Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 April 1894 — UNITED AT LAST [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

UNITED AT LAST

BY MISS M BRADDON

CHAPTER IV. •OrrEUD HEB AND SHE KNOWS NOT HOW TO FORGIVB Three days after the little dinner in Half-Moon street, Mrs. Walsingham sat at her solitary breakfast-table rather later than usual, dawdling over the morning papers, and wondering drearily what she should do with the summer day before her. She had seen nothing of Gilbert Sinclair sincq the dinner, and had endured an agony of self-tor-ment in the interval His name appeared in one of the morning journals among the guests at a distinguished countess’ ball on the previous evening, and in the list of names above Mr. Sinclair she found those of Lord Clanyarde and his daughter. There had oeen a time when Gilbert set his face against all fashionable entertainments, voting them the abomination of desolation. He had changed of late, and went everywhere, raising fond hopes in the breasts of anxious mothers with large brocds of marriageable daughters waiting for their promotion. Mrs. Walsingham4at for some time looking vacantly at the long list of names, and thinking of the man she loved. Yos* she loved him. She knew his nature by heart; knew how nearly that obstinate, selfish nature vergea upon brutality, and loved him nevertheless. Something in the force of his character exercised a charm over her own imperfect disposition. She had believed in the strength of his affeotion for herself, which had been shown in a passionate, undisciplined kind of manner that blinded her to the shallowness of the sentiment. She had been Intensely proud of her power over this rough Hercules, all the more proud of his subjugation, because of that halfbidden brutishness which she had long ago divined in him. She liked him for what he was, and scarcely wished him to be better than he was. She only wanted him to be true to her. When he had asked her. years ago, to be his wife, she had frankly told him the storv of her youth and marriage. Her husband was five and twenty years her senior, a man with a constitution broken by nearly half a century of hard living, and she looked forward hopefully to a speedy release from a union that had been hateful to her. She had believed that it would be possible to retain Gilbert’s affection until the time when that release should come without sacrifice to her reputation. Had shfe not believed and hoped this, it is impossible to say what guilty sacrifice she might have been willing to make rather than lose the man she loved. She had hoped to keep him dangling on, governed by her womanly tact, a faithful slave, until the Colonel, who led a stormy kind of existence about the Continent, haunting German gambling tables, should be good enough to depart this life. But the Colonel was a long time exhausting his battered constitution, and the flowery chain in which Mrs Walsingham held her captive had faded considerably with the passage of years. A loud double knock startled the lady from her reverie. Who could such an early visitor be? Gilbert himself, perhaps. He had one of those exceptional constitutions to which fatigue is a stranger, and would be no later astir to-day for last night’s ball. Her heart fluttered hopefully, but sunk again with the familiar anguish of disappointment as the door was opened and a low, deferential voice made itself heard in the hall. These courteous tones did not belong to Gilbert Sinclair.

A card was brought to her presently, with James Wyatt's name upon it, and “on special business, with many apologies, ” written in pencil below the name, in the solicitor’s neat hand. “Shall I show the gentleman to the drawing-room, ma’am, or will you see him here?” asked the servant. “Ask him to come in here. What special business can Mr. Wyatt have we me?” she wondered. The solicitor came into the room as she asked herself this question, looking very fresh and bright, in his careful morning costume, with a hot-house flower in the button-hole of his perfectly fitting coat. He was more careful of his toilet than many handsomer men, and knew how far the elegance of his figure and the perfection of his dress went to atone for his plain face. “My dear Mrs. Walsingham," he began, “I owe you a thousand apologies Sor this unseasonable intrusion. If I did not think the nature of my business would excuse ” “There is nothing to be excused. You find me guilty of a very late breakfast, that is all. Why should you not call at half-past ten as well as at half-past two? It was very kind of you to come at all." “I hold it one of my dearest privileges to be received by you, ” he replied, with a certain grave tenderness. “There are some men who do not know when they are happy, Mrs. Walsingham. 1 am not one of those.” She looked at him with a* surprise that was half scornful. “Pray spare me the pretty speeches which make you so popular with other women,” she said. z You spoke of business just now. Did you really mean business?” “Not in a legal sense. My errand this morning is of rather a delicate nature. I would not for the world distress or offend you by any unwarranted allusion to your domestic relations, but I believe I am the bearer of news which can scarcely have reached you yet by any other channel, and which may not be altogether unwelcome.” “What news can you possibly bring me?” she asked, with a startled look. “Would it distress you to hear that Colonel Walsingham is ill—dangerously ill, even?” Her breath came quicker as he spoke. “I am not hypocrite enough to pretend that,” she answered. “My heart has long been dead to any feeling but anger—l will not say hatred, though he has deserved as much—where that man.is concerned. I have suffered too much by my alliance with him." “Then let me be the first to congratulate you upon your release from bondage. Your husband is dead.”

Clara Walsingham's cheek blanched and she was silent for some moments, and then she asked in a steady voice, “How did you come by the news of his death?” “In the simplest and most natural manner. My business requires me to be au courant as to continental affairs, and I get several French and German newspapers. In one of the last I found the account of a duel, succeeding upon a quarrel at the gaming-table, in which your husband fell, shot through the lungs. He only survived a few hours. His opponent was a Frenchman and is now under arrest. Shall I read you the paragraph?* “If you please,” answered Mrs. Walsingham, with perfect calmness of manner. Her heart was beating tuVnultously, nevertheless. She had a dismal conviction that no advantage—that is to say, not that one advantage for which she longed—would come to her from her husband’s death. How eagerly she had desired his death once! To-day the news gave her little satisfaction. Mr. Wyatt took a slip of newspaper from his card-case, ana read her the brief account of the Colonel’s exit from this mortal strife. Duels were common enough in Prussia, and the journal made very little of the sanguinary business. “As many of my friends believe me to have been left a widow long ago, I shall make no fuss about this event; and I shall be very grateful if you will be good enough not to talk of it anywhere,” Mrs. Walsingham said, by and by, after a thoughtful pause. “I shall be careful to obey you,” answered the lawyer.

