LITERATURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4544, 16 November 1882, Page 4

LITERATURE.

BEMINIfIOENOE OF A MABOH. (Blachoood't Magcmnt.) Several years ago it fell to my lot to be on the march with a subaltern of my regiment in Ireland. I was taking a detaohment into a remote part of the country, where, I believe, some disturbances were apprehended, and we had been started off at pretty short notice. I have even now a lively recolleotion of a long railway journey, the dingy stations we passed, the tedious stoppages, occasional plashes of rain against the carriage windows, and our final exit from the train in a dark, draughty shed with a sloppy platform. From here we had a good long march to our halting-place, through a sad-coloured waste, past hillsides of black bog, hardly a fenoe worth calling one to be seen, now and then a tumble-down hovel by the roadside, and off and on the rain pelting down in the sort of searching cold showers one gets in bleak parts of Ireland in the autumn time. The town where we were to stay the night was no exception to the general dingiaeas. After setting the men down into their billets, we " prospected" the prinoipal inn in the place, gotaoouplo of very middling bedrooms, and made up our minds to make the best of the situation. We had divested ourselves of our wet uniform, entered our little sitting-room with its welcome peat-piled fire, examined some hideous scored prints hung round the walls— among them I remember one of St Yeronioa displaying a large handkorohief with the Saviour's face upon it — and were busy planning what to aasooiate with whiskey and the jaoketed potato, when a note was brought in and handed to me, with a message that someone was waiting for an answer. It wus addressed to " The officer commanding detachment, — Begiment ;" but ono saw at a glance it was not an offioial communication, the envelope being a dainty white one, and the handwriting almoßt unmistakably that of a lady. It turned out to be a very courteous invitation from aMr and Mrs M ,of Innishderry Hall (we will call it), who, having heard that somo troops were paesing through Moynetown to-day, hoped for the pleasuro of the officers' company at dinner that evening. This was > cully a timely as well as a hospitable .offer, so A ,my subaltern, and I at once agreed to accept it. Fortunately, when evening came round, and the Tiokety-looiing oar that was to iolt us to our en< erUiner's clattered up to the inn door, the weather had cleared a little. Well do I remember the drive ; the cold, keen air ; a pale, half-moon lighting up the sombre landßoape; dark islands of bog alternating with pools of shimmering water ; hill slopes near but mysterious. As far as I can remember, we entered the grounds of Innishdeny Hall about a mile and a half from the town. Already the country had began to wear a prettier aspect ; patohes of wood appeared; and after passing the lodge gate we began to descend a valley— broken, rooky ground, with clumps of spruce and laroh on either side— till suddenly emerging from this, the drive swept round a corner, and we were in view of the sea. A few minutes more and we were looking down over a oharming little bay shut in by cliffs, with a boat high and dry up the beach ; and from this point till we flighted the lights of the house, oopae, park, and heather intermingled one with the other to our left, while on the right great white lines of Burf quivorod and broke in the moonlight. It was a beautiful scene as it presented itself to us in the obscurity of the night-time. Possibly by day some of its enchantment might have been missing, but we did not see it in daylight. Suoh as it was, it probably impressed me and stamped itself in my memory, moro on account of the subsequent incidents whioh ensued than anything else. The houao, as we drew up to it, seemed a large and handsome one. It had a great many windows, a steep- pitched roof, and was partly ivy-clad. Two long ranges of outbuildings wero attached to it, one at either end, and from that nearest us as we approaohed ran out an old wall matted with ivy-Btemß, and forming an inoloaure soreened by a row of thorn trees, behind which one •mall building. Our driver, who had been most uncommunicative all tho way out as to our host and hostess, condeßceuded to tell us this was a very ancient chapel, which some anceßter of the family had pulled down and dismantled, " bad luck to him!" The fine entrance hall— l can recall it now —warmed by an ample stove and well lighted up, with a few droesed skins lying about, and b huge ebon onbinet ovor against the door, made a cheery contrast to the outside car and surroundings we had jußt left. Bound the -wall were grouped a splendid pair of stag's horns, a fox's head and brush, a stuffed seal, and other trophies of a sporting life • and a blaok buffalo's massive frontlet surmounting a sheaf of assegais, suggested at once what we afterward learned to be the case, that our host had been in Bouth Africa. " I wonder what tort of people they are, Major P " were A 's words to me, sotto voce, as he gave his sleeves a final jerk and glanoed down oritioally at his boots, while we followed the butler to the drawing-room. A moment mote and we were face to face with our new acquaintance. I do not reoolleot anything very noteworthy about our host. He was a tall and rather handsome man, but of somewhat faded aspect—quiet and genial in his manner. " I am an old suldier myself," was his greeting to us, " and 1 never like any one in the service to pass our place on duty without our finding him out. But our hostess ! Ab I ■hook hands with her she at once engroßsed my attention. lamat a loss now, as I was then, to define the nature or cause of the peculiar interest; aho seemed at once to excite in me. Certainly she was a remarkably handsome woman, but my observation of her at the moment of introduction was quiokly diverted by the strange demeanour of A . I had turned round, and waß in the aot of presenting him, when he suddenly started, stopped, and without attempting a salutation or advance of any kind, stared at her. For the instant the situation was embarrassing. Was the man going to faint, or was he off his head, or what ? There he stood, atock still, faoing Mrs M , till in a severe tone I ■aid: «'A , thia is our hostess." Mrs M , allow me to introduce Mr A ." This appeared to rouae him a little, for he made a sort of backward movement, which might do duty for a bow, though a very poor apology for it, and said : "J— J— l beg your pardon," retiring immediately into the background. If this was baahfulneas, it was a ourious form of it, I thought, and certainly new in my knowledge of A , This little inoident over, I had leisure to look round the room. There appeared to be about • dozen people in all. Mr M introduced me to a relation of his, a baronet, whose name I forget ; to a parson, who assured me in Hibernian aooenta that troops had been down here " repeafadly ; " and to a niece, whom I was to take in to dinner. I oaught a momentary glimpse of A , and saw to my Burprise that he was furtively but intently watching the lady of the house from an obscure corner. I was quietly slipping up to him to ask what it all meant when dinner was announced. At the dinner table I found myself on tho left of our hostess, the baronet opposite me. A—— was placed some distance down on the other side, so that I could keep an eye on him, whioh I soon began to think I must do. I had now an opportunity of noting more particularly Mrs M 's personal appearanoe. Her age I should judge to have been somewhere about eight and twenty Of thirty, considerably under her husband's. Her flguro was faultless; neok and arms of that nameless tint one has so often seen imperfectly described in novels as " oreamy white j" a corona of hair •l^ that deep auburn red which bo aett off a fair woman ; and a face of singular beauty, of which you forgot everything but the eyes the moment you looked into them. Suoh eyes they ware ! Their partioular size, shape, this or that colour, would never ocour to one ; it was their strange, almost weird, effeot when turned on you that one felt. It was as though they divined what you were thinking of, and Oould answer your thoughts. Yet it was not a satisfactory or a restful face. I can recall certain half -disagreeable sensations I experienced bb her eyes occasionally rested on | mine while we talked, and once or twice a flash as of something almost malevolent seemed to pass out of them. One inoident I recollect. Wo were discussing piotures, and Mrs M , pointing to tons fine family portraits hung round the dining-room, said, "My husband and I are distant cousins, Major P ,so that you see we are mutually represented here ; and yonder is a lady of by-gone days, supposed to have been very wicked, and to be like me." X looked up, and sure enough there gßied

