ESTRANGED or the LOST HEIRESS of the CHAMPNEYS.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 24, Issue 17, 4 March 1913, Page 7

ESTRANGED or the LOST HEIRESS of the CHAMPNEYS.

(A’.i Rights Reserved.)

1 A Fascinating Romance, By the Author of “The Hampton Mystery,” ’“Sir Peter Eldon, &c.

CHAPTER I. ’’ AFTER MANY YEARS. ■ On the coast of Norfolk, not a great distance from Cromer, is situated the -Saltair Manor, the (lower property and the residence of Lady Champney. Its wide water front is protected against the encroachment of) ■the sea by a range of low cliffs, and on other sides the estate stretches nv ay to embrace in its wide grasp sunny fields and pastures, woods, parks, and all the natural features (appropriate to a great and prosperous domain. , The house, situated in the midst l of a large and sunny lawn, is a picturesque, turreted stone dwelling, with great bay-wmdov/s projecting upon the terraces, and "with a high tower which' commands a magnificent view of the North Sea.

One June morning a gay group of young people of both sexes was gathered on the lawn between the house and the sea. A game of croquet was in full progress, and the little party, numbering seven persons, three of them young girls in picturesque short costumes, the remain ng four of the sterner sex, were fully absorbed in the play, their laughter ringing out like silver chimes.

In the great bay-window of the drawing-room Lady Champney stood, idly looking oixt upon the bright scene, and upon the glittering waters that lay beyond, dotted with the white sails of commerce and of fishing craft. Lady Champney was a royally beautiful woman of some five and thirty years, yet she looked nearly ten years younger. She was tall and queenly, with bronze gold hair waving back from her bro.vs, and dressed after the prevailing fashion —with, a pale and creamy complexion, and with proud, dark eyes, whose glances were as cold as the beams of a winter’s sun. Her red lips wore an habitual proud curve, and her rare Saxon face, bright with a dazzling loveliness, was strangely haughty and reserved in its expression.

'"How happy they all are !’’ she thought, her glances lingering upon the group of croquet players. ‘'"This is their time for dreaming ! I pray Heaven that they may never wake up to life’s bitterness, as I have done !”

She moved away, as if the sight of the bright faces and the sound of the gay voices annoyed her, and took up from the table a London paper of the clay preceding.

Looking over the columns idly, her gaze fell upon the brief list of arrivals in town.

Prominent among these was the arrival of Lord Champney, late Minister to an important German Court. Lady Champney started at the sight of that name, and her pale face grew paler, and she walked restlessly to and fro the room, soon halting again at the window, a great agitation convulsing alike her soul and her features. “Back again iin England !” she murmured, her long white fingers twining themselves nervously together.; '“Back again, after all these years ? Why has het come ? To torture me ?”

She uttered a low moan, and wrung her hands yet more fiercely. At this juncture her roving gaze, wild and restless with a great anguish, marked the opening of the great brazen lodge-gates. Again she started, a sudden foreboding seeming to seize upon her. The next instant a horseman rode into the grounds, and galloped up the avenue.

“It is ho!’’ she murmured, her pallor deepening to ghastliness. “Oh, heavens !” She drew back hastily behind the flimsy curtains of lace, and peered out( at the approaching horseman, seeming 'to devour him with her eyes.

! ‘-'lt is he !” she repeated, trembling convulsively, and clinging to the window-sash as a sadden weakness overpowered her. “How little he ihau changed! Oh, Sidney! Sidney !”

1 She bowed her head, and a gust of sobs shook her frame.

' The horseman galloped nearer and irarer, the sound of his approach soon)

reaching her ears. Then, as if endowed with a sudden strength and energy, she aroused herself. drew leer form erect, and banished from her face every trace of emotion.

i Still listening, however, she heard the newcomer alight at the porch, and give his horse into the charge of a servant, and then heard a quick tread on the marble floor of the eni trance hall. i Lady Champney crossed the floor |to a distant seat, and had scarcely settled the ample draperies of her ' white morning robe, when the door opened, and a servant announced the new-comer :

j i‘ 'Lord Champney !” : Lady Champney arose to greet her i visitor, her face as cold and impas- ! give as the face of a statue. ! The visitor came forward with some eagerness, and halted within a few pacts of her. Ho was a tall, noble-looking mah*

-;.o lui ty ycriv, dark aim os c to Bwarth'ncss, with eyes as black as midnight, just now lit vrith strange emotion and eagerness. His mouth wa; trembling under the shade of the heavy black moustache that drooped over it, and his manner was full of a great agitation. “Bari ara !” he raid, holding) out his hand. '“Barbara, is at thus we meet at last ?”

