Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 January 1896 — Two in the Game. [ARTICLE]

Two in the Game.

It was very pleasant there In the summer time, and Madeline Devereux looked forward with regret to the termination of her holiday. As a matter of fact, life was all holiday to her. she being the only daughter of a wealthy merchant with society leanings. After the season Madeline and het mother had come down to Sandsfoot for a couple of months’ rest and qnierness. which they thoroughly enjoyed. Madeline was a very beautiful g rl, small and graceful, with a dainty, delicate face framed in a wreath of golden hair of the ripe Titian hue. She was a favorite with men generJtlly 1 ; she liked their society better than that of her own sex. The openings r a plalonics at Sandsfoot were very limited. but there was one man there— Sydney Parton, a native of the place • whose society suited Madeline ex actly. He wasn't one of her set. she recognized that. He was poor, because he lived very quietly in a cottage worth £2O a year, but he was a handsome man, with a fine, square face, and he could sail a lioat better than any of the fishermen in the bay. He had been a trifle diffident at first, but after a little encouragement he had taken quite naturally to the lessons in love which Madeline directed with such consummate skill. Sydney was helplessly in love, of that there was no question. Never had Madeline gone so far before, but then Satan always finds some mischief for idle hands to do. The twain were always together, and that tender, seductive moonlight over the sea had done the rest.

No thought of the future troubled Madeline. It never occurred to her that she had laid the lines for the destruction of a good man’s happiness. She liked to feel his strong arm against her waist; there was something blissful in the contact between his shoulder and her sunny head, where she would lie, with her blue, trusting ■eyes turned up to his, and catch the fervid protestations of undying love and affection. They thrilled and moved her a little at the time, for Sydney had the voice of a poet, and his voice was wonderfully low and sweet for a man. And while he gave her all it is possible to give, she kissed him lightly on the lips and led him on to his doom, with only one thing to trouble her. She knew that it would be harder to give Sydney Parton his conge than it had ever been with any unattached lover before, and at the same time the idea of carrying the idyl beyond Sandsfoot was out of the question. “Oh, dear! why cannot this life go on forever?” Madeline sighed, as she sat with her back against a rock and looked out over the restless sea. There was not a soul in sight, nobody near her but Sydney, lying at her feet, with his whole soul in his eyes. “It can,” Sydney replied; “it is entirely in your hands. Madeline, you are not going away to leave me now?” Madeline’s eyes grew very sweet and tender. It was in moments like these that she felt a strong temptation to throw' the world aside and drift away Into the sheltered haven of a good man's love. “I am afraid that all things must have an ending, Syd,” she murmured, as she bent forward to play with his crisp brown hair. “‘I have been very happy here, and I shall be very, very sorry to go away.” Madeline watched for the cloud which she knew' would come into Syd ney’s eyes, and she was,not disappointed. “But why go away at all?” he asked. “You love me, we love each other. Why not stay with me altogether and become my wife? Madeline, I never loved a woman before. You have come like sunshine into my life, and all my heart is yours. I know that 1 lack worldly knowledge; that I am a plair, simple sort of fellow’, and not at all the kind of man you have been accustomed to; but none care for you as I do. My darling, you must not go aw’ay!” Sydney spoke almost fiercely in ids passion. He grasped Madeline by her Lands and bent his face over hers, as if trying to read her very soul. His glance almost frightened her for a moment, so wild was it. “And suppose,” she asked, “that I must .go away? Suppose I told you that we must part never to meet again?” “Don’t,” Sydney said brokenly. “I cannot bear to think of it” r /-.~ M r * I ?

He half turned away from her so I that she should not see the sadness in bis eyes. Then his mood suddenly changed. “Madeline,” he demanded almost roughly, "you are concealing some thing from me. Is there someone else —some other man ■” He could not continue: something I seemed to choke him. He leaned down I and laid bis quivering lips ujwn h-r tiny, dewy mouth. ••Pardon." he murmured, “forgive me for doubling you. How could I Took into those truthful, beautiful eyes and ask such a question?" Madeline smiled siveetly in reply ns she gave the speaker's arm a loving littlepressure. Asa matterof fact.she was grateful that Sydney had not pressed the question, which she could not have avoided without telling a deliberate lie. Six more days remained of her stay at Sandsfoot, and she had no idea of sacrificing the pleasure of the last week out of any paltry-scruples for the truth. Naturally there was another man, who, ,in all probability, would claim Madeline in the future, but he was in no hurry. Neither was she, for the sin: pie reason that there was just the off chance of something better turning .’.p. An aged peer with a good rent-roll is not to be despised.but then a young one with corresponding advantages is isjtter. And if the younger did not put in an appearance liefore the spring came round. Madeline was prepared to accept the inevitable with due philosophy. “Silly boy," Madeline murmured, “do you think that every man I meet is as foolishly fond of me as you are?" "They would be if they had any taste,” Sydney said rapturously. “But you have not answered my question, dear. You will not go away?” Madeline sighed, ami her face became a little sad and weary as she looked out across the sea and displayed her perfect profile at the same time. "I must,” she said presently. “I am not my own mistress. My parents are not like me, dear. They are hard and worldly, and they would laugh our little romance to scorn. If they knew they would forbid me ever to speak to you again, and picture the unhappiness of that!” “It would be despair itself.” Sydney murmured. “But if you will be true to me, darling. I shall find a way. Such passionate devotion as mine will conquer in the end. And you do love me, sweet ?”

