FOR HONOUR'S SAKE

Timaru Herald, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 12907, 22 February 1906, Page 2

FOR HONOUR'S SAKE

(By Bertha M. Clay.)

CHAPTER Vlll.—Continued.

Stewart sometimes wondered himself how he bore this ceaseless pain, this iire in his heart, that would not be quenched, but seemed to him the more fierce as tie months rolled on. Sometimes the longing to see once more his lost love grew almost to madness.; he must seek her, must at least discover where she was. He passed nights in wild wrestling with that passionate desire; prayer gave him no help; "his words went up, his thoughts remained below." Conquest, when it came, seemed all too dearly bought. Once, by chance he heard of Claude Verner; she was with the Davenants in Vienna. Society was raving over her beauty. Only a few hours' journey !—but he had strength to battle with that temptation, yet felt, with a kind of despair, how nearly he had yielded to it—that next- time the temptation came he might be conquered, and not the conqueror.

Then came one of those small wars which are always vibrating over the Indian peninsula, and Capt. Stewart, greatly to some people's surprise, and to society's regret, volunteered to go out. For, after all, this was only a sort of guerilla warfare, where there was no glory to be got. A few handfuls of ignorant heathen to fight. Pah! Brother officers remonstrated, but .in vain.

Stewart went out, and for six months remained in India fighting the natives and seeking death; but death passed him by, as it often passes those who court it. He bore a charmed life; he was not even wounded. His splendid constitution was firoof, as it had always been, against everyhing that a bad climate—the climate here was especially bad—could do. Other men were hud low by malaria, ague—what not. They all passed him by, as if they knew he would open his arms to them, and were determined, for some inscrutable reason, to spare him.

He never spared himself; he ■exposed his •ife with :m ut'er recklessness that sometimes made bis brother officers say to him, half in jest, half in earnest: " One would think, Stewart, that you wanted to be shot!"

This was but a year after the ill-starred marriage, and Pauline had long ago dropped even the pretence of having ever loved her husband.

With brutal frankness, the rose-lipped woman told her husband one day: " I never loved ..you. I meant, from tie first hour you entered my house, to win you, if I could, and I succeeded. You were deeply grateful, bah! I never nursed you; that sort of thing isn't in my line. I played on your gratitude—your fantastic sense of honour, and—l am your wife. You can't undo, that, though we are, praetically, strangers to each other; that is.best so, we have nothing in common."

She had so spoken within a month of their marriage -day; but, even thus early, the speech was no revelation. He knew, even before he married her, that such love as she had "once professed was a sham. In a dozen ways, during the misnamed honeymoon, she had shown him the coarseness of her natural fibre, and to his nature, sensitive as a woman's, such knowledge was an actual horror. She was perfectly aware cf this, though he made no overt sign, and she had a curious delight in torturing him. He had been proof against her attractions, to surrender at discretion to some other woman. Well, then, let him suffer—suffer to the uttermost—draw perpetual comparisons between the wife to whom he was tied, an'd the girl he would, if he could, put in his wife's place. Perhaps it was women like Pauline Arnold that gave'rise to the ancient tradition of some human beings who were possessed of a demon; but they, at least, gave unconscioms warning by casting no shadow. Pauline; gave no warning. She looked, and could talk, when she chose, like an angel.

in six months the little war was over, and Esric Stewart came home. His wife was out at a ball the night before he arrived. He met her the next day, a little before luncheon, and she held .out her hand to him, scanning him with a halfquizzical smile. " As handsome as ever;" was her remark, as he took her hand for a second, and" •dropped" it. "and not a bit changed, only ;•. little more bronzed, perhaps. . So you've rome-ba.vk' safe and sound?" Of course lie knew what those last words, and the smile meant--" Yon went out hoping to hti<) you didn't succeed." He ■ tu'riKd awav. without a word, and took up a book. Pauline added, after a pause :

"Lady Meldune is coming in to luncheon] to-day. and two or three others. Oneis a Mrs Westmcre; she was introduced to me two months ago. Do vou know her?"

"les. ' Stewart looked up from his book to answer. Nothing could obliterate his fine courtesy; he was never rude to his wife. "• I have met her twice."

I don't like her," said Pauline, shortly. Why not?" asked her husband.

