IN THE VAGUE.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIX, Issue XIII, 27 September 1902, Page 774

IN THE VAGUE.

I. 1 am a disappointed woman. It is best to mention this before I begin my story, so as to disarm any obvious criticism. 1 will try to write as an onlooker only, which in one sense 1 was, or perhaps 1 should say as an eavesdropper. My husband, Godfrey Lacy, had died just two years ago. He had been the heir to one of the most beautiful places 1 had ever seen. Lacy Court is for ever lost to me as a home by his death. Had I had a child 1 should have spoken; having none where was the use? As Godfrey and I, and children after us could never be the owners of Lacy Court, it does not matter much who it belongs to, only my heart is sore sometimes when 1 "think of the kind old Colonel Lacy, and how fond he was of my husband and of me, and of the beautiful old house. He was nearing sixty, when, according to my opinion, he did the one foolish deed of his life, in marrying Diane D Etardes, a girl ot two and twenty; half French, half Irish, altogether beautiful, he wrote, altogether charming. He wrote apologetically, wistfully, deprecating the disappointment he knew we both must feel. Godfrey, his nephew, had always been his heir, and we had been married fifteen years. I sometimes think had we had children Colonel Lacy would not have married. At least I thought so, till I saw Diane. We had been more or less living abroad for the last two years in the fond hope of saving or prolonging Godfrey's life. We had always been happy " together. Childless people are sometimes more to each other than those whose hearts are divided amongst children. The last years of my husband’s life we saw nothing of Colonel Lacy and his wife. I had been for two years a widow, and Diane four years a wife, when Colonel Lacy wrote to me (as he had written constantly during my widowhood), imploring me to come and stay at Lacy Court. "You must come and be comforted, dearest Venetia. in your lonely sorrow. Diane is prepared to welcome you as a sister. To me you have always been as a very dear daughter; conquer your natural aversion to coming back to a house where you were so happy with our dear Godfrey. Come. dear, come;l want you and mv wife to be friends.” How could 1 resist such pleading? 1 had shrunk from all society, had been living with a sister, sad and widowed like myself, in a remote corner of Wales. I had grown eaim and even peaceful in her company, and with many books, much needlework, and a passion for flowers. But my sister persuaded me to go to Lacy Court. "After all. he has always been very fond of you,” she said, "and you might find an interest in Diane.” "Diane has no children,” I considered, as I drove late that evening up the familiar approach. “Ah! if I had had a child, how different my position here would have been from what it will be now.” T was received with most affectionate welcome by Colonel Lacy, kissing me and leading me by the hand through the hall, into the great library. where fifteen years ago he had welcomed me with my husband. Then I had been a lady of consequence. the heir’s wife. Now. I was nobody, worse than nobody—a disappointed. heart-broken woman; not a poor relation exactly, no one could call me that. And T saw Diane’s beautiful, narrow eyes open and widen as they fell on me. I suppose, in her young pride, she had expected to see a crushed-looking middle-aged woman. T am very little over thirty, and sorrow has not crushed or aged the beauty Godfrey was proud of to the last. Diane came up to me with

a sort of gliding—grace, her manner was sweetly, gently cold, or coldly sweet. As we stood together for a moment by the fire dear old Colonel Lacy’s eyes lit up with pleasure at seeing us together, but Diane’s face never relaxed from its cold severity. There was no doubt that she was exquisitely pretty; her small rose-leaf tinted face set proudly on her long, delicate neck, dark hair curling closely like a little boy’s all over her head, except where one knot was twisted high up like an old French picture; and the pretty lips curled, too, rather disdainfully, with infrequent smiles; as for her eyes, one seldom saw them, they were so long, so narrow, hidden under eyelashes dark as her hair. I had not heard her speak yet, and I waited with some curiosity. And when she spoke her voice was soft, slow, and monotonous. I could not understand why the French and Irish blood had mingled so gravely in her. but I saw what her eharm might be. even while I unhesitatingly disliked and mistrusted her. Colonel Lacy called to the young man who was busy at the tea-table bringing me my tea: “This, Venetia, is a cousin you have not yet seen—Lucian. We are all Lacys here. You and Lucian ought to be friends.” Why I don’t know. as. unless Diane had a child. Lucian held the same position my Godfrey had held. Lucian was a very good-looking man—boy I almost said, but I heard afterwards he was over thirty; he was fair, and there was something in

