THE SPY.

Otago Witness, Issue 3149, 22 July 1914, Page 81

THE SPY.

By Ralph Coding,

[Copyright.] “I look at the case from a purely br»iness_ point of view,” Mr Balling affirmed, staring hard at his niece. “Your mother is left a widow with a debt to meet. I ask you to perform a particular piece of work for me, the payment for which is to be the wiping out of the aforesaid debt.” Sylvia looked down at the glove on her knee, straightening the empty fingers, crumpling them again. She lifted her eyes at last, meeting the hard, scrutinising look of the old man opposite. “I detest the idea of playing the spy,” she said. “But you detest still more the idea of refusing my offer,” he threw out quickly. “Perhaps. At least I detest the idea of my mother being hampered oy a debt that I haven’t the least chance of dealing with.” “Tour profession gives you exceptional chances,” Mr Balling said coolly. “As a nurse, you will have a certain amount of freedom. For instance, it won’t be at all singular for you to be about downstairs at night. The probability would be that you had gone to fetch something for your patient.” The half laugh that went with this last whipped colour into Sylvia’s cheeks. “Your mother is not strong. I doubt the effect of worry on so frail a woman ” . j “You have me in a cleft stick,” she said. “Give me the details.” Mr Balling’s voice with its metallic note set forth his requirements. She was to accept the post of nurse to an invalid gentleman called Legrand. In this family she was to make herself liked, trusted. With an appraising glance at Sylvia’s face Mr Balling commented that this should be easily accomplished. She was, if possible, to obtain access; to an old oak writing bureau and have a peep at certain private papers. ■ " “How long am I to stay there?” “I don’t suppose it will be necessary for you to be there longer than a month. After which you will reap your reward.” She caught at a possible reprieve. “There will be many applicants for the post. I may not gat it.” ; “You will get it.” There was ■ a note of assurance in Mr Balling’s voice that showed Sylvia the futility of her hope. She gave a little gesture of assent to the assurance of his voice, and added, “I must have more details. How shall I know exactly how to play so despicable a part?” He nodded his approval of her sudden docilitv and began to give her a plan of campaign. Sylvia' listened, her brow puckered, one hand beating nervously against the other. Her mother’s face, drawn and haggard, came before her eyes, and abruptly her hands lay still upon her knee. The grim old man. opposite was giving her a chance to lift a burden from weak shoulders; whereas worry for so frail a woman—Sylvia felt herself revolving in a circle, perpetually returning to this same point. She felt her uncle's eye on her again, appraising her looks. “Oh, you’ll do,” he chuckled suddenly'. “No one would suspect a woman with your looks, your Madonna face. You’re a pretty woman, my dear.” ■ Sylvia ignored this, asked a few last questions hurriedly, then got to her feet. She did not take Mr Balling’s outstretched hand, and she heard him laugh to himself at this refusal as she went out of the room. A week later Sylvia travelled south to take up her post as nurse to Mr Legrand. She found him a white-haired man,, kindly, humorous, a model patient. 'lt was difficult to think of him as a man who had wronged Mr Balling. “I shall find nothing,” Sylvia assured herself. “I shall be able to prove Uncle Balling in the wrong, most needlessly suspicious.” Mrs Legrand was a vivacious woman of sixty, and there were two unmarried daughters. A step-brother, Dick, spent all his holidays with them, one of the daughters informed Sylvia, and he was expected very shortly for his summer vacation. Sylvia was received and treated as an equal, even as a friend. And this gave her a feeling of suffocation. She felt that when these people looked into her eyes they must surely see her secret in them. Mr Legrand referred one evening to the expected arrival of his stepson. Sylvia was busy about her patient’s room, and his eyes followed her neat figure approvingly ■as he spoke. “A fine fellow ,my stepson,” he said. He laughed a little to himself. “One of the finest things about him was that he had sense as a young boy to accept me cheerfully as a stepfather, didn’t act the injured martyr. I’m as fond of him as of my own children. Pie’s taken up medicine, and he’s house surgeon at one of the big hospitals up north.” Sylvia’s thoughts abruptly centred on herself at the last sentence. Memory brought a quick flush to her cheeks, sent -pictures' like revolving films across her mind. Her last months of training in the hospital—a handsome young medical student who came —his chivalry—the touch of reverence in his face and manner when he spoke to her—a few hurried sentences when she left the hospital about the day when he should have won a position and should seek her out and renew their friendship—the pulsing emphasis on the last word —and then silence—on her part three years private nursing, with memory moving by her side in comradeship. She became aware that Mr Legrand’s voice had struck a personal note. “Of all the nurses I’ve had I’ve taken most to you. We hope you’ll stay a long time with up ”