"Oh! she's pretty and lively, and all that—but I don't like her. Did vou see Major Langdale in India?" Stewart half smiled. " No." he said ; "he was hundreds of miles from where I was." Pauline's geography was, like most other things worth knowing, hazy. "Ah, I didn't know." she said, indifferently. ; -1 am going to Lady Allister's ball to-night, Esric. You'll come with me?—it will look better." ' '

"It -will do if-1 escort you home," said he. quietly. Pauline knew by experience that her husband's " I will "or " I will not : ' wns final, fehe delighted in a quarrel, and had quarrelled continually with her first husband; but Captain Stewart was of another metal; he never stooped to a war of Avoids, and quickly made Pauline understand the worse than futility of opposing his will when once he had expressed it. So now she pouted, and observed, sulkily: '" You might do an 1 wish "for once in a war; but it doesn't matter." To which Stewart -made no reply, but rend in silenc-?. until the visitors were announced, and he was overwhelmed -with rleljsrhted greetings. He was n universal favourite, everyone was glad to see hhii. except "the womnn who bore his name.

"Detestable, heartless doll!" thought ; Maida; "though there's a lot more mis- ] chief in ier than was ever in wax and sawdust; the very sight of her irritates < me." - { CHAPTER IX.—A MAN'S TEMPTA- . TION. J After luncheon the callers went away, , all save Lady Meldune and Mrs W T estmore, « who had come together. Captain Stewartasked them not to be in a hurry when ] they rose to go, and Pauline seconded the ) request, chiefly because she wanted to show ] Lady Meldune a new gown, which w;.s " a . dream"; so she carried that lady off to , her dressing room for the inspection, and , pretty Maida was left in the drawing-room j to the care of her host. j "I shall expect you to tell me all the j news," said he. placing her in a low chair ] by the fire—though it was late April, it ] was quite chilly enough to make a fire j a necessity—and leaning against- the mantel. i " One gets very little home news in India, , you know." j "Of course, poor fellow! How you ] must have pined in that barbarous place ] for something in the way of life. Well, ] there isn't much stirring at present, as ( the season has scarcely commenced. By , the way, Captain Stewart, I hope you ; will find your way to Lexham Gardens j now." i "Be sure I shall only be too delighted. . I haven't forgotten our waltz, you know, , at- the ambassador's ball." j "Really? Or are you only making a pretty speech? You soldiers are not to be trusted. But I haven't forgotten ife. You waltz just perfectly. I shall be obliged to ask you to bespeak a waltz for ; the next ball where we may meet." "You need not." said Stewart-, laughing. " I am quite ready to anticipate you, and make the one, two, if you will be so good to me." "So good to myself!" crkd Maida. "Of course, I will! It's a bargain! Shall you be at Lady Allister's this evening?" " Only to escort my wife home. I have a good deal to do," he explained: and it was, so far, true, that he did not choose to put off what- he might have done another time, had he been so minded. "Surely." he added, "you, who, report says, know most things, must have some news." She could not guess how fiercely his heart was throbbing as he went on, without a pause, without a change of tone or feature: ' "Any fresh arrivals, for instance? or any expected ?" How he held his breath for the answer, and braved every power of his being to be armed at all points for whatever that answer might be. " Oh, yes!" exclaimed Maida. " there are some new people, come over about a foitnight ago from abroad—Rome or Florence, I think—at least, one of them isn't new. Did you ever meet a Mr Davenant?" For a moment Captain Stewart's heart seemed to cease beating, prepared though, he was by what had gone before for the name that concluded Maida's speech. Davenant! —here in London—that surely meant- also Claude! "Davenant?" he repeater, as if trying to recall the owner of the name—" Chris "Davenant ?" " Yes." " I knew him slightly in London ; I met him in Paris nearly two years ago." "Was his ward with him then. Claude Verner? What an odd Christian name for a modern girl. They say she is such a , beautiful creature." Stewart had instinctively changed bis position a little when Maida began to , speak of the Davenants, so that his back was to the light; and now if theie was a slight change in his face she could not observe it. The mere round of Claude's name made every nerve thrill—and she was still unmarried! But self-control had grown, especially during these two years, to be the habit of the man's life, so that t he replied with just the tone and manner in which one speaks of any passing acquaintance : . '

" Yes, she had not long been with them. I met them at the theatre one evening, and spent another evening at their house; that was all I saw of them before I left Paris. Miss Verner was certainly a most beautiful girl, and a very charming one." "Ah, well, I believe you, you are a connoisseur," said Maida; ""but*Basil Tollemache was raving about her to me yesterday—if raving is the right word to* apply to his outpourings—" " Tollemache," interrupted Stewart; the blood shot through liis veins like a swift, fierce flame—" forgive me—Tollemache, of East Danford?" "The same—you know him?"

