Sister Aune.

Otago Witness, Issue 929, 18 September 1869, Page 20

Sister Aune.

CHAPTER HI.

Many women havo such sorrows, and go through thorn, as I wont through mine, with silont endurance. Time did it« work with me, as it does with thousands daily ; tho wound hoalod, and only now and thon a thrill reminded mo of the old pain. Through some fond and foolish memory of the past, I suppose, I mado my darling a civil engineer. lie was tn London away from me, working hard, and full of hopes of success ; and I remained in Eosobower till the happy tirao should como that would ro-unito us for evor. On this dream I fod and lived, not unhappy though lonely ; and day after day tho stillness that was

flowing over^ my, lifej&eWfdeeDei^iU pncej moroitwas broken. , M ? /> - , r \< r~j .(,«;?< J » I was comiugin one evening irono, a longwalk, when, leaning, over my garden' gate/ and looking? full at. me, like the ghost bfj my former, years, I saw. William, Gibson.' He was mu oh. altered ; a thin,, worn, im--' happy-looking man,' verging on, middle age ; but I knew him in a moment. He did not stir until I stood within a few' paces of the gate ; then, ho opened it for me, and held out his hand in a calm, selfpossessed man-of*the-world manner, which showed me that the shy nervous WilliamGibson was no more. "We entered the house together, and what that first glimpse had revealed, everything I saw and heard rapidly confirmed. In a few brief words he told me his story." He had married a foreign lady, as I, had been told, but his wedded life had proved miserable from the first day to the last. " " My wife was attached to another man," said William Gibson, very calmly, "and was forced into marrying me. She never forgave me the offence of having believed in her willingness, and I never could forgive her for robbing me of my liberty. After a few wretched years, during which I vainly tried to win her affections, we parted by mutual consent. She is living with her parentß, and I am thrown back on solitude. Tou did well not to marry Miss Sydney ; you never ran the venture, and never paid the coßt." _ # There was a touch of bitterness in his tone, but I did not seem to notice it. Where was the use ? All was over ; he did not know, he never must know, what he had been once to me, what I might have been to him. Only once more did we touch on the subject. Mr. Gibson stayed a fortnight in the village. I never met him all that time, and when he called on me again, it was to bid me good-bye. The autumn evening was chill, and I had a fire He leaned forward, so as to get the heat, and the ruddy flame played on his bending face. My heart ached to see how pale and worn he was. Oh ! what a different fate might have been his and mine, but for hie sister! For a third time we were going to part, and this time there was no one to check him or to keep me mute ; but it was too late, for ever too late ! We were both silent. At length, raising up his head he said, abruptly : " You little know what my Me might have been but for you. You little know, Miss Sydney, that you once held my fate in your hands." „ . „ I looked at him till I could not see him for blinding tears. "Do I nofcknow it 1" I asked. "Had I not seen it, though you never spoke ; and did I not hear your sister Ellen speaking to you along the hedge as I sat by the stile, ten years ago ? She sealed my fate and yours then. I do not complain, I forgive her ; but do not blame me for your sorrows. She spoke, and you listened— and what could I do, Mr Gibson / I was a woman condemned to silence ; a woman compelled to wait for a wooing that came not. She repeated, words that had been spoken many years, and used them against me, and you believed her, and had no faith in me, and what could I do? I never so much as saw you once before you loft. Did you make one attempt, Mr Gibson, to learn the truth from me 1 Not one. Remember that, and never reproach me for what was your own doing." Ho looked nt mo like ono transfixed, then his lip quivered and his oyo grow dim. „ , -j • " Thon it might have been," he said, in a low tone—" It might havo been ! " "Yea," I replied, trying to smile, "it might have been, but now it io too late ; and even if it wore not, we both have passed that time, and should bury xt far and deep, and sot a grave-stone ovor it, with a hie jacet epitaph as final as any ever engraved in ft churchyard." He was silont for a while. I believe his heart was very full, and whon ho did speak at length, it was to tell mo how dear I had been to him in thoso last days, which might have boon bo blessed. It was also thon ho said how beautiful ho thought me whon I enrae to iivo at Kosebower. Well, ho was the first and last who ovor told mo such a talo, and as I stood on the hearth before him, with my hand claspod in his for our last adieu, I could omilo at the pale face I saw m the tarnished mirror ; poor pale face, as pale and as faded as theso last years of my youth. , „ , It was lato whon ho at length »aia goodbye. I walked out with him through the oliill ffurden, and partod from him at the gate, whilst ho wont on to tho village inn whoro ho slant Ho loft early tbo next morning, and I saw him no more, i have hoard about him since, then, but wo have never met again. It w better so. Why go back to a lost paat--loot and barren ! lam not unhappy, though 1 oannot forget him, but I do not care to think of him in th« time whon ho wao my shy norvous lover. When I wmomber William Gibson, itiiata kind grayo youth, who found mo crying in tho lonely parlot of Roiobovror, and who, Uklng me by tho hand, led mo out on tho shore, and I

