A HEART'S TRIUMPH.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9112, 11 June 1908, Page 2

A HEART'S TRIUMPH.

CHAPTER 111. -Continued. Once qualified to practise, Felix was settle J—at a considerable costin a good locality, and having obtained all he needed to start himself with every flourish of trumpets, Felix set himself to the tas'i of amusing himself. His uncle, h:ippily for him, never paid a visit to London and, equally happily, Doctor Thorold lived now so completely out of the world that he was never likely to hear any accounts of Felix save what Felix desired he should hear. Now and then, just for the sake of receiving further attention, the joung man would do co.ne small thing and get himself written about in the papers, in order that his uncle should imagine he was becoming famous. Famous he certainly was, but in a way quite different from what Sebastian'Thoroli could have imagined. Through his uncle's fame to bc?in With, Felix Bingham had found himself a favoured guest in the houses of the smart and the rich; and once having been admitted, his handsome presence and his charm of _ manner won him instant appreciation. He was, before very long, a familiar figure in the most exclusive and fashionable set, and life was a succession of pleasures for him varied only by the prepetual ennui oE not having enough money to keep himself going in the way he liked Lest. Now and then Felix ran down to Westshii-3 to pay his uncle a visit. He timed these visits to suit his own convenience. For instance, in the autumn he enjoyed some shooting, and in the hunting" season he was able to have some good runs with the hounds. The allowance Doctor Thorold had made him during his college days was jrtill continued, but as it was only a few hundred jjd'jiicls.a.year*, it tlkt very little to support Felix in his expensive taster. Despite the knowledge t.iat the old man had parted with a considerable sum to purchase him the practise he now held, Felix was of the opinion that Doctor Thorold might easily have increased his yearly allowance. He had already borrowed as much as he possibly could on the wealth that must corns to him at his uncle's death; but wh-.n one has started at such a pace as ,\oun.r Doctor Felix Bingham started, one requires mora command of monr/ that ha was able to get. He was, indeed, beginning to find himsslf.ina very awkward cornyr, when he received an invitation from some county neighbours of his unde's t-j join their party for the military hall given at Manchester by the Fitieth Lancers. As thass people ware rich, and as it suited his purpose to pay a visit to his uncle at this time, Felix wrote saying he would be at the ball, only he must remain as a gjest in his uncle's house, otherwise he feared tha old man would be mads unhappy; and this arrangement he carried out, much ta Sebastian Thorold's delight. Tha two men had a cozy dinner together, and Felix had listened with his usual expressions of pleasure to all the—to him—prosy details of his uncle's life, giving in return an airy and entirely fictitious account of his own.

These visits of the young man were a source of great happiness to Doctor Thorold. He found something better in B'elix each time they met. To him his nephew was the embodiment of every physical and mental perfection. Most certainly it would be a rare thing to come across a man mora splendid in form, more charming in manner, mora even tampered. Felix was in one of his sunniest humours this night of the ball, as he sat listening to his uncle's voice, while he smoked his after-dinner cigar. It v/ould have saemed inconceivable to an onlooker to imagine that his laughing, happy, handsome extsrior covered a mind full of impatient anger, anxiety, and pronounced selfishness. With his wonderful eyes in apparent affection on Sebastian Thorold's silvered hair and bencvoler.t face, hot, bitter thoughts wsra chasing themselves through Felix's brain. If he could only obtain some clue as to the extent of the property the old man possessed! Wealth he must have, for Felix. ki;ew that his untie came of a moneyed family; that his lifework had been rewarded by financial success, and this quite apart from the fact that several years before a certain friend and colleague of Sebastian Thorold's had died, bequeathing to the latter a large sum of money to be used for the purpose of furthering the interests of science —a purpose needless to say, that Felix Bingham regarded with no amicable spirit. Generous as the old man was to Felix, he never made any confidincas about his property to his ntphew, and Felix had to draw conclusions of his owii ay to the valu.; of the citato Wnidi must one day come to him, and on which he counted so mu:h. "Will he live forever" he asked himstlf, with cru;l impt'.i-in?, this night. * It'v.-j.i:..'. r.nnoyar.cc lo find Djclor Tlu'V\.ld looking more sprigMly ivxl talking morj intelligently than ever. Mutters would have been altogether be; ut.' for his ambitions and his daily Densities if hij U'.uls had fjlhn into an invalid state. Thus helplass, \\\.i affaira would have passed into Felix's huiid* and the rdsulfc would have been infinitely satisfactory to the young man. But, save for a rheumatic tendency, which crippled I i (i .'lightly. Sebastian Thorold was ua hale and hearty now in his seventy-fourth year as he had been when Felix was a lad. The young man's thoughts were far enough from the various subjects-his uncle introduced; Despite the smile on his lips and his serene manner, he

