Painted Butterflies

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 978, 22 May 1930, Page 5

Painted Butterflies

Published by Special Arrangement.

V.

Mrs PATRICK MacGILL

Author of ~ Dancers to th» Dvk. The Ulcelelo Girt." “ The FUmr ol Life ere «e

SYNOPSIS OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS. CHAPTERS I. and IT.—Jennifer Lome, fashion artist at "Elise, Ltd.,” is sent lor by Madame. She has only come for m pnth on trial, and fears dismissal, bhe is small, pretty and popular. Madame informs Jennifer that Miss Russell, their smallest mannequin, has had to go home u- ou^d Miss Lome be willing to take this mannequin’s place and show Miss Creighton’s dress at her house at five 0 clock that afternoon. Jennifer consents gladly. She taxies to Chester Square. The butler doubts whether his young mistress will see Miss Lome. She k? s P ra^ne d her. ankle and will not be able to show off her new frock at the oall tonight. Miss Creighton sends for Miss Lome. Jennifer finds her in a luxurious boudoir, nursing her ankle, tier uncle. James Read, and a young man with whom she is in love, are with SfI** 1 ** His name is Frank Yardley. He is *°n of Sir Ralph Yardley, Bart. fMieia Creighton orders Jennifer to go til, 0 . , r dressing-room to put on the d , ress - She obeys and emerges in j_r. lac k gauze frock covered with hun°f painted butterflies, grouped in ineir natural order. Enormous butterfly 'wngs spring from her shoulders. She rh.ii- £ bu,b in oacli hand, and. when th!e 1 aae turned off, Jennifer presses Hundreds of tiny lights spring over the frock. Adela is certain «. . w,n the diamond bangle if it JS® and, being crippled herh#«r » e > Miss Lome to act for* at 11 Jennifep promises to be at the ball P-p l ' Arrived at home in Camden Jennifer finds her brother Jack Usual. Cr^Sh? TERS nI - and IV.—Adela . is in her box at the ball in °f^ the ankle. At eleven the exhioiuon of frocks takes place. When N'o. •‘•pj.® Jennifer steps forward. cfiiJa ~ Butterflies.” as the dress is takes the first prize. Frank lawm. ♦ Soes in search of Jennifer. He con J 13 i° dance with her, but she lias , Jar nes Read insists on taking her catntL.i. b * s motor. Halfway there he on hf B sserer5 er m his arms and rains kisses hom*! 61 *- * ace and neck. The car stops; in r^ ac hed, and Jennifer escapes le house. Her brother Jack is ana ln F i Up * or her. He is in the depths, iia«s xv* nov yledges to his sister that he u- indulging in petty pilferings his firm until the sum of £2OO has mi**! 1 I f eac hed. If he does not find this w tomorrow evening, five o’clock, rin „iT be arp ested. Jennifer promises to fnii '^h at ehe can. At eight-thirty the b',? ln S morning she rings up James * private house. When he replies an t° r an interview. He gives her at in a street off Earl’s Court. To*«' oo ‘*, Sbe froes straight there, and ames R ea (j opens the door and takes XSL. int S. hat appears to be a sittingShe has to tell him what she «-!??* * the £2o ° for - and also gives her , h to J>ay >t back. He makes out a • ;ll que f or the amount and she gives mm an IOI?. CHAPTER V.— (Continued.) Her brother would be waiting at opine, watching the clock, longing for JJAyet dreading her return ... if the could not be cashed, he could-i

