PAINTED BUTTERFLIES

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19133, 28 July 1930, Page 16

PAINTED BUTTERFLIES

s@h@@@@mam®mmmm® s is @ s a is @ ® @ m @ a s @ [Published by Special Arrangement.]

Bv

MRS PATRICK MacGILL.

Author of “ Dancers in the Dark,” “ The Ukulele Girl,” “ The Flame of Life, etc,, etc

[Copyright.]

®®®®®®®®®®!iy®®®®®l3®®® CHAPTER X. (Continued). The spiritual essence of Jennifer was Frank's already; the lovely eyes, the transfigured beauty of the young girl into something almost unearthly, told him that; and, as is the way of all love that is deep, passionate and true, Frank Yardlev felt unworthy of the proud, exquisite, all-sufficing little creature who, he thought, had been meant for him from the beginning. In the darkness their lips met and clung together. “ Oh, it is wonderful to be loved in this way.” Jennifer’s voice faltered, and a burning blush spread from forehead to neck, and even lapped to the roots of the bright, brown hair. Colour and light and glow pulsed through and through the tender young body, new’ly awakened to the miracle that underlies all sentient life. “ It is still more wonderful to have found love at the beginning, instead of later on. Just think of all we would have missed if we had not met so soon,” said the eager, excited, radiant young lover. ■' I say’, sweetness, don’t think me a cad for asking, but I’m jealous of everybody who has had anything to do with you up to now. You’ve never been in love before; not seriously, I mean ? ’’ Jennifer was back for an instant amongst the naptha flares, meat and fruit stalls, hot, overcrowded, greasy High Street of her native Camden Town. There had been youths who wore checked caps pulled over their eyes, who reeked eternally of the strong foods that they consumed, and the cheap cigarettes that they smoked; who had fought with each other for the privilege of carrying the washing basket, the contents of which she had to deliver every night of the week, except Sunday. But she had not much time for thinking of boys in those days. Her thoughts had been on matters very remote from the opposite sex. Jennifer Lome’s lips were as pure of masculine kisses as those of an unawakened child; indeed, until her meeting with Frank Yardley, she had virtually been a child in emotional experience. “ Your eyes are filled with thoughts, sweetheart, but I’m not going to ask what they are. It's enough that from now on 3'ou are mine.” Once again the eager arms enfolded Jennifer's slim sweetness, and the passionate, lovehungry voice swelled with the joy that ever accompanies effort contemplated for the beloved’s sake. “ I'll work like blazes, darling, and get on like a house on fire! I haven’t much money of my own yet—only a hundred and fifty a year left to me by my grandmother—but I’m very keen on father’s line of work, ship-building, and I know he’ll give me a partnership when he hears that I want to settle down and get married.” Jennifer could feel the pulse racing in the brown hand that enclosed her very much smaller one; her head rested against the wildly-beating and she could actually feel its throbbing. “ Oh. Frank, what will they say, your people? They won’t let you marry a girl without a penny- in the world, except what she earns,” whispered Jennifer into the soft gloom, as her little head, practical far beyond her years in so many ways, came suddenly out of its rosy cloud. “ Good lord, they are not marrying you, are they’? The only possible thing they could have against you is that you haven’t many pennies, as you readily'’ admit. But I don’t want my wife to keep me, thanks. I’ll make all the money- that we shall need,” argued the logical, clear-eyed, clean-limbed youth, who was so pathetically ignorant of that of which he spoke, although to do his parents justice, he had more reason for his self-assurance than a good many of his generation. “ Here we are, sweetheart! Oh, hang I Adela’s party I I say, we couldn't go for a drive and give it a miss, could we?” suggested the graceless young rascal. All Jennifer’s being yearned to fall in with the suggestion; from the beginning she had felt uneasy about the whole thing. On the surface, Adela Creighton was gracious kindliness itself, but the creative instinct has its root-being in psychological yierception, and Jennifer feared the more because her entire well-being, and that of her mother, depended upon humouring this rich, arrogant client of her employer. “ No, Frank, we couldn’t possibly do that. Poor mother will probably be in a cold sweat of terror even now. She’s only accepted Miss Creighton’s invitation because she was so pressing, and I insisted—although wild horses would not have stopped her from seeing “ Black Cargo.” All right, darling. Of course it shall be as you wish. I should not have suggested such a thing,” was Frank’s charmingly contrite reply. Then, as the car was slowing up outside the big stone portico of Adela Creighton’s house, his face suddenly lit with the upshooting fire of inspiration. “ What about announcing our engagement to-night at the supper party T ?” he grinned. “A great idea, don’t y’ou think?” Jennifer laughed, and felt a dozen years older than this big, impulsive lover of hers. “ Great for us, perhaps, but too great a surprise to spring on our own people, dear. Mother is not one of the most go-ahead persons, I’m afraid. She will expect to be 4 asked ’ for me just the same as in her own time,” Jennifer told him with the laugh still lingering in (U u ® EEI ®® ® Hi HI H 3 HI ® HI HE ® Hi HI HI IE tE3 i

