THE

Otago Witness, Issue 2425, 5 September 1900, Page 56

THE

By ESTHER MILLER, Author of " Should She Have Spoken? " " The

St. Cadix Case," &c, &c.

[COPYRIGHT.]

CHAPTER X.— BIRTH OF A SOUL,

"My God!'' he screamed. "She is Octavia Lennox! And she asked me for that thousand pounds ! It Avas for her !" "Lucian! No— no. Poor old chap. . . . Lucian!" The victim who saAV the thing that he had done in its true light at last flung himself face downwards on the bed. He Avrithed like a man in the agonies of death, his eyes bloodshot, distended, foam on his lips. "She told me it was to save her brother —her brother ! And she hasn't one. -She begged and lied, and tore my heart out of me. Delilah! v . . And I hwed her so Avell that T could not even tell her I was sacrificing everything for her sake. . . . I Avrote to the lawyers, and she did not know." "You did that, Lucian V God pity you!" 'It isn't the money ; I don't care for that. But I loved her !" he moaned. "I loved her. I loved her." The other man Aviped his face. He felt sick. What could he say? ' Words of consolation Avould have been a ghastly mockery. There Avas no consolation possible. "And-I &ent you the confounded money! I ruined you ! If I had only .vaited to bring it! If I had only Avritten ! If I had only_ had a notion that you Avere going to do such a Quixotic, asinine thing as to confess ! I could curse myself ! Lucian, get up and stamp on me ! It's my fault. I stopped in toAvn to fool about after a Avoman — instead of coming straight doAvn to you. I shall never forgive myself as long as I liA*e !" The other man got up slowly. His face Avas seamed as though with illness. "Don't talk rot, Tony," he said. "IVe only myself to thank. You Avarned me long ago, and — I—lI — I Avas a fool." His voice Avas laboured — he could scarcely breathe. "I am choking," hoTAvhispered, hoarsely, "choking ! My God ! That such Avomen can live ! And Avith her face — her eyes ! I could have sworn she loved me." He Avalked to the Avindow, SAveeping the hair from his brow". "I used to talk to her. I remember telling her how I had lived for years in anticipation of my freedom ; lioav Nai'd I had often found it to keep straight ; hoAV I had set my teeth and Avorked — for the future. And she's robbed me. Inhuman ! vile ! Oh, horrible ! Tony — Tony" — he caught the other man's shoulder suddenly in a grip of steel — "what can I do? I must do something. Can a man bear a, thing like this in peace? I Avant to kill her ! I Avant to take her Avhite lying throat between my hands, and squeeze it to death. I Avant to tAvine my fingers in her hair, and drag her to my feet, and stamp oiit the fatal beauty Avhich came not from heaven, but from hell !" "Steady, steady, Lucian !" "Would it be Avrong? Is it wrong to destroy the serpent Avhich crosses Dne's path? She is a A'ile woman, and she shall feel some of the bitterness she has given me before I haA'e done Avith her !" "Liician, where are you going '>."■ \

OR half a minute, which seemed endless, the man upon whom this bombshell had burst sat perfectly still, as though stunned. Only his mobile face —hard now and ghastly — showed the progress of thought hastening to climax — the grand rush of comprehension