“I wonder how you came to guess that I was not a widow, and that Colonel Walsingham was my husband. .He took me abroad directly after our marriage, and we were never in England together.” “It is a solicitor’s business to know a great many things, and in this case there was a strong personal Interest. You accused me just now of flattering womem; and it is quite true that I have now and then amused myself a little with the weaker sex. Until about a year ago I believed myself incapable of any real feeling—of any strong attachment—and had made up my mind to a life of solitude, relieved by the frivolities of society. But at that time a great change came over me, and I found that I too was doomed to suffer life’s great fever. In a word, I fell desperately in love. I think you can guess the rest.” “I ana not very good at guessing, but I suppose the lady is some friend of mine, or you would scarcely choose me for a confidante. Is it Sophy Morton? I know you admire her.” “As I admire wax dolls, or the Haidees and Zuleikas of an illustrated Byron,” answered Mr. Wyatt, with a wry face. “Sophy Morton would have about as much power to touch my heart or influence my mind as the wax dolls or the Byronic beauties. There is only one woman I have ever loved, or ever can love, and her name is Clara Walsingham. ” Mrs. Walsingham looked at him with unaffected surprise. “lam B?rry that I should have inspired any such sentiment, Mr. Wyatt. I can never return it." “Is that your irrevocable reply?” “It is,” she answered, decisively. “You reject the substance —an honest man’s love —and yet you are content to waste the best years of your life upon a shadow. ” “I don’t understand you.” “Oh, yes, I think you do. I think you know as well as I do how frail a reed you have to lean on when you put your trust in Gilbert Sinclair.” “You have no right to speak about Mr. Sinclair,” answered Clara Walsingham, with an indignant flush. “What do you know of him, or of my feelings in relation to him?” “I know that you love him. Yes, Clara, it is the business of a friend to speak plainly; and even at the hazard of incurring your anger, I will do so. Gibert Sinclair is not worthy of your affection. You will know that I am right before long if you do not know it now. It is not in that man's nature to be constant under difficulties, as I would be constant to you. Your hold upon him has been growing weaker every year.” “If that is true, I shall discover the fact quite soon enough from the gentleman himself, ” replied Mrs. Walsingham, in a hard voice, and with an angry cloud upon her face. “Your friendship, as you call it, is not required to enlighten me upon a subject which scarcely comes within the province of a solicitor. Yes, Mr. Wyatt, since plain speaking is to be the order of the day, I am weak enough and blind enough to care for Gilbert Sinclair better than for anyone else upon this earth, and if I do not marry him I shall never marry at all. He may intend to jilt me. Yes, I have seen the change in him. It would be a vain falsehood if I denied that I have seen the change, and I am waiting for the inevitable day in which the man I once believed in shall declare himself a traitor. “Would it not be wise to take the initiative, and give him his dismissal?” “No. The wrong shall come from him. If he can be base enough to forget all the promises of tile past, and to ignore _ the sacrifices I have made for him, his infamy shall have no excuse from any folly of mine.” “And if you find that he is false to you—that he has transferred his affection to another woman—you will banish him from your heart and mind, I trust, and begin life afresh.” Mr. Walsingham laughed aloud.

Yes, I shall begin a new life, for from that hour I shall only live upon one hope.” “And that will be " “The hope of revenge.” “Revenge is a hard word,” he said, after a long pause. “Redress is much better. If Mr. Sinclair should marry, as I have some reason to think he will " “What reason?” “Public rumor. His attentions to a .certain young lady have been remarked by people I know. ” “The lady is the beautiful Miss Clanyarde." “How did you discover that?” “From his face the other night.” “You are quick at reading his face?” "Yes. I believe he is over head and ears in love with Constance Clanyarde, as a much better man, Cyprian Davenant, was before him; and I have no doubt Lord Clanyarde will do his utmost to bring the match about." “How long has this been going on?” “Since the beginning of this season. He may have lost his heart to the lady last year, but his attentions last year were not so obvious.” “Do you know if Miss Clanyarde cares for him?” “I have no means of knowing the lady’s feeling on the subject, but I have a considerable knowledge of her father in the way of business; and I am convinced she will be made—induced is, I

suppose, a more appro or iate word—to accept Sinclair as a husband. Lord Clanyarde is as poop as Job and as proud as Lucifer. Yes, I think we may look upon the marriage as a certainty. And now, Mrs. Walsingham, remember that by whateve means you seek redress I am your friend, and shall hold myself ready to aid and abet you in the exaction of your just right. You have rejected me as a husband. You shall discover how faithful I can be as an ally.” “I have no doubt I ought to be grateful to you, Mr. Wyatt,” she said, in a slow, weary way, “but I do not think your friendship can ever be of much service to me in the future happiness of my life, and I trust that you will forget all that has been said this morning. Good-by. ” She gave him her hand. He held it with a gentle pressure as he answered her. “It is impossible for me to forget anything that you have said, but you shall find me as secret as the grave. Good-by.” He bent his head and touched her hand lightly with his lips before releasing it. In the next instant he was gone. “How she loves that snob!" he said to himself as he walked away from Half-Moon street. “And how charming she is! Rich, too. I could scarcely make a better matph. It is a case in which inclination and prudence go together. And how easily I might have won her but for that man! Well, well, I don’t despair of ultimate victory, in spite of Gilbert Sinclair. Everything comes to the man who knows how to wait.” [TO BE CONTINUED. I