Hectford's Trust.

Otago Witness, Issue 1674, 22 December 1883, Page 12

Hectford's Trust.

By Edward T. Friokkb,

Chapter XI. Ihe Plight. HE well-worn proverb *' Anger i." a short madness " was verified in the case of Gerald Hertford Hiß actual passion was soon spent, , but it unfortunately in this instance left something even more unpleasant behind it. By the time that be stood upon the steps of Graf era after hit encounter with Maturin he had attained a state of comparative calm, but was ' nevertheless a prey to an in tolerable gnawing apprehension. The momentary excitemenb of the struggle was over, and now only one thought troubled him concerning it, Maturin would revive in a short time, and would imrnediately^be on hi* way to Crafera. In a few minutes ho might be with Annette, pouring into her ear the vindictive words he had used at their late meeting, and fulfilling that other threat which he had uttered. This should not be. The same idea which had possessed Gerald when he resisted the passage of his opponent by the apparently useless expedient of physical force possessed him now. Maturin should not approach his sister and whisper into her ear the same words that he had spoken in the copse yonder. Gerald remembered the words well, and the tone in which they were hissed out. " I have seen your wife," Maturin had said, and concerning this assertion he, Gerald,, had replied nothing. At the present moment his thoughts were occupied, not with the truth or falsehood of the statement, but the effect it would have upon Annette if it reached her. He stood in his own doorway for a few moments hurriedly debating the matter, with an anxious look in his eyes. A spectator might with some show of reason have considered it the look of a desperate man.

"At the very moment when everything appeared to be going so smoothly," muttered Gerald, " when the difficulty was just about to solve itself— this happens. Another few days would have brought certainty, and by the interference of this boy, my plans and the happiness of our two lives are to be overthrown in an instant. It Ehall not be, by heavens { I will be just and considerate to the girl but would it be just and considerate to let this blow, fall upon her needlessly? It would bo the part of a fool." With one swift glance from the open door way Gerald hastened upstairs, along the corridor, and stopped at that room which Bad been his own den in the old days. He did not now enter it as of right, but knocked hesitatingly at the door, and waited for the low response from within. . Annette was sitting with an # open book beside her, which she waa not reading, and her hands folded idly in her lap. She looked up with her usual grave smile and welcomed Gerald in some surprise. "I did not expect to see you again this evening," she commenced, and at that point the look of surprise changed to one of unmistakable alarm. For Gerald had either forgotten or neglected to remove the traces of his recent adventure. His clothes were dusty and torn, his hair was matted, and from beneath it still trickled a small crimson stream, that had found its ™ay downwards and hopelessly disfigured the snowy collar and the irreproachable cravat. " What has happened ? asked Annette trembling and apprehensive. You are hurt. There has been some accident."

"It was nothing of any consequence. A very small mishap that a towel and a basin of cold water will set light. 1 will explain it to you afterwards, Annette, but not now. There is no time." , "No timft ?" echoed the girl ; what have ' you to do? Why do you look so stranpe ?" " You remember our conversation an hour ngo, and the talks 'we have had together before?"

" I remember, of course." ' % " You remember that when the time came you were to be ready, Annette. That you were to trust me to choose the time and the manner that was fittest, and to do what is best for us both?" " Yes," said Annette opening her brown eyeß with serious assurance. " I was to trust you, and I do." " Suppose that I saw some danger threatening us 'i No, Ido not mean actual danger ; suppose something were to happen that might imperil our happiness — that might perhaps separate vs — needlessly. You would do my bidding if I took the beat and surest measures to avert the evil?" " I do not understand what has happened, or what is going to happen," said Annette. " You look dreadful, and when you speak in that strange way, I am frightened." " There ia no necessity to be frightened," replied Gerald almost sternly. " The question is a very simple one ; merely whether all that has passed between us has been jest or earnest. I must see you and speak to you, but not here, if you have really meant all that has been said on your side, everything will be well. I want you to meet me half an hour hence outside, at any spot near at hand — say where we parted jusfc now." "It is late," said Annette, perplexed and doubtful. " Cannot yeu talk to me here ?" " No, I cannot. Say merely whether lam to expect you or not." " I will come, of course, if you wish it," said the girl, almost in teara af her conopanion'B abruptness. " That is right," said Gerald more gently. " Put on your cloak little one, and do not be afraid. I will be waiting there for you." And he left her. With the same set resolution in his countenance that it had worn since his encounter with Maturin, Gerald hurried to his room and hastily changed his dress, and removed the bloodstains from his face. Then ho descended the stairs and looked in the several rooms which Mr Wycherley might be likely to haunt at such an hour.

