A Short Story.

Rodney and Otamatea Times, Waitemata and Kaipara Gazette, 18 September 1912, Page 6

A Short Story.

BY KATHARINE TYNAN. Author of "The Way of a Maid," "Oh! What a Plague is Love," "A Lover's Breast Knot," "The Honourable Molly," &c.

(All Rights Reserved.)

THE SPINEL RUBY.

(Completion.) The year was some weeks older when Johnny was introduced to the unwelcome guest. He felt very sorry for her, but- apart from that fact he was not attracted. She was dark and pale, and had large, pathetic, velvety eyes, like saucers, as Lady Muriel said. The mourning was against her looks. The dusty, ill-fitting black gown, too hot for the time of the year, made her pale darkness seem unhealthy, if one had not discrimination to look beyond and see the smoothness, the fine, firm texture of the skin which never yet belonged to ill health.

She had brought with her a canary in a cage, a tame jackdaw, and a tiny rough dog with eyes as wistful as her own. f

Lady Muriel had referred contemptuously to Hildred's menagerie, but no one protested against her keeping her pets. John Warr, indeed, welcomed them kindly, and Algernon expressed his preference for little Trust beyond his mother's spoilt poodle, who was as cross as one might expect from a dog who got only carriage exercise, and* was fed on the most unsuitable food possible. After all the Queen's Gate hooise was a big one. Hildred kept her pets as much out of sight as possible. And it amused Lady Muriel's guests when, if the drawingroom door was left carelessly open when Hildred was present, a black shape would suddenly flit in with a hoarse cry and settle itself on Miss Maynard's shoulder.

In the life of the big house1 Hildred was absolutely alone; unless when John Warr or Algernon were at home. But the master of the house was only at home in the evenings. Week-ends his wife generally managed to be out of town. Sometimes he went with her, sometim&C he did not. Occasionally when Hildred and he were left together from Saturday to Monday, the girl would have the happiest moments ol her life. She"would steal out in the morning to an early service. After breakfast she and Uncle John would slip off to fche country by train, getting just beyond the London crowd, would find an inn and lunch there, spend the afternoon in the fields, and <y}i, back to town by a late train.

One Saturday evening when Jlohn Warr and Hildred were eating their dinner together, and not discovering that they were being put off with a far plainer meal than if Lady Muriel were present, Johnny put in an appearance. As a matter of fact, he had made some half-arrangement with the young ladies for Sunday, and remarked that since it was off he was thrown on his beams-ends for the day. "Come with us," said John Warr, who, with all the rest of the world, liked Johnny. "Victoria 9.45. Do 3'ou think you can manage it?" "I'll sit up all night," said Johnny, so gravely that his joke passed unobserved. Johnny was really capable of getting up at three o'clock, and liked to be out while other people were abed. ED© had a vague sense of some change in Hildred. She had been obliging to her cousins to the extent of lending them money, and they had responded by some suggestions as to her toilet. She would never look her best in black, but a soft line of white between her gauzy black dress and her smooth shoulders took from the sombreness. Her brown eyes looked tranquil for the first time: her cheeks had a spot of colour that was very becoming. The next morning she was even better. Her thin black was worn over white silk. She had a little air of elegance. She would ■ make an inter-esting-woman some day, Johnny decided, although she never would be pretty, and could have no possible attraction for him, Johnny. She had brought her dog, and the four merry-makers ,spent the happiest day. They wandered through fields in the morning, found a wood descending a steep valley and sat in its shade till they r grew hungry, had a substantial meal of cold roast beef and salad and fruit picked from the inn garden, spent th re afternoon on the river, and returned to the inn for the most glorious high tea, with cold chicken and ham, eggs, and honey and cream, wafer-cress, and radishes. Johnny 'did not know when he had enjoyed anything so much, and said so when they, arrived at Queen's Gate, tired and happy. Of course, the next day Grace and %bil were back, making the little fc^H-i.n sallow and dowdy by their X "o^ntrast, She slipped away thY "-background of jackdaw piei'V^ng shrift heard someas he deikafia she thai .

which of the two girls he desired to marry.