By Effie Adelaide Rowlands, Author Jof "Hugh Grotton'a Sjcret," "A Spbndid Heart," - Brave Barbara," „"Tl.o Temptation of Mary Earr," "Selina's love Story," etc.

felt utterly depressed this night. Ihe ball had no particular attraction for hiii-he wa.it to so many balls; and though the people whom he was to meet were certainly rich, they were correspondingly vulgar, and, as such, rnoit displeasing to him. "I wonder if he would be good for a thou.and if I were to break it to him gently?" he pondered. He took another cigar and lit it meditatively. Doctor Thorold smoked his old meerschaum pipe. "Surely it is time for your dancs, isr/i i<", Felix?" he queried, as the clock chimed eleven. Felix shrugged his shoulders. . "I have a very good mind not to go," he said; "it is so pleasant here with you, Uncle Sebastian, and I see you so seldom." Doctor Choroid's eyes had a deeper look of tenderness. "There are others, maybe, who will be looking for you, my boy." Felix smiled. "I can do without the others." To himself he set the awkward task >of finding some good way of broaching the subject of money; it was not an easy matter to handle. "Well," the old man said, with a sigh and a wistfulness in his voice, "I shall not be in a hurry to lose you, Felix, only since you came down here to go to this ball, it seems to me you ought to go. You will see all the elite of Westshire. Everybody belonging to this part of the world will be thereto-light, except Charles Lacklyne and myself." F clix looked up suddenly. The name Lacklyne was one he had | heard frequently enough, but it had j never conveyed any special significance to him till now, when he remembered to have heard it mentioned a few days previously in the city in close connection with a financial speculation which was, in its way, g'vjlitmiiid. I "Doss Sir Charles still live in his j usual eccentric fashion? People say 1 he is quite mad, don't they?" 1 "Peopb say very many stupid I things," Doctor Thorold observed ! dryly. "Lacklyne is not mad," he , added quietly. "A shrewder, cleverer ! man does not exist where actual business is oncerned. He has this hobby of machinery, but though he carries it to excess, he manages to achieve ; something now and then." | "He is very rich, is he not?" ' Felix asked tentatively. I Doctor Thorold nodded his head. I "Very, I believe. He spends very little, comparatively speaking. His | estate down here alone brings him in many thousands a year. He is not an easy-going landlord," Doctor ' Thorokl continued, after a little pause, "but there is alwtys a demand for hu land. His farms are never unlet. Little Cecil will be a rich person one of these days." ! "Cecil!" Felix Bingham looked up. "Is that his son?" "His daughter, and only child—a . beautiful girl, brought up in wha 1 -, . the world would call the most eccenI trie fashion. Lacklyne always wanted a boy, and he thought to get even ! with fate by turning Cecil into as close a resemblance to a boy as he can. Your smart young ladies, Felix," Doctor Thorold said, with a i twinkle in his eye, "would no doubt j look askance, at my Rosalind, as I j call her, in her brown velvet suit. i Sne is a creature quite out of their ' sphere; to me, she is one of the j sweetest, purest, and most beautiful [ creatures that has ever been ; created." j t It is odd I have never heard any j mention of this girl before," Felix said. "How old is she, uncle?" I Doctor Thorold shook his head. i "Ah, that I cannot tell you. Some- ! thing under twenty. Lacklyne has : never told mu anything about his '■ marriage, so I can but guess at Cecil's age. I thought you knew all about her, Felix. All the world around here knows Cecil Lacklyne by name, though no on a save myself ever meets her. Shu never leaves tie precincts of tno Wlute Abbey." (To be continued).