“Thank you,” Sylvia said. Shame was like a weight about her tongue. She told herself that she must do her work quickly and then leave this house for ever. To be treated kindly when you came to trick and deceive! To-night she would make her first venture. She laid her plans carefully, remembering Mr Balling’s instructions. When the family had retired she would go into the library and examine the oak writing bureau. She felt when the hour came, and she crept in a furtive fashion down the stairs, that she must surely look the part she played. Her uncle had called hers a Madonna face, and now she suddenly lifted one of her hands and brushed it across ner cheek aa if she should find some startling change there giving the lie to beauty. Shadows dwelt in the library like dark watching presences. Sylvia’s hand shook as she switched on the electric light, and stood hesitating in the middle of the floor. She found herself saying audibly, “I can’t, I can t. And even as she spoke necessity got her by the feet and sent her nearer to the writing bureau. She bent down examining the drawers; timorously, and with startled looks across her shoulder from time to time, she fell for the locks and pressed soft wax against them to their impression. She felt that she did this in a crude way not meriting success, but nervousness had robbed her of the power of moving adroitly. Her one desire was to do the thing she came to do and rush in a scared way from the room. There was a wind moaning about the fields, pushing persistently against the house, and now as she knelt at her work there came three smart taps as of someone s fingers against . the window-pane. oyJvia knelt rigidly, pinned motionless by nei rear. And the sound came again, more sharply, imperatively. Suddenly Sylvia swayed on her knees and bent in silent hysterical laughter. What tricks the night and the hour played her nerves I This sound was familiar, a mere play of trailing rose branches against the glass. Only, that afternoon they had had tea here in the library, and the samo branch had bent with the wind and beaten a tattoo against the -?lass. She got to her feet and went hurriedly towards the, window. She must see for herself that' there was no one there, that only the rose branch tricked her. She pulled the curtains aside and saw the rose branch swaying, dipping towards her, and nothing else. In the collapse of her fear she gave a quick exclamation of relief. Back at the bureau she began to work more steadily, realising the absurdity nf her recent panic; her fingers now gained a mmbleness in moving, a'deftness. Presently, still on her knees, she tinned her head over her shoulder, startled at a slight sound in the room. Against the doorway a man stood and stared at her. Sylvia remained on her knees, her hands hanging ihnp at her sides. Shu felt that the. power of moving had ceased to ha hers. Into a heavy silence his voice dioppecl. “Miss Locke—you.” “Yes, I,” she said in a whisper. He came a few steps into the room, still staring at Her. Something in his eyes, his way of looking at her, brought her to her feet, filled with a momentary energy. “How can you look at me like that?” she asked, her head thrown back, meeting his eyes. “How do you come here your* self, in this house, at this hour?’ . “I am Mr Legrand’s stepson,” he said quietly. He added with deliberation. “And you are the woman I have made my ideal since I met you in the hospital three years ago.” She put her hands out waveringly as it to entreat his silence and said hurriedly, “But you were Dr Smith ” “My mother’s name was Smith before she married Mr Legrand.” “Here I only .heard your Christian name. I did not know that you were someone I had met.” “I arrived late to-night after you had gone upstairs.” Then, “Why are you here?” he demanded. He looked at the writing bureau, at the implements she had been using. From these things his eyes went to her uniform, the sign of her office. He nodded slowly.' “You are my stepfather’s nurse, I suppose?” “Yes,” she said. She felt scorched by the flame of contempt in his eyes. “This is a strange meeting after three years,” he said lightly. The lightness of his tone stung her into sudden self-possession. She " stooped, gathered together the things she had been using, and began to move towards the door. “I can’t understand,” Dr Smith said. “Here in this house there is nothing to make you act the spy. My people—surely when you are near them you feel you are near truth, goodness.” “I have felt that,” she,said haltingly. “And now ” She broke off, her finger suddenly to her lip. “There’s someone coming.-’ The door opened and Mrs Legrand came into the room. She looked in amazement from one to the other. Instinctively Sylvia’s hands had gone behind her back biding the things she held. “I heard voices,” Mrs Legrand said. “What is the matter?” Dr Smith’s voice came instantly. "Miss Locke had to come down, I suppose, ort some necessary errand. I happened td meet bar, and we discovered that we were old hospital friends.” Sylvia felt the whip of his voice. Evefii though he shielded her he was giving he® a chance of escape. And impulsively shi cast aside his shielding. She faced Mri Legrand with flaming cheeks. The handj she had hidden she held out. mutely elo* quent with the things she held. “I am here on false pretences/' flha said, "and you whip me with your trust and kindness.” She suddenly felt the rush nf tears, of some hysterical showing of distress and she went stumbling from thf librarv. Tbe two who watched made lid atte- to stop her. AU-ue in her room Sylvia faced the

