For Honour's Sake.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7951, 29 January 1906, Page 2

For Honour's Sake.

CHAPI'EK XV—(Continued). "Good night," he said, very low, his voice quivered; "but not adieu." He turned from her almost abruptly, and a minute later had left the house. The same action, the same words, with which he had parted from her two years ago. Claude sank down, trembling, into the chair, frotv which she had risen. She d:d not say it within herself, did not think it; but'she felt that there was something more in the kiss Esric Stewart bad pressed on her hand than tenderness and reverence. The touch of his lips lingered still where they had rested. Mentally, the girl was in a kind of golden haze; it was the stirring in her heart of the love that lay dormant; but as yet she was only restless, tremuously happy, not conscious enough for inward question. But instinctively Bhe sought solitude, shrank especially from the Joud voice and boisterous manner of Chris Davenant, and quickly making her esoape,. she went up to her own room. ' And all her waking thoughts, could she have analysed them, centred round Esrio Stewart. But then, though not always in the same degree, so' from the time he left her in Fans with that lingering "Good-bye, but not adieu!" CHAPTER XVL FANCOURT BECOMES INQUISITIVE. Arthur Fancourt kept his word to Chris Davenant, and kept himself entirely apart from the family uircle at The Ferns, leading, practically, quite, a recluse life. He rarely went beyond the garden, and when he did it was at night; his meals Were served to him in bis own room, and. you might have visited at the house for months without- discovering his presence in it. Even his pet vice—the vice that bad been the chief factor in bringing him to his ■ present pass—-was quietly and inoffensively pursued; he Was never noisy, but heavy and itupid, and simply lay down and slept off the fa"t, arising from his slumber almost entirely free from t»ny effects of the brandy he had taken, for brandy was what be drank. Davenant had given out, to the servants, and Claude, that the new inmate of The Ferns was a poor and improvident relation, who, having done him (Davenant) mur>h kindness in the past, deserved the return of a home; when he was homeless and penniless, and, by reason of bis oonflrmed vice, wholly unfit for employment. The servants, perhaps, believed the story; Claude did not. The idea of Chris Davenant doing a genuine kindness to anyone, or being guilty of the virtue of gratitude, i was to her who now knew him so well, simply farcical. She Sit the truth—though she could not know its exaot phase—in privately deciding that Fancourt bad Davenant in bis power, and famished food, shelter and drink in payment for his silence. It was not at all unlikely, thought the keenwitted girl, that Julia Davenant bad *'a past"; women are, so mnoh quicker in these things than men, their instincts finer, their sense of proportion in morals dearer, their perception of shades of expression of intonation, [sensitive, often to the ooarder brain of the male half of creation; and living with Julia daily, seeing her, hearing her, in all moods and phases, Claude saw what the society world never saw; was led sometimes to that involuntary conjecture which is own 3ister to aospioion, "I wonder what her life was once?" Bat Mrs Davenant was cunning enough never to express jany dislike to a man so degraded. She applauded her husband's "kindness." "After all," she would say, "he isn't much trouble, and you couldn't leave uirn to starve, Chris; he won't trouble us long—the man bas simply shattered his constitution—there isn't a year's life in him." This, of '■couwe, was before Claude. When husband and wife were alone there was no disguise. Why should there bef For the intruder, Claude had the pity whioh a noble nature feels for one utterly lost and degraded. » She saw at once that he was a gentleman, and it seemed horrible that he should lead this wretched life, caring for nothing but brandy and cards, though the last taste was very subordinate. He had been once, Chris said, a terrible gambler; but the love of drink bad gradually pushed the other vice into a corner, and though he was always ready to play, he seemed content without it. Claude alone, iu the household, treated this unfortunate creature with gentleness and courtesy. Davenant and his wire, knowing that he would accept rudeness so long as he bad plenty of brandy, treated him in such off-hand fashion that one could almost have believed the story of his being a poor relation true. The servants, following suit, wasted no deference upon him. But - Claude, however, much as she despised the drunkard, could not be unkind to the man. "The pity on't, the pity on't, ' ■was always in her heart. It was s not often she came across him, but when she did she treated •him as if he were wbafc%e was once jeara ago, though only its poor wreck now—a gentleman. He scarcely seemed to notice, though one dav he said to Davenant, ■with a laugh, and a far from distinct utterance—be had been drinking a : gool deal that flay: "Madenibiselle Claude treats me like "'a gentiehian~how^ia v sh it out, oh?—and gives me such a sorrowful look! What's good of it, r-w> Hnv. though, Chris, she's aa

By Bertha M. Clay. Author of " Wife in Kame Only," " Wedded and Parted," "Dora: Thome," "A Queen Among Women," " A True Magdalene," etc., etc.,

beautiful aa a dream, a poet's dream, eh? Not mine, not mine," with a shudder. Yet perhaps somewhere iu tho depths of his abandoned aud shattered nature lay some remnant of the good which is iu things evil; and bo was not quite insensible to tho gentleness Claude showed him. The night following the at-home, was playing cards in his room, with Davenant. It was late, aud Chris, who cared nothing for Cards, with uomiual stakes, was tired, but he dared not be too independent of Fancourt's whims. The latter in some drunken fit, might turn "nasty." FaucourJ;, however, was anything but sober now, and would poon be helpless. \ For some time the game had gone on with hardly a word spoken on either side. Suddenly Fancourt said, with that abrupt plunge at a subject characteristic of all unhinged minds: "Say, Chris, that girl's beautiful as a dream." He had got bold of that simile, and chuckled over it as if it were his own creation. "Wha' going to do with her?" "Oh she'll marry, of course," said Chris, throwing down a card. "Yes: but who to? Look here," said Fancourt, leaning forward on the table, "who's that handsome chop came here last night? Military fellow, howling swell, curly black hair? You know him; that's the chap for her." "But that man's married already," said Chris—the dascription would only apply to one among last evening's 'guests. "You mean Captain Stweart, of Loobmohr." "(jap—" Fancourt Ist the cards drop from his trembling fingers on to the table. "Married?" he repeated, after a pause. "Well, now that's a pity, isn't it? Who's his Wife?" (To be Continued). '