CHAPTER XXXVI.—A STARTLING DISCOVERY.

Otago Witness, Issue 2511, 30 April 1902, Page 60

CHAPTER XXXVI.— A STARTLING DISCOVERY.

The first d-» \ out thinned the dinner 1 table of the Bangoon considerably. Saville, who was as good a sailor as need be, came across a vaguely familiar face on deck. '"Vivian Tallantire? '" he queried uncertainly. "Ye.*," &a;d TulL.ntire. "Who are you? Oh, I remem'byr; you are Saville Carew." The two young men dropped into conversation. It would have amused Saville to come across the object of his former unfounded jealousy if it -had not also aroused memories of a painful kind. Tallantire, it tianspired, had been called home suddenly by his uncle's death, and was returning to India merely to settle certain aftdirs- of hijs own before he left the country altojjether. " I've had about enough of it," he said. " England's good enough for me. What aie you going out for? " •" Pleasure ! '' said Saville, laconically. The other man laughed. '" I never could understand the globetrotting mania some of you fellows seem to get. I shall be glad enough to marry and settle down.'' " Marry? " repeated Saville, curiously. "Yes." said the other man. "There's a little girl out there, you know." He nodded towards the east with a smile and a softening of his eyes. " That's really why I am going back. Governor's an the Aitillery. 1 was afiand we should have to wait.'" Saville chewed the cud of his reflections w ith the end of hi? cigarette. "Do you know ,"' he said slowly, " I heard something about you and Miss Cheverley fiorn Dalbiac while I -was away yachting wah him. He >aid you — you were after her." " Oh, rot ! " said Tallantire. He laughed. '" I won't deny that once upon a time — but that's ancient history. I wish people wouldn't tell such lies. If they get out to India before I do there will be the deuce to pay. By the way, aren't you engaged to Mi&s Cheverley yourself? "' " I was," said Saville. His confidence stopped there. "By the way, did you give a luncheon at Richmond the other <\a\ ': " " No," said Tallantire. " Why? I haven't been to Richmond since I came home." "Been to the theatre much?"' " My clear fellow. I am "in mourning for lily uncle, who has left me £5000 a-year! What are you driving at?" " Somebody has been yarning, that* all," said Saville. looking at the sea. " I say." cried Tallantire, with the sympathy of a lover, "there hadn't been any damage done, has there?" "I can't reckon it up jet." raid Su\ ille. uncertainly, " but I am glad I met you See you again by-and-b\i\ I want to think ' He strolled away alone to meditate. None of the things, that Dalbiac had told him on the w-'bt were tiue. it appeared He iud conclud-cd, on learning of Hilda's Visit, lf\ TivOanH T t.h;jf L a. f hip Jjym^jjjjjjnyyj^ !_

