LITERATURE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4856, 23 January 1894, Page 1

LITERATURE.

ALL ALONGJTHE RIVER. [BY MISB M. E. BBADDON.] j Author of "Lady Audiey's Secret," j "Aurora Floyd," " The Cloven Foot.' ' j " Dead Men's Shoes," &c, &c. {Copyrighted.) Chapter XllL— (Continued.) 'Mra Baynham gave the signal for ■ departure, feeling that her dinner, from a material point cf view, had been a success. ' The lobster eauco had been backward, and the three, last people to whom the vol au vent was offered had got very little except pie-ctustand white sauce, but those were small blemishes. The mutton and the pheasants had been unimpeachable, and on those substantial elements Mrs Baynham took her stand. Sho had spared neither pains nor money. Her Italian cream was -cream, and not corn-flour. Her cabinet padding waß a work of art. She felt satisfied with herself, and knew that the 'doctor would approve j and yet she felk somehow that the moral atmosphere had/ not been altogether free from storm cloud, i ■Colonel Disney had looked on at the feast ■with a gloomy countenance 5 Mr Crowther ihad talked in anunpleasant tone. "I am afraid those two will never forget the church path," she thought, a3 she set her nieces down to Zampa, and then went to inspect the card table in a snug tjorner near the fire, with its f re3hly-lighted wax candles, and new cards placed ready for the good old English game which our ancestors called whißt. Zampa once started meant a noisy even- ■ ing. Captain Pentreath would sing " The Maid of Llangollen," and "Drink, Puppy, j Drink." Mary Baynham would murder • "It was a Dream," and scream the higher notes in "Ruby." Duet would follow 1 solo, and fantasia succeed ballad, Mrs '. Baynham'sideaof a social gathering being ; the nearest attainable approach to a penny reading. She wonld have had recitations and imitations of popular actors, bad there been anyone capable of providing that form of amusement. Thia evening, however, she failed in getting a quartette for whist. Neither Mr Crowther nor his wife was disposed for <$ards; Colonel Disney coldly deolined* • and it was useless to ask the young people ■ to leave the attractions of that woody 1 piano. While Bhe was lamenting this state of things, the whist-table being i usually a feature in her drawing-room, | the Disneys and AUegra bade her good J night, and were gone before Bhe had time to remonstrate with them for so early a departure. It seemed earlier than it really was, for the dinner had been late. Disney's quick ear had heard the step of his favourite horse, punctual as the chuich clock. He bad ordered his carriage at half -past ten, and at half-past ten he and his party left the drawing-room, the doctor following to hand in the ladieß to their carriage, while the Colonel lighted a cigar on the door step, preparatory to walking home. *' If a a fine night ; I'd rather walk," he said. He walked farther than the Angler's Neat. He walked up to the hill where he and Isola had eat in the summer sunshine on the day after his home-coming. He roamed about that wild height for two 1 hoars, and the church clook struck one 1 while he waa in the lane leading down to j Trelasco. "If that man haa any motive for hia 1 insolence — if there ia the shadow of a secret between him aud my wife, I'll ring the truth out of him before he ib a day older," the Colonel said to himself, as he tramped homewards. He wrote to Mr Crowther next morning, requesting the favour of half-an-hour's private conversation upon a very serious matter. He proposed to call upon Mr Crowther at twelve o'olook, if that hour would be convenient. The bearer of the note would wait for an answer. Mr Crowther replied that he would be happy to see Colonel Disney at the hour named. The Colonel arrived at Glenaveril with military punctuality, and waa forthwith shown into that grandiose apartment, where all those time-honoured works which the respectable family bookseller considers needful to the culture of the country gentleman were arranged in old oak bookcases, newly carved out of soft chestnut wood in the {workshops of Venice. It was an imposing apartment, with pannelled dado, gilded Japanese paper, heavy cornice and ceiling, in carton pierre — 3uch a room a3 makes the joy of architect, builder, and furniture-maker. So far as dignity and social position can be bought for money, those attributes had been bought by Vanaittart Crowther ; and yet this morning, standing before his mediaeval fire place, with his hands in the pocket of his velvet lunge coat, he looked a craven. He advanced a step or two to meet his visitor, and offered his hand, which the Colonel overlooked, fixing him at once with a gaze that went straight to the heart of his mystery. He felt that an accuser was bafore him— that he, Yansifcfcart Crowther, waa called to account. "Mr Crowther, I have come to ask what you mean by your incolent manner to my wife." " Insolent ! My dear Colonel Disney, I admire the lady in question more than any other woman within twenty miles. Surely it is not insolent to admire a pretty woman." "It i 3 insolent to adopt the tone you have adopted to Mra Disney— first in yonr own house— on the solitary occasion when my wife and I were your guests — and next at tbe dinner table last night. I took no notice of your manner on the first occasion — for though I considered your conduct offensive, I thought it might be your ordinary manner to a protty woman, and I considered I did enongh in forbidding my wife ever to re-enter your house. But last night the offence was repeated — was grosser — and more distinctly marked. What do you mean by talking to my wife of Lord Lostwithiel with a peculiar emphasis? What do you mean by your affectation of a secret understanding with my wife whenever you pronounce Lostwithiel'a name ? " " I am not aware that thore haa been anything peculiar in my pronunciation of that name — or in my manner to Mrs Disney," said Mr Crowther, looking at his boots, but with a malignant smile lurking at the corners of his heavy lips. " Oh, but you are aware of both facts. You meant to be ineolent, and meant other people to notice your ineolence. Ifc was your way cf being even with me for defying you to shut up the wood yonder, and cut off the people's shorb cut to church. Tou dared not attack me, but you thought you could wreak your pretty spite upon my wife— and you thought I should be too dull to observe, or too much of a poltroon to resent your impertinence. That's what you thought, Mr Crowther; and I am herejso undeceive you, and to tell you that you are a coward and a liar, and that if you don't like those words you may send any friend you please fco my friend, Captain Hulbert, to arrange a meeting in the nearest and most convenient place on the other side of the channel." Mr Crowther turned very red, and then very pale. It was the first time he had been invited to venture his life in defence of his honour; and for the moment it seemed to him that honour was a Bmall thing, a shadowy possession exaggerated into importance by the out-at-elbows and penniless among mankind, who ' had nothing else to boast of. Aa .if a man who always kept fifty thousand poundß at