" I will be just to her, ' muttered Gerald, " and I will tell Jack."

But the curate was not to be found. Oppressed by the burden of his own disappointment, he had wandered out across the moor, after a vain search for Gerald, and had decided to postpone their farewell talk until some hour about midnight, when they might smoke a last cigar together, and exchange those confidences which had been' so rare of late,

Nelly Grahame, after enduring her enforced solitude as patiently as she could, had gone to bed the least bit out of temper.

Gerald stood in the deserted hall irreselute.

" This is a nuisance," he reflected. " A man cannot slink out of his own house in this way like a thief. I will write a note to Jack, and explain it fully to him afterwards."

Which iho did, and addressing the missive to Mr Wycherley, left it upon the toilette table in his voora. Then wrapping himself in his overcoai, with flushed cheek and quickly beating pulses, Gerald once more left the house, '.md bent his steps towards the spot where he had left Maturin.

He almost expected to meet him on the way, or perhaps to find him waiting in the same place still, ready to baffle his enemy's designs, dnd as the thought occurred to him Gerald clenched his teeth more firmly, and hurried on.

But Maturin was not there. Near the spot where he had lain the ground still bore marks of their short, conflict. The dry leaves were crushed and scattered by quick moving feet, and from the brambles hard by Gerald extricated a handkef chief . It was Maturin's, and was stained — almost saturated with blood. He must have been badly hurt, but not so badly as to prevent him moving. Sufficiently, however, as Gerald reflected with some satisfaction, to deter him from persisting in his purpose of visiting Crafers, agd the watcher strained his eyes eagerly in ths direction from which Annette was to appear.

Presently he discovered a slight, dark figure dimly shadowed in the obscurity. It grew gradually plainer until it stood actually at hia side, and Annette's small white face peered up at him, half muffled in a capacious hood, He took the face caressingly between his two hands.

"I have brought you here," he said, "to show you the only chance that we have of avoiding the evil that threatens us." " What evil is it? You have not even told me that yet." "The separation of you and I. That, you will count an evil, will you not, Annette ? I am not frightening you causelessly when I say that this will come upofi us unless you consent to take the means 1 point out. You are here to choose now."

"To choose what?" asked Annette helplessly, - Whether yon will in reality trust yourself to me now, once and for ever, and follow me away from this place, or whether you will stay here and' abide by what must happen." " Follow you now ?" gasped Annette. " Yes, now ! The time that we Bpoke of haß come, and I claim you, Annette, by your own consent. Instead of being married here as we proposed, we will be married elsewhere. I will aend or take you to friends who will be kind to you, in the meantime, and before you have had time to get accustomed to youf new quarters I will be with you, and no one will thereafter have the power to come between us."

" But who has the power now ?" asked the girl pushing back her hood and gazing at him bare-headed, with frightened eyes. "How is it that to-night an hour or two after you said that we must wait, because the time had not yet come — that you wish me to leave with you secretly, at a moment's notice ? Who is it that can come between us ?"

" Listen, Annette : There are certain things that you must not ask me now — certain matters which I cannot explain to you, if you do ask me. It is not desirable that 1 Rhould. But one thing I will tell you. The person who may come between us, and who will come between us unless yoi aie willing to do as I suggest, is your brother. You have to choose simply between me and him, and the choice must be made at once."

