“The Heirs of Heritage,”

Wairarapa Daily Times, 21 July 1934, Page 7

“The Heirs of Heritage,”

COPYRIGHT. PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

CHAPTER IV.—Continued,

“ About that. I was a kid when she was born/’ said George. “I remember the fuss at The Hall over the baby that everyone expected would be a boy.” “I don’t believe he ever forgave her being a girl.” “Or me for the same offence,” said Joan, with a little resigned shrug of her slim shoulders. “Well, I must be off, or I shall add to my delinquencies by being late for dinner. Bye-bye, everybody. (I’ll be round as soon as I can to-night, Polly.” “And don’t forget to come here tomorrow morning to have a look at your new cousin, ’ ’ Miss Lucy reminded her.

“Not likely, dear. I’ll come all right,” she laughed. “How Joan stands it, I can’t think,” said Miss Lucy, as, Polly also having taken herself off, she bustled about, preparing supper. “I wonder she doesn’t run away as Marion did.” “No one to run away with, so far,” suggested George. “Besides, she wouldn't leave her mother. And she doesn’t let the old man’s nagging worry her. It slips off her like water off a duck’s back.”

“If ever he finds out that she goes down to the Manor Farm every day to help Polly with the incubators and chickens, and is being paid for it, there will be no end of a flare-up. Luckily he keeps so aloof from everything and everyone —the Stocktons especially—that* it’s fairly easy to hoodwink .him.”

“I don’t know. I think sometimes he sees and knows more than we imagine. Anyhow, he can’t —or he doesn’t —give her any allowance, and he must know she gets a little pocket money somehow, and doesn't choose to ask how or where.”

“Perhaps you’re right,” said his sister. “But there’ll be a catastrophe one of these days. I can feel it in my bones.” After supper she lighted the lamp, and they settled down as usual, she with her knitting, he with his work, on a little swivel table that could be swung across his chair. Quaint woilc. Decorating miniature chairs and tables made of white wood by-his own deft fingers, with a tiny lathe, and now being exquisitely lacquered in vivid colours —green, blue, red, gold, black. He found a ready,sale, through “arts and crafts” shops in the county town for as many of the toys as he could turn out, and the proceeds made an appreciable addition to his slender pension, which represented their sole income. While they worked, Lucy switched on the wireless, a set bestowed on them some time ago, by the Stocktons, and their . chief source of entertainment. Presently a light footstep was heard outside, and they exchanged significant smiles. Mr Heritage professed to loath “wireless,.” as all other modern innovations; nevertheless, nearly every evening he strolled up to hear the news bulletin, in the racing season especially, the one thing lie took an interest in at this time of year, as hunting was his one pastime in winter. “May I come in?” he asked, and entered forthwith, dignified in his wellworn, well-brushed evening clothes, and smoking an excellent cigar. . The strict economy practised perforce in hi* household did not extend to ~his immediate and personal comforts. “Yes —do,” said Miss Lucy, and rose to mee him. “The news hasn’t come through yet, but it’s due in a minute or two.” “Ah—the news! Yes, I’d rather like to hear the Kempton results. Hard at work, as usual, eh, George?” With no trace of the asperity with which he had parted from her before dinner, he settled himself in his accustomed chair, just outside the circle of lamp light. A minute ticked away, with no sound from the wireless, then the announcer’s clear voice was heard, there, as in the hotel lounge a few miles away, and with much the same effect, as the “5.0.5.” for Anthony Hylton fell on their ears. Miss Lucy and Gilbert Heritage started to their feet, George dropped his paint brush, and they stared at each other. Then, as the voice continued with the weather forecast, Miss Lucy moving swiftly across to the instrument, switched off, and there was an interval of breathless silence, broken by Heritage, almost in a whisper. “An accident! What can have happened?” “God knows! Oh how dreadful. What can we do? That poor boy! And Marian!” ejaculated Miss Lucy. “What hospital did he say?” asked George. “Can’t you telephone there, Lucy?” “Of course I can. From The Manor. I’ll run down at once.” She started off on the 1 instant, snatching a coat from a peg by the front door, and struggling into it as she went. Heritage followed, and helped her on with it, but said never a word. In half an hour she returned, panting, up the hill, and found him in the road, pacing up and down by the churchyard Avail, vdth Juno, the old spaniel, keeping pace Avith him. He hurried to meet her, his face Avhite in the soft dusk.

“Well?” She gave hi rathe news, as the nurse to whom she liacj, spoken, had given it her. “Is there no.hope?” “The nurse didn’t say. They never will, you know. But they knew the boy was on his way, his friend telephoned just before I did, and she promised to give him a message to ring me up at The Manor at 10 to-morrow. ’ ’ “Did,you give any message. . . from me. . . to her . . . Marian?” “How could I? When you never gave me one?” she asked, sadly and sternly. . , ~ . “No. No. God forgive me! But in the morning, Lucy ... If she’s still . . . living, send her my love, and ask if I shall come up to her ...” CHAPTER V. —VAGUE EXPECTATIONS. As she expected, Lucy Fordo foimd Mr Heritage again anxiously awaiting her, on Whit-Sunday morning, when she returned, panting up the steep hill, after her telephone interview with Tony Hylton. “Well?” he demanded eagerly. Incapable of speech for the moment

. BY JOHN IRONSIDE. (Author of “Lady Pamela’s Pearls,” “The Crime and the Casket,” “The Black ShadoAV,” etc).