his kind eyes which reminded me of Godfrey fifteen years ago. I liked him as instinctively as I disliked the beautiful Diane. “Diane, I think Venetia will like to go to her room, and rest,” Colonel Lacy said, and ungracious still in manner, she offered to take me upstairs. “I thought,” he said in his deprecatingly gentle way, speaking very low, so that Diane stiould not overhear, “you would prefer to be in the other wing of the nouse, the west wing.” Remembering how I had always had rooms in the south wing with Godfrey, I thanked him for his thoughtfulness. My room was large and comfortable, a great fire burned in the basket grate. While retaining the beautiful old furniture, there were a few modern comforts in the way of a great soft sofa, silken cushions, and an armchair close to the fire. “Yes,” said Diane, “Arthur was anxious you should have this room, as we have just done it up—at least he has.” “Don’t you love the house?” I said. Her lip ecurled, her nearest approach to a smile. “Love it, oh no, it is so dull and gloomy. I take no interest in these sort of old places. You forget I am French. One ought to be thoroughly English to appreciate these traditional places.” I looked at her with some contempt. “Why.” I said, “every nook and corner of the house is interesting. My

husband and 1 used to delight in it. We loved it.” "Did you ever explore this wing?” she asked. "This part of the house was practically unfurnished in those days,” I answered; “we thought it a pity as this side gets all the afternoon sun.” Diane left me with some abruptness, if anything so serpentine could be abrupt. I dressed myself leisurely, piling my hair, which is golden and I may say beautiful, on the top of my head; tying black chiffon round my slender waist, and, in spite of my sorrow, unable to resist some pride in the whiteness of mv neck against the square-cut black velvet of my dress. “Diane shall not be the only beauty, I said, as I pinned in some violets and swept down the oak stairs. Only Lucian was in the library. There was something particularly attractive to me in this young man’s looks and manner, which had something of a sweetness about it, as of a mother’s favourite; therefore, I could only ascribe Diane’s excessive coldness to him as jealousy of her husband’s heir. I am observant and not stupid, but it would have taken a cleverer woman to understand Diane. Dinner went off with the usual dullness of a party where all are related by law, and none by sympathy. I found my spirits unaccountably depressed. in spite of Lucian’s charm, and could not respond with my wonted readiness to his assiduities. He hung over the piano when I played Chopin and Wagner afterwards, with all his heart in his eyes. At last, chilled by Diane’s evident want of appreciation of my music. I -got up from the piano. He pushed a low armchair close up to the fire and sitting closely by me, devoted himself to me without a glance to the end of the great room, where, oy another fire. Diane half lay on a chaise-lounge, silent and beautiful. Colonel Lacy sat reading the papers, Diane lazily stroked her tiny Blenheim’s ear, as it lay on her lap. Now and again I heard her give a little impatient sigh and look at the clock. The evening ended not too soon for me, for in spite of Lucian and Colonel Lacy’s welcome. I felt that Diane had taken a dislike to me. I was glad when we all said good-night, and I went my way’ to the west wing. Lucian went as far as my passage, and said laughingly, “My room is just up those steps close by. so if you hear any’ ghosts in the night mind you call me to-fight them. Mrs Lacv.” “Call me Mrs Godfrey,” I said gently. “I am not Mrs Lacy’ now.” “You must not forget we are cousins, Mrs Godfrey.” he said lust pressing my hand as he said good night, with a touch which might be the prelude to a friendship if I was willing. Even now I can never be as hard on Lucian as I ought to be. I went to bed and slept. It was midnight when I woke, and was glad to remember that my maid was in the dressingroom just across the passage, for I felt lonely’, a little nervous, remembering Lucian’s joke (a bad ioke I thought it) about ghosts. My’ room was dark and very cold; it was a stormy night, and the curtain was blowing into the room with a tiresome flapping noise. I lit my candle, and got up to shut the window, shivering, and wishing Diane’s housekeeper had put more blankets on my bed. The great embroidered quilt was folded up and put on the sofa. My room had two doors, the second was a cupboard in the wall, where mv maid told me. she had put my fur cloak. On opening the door what was my’ surprise at seeing a little ray of light shining at the end of the cupboard, which appeared to go a long way’ back into the wall, to be rather more a little passage than a wall. My terror was so great and unreasoning that I shut the door and locked it. and hurried back to bed. My clock struck two; it had a deep-toned strike like a church bell, and to my ear it sounded like a knell. Next morning I took a lin-hted candle with me and investigated the cupboard. I found a tiny door in the end. up two steps and locked. I could not remember ever having been

