HIS LOVE OR HIS LIFE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10753, 26 April 1913, Page 7

HIS LOVE OR HIS LIFE.

(By RICHARD MARSH.) luthor of " The Beetle,' " The Marquess of Putney,' Eto.

[All Rights Reserved.] CHAPTER XIII. KKWS AT HIIEAKFAST. It was quite late when Miss Barber returned to The Pleasaunce. At the gate the lodge-keeper greeted her with acclamations. "Miss Barber, I am that glad to see you. Wo liave be&n wondering what had become of you." Miss Whitaker met her in the doorway. After her own fashion she acted as echo to the logde-keeper. "My dear Olive, where have you been? Do you know it's after ten o'clock? You might have wired; you might have guessed how anxious I should be. I've been wondering all sorts of tilings; if you'd lost your way, if anything had happened to the car, if you'd been caught in the storm. _ ■ " I did lose my way; something did happen to the car, but it wasn't very much. And as to being caught in the storm, just look at me—-don't I look as if I'd teen caught in the storm P "My dear child, what a sight you are! You don't look as if you had a dry thread on you. Come upstairs and change; how wet you are I You should have got into shelter." The butler, Kelly, was standing in the ball. It was he who had opened the door. Ho said, not as he had spoken in the morning, but in the suave tones of the well-trained servant : „ .

" How about dinner, Miss Barber. Have you dined?" "So you're hack again, are you? I'm glad to see you, Kelly." " Yes. miss, I m back again; and if you'll excuse my saying it, I'm glad to see you." The mistress and the servant exchanged glances, almost as if each expected to find something 011 the other's face.

"Well, Kelly; I certainly haven't vfhat you call dmed, or anything like it; so if, after I've got myself into something like decent order, you could offer me something tempting to eat, I think I should rather like it; in fact, I'm nearly 6ure I should. I believe I'm starving." While she ate the servants were in the room waiting; Miss Whitaker sat opposite, as&ing an ocasional question, though the presence of the servants eeemed to act as a oheck. When the meal was finished, and the two girls had adjourned to another room, the bridle seemed to have been removed from Miss Wliitaker's mouth—«he was all questions. She wanted to know exactly where Miss Barber had. been, why she went there, precisely what she had seen and done—in fact, she seemied to desire a minute account of her proceedings, almost as if she suspected her of having done something which she wished to hide, and. which she—Miss Whitaker—ought to know. She eeemed devoured with ouriosity—to have a thirst for information which was insatiable.

"Reallyl" at last protested Miss Barber. "Enid, are you all notes of interrogation."

" But it seems so strange that you should hare been gone all this time, been out in all that frightful storm, so far as I can make out from -what you say, for 110 reason at all." Miss Barber had a book in her hand which, presumably, she desired to read. She lowered it and regarded her friend. " Enid " —she paused as if to choo&a her words—" I hope you won't mind what I'm going to say, but I believe I've told you already that I'm half American, and perhaps American girls do all sorts of tilings just because they choose. They don't like comment, they don't like criticism, they don't like to feel they're wat-ched and they don't like questions. I've been out over and over again for whole days by myself and you've never shown the slightest desire to know where I've been. What's the matter with you to-night?" " Of course, Olive, if you think I'm intruding, or wish to pry into your private affairs - ■" "My dear Enid, I don't like you to talk to me like that. _ You owned you weren't very well thiß morning, and I'm afraid you're not much better tonight; are you?" Miss Whitaker, rising from her chair, tossed her book on to a table with what was very like an angry gesture. " I suppose I'm not. I don't know what's the matter with me, but I know I'm very miserable. Graham Burke is trying to sleep in his cell at Canterstone; how would you feel if you knew that about the man you had once been going to marry?" She turned to Miss Barber a fact which was white, drawn, haggard. Miss Barber regarded her witli what might have been described as observant calmness, as if she were some curious study. "Did you ever care for him?'* " Care "l'or him ! Care for him!" Miss Whitaker repeated the words twice over, then she laughed. " What a way to speak of what I felt. I've been sick of love for him ever since the days in which I wore short frocks; now you have it. I suppose you'll laugh at me, but—l had to put it plainly. And there he is in gaol." "I don't wish to intrude upon your confidence, and won't say another word about it if you'd rather not, Enid, but there is one question I should like to ask." "Oh, ask it! you can ask me anything. I'm the employed and you're the employer." "Enid! what a horrible thing to say. How can you allow yourself to speak like that?" " It's true, isn't it? iou 1 pay me two hundred a year to be your companion. You get very little value for your money, and sometimes you can't help letting me know it." * " What have I done or said which in the least degree entitles you to make such a statement?" "When I asked you questions just now you put me in my place, but I have' 110 doubt you consider yourself entitled to ask me what you like. Go on, ask me what you were going to, von can."

"I'm afraid' you really are Dot very well, your nerves have been overfM.vaine'l. And I'm feeling very tired. I m c;oing to lied. Good-night."

" Olive, before you go toll me what you were going to ask rue about Graham

Miss Barber paused at the door to answer.

" Something which I shouldn't dream of asking you in your present Ira mo ot mind'; you might throw things. 1 daresay, .Enid, aftor a good night's rest you'll forgive me for what I have not done."