Anthony caught him by the arm as he turned to leave the room. "To her."' "Yon must not."' "I v.'ill !" He paused — bins man whom a "wrong so cruel had driven mad, and turned with sudden' gentleness to his friend. "Don't fear, Anthony ; .she has ruined my life ; I won't fling my soul to~ the dogs for her too ! I won't lay hands on her, but I'm going to tell her something of what she is — for once in her shameless life she shall see hersef as in a looking-glass. Goodbye." '"Come back afterwards/ said Anthony, huskily. "Yes, I will come back." * He scarcely saw the pavement he walked on, the people he passed. The fiist emotion — agony — was over now, and in place of it was only pa^sior. — passion which devoured him like a flame — passion which made him deaf and blind and indifferent to everything in heaven and in earth except his great wrong, and this woman lie had loved. If another man had served him such a trick it would have been bad enough, but the means she had employed, and the cold-blooded deliberation of the whole plan were almost incredible. Of her moods, her hesitation, her occasional regrets, he knew nothing. The result had been as disastrous-, in any cas.e, for him. 'And she was only a girl, toe — only twenty-two! j He understood now the cause of her headache. She no longer wished to see him, of course, now that her work was done. Probably she was preparing to leave Brighton with her stepfather — peihaps she had al- j ready gone. He was wrong in that, at any rate. She had not gone when he asked for her at the door. "Ls Mr — Mr Somerville at home alaoV he asked the servant girl.''No, sir." '"Miss Arnold is in the drawing room';" "Yes, sir. I've just taken up the tea."' "You need not show me the way — 1 know it,"' he said, and went upstairs softly, alone. The last time he had entered (his house what had his feelings bean* What were they now? He would have been ready to give his life for this woman then ; at this moment his only idea was to make her realise the damage she had done, to make her see herself a^ she was. And she would have to listen ! The man was out — it was fortunate, and he would lock the door ; she should not get away from him, and no one should interfere. He would not touch- her, however she provoked him, because she was a woman, and he had sworn on his conscience to do no more than speak ; but if dagger,? could be in a man's -speech, they should be in his. ' She would be frightened probably. He could imagine, as h& mounted the stairs, his brain working with the unnatural activity of an , unnatural state, how she would blench and whiten at the sight of him. He did not pity her. It would do < her good, perhaps ; make the acid of his words bite deeper 'if her "wonderful composure were disturbed. He paused an instant outside' the door. Yes, she was there. He could -hear the tinkle of a teaspoon. The words ot her note came back to him : "I am too ill to write more than a, few lines. . . . To-morrow I shall be all right, and then "I shall have much to s-iy to you." Curiously enough that lie, trivial in comparison to a list he could have named, made the man's blood boil again. He flung open the door. She sprang to her ieet with a cry, and her cup slipped from her nerveless hand to the floor. 'The spilt liquid* streamed on the carpet in a little pool — he noticed, God knows -why, and also that il had left a stain upon her gown. "Lucian !'' she whispered. "My God !" The look of him -was enough for her. He knew. "You A'ile woman !" he said. Her hand crept to her throat, and she swayed slightly, standing before him with dilated eyes fixed on his face. Her own was ghastly with emotion — with fear of him, perhaps, as of a wild beast come to slay. "I'm not going to kill you,"' he added, huskily.; "you" needn't be afraid. You deserve it, but I wouldn't soil my • hands with you. The remembrance that I have ever kissed you, loved you, will be degradation enough to last me for a good many years."' "Why have you come?'' she asked. "On a fool's errand — woi'thy of the dupe — to tell you a- home truth or two, which I pray to God you may carry to your grave !"' "Oh !'' She put her hands to her ears shrinking. "Don't be cruel to me, I'm only a woman.'' The man's eyes blazed at her. "If you had a heart instead of a stone in your breast, what I say might hurt you one-thousandth part as much as you have hurt me ! I loved you ; I gave iip more for you, in my mad infatuation, than ever a sane- man gave up for a Avoman. Have you received my letter of confession yet? While you lied, cheated, ruined me, I sacrificed the future I had striven "all my ife to attain, without even telling you of the sacrifice lest it should cause you one pang of regret for me ! You called on me for protection when my friend avoulcl have Avarned me of what you Avere, and because —Heaven help me ! — I looked in your eyes and found there the sham of what should be, 1 came to your side, and took your hand. And you pretended to be grateful — you feigned love, you kissed me ! God ! Avhen I think of it, I can only ' Avonder at the patience which is in man .to bear the things I have borne from you and let you live !" He could see her breast rise and fall like a surging tide, and she flung her head back as though she could not breathe, Avith an inarticulate murmur and face upraised. "If I had walked the gutters of London, and taken the first Avoman I touched Avith my hand as she passed, I must have chosen bettei than you. And I thought I kne-AV ! I vraj? so sure that even after I had left jrou yesterday I cjyjag jjack to jrlu^