" Francjois !" exclaimed the girl, " does he know of this ? Have you heard where he is ?" " I have seen him this evening." " You have seen him ! Then it was he "

Annette shrunk back, and covered her iace with her hands. She remembered the plight in which Gerald had presented himself a short time ago— the traces which might be those of some accident, might «lso be the evidence of a violent encounter betwsen her brother and her lover. She recalled to mind the vindictive sentiments expressed by the former—his long-

nourished grudge against Captain Hertford as the slayer of their father. The choice placed before her seemed too evidently real to be dallied with, but need it be decided now, at once? Was not Gerald strong enough to hold her for himself without secretly flyiug from the presence of hw enemy ? And yet for the safety of the man she loved she was well satisfied that he should fly. Bub deeper than this was a feeling of shame, of disappointment, and although she gave it no tongue, Gerald divined it. "Fray, do not think," he said, rather coldly, " that I value your brother's threats a jot as regards myself. I fear them only as they affect you." "What can he do?" asked Annette, appealingly. " Tell me, Gerald ;" and she laid her hand timidly upon his coat sleeve. " Did you quarrel with him to-night ?" " We did quarrel, and it was a quarrel which he will remember for a long time to come," said Gerald, grimly. " I need not tell you the details of all this, Aunette. It is enough for you to know that be has come back here for the one single and only purpose of separating me and you." " He cannot," said Annette, proudly.

" He should not, if it were a question that, lay between him and me alone. As it is, Ido not say that he can, but he may. I implore you, Annette, if you love me, come with me now. Who is there here that you should cling to ? To-morrow it may be too late. Leave it until to-morrow and I may lose you. ' " You shall not lose me," pleaded Annette, "but give me time. I cannot go now— like this."

" Do you -see this path ?" said Gerald, "in a quarter of an hour it will lead us to the main road ; we can be at Kirkly Stephen within the hour, and I can get a conveyance from there in time to catch the night express."

The whole district around Crafers and the adjoining village was agog next morning with news of an incident that promised to develop into a scandal of the raciest description.

Old Mike Hatfield, at the toll-gate three miles beyond the village, was the purveyor of the choice morsel. A hired travelling carriage from the "Three Tuns"- had passed along the road late the night before at breakneck pace, and a buckle of the harness needing a touch, Jack Mason, the driver, had pulled in his horses for a " jiff," intending to get it put right, and maybe take a drop of something to keep off the night air if invited to. But he was not invited to, for the horses were scarcely at a standstill before the gentleman inside was yelling to him to hurry on, and using language as strong as though the pace had been five miles an hour inßtead of fifteen. More than this, the gentleman let down the window t« take a look back along the road, and showed himself to. be" none other than Master Gerald of the big house.

Mr Hatfield had here some remarks to offer concerning the change that had come over the young squire since he visited foreign parts and became a "capting." He had been previously a good tempered Jad, a tiifle hasty, but free with his half-sovereigns, rind never particular as to time. Last night, however, finding that Jack was obliged to pull up, he got out and trapezed about the road w''th a scowl that would have blackened a haystack, and ne'er a copper but the actual toll fare' left his pocket. At this point in the narrative. Mr Hatfield in his frequent repetitions of it waxed intolerably knowing and closed one eye. Master Gerald was not alone in the carriage as he had reason to know, both from what he saw at the time and from what occurred afterwards.

An excited chorus of inquiry invariably helped the histoxian along here, and he then related how the carriage lamps were still twinkling in the distance, when the young overseer chap, who had been brought over by the parson from France or Fiji, came rushing up the cross-road more dead than alive, and in a powerful rage. He had a white cloth twisted about his forehead, and the lower part of his face was ornamented with plaster, and presented an appearance that Mr Hatfield described as " creepy." His face, oven where it was not plastered or bound, was pale aa the tollkeeper explained, and his black eyes looked all the blacker by the contrast.