Miss Barber went; Miss Whitaker stared at tho door as if she would liko to see through the punols what slio was doing. "I wonder what she's bee:; doing; she's so secretive. As she says, 1 may be overstrained —God knows I have cause to be-—and perhaps it's onlv my imagination, but for the moment I saw lier standing like a drowned rat in tho .doorway I felt that she'd been doing something she didn't want me to know. I wond'er what it was."

She seemed to be still wondering when the butler entered. Hours as a rule were very early at The Pleasaunce. The household was in bed before eleven o'clock; it was his custom, before retiring, to come to learn if anything els© was wanted. He looked about him when ho saw that Miss Whitaker was alone.

."I beg your pardon; has Miss Barber retired?"

"She lias; I suppose she has; I don't know what she's done." The young lady spoke with an irritation of which she could scarcely have been conscious. She turned on the man in ft passion which seemed to disconcert him. " Well, Kelly, what about your Graham Burke now? They've got him, and thev'll keep him, and they'll liang him."

"Miss Whitaker!" _ Judging from his manner she might just as well have struck him. Suddenly ho smiled; "You think so?"

The smile seemed to add to her exasperation. " I'm sure of it. You may indulge in all the rant you like, but he's a. thief and a murderer. I wouldn't keep anyone in my house who sympathised with a person ol' that description." " Wouldn't you? Fortunately, Miss Whitaker, this is not your house." Still smiling Kelly left tho room, leaving what seemed to be a very angry young lady behind him; one, too, with whom suspicion seemed all at once to have become a disease; she saw something suspicious in Kelly's smile. She actually set herself to solve the mystery. " I wonder what he meant by it. It came to liim all of a sudden, his smile, when I was saying that they had got him, and would keep him, and would hang him. Why should lie smile, when I said that? That sort of thing wasn't calculated to amuse him."

In the morning the story was all over the house—Graham Burke had escaped. It came almost with the daylight; the servants had all the particulars at their fingers' ends by the time the young ladies rose. When Louise, Miss Barber's maid, took the tea into her mistress, they wer« the first words on the tip of her tongue. " Miss Barber, Mr Burke has es-

caped." Miss Barber's eyes were not yet quite wide open. When Louise said that, she opened them a little wider, but not much.

"Oh, has he?" she said. "I hope Louise, you haven't made my so strong again; the last two or three mornings" it has been almost undrinkable."

" I think you'll find it all right, miss. Mr Burke jumped out of the train as it was going through Okeham tunnel, and nothing has been seen of him since." " Hasn't there? I'm afraid, Louise, you're more interested in Mr Burke than I am, especially at this hour of the morning. Will you see that my bath is nearly cold; I feel as if I shall want something to rouse me." Louise went out feeling snubbed. "Of course," she said to the hous&maid, as 6he told of the way in which her mistress had received the news. " she doesn't really know him, and that's why she doesn't care what becomes of him. Yet I'm told, she was in court."

"Lots of people would have liked to have been in court who don't care what becomes of him." This was the housemaid, whose taste appeared to be slightly morbid. " I know I've often said to myself that I should like to be in court when a man is sentenced to be hung, and I shouldn't care who it was."

No one breathed a word of the great news to Miss Wliitaker. Somehow, the servants never did say more to her than they could possibly help. The first she learned of it was from Olive Barber's lips at the breakfast table. Miss Barber finished reading a voluminous epistle, and laid it down beside her plate with a sigh. " Teddy ,again ! I shall have to deal with that young man." Miss Whitaker glanced across at her. Do you mean to say that great long letter is from Mr.Sloane? Why, he writes to you every other day."

"He does. I suppose he expects me to read what he writes."

" Olive, what a humbug you are. You told me the other day what a dear boy he was, what nice letters he wrote, how you liked him, and how you weren't sure that your feeling for him wasn't even stronger. Doesn't ho want to make you his wife?"

"I suppose he does; he's said so about a dozen times."

" Then why don't you marry the man if you like him, and you're not sure that you don't do more than like him ?"

" No, that's just what I won't do. Directly I saw this letter I knew I couldn't. I'm going to write and tell him so, and I'll put it in a way that will let him understand that "no " is the last word I've got" to say." "You're an extraordinary person, Olive, after hesitating as you have done, to make up your mind all of a 6udden like that.

" Yes, I am rather sudden, but my mind is made up. I might have had him last week. 'I couldn't now—ever again. I wish people wouldn't write me letters; it's just hard work to have to read them."

" You told me only the other day that you liked having letters and you loved to read them."

" You mustn't quote the other day against me, Enid: it isn't fair. Did vou sleep well? Have you heard the qj) * news r

"What news?" Miss Whi taker glanced up from the letter she was reading. " You can't have looked at Kelly, or you'd have seen it on his face." " Seen it on Kelly's face? What do you mean? Has anything happened?" " Only that you were mistaken last night when you talked about Mr Graham Burke being in his cell." "Olive!" Miss Whitaker leaned over the table, suddenly all eyes and ears. " Tell me what you mean." " I only know what the servants say. When Louise brought me my tea she told me that Mr Graham Burke had escaped. Didn't anyone tell yo/i?" "Not a soul, not a word, it isn t true! Escaped? How can he have escaped? It's' impossible." " My dear Enid, don't allow yourself to get into a state about a thing like that." Miss Whitaker, who had got up from her chair, was visibly trembling. "I dare .say it is impossible; it seems like, it, doesn't it? The police do take such care of their prisoners in England. So far it's only servants' talk." . Just then Kelly came into the room, a dish in his hand. _ "Kelly," cried Miss Whitaker,