yon asked at the cost of all I had to give. Ah, woman! — "' his voice shook suddenly — "what a glorious woman it might* have been that you. have made into a thing) so base ! You had so much — a face to conjure with, a form divine, the knowledge of the true ideal — or you could never, have been able to act up to it so well'.t/ Only the soul was wanting — the intangible""' quality you have been taught to mock at,-' very likely — and the quality without which,' all your beauty is to me but as rich clothing on a skeleton — the wrappings of death !" A great light came into the Avoman's eyes .suddenly, and she no longer shrank and) blenched, but stood erect, as though that' light had reached even tojhe soul he would deny. - -"• "Stop!" she cried. "-You h^a.ve saidi enough. You don't know me .after all. How should you? I didn't know myself." She tore. open the bosom of her drjess, and took out a packet. "There are your bank notes : take them back !" With a superbly dramatic gesture she stooped and thrusft a paper into the glowing "fire. "There is your letter *of admission ! ,The pas'tf burns Avith it! ,Your fortune' is yours again. ' I love j-ou. Now go !" The woman who had risen i to so grandi an atonement, the man Avhose fortune sha had restored, confronted each other in tense silence. Octavia's breast Avas heav- N ing, and it seamed to Lucian that she had never looked so beautiful. He, too, was moved by the stormy scene which had ended f-o remarkably, to a pitch of emotion Avhicb made his face almost as Avhite as hers. Yet he did not speak — words had left him ; he only stared at her with a strange light in his eyes as though she Avere something he had never seen before. The woman's throat and lips began to quiA-er suddenly. "Wiry doii't you go?" she said. "I am not goftig." "What do you mean?" "Slow]}-, as their eyes clung together, lie opened his arms to her — wide — wide, as though he would clasp her for all eternity. "Will yoii come?" he asked. She seemed dazed — incomprehensive. "Through love," he said, huskily," "you have found your birthright — a soul as beautiiul as your face. To me the Aroman Avho has sinned and atoned is better worth winning than the girl Avho has been shielded from temptation all her life. * Don't you understand? I love you — I Avant you still, Octavia ! Octavia \" "You Avant me still? You forgive?" 'There is no, longer anything to forgive." An inarticulate sound broke from the woman's lips ; a heavenly radiance ' shone in her eyes. She sank on her knees suddenly, and hid her face against him. "Lucian !" "Don't,"- he sobbed. "Don't !" and took her in his arms, and raised her to his breast"l - am" no hero to forgive you ; there 0} no need to drop at my feet because- 'I acted like a man. , Yoii, have done the noblest, grandest thing a woman , ever did. The past is dead — the writing on the slate sponged oub by that oiie . moment of your hfc ! Don't cry," OctaA-ia !"' . His OAvn eyes were ~h et as his lips sought) her cheek. She .clung to him resuonsively, weeping still. "I ATould die for you !" "Do better. Live for me."' "All my life, 1 swear!" she gasped. "All my life !"' "Yes ; kiss me." It Avas their lips that met this time. "When did you begin to care?" "I -think it Avas the moment Avhen you took my part against your friend — when you believed I-\was good — only I did not know it then." "Ki.-ss me again !" he said. "What a half-hour ! Hell — and Heaven ! In future it Avill be Heaven always. How happy Aye shall be!" "I don't deserve it. lam almost afraid to take it," she moaned. "I am the best judge of that. When, Avill you mary me?" "When you like," she said. "Next Aveek? — next Wednesday?" "Yes." 5 "Octavia !" . It Avas a. sigh of happiness ; and _he clasped her closer still. ' ' "I am afraid/ she said by-and-bye, "that t Uilbert Avill feel sold." .Her tears Avere dried iioav, and they, stood at the Avindow, his arm round her, looking at the sea. "Do you think he'll bully you?" cried Lucian, quickly. "I Avon't stand that." "He has a temper," she said. "Not that I am afraid of him — now ; I don't think I ever Avas afraid of him. He had an influence, of course. He has been kind to me in a Avay." "Kind !" repeated the man between his teeth. "He might haA-e ill-treated me after all, Lucian, and he has controlled himself a great deal, I think." "We Avon't quarrel over his qualifications for paternity," said Lucian, smiling. "He is a rogue ; but if he has been an amiable rogue to you, I suppose I must 'not insult him in his oavii rooms ! We must coma to a little agreement of our OAvn, that is all. I'll have to talk to him one day Avhen youi areynot there.' "About?"' "Himself. ' I shall propose that he does not disgrace my Avife in ever capital in Europe — for a consideration. Out of no concern for him, Octavia ; I'm not posing — I Avant no credit foi magnanimity ! I should like to kick him doAvnstairs !" "Here he comes,"' she said, the smilei dying on her lips. "C4o- away, Lucian.Quick, quick! Don't tell him — any* thing !" ■' "You're afraid of him, although you denyj it ! 1 shall stay Avith you !" "No ; only I don't Avant a row. You are , hot, and so is he— when he has 'nothing to gain by keeping cool. Go away, Lv« cian!" "Your hands are 2old!" H&was holding, them. "I won't go \mless you come Avith me. Tell* him lately You are upset and