" For a hunting country squire," said Stewart, through his teeth. Maida only thought he knew more of Tollemache thai he chese to say; men are slow to run each other down. She could not guess at the jealousy that gripped his heart like an iron hand. "\es? And he is delighted with Miss Verner?"

Decidedly," returned Maida, laughing; "it would be a good thing for her, in a ■worldly point of -new. ToUemaehe lias lots of money, and she. I hear, has little or none. I dare say" the Davenants encourage him. Chrie* is just the sort of man to look upon a beautiful girl as a marketable commodity. I wonder he hasn't, succeeded in getting*Jier off before now;, they have been flashing about in Paris, Vienna, Rome, everywhere." Ah! that cruel life! -How had Claude come through the ordeal. But he could not endure hearing her di.scu.ssed as one might any butterfly of the season: he changed the subject back to ToUemache. . And now they are trrinsr London," ho said. "But when did Tollcmaclie com© out as a London man ?" " Oh. at the fag end of the winter season. He went the pace like the best- of them—no doubt he did that at home, too," said -Mrs -\Vestmore. "Thon he vanished, and came up to town ten days a-o; knocked ■up against Daveiwnt at a dub. and Davemint invited him to their house—they've Cot a pretty place at South Kensington. \ y r m l can nem ' makc - a Tendon man out of Squire ToUemache—he's so heaw' always, to me. (he scent" of the hnv about Ins Bond street clothes." "Poor ToUemache! How unmerciful yon are. Mrs - Wesrmore." ' Am I ? Women are censorious, von ! know. Here come I.sdy Mcldune ond

your wife, and we must be trotting. I have enjoyed our chat so much.*' "So have 1." he said, smiling. "I shall renew the pleasure at the earliest opportunity.'" '• Mind vou do.''

And just then the two other ladies came in, and the visitors took their lej«*e. Stewart saw them to their carriage, tt.ai went straight to his sludy, and liu.-g l.'iiiself down, covering his face.

Claude so near to him! so a.v! ai>d he worn and spent with the "ong the hopeless strife! What use to a\<id her? He might meet her in any ba.hooju. at any fete or garden party; and, th! f«»i one touch of her hand, one look ini«* I lie sweet eyes that were ever gazing ui him from the depths of his soul. He w:i.« mad —mad with pain and longing, sick wills heart hunger. That he, of all men, si.-n-ld be denied even a little love—he to wuom love was a paramount need; he must «-.%%<.- it—he was growing reckless, desper.ue. lie dreamed of n:> wrong to Claude: his he;>rtwas her shrine, before its saint he knelt in worship. Had not his love for her been his ,_ salvation ? Without it he l\-.d long ago made moral shipwreck of his life; but he was loyal to this love, as only the finer, more ideal natures can be to a pnssiou whose object is " lost to sig:!t." He could not listen now to the, voice that had called him back a thousand times lr«m

the all but overmastering temptation to seek Claude—the voice that pleaded for her peace—that bade him remember the wrong he would do her to win her love; such love as his was a compelling power, tb« more so when giv-tn t.< one whose whole nature was in affinity with his own. " Let me suffer," he had said: '' no! her—my darling!" and had turned back in time.

But he gave no heel to that voice "oday; he heard it. hut iis accents \\x-r< faint and uncertain, drowned in the tempest of his passion and his anguish. Temptation was by lw side, within his grasp, and his strength was weaker to oppose ii- j He gave up the battle—h* yielded himself' captive—he stretched «jut his hand, and caught temptation to his heart, and held it close—close; and heard .only the passionate cry of his Foul for its supreme need; saw only the wistful eyes that looked into his across the de«ert of those two years that were as a thousand for the anguish they held, and Raid to liirn, " Come!" (To be continued.)