"what's this cock-and-bull story Miss Barber tells me about Graham Burke having escaped. What nonsense ta!e have you got hold of in the servants hall?" 1 The butler looked at his questioner, then at his mistress; then lie placed tlio dish upon the table. " Kidneys and mushrooms, Miss Barber : thev have just left the lire. "Thank you, Kelly, I think I 11 have some. A kidney ought to be eaten while it still tastes of the lire. "Yes-, miss, that is so." He heldthe cover .while Miss Barber helped herself. Miss Whitaker repeated her qU " S Dk"'von hear mc aat you, Kelly, what is this cock-and-bull story about Mr Graham Burke having escaped/ tw "SW cniw tW i-Hy's attention to tho contents of the dish "Will you have some kidney and mushroom, Miss Whitnker ■ , , "No, I won't. She stamped her foot. "Answer myquestion. "If vou please, miss, I don t understand what your question is. Ive heard no cock-and-bull story neither in the kitchen nor anywhere else. Miss Whitaker looked at tho man a.s if she would have liked to have shaken hl " Is it true —that Mr Burke has es°a"f believe it is ouite true Are there anv orders for Johnson.' uThe question'was addressed to Miss Barber; Johnson was the chauffem. ~ "Yes Kelly, there are. Tell him to lot me'have"the big car as soon as possible. I'm gomg out in if alone. As T want to do some exploring in it on inv own account, and shall probably b 0 away some time. T. hope you people won't perish with anxiety if I m a little la Kellr departed. Directly ho was gone Miss Whitaker asked her companion a question as if she were aiming a pistol at her head. . "Olive, where are you going? " These kidneys are delicious, so are the mushrooms, only I'm not sure that I ought to eat. any more. Miss Barber rose. "'l'm going to tell Teddy that it's absolutely and finally ' no.' " "That isn't what I mean? where are vou going in that car? "Oh, in the car. Perhaps to the other end of the rainbow; and I'm going alone. It's rather odd about, Mr Graham Burke ha.ving escaped, isn't it? I wonder if they'll hear anything about him in the course of the day. Do vou think thoy will?" Before the qfcher could, answer, the questioner had left the room, leaving Miss Whitaker looking as if she could have said a very great deal.

CHAPTER XIV, THE LODGER.

Miss Barber left The Pleasaunce soon after ten, travelling as a rule at considerably over twenty miles an hour, and yet she only reached Mrs Eliot's cottage at just upon one, the distance by dix-ect route being under sixty miles; the explanation being that she chose a route which was really no route at all, but a sort of winding and twisting business, winding in and out with a total disregard to mileage, as if she wore possessed with an idea that she might be followed, and the first thing to be desired was to throw pursuers off the scent. Directly Mrs Eliot came to the door she asked her;

"Well, is everything all right?" "I can't say as to that, miss, but the gentleman is conscious, if that's what you mean." "He is conscious? Thank goodness!" The look of relief which cam© over the young lady's face was so obvious that it could scarcely have escaped the woman's notice. "I've brought a few things in the car, I thought you might want them " With Mrs Eliot's assistance, parcel after parcel was taken into the cottage. " Whatever Lave you got in here?" she inquired as she surveyed the display they made upon her table. " Odds and eflds to eat and drink. I thought they might come in useful, as you don't seem to have many shops round here."

Mrs Eliot stared. " Why, miss, there's soles, and there's salmon, and there's turbot "

" I thought your lodger might like a little fish."

"A little fish! It will take him some time to eat all this. And there's a chicken, and a duck, and there's pigeons "

'' Just so, Mrs Eliot, you needn't go through the list And how is Mr Burnand?" The name came quite glibly to the young lady's lips, as if she had been familiar with it for years.

Well, miss, he's hurt his leg, and I'm not sure there isn't a fracture. I've seen broken bones in my time; 1 told him he ought to have a doctor, but he wouldn't. It seems to me he's got something on his raind, and that's what's the matter with him more than anything else." " Can I go in and see him P" ' I should think so, miss, for anything I know."

Miss Barber, tapping at the door of the adjoining room, opened it and entered, closing it the moment she was in. The figure of a man half raised himself in be<L " You 1" he exclaimed.

"Yes, me; who did you think it was?"

' I couldn t make out. The woman or the house told me a yarn about my having been brought here by a young lady in a motor-car, who left 110 name. Who the young lady could be was beyond me altogether. I knew no 3 r oung lady who owned a motor-car, and, anyhow, how 1 could have found my way into anybody's motor-car I couldn't understand. Was it you who brought me here?"

Miss Barber explained, he listening with a degree of amazement which was almost comical.

" And do you mean to say you found me lying in the road, in the mud, and put 1110 into your car and brought me here. Where did you find me?" I couldn't tell you the nam® of the place, but I suppose it was seven or eight miles from Canterstone. How did you get there?" "Fm not quit© certain. You know I jumped out of the train while it was running through the tunnel. I fell and hurt mv log; the woman here says sbe thinks the bone is broken, and I shouldn't wonder if she's right. I got out of the tunnel somehow, and across some fields. I know I felt very stupid, and could scarcely move; then a thunderstorm came on, and—that's about all that I remember. How far is this from whore you found me P" '' A long way, about forty miles; yoy're not far from Rochester."

