UNDER FALSE PRETENCES

Thames Advertiser, Volume XVII, Issue 5945, 16 December 1887, Page 4

UNDER FALSE PRETENCES

A KOVBL BY ADELINE SERGEANT, Author of "Jack's" "Martin DeVEHIL's DIASIUND," &C CHAPTER XL ' ON A MOUNTAIN-SIDE. (CONTINUED.) " I knew what he meant. I resolved that! would never tell you. And but for Richard's death 1 would have held my tongue. But to see you in Richard's place, with Kichard's money and Kichard's lands,' is more than I can bear. i will not tell this story to the word,'but I refuse to keep you in ignorance any longer. If you like to possess Richards wealth dishonest y, you are at liberty to do so. Any court of law would give it to you, and say that it was legally yours. There is, I imagine, no proof possible of the truth of my suspicions, Your mother and fa her are,'l believe, both dead. I do not remembpr the name of the monk who acted as my doctor. There may be relations of your parents at San Stefauo, but they are not likely to know the story of Vinceuza's child. At any rate, you are not ignorant any longer of the reasons tor which I believe it possible that you knew what you were doing when you were guilty of Eichard Luttrell's death. There is not a drop of 'honest Scotch or English blood in your veins. You are an Italian, aud I have always seen in your character the faults of the race to which by birth and parentage you belong. If I had not been weak enough to yield to the threats and the entreaties with which my husband and his tools assailed me, you, would now be living, as your forefathers lived, a rude and hardy peasant on the North Italian plains; and I—l might have been a happy woman still." . The letter bore the signature " Margaret Luttrell," and that was all. The custodiau of the place wondered what had come to the English gentleman ; he sat so still, with his face buried in his hands, and some open sheets of paper at his feet. The old man had a pretty, fair-haired daughter who could speak English—a little. He called her and pointed out the stranger's bowed figure from one of the cloister , windows.

"He looks as if he had had some bad news," said the girl. "Do you think that he is ill, father ? Shall I take him a glass of water, and ask him to walk into the house ?"

' Brian was aroused from a maze of wretched, confused thought hy the touch of Gretchen's light hand upon his arm. She had a glass of water in her hand. "Wouldthe gentleman not drink?" she asked him, with a look of pity that startled him from his absorption. " The sun was hot that day, and the gentleman had chosen the hottest place to sit in ; would he not rather choose the. cool cloister, or her father's house, for one little hour or two ?"

Brian stammered out some words of thanks, and drank the water eagerly. He would not stay, however; he had bad news which compelled him to move on quickly—as quickly as possible. And then, with a certain whiteness about his lips, and a look of perplexed pain in his eyes, he picked up the papers as they lay strewn upon the grass, bowed to Gretchen with mechanical politeness, and made his way to the door by wheh he had come in. One thing he forgot; he never thought of it till long afterwards ; the sweet, frail rose that Brother Dino had placed within his hand .when he bade him God-speed. In less than an hour he was in the train ; he he, hardly knew why or whithi-r he was hound ; he knew only that one of his restless fits had seized him and was driving him from the town in the way that it was wont to do.

Mrs Luttrell s letter was & great shock to him. He never dreamt at first of questioning the truth of her assertions. He thought it very likely that she had heen perfectly able to judge, and that her husband had been mistaken in i treating the matter as a delusion. At | any time this conviction would have been a sere trouble to him, for he had loved her and her husband and Richard very tencbriy, but just now it seemed to him a ! most more than he could bear. He had divested himself of nearly the whole of what had been considered his inheritance, because he disliked so much the thought of profiting by Richard's death ; was he also now to divest himself of the only name, he had known, of the country that he loved, of the nation that he had been proud to call his own ? If his mother's story were true, ho was, as she had said, the son of an Italian gardener called Vasari ; his name then must be Vasari; his baptismal name he did not know. And Brian Luttrell did not exist; or rather, Brian Luttrell had been buried as a baby in the little churchyard of San Stefano. It was a bitter thought to him.

But it could not be true. His whole being rose up in revolt against the suggestion that the father whom he had loved so well had not been his own. father; that Richard had been of no kin to him. Surely his mother's mind must have been disordered when she refused to acknowledge him. It could not possibly be true that he was not her son. At any rate, one duty was plain to him. He must go to San Stefano and ascertain, as far as he could, the true history of the Vasari family. And in the meantime lie could write to Mr Colquhoun, He was obliged to go on to Geneva, as he knew that letters and remittances were to await him there. As, soon as he had received the answer that Mr Colquhoun would send to. his le ter of inquiry, he would proceed to Italy at once.

week at Geneva. And there, in spite of the' seclusion hi which he chose to live, »nd his resolute avoidance of all society, it happened that before ho had been in the place three days he met an old University acquaintance—a strong, cheery, good-natured fellow called Gunston, whose passion for climbing Swiss mountains seemed to be'unapt enable. He tried h;;rd to make Brian accompany him on his next expedition, but failed. Both strength and energy were wanting to him at this time.

Mr Colquhoun's answer to Brian's communications were short, and, to the youug man's mind, unsatisfactory. " At the time when Mrs • uttrelf first made the statement that she believed you to be Vincenza Vasari's son, her mind was in a very unsettled state. Medical evidence went to show that mothers., did at times conceive a violent dislike to one other of their children. This was probably,a case in point. The Vasaris were honest, respectable people, and there was no reason to suppose, that any fraud had been prepetrated. At the same time, it was.impossib.e to convince Mrs.Liittrell that her own child had not died; and Mr Colquhoun was of opinion that she would never acknowledge Brian as her son again, or consent to hold any personal intercourse with him." "Itwould be better if I were dead and out of all this uncertainty," said Brian, bitterly, when he had read the letter. Yet something in it gave him a sort of stimulus. He took several long excursions, late though the season was ; and in a few days he again encountered Gunston, who was delighted to welcome him as a companion. Brian was a practised mountaineer; and though his health had lately been impaired, he seemed to regain it in the cold, clear air of the Swiss Alps. Gunston did not find him a genial companion ; he was silent and even grim ; but he was a daring climber, and exposed his life sometimes with a hardihood which approached temerity.

But a day arrived on which Brian's climbing feats came to an end. They had made an easy ascent, and were descending the mountain on the'southern side, when an accident took place. It was one which often occurs, and which c?n be"easily pictured to oneself. They were crossing some loose snow when the whole mass began to move, slowly first, then rapidly, down the slope of the mountain side.

Brian sank almost immediately up to his waist in the snow, He noticed that the guide had turned his face to the descent and stretched out his arms, and he imitated this action as well as he was able, hoping in that manner to keep them free. But he was too deeply sunk in the snow to be able to turn round, and as he was in the rear of the others he could not see what became of his companions. He'heard one shout from Gunston, and that was all—"Good God, Luttrell, we're lost!" And then the avalanche swept them onwards, first a sharp, hissing sound, and then with a grinding roar as of thunder, and Brian gave himself up for lost indeed. To be continued to-morroiv