not cover up his defalcations at the office, and her mother would know . . . the knowledge would so crush her proudly indomitable spirit that Death’s voice would be like that of a friend in her ears. A thousand fears lay behind the look which she bent upon the cynically impudent yet deeply unhappy face of the man sitting opposite to her at the tiny table; found their way iuto her voice, tearing down the ramparts of contempt and suspicion which his mind had harboured against her as completely as If circumstantial evidence had never enacted them. “Mr. ?” Jennifer paused, at a loss. For the first time her companion thought fit to Introduce himself. “Carlos Mayhew—my mother was Italian, my father English. Both are with God.’’ Apparently the Latin strain predominated for, with the complete unselfconsciousness of the Continental. he rapidly made the Sign of the Cross to their memory. “Mr. Mayhew. there is an urgent, a terribly vital reason why that cheque must be cashed before the banks close today.’’ cried the desperate girl, who was facing issues far too big for her own handling. Something in her very evident loneliness and perplexity touched Carlos Mayhew who, up till then, had certainly imagined that he had more than his share of trouble. “You’d better tell me that urgent reason —and cut it as short as possible, if you don’t mind. I’ve affairs of my own awaiting me,’’ he told Jennifer, in a worried but not unkindly voice. For the second time that morning Jennifer laid bare her soul to an utter stranger, and never in her life was the memory of the searing humiliation entirely erased. Every word that fell from the white, pain-twisted lips was so obviously weighted with truth that, with the quick sympathy of the Italian part of his nature, facile tears started to Carlos Mayhew’s dark eyes. Now that the drama of the shooting episode was over, and the inevitable reaction had set in, there were a good many reasons why Carlos Mayhew preferred to have Jennifer in his power, rather than place himself in hers by demanding that she kept secret the fact 01 his intrusion. She would cash the cheque, he knew, to save her young fool of a brother, and then, with the invariable mulish obstinacy of the self-sacrificing, herself suffer to fee tfltimate degree

rather than let a single revealing sentence regarding the cheque pass her lips. That would be for the sake of the brother and mother who, between them, appeared to make up the whole reason for her being. But the quick power of psychological deduction which was one of liis inherited attributes, warned him that Jennifer would be a very frank, open proposition where her affections were not involved. True, the inquest would prove that he had not been the direct murderer; but to be the indirect cause of another's death by breaking into his presence with firearms would certainly yield consequences, not only to himself, but to somebody whose good name Death had more than ever entrusted to his keeping,, a fact which had not troubled his first fit of violent rage. All these reasons flashed lightningwise through the brain which was a mixture of Southern impulsiveness and English shrewdness, but in his voice, and in his manner of bending confidentially toward her, there was no trace of anything but the blessed healing warmth of his sympathy as he said, “You had better give me that cheque, and let me replace it with my own for the same amount.” A flush stained the whiteness ot Jennifer’s cheeks a painful crimson; her little head, so like a flower on the slender stalk of her round young neck, bent itself in the most utter, abject shame. Would her brother ever know the hell she had endured tor his sake, she wondered. “I am no more a stranger than he, and there are a good many reasons why my money is to be preferred to his,” Carlos Mayhew assured Jennifer, with so much truth that evn in her overwrought state she was forced to admit that he was perfectly right. “Give me the cheque!” he repeated, holding out his hand for the piece of paper which Jennifer had again crumpled nervously between her fingers. “We will go,” he said, after he had placed the cheque carefully in an inside pocket. Jennifer's head felt light, and she had to keep her attention concentrated upon the steadying of her legs as she followed the tall, well-built figure, which was her companion's heritage from his English father, out of the little tea-shop. They walked rapidly to the Tube station, and. to her surprise, Jennifer found herself giving an hysterical giggle at the fact of having a flowerseller's basket of bright yellow daffodils thrust under her nose with the request to “Buy a bunch o’ sweet daffs. Miss. Bring yer good luck!” with a swift look into the white, terribly worried young face. “Two to Hampstead, please!” Jennifer heard Carlos Mayhew say as he pushed a coin beneath the arch in the clerk's ticket office. In the lift Jennifer’s eyes were livetted to the advertisement ot a private detective, whose business slogan was “Nothing can be hidden from me.” and, her mind reverting >swiftly*to the man who had been left