in the room before in my many visits to Lacy Court. Diane had said at dinner that Colonel Lacy had had two or three rooms done up in this wing while they had been abroad in the spring. She had also said he had wished her to ehoose that wing of the hous« for their especial use. but she had preferred the outlook over the park and the view of the distant hills. She had said that she considered the western side too shut in with trees and hedges, and was already bored by gardens. “People have gone mad over gardens in England. I think it is one of their new crazes.” I must say that hers must have been a most discontented mind to object to that lovely view of Dutch gardens below mv windows. T remembered

my many hours there with Godtrey in my young days, early morning strolls with the dew on the close-cut grass, and the little red tiled walks; or in the evening, when the nightingales sang, and the air was sweet with the smell of early summer flowers. Poor Godfrey! poor me! A thought came to me, which I put hastily away, but it could not be quite stifled, and as I looked into my look-ing-glass before going downstairs. I was glad I was still so fair to look upon.

CHAPTER 11. At breakfast I said to Lucian, “I wish you had not made me so nervous about ghosts last night.” Diane looked up quickly! Colonel Lacy said, “What nonsense! Ghosts. Who ever heard of ghosts here? I am sure I have known the house long enough to have got over such nonsense.” He was frowning, and looked thoroughly displeased. Diane sullenly furious, and Lucian uncomfortable. He was sitting opposite the windows, and I. with feminine presence of mind.

had hurried to the opposite seat, fie flushed and looked annoyed ami discontented. Altogether my harmless speech completely upset the harmony of the breakfast table. As we were leaving the room Colonel Lacy came up to me, and gently touched my shoulder. “Forgive me. dear, for speaking so abruptly to you: the truth is that Dian? is so very highly strung, and has such an intense horror of the supernatural, that I always dislike any allusion to ghosts before her. I believe, poor child, she got some fright from a stupid servant in her childhood.” “I said nothing, but thought to myself. “Fright is not temper, and it was temper I saw on he- face.”

Later in the morning, Lucian, who was strolling by my side on the terrace, said, with some embarrassment of manner: "Why did you allude to my speech about ghosts, Mrs Godfrey? Did you hear anything last night?” "No, I heard nothing." I answered with reserve. "And, as Uncle Arthur said, 1 ought to have got over any fear of ghosts in this house by now: but 1 have never slept in this wing before. Indeed, the rooms were only half-furnished in my day." Lucian immediately relapsed into his sympathetic manner. “It is hard for you,” ha murmured. “It is almost impertinent to express my sympathy, but will you. will you take the will for the deed and believe you have all my sympathy?” I looked at the beautiful Elizabethan house, at the park, the terraced garden, and sighed. “Anyhow, it is nice of you to express sympathy for my—bereavement.” I said, but even in myself I hardly knew which bereavement. “1 could have been happy hero.” I said, “and was happy with Godfrey.”

Diane came slowly down the stone steps to meet us. Her beauty was enough to charm anyone who only cared for looks. As for me. no woman has ever so thoroughly repelled me. before or since. I thought, but it may have been fancy, I caught a look pass from her inscrutable eyes to Lucian's, and that their frankness was momentarily clouded. To my surprise her cold manner had changed to something more gently friendly. She even smiled at me. as she asked me if I had found the west wing haunted, as I had alluded to ghosts at breakfast. "I never saw Arthur so cross before. but he is so absurdly anxious about my nerves, one would imagine I was on the verge of nraln fever.”