Madeline looked wonderfully dainty and sweet as she stood admiring t’.e effect of her sailor hat before the dingy looking-glass in the sitting-room of the farm house where she and her mother were staying. "Really, you might let that young man have one afternoon’s peace,” Mrs. Devereux observed, witli serene dignity, “and you might stay and lend me a hand, especially as we are going to-morrow. Thank goodness, this will be about the last of them!” "I hope not,” Madeline laughed. “If I must marry Chatterleigh before Christmas, as lie seems to be in such a burry,‘l certainly don’t mean to be a kind of female hermit afterwards. The old stupid might have let us finish our holiday in peace without dragging us off to his castle.” Mrs. Devereux frowned severely, not that she was very angry, and. after all, she had every confidence in Madeline's discretion. Apparently the elderly lover had become somewhat impatient, for that morning there had arrived an invitation for Mrs. Devereux and her daughter to repair to Chatterleigh Castle, which invitation was in the light of a command. Mrs. Devereux was much too old a soldier to ignore the missive, and, besides, she was getting heartily tired of Sandsfoot and its pretty solitude. Madeline's fun would have to be curtailed a little, but that did not matter in the face of more serious business. “There will be a large party at the castle, Lord Chatterleigh writes,’’ she said. “In fact they will be there to meet you. Now, don’t be long, my dear child, because Jennings is a perfect fool when there's anything to be done.” On the golden sands Madeline found Sydney awaiting her. The expression on her face was inexpressibly sad and sweet; the little mouth drooped as she placed her hand in Sydney’s.

"My darling, what is wrong?” he asked, when once in their favored nook he tried to draw her to his side “Are you in trouble, sweetheart?” The tender words touched Madeline a little, but she made no response to his advances. She thrust Sydney away almost passionately. “Do not speak to me like that or I shall go mad,” she cried. "Sydney, I am not fit for you, who are so good and noble. You must try and forget all about me—put me out of your life altogether.” "But, my darling, what is wrong? It I have done anything ” “You have done nothing,” Madeline interrupted, with a sob. “You have been tender and kind and true, and now I am going to break your heart. Sydney, I do not know how’ to tell you. but you have been deceived.” “Deceived? Do you mean to say that you love another?” There was a stern inflection in Sydney’s voice that almost frightelned Madeline. And yet, at the same time, his face was wonderfully calm. “Oh, no, no!” she cried. "It is not that. I never cared for any one as I care for you. I never shall again. Had I been left to myself I should have gladly, so gladly, become your wife but it is not to be. I told you my parents were worldly and ambitious, and how my weak nature is as clay in their hands. And some time ago, before I met you, I was foolish enough to make a half promise to marry—oil! how can I tell you?—to marry an old man, and now he claims ’ Madeline paused as if utterly overcome with her emotion. She buried her face in her hands, waiting for Sydney to speak. But there came from him no wild outburst—his voice was calm and steady. “And you are going to obey your parents, of course,” he said. “You did not think for a moment that it would be a good thing to wear a coronet and take a high position in society? You did not expect when you led me on and gained my heart that your promise would ever be claimed? You are grieved and desolate for me, Mude- " Don’t," Madeline sobbed; I hate to head you speak thus. Have you no pity for me? Do you not see how I am