huddled, lifeless, in one of his own chairs. She shivered as the thought struck her that from now onward there would always be a secret in her life, a sealed door in her memory that no human being might enter. In the Tube carriage itself at that hour of the day there w.ere few passengers, but when they glanced pityingly at her, thinking how wretchedly ill she looked, Jennifer Imagined that they suspected her, and took refuge in a paper which she picked up from the seat opposite her own. Carlos Mayhew seemed lost in thought, gazing steadily before him, seeing nothing, his thoughts turned inward, as Jennifer could tell from the blankness of the soft, dark, melancholy eyes. “Here we are,” he said, jumping up when Hampstead was reached. He ran up the steps leading to the street two at a time, and strode up the narrow hill toward the Heath like a man very late for an important appointment, Jennifer having hard work to keep up with him. The breezy, tree-clad hill-top, with its pretty pond of wind-ruffled water, brought a moment’s surcease to the turmoil of the young spirit, and Jennifer felt a blessed sense of peace which was as real as it was fleeting. Carlos Mayhew plunged down a narrow lane which gave off a by-path of the Heath, and there, surrounded by fields, so that it seemed more like the country than London, was a group of four little modern, semi-detached villas each with its garden and painted gate, each boasting a roof of cherry-red tiles with red-flagged paths leading to the doors, the said doors being identical in their oxydised metal furniture, and in three of the four front gardens Jennifer noticed prams. There was no pram in the fourth and last, front garden, and when they reached the house, the windows were all covered with drawn Venetian blinds, their lately-applied varnish gleaming in tbe pale spring sunshine with irritating newness. Jennifer felt a strange reluctance to follow Carlos Mayhew up to the front door of what was evidently his home. The shrinking had a quality which was more spiritual than physical: invisible hands seemed to be stretching out in an endeavour to stop her entry, her subconsciousness warning her against intangible but definite evil. Carlos Mayhew stood aside for her to enter exactly the kind of hall that one would have expected to enter. A bamboo stand with a piece of cheap mirror inserted, a piece of painted drain-pipe to hold the sticks and umbrellas, a row of curved hooks on the blank wall facing the bamboo stand to supplement its power of clothes holding. The windows appeared to have been closed for some time, for the air had a slightly stale odour. Hanging up his hat and placing his stick in the painted drain pipe, Carlos Mayhew opened the door of the front room, and motioned Jennifer inside. Jennifer’s first impression of the apartment was that one of the Tube posters depicting just such a room,.

“Furnished out of income,” had sprung into being. It was furnished with such strict regard for the picture in the catalogue, that any individual touches were for the moment lost. Then, on a small table, half hidden by a dying fern, Jennifer noticed the photograph of a girl in an ornate silver frame, a young girl of about 20, with a pretty, blonde, insipid face that did uot bear a close inspection, for on a second and more critical glance, it looked cheap and pert. Carlos Mayhew followed his guest’s gaze, and, suddenly darting forward, he seized the photograph in hands that trembled so violently that they were rendered almost useless for their Self-imposed task of destruction, so he flung the picture on the floor and ground it with his* heel into a mixture of powdered glass, bent silver and torn cardboard. Then, just as suddenly And inexplicably, he bent and. extricating the torn, almost unrecognisable piece of cardboard from the mess, sank into the one armchair that the room contained, and covered the card with”-kisses. “My poor little Laurel, you were only a child to that rich old reprobate who tempted you until you could hold out no longer,” he moaned, like some poor animal in pain, thought Jennifer, who had turned her back to the suffering man so that she looked out of the window. She saw willows waving gently in the breeze, saw the sun shining on rows of copper beeches, heard *iie voices of merry, laughing children, and then wondered why, in a world so fair, the sum of human misery so far exceeded that of joy. It was easy enough to deduce the motive of an excitable, easily-inflamed man such as Carlos Mayhew;, for the crime that he had intended to commit. The girl whose picture he had first ground beneath his heel and then kissed so passionately, was no doubt his wife, aud her flirtation with James Read had been discovered. But Laurel Mayhew’s affair with” Adela Creighton’s uncle w-as to stretch out octopus-like tentacles and enfold m a death-tight grip, not only Jennifer s life, but several others as well _A_ short, tense silence, pregnant with unspoken thought preceded a curt request from Carlos Mayhew for Jennifer to sit down. She did so, choosing a seat where the sunlight fell full upon her face, so that the dark, brooding eyes of the man in the armchair could note everv shade of expression evoked bv the terribly poignant little history of his hatred for James Read. “I am a commercial traveller, and away a great deal from home, sometimes even being sent to the Continent to get orders.” Even in his distress, with which was | mingled a little shame for his recent outburst, there was a trace of pride as he mentioned beiDg sent abroad by his firm, and Jennifer was glad to hear it. It indicated a swifter return to normality when kindly Time should