■ "Then I'll come with you," she said. "Wait for me in the sitting room downstairs. There is nobody there." He obe3'ed, and she dressed herself and fol lowed him as soon as she heard v the drawing room door close behind Townshend. They strolled out together along the sea front in the dark. Octavia was quiet, but she had never .been more womanly and lovable. She voiced the feeling presently which made lier eyes, her hand, seek Ms. "It is so delicious to know that you know," she said ; "that I can talk freely, that there is nothing to conceal." He pressed her hand in warm response. "Were you ever really happy before?" "Never," she said, quietly, "in all my life." "That's good to hear. You do love me?" "That letter of yours for the cousin you had never seen finished the work your unfounded confidence in me began," she said. "I had been jiersuading myself that your honesty wasn't perfect after all, and it was — it was! The contrast between us .was too frightful. I could not bear it. " • He glowed. : "Then I am rewarded' for -what it cost »ie to write," he said. "The straight . course paid" for once. J> * .• "I should never, have admitted that 1 .■#red," .she 'told him, <f if you had been treacherous too. '. It was for your contrast to everything 1 had known that - 1 loved you. Oh, Lucian, Lucian, what a good fellow 'you are !" "Nonsense !" - "I am not worthy to touch your hand. You ga^3 up twenty thousand for me. I could kill myself. lam a beast ; a wretch !"' '"You are what you would always have been if you had Jiad a chance — if you had been brought up like other girls." "You forgive because you are a man and love me," said she. "But I know. When I have made you happy for ten years, when I have been the best wife that a woman can be, I'll respect myself a little — not be-fore !" They had tea for the sake of the light and warmth, and smiled at each other in a happy mutual thought. "A forerunner," he said. "How cheerful it is to see the woman pouring out tea." He kissed her hand surreptitiously. "Don't be a fool, Lucian!" "Don't you like it?" "It gives me a thrill to the marrow of my bones," she confessed, deliciously. "Do it again. How silly we are ! I feel so young. I believe lam not more than seventeen and that I went to my first party yesterday in white muslin and a blue sash !"' ' "Thank Heaven that isn't true ! I hate ingenues!" . "'My poor Lucian, I am afraid you have rushed to the other extreme. I am old in knewledge of this wicked world !" / "We know each other now," he said ; "we can talk to each other with the sympathy of understanding. I found your heart and soul for you. What a bond !" . "Of steel," -she said. "Always, oh Lv- j cian !" ' They were silent for a moment, moved ; nerves could not be normal in either of them after what they had, undergone, and both were as sensitive to a look, a word, as a harp to the touch of a hand. But they were both happy. This woman who had strayed so far, who had been saved by a God-sent passion on the brink of Hell, was almost divine in her new-found sincerity. She, who had been cold so long to men, glowed in delicious tenderness and pathos, sympathy ; she could not even feign the moods she had used with such success ; it would have been an insult to'this gieat love that she had won.' And the man, natural as he had always been, attracted her doubly now fear was removed. He had been the enemy, before whom she must be always on the defensive, alert. In this restfulness of entire comprehension she could look at him and wonder at the magnanimity of such- a love, and worship him for the power which his truth and passion had wielded over her at last. "You are my Pygmalion," she said to him. "I was stone, and you gave me life." • It was late and chilly before they reached home. Lucian kissed her in the kindly shadow at the corner of the street. , "Take care of yourself, Octavia. I wish I weren't obliged to go back to town in the morning. I shall look out for you at the station. Can Ido anything for you in the shopping line?"' "That," she laughed, "would be the crowning sacrifice of all ! I won't victimise you any more, my poor Lucian. Write to me." "Of course. And you — tell me how you get on with Townshend. Don't be bullied, or I shall bully you." "I can take care of myself." "I'll wire you my train on Saturday,"' •lie paid. "And on Wednesday " "My cheeks are blushing," she said; "all to themselves !" He wrung her hand again, laughing. "And I am laughing the other side of my mouth. No accident has happened ■to you for twenty-two years, but I feel that directly my back is turned the house will collapse on you, or a thunderbolt will fall. My spine creeps with a host of absurd terrors. I should like to lock you up safely in a glass case, and take away the "key. God bless you, dear." In half a dozen yards she caught him up again. ■ "Lucian, you've " been good to me; oh, you've been good to me ! Words fail ; I haven't said half enough. I could lie down at your feet* and put your foot upon any breast." I "My dear!" " He kissed her again, on her lips, his eyes (Shining. - - - "There is no need for wor.ds now; we Enow. , Good-bye." "| It was not until he reached his hotel i;hat he remembered Anthony Hill, and now ihe had left him.