" Why should you have brought me here ?''

" Why shouldn't IP" "You knew that I'd. escaped?" " I guessed it..' ; " And that it was an offence against tho law for anyone to help me? "1 don't care about the law." "But why did you do it?" " You saved my life." "Yes; but I doubt that you can save mine, even granting that I saved yours. And, anyhow, the cases aren't on all fours. You weren't a fugitive from justice. I've been thinking things over, and I'm not sure I haven't made things worse by running awny, but the temptation was too strong for me. Still, that's no reason why I should drag other people into the hole I'm in. There's you. and there's the woman of the house, you are both of you running a risk." " Mr the name of the woman of the bouse is Eliot : I don't know if she informed you that I told her that yours was Burnand." " She called me Mr Burnmul more than once ; I supposed she had got it from someone, so 1 just snid nothing." "Mr Tiumnnd, there's one question T should like to ask you."

" A<?k it; ask anything; no one in this world has a better right." ""Is that so?" The young lady's

eyes, In them an expression of unusual gravity, were fixed 011 the mail s face. " I'm afraid you'll not think it a nice question, and it's not one which you are bound to answer.'

'•"Having treated me to that preface, what is the question?" "Did you kill the man they say you did?" Miss Barber Mas standing close by the bed ; her words were whispered; they were certainly inaudible to anyone who might be listening without. "You understand, if you'd rather not answer you've only got to say so." " Miss Barber, when you were good enough to renew our acquaintance by the roadside, I. told you that I had just eomo out from serving a sentence of two years' hard, labour for something which 1 had never done. Did you believe me?"

"T did; ves I'm sure I did." " It's like that, you weren't sure at the timer"" " You see, Enid Whitaker lives with me, and she's so absolutely sure in the other direction; she takes it so foi granted tho,t it's impossible that the»e should be any room for doubt."

"That's her position, is it? I dp l }'' wish to say anything about Miss Whitaker; I said all I wish to say labtjdme. You've got to believe that Miss u nit* nkr-r's view of mc —what she tolls u is her wpw ol me is moI tho right one. 7">on't von believe itr

" T do. At Beaubeu I felt still more sure you weren't tint, kind el man; when 1 saw vou I lie other d;iy 1 J"lt still mor:> sure; ami. soitivin-w, Kind lur; mad > me surer si ill."

" As regards vonr quo-lion. I did 11■ > r kill Alfred .No:'ko!ds '• 1 did'not know

that ho was dead till they found his body on the bed in the bedroom in my house."

She shrank back. '' Did they find it there?"' " They did; didn't you know it?" "I know not-lung. absolutely nothing, except that you're charged with it." " Then in that case we're in the same boat; with that- exception I know no more than you did; I'm wholly at a loss to conceive how his body came to be there. I'm told they'ro got a chain of evidence, circumstantial evidence, against me, which, unless Providence is on my side, and it hasn't been hitherto, will hang me." "It's impossible that such a thing could happen, especially in England, where they boast of then* administration of justice." " Innocent men have been hanged in England before to-day; I don't want to bo ono of them. Life is sweet; that's why 1 made, a bolt for it. But I'm under no delusion. They'll hare me again before very long."

"Why (should they?" " In a case like mi:?o the whole of England joins in the hunt. We're all spori&men, men. women, children; everyone is always ready to .hunt anything, even such «s me. I ran only do my best to give them a good run; sooner or later they'll get mo, sure as houses."

""Will they? We shall see. "Wo may he-it them, you and 1 together." "Yon and I iogoiher! lint, Miss Barber "

" 'V.-.'i r:il! me that. If you must cssli hh- anything, call mc Ihuuc>,

She waved her hand, as if to dismiss the subject. "I didn't come to talk about that sort of thing; I'm running this business, you merely have to do as you're told. What I chiefly want to know is—how are you P 1 see you've been shaved. By the way, I never understood how you cam? to have a beard; I thought in an English prison everyone was shaved." "I don't know about shaving; wherp I was thev rat your hair., beard and whiskers as close as they could, and as your term draws to a close they let grow wiiat you like. The woman J-ere tells ine she saved me. It must Saivj been while I was unconscious. Has in maclo much difference?" "1 should have known you. You're one oi those people whose identity is not going, to be concealed by a few hairs on—or off—your chin." She was regarding him as if critically "You seem to be pretty bruised." " I am; something has happened to ray left eye, there's a cut at the back of my head, there are pieces missing from various parts of my body; I feel all muddled and hazy, as if someone had been trying to shake me to bits, and Mrs Eliot tells me that my leg is broken. On the whole, I don't seem to be the sort of person who is likely - to keep the police off me for any length of time." "That part is my business; don't: I tell you that I'm conducting this matter. I've got to think things out. Time is of importance. I want to get) you out of this as soon as you can move. When do you suppose that's likely to be?" ( " Why should you trouble yourself —about a tiling like meP" "Don't argue; the thing is'settled; the responsibility is mine; don't make it heavier by unnecessary talking. I ; asked you when do you suppose you'll : be able to move?" _ " You. see how it is with me. I tried to get out of bed this morning—and I • just couldn't. I may be all right to- : morrow." "You may be better, but not all , right. 1 have 'pcot a glimmering of an idea in my head, and I'll tell you what it is. You know we're not very far from the Thames. I thought of chartering a steamer, say, to-morrow night, and running you across the Channel, i and landing you somewhere on the coast of France. You might pass as ■ ! an English tourist, and keep still for a while "