soften the blow just inflicted by life. “I trusted her, sent her all the money X could to keep her happy, and, when our baby was born, I was so proud that sometimes I would show her photo to perfect strangers in the train. Look, this is Faith,” Jennifer’s heart swelled with pity as she received from the young father’s hands the photo of a beautiful little girl with huge, dark eyes exactly like his own, a pure oval face, and a shock of curls that looked as if they must be fair, like her mother’s. “I begged for her to be called Faith because of the perfect trust between us,” Carlos Mayhew told Jennifer, in a voice which cut her to the quick, so like was it to that of a small boy who has suffered the rude shattering of his heart’s idol. “I was saving for a bigger house and a little motor-car, all unknown to Laurel, and I meant to buy the house and take her to it one day, and then, as if that were not enough to have done, to take her round to the garage and bring out the car. And all the time her rich admirer was giving her furs and jewels and taking her to night clubs, and little Faith was sent to her sister’s to be cared for on the money that I sent home. When she was dying she confessed everything, and I forgave, and it was my kiss of love —love, X tell you, for I would have died for her!” cried Carlos Mayhew, the Italian side of him again coming uppermost for a moment as he looked at Jennifer, almost as if she had doubted his word. Once again Jennifer felt her heart go out in sympathy to the man whom Fate had flung so strangely across her path. Somehow, she could not help liking him, and, though she knew that she should not, heartily disliking his dead wife for the wretched situation brought about by her own selfish greed. “All her clothes I have burned; everything that I did not myself buy for her I have destroyed,” the miserable man, who seemed to have somewhat recovered himself, told Jennifer. “"But there is still little Faith left to me to love, and I do not choose to leave her with her aunt, who, anyhow. is going out to Canada in eight days’ time for her own marriage. She is with my sister-in-law now,” went on Carlos Mayhew. speaking suddenly in a slightly exhausted, disjointing manner. Jennifer nodded, and waited, flashing a fearful glance at the ugly little clock on the mantelpiece, which showed the hour to be long past twelve. “You say that you are a fashion artist —a designer of women's clothes —at Elsie's?” he asked Jennifer, with a brisker, more purposeful note in his voice, a note which seemed to indi--1 cate that he had. for the time being. ; shelved his own affairs and was willing to turn his attention to hers. Jennifer’s pulses began to hammer, and her brain suddenly grew crystal clear. “Yes.” she replied, with intentional brevity.

The sooner her cross-examination concluded, the sooner would her suspense be ended, she told herself with deadly weariness. “And your mother runs a small hand laundry in Camden Town. Is the house her own?” asked Carlos Mayhew, with what seemed to Jennifer strangely irrelevant curiosity. Thinking of the numberless occasions on which the rent day had caused anxiety in their little home. Jennifer’s lips twisted in a humourless smile before she replied, “No, indeed. The house does not belong to mother.” “Would she consider changing her environment for this place?” The question so startled Jennifer that she answered it by asking another. “Why?” Her voice was as bewildered as her pretty, fatigued little face. “Because I want somebody to look after Faith, and I might search England for a woman of your mother's courage, and the ability to bring up a girl like you,” was the totally unexpected reply. “Mother is the most wonderful woman in the world, as well as the kindest,” answered Jennifer warmly, feeling more and more drawn to the strange but eminently likeable widower. “But I do not know how she would view a proposition like yours, put up to her so suddenly,” Jennifer continued, a little doubtfully. “You see. if mother is to know about Jack, it will not hurt her any more for him to go to prison and suffer for what he has done,” she told the intently-listen-ing man, earnestly. “Well, this two hundred will about take all I’d saved toward a new home, and I cannot afford to wait until your brother is able to return it. How much would a woman charge to run this house and look after Faith, and keep a room ready for me whenever I wanted it?” asked Carlos Mayhew. “About a pound a week,” replied Jennifer, after a moment’s thought. “A pound a week,” repeated Carlos Mayhew, reflectively. “Well, I’ll tell you what I'll do. I’ll offer your mother ten shillings a week over and above what any other woman would charge; that will be thirty. The twenty shillings a week can go off this money which I’m lending you to cover up your brother’s thefts.” A flood of crimson dyed Jennifer’s white cheeks at the ugly word, but she voiced her opinion juat the same. “But —pardon me, won't you, Mr. Mayhew—it is a most kind and generous offer that you are making, but where am I to go if mother breaks up our home to come and look after little Faith for you?” ; “There are six rooms besides thekitchen in this house. Why could i you not come, too?” was the astonishj ing proposal of the man who was to ; l'iay so vital a part in Jennifer Lome’s • strange love story. [ (To be Continued Tomorrow*),