Jitter eispoke j^ordsSwiseWd geiitl^cbmfort&b*i>respnfg girt # ; | &SVJ , <}}.'s> 'About' a month after his departure", my deal* boy paid mea very unexpected, visit. I He' was' twenty-four th'eny t|uite a'man, and doing wonderfully, according to his account, — -more moderately, in my opinion. I1I 1 wondered what had brought him. He soon told me. * \ ,-< " Sister Anne, V he said, When 'our first greeting was over, ,'/ Monsieur Thomas has turned up. ' He has been heard of in Algeria." - Monsieur Thomas was the gentleman who owed us forty thousand pounds. I shook my head rather doubtfully. * " There are so many Thomases all over the world," said I. '","<*■, ,\ , ' '' " Oh, fr'Ut this is the one/ eagerly replied I William; "and he is quite a rich" man, and can pay us principal atid interest,, you know, and we can get back the old house, and live in it, and bid a last good-bye to Rosebower." j - » * < "My dear William, do not be too hopeful. Depend upon it this Thomas is hdt the right one, or if he is he will never pay us," " You are a Thomas of Didymus, Sister Anne. I tell you this is the man." Arid he proceeded to give me proofs which convinced me. Yes, this Thomas was our Thomas, but my older knowledge of the world would not allow me now the illusions I had formerly indulged in. William got vexed with my scepticism, and said, rather warmly : "I toll you he shall pay us, and, what is more, I shall be off to Algiers next week." " My dear boy, you do not mean it !" But he did mean it, and meant it very seriously too. Now I knew this was rnin. To leave his work when he was just beginning to be known in it was ruin, and I tried to impress this truth upon him, in vain. The forty thousand pounds dazzled him, and for that ignis fatuus he was willing to forego the steady flow of his little prosperity at home. I took a desperate resolve. "I shall go to Algiers," I said, "and so you will run no risk of loss, and be no worse off if the money cannot be recovered." William's face felL I suspect the pleasure of seeing Africa, palm- trees, and turbaned Arabs had had something to do with his eagerness to hunt down Monsieur Thomas. But my proposal was so reasonable, that he did not dare to resist it ; he raised, indeed, a few objections, which I promptly overruled, and my journey was decided.

I never look back to that time without sorrow. It was a great trial for me to leave my quiet home, cross the sea twice, and seek an unwilling debtor in a strange land ; but I undertook it willingly, for his dear sake. Neither that, nor the fatigue I underwent, nor the tribulations — and they were many — which awaited me, would now cost me a ,'sigh, but for other things which this ill-fated journey led to. 111-fated 1 call it, though I wonder if forty thousand pounds were ever got back so easily as I got ours. Monsieur Thomas had just died when I arrived at Algiers, and as he was a foundling by birth, the state was hia only heir. I set forth my claim, it was indisputable, and was granted almost without contest, though not without some delay. So far, surely, I had no reason to complain. Everything was, or seemed to be, over. Yet a strange presentiment of coming misfortune, which I could not conquer, indnoed me to send on the money beforehand. A terrible storm overtook our boat tho day after we left Afrioa, and seemed destined to justify my worst forebodings. Sea and sky met in a darkness so fearful, that we could scarcely see tho white crests of tho angry waves roaring around us, as if eager to devour and swallow us up. An agony like that of death camo over me. Oh ! to b«o him Again, my boy, my darling — to aoe him onco moro, and then, if it were God's will, to dio ; I remember that I prayed thus, not onco, but all tho time the storm lasted. When the sky oleared, and tho great waves foil and danger went by, I rejoiced, thinking I had prevailed, and so I had, but I Httlo guessed at what cost. In Paris I found a letter from my dear boy, telling me not merely that tho money had reached him safely, but also that ho had secured our old homo "on a long loaue." It was a groat piooo of folly, and I know it, but I ounid not bo angry with him, do what 1 would. Ho wrote so joyously, ho seemed so happy, so hopeful! And, after all, we wore noh. Our forty thousand pounds had boon bearing fair interest all theso yean, and of that interest, owing to raro good fortune, we wore not defrauded. If wo choso to shut up part of the house and to be prudent, wo could indulge outwlvot with sleeping onco more beneath tho old roof. William's children might play by the fountain where my father and Miss Gnurae had found me reading long ago, and I might know happy hours again within those ooar and stately rooms whonoo 1 had been banished to