"You're perfectly certain? I wish I were. "What you call your glimmering of an idea suggests to me one or two objections. In the first place, I've goti no money. You talk lightly of chartering a steamer. I>o you think that would cost nothing? One able to cross the Channel Would cost a good deal, if any owner could bo induced .to undertake the job ? You don't seem to realise that by this time to-morrow night everyone in this dear country will be on the look-out for a man like me, and that, if you succeeded in getting your sttamooat, Lhere would probably be a policeman on board waiting for me. As for the rest of your pretty little plan " "I'm not inviting your criticism. All you have to do is to get yourself into a state in which you'll be capable of a reasonable amount of movement, and leave the rest to me. Now, I'm going to call Mrs ISliot in and have a talk with her. By the way, what sort of person do you think she is?"

'• it's rather early days for mo to jurigo. I've not your keen wit! There will probably be a reward offered for my apprehension, and, though I've no doubt she's quite a detent body, and in the ordinary course of things wouldn't even throw a brick at a cat, I take, it that she has two eyes, and I consider it as being quite possible that she'd regard that reward as—we'll say tempting. And you must always remember—that she'd be a fool if she didn't." 4 "What a very disagreeable way you have of putting things. 'Why do you say that?" " 1 believe you've told me you're, more than half American." " Is that against me? Are you going to say disagreeable things to me because of what I couldn't help?" He looked astonished. :, My dear Miss Barber—- '' Baines." " I mean Baines." "Then say it."

" My dear Miss Baines, I was merely, about to observe that it is psrhaps be. cause you are in part American that* you are unconscious of the fact that the risk Mrs Eliot runs in harbouring me is a very real and a very eerioua one. ' Ifj the moment sho discovers my identity, she doesn't rush off to the police, "they'll make her pay for every moment she delays. Since someone is sure to get any reward that may be offered, wouldn't she be a fool not to get it tor herself and keep out of gaol ? And the same remark applies to you. Your duty is to go straight to tha police and hand me over.''' " You—an innocent man."^ " That's not the point. I'm a fugitive from justice, charged with a capital offence. It's the duty of every* citizen to hand me over to justice." " I don't happen to be a citizen, so don't talk nonsense. I'm going to call in Mrs Eliot, so be careful what you S3V '' Mrs Eliot was called in. She came, wiping her hands, which she had just taken out of the washtub. "I hope you'll pardon me, miss, but this is the day on which I do my wash" ing."

CHAPTER XV DEAR FRIENDS.

One of the first things Miss Barbel? did on leaving Mrs Eliot's was to buy a newspaper. Of course, a man placed as she was would have been acquainted with the contents of the daily papers long before, but somehow the average woman does not buy newspapers, unless the idea comes to her now and then as a sort of inspiration. Passing a newsagent's shop in Rochester, Miss Barber purchased a copy of every journal the man had left. She drove a few miles down the road, till she came to a spot where there seemed to be no traffic, then she drew the car up under the shadow of some great beeches, and_ she read her papers. Some very surprising information she obtained from them. In ?ach of them the topic was the Great Erdington murder, and also, what most of them called the escape or the "murderer." What those papers did not know about the business was hardly worth knowing. They gave Graham Burke\s history; some of them a sort of historical sketch of his ancestors. They told the story of what they called his defalcation as a trustee, and they gave a glowing account of Miss Wliitaker and of all she had suffered. They told quite a number of things about Mr Alfred Nockolds. According to the scribes, he was a person of blameless life, and lofty reputation, who had risen, by his own unaided efforts, from nothing to be a man of substance; he was honoured by all, loved by his fellow-townspeople, and had left a void behind him which would not easily be filled. In short, those newspapers made out Mr Alfred Nockolds to have been a paragon of all the virtues, and, by inference, Graham Burke ft monster of vice. This presentation of the case did not please Miss Barber at all. it made her vorv angry. She said things out loud about the'men who had written those things which were not flattering, but she thought still more. She tore up each of these journals after she haa read it, and she dropped the fragments on to the floor of her car. In some of thorn wore what purported to be portraits of the man she had just now left, and they annoyed her even more than the things which were written. "'Graham Burke, the man whom all England is looking for to-day,' " She was holding up in front of her a page from a paper, in the centre of which was a process block of a man's head and face with that inscription underneath. " Was there ever anything so absurd or r«o libellous? It's no more like him than it's like me. If that's their only means of recognition he'll never he found at all. Rubbish!"

And the page was torn in two. ihen across again, and t.be pieces joined tho

Theap which was lying at her feet. really was quite a quantity of on the floor of the car. She looked down at it.

" I can't take that home; they'll jump to conclusions at once. If Enid Were to see it she'd never leave mo alone until she'd got the whole thing Dut of me. I can't litter the road with pieces of paper as if I were the hares in £ paper chase. I'd better have a bonfire."