The new comer had inquired breathlessly for the carriage, and on being told that it had passed, and beingshown the rapidly disappearing lamps, he bad shaken his fiat and started with furious but uncertain sfcepB in pursuit. Mr Hatfield had shouted and remonstrated with him in vain, and had finally hobbled after hip, and seen the figure stagger and fall, rise again, and fall once more. Further it was related, how on reaching the aide of the prostrate man, Mr Hatfield had found him conscious, bufc expending his little remaining strength in breathing frantic incoherent curses against the objects of his anger, and the whole story concluded with the item that lent it its chief flavour of romance and impropriety. The lady in the carriage was Annette Maturin, which explained the sequel of the pursuer's anger, although it did not explain the plaster and bandages. The long and short of the matter was-— as Mr Hatfield aptly put it — that Master Gerald — a owdacious young dog as ever was — had run away with the sister. "It ia strange," mused Mr Wycherloy, seated shivering in ,the library at Orafers, as the small hours of the night give place to the smaller and more uncomfortable hours of the morning. "Something serious must have happened ; no light matter would have kept him away to night of all nights. . Poor Gerald, how we used to enjoy these midnight ' confabs,' and how few of them we have had of late." The curate once more fell into a train of reflection engendered by his recent contrition at having harboured thoughts other than friendly in the first throes of his bitter disappointment. Gerald was just now the central figure about which he weaved his reminiscences and a strong, perfect, almost godlike figure Mr Wycherley painted him, " Poor Gerald !" h<> repeated once more with a slight sigh. "We will be better, closer friends than ever when we next meet ; after a little time that is, after I have had a htile time to forget." It was a hard word that " forget," and it would not bear dwelling upon just then. So Mr Wycherley rose, and after a final peep into Gerald's room, gave him up for the time being, and entered his own. Here he found the hurried note signed " G. H." that caused him to hold his breath in astonishment, and to wonder seriously whether Crafers wa3 a building lying under some baleful enchantment ; a building accursed amongst its fellows, and set aside for the commission of erratic actions. Gerald had gone suddenly without a word of warning, with Annette. He entreated his old friend's patience until he could explain the pressing reasons for this step. Let him wait, and let him be charitable in the meantime. He — Gerald, was to marry her — the girl was safe. " If I thought she were not ," muttered the usually phlegmatic curate ; and he crunv

pled the paper quickly ■in his clenched hand.

Morning came at last, a time of gloom nnd bewilderment at Crafers. Mr Wycherley was to have departed by the early train, but he hid delayed for some hours to see and confer with Mis 3 Grahame.