Lady 'Champney trembled. His passionate voice, broken with emotion, stirred her soul to its depths. Yet her voice was clear and cold, her manner full of haughty surprise, as he answered : “Yes, it is thus we meet, Lord Champney : and it is a strange meeting, is it not, for a husband and wife who have not looked upon each other’s face for seventeen years ?” I ord Champney retreated two or three paces, and regarded her in fi--1 nco.

“To what may I attribute the honour of this visit ?” inquired Lady Champney, with i'ey courtesy. ''We parted nearly seventeen years avo, by mutual consent, and agreed that our marriage should henceforth be a marriage but in name. To spare me ignominy, and your name the faintest shadow of disgrace, and very possibly because you had not suificient grounds for a divorce,” she added, with hitter emphasis, ! “ wo agreed that the world should never I now of our domestic troubles. We have smiled, like the Spartan lad, while the fox gnawed at our very hearts. But our secret has been very well kept. The world does-n.it dream of our incompatibility—is not that the word ? You weut abroad as Ambassador. I came to Saltair, where I have since lived in retirement. The world—the fashionable world, I mean, has been charitable enough to believe me an invaV.d, and to eulogise your noble self-sacrlflce in devoting yourself to the interests of your country. I see, however, that you have resigned your post abroad. How is the farce to be kept up now? How are we still to hoodwink society ?”

Lord Champney drew a heavy sigh. "•Still unforgiving, Barbara ?” he exclaimed, in) a passionate voice. ‘"You never loved me.”

Lady Ohampney's Up curled. "‘You do well to say thati,” she said. “I did love you, Sidney. I loved you ' as wives seldom love. And what was my reward ? Your passionate, jealous nature made me miserable from the first. You suspected me of loving others better than you. You discovered—in that way I know not—that Willard Ames had been a suitor for my hand before yourself, and that I had refused him. From the moment of that discovery you were on the watch lest my heart should turn to Willard” —

■‘‘Because he was handsomer and gayer than I,” interrupted Lord Champney, humbly. ‘‘He was fascinating and bright, and full of those ways. that women like, while I was dark a nd reserved and stern.” “You had no right to doubt your wife.” said Lady Champney. ‘*‘l gave you conclusive proof that I preferred you to all other men when I married you. When our child was born you forgot for . a while your suspicions and jealousy—at least, while I continued ill. You thought I would die, and the doctor ordered that the baby should be sent out to nurse. It was sent away while I was delirious with fever. As I grew better you were again the devoted and tender lover. But before I grew entirely well—before my child had been brought back to me—you found among my trinkets a packet of letters from Willard Ames, one of them of recent date, and full of protestations of love. Willard Ames was incapable of writing such letters to a married woman. Where the letters originated I never knew, but they were forged by .some enemy w lip knew of your peculiar weakness.”

‘‘‘You never told me before that they were forged,” said Lord Champney, with agitation. ■ “ You refused to satisfy my doubts” "I repeat that you have no right to have any doubts of your wife,” said Lady Ohampney, firmly. “Your doubts were an insult to an honourable woman, and I would not pander to your weakness by denying your charges. Then, inflamed with passion, you told me that I should never have back my child —never see her face again—until I proved myself worthy to take charge of her. Those were your very words,” “I don’t deny it,-,” said Lord Champney. '“I was mad, Barbaramad and cruel. If you had only told me as much then as you have told me now, I should have been at your feet. Did I wrong you throughout, Barbara ? Did you never love Willard Ames, and was your heart always true to me, even while I doubted you ?”

Lady Champney drew herself up proudly.

"•You insult me by such questions,” she said, coldly.

“Oh, Barbara, Barbara !” cried his lordship, coming a step nearer, and speaking imploringly. “Is it all over between us ? If you hut knew the misery of the years since we have parted ! I have stayed away because I have always doubted your fidelity to me more or less, but my heart has yearned for you all these years. Oh, the long days and the long nights, Barbara ! My pride,) my anger, my jealousy have kept me, from you, but my love at last has conquered all. Take me back, Barbara'. Let us begin again at the point when you, hard and cold and unforgiving, like an insulted queen, and I, stem, jealous, miserable,, and cruel, parted! by mutual consent. Barbara, my wife, I love you with a love to which my boyish love was weak. Take me back,”

lie iiei.i c\t Uiu arms, as Tits voice* broke down in a bard, dry sob. But Lady Chany my waved him beck. There was a look of pity in her glorious eyes, but a stern smile, awful in its beauty, held its place l cn her lips. No, Sidney,” she answered. “When we parted years ago, we parted for ever. You have the old jealous nature still. You think so humbly of yourself that you would inevita’ ly suspect me of preferring another. Besides, there is a grave between us.”