She had on®, and while the conflagration was at its highest an individual cams over a stile vhicli she had no* noticed and asked her what she meant by it. He wore leggings, and a velveteen jacket, and ho had a gun under his arm ; she set him down as a game-keeper. His manner was not at ill pleasant. She explained that she was burning paper. " Don't you know bettor than to do It in a place like this; you might set fire to the grass and the hedge, and do no end of mischief."

" But it poured in torrents yesterday: the grass is quite wot." "Not wet enough not to burn. Why, iook at it! Look at that piece of lighfcjsd paper blowing away. With a wind like this you might set the whole country alight, to say nothing of tho smoke what's blowing straight over to where I've got two hundred young birds."

i He was stamping on the flames with his great, hob-nailed boots; he certainly did find it difficult to put them out. The wind oauglit a half-sheet, the corner of which was iust alight, and blew it up. If he had not seized it with his hand it tnight have gone over the hedge.

"See that!" he cried, as he extinguished the burning corner with his hand. "I don't know who you may be, but you as a lady ought to know better." He paused to stare at ihe " portrait" which filled the greater "part of what was left. "What are fou burning this paper for? Why, it's :o-day's. \Yliat s the idea?" "I don't think there's any particular idea, thank you. Only, you gee, I had a lot of silly newspapers, with which I didn't wish to litter the road, and which I didn't wish to take home, so I thought I'd have a little bonfire. I'm sorry if that seems to you to he extremely dreadful. Good day; I'm glad to have met you !" She got into the car and off she went, the gamekeeper standing staring after her, evidently not knowing what to make of her. "I wonder what this means?" he aslted himself. "These papers are nil about the Great Erdington murder." He had a portrait in either hand. " Why does she want to bum them out here?" Miss Barber was saying to herself as her car rolled onward: "England's a very nice plaoe, but there do seem to be a great many tilings mlt that one didn't ought to do. Britons may he slaves, but me—no, never! If I like I shall do just all or them.'' She passed a policeman .who was walking smartly along the country road. " What would he do if he knew what I knowP Perhaps before long he will. Not if I can help it." As she said that she. it might be tin wittingly, quickened her pace, possibly to emphasise her words, _ and perhaps, in part, to relieve her feelings. "'They shan't touch him with their horrid hands if it costs me more than money. He saved me—and I'll 6ave him.'' It was odd how the idea obsessed her of returning in kind the service he had rendered her. Yet she was sufficiently honest with herself to admit that if he had been a different kind of person the desire' might not have been so strong. Her life might have been saved by a quite antipathetic kind of person, in which case she might not have been so eager to save his. The truth was that, acute and—she belived—hard-hearted as she was, there was in her that romantic streak which is in every girl, and quite unconsciously on his part, Graham Bnrke had appealed to it. That night on which he had roused her from, sleep by bursting into her room and lifting her out of bed without a word, had home her in his arms through passage after _ passage, and down staircase after staircase, through smoke and flames, had, after a fashion, been always with her. She had not spoken to him a word, nor he to her; at the time she was soarcely sure that she was nob still asleep and dreaming; but again and again afterwards she had imagined conversations 'in which they had said to each other the most a.™ a wing thing?. Although she did not know it, and indeed would have been the first to deny it, the whole incident had cast over her a sort of spell. Had she met him in the morning the spell might have been broken, but because she did not see him, unknowingly, it had grown stronger. Olive Barber had not only personal charms, she had charms of a more material sort, and they were very abundant. She was a most tempting bait to any single gentleman who wanted money with a wife; and she had reason to know it. _lt had not been the slightest trouble to say "No!" to a large peroentage of her suitors; but in one or two cases to say " No 1" had been a little difficult. In one case especially—that of Mr Edward Sloane —she would have consented long ago if —she herself did not know why. When she saw her resouer at the gate of the Old House there had come a sort of glimmer, which had grown greater when she met himi at the roadside. That morning it had become perfectly clear to her that she never could become the wife of Mr Edward Sloane. To imagine that this sudden effulgence of light on a subject which had been so wrapped in darkness had anything to do with an individual of whom sheknew very little—and that to his apparent disadvantage—was on the face of it ridiculous. All the same, Graham Burke's face went with her the whole way home, and on one thing she resolved—she would stick at nothing which could stand in the way of her returning to him in kind the service iphich he had rendered her.

It was just as well that she was prepared for what awaited her. -There iesoended on her an avalanche in the *hape of Enid. Whitaker and her questions directly she set foot inside The Pleasaunce. She had had some vague notion of avoiding it by taking the car round to the back door; she was stayed by what 6he told herself ivas a sense of what was due to her position. "I'm very glad to see you back, Olive, especially as, if you're quick, you'll just have time to dress for dintier. I suppose it's no use asking where you've been, although there have been heaps of people here who wanted to know what had become of you. I presume you forgot that it was your ' at home' day, and that you specialty requested the Glarkes to come to tea and tennis." "And did they come?" " Of course they did. It was a disHnct arrangement." "Then I'm rather glad I was out ; im a hot day the Clarkes are u> trying, and it has been hot, hasn't it?" " My dear Olive, I suppose it doesn't occur to you that you placed me in a most anomalous and uncomfortable position? How could I explain what had become of you when I didn't know ?". "Exactly, how could you? You

havo asked mo about fifty things already, and, as you said, I've only iust time to change, so perhaps you wouldn't mind asking the remaining fifty whilo we are eating." As a matter of fact, while they were dining scarcely anything was said. The presence of the servants, as usual, acted as a restraint. Tho conversation which began as Miss Barber would have rather it had not begun, and which ended on a note which was probably unexpected by both the parties, took place after dinner in the drawing-room. It was started by Miss Whitaker as Miss Barber was sipping her coffee.

