THE HEART OF DIANA,

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12456, 26 May 1926, Page 4

THE HEART OF DIANA,

[PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.]

BY

DOROTHY M. GARRARD,

Author of “Iris,” “Roger Northcote’s Wife,” “The Spider’s Web,” etc., etc.

'HiumHHHiHmmmimumiHHimiHiHHimiiHiuJHnnHtiHUMHiim CHAPTER V.—Continued. It was quite dark by the time lie reached the Lodge. Dinner would be over, so he guessed. Hut there was a small side-door leading in by way of the gun-room. No one was likely to be there. Quietly he opened it, hoping to slip in and upstairs unseen. But, before he had shut the door behind him, he heard a girl’s voice calling his name. “Oh, Derek, here you are,” despite all her efforts Sheila knew that her voice shook. “I’m so glad you’ve come. I’ve kept some soup hot for you in the chafing dish in here. I’m not going to let you go a step further until you’ve had it.” She caught hold of the tweed sleeve of liis coat. Almost by main force she dragged him into the gun-room. He was too tired to resist her. Somehow her presence, the half-piteous look she could not drive out of her eyes, was vaguely comforting to him, eased a little his sore spirit. But, as she looked at him, the girl’s heart ached. Since the morning, so it seemed to her, lie had aged ten. years. All the youth, all tlie hope, had gone from his face. Obediently, like a child, he drank the big cup of bouillon she ladled out for him. Until he had finished he did not speak. Then suddenly he raised his haggard face to hers. “Where is Diana?” he; asked. His voice was toneless, absolutely without expression of any sort. “She is upstairs, in her room, Derek,” Sheila’s tone was constrained. “She did not come down to dinner. That’s why I’ve been waiting for you here. I knew, somehow, you’d oome in this way, hut I made Freddy keep guard at the front door. I wanted to see you,” she went on iliconsequently, hardly knowing, so that it eased the tension, what she said. “You won’t be too hard on her, DeTelc,” Swiftly her voice altered, her eyes met his in halffear , half-appeal. “So, I won’t be too hard on her,” I again he spoke in that dull, lifeless voice. Without any more attempt at conversation he got up and walked heavily out of the room. Sheila stood watching him. She had, so she felt, done all she could. When he had gone, when the sound of his slow footsteps had died away, she went to find Freddy. Derek walked slowly upstairs. He was dead tiredi now, but he could not rest until he had seen Diana. An almost feverish longing to see her —see what she had to say for herself, possessed him now. He came to the door of his own dressing-room and opened it. There was another door, a little further on round the corner of the passage, which led into his wife’s bedroom direct. But he would not go in that way. The door might be locked, she might already have gone to bed. With fresh stab of pain he remembered that night when, creeping iu, he had kissed her as she lay asleep in bed. The dressing-room was in darkness, but, in the instant before he switched on the electric light, he saw a light shone under the other door. She was not in bed, then. With an effort, squaring his shoulders and holding himself erect, he walked across the room and rapped on the panels of the door. Despite lie ha.d made up his mind to be calm, self-controlled, his heart was beating with loud, unaccustomed throbs. There was no answer to his knock. Again he rapped, more sharply this time. There was someone in the i room. He was certain of that. He could hear movements, when he listened closely, furtive, stealthy movements* Again he knocked, trying the handle of the door. It was locked from the other side. A sudden fierce, uncontrollable anger came over him. What right had Diana to bar her door to him? He would burst it open. And then, just as he had made up his mind, he heard footsteps coming across the room in his direction. The key turned in the lock, then the door was opened a few inches. But the woman who stood peering at him through the narrow opening was not his wife. It was her maid, Toni Kressler, the girl he had always disliked. “Has Mrs Moore already gone to bed?” With a tremendous effort he mastered his anger and spoke in something like his ordinary tone. For an instant the girl did not answer. And something in her manner, in the half-suspicious way she looked n.t him. roused his temper once more. What did sh© mean by standing there, keeping him out like that. With a sudden, unexpected movement he out his hand over her head and pushed the door sharply open. He could see vight into the room, and at once he noticed it was in disarray. A halfpacked trunk stood by the bed, clothes, ..all sorts of things, were scattered around on chairs and on the floor. But Diana—Diana herself was not there. “Where is your mistress?” AgaYn lie turned to the girl. He had never liked her. Now he felt ho hated her. “rMs Moore has left Goar, sir.” She spoke in her smooth, servile voice. “She left pie instructions that T was to pack her luggage and send it on after her to-morrow.” CHAPTER VI. “Mrs Moore has left Coar?” In his utter surprise Derek found himself repeating the maid’s words. “When did she go?” he went on, in a voice which, vaguely, ho was aware, was totallv unlike his ordinary one. “About an hour ago, sir,” the girl’s tone was respectful, hut she was watching him kcenlv out of her little, sloe-like eyes. Like everyone else in tho house she knew something of wliat. had occurred that afternoon. It was tonv Kressler’s business—a very profitable business, so she had found—to know tilings about people. Alrendv she knew n good deal of Derek Moore’s wife, of her mother. Lady Forrest, of Clifford Allerdyee, the novelist, and, even, what there was of a nature interesting to her, of her new employer himself. Derek stood quite still. For the first time in his life sudden physical faintness had come over him. Ho wa*. both in mind and body, forn out. And this last and most unexpected . niece of nows seemed the culminating blow. “But where has she gone?” he asked, his voice little more than a whisper, and steadying himself with his h«uid against the side of the door. Tr\ the ordinary course of events, in his normal state of mind, he would never thus have questioned n servant. Nor.* ho hung riorum dent on her w^rds. “To London. T believe 'There is gu cxnvoss from Gotland, sn T undersfmd. f'dh nt Mornrfh u>ino o’clnoV in the ovonmo-, , Mrs "Moore jv-h'-d pie mn!' / ' e»,rn.u(fernonts that the small car should take

her there. She did not wish anyone should be troubled. She only "took her dressing case and went alone.” Diana had gone to London. Diana had run away from him. And Clifford Allerdyee, had fie gone, too? As the girl went on smoothly, glibly, one after the other, with torturing persistence, the thoughts chased each other through his mind. And everything about him seemed goiiig round, in foolish, extraordinary circles. He must sit down, or he*would fall. “Thank you,” he turned away, staggering towards a chair, his bed, anything that was solid and substantial. Then, as he found himself somehow in the depths of an armchair, he struggled to ask a last question. “Where did Mrs Moore direct you to send her luggage?” He gripped the arms of the chair. But his head was growing clearer now, the faintness beginning to pass off. “She told me she would write, or telegraph. In the morning, possibly, I shall hare her instructions.” Toiii Kressler’s eyes were discreetly lowered, but in her own mind she was wondering how the knowledge she already had, and that which she hoped soon to obtain, could be used to the best advantage. “Is there anything else I can do for you to-night, sir?” she added, her voice suave as ever. “No, thank you.” As he sat there, Derek was regaining something of his self-control. But, as, after one lastglance, she quietly shut the door between the two rooms, suddenly his head sank, upon his hands. Diana, his wife, the woman he had loved so passionately, had left him. All the happiness of his life, the castle of hope he had so confidently raised in the air, was fallen, gone to nothing. After a while he got out of the chair, took off his clothes, and went slowly to bed. He was so tired that, despite everything, he soon fell asleep. The last thing he heard was someone moving about in the next room. It was Toni Kressler, he supposed. And vividly he felt he hated her there. (To he continued.)