CHAPTER XXVII.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 126, 31 October 1885, Page 6

CHAPTER XXVII.

. .KATIE MAKES A DISGOVKRY, Mask was becoming impatient of this mode of life, and wanted a change. Leta was rapidly regaining her usual spirits, and began to think with something very nearly approaching pleasure of their return to Valley Farm. Mark, 1 in the long winter evenings that had passed, had planned numerous improvements for the old homestead, and was anxious to be putting his projects into execution. "It will kill time," he thought, moodily ; but he was very solicitous for Leta's welfare, and knowing how she longed for and yet dreaded this homegoing, he left it all for her to determine. Unfortunately, she could not quite make up her mind, but put it off from day to day until spring was ushered in, with rough winds and fitful changes of weather. "We must go some Umd, I suppose, Mark," Leta said, sadly, one evening: " but oh ! how I dread the torture to which I shall be subjected when our acquaintances discover the reason of my absence from home !" " Why, is it necessary to tell the reason ?" Mark said, quietly. { Yok went away as Leta Maynard, go back the same. Mother has stated you are absent on a visit. Your returning home with me will disarm suspicion." j " And live a lie the rest of my life !" Leta said, bitterly. "Oh ! Mark, I cannot do that !" " It will only be for a little while, Leta ; then we will go abroad, you and I, and investigate that matter mentioned in the papers in your possession. We can be gone .two or three years, and if what those documents state be true, you can don your widow's weeds • with your title and return with me to Valley Farm. Then who will dare to point the finger of scorn at you ? It will be thought tbat you were married and widowed while abroad. You must not let that one mistake cloud your life for ever. Sister, will you do as I say?" " How can I do otherwise, Mark, when you have devised this plan to make my life what it might have been but for my own folly? I will go home when you are ready !" •'Spoken like a sensible girl!" Mark said. " Now, you must go shopping," he continued, as he placed a roll of bills in her lap. Leta said, sorrowfully : " How can I, Mark V " You must, Leta ; that is part of the programme. If you return home sad and dark-robed like this, people will look at you askance. You- must go bravely, like a| soldier to the battle-field, and, sister, don all the war-paint, for good clothes, you know, take a. great part in the estimate! people make of you." Leta, knowing in her heart all that Mark j said was true, complied with hia request, j and came back laden with purchases ; they were for herself, she told her brother, but in her mind they all had been given to Alice in advance. Then Mark seemed to grow very worldly in his tastes, and urged Leta to accompany him to variouß places of amusement which she did. Mark dreaded, yet longed to meet Mrs Lee again ; - he knew it would be much better for him to go away without seeing her, but felt that to meet her and hear her voice once more were pleasures he could not forego. In the theatres and crowded assemblies he searched for her in vain ; there ■was no other way but to call at Uncle Sam's again j poesibly she might be "at home " to him, but it was hardly probable after the coolness with which she had treated him when last there. Determined to make another effort, and doubtful as to what his reception would be, Mark found himself ushered into Mrs Lee's presence, for Bhe had not had time to evade him, as he was Bure she would have done if she could have escaped unobserved. She turned at his approach, coldly polite, as to the veriest stranger, and said, pointedly : •'Mr Desbro is in the library. Shall I tell him you are here ?" She wished to escape from him, Mark thought, but his words were as courteously uttered when he answered as if the bitterest i pain was not filling his heart at that moment. % i " Can you not spare a few minutes to j me ?" he asked, pleadingly. " I will not j task your patience long, for I return home to Valley Farm in a few days, and, as i quickly as I can make arrangements, I shall go abroad again. " Indeed !" Candice said, trying to speak calmly, and succeeding so well that her voice sounded harsh and indifferent. "Your resolution is quite recent, is it not?" " Quite," Mark answered, sadly. "I dare say, however, few will regret my departure ' " What a consummate rascal he was, to be sure, Candice thought, bitterly, and he was acting dishonourably to the very laet ! She thought of the golden-haired girl she had twice seen with him, and wondered if he had tired of her already. The suspicion added a shade more of scorn to her voice as she answered : "As people sow, so shall they reap, I believe* Mr Maynard. Has your life been one that would cause people to regret your departure ?" " I see you have misjudged n?e," Mark answered, gloomily. Candice wondered for just one second if it were possible she had misjudged him in the minutest degree. Uncle Sam, hearing voices and recognising Mark's deep, full tones, hurried into the room and grasped the hand extended to him warmly. What Mrs Lee's welcome had lacked in cordiality Uncle Sam's made up for. He noted with deep regret the cloud on Mark's handsome face as Mrs Lee slipped noiselessly from the room, but, fearing to wound Him by impertinent questions, listened quietly while Mark explained his plans for the future. "Uncle," the nephew said, noting the old man's kindly gaze, "I believe you have liked and trusted me even when I have most deserved your censure, but ever -since I lost my wife by my own foolishness, 1 have done nothing I need blush for ! Do you believe me ?" "I do," Uncle Sam answered, earnestly, " and I cannot see why some folks take such unaccountable prejudices !" Mark knew he referred to Mrs Lee, and was glad his uncle did not share her dislike of him. "I'm getting to be an old man, Mark," Uncle Sam said, regretfully ; " you must not stay too long abroad, for I will need your help very soon perhaps." ; Mark dreaded this parting. - It seemed to him as if those he loved most were always lost to him, and he knew he could not trust himself in Mrs Lee's presence again. A cordial' hand-shake, a promise of speedy news from the wanderer to be, and Mark was once more on his way homeward to Leta. Meantime, Candice hurried to her own room* and shut the door. She did not otice Katie sitting just .inside the great