" Mr Graham Burke will soon be recaptured." She spoke in what was meant to be a tone of final conviction. "Will lie?" Miss Barber's manner was meant to suggest complete indifference. 1

"He will. They know where he is." "Do they? Who's they?" " Why, Olive, how stupid you areOf course, tho police. He'll have to pay for his little escapade. But what a villain ho must be—what an unspeakable brute! Ho almost killed John Kelly, and Edward Vincent is injured, for life." "Is that so? Two men against one, and ho did for them both. Wasn't he handcuffed?"

" Haven't you read about it in the papers? Of course he was, that's the extraordinary part of it. It shows what a monster he is. When they started he was handcuffed to them both, but his right wrist was cut and bleeding, and after they got out of the station, to ease it John Kelly took that handcuff offl"

" Bravo, John Kelly! Is he any relation to our Kelly?" " He's his brother, that's the shocking part of it. And then the wretch's monstrous ingratitude. At his request Kelly got up to open the window because the caxriage was hot, and as he bent forward to do this, and his back was turned to Mr Burke, Graham struck him a terrific blow on the back of the head and knocked him senseless. Then before Vincent realised what had happened he took hira by the throat " "With one hand?"

" With one hand. They were handcuffed together, so each only had one hand ; but that one hand was sufficient, with it he almost killed him."

"He seems to be a handy 6ort of man." " Olive, how can you be so frivolous P The whole business seems to me to be the most horrible of which I have ever heard. It's inflamed the whole country against him. It isn't Great Erdington only, it's England which wants him now. There isn t a man, woman or child who won't rejoice w-hen the police havo got him again. Each moment such a murderous brute continues to be at large is a fresh danger to society." "It seems to me you use rather inflated language. Since Graham Burke was released from Canterstone Gaol ?ou appear to have become quite a. diforent person. You told me last night that you cared for him more than anything else in the world, and to-night you talk like this. I don't understand. Have you any special grudge against him, apart from what you allege to be his treatment of your trust funds?'

Miss Barber was looking at her companion over the top of her coffee cup, with a something m her glance which seemed to irritate Miss Whitaker. That already sufficiently excited young lady, coming closer to her friend, 6tood glaring down at her.. "You say I have become different; what about you? It isn't what you say, but what you d'on't say; it's your manner, your way, your bearing, everything" about you, which tells me you have changed; since, according to you, you met Graham Burke by chance by the roadside, you've ceased to be the Olive Barber I used to know. Olive, do you know where Graham Burke is?" The girl, bending down, glaring at the other, asked the question with a sudden intensity which was almost startling. If for an instant Miss Barber was taken aback, she managed to conceal it, and met the other's flaming eyes with an appearance of the utmost oalm.

" Why do you ask me such an extraordinary question ? What has put such an idea into your head? I'm afraid, Enid', that as you told me yesterday morning, you are still very 'far from well."

" I'm well enough, and you know itWhat has Graham Burke been telling you about me? He's been telling you something; I'm as sure of it as if I'd heard him. It's that which has changed you towards me. What has he said? Olive, tell me."

Miss Barber still wore her air of coolness in a fashion which did credit to her powers of self-control. "My dear Enid, I'll tell you what occurs to me, you and I would be all the better for a change. Suppose you go away for two or three months, abroad, anywhere you like. A fresh environment is what you want, at least for a while. If we go 011 like this we shall got on each other's nerves."

"You haven't answered my question. Do you think you can put mo off by talking rubbish like that? "What did Graham Burke tell you about me?"

Miss Barber hesitated. She did' not intend, if she could help it, to tell a direct lie; she was at least equally unwilling to tell the whole truth. She sought for a middle path, which her quick-witted questioner at once perceived.

"Don't try to dodge, Olive. Don't search about for something which you hopo will satisfy me without telling me too much. W hat did Graham Burke tell you about me? You are °nly making it clearer every second that he told you even more than I imagined. What did he say?" Miss Barber, putting down her cup, got up from her chair; Mis 3 Whitaker was so close that there was only just room enough for her to do it. One would think that you had a right to ask me such a question, but you hare no such right.'' "He told you that, did he?" 1 1 toll you it. 1 don't like your attitudo towards me at all. J did not ask you to come and live with me for this kind of thing. "Would von mind getting out of my way, Enid, I am going to my room." " You are not going till you have answered my question ; what did he tell you?" The two girls looked each other very straight in the face.

"Would you really like me to tell you? Your behaviour is so extraordinary that I'm beginning to think it would serve you richfc if I did." " What do you mean? Tell me what you mean—toll me!" "I think J'd better not, for your sake; although you are so provoking. Please stand out of my way." "I swear to you, Olive, that if I can help it you shan't leave this room until you've told me what he said about me."