She slipped her arm into mine, as we walked together—l felt as if a serpent had glided in. And yet the arm was soft and warm and white, and the little hand, how white it was! and how her diamond rings sparkled! I don't know why at this particular moment a sort of second-sight came over me. 1 seemed as if behind the scenes of a strange drama; as yet, I was not clear as to the different parts. Insi inctively I put myself on my guard against treachery. Diane's manner continued quite frigid to Lucian. He left us before long, and then she said: “Arthur is so ridiculously fond of

Lucian"; her lips had again their scornful curl. "1 like Lucian," 1 said; "he is pleasant and good-looking." “Don't you think he is very shallow and superficial?” “I really have not been long enough here to judge, and when people are plasant 1 am never critical.” She gave me one of her odd sidelong glances, and withdrew her arm from mine, ostensibly to gather up the train of her long white gown. She was very prettily dressed, and in a way to accentuate the serpentine type of her beauty, a silver snake coiled rotind the slight waist. I was very anxious to investigate the mystery of the little door at the back of my cupboard, but my distrust of Diane was great, and I preferred to wait till I knew her to be safely out of the house for some hours. That day passed without adventure. That evening was a repetition of the one before, except that Diane asked me to play, and e'en condescended to admire my music, languidly, afterwards. It was a tine warm night, very different from the last. 1 mentioned how the wind had blown the ?urtain out into my room, and how I had got up to shut my window. "1 suppose." said Diane, quietly, "that was when yon felt nervous about ghosts?" “Perhaps it was.” I answered, “but I knew it was foolish, for. after alt. Lucian's room is near, and my maid's, and neither of them have heard or seen anything." That night I looked into my cupboard without a fear of ghosts, but no light was to be seen, t->o bold hail I grown, that I felt for the keyhole to see if it had been filled up. but it was open. I pushed a hairpin through to be sure. My hairpin fell and dropped on the other side. Next morning we were all more amiable at breakfast. Diane came tn late, she looked wan and tired, and her silence was not sullen. She asked me at last if I would drive with her that morning', but my plans being prepared. 1 said I had one of my bad headaches coming on, and thought 1 would lie down quiet Ivin my ro m till luncheon, when, if not better, i should go to bed. “Take Lucian." Colonel Lacy said indulgently, “he has not seen half our pretty neighbourhood vet.” By which 1 understood that Lucian was still a comparative stranger to his future home. But Diane might have a child. I looked at her attentively as she walked up and down the terrace afterwards with Colonel Lacy. There was a languor in her steps, and I wondered if. after all- but Diane was not a woman to rush into confidence to a stranger. At last alone! All the headache apparatus on evidence, before Diane's dutiful visit to my room eau de Cologne, smelling salts, a darkened room, and an eider-down quilt, which she had sent to cover my feet. At last alone. I got tip as soon as I heard the pony-cart drive off. and locked my door. I never felt so well in my life. and. positively trembling with excitement, set to work fitting the door and wardrobe keys, and my own box keys, into that tiny, dark keyhole. It was a long time before I succeeded in finding a key to fit, and then, after covering it wirth cNd cream, tin- traditional oil of sensational stories being unattainable in this case, the door flew open, and 1 fell down several steps into a small, light room, twisted my ankle, and writhing on the floor in pain, but so overcome with surprise that I heroically put the pain aside, to be attended to later. Still sitting on the floor. 1 gazed around me at the small light, room.