“‘A grave 7” “Yes, a grave. The grave of our little child whose face I never saw;” and a piteous look crept into the st rnness of Lady Champney’s 'face.

“You robbed me of ray child beqause of your wicked jealousy, and I never frit the touch of her little clingifag hands ; I never tasted the joy of seeing my child’s eyes look up, into mine. Shj smiled on another,- woman’s bosom. She died in another woman’s arms. And my amus, my heart, and my life have been eijipty.” Lord Champußy’s dark face ’paled, and his features worked in a convulsive emotion.

“Oh, Barbara,” he said, “bear my defence. You were ill, and near to death. The doctor said that the child must be sent out to nurse~ It was a frail little thing, and he thought it should have country air. We were in London, you know. The doctor knew of and recommended, a farmer’s wife down in Surrey--a woman with a young child of her own—and our child was sent to, her. As Heaven is my witness, I sent her away In love, and meant to bring her back when you should be> well enough to take charge of her. Then, as you grew better, I found those letters, and the demon of jealousy within me was unchained. I told you that I should never have back the child until you swore to me that you were fit to guide her. Oh, I was mad, Barbara : yet, if you had yielded to me in wifely forbearance, all years of misery might have been spared us. Our quarrel deepened into estrangement. Wa agreed, to part amicably, and thenceforth be to ea'h other as strangers. I went out from your presence a. brokenhearted man ; yet, even in my bitterest anger and jealousy, Barbara, I mttst have vaguely felt jfour innocence, for I went from yon to the Surrey farm, intending to send our child back to you.”

He paused, and searched in vain that proud and passionate face for some token of relenting. ‘■‘Go on,” said Lady Champney.

“The woman and her husband were but sub-tenants of the farm,” said Lord Champney, in a broken voice. ‘‘l had paid "them frequent visits, and they seemed contented and prosperous. But when I went, to them, after our separation, I found that they had vanished. The farmer had; committed a forgery, and had fled with his family- I inquired of the neighbours, and found that our child had died and had been buried on the eve of their flight, and no notification of its death had been sent to me. I had the little body taken up and removed to our family vault, and I sent you word of the child’s death. Then, the last link being broken between us, I went abroad. Barbara, if I have sinned, I have also suffered. Can you not forgive me ? Oh, Barbara, the sight of you revives my old love, with a million times its old force ! I,cannot live without yon !” “I forgive you, Sidney,” said Lady Champney, softly. Lord Clmmpney’s face became transfixed with an absolute radiance. “Oh, Barbara \ ” he breathed, coming nearer.

“I forgive you, Sidney,” said his wife, retreating as he advanced ; ! ‘'but I cannot take you back. Wo can never forget that little, lonely grave—never ! When you can give me back my lost child—when you can place upon my breast the little head that has nestled there only in my dreams—then, and only then, can we be to each , other what we were. You see how impossible it is to take up the old 1 life where we dropped it. If I seem harsh and cruel, it is youwho have made me so. It Is you who have frozen my life at its fountain.”

The radiant look faded from Lord Champney’s face and a haggard and despairing expression stared from his dark eyes. . A silence fell between them—the silence of terrible anguish and despair.

The summer winds, fresh from the sea, lifted the lace curtains of the open window, and brought on its wings the burden of gay voices and merry laughter from the croquet players on the lawn. That sound, seeming like a mockery, lashed Lord Champney’s l soul to a bitter fury.

“You can have gay company,” he sneered, '“while my heart is breaking.”

"■You have lived without me seventeen years,” said his wife, coldly, '“and I daresay you can live without me to the end. My young cousin, Ada Gower, lives with me, and my guests are invited to keep her company for a few weeks. I am at times but a dull companion for a young girl. And now,” she added, “are we to consider our interview at an end ?” Lord Cha.mpney’s lips qpivered as with a sudden spasm. He staggered to the window, gasping as if for air. The old love—the yearning tenderness, the passionate affection he had

felt for his wife in the old days—had come back at the sight of her, as he had said, with a thousand times its o'den force. His anger and jealousy were all forgotten. The smothered love of years had burst through its bonds, and was become again a