"If that's your attitude, 1 presume

that I must yield to pressure. He told me that all your life you've postered him with offers of your love and yourself; that you became so importunate that in a weak moment, out of pity, lie said something to you which you twisted into an expression of his willingness to make you his wife; when ho made it clear that you had quite mistaken his meaning, that he was a.s reluctant as ever to havo anything; to do with you in that way, in your furv, out of revenge, you so contrived that a trumped-up charge ivns brought against him, which you well knew was false, with the result. <hat ho was sent to two years' hard labour, because ho wouldn't marry you. That's what ho told mo, and T've not tho slightest doubt that every word of it was true. You make that much clearer to mo than he ever did." " lie told you that." Miss Whitaker had drawn a littlo back from the other. Sho was breathing in gusts. "He told yon that: and—you dare to tell me." " Not because T wished to, but because you insisted. You declined to let me leave the room until I told you: I didn't wish to stay in it all night." "He told you that? Why did he t-ell you?" " Woll—because——" " You shall pay for it and he shall pay for it." "Ho has already paid pretty dearly." " Nothing like what he shall pay; he shall hang for it." "I believe that it's your intention that ho shall. You contrived to have a charge trumped up against him two years ago; I believe you're at the same trick again. Enid, who killed Mr Alfred NockoldsP" " He did."

" That's a lie, and you know it. I believe you know who did, and I'm quite sure you know he didn't. . I can see it ou your face, in your eyes, written large all over you." "It's false, you can do nothing of the kind. I>o you think you will ever get anyone to believe you?" " I do! I have faith in the old adage that ' truth will out' : that such as you, in tho end, are tried in the balance and found wanting. Come, Enid, let me plead with you to save this man. He has done you no wrong; even now he wishes you well "

"That, I presume, is why he told you what he did." " He wished to justify himself in my eyes, to make it clear that he was no felon; to do that you had made it necessary that he should explain."

" Why should he wish to justify himself in' your eyes Why? Why? What is ho to you, or you to him? Do you throw yourself at the .head of every strange man who has just come out of gaolP" "That hasn't been a very pleasant conversation, has it, Enid? Don't let us make it worse. It will lead ns into a very queer place if wo don't look out. I tell you, quite frankly, that I believe if you chose you could relieve him of the odium of this hideous charge, and that pressure will Ih? brought to make you do so, if you refuse to do it of your own free will. Now I am going to bed." MisG Barber made a rapid movement round the back of a table by which ihe was standing, and with rather n;oio haste than is common on such occasions she went through the door. As it happened, her movements need not have been so hurried. Miss Whitakor made not the slightest attempt to stop her. She remained standing where she had been during the last few minute 3, staring at the doer through which the other had passed.

"He told hev that He tcld her! Why? If—if—by moving a l could sare liira—now —T wouldn't! I'l! never know a moment's peace until they've hanged him. I shouldn't wonder if she had helped him to escape; I could, see it in her looks as I was telling her what happened in the carriage of the train; he didn't do it all by himself; there was collusion somewhere. And she knows where lie is." On the way to her room Miss Barber met the butler, William Kelly. She stopped him. " Is it true, Kelly, that your brother was one of the policemen who were escorting Mr Graham Burke from Great Erdington to Canterstone Gaol?" . , , . The man looked at her with the imperturbable visage of the well-trained domestic whom she had expected to find in an English household. "Yes, Miss Barber, my brother J°hn." "Was he very seriously hurt? One might have suspected that for a moment there was a twinkle in the butler's eyes: "Seriously enough, miss. What do you mean by seriously .enoughP What happened to him exactly?" "*You see, miss, Mr Graham had to hit him pretty hard to knock the senses out of him." '•'Had he? I don't know how hard that might be, but—is your brother on the road to recovery?" " Oh, yes, miss, there's nothing the matter with him now; though I'm afraid there may be trouble for him m another way." " What way is that?' "You see, Miss, Inspector Dalton, he's very angry. He can't make out how a prisoner who was handcuffed to two constables in a railway carriage, both doors of which were locked, can have got away from both of them."

"It does seem rather —mysterious; don't you think it does?" " It does, miss, not a doubt about it; that's what makes me afraid there may be trouble for my brother in another way." " If there is, Kelly, I shall be happy to help your brother in every way I possibly can." "'Thank you, miss; that's very good of you, miss, very good indeed." When Miss Barber had retired, the butler was trying to resolve a problem which was presented to his mind.

" There's" something about all this I can't make out. Miss Whitaker—l can understand her wanting to put him away; but Miss Barber, so far as I know he's as good as a stranger to her —why should she want hire, to come off best f and want it batlly too; as something inside tells me that she does."

In her own chamber, having dismissed her maid. Miss Barber could not get her thoughts quite out of rather a curious channel.

"She knows! Enid knows! With a word she could clear him of everything; she would never dare to let him go to the gallows—the gallows—oh!" She put her hands up to her eyes. "I don't think she could do that, but she'll bring him very close to it, unless—unless a means is found of persuading her to speak. The mystery should not be so insoluble. If there are detectives who can see as far as the ends of their noses I'll put them all on the track tomorrow. Trained men ought to be more than a match for an untrained girl. She's eaten up by jealousy as by a cancer; she's got the disease so badly that in cunning it may make her the match of any man, or of any dozen. I know she knows." (To be continued.)