In the autumn of that year John Warr went to America on some matter of business. They seemed to see less and less of Algernon. He was always m attendance on his great aunt.

"I don't know why the boy does it," said Lady Muriel, frankly cynical. "If it was anyone but >Algy I should suppose he was after the money. I expect he has some nonsense in his head' about their being old and lonely. Wild horses would not drag me to that gloomy old house of theirs, and I believe the old' creatures like Grace and Sybil quite as little as they ever liked me. So it's a good job that Algy keeps the money in the family."

Johnny smiled imperceptibly. It was no part of his business to tell Algy's mother about Miss Dolores Haygarth. v They would know soon enough, since Algy had made up his mind to tell all when his father came back from America. In his own mmd Johnny had an idea that there might be more to tell than Algy had imparted to him. He had an idea, in fact, that Miss Dolores had, been for some time Mrs. Algernon Allandale-Warr. He guessed that Lady Muriel would be furious. Romance did not appeal to her. But John Warr would surely stand by his son; perhaps even the old •ladies would be' ready to forgive nor add a codicil revoking the wills they had made in their great nephew's favour.

About the end of September, Johnny had a note from Lady Muriel. They were passing through town and were at Queen's Gate for a few days. The blinds were still down, and the furniture in hollands, so no one was to know they were there, except, of course, Johnny. Would Johnny come round as usual whenever he liked ?

As* a matter of fact, Lady Muriel had discovered her daughters' hopeless love affairs. She was determined that Johnny should propose to one at once and be accepted. It would be a tussle between her and the one of Johnny's choice; but she had an idea that if she really chose to assert herself, she could bear down her daughters' wills. She would have all that settled before her husband returned.

Johnny found Lady Muriel in her boudoir, which was at the back of the , the house. She was alone, and he , had only glanced at her when he per- ] ceived that something had happened. ] She was very pale, and her eyes glittered. Her lips met in a straight line, , and were curiously white. ; "Why, what is the matter?" asEed : Johnny. i "I have lost my spinel ruby," she j said. "It is worth six thousand ] pounds as a stone apart from its value , as a curio. You know the Emperor Aimmgzebe gave it to an ancestor of mine." "Lost it! How?" "It has been stolen. I was showing it to someone, and accidentally it was left out of my jewel-case. Only one person visited my room meanwhile." "And she?" "That little wretch Hildred. I am going to charge her with it. She will have to give it up. The whale thing is as plain as a pikestaff. She was, I believe, just about to tell me that she preferred to live with an old governess of hers rather than with us. She was quite welcome so far as I was concerned. I never liked her. Those big eyes of hers seemed to be always spying and accusing. She knew * that I never wore the ruby; it is so heavily j set. She thought I would not discover that it had gone for a long time. I know she hadn't a penny to carry out this plan of hers. She seemed to have got through her quarter's allowance somehow—l can't imagine how." She paused for breath, and Johnny put in incredulously: ' 'Miss Maynard t What bee have you got in your bonnet, Lady Muriel? She would never have touched the ruby." "She'd find it hard to clear herself in a court of law. Not that it'll come to that. John is so soft, and he was in love with her mother. But I shall threaten her. I shall frighten her into giving it up." Johnny thought that Lady Muriel looked positively repulsive; he had a hazy memory of the women who turned up their thumbs at the gladiatorial games. "You are not going to accuse her before me?" he asked, incredulously. "Why not?" He made a movement as if to go, then restrained himself. He would stay and see fair play. Lady Muriel looked dangerous. The door opened and Grace and Sybil came in together. "I don't believe she ever had th© ruby," said Grace, in a disrespectful manner. "Yon were always down on her, mamma," sajd Sybil, shrugging her shoulders. "She's a good little cat, and downright decent if you take her the proper way." They were both so excited that they only noticed Johnny's presence by a nod. Johnny looked at them admiringly ; he didn't know which of them he liked best. The door opened again and Hildred Maynard came in. She stood an instant with the door held in her hand. Something in Lady Muriel's face, in the atmosphere of the room, frightened her! Her eyes dilated. She trembled; and Johnny had an odd impulse to go to her side and uphold her. "Yon sent for me" she said, in a terrified way. "Give up my ruby, you wicked g.irl,"i cried Lady Muriel, yielding to unres-] f[ trained passion. "You know you have i it. You were the only person in my yroon. It was on my dressing table,

and now it i« gone, Give it up at onoe, or I shall send for the police:"

