THE DARE-STREET MYSTERY.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 5031, 12 June 1889, Page 4

THE DARE-STREET MYSTERY.

LITERATURE

A DOCTOR’S STORY. CHAPTER XI. The address was 99 Spark Street, Camberwell —a title so close upon the fancy appellative which the Nash girls had given it, that I wonder it had not suggested itself to the S.E. PostOffice officials to try Spark Street —it was so close upon the truth. There was something strange about the envelope, too, on which the address was written. The superscription was in George Faixfax’s handwriting—the envelope was addressed to Miss Delia Nash, 99 Spark Street, Camberwell, S.E. ;it had been through the post, and it had got in some inexplicable fashion back into George Fairfax’s hands.

Hence it was evident that Fairfax had been in correspondence with the younger sister ; that he had solved the mystery which had been so long a perplexity to me, and kept that mystery to himself. For what reason and in whose interest P

The street deserved its weird cognomen, I thought when I had set out in search of it, armed with my strict and tabular items of receipt and expenditure my hills and receipts of bills, my facts and figures to nrove that there was a balance of three pounds seventeen shillings and seven pence to make over formally in due course. It was one of those out-of-the-way, God and parish forsaken thoroughfares common to large plots of ground given up to the jerry-buiiders. There was a light in the parlour window ot No 99—the only light in 'Dark Street ’ —and I went towards it as to a beacon.

Some one began to play on a piano as my hand was raised to the knocker, and I paused to listen. A minute or two afterwards a fresh, young voice broke into a song. They were merry as well as musical in Dark Street. Adversity had not taken all the fun out of them. Death and debt and distress seemed to ha a long way back in their thoughts that evening. There were trills and tra-la-las’ and ha-ha-has’ ; and I waited patiently till the song was completed before I knocked at the door, becoming fully convinced by that time that the singer was a long way ahead ol the average amateur, and possessed of a voice of remarkable power. There was a dead silence after I had knocked, and the walls of the house were so thin I could hear women’s voices within. Finally a chain was drawn across the door, which was then partly opened, and a young woman peered through the narrow aperture. ‘ What is it ?’ asked a low, soft voice.

‘My name is Lissamer. I have called on business with Miss Nash.’

The lady surveyed me critically as I stood outside in the shadowland. After this examination the chain fell with a rattling noise from the door, ‘ Step in, sir,’ said the cautious young lady; 1 you are a welcome visitor to us. My sister and I have to he extra careful in a neighbourhood of this character. There are some rough people about, and not a . few of them dishonest.’

I entered the bouse, and was ushered into the front sitting room, where lying upon an old horsehair sofa drawn very close to the lire was Hyacintha Nash.

She was looking more of the invalid than when I had seen her in my lodgings at Breymouth ; she was a woman who had suffered, or was suffering, a great deal of pain. ‘ I am glad to see you, Mr Lissamer,’ she said, after I had shaken hands with her. ‘ This is my sister Delia,’ by wav of an informal introduction.

I turned and bowed to the lady who Lad admitted mo into the house, who bowed also and with exceeding grace. She was not so tall as her sister, I observed at once—a bright-faced, animated vvounn, with an abundance of very fair hair, and with dark, deep-set eyes. Altogether, a very pretty girl oi nineteen or twenty years of age, this Delta Nash. I could not account lor the impression which suddenly be set me, that it was a pity that she was so beautiful. She looked so out of place in that poorly furnished room. She was net well dressed either ; bar collar and cuff's were not as remarkable for their whiteness as those ol her invalid sisters’; there was a jagged little rent in the sleeve of her black dress, showing a grey underlining : and her fair hair would have seemed rough and tumbled had it not been the fashion at that period to look wind-blown and frowsy all over the tot'. She was quick iu her movements, and graceful as well as alert. Sbe dashed at once into conversation as if she had known me all my life. I I have been in doubt if I should recollect your face, Mr Lissamer/ she said ‘ and—yes you are well known to me. Wo lived in Thisilewood Street three years, and when I was a girl I used to peer at you over our wire blind as you passed, and wonder what unlucky mortal you were going to kill next. Hyacintha and 1 used to call you “ the sour man ” you went along with so grave a countenance, as though all the troubles of the world were yours. Perhaps they were/ she added quaintly ‘ but one ought to be able to laugh even at them. As for grieving over them, as I tel! Hyacintha, what is the use ? What is the use ?’ she repeated. *lt makes no difference —it alters nothing ; the clouds don’t sail away the iaster, or turn their silver linings to ns any the quicker for it. But Hyacintha does not see this, although I talk to her enough about it, goodness knows.'

‘ Tes, you talk enough, Delia,’ was the dry answer to this, and it would have sounded like satire had it not been in so faint a tone of voice.

4 Do you blame me for talking V she psked.

‘ No ; it does you good sometimes.’ Delia laughed very merrily and musically, and Hyacintha’s face seemed less in shadow for a while.

‘ We can’t doth be dumb,’ Delia said leaning forward and touching her sister’s hand lightly and affectionately, ‘ and Ido the talking for two, when my sister is not well enough to take her fair share, Mr Lissamer. That is why lam so garrulous to night—unless it is good fortune which has come to mo and turned my bead. And besides,’ she said locking at me frankly, ‘ I can talk to you. You are not a stranger in any sense of the word. You ba w e been one of the best and kindest and most remarkable ol friends to us.’ ‘ I do no' see it,’ I said, shaking my head by way of protest. ‘Oh ! hut we do. Hyacintha has thanked you already, however, and I don’t fancy you are the kind of man to want professions and blessings over and over again. At all events, if you do, you have come to the wrong shop.’ * Delia,’ exclaimed the elder sister, sharply. Yes, that was crude. Mr Lissamer will forgive me, I hope,’ cried Delia, with a pretty little display of confusion. ‘ I am not refined as my sister—l never was. lam sorry if I have bored you, but you are a - friend of ours in so many ways, sir. Mr Fairfax sings so constantly to your praises, too ; be thinks there is no one like you, except himself, perhaps,’ was the odd little sequel to this flattery, unless the musical little laugh was to stand for the end of it.’

‘ Mow long have you known Mr Fairfax, may I enquire,’ I said. ‘ Only a few weeks,’ was Hyacintha’s reply. ‘He found us out,’ said Delia, ‘He is aggravately sharp in some things, just as he is deplorably dense in others. I tell him so to his face, Mr Lissamer,’ she said saucily ; ‘so I am not speaking in confidence.’ 1 was surprised, but I made no comment. They had become intimate, then, these two. ‘ Have you seen Mr Fairfax, lately, 1 asked.

* Not all; this week. I he’s offended about something ;be often is.’

'To ie Continued .}