mshy^yekn! TJ& ihougtft' aladej ale happy, very happy. I sat by the 6pen window ot my room in the Hotel Meyerbeer. It was night, ? and,, lights were * burning brightly along thY dark "avenues of the Ohamps Elysees'j I heard the roll of carriages, and every now and then bursts of music and thunders of applause from the cirque close by. I saw and heard, all, this, but as in a dream. The reality was not the. gfty scene I had gazed on ; it was that fair home to which I was returning, aB I thought, on the morrow. That dear face, that kind voice, that warm clasp and fond embrace which were to be mine so soon, alone were real j the carriages, the lights, the music, ' the sounds of the foreign city were the dreani. But it was not to be. I had not felt quite well during my journey, and I was very ill the next morning. The, English doctor I Bent for told me at once that I had brought fever with me from Africa. If it had been possible for me to travel on I would have done so, but I could not. All I could do was to write to my brother, and telling him that Paris was a very fascinating city, I bade him notexpeot me just yet. I would not say more, I would not alarm him, I would not bring him from his new-found joy to my sick bed ; but the self-denial cost me very dear. I did not know if my life was in danger. I only knew that the thought of dying in a strange city, of being laid amongst unknown dead, and^ above all, of never seeing my darling again, haunted me night and day, like a perpetual nightmare. Ah! what visions were with me as I lay there looking at the light stealing in through the grey persiennes, conning over the strange furniture, listening to voices which, though kind, were foreign, and pining for my own speech and my own kindred in my own land ! At length the probation was over. I got well again, and though the doctor said I was far too weak to travel, 1 went, spite his warnings and grave looks. The journey was safe, easy, and rapid ; I wonder if there was a happier heart than mine when I reached our village, and, alighting from the carriage that had brought me, I passed through the open gates of our old home and saw the fountain dancing in the red sun-light which lit up the front.of the house with a deep gorgeous glowj. I No one, nave a servant girl, came out to meet me. I did not wonder at it j leßt fatigue or illness should detain me, I had not fixed the day of my return when t wrote to my dear brother. But he was well, quite well, the servant told me, and out in the grounds walking. I would not let her go and fetch him. I wished to seek him myself. My heart beat with rapture^ as, for the first time after so many years, I found myself again in these dear alleys, and saw the same flowers, it seemed to me, that used to bloom there when Miss Grreme and I passed them hand-in-hand. And I had helped to win all this back for her son ! The thought was very sweet. It was enchanting, and paid me back ten- , fold for fatigue, and danger, and sickness, and all I had undergone. I walked very j far, still seeking my brother, but I could not find him ; y»t a Round of voices lured and led me from path to path, and alley to alley, till I turned back disheartened. I had entered the lime tree avenue, at the end of which one Bees the little fountain with the red house, and a solemn background of deep dark vorduro behind it. I was walking slowly, for I felt tired, when I heard the voices again. I stole into the side path, and, lurking there, I waited to see who was coming. Hiding behind a thick clump of trees, I saw thii. A handsome child, a boy richly dressed, came up the avenue, throwing his ball and shouting gaily. "After him appeared my brother, and a lady, a beautiful woman, walked by his side. In a moment I knew her ; this was Ellen Gibson. My heart seemed to cease to beat. What had brought her hero 1 She spoke. In that light voice which had onoe settled my fate, and whioh I knew so well, she said : "I wish, Mr Gibson, you would plant evergreens at the gate. People do stare in so, and I &m sure I saw some ono iutt now moving amongst those trees. And if it were not that, there is no banshee » " And how do you know there Is no banshee?" ho interrupted, in hla gay voioo. " Wall, »t all events it it a comfort to know that dreadful old woman is getting civilised, and wears glove*," said Ellen, pushing away with her foot a glove which I had dropped in my hurry to hide from them. He laughed. He did not mo me, but oh I how I saw him, and how hippy, how blest ho looked, with tho strong light shining on his handsome faoo. The boy had run on, and waa now shouting fa* away. William thought himself alone with Ellen. "My darling— my darling wifo 1" he tdd ; and ho took her in his arm*, and kUaed her. I leaned agataat tho trunk of ft tree,