sacrificing my happiness to my honor? Oh, Byd, say that yoq will forgive me. and that when we are far away from one another, you will not think of me with hate and bitterness? It will be my sweetest consolation to know that you and I part friends." "And when we part we part forever, I suppose?” "Yes.- dear—it seems to me that it would lie far better thus." “Naturally. Also, it might save you a deal of worry and inconvenience in the future. You can make your mind quite easy on that score. Miss Devereux. 1 shall not be likely to trouble you after you leave Sandsfoot.” Madeline looked up in amazement. The change in Sydney's voice acted upon her nerves much as if he find poured a jug of ice-water down her back. “You are cruel," she murmured. “I come to you for sympathy in my distress. My heart is broken. I shall never know happiness again. You arc harsh and hard, Sydney, but the time will come when once the wound heals ” "The wound has healed now, you silly little fool.” Miss Devereux positively gasped in her astonishment. She saw to her amazement that Parton’s face was not drawn witli pain, his features were not white and set, and there was a smile of quiet amusement in his eyes. The cigarette he was lighting never trembled at all. “Sir,” Madeline said with dignity, “why do you insult me?” Parton laughed pleasantly. There was a satirical smile on his face which Madeline didn’t remember to have seen there before. “I called you a silly little fool." the victim replied coolly. “You are. Why try and humbug me about your senile peer, whose name is Chatterleigh, a* I could have told you? My dear child, you haunted that poor man, flattering his vanity until he proposed to yon, and then you kept him dangling on until he got impatient and wouldn’t wait any longer. Of course. I am conceited enough to know that you prefer me to him; but then I am not an eligible, and you have inherited your father's business eye to the future. I had to be dismissed, or perhaps you would have found me a nuisance later on. Now can you deny that every word I say is true?” Madeline gasped again. The light, ironical touch was more merciless ‘han any passionate reproach could be. The latter would have gratified her vanity; the easy surrender wounded It terribly.

"You make an accusation,” she said. with a sorry attempt at pathos and born misery. “Insult me as you like, but prove your words." “With pleasure. 1 am Chatterleigh’s nephew. Some day or other unless you are blessed with a family— I shall have the title. It would be worth all my disappointment, should that very desirable event ever come off. to see you in tiie role of the devoted mother.” "I know who you are.” Madeline cried. "I ought to have guessed it before. You must be •Victor Vidal,’ the author. And yet you allowed me to think that you were an intelligent rustic.” Parton laughed gently. He was enjoying Hie scene Immensely. As for Madeline, her face turned deadly pale; then the shamed crimson overspread it. She knew the most brilliant author of the day was Chatterleigh’s nephew, but she had no idea what his name really was. And lo! when she fondly dreamed that she was playing a pleasant little comedy with the simplehearted country gentleman, all the time she had been laying bare the weak frivolity of her mind to the keenest, most merciless critic of human fool ishness in the world of letters. "You have fooled me,” she said bitterly. “I have been deceived.” “And what about me?” Parton asked quietly. “I suited you down to the ground. I was not bad-looking, and I could play Platonics in the moonlight to perfection. You thought 1 was an apt pupil, and that my progress was inspired by the love I felt for y »u. Bah! I have had more practice at this kind"of lunacy than you ever heard of. But you did not know that. Yon thought I had fallen under the glamour of your beauty, and that you could thow me on one side at the end of your holiday, careless whether my heart was broken or not But not even my vanity is hurt. It has scarcely been torn-b----ed. Great Heaven! could you think that I should be fool enough to be deceived by a pair of shallow blue eyes and a pretty, exquisite little face, with no more soul in it than that of a doll? But I bear no malice. You have as forded me six weeks’ wonderful amusement.”

The ready tears rose to Madeline’s eyes; the disenchantment was enrd. He had never cared for her. He bad fooled her to the top of her bent, and, as Madeline recalled some of her own most foolish speeches she felt inclined to cry with vexation and wounded pride. “Then you never loved me at all?” she said in a choked voice. "Not I, my dear child. You were simply an amusing analytical study of a not very high type. Had you uot been so dreadfully vain, you would have seen how I was humbugging you. But my revenge will not be so very terrible. I shall let you marry my noble kinsman.” , "Yes, I know,” Madeline said tearfully; and put me into a horrid book.” Parton smiled amiably. Really, he was not in the least offended. “You have more discrimination than I gave you credit for,” he said. “As a matter of fact, I came to my little place here to turn out a new volume, and I was looking for a type of girl like you when fate drifted you in my way. You can have no conception what a help our platonics have been to me. Let me see—we have done the friendly, the soco-friendly, the warmregard, the distant sentimental, the close-and-klndred, the philosophies spoony, the passionate, and” “Don’t!” cried Madeline as she rose to her feet and placed her hands over her ears. “Be merciful, please. What have 1 done to you that you should torture me'like this?” Parton] paused in his cruel tirade. His victory was absolute. “Good-by,” he said, as he held out his hand pleasantly. “I have rubbed it in pretty thick, and I hope, you’ll remember It. I’ll send you a copy of my next I wok—it will make an appropriate wedding present.” The Countess of Chatterleinh sits

before the fire In her boudoir, a volant* she has just finished clinched in her hand. Iler face is as red as au angiy sunset, her lips are tightly clinched together. Then with a passionate gesture, she cast the offending volume into the flames. “How dare he?” she mutters, with difficulty keeping back the tears. “How dare he make me out to lie such a wretch as that! I'm sure that I’m not half so bad as he thinks me,* the- the odious flirt.”