The ceiling was high and domeshaped. the wall covered with striped white and watered green silk, of the pattern often used to cover Empire furniture. The fireplace was narrow and tiled, and contained an iron basket grate, while both the scrolled fender and quaint fire-irons were rusty from disuse. The chimney-piece was prettily carved with pomegranates and leaves in white painted wood. On each side stood a tiny lacquer cabinet, empty. An Empire sofa and two chairs, all covered with the same silk as the walls, completed the furniture. A picture of a beautiful boy. dressed in green was above the chimneypiece. framed in white wood and over the sofa opposite another picture of a shepherdess holding a iamb by a red ribbon. The window’ was high up, and the light obscured by a high balcony. Below the window was a settee, o» backless double chair. There was no door in. except the room where 1 had entered so ignominiously, and when, sick with pain. I looked round. I found that two steps led up to a third picture, which was my mysterious door. The floor of the tiny room was laid in parquet; here and there bits of the parquet had become detached, and lay about carelessly.

The pain in my foot prevented me from making further researches. Tt all "gave me to think” to translate a French phrase literally. How did light get into the room whose only door was through my cupboard, unless another door was concealed behind one of those pictures. With the help of a chair 1 managed to get round the room somehow. I found no other door. In fact, there was none, unless some supernaturally ingenious device hid one behind those frames. I thought not. because the handle of my picture door was very obvious. In fact, the picture was a perfectly visible door, at this moment wide open. This and the pain in my foot recalled me to the present. I got back into my room, locked the door, put the key in my pocket and prayed to my guardian spirit to inspire me with some raison d’etre for my sprained ankle. Inspirations come to those who seek them in an earnest spirit. The pain was severe, but something must be decided on. A woman does not twist her ankle while resting the sofa with a violent headache. Goiit. neuralgia. rheumatism — I scorned the thought. Any doctor—and of course a doctor must be summoned —would know it was a sprain. A very strong dose of sal Volatile, my fur cloak thrown round my shoulders. my big hat secured with pins. I crept downstairs, somehow, do not ask me how —and found myself, at a quarter to two. lying prostrate in pain (I am sure the pain was true enough) at the foot of the terrace steps. There, and it was no pretence, one of the gardeners found me. really and truly almost fainting, and summoning the butler. I was safely laid on

the library sofa, when Diane and Lucian came back from their drive. I had really slipped (on purpose this time) on the garden steps, and many were Colonel Lacy's sighs over those silly French heels, and tender was Lucian's sympathy, as I lay on the sofa all the afternoon, my foot bandaged in a hideously unbecoming manner. Diane tried to be sorry for me, but she seemed rather bored by all the attentions showered upon me, and when later Lucian ottered to carry me to the terrace, or up to my bedroom to rest, Diane’s frown was really alarming. “We have a carrying chair. I believe, somewhere,” she said coldly, “and the servants will carry Mrs. Godfrey up and down, to and from her room.” That luckless room! I stayed in it for two or three days, preferring this to being carried up and down by the servants, along miles of passages anci staircases. Dear Colonel Lacy came often and sat with me; we talked of Godfrey; he told me how he had loved Godfrey, how he had mourned his death, how fortunate he found himself in liking this young Lucian, and then his voice trembled —how desperately disappointed he was after four years to find himself still childless. “But,” he said, “Diane, darlingchild. is—is so very fragile and delicate. I can only believe, indeed know, that God knows best in withholding this blessing from me. Is she not more to me than ten sons?” Perhaps my foot hurt me very much at that moment, for 1 answered rather crossly (also it must be borne in mind that 1 was a disappointed woman). "Is your marriage such a happiness to you. Uncle Arthur?” Then he said quickly and deprecatingly." Don’t misjudge Diane, because she is shy and reserved. Venetia, you little know what she is to me. the light of my life, the joy of my old eyes, so gentle, so beautiful! “She is very beautiful,” I said, kindly. “But think what that beauty means: unlimited admiration, every temptation, that child has, and yet she has no thought for anyone biU me. She is co’d. yes. thank God. to others, but not to me.” After this I considered Diane even more attentively than before. Foot or no foot. I continued to creep to my cupboard door in the <iead hours of night, and twice again i saw that light. Even to this day 1 can’t understand what made me hold my peace. I believe I have the spirit < f a lawyer, or. say, a detective, and absolutely enjoy unravelling a mystery, for a mystery it certainly was. (To be continued.)