“Dead!” he repeated, almost in a Avhisper. “My poor Marian!” Then, turning again to Lucy, he asked, brokenly: “Did he say if she —Avas conscious? If she spoke of —of me?” “Yes. He’s going to Avrito to you to-day. He sounds such a dear boy. Just Avhat Marian’s son Avould be! And Dudfield says lie’s the living image of vou. That’s Avhat made him speak to him.”

He nodded. Already this morning he had cross-questioned Abel and learnt all that passed in the brief intervieAV. “Did he say anything about his father? That artist fellow?” “Yes. He died in Corsica, many years ago, Avlien Tony AA r as ,an infant. He can’t remember him at all.”

“Dead! So long ago? Then — Avhat has she been doing since? Hoav did they live?” he demanded. “I didn’t knoAv. We couldn’t go into anything like that on the telephone, could avc?” “No. No. Of course not. Did he give you his telephone number?” “Yes. I’ve got it here.” He- took the crumpled slip of paper she extended to him, adjusted his glasses Avith a hand that trembled —his one visible sign of emotion —fetched out his notebook, and copied the number.

she shook her head sadly. “Dead. No, no, don’t tell me that!” he exclaimed.

“Yes —last night—soon after the boy got there. It’s too dreadful,” she sobbed, dabbing her hot face and streaming eyes Avith her handkerchief.

He stared doAvn over the sunlit valley, and the little church, Avhere the bells Averc ringing merrily for morning serA r ice.

“You’re going to ring him up?” she asked impulsively, as he returned the paper to her. “Oh, I’m so glad! Won’t you go doAvn to The Manor? They’ll be starting out for church, but you’ll be sure to meet them, and I ltnoAV they’d be only too pleased if you Avould make use of their ’phone.” “I will make my own arrangements, thank you!” he responded, haughtily, adding, more gently, “It Avas very good of you to take the- trouble to go doAvn this morning, Lucy. I am infinitely obliged to you.” With a courteous gesture he turned arvay, and stalked doAvn the avenue. Still panting, Miss Forde gazed after him, half iompassionate, half indignant. He needn’t have trouble to thank her for going dorvn to telephone. She had done it for Marian’s sake, and the boy’s, and her oavia, certainly not for his. But that Avas just like him —overweening egotist that he AA'as! She knerv he loved Marian, liis only child, in his oavii jealous, tyrannical, possessive Avay; knerv that the long estrangement had been a real grief to hi mall these years, the more so, perhaps, because lie attributed all the blame to her, none to himself, and *had persistently, if silently, cherished bitter resentment against her, as he was Avont to do against everyone who, he considered had gWen him cause for offence.

How “huffy” he had been over the innocent suggestion that he should use the Stocktons’ telephone! His onesided feud against them rvas another of his deplorable absurdities. It was “the Heritage way,’ ’ on which he actually prided himself, poor, obstinate, unhappy old man, his own worst ' enemy, always! Unconscious alike of her pity and her condemnation, he passed out of sight, through a wicket gate on the left leading into the paddock, and made towards the stables, walking slowly, his head bent in brooding, painful thought. His heart was indeed wrung with sorrow, and for the first time with a thrill of remorse, as he recalled that one letter his daughter wrote to him from her Corsican home, and that he had returned to her without a word.. He had read it before sending it back, and it had increased his anger. For, though she had written lovingly, and asked him to forgive her, she had expressed no real penitence, but merely emphasised her happiness. Happiness indeed! That, he was very sure, would be short lived. She would soon tire of poverty and exile, or that artist fellow would neglect her, when the glamour of romance had passed, and then she would turn again to him, her father and natural protector, and sue for the help and forgiveness that he would never deny if she asked for them in what he considered ‘ ‘ a proper spirit. ’ ’ How he had waited, week after week, month after month,, year after year, for that appeal, which had never come, until at last he had resigned himself to the belief that she must be dead in fact, as well as dead to him. The news yesterday, so bluntly imparted by Lucy Forde, that she was living in London, and had a grown-up son who had actually been here in Heritage, had startled and moved him more than he would have confessed to anyone. now, even more than her death, the thought of her son, his grandson, stirred him profoundly. Perhaps the most bitter of the many disappointments of his life was that he had never had a son, and that, since Dick Heritage’s death, he had no near kinsman to carry on the old name, and perhaps even, in course of time, restore the fallen fortunes of the family. Would this young man, his own grandson, fill the breach at long last? Dudfield had declared him to be “every inch a Heritage.” If that were so, his name would be a trivial matter, and, after all, could be changed if, by any fortunate chance, the old home might yet be saved. (To be Continued).