Seven o'clock had struck some time ago ; wojuld foe dining?, but he .would

like to know. Lucian on to the Metropole and found his friend over his soup. "I haA*e asked myself to dine Avith you," he said, Avith almost boyish brightness. "But I am afraid my appetite avill be ladylike. I haA r e been eating cakes !" "You can joke !" cried Anthony, in a loav tone. His hand gripped Lucian's arm. "Sit doAvn, man. Are you hysterical — or AA'hat?" "1 Avas right after all!'' said Lucian. 'She has a beautiful, soul ! What do you think happened, Anthony V She destroyed that letter of mine before my eyes, and returned me your notes. She loves me !"' "She has throAvn up the game now, and given you back your money? Impossible !" "True !" "Good heavens ! And you — Avhat haA r e you done?" ' "I have asked her to marry me next Aveek. " "This," said Anthony Hill solemnly to his plate, "is romance. I don't believe it !" "You must come to the Avedding all the same. Nobody else Avill be there." "But does Miss Lennox echo the invitation?'' • Lucian smiled. " "She loves me, and you are my friend."' "But" it was I Avho ■ Lucian, no avoman avouM ever forgive interference like mine!''", '■ "She has nothing to forgive," said Lucian, .quietly. "You _ were right, and she Avas, Avuong, "and she Avill tell you so. Aren't you — old chap, haven't you something pretty to say?" "By Jove ! haven't I !" cried Hill. He put out his hand and AATifng his friend's. "God bless you, old felloAA- ;, this is the best news you could haA-e brought me. You haA r e chosen Arell ; only a Avoman aa'lio Avas true metal inside could have done such a splendid thing. YouYe gone through fire, both of you, and you're proA r en. I should like to shake hands Avith Miss Lennox as soon as she'll let me. What's this?" "Your thousand pounds. As many thanks/ Tony. I don't AA'ant it noAv." "No," said Anthony, grimly, pocketing the notes, "you'll be able to giA r e me a lift by-and-bye, you blessed Croesus ! I don't press the loan on you, obserA'e. lam only too jolly thankful to get it aAvay from you again !" "That's all right,"' laughed Lucian. They Avere in the best of spirits. Lucian had something to be cheerful about, and Anthony could 'be sympathetic He Avas so delighted at the unexpected tifrn affairs had taken that his thoughts fleAv, manlike, to marking his appreciation of Octavia's atonement by a Avedding --resent that should be a present. Would she like diamonds ? Meanwhile champagne appeared. "Her health!" said Anthony. Names Avere unnecessary. They drank Avith enthusiasm and talked of many things. (To be continued.)