bay-window, where the heavy curtains of rich, dark material fell about her, almost screening her from view. Baby Mark ,was sleeping sweetly in her arms, and, fearing to disturb him, she sat there quietly, oon tent to feel his ourly head resting so confidingly against her brawny arm. She was 'almost asleep herself .when Gandice came into the room, and was suddenly recalled to consciousness by the sound of suppressed weeping. Katie rose hastily from her ohair,and, depositing Mark on the bed, was in the aot of leaving the room when Candice called her back. "Don't go, Katie ; I wish to speak with you." " Yes, mum " Katie said, wonderingly, and then added, eagerly : " Can I do aught for you, Miss Gandice ?" "No, Katie, but you have been my friend through many difficulties, and I am sure you will sympathise with me in this great trouble that has now come to me." She then told Katie all about her suspicions regarding her husband, and how she had seen that fair girl and Mark together. " And yet," she added, "he seems so true, Katie, I would fain forget it, if I could !" "Don't worry so, Miss Candice," Katie said, earnestly, stroking the tumbled curls of the young girl-wife. " You'll get along j well enough without him, my lassie ! I ; wouldn't spoil my eyes by crying for the j likes of him !" j " He is my husband, Katie I" "I know it, Miss Candice!" and she added, mentally : " Bad 'cess to the decateful craythur !" Then, seeming to take a sudden interest in* the subject;, she asked, hurriedly: "Is he downstairs yet, Miss 1 Candice ?" " Yes," Candice answered, "he is with uacle ;" and then she wondered why Katie left her and hurried from the room. Mark was just making his adieux when a woman closely veiled stood waiting in the back hallway leading from the servants' quarters to the little side street. " Where are you going, Katie ?" the brisk chambermaid asked, wonderingly. "None of your business, Miss Curiosity !" Katie said, sharply. The girl ran lightly upstairs, laughing at Katie's quick retort. As soon as the front door closed, Katie went out at the side entrance and came demurely around in front ol the house just in time to see Mark turn a corner a square distant. Then Katie hastened after him, never losing sight of him. Mark was wrapped in though*, for Mrs Lee's conduct puzzled him, while it wounded bis pride to be treated so scornfully. He walked away from the more pretentious dwellings to those of smaller size. Katie was close behind him now ; she saw him open the gate belonging to one of these dwellings and hurry up the gravelled walk. A lady was sitting by the window. Katie trudged slowly by and gazed at her eagerly. Would she never turn her head ? Yes ! She had heard Mark's footsteps ou the gravelled walk and turned her head quickly, with a glad little gesture of welcome. Katie, with an exclamation of astonishment, stopped before the gate and gazed with all her heart in her eyes at the fair vision at the window. I "Do you wish anything, my good woman?" Mark asked, looking back at the [ silent figure at the gate. But Katie, with one backward glance, passed on, without giving him an answer. She was in a perfect ecstaey of delight all the way home. "Bless my soul!" she said, mentally, "all that worriting about the man's own pister ! Shure 'tis meeself thought Mips Candice was mistaken ! The poor darlint ! to cry her eyes red over that !" and Katie laughed softly, although for some reason best known to herself her eye 3 were full of tears. That evening Katie astonished Candice by her unusual bursts of Irish wit, and she wondered why the girl looked at her so tenderly. "What is the matter, Katie?" Candice asked at length, unable to account for the girl's actions. " Miss Candice," Katie said, laughingly, "shure 'tis not right to cross the mountain till you get to it, and I fale light-hearted, that's all !" Candice never dreamed of the hidden meaning underlying the girl's quaint remark. Katie feigned an errand in her room before retiring, and, waiting until she had j disrobed, the kiud-hearted girl tucked her in bed ; then, bending over her, she left a kiss, and Candice fancied a tear also, upon her mistress's fair young face.