down on me from the canvas a woman's face strikingly like the speakers— so like, that except for the quaint oostume, the portrait might have been taken for her own. It was a finer speoimen than usual of the formal yet fascinating style in which our great- great* grandmothers have been depicted for us— a stately attitude, regular but immobile features, and exuberant charms sumptuously if somewhat soantily drsped. The lady's figure, as it ohanoed, was turned toward our end of the table j she held a fan in her hand ; the lips had a disdainful, almost derisive, smile ; and the eyes, which in such pictures usually appear to be contemplating the spectator and to follow him about, seemed directed full on our hosteßS. " There is certainly a likeness," I said, "but the lady on the wall is entitled, I feel sure, to an entire monopoly of the wiokedness." Mrs M— ■— laughed, and winged a glance at me, and the smile and the eyes were those of the portrtit. Another circumstance I remember discovering ia looking round the table, which, had I been superstitious, might not have added to my comfort. We were sitting thirteen. Mrs M , I rather think, mutt have notioed me counting the numbers, for she made some remark as if in reply to my thought — " So sorry wo were disappointed of one of our party at the lait moment." Meanwhile A was again attracting my attention by his extraordinary behaviour. His Sartner, a pretty-looking lively girl, was eviently doing her best to make herself agreeable, and he was answering her in an intermittent fashion, but I could see he was eating very little, and crumbling his bread in a nervouß, preoccupied manner, while every now and then his eyes wandered to Mrs M , with a curious fixed stare that was positively ill-mannered and altogether unaooountable. Instinctively I turned to the same corner to see what could be the objeot of this persistent scrutiny, but in vain. There, indeed, was a beautiful woman, dressed to perfection, and with those wonderful eyes ; but what right had he to gape at her like that? I began to wonder if she or any other of the guests would observe A *s rudeness. I tried to catch his eye, but without suoceas. In a little while I lapsed into comparative silenc", and set myself to watoh A— 's mov <ments more narrowly, as well as I could, aortas the table. After a time ifc seemed to me that the direction of A— — 's gaze must be at Mrs M 's head, or a little above it ; but there was nothing I could see to account for this. To bo sura, she wor», fastened into the thick top coil of her hair, a jewelled ornament of some kind that seemed to sparkle at times with intense brilliancy ; but still, why this repeated and offensive contemplation at her own table of a married woman, on whom, so far as I knew, neither A—- nor I had ever set eyes before t Could these two have been known to each other in some by gone love affair, or was the man gone out of hifl wits, or had he taken too muoh drink ? [To be continued.J