oak panels to let more light into the rooms, and turn my mother's garden into a brilliant parterre. and put plate-glass into the mullioned windows? When the hand of the builder and the decorator is laid upon the old place, then Selsby will see me no more."

"Unless a friend bought it," said the

girl. "A friend with- whom you could work, who would consult you a Pout the slightest alteration ?" “tjuite impossible. I don't know any millionaires/' “They don't come much to Selsby, I suppose ?" she said, w r ith laughing eyes, “it is getting late. I must go in. But before 1 go will you be so very good as to repeat that poem, again—'Tfie Last Bide Together' ?" “With pleasure. Do you like it so much ?"

"Very much; and besides, 'who knows if the world will end to-nighf ?" "What do you mean?" "Nothing at all. What could I mean? It was only a fancy. Please go on with the poem, Mr Lovell." Frank did as he was desired, and when she had gone he wandered, about the orchard for a little while in a state of strange content and happiness, murmuring now and then a line tnat had particularly struck him. "Should ride lor ever —together ridel So one day more I am deified," he whispered to himself. "Can a man feel as if Heaven lay for him in the winning of one woman. It seems incredible. And yet—if the woman were like May Balfray 1 Sweetest, dearest of women. I have met none like her. and yet—-yet she is only a dairymaid,- the niece of the village innkeeper, the halftaught, half-educated daughter of the people whom I should never have known if my insane fondness for Selsby had not brought me so often to her aunt's publichouse. For what is it but a public-house ? And, after all, Mrs Balfray is much richer than I am, and would probably decline the alliance for her niece if it were offered her. And I can't afford to marry. But if I could —ah, May, sweet May! should I care one jot for your birth and breeding if only I knew that you returned my love? May, May!" He breathed the name aloud, and then rested his forehead on his arm, which he had lain against the trunk of a gnarled old elm-tree beside the orchard fence. Once he thought that he heard a lootstep on the twigs beneath his feet, but when lie looked up no one was there. He threw back his head with a gesture of utter weariness. "What do I live for?" he said. "And why doesn't my world end to-night ?" Meanwhile, in an upper chamber of the quaint old inn. which Frank Lovell basely slandered when he called it a public-house, a tall, heavy-looking, greybearded man with rugged features and beetling eyebrows, stood straight in the middle of the room and surveyed Mrs Balfray's niece with a mixture of amusement and surprise. There was a glint of humour in the shrewd old face, some kindliness of expression also in the deepset eyes; but, except to those who knew him well, old Matthew Sendall was somewhat forbidding in appearance. His daughter, who had drawn one of his arms round her and now stood looking up into his face with a pretty persistence, did not, however, seem to be in the least afraid of him.

"Daddy," site said, "you know very well that you are quire ready to like nun if you find tfiat auntie ana I like finn too." “I'm not sure," said file b;g man, rather grumpily, “tfiat I snould ever line a fellow tfiat leansi ins fiead on fiis fiand. and calls out —‘May, May / as if he wanted tfie moon to hear."

“I'm very glad that he did," said May, with a toucfi of sauciness in her tone. "It shows that he tfiinks of me sometimes. But we are only friends—good friends, daddy; you need not think we are anything else. It is just that I want you to be a friend to him too."

"Well, ain't I going to be a friend?" grumbled Matthew Sendall. "Isn't it a friend's part to enable him to pay his debts ?"

“You’re going to do it, then, my dear, good, delightful daddy! Oh, I am so glad!” “I generally end by doing Avhat you ask, don’t I? Ali the same, May, I don’t think you are Avise, child” —and the father’s voice suddenly took a tenderer tone. “You are going to tie yourself doivn to a locality that -we aiAvays intended to cut ourselves free from; you Avill be saddled all your life Avith old associations ” “Well, you aren’t ashamed of them, are you, daddy ?” “Heaven forbid!” said her father hastily. bending to kiss her broAV—perhaps because he did not Avant at that moment to look too keenly into the clear depths of her eyes. "I’ve never been ashamed of them, and I never will be. But you yourself, May. and those, perhaps, that may come after you •” "If I-am ever ashamed of my father’s history, or if anyone belonging to me is ever ashamed of it,” said May, with great distinctness, "I trust' that av© shall lose every atom of the prosperity that you have made for us daddy dear.” “Well, Avell, well!” said Sendall, giving his daughter a little squeeze with his arm. "We Avon’t anticipate misfortune, my pet. We’ve done v very well, so far, and Ave’ll 'stick together to the end. But as for this young interloper”—and his voice took a snrlier tone, as though he Avere inclined to growl, like a dog, at anyone who tried to take from him a precious possession—"l hope I shall find him Avortky of better things than to. bay the moon at midnight with a cry for my May J”

"Perhaps it was some other May," said the girl, with her eyes cast down. "Not very likely. I think. But. I say, my darling. I wanted to tell you of a house I saw last week in Surrey—a fine, red-brick house, with a background of fir-woods, lots of 'glass/ as they call it. conservatories, vineries, pineries, and all the rest of it; perfectly brandnew. Eh ?"