and 1 groaned aloud' in my agony. ■ But they had walked on ; they did not heat me ; they did* not nee "toe'} they left mb there alone with* my misery. There, is a legend of -a maiden's soul in-Purgatory who bought, at the cost of a thousand years of pain, the boon of visiting earth to console her lover, and who, finding he had forgotten her for another love, fulfilled her compact in that one moment 1 . Whilst the tempest was howling around the ship" that bore me, I had asked of Heaven to Bee my brother again, and see him well, prosperous, and happy; and now was not my prayer granted, like that poor soul's ? Did I not see him again ? Was he not prosperous, thanks to me ? And after what, I had beheld, could I doubt, that he was happy ? Ah M can say it, from the depths of my heart, ,I, I wished him to marry— l wished him to know whatever joy had been denied to my life ; I grudged no good woman hia love, and even could have felt satisfied to look on and see another loved far more fondly than I had ever been. But that Ellen Gibson should be the one 1 That she who had so wantonly destroyed my happiness should reap the fruit of every sacrifice ! That she who had robbed me of her brother should have stolen mine i from me whilst 1 was away toiling and suffering for him! That she and her child, strangers to my blood, should come and possess the lost home I had redeemed for him — all this it was that seemed too much, and overpowered me I I could not bear it. I sank down on the gr&BS, and wept and moaned there as if my heart would break. A rustling sound roused me. I looked up and Eaw her. She stood before me in her rich silks, and with her still young beauty seeming to triumph over my ruined life. The fountain played behind her with a low pleasant sound, but instead of my dear Miss Graeme, I saw the evil sorceress who had stolen Miss Graeme's son from me. She was alone. She did not know me at first, but on recosniaing me she turned pale and stepped back. " What are you afraid of 1" I asked, bitterly. " Have I not returned too late to Bave him from you? Are" you not his wife? You were a widow, it seems, though you cannot long have been such. I do not know and do not care by what arts you made him lorget that you are almost as old as I am — far too old for him ; you did it. You made him so far forget the sister who was away toiling for him, that he did not await her return to marry you. Well, you have prevailed a second time over me. Your brother loved me, and you took him from me, and helped to make him wretched. And, now that you have taken my brother, my ohild, my darling, make him happy at least, and it will atone, perhaps it will atone, for all the weight of grief you have laid upon. Tell my brother that he will find me at Rosebower. Here I will never set my foot again. She did not answer me one word, she looked thunderstruck, nor did I give her time to speak. Ab fast as I could I walked away. I forgot the carriage, and, leaving by a postera door, I went on to Rosebower like one pursued : it was only the amazed look of the servant who came and opened tho door for me that recalled me to myself. I Bent her for the driver and my luggage, and sat down in the i lonely parlour. How chill, how dreary it looked, with the blinds down and the blank fireplace ! Was this my welcome home after near a year's parting? A quick step along the gravel path roused me, and, looking out, I saw my brother. He entered tho room pale, disturbed, and half angry. "Anne/ 3 ho said, taking me in his arms, " Anne, how is this ? Why are you here?" " My darling," I replied, kissing him, " I am here because it ia best for me to be so." . „ i Ho thought I was angry with him for not waiting my return to marry Ellen, I and ho proceeded to give me all sorts of treasons, which he had found very conj vincing, for having taken that step without my knowladgo. I heard him out, and seeing she had been silent on my real grievance against her, I was silent too. " My dear boy," I said, " I loyo you dearly, and think T have proved it, but it ia not in my power to five at the old houao now, bo I came here." " Yon don't know Ellen," ho aaid, reddening with displeasure; "she is an angel, and your unldndnom is breaking her heart" It was very hard to bear that, but I bore it too. He did all he could to prevail over me, and not auooeeding he left me, not in anger, Indeed, but in somu bitterness. And from that day forth to this he haa nover been the same to me— never, and ho novor will bo— -never. She ha* conquered him, and the will keep him. Mr* Sydnoy took * dialike to this part of the country aoon after my return, and made hor huabimd leave it. They livo in

town, and 1 leaSiJi^ay lifefom told, for "William makes a. great deal of money by civil engineering* and, the old house is once more shut ujp and deßerted. Will Ham cornea down- in the autumn, when ihiSjWJfe goes to a fashionable Watering: place. It is then I see him. He sayfl £«r is happy, but I cannot believe it. He looks pale and oatewotn. The bright happy boy I had once, the hopeful young man who longed for his paierrial home} are gone, and in ' their stead I have 'the pale, sullen, and discontented husband of Ellen Gibson* ," , i I had written thus far, .thinking my tale ended and my little dream, of lit^ I over. Alas! life never ends? great joy and great sorrow were yet in store for me. " ■,»!'■ (To be concluded in our next.)