ings between the girl and her old lover had been magnified by Dalbiac's correspondence, and again by Dalbiac ; that she had been asked to rhe Richmond luncheon, but had not cared enough about it to remain at home on that account. The whole business had seemed of so little consequence, indeed, that he had not troubled to inquire into it, occupied as he had been 4>y weightier affairs. " But the story is an unfounded fabrication," he mused. " Dalbiac must have made it all up himself. Why? Did he know, by any chance, tha-t she was going away? He is too rich a man, surely, to have played such a mian trick for the sake of £10,000? Besides, he is venomous — there is no mistake about it. It almost looks as though he meant to ruin me in order to separate us ! " His pulses quickened. He began to suspect at last that there was more in the affair than had seen the light before. Suppose Dalbiac's challenge had not been spontaneous, born of an exicited moment, but had been led up to deliberately by a man who wanted to revenge himself upon a woman who had scorned him? Dalbiac's attitude throughout the cruise assumed a natural sequence suddenly to his enlightened eyes — a sequence of which the crisis had been inevitable. Dalbiac hnd had letters from London. It might be assumed that he had taken the trouble to keep himself informed about Hilda's movements. And did the plot, which seemed to be unravelling itself like a tangled skein of thread of which the beginning has been found at last, stop there? " Is it possible that he asked me to be his guest with evil intentions in his mind?'' wondered Saville. " Have I been the dupe of a villain throughout? A man who would take advantage of private information to j make such a bet would be capable of anyj thing ! Certainly he has no reason to love I me. The invitation must h.ive been given with a motive, though he could not have known then that Hilda was going to Ireland. In that case was he relying upon some connivance of his own to prevent her meeting me if necessary?" I The landing at Southsen and the men ! ing with hfc wife was next reviewed. H's I heart throbbed. It was strange, now he came to think of it. that a womm who knew him should be the first person he came across ; it was stil' more remarkable that lie should have forgotten the introduction she claimed so completely that, rack his memory as he might, he conld iecall no trace of it. Had he ever seen her before at all? Or was she a tool of Dalbiac's? — another factoi, unknown 10 him, in this bnital game at which he had been so completely fooled? "These things don't happen out of books," he told himself. "It is impossible! I am mad ! "' I But he could not dismiss his suspicions so lightly, now tha+ they were aroused. Had Laura been prepared for his. proposal of marriage? Had Dalbiac selected a. woman of his acquaintance who could and would marry him. in order to ensure him the opportunity of separating himself from Hilda for ever? A phrase hi<« wife had used came back to Mm with peculiar significance : "She won't be faithful, you'll find. You'll soon hear of her engagement — to Sir George Dalbaic, perhaps.'' The remark had struck him as curious even at that time. He remembered asking her haw she knew that Dalbaic was acquainted with Hilda, and how she had coloured <is on recognition of a s-lip. Was it no chance remaik which had coupled Hilda's name with D&lbiac's, but knowledge that the man cared for her, and perhaps intended to try his luck again? " And she thinks that I have treated her badly ; she doesn't know why I gave her up ! " he remembered. ''I Lave left her in the mood to accept the first man of position wlic asks for her. 1 have done just what a devil who loved her could have asked for : married his tool, and gone away to give him a clear field ! " Did this conspiracy exist in his imagination alone, the work of disorganised nerves, or was it the sober, earnest truth? At one moment he thought that his suspicions were too wild to be possible ; at the next he seemed to see the whole affair spread out before him like a game of chess of which he could follow every move. If Dalbiac wanted Hilda still, or merely wished to punish her for his rejection by defrauding her of her lover, his actions agreed with his motives equally well. " It was not Ronald that he wanted on. the Gieyhound, it was I," he told himself. " And I went — I went ! Whatever he wanted me to do I did. I fell into every tiap he laid for me. How he must be laughing — my God ! But he laughs be&t who laugh* last."' His biain was swimming ; lie could not see the sea for the blood in his eye.«. He mu*t find out whether his suspicions were correct. It might be that he had imagined too much, but unless, he knew for certain, he would go mad. Back to England! He would have given ten years of his life to be confronting at this moment the woman who was his wife. At Naples he left the steamer and came home overland without stopping an hour all the way. If all his wild conjectures were mistaken he would feel a fool ; but the more he thought over what had taken place, the more certain he became that this had been a detp-laid scheme on the part of Dalbiac. "Perh.ip* at this moment he is renewing his i-uit," lie thought. "And I begged Mm to say nothing about the' wager, but to keep his own secret for me — to let her remain under the impression that I was a cad ! By this time she will know of my marriage ; she will believe, no doubt, that I im away on my honeymoon." P. i?-ion consumed him. His hatied of Dalbiac grew &o intense that on the long nights of the journey he imagined himself struggling with his enemy — throttling him — Mining blows on the other man's handsome, cynical face, until it no longer reiimbled anything human A savage thirst to kill was on him,

if it were true that be was the victim of a conspiracy so vile. Did Dalbiac want Hilda? That was +he question which interested him more than all. "He shall not have her ! " he swore. "Any man sooner! She shall know all there is to know, and she will be the first to tell him what a scoundrel he is ! " It was natural that he should change his mind a dozen times before the journey was over ; nevertheless he reached London with a ferment of emotion in his breast and a fire in his eyes. The truth — he would know it at last. He would Trring it from the woman he had I married, with violence, if need be. Rossmore Mansions looked as shabbily genteel as ever when he leaped out of his hansom at the door. His wife's maid had not served her apprenticeship to service in Mayfair. She looked surprised to see him, and hesitated, gaping, with the door in her hand. "Well, what's the matter with you?' asked Saville, impatiently. "Isn't yoir mistress at home? " '" I'll see, sir." "Rubbish!" said Saville. "You must know whether she is in or not." He entered without further parley, and opened the drawuu^-room door. His wife was sewing, and started up with an inarticulate gasp. . (To be concluded.) j

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