"1 hate a brand-new house, daddy. And you know as well as I do that you have never in all your life seen a that you thought equal to Selsby Hall." "Bless you, my girl, perhaps you're right." said her father, kissing her fondly. "If only that young man knows his luck !" he added, piously, to himself, as he said his good-night to his daughter and went to bed. Frank was a little startled next morning by tho appearance of the rough-look-ing, elderly man with rugged features and grizzled hair who claimed to be May's father. He could not possibly dislike the man. whose shrewd, slow speech was as far removed from vulgarity as from mere outward refinement; and yet he was disturbed by the incongruity between him and his beautiful daughter. He was even more perturbed when, in the course of the day, he received a cautiouslyworded letter from his lawyer in the next parish, who informed him that a client was found for the purchase of Selsby Hall—an admirable and unexceptionable client who had made a fortune in the colonies, -and wished to spend it at home, a who had not only proposed to give more than the sum originally asked; and who suggested that if he made any alteration or improvements in the old house, Mr Frank Lovell, as a member of the original owner's family, would always be consulted before they were carried out. The client for the present preferred Jp. wi-thhold his name. Frank 1 took the letter to May in the orchard that afternoon. “It is the oddest proposal I ever heard! It is just as though it came out of that talk I had with you. Are you a witch, May ?" .“I have no- magic," she answer! gently; but she blushed when he called fier by. name.

“Have you not? Indeed, you have, May! What can I call you but May? Why do you look at me ? I do not use it out of disrespect, but because I cannot think of you as Miss Balfray——” “You need not think of me as Miss Balfray, certainly.” "Then give me permission to call you May. Oh, May, you don’t knoAy koAV I love you! Darling, can’t yon give me a little hope?” She took a step backAvard and her eyes greAV bright—but the bi’iglitness was keen and hard as steel.

"Hope—of what?” .5 "Hope that you will some day be my wife, May, although' Heaven knbAVs, I haven’t a penny of my oavu. But I shall make some, and then, if you will promise to Avait for me ” Her eyes had groAvn soft again ,and her. face Avas rosy with blushes. "Does that matter? I could Avork, too,” she "But, my darling, I don’t Avant you to Avork. I want you to be like a queen— all——•”

"And beloved by all. I care for that more than for anything else. Frank, do you really love me P” “With all my heart and soul.” “Although my father is—has been—no, is a labouring man?”

“As if I cared, my darling.” "Although I come of the very lowest middle-class if not of the poor?” “I should love you wherever you were, whatever you came from. Do you love me? That is the question/*

"Yes. Frank." ’

"Let me hear you say it, my darling/* 5 "I love you, Frank, as you love me; 1 as you said just now, with all my heart and soul." Then Frank was satisfied. But she did not let him leave her until he had promised her that he would accept the offer- of this unknown client for the house (as far as he had any interest in the matter), and would promise to help the future owner with his advice when any alterations were propos'e.d. He groaned over the prospect, but he’' signified his assent. And then the unexpected happened. There was a cry by night of terror and alarm. "Fire! Fire!" cried a score of voices, and a red light was seen in the sky, and the air grew thick with smoke a mile away. Selsby Hall was on fire. It was long before the fire-engines arrived; but two men were on the spot who organised a steady resistance to the flames, who toiled for hours in saving the works of art. the heirlooms, the precious portraits and old-fashioned furniture that remained. And it was when Frank Lovell nearly lost his life and lay white and senseless beneath a heavy beam of. wood which had fallen across him as he reached his mother's old boudoir and tried to save the beautiful picture of her which still hung-upon the wall —it was then that old Matthew Sendall not only carried him back to safety but also took him to his heart. "That lad's got grit in him," he observed afterwards to his daughter. "I tfiougfit him a fool/' "And you thought I should fall in love with a fool ?" asked May, with a directness of speech which . she had surely learnt from him.

"I was mistaken. Heaven forgive me. Never fear, May, he'll pull through. A lad of his sense will never be killed-by a falling log. Don't be afraid." “I'm not afraid," said May 0 with her head high in the air.

Nevertheless she had an anxious time before Frank recovered, for he Avas very seriously hurt, and lay for some days between life and death. He came back to life and health, however, and was sedulously nursed by May in the seclusion of Mrs Balfray’s best bedroom, Avith tA\ r o trained nurses to guide her efforts as well as to provide her with proper chaperonage.

One day Frank eyed her oddly. "May,” he said, “Avhat do the nurses call you ?”

"Miss Sendall,” she said promptly.

■ “Then, you are a relation of the avouderful MattheAV Sendai, about Avhom I’ve been reading in this newspaper? The man with millions of money, Avko has given so much in charity?”

j “Yes, dear. I’m a relation. He’s comj ing to give me aAvay Avhen Ave are married next month, Frank. I think he’ll probably give me a pittance to live upon.” ; "And why should he?” "Because he happens to be the unknown client who bought Selsby Hall, i and he is very grateful to you for helping to save so much of it. And there is another reason, Frank ■” “What is it, dear?”

"You don’t mind, do you,* darling? You won’t throw me over because I am related to a millionaire?”

"Certainly not,” said Frank, sensibly. “Not that I shall let him support either you or me, you know.” “Of course, you will do as you like about that. Frank, dear.” "What relation is he, little woman? Not a very near one, for the sake of our independence, let us hope?” He spoke in a jesting tone. "Pretty near, Frank.” "Speak out, May. What relation are you to Matthew Sendall. the millionaire?”

"Only his daughter, darling!” May was very apologetic, but it Avas some time before Frank >vas reconciled to the fact.