Ni-lly was as much surprised, and far more hoi rifted at the news than her companion. She had all an orthodox young lady's feeling of horror at a secret flight. Improper ! was a word far' too mild to express its character. As for Gerald — her cousin and old play-mate, almost all her ancient affection for him seemed changed to a feeling of disgust and disappointment, It had never been like Gerald to be mean or shabby in conduct or sentiment ; but what else could she call this ? And above all, what possible reason could there be for such an escapade ? " Is not Gerald his own master ?" said Nelly bitterly. "He could have pleased himself about marrying or not marrying this girl, without going to work in such an underhand way." " It is more than I can understand," said the parson, shaking his head despondently. " Perhaps we shall hear afterwards. Anyhow there ia uothing to be done - now. It is too late for advice." " You might as well advisa a brass-headed door nail," exclaimed Miss Grahame indignantly. "I had taken Gerald in hand so far as pumping his secrets from him and giving advice was concerned. , He was just getting on nicely — at least I thought so — when this hap pens. I shall wash my hands of him from this day forward, and shake the dust of Craf era off my feet." Mr Wycherley had it in his mind to say that little dust could accumulate in so small a compasa, but he did not feel quite equal to the gallantry and let the opportunity pass. One thing he was determined upon. He would, as Gerald urged, think no worse of his frinud until he heard the explanation of the affair ; and he would never for one moment allow a doubt as to his honour to cross hia mind. It would be as mad to doubt Annette —that girl with innocence and honesty stamped on every lineament of her face. "He will deal fairly and honourably with her, I will be sworn," said the parson to himself. "It would not be possible for Gerald to do otherwise. I pray^only that he may make her happy." ' Late in the morning the housekeeper came with a startled face to say that Mr Wycherley was wauted, and the latter, proceeding to the library, was confronted by the same pale- ' visaged figure, of which Mr Mike Hatfield had so much to tell. But the curato had, so far, heard nothing of Mr Hatfield's story— he knew nothing of the travelling carriage and its pursuer, and only recognised to his horror FranQois Maturin ; his features disfigured, and his whole countenance haggard from the effects of excitement and pain. " You needn't stare at this," exclaimed the visitor, making a nervous motion, as though he would hide his face. ' The » hound that did it shall be whipped for it. I have come to talk to you about something else." "I am astonished to see you," said Mr Wycherley, averting his bewildered eyes. " I suppose, theugh, I ought not to be surprised at anything now. When you disappeared he came ; now that he has disappeared you come; It seems like a box trick at a pantomime, or — or— a merry-go-round." " I didn't come here to play the fool, or to talk about merry-go-rounds," said Maturin, brusquely. • "No! quite so," said the curate, in some trepidation. It is about him," with an angry jerk of his head, "that I am going to speak." "Of Captain Hertford !" " Of the dog that left here last night." " You will remember," said Mr Wycherley, with great distinctness, "that you are speaking of my friend, and that you are standing in his house." " Your friend !" Maturin laughed hoarsely and derisively^ " See here ; lam come to speak to you in consequence only of some gossip that I heard yonder." " Indeed." "They say," continued the young man, peering intently into the curate's face, " that you were sweet upon her, too, and that he tricked you as well as befooled her. Ia that true?" # < ' " It is horrible," said Mr Wycherley, aghast, " that you should talk in this wayof your own sister. I will not stand, by -and hear it, and just as little will I stand by and hear you insult Captain Hertford. You had better SO." " You are a fool," retorted the other roughly, " but all the same you had better listen to what I say. You do love the girl. "I can see it in your face, and you have not denied it. In that case, hear me.". " What do you wish to say ? If it concerns Captain Hertford, it had bettor be left unsaid by you." < « "Ifc does concern him — ifc concerns my sister — it concerns ypu — and me — me above all others." Maturin snapped his teeth together involuntarily with a revengeful scowl. Then he leant forward, and grasping the curate's arm, spoke in a lower tone, each word of his speech burning its place in the memory of his auditor. "This, man— this Gerald Hertford— whom you bpast as your friend— has run away with my sister— with your sweetheart that was to have been — because he dared not slay here and face me. He is married already. He has a wife living in France, and I charged him with it last night." i "Ifc is false," said Mr Wycherley, with a desperate effort. But his cheeks were blanched, and his voice quivered as he Bpoke. • " It in true," said Maturin, " I swear it — aa true as Gospel. As true as ifc is that the game is only half finished. She is in Paris— a miserable woman of whom he is ashamed. He has kept the secret well, but not well enough." '* I will not believe this," faltered Mr Wycherley once mor^. "Where are your proofs ? You are his enemy, I know. I overheard some words of yours in' this house not long' ago. It is some malicious fable you have framed," " Fable ! Proofs !" echoed Maturin, with contemptuous rage. " I could give you the proof of your own eyes and ears. You did not care for Annette after all, or you would hear of her disgrace differently." "Her disgrace?" The curate started up with wild eyes and passionately working features. " Show me this ! Prove thiß to me, and-" The haggard face of young Maturin bright' ened, and he smiled sardonically at the other's emotion. " And if it is true, what then ?" "If it is true," repeated Mr Wycherley, bringing the words with difficulty 1 from his ashen lips ; "if it is true ; may God forgive him— for I will not."

(To he continued.)

—A little four-year-old staitled her mother after praying for all her friends one night by adding: "And God please to bleßß the butcher* boy who brings ub our meat." i