"* con ;i ' ni:rg 1 a;no. : fie ii'ang himself into a chair, | - ishing he might die then and 4^iijDrc. 1 .And suddenly through his anguish ■ and misery a gay laugh floated, rcing his heart like a knife. f Ho started, got up from the .chair, : 'walked across' the room, and looked *out upon the lawn, j His wild eyes scanned every mem- ; iior of the gay group in turn, settling ;at last upon the tail and slender j Jig-ure of a gentleman who stood, j with folded arms, his face bright with j laughter, talking to a pretty girl, j The countenance of this gentleman was fair;, delicate, and effeminate ; I yet, evjtn from the window, it might! i have been seen that his bright blue j eyes were lit by a courageous soul, I and that his effeminate face belied j his noble, manly, and determined spirit. The sight of that fair face was like the sting of a serpent to Lord Champney. “Good heavens ! Willard Ames !” ho ejaculated. “What is he doing here ?” “It is unnecessary to ask,” said Lady Champney, her face changing slightly, with a sudden indignation, i “Mr. Ames is my friend, and the i suitor of my cousin” '“Ah, yes, I understand,” cried Lord Champney, with a hitter sneer. '“I see through your arts, madam. You 1 send me from you—you goad me to I desperation—you harrow my soul by j reproaches—and all that you may en- | joy the visits of your old lover, ! under cover of Ms pretended affection | for your doll-faced cousin. Pool that j I was, I was completely deceived, 1 So-o ! No wonder you are in baste j for my departure.” j ‘“j am in haste for it, Lord Champl ney,” said Lady Champney. “Madam,” he said to her, with a desperate coolness, "we were never divorced. We were never legally separated. Our private agreement to separate has no legal value. In the eyes of the law you are;as much my wife as on the day wc were married. I shall remain at Saltair just so long as that popinjay out there remains. I shall stay here to protect my name and yours. You may order me a room to be got ready. I am not going away.” Lady Champney made no remon strance. She knew well that to do so would be but to feed the flames of her husband’s jealousy. Quietly touching a hell, she ordered a room to 'be got ready for Lord Champney, indicating an apartment at some distance from her own. ‘‘T shall proceed to make myself comfortable,” observed his lordship, with savage bitterness, when the servant had withdrawn. “As you have your guests, your party of sympathisers, it is but fair that I should have mine. It is not safe to trust oneself in an enemy’s country alone. I shall send for my luggage immedia--1 tely and telegraph up to town to my ! cousin to follow me here by the first train. Of course you remember my 1 cousin, Felix Champney, whom you 1 (used to call a ‘ self-seeking hypo- ! crite,’ and who has spent all these j years abroad with me. He came to I England three months in advance of 1 me. You can proceed with your i little drama. Felix and I will be j spectators of it, or actors la it, as ■ circumstances indicate.” With a how of intense mockery, he went out from her presence.

CHAPTER 11. THE OLD SQUIRE’S DARLING. In the pleasant and fertile Weald of Sussex, as the district between the South Downs and the hills of Surrey has been called from time immemorial, and not many miles distant from the town of Horsham, is another country home, to which we would now call the attention of the reader. It has not the splendour and elegance, nor has it the extent of the Saltair Manor. It is, however, one of those sunny English homes which are the boast of the country, and which find so many reproductions in every land to which the English have emigrated. It is called Chessom Grange.

The house, built of red brick, is ample in its dimensions,, is ornamented with a profusion of elaborate chimney-stacks, which are of a hospitable feature, and has immensely wide windows, set with plate glass. Upon the east side*of the house is a beautiful flower garden, in front is a lawn, to' the westward a charming grove, and to the rear are the kitchen and garden, the offices, and the paddocks. Upon the same bright June morning upon which occurred the interview described in the preceding chapter, two persons were sauntering down the short, wide sweep that led from the ambitious porch to the open gates. The elder of the two was Squire Chessom. He wfl-S 1 Qj short, stout man, with. & red face and an apopletic look, evidently an advocate of generous living. Ho had a genial countenance, bright with intelligence, and beaming, with an irrepressible jollity. He was, in brief, a kind-hearted, jovia , and’rather choleric old gentleman, with a generous purse for the needy, and a generous heart for the sorrowful and the erring. He was equipped for a ride, and led by the bridle his favourite thoroughbred, whom he .intended to mount at the gate. His companion was a young girl, who was endowed with bright beauty, as piquant as -it was rare. Her complexion was dark, but clear and transparent, her scarlet lips contrasting with the clear dark - paleness of her broad brows and of her cheeks. Her eyes, brown almost to blackness, was velvety in their softness, starry in tlMr splendour, and as changeful

in hne and expression as an April sky. Her jetty hair, cut short, clung to her little, well-shaped head in tiny, close-curling rings. She had the archness, the purity, the sweetness of an unspoiled child, yet in her eyes was the tender gravity of the woman.