her eyes. But her voice assured Frank of her seriousness, and in his heart he honoured her the more, and wondered if the whole ™ide world contained another such as his Jennifer. CHAPTER XL The severest, most toilsome day at the wash-tub was as nothing compared to this, thought Jennifer’s mother, as she took her place at the supper table between her hostess and Sir Ralph Lady Yardley had been seated immediately opposite, so that her experienced eyes could look straight into the lined, worn face, with its frightened rabbit expression, its entire lack of make-up, and look of ingenuousness that would have been ludicrous had it not been pathetic. “ You must be very proud of you r clever daughter, Mrs Lome,” beamed the great shipbuilder, kindly who was one of the best “mixers” in London, and privately thought it most charming of Adela to have given this party’ for her pretty little protegee. “ I am indeed, sir,” was the hearty response of Mrs Lome, and Jennifer, hearing her mother’s voice, threw a smile down the whole length of the table which was so radiant in its delight, so infectious in its gaiety, that j the tension in her mother’s face re-j laxed, and she actually began to en- j joy her iced soup, which at first sight had amazed her, for she had never; seen soup, except as it appeared on her; own table, steaming hot. “ Tell me, Mrs Lome, who taught! Jennifer her art? Whom did she study’ [ under? I’ve never seen such a vivacity j in figure-drawing, except in the more advanced French school. Was she in Paris at any time?” Every word was a studied insult, uttered in the clear, high, would-be childishly’ innocent tones that Adela Creighton affected. Sir . Ralph looked slightly surprised, but kept his eyes on his plate; his wife could not help feeling a little sorryfor the poor woman who seemed to be. so much out of her element, and immediately, with the best intentions in the world, made matters infinitely worse by asking her the first question that came into her head, “Do you admire the new Epstein statue—‘Night’? Personally,” Lady Yardley hurried on, becoming suddenly conscious that she, too, had blundered, when a look of utter bewilderment w r as added to the confused redness of Mrs Lome’s face, “ I consider that those who decry it are simply betraying their own lack of imagination. It is meant as a symbol of all the ugly passions let loose in mankind, with the coming of night—what do you think, Adela?” finished Frank’s mother, thus diverting her hostess’s attention from her victim with quits commendable skill. For the moment the chase was suspended, and one of Jennifer’s sincerest admirers, the butler, noted with satisfaction that his employer’s victim was at last being left to enjoy her supper. “ Like a cat after a poor bloomin’ mouse, she was, all the time. Seemed as if she’d got ’er claws so dug into the poor old girl she couldn’t get ’em out again. But, my gawd, you should ’ave seen 'er turn green, as I did when it ’appened. I wouldn’t 'ave missed it—-no, not for £SO! ” Thus Saunderson to his friends below stairs, at one o’clock the next morning, when, the last chug of the last motor having died away, he was* free to join them. The discussion that began with Lady Yardley’s remark on the Epstein statue, proved only a temporary respite for Jennifer’s mother. In the polite, fiendishly, clever baiting, which, on the surface, was s.o entirely innocuous—one subject after another being introduced and immediately’ dropped as Mrs Lome displayed her woeful * ignorance—Adela Creighton was like an animal display’ing an atavistic tendency’, blindly consumed by’ an uncontrollable desire to rend, hurt, andj no matter at what 1 cost, to destroy’. A less keen intelligence 'than that oT Jennifer would have deduced the rea- , son for the cruel treatment that her mother was receiving at her hostess's hands. She knew now why she had been placed in such close proximity’ to F rank’s parents; she could sense the triumph, see it waving flags in the big china-blue eyes that now and again smiled on her from the other end of the table. As a move, its success was quite hopeless. All the sparkle and joy represented by’ the success of “Black Cargo” had disappeared. People spoke kindly and graciously of Jennifer’s talent, and predicted for her a brilliant future. One or two, to Madame Elise’s great delight, made definite arrangements for the discussion of gow ? ns to be specially designed. Frank’s place at the table was not very’ near Jennifer’s, being close to her mother and Adela. Yet, without speaking across the table in a raised voice, he could not be of any conversational use to Mrs Lome, much to his chagrin, for, without definitely sensing malice on Adela Creighton’s part, he was uncomfortably aware of the fact that she was making Jennifer’s mother both look and feel like the proverbial fish out of water. It was only when, with a palpable relish that outraged even his good-nat-ured masculine tolerance, Adela found a fresh way’ of “showing up” her guest, that Frank proved the truth of one of the indubitable facts of life—that emotions which have not a door into the open will inevitably make havoc with-