Hildred Maynard turned suddenly one wounded red from her forehead to her neck. One could imagine that wave of colour extending all over her slender body. She looked straight at Lady Muriel. Her cousins moved uneasily in their chairs and murmured something, but she never looked at them.

I saw the ruby on your dressingtable when I went in for the lace you asked me to mend," she said, steadily. "I left it there when I went out."

"And two seconds afterwards I re. membered it and found it gone." Give it up, or I shall send for the police. Give it up, I say, girl. I shall have you searched. Afterwards you will be turned out of the house in disgrace."

"I have not the ruby," said Hildred again ; and now the colour had ebbed, leaving her deadly pale. "If you search me, you will find nothing; but I hope you will not do that." "You are a thief, and you shall be treated like one." Louder murmurs broke from the two girls ,• but Mildred looked steadily past them. "1 have not the ruby," she said. Just then Johnny stepped to her side like a man out of a dream. "I will not allow any indignity to be offered to Miss Maynard," he said. [ "You"! cried Lady Muriel,1 choking. "By what right, Johnny Maxwell—" "A lover's—a husband's right,V said Johnny, ' 'if she will grant it to me. If not, by the right of a friend." Hildred looked at him. Her gaze was the gaze of the girl in Browning's poem: "Then outstrode Gismond. Then I knew That I was saved. I never met His face before, but at first view I felt quite sure that God had set Himself to Satan: who would spend A minute's mistrust on ths end? Johnny had never heard of Count Gismond if he had of Browning. But he knew the meaning of the look. Out went his arm and drew Hildred to his side. He was conscious of the amazed faces staring at him. His own amazement was hardly less than theirs. His action had been so entirely unpremeditated that he felt as if something stronger than himself had been driving him; but he was- wildly, unreasonably happy. A strange, chuckling noise broke the silence of bewilderment in the room. No one had noticed that Peter, the jackdaw, had flown in on Hildred's track, any more than they rioticed the small, wistful dog, who had crept close to her skirt and had begun to wag his tail quietly on Johnny's intervention. "Why, it is the bird, the jackdaw," cried Sybil, shrilly, "and he is choking himself. He has something in his beak." Johnny turned round quickly and made a stride or two to the tall buhl armoire, upon which the jackdaw had perched himself. The bird flew over to his mistress's shoulder with a hoarse cry. As he went something dropped from his beak. Johnny stooped and lifted it, and then held it out for the others to see. 4

"It is the ruby," he said

"Oh!" cried Hildred, covering her face with her hands, "he must have taken it. I have missed so many things of late."

Indeed, on investigation quite a considerable cache of small trinkets was found on top of a wardrobe in Hildred' s room, mixed up with leaves and paper and small bits of muslin and silk and all sorts of odds and ends.

Johnny always dectaifes that only for Peter's theft of the ruby he'd Have been Lady Muriel's son-in-law, and spoils the bird shockingly. However, that was unlikely enough sinoe Grace and Sybil married their detrimentals ia the face of all opposition, and became reformed as suited the wives of poor men. Their marriages and Algy's were bitter pills to Lady Muriel, although Alg3r's was sweetened after some time by tha fact that he inherited all his great-aunts had to leave. There is a great friendship between Hildred and her cousins, out of which, to be sure, John Warr is not left. But! between her and Lady Muriel there is never anything but an armed neutrality ; nor has the lady forgiven Johnny, although he very handsomely wiped out all memory of her debts to him be-j fore he married Hildred. j ' (The End.)