“It’s rather warm for you, papa, to ride over to Horsham on the mere chance of getting a letter from Edfnund;” she observed, tying a tiny buttonhole bouquet with a blade of grass. “Why don’t you send one of the servants 7” • ‘Because I’ve promised to meet a man at Horsham on business. This is market-day, you know, and I am to get my pay for the sheep sold to the London dealer. But what do women know about business?” asked the squire, with a fond smile. “Give me the buttonhole, Dora, and I’ll be off.” ‘

“As if there was any need such haste, papa !” exclaimed Dora, with a laugh, as she affixed the flower to his coat. “There ! That looks nice. You wouldn’t be in such haste if you only knew how I miss you when you are gone.” • “Then you do think something of your old father, Dora ?” Dora’s eyes answered him. A sudden moisture dimmed the squire’s eyes, and he laid an unsteady hand caressingly on the girl’s bright young head. “I wish Edmrnd was here,” he murmured. “But why ?” questional Bora. “It’s a great deal pleasanter when he’s papa. He’s so dull and cross, and all he carts for is making money. I must say si if he is my brother. Thank fortvnr, he and I are not alike. See vlat a little Pharisee I am, papa,” sh ■ added, looking up at him with laughing eyes. “‘But it is true that we In. e no resemblance to each other, ph. ideally, mentally, or morally. We might as well have been children of different parents,” The squire’s - outh twitched a little. A shadow of trouble appeared in his honest eyes. “People who are dissimilar are generally the best of friends,” he said. "•People like their opposites. About Edm nd, Dora”—and the squire forced a smile, under which lay hidden a deep anxiety. “He isn’t —ah—he is, peihaps, not the sort of man you’d like for a husband. Eh, Dora?”

Ilia young girl trade a comical grimace, as if she had tasted something bitter. ‘•Our Edmund the style of man 1 should like in a husband ?”. she exclaimed. “Oh, dear papa, what taste you have ! Edmund should have a prim, dignified wife, all backbone, you kjnow—one of the pro ter, stillnecked sort of women who never by any chance do an impulsive thing. And as for me,, why ”

She paused, her gaze drooping, her sparkling face suddenly flushing. The squire noticed that tell tale blush. He was looking at her keenly, with many anxieties hidden under his thin mantle of gaiety and badinage. "'And as for you, Dora,” he asked, taking up her words, "you prefer a town gallant—an elegant, fine-man-nered gentleman, like this Mr. Felix Champney, who comes to the Grange so often ?” Dora hung her head, but that very act was sufficient answer. “But Dora,’’ said the squire, “this Champney is no fitting mate for you. I would never have invited him here if I had suspected he would win your heart. In the first place he is too old for you.” “Oh, papa, he is only thirty-five, and 1 I am seventeen. • Besides, hs doesn’t look as old as he is.”

“Hair dye, my child,” said the squire, sententiously. "You are very venerable—l am willing to grant that”—and he smiled ; “but there is too much disparity between your ago and his. Let the young wed the young, and grow' old- together. In the second place, Dora, there is too much disparity between your positions.” ‘“But how so, papa? It he is a gentleman, I am a lady. Where will you find better blood then that of the Chessoms ?” asked Dora, proudly. “There is not a more honourable family in the kingdom.” The squire’s lips trembled a little, and a look that was strangely compassionate crept Into his eyes. Dora marked' the look, but failed to comprehend it.

'•‘Well, papa ?” she questioned. '‘Welt, darling,” returned the squire, with an assumed cheerfulness, “ I am but a simple country squire. Mr. Champ ney belongs to the younger branch of a titled family. He is the cousin of Lord Chami ney, the Minister to a German Court,, and he will be the n?xt Lord Champney, if the present lord, who is childless, has no son. Champney told me this himself, and said that his prospects were good for becoming the ninth Da-on Champney. Ido not believe Champney would make a little country girl, however good and pretty, his wi’e and heiress to all the honours he expects to gain.” "But what do empty honours amount to, papa ?” demanded Dora. “It is the qualities of the mind and the heart that make sensible people’s happiness. I am sure that Mr. Chvmpney is better than you think.” The squire looked troubled. “Do you like this man, Dora?” he asked. “Yes, papa,” whispered Dora, blush-, ing. (To be Continued.)