his bankers, and who haiS money invesiec all over the world, would go and risk his life upon the sand 3of Blankeoburgh again s ! a soldier who3e retiring allowance was something less than three hundred a year and who was perhaps a dead shot. The ides was preposterous. No, Mr Crowther was not going tc fight, and though he quailed before those steady eyea of Martin Disney, cslm in their deep, indignation, this explanation was not unwelcome to him. He had a dagger ready to plunge into his enemy's heart, and he did not mean to hold bis hand. "I'm not a fighting man. Colonel Disney," ho said • " and if I were I should hardly care to fight for a grass widow who made herself common talk by her flirtation with a man of moat notorious antecedent*. We will say that ifc never waa any more than a flirtation — in spite of Mrs Disney's mysterious disappearance after the hunt ball, which happ9ned exactly to correspond with Lord Lostwithiel's Budden departure. The two eventa might have no connection —more especially as Mrs Disney came baok ten days after, and Lord Lostwithiel hasn't come back yet." "^ " 1 can answer for my wife's conduct, sir, under all circumstances, and amidst all surroundings. You are the firat person who has ever dared to cast a slur upon her, and it shall not be my fault if you are not the last. I tell you again, to your face, that you are a coward and a liar— j a coward because you are insolent to a young and lovely woman, and a liar because you insinuate evil against her which you are not able to substantiate." - ** Ask your wife where she was at the end of December, the year before last— the year you were inlndia. Ask her what she had been doing in London when she came back to Fowey on the laat day of the year, and travelledin the same train with my lawyer, Mr M'Allister, who was struck by her appearance, first because she was so pretty, and next because she looked the picture of misery— got into conversation with her, and found out who she was. If you think that is a He you can go to M'Allister, in the Old Jewry, and ask him to convince you that it is fact." "There iano occasion. My wife has no seorets from me." "I am glad to hoar it. Then there is really nothing to fight about except a good deal of vulgar abuse on your part, which I am willing to overlook. A man of your mature age married to a beautiful girl has some excuae for being jealous." " More excuse, perhaps, than a man of-" your age has for acting like a cad," said the Colonel, turning upon his heel, and leaving Mr Crowther to his reflections. Those reflections were not altogether bitter. Mr Crowther felt assured that he had sown the seeds of future misery. He did not believe in the Colonel's assertion that there were no seorets between him and his wife. He had cherished the knowledge oE that mysterious journey from London on the last day of the year. He had warned his confidential friend and solicitor to mention the fact to no one else. He had pried and questioned, and by various crooked ways had found out that Isola had been absent from the Angler's Nest for some days after the Hunt Ball ; and he had told himself that she was a false wife, and that Martin Disney was a fool to trust hen As for being called by harsh name 3, he wae too much a man of the world to attach any importance to an angry husband's abuse. It made him not a sixpence' the poorer ; and as there had been no witness to the interview it scarcely diminished his dignity. The' thing rested between him and his enemy. "He took down my gates : bub I think I have given him something to think about that will spoil his rest for many a night, before he has thought it out," mused Mr Crowther.