*vofst hour of her life. In this guise she liad shown herself to the man who had filed her dreams! Into a house where she played a despicable part he came and saw her as a man . might see a vase lying broken and useless at his feet. Sylvia heard a knock at her door, and before she had answered it was opened and Mrs Legrand came into the room. . “I must talk to you,” she said. “It is necessary that we should both explain things.” “Both ” Sylvia doubted. “1 will begin with my share of the explanation. I think I must tell you that I knew from the first that you were Air Balling’s niece.” “You knew that!” Sylvia said, amazed. “Just because of that I gave you the preference over the other applicants for the post of nurse. By means of you I wanted to try and heal an old, most unworthy quarrel. Mr Balling never forgave me for refusing to marry him and giving my love instead to Dick s father, who, was your uncle’s deadest friend. Your Uncle transferred his anger to pick when his father died; Dick is like him in temperament and in looks. Mr Balling would hate the thought of yon, his favourite niece, marrying the son of the man who supplanted him.” For a moment Mrs Legrand studied Sylvia’s face, saw the quick flush bn it. “In some way it came to your uncle’s ears that my son had met and immensely admired you. At a chance meeting I had with Mr Balling in town he told me this, for some reason of his own seemed to want to speak of it at length. I suggested that such a marriage would be a delightful ending to a long, most unworthy quarrel. I proposed that you .should come here as nurse and meet . Dick, again, neither of you to know beforehand of the other’s presence in the house. Well —my scheme has gone wrong.” She hesitated, looking at Sylvia. “Now, it’s your turn.” “My story is despicable,” Sylvia said. She made no attempt to soften the thing she had to tell. Her voice ran on, lifting, falling, always in the minor key of regret. At the end Mrs Lcgrand’s words amazed her. “You poor child !” she said. “Oh, you poor child! ” - She came near to Sylvia - and took her hand. '“I see by what a subtly-spread net you were caught. Mr Balling played his cards astutely. There was nothing, of course, for you to discover.” “Nothing!” Sylvia’s thoughts groped. “No reason for the part I played?” “A reason—yes. Your uncle'wanted you to be disgraced in our eyes, so that a marriage would be impossible. He 'counted on your being discovered, and chance has played into his hands. Oh, I can see his desire to make an irreparable breach. I ought to have known that his readiness to fall in with my suggestion held something behind it.” “But that’s only surmise,” Sylvia suggested. But as she spoke she knew it for truth, knowing her ..uncle. Alone presently in her room, Sylvia became a creature of impulse. She gathered together her belongings and pushed them into her box. As soon as morning came she must leave; it would kill her to face again the scorn in Dr Smith’s eyes. She had been tricked, made to play a mean part by subterfuge—but she had played it, and that fact must surely lower her for ever in these' people’s eyes. She sat, watch in hand, waiting for morning. Soon after seven she crept downstairs, went to the library, and left a note for Mrs iuegrand on the writing bureau. Hurrying out into the hall, she came face to face with Dr Smith. He eyed her hat, her coat, questioningly. ’ - “I am going,’’ she said simply. can’t stay here meriting your contempt. ’ “My mother wishes toNirush this incident aside as if it had never been,” he said. “She has been telling me her theory of the story.” “I could never forget.” She had come to the door and her fingers turned the handle, opened it wide. She stepped out into the morning. “Good-bye,” she said. Her breath came in a fluttering manner because he still kept by her side, moving step by step with her. “Good-bye,” she said again. “Never,” •he spoke abruptly, almost sternly. “I said good-bye three years ago for the last time.” “But after last night ” r “You were a woman in sore straits. Who am T to judge you? Besides,” he laughed, “you have done nothing save to scratch one of my mother’s most cherished pieces of furniture.” “I love you,” he added presently. “Ah, but I must not hear you say that now.” “You shall hear me say it to the last day of my life.” “But last night I saw contempt in your eyes.” “For myself, that I should have left you to fight life alone ’whilst I was making a position worthy to offer you.” Sylvia still walked quickly, as if desiring escape. But something was lifting, tho corners of her mouth into a radiant smile. “I’m glad I haven’t earned my money,’’ she smiled at him. “It would have burnt by fingers.” “And as my wife you will cease to have -any money worries,” he assured her. “Oh —as your wife ” “I intend to marry you off hand. And I shall have an interview with Mr Balling and tell him what I think of him. I believe my mother’s theory. He played an astute game for parting us.” “But he hasn’t succeeded.” Sylvia let joy loose in her voice. 1 “Then come back and let us show him that he hasn’t.” Sylvia hesitated, then swung impulsively round upon her heels. “I will come and try to earn the forgiveness of your family,” she said. The sun flung his morning beams paternally about them as they walked. Humility was still with Sylvia, and regret; but they were mawd with a sense ,of happiness that matched the dancing beams of the sun.