Democratic Sentinel, Volume 22, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 August 1898 — A Dangerous Secrest. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

A Dangerous Secrest.

By FLORENCE MARYATT.

CHAPTER I. Mrs. Hephzibah Horton has just come In from a weary trudge through the mud and the grease of the city on a foggy November afternoon; from standing in dingy offices until pert clerks shall have thought fit to deliver her messages to their masters; from fighting her way into omnibuses over a chevaux de frise of damp umbrellas and dirty petticoats, and she thinks she has earned the right to make herself comfortable. Miss Hephzibah Horton is her legal denomination, for no man has persuaded her to enter into bondage to his will; but she stands out for the “Mistress” before her name on the plea that no woman has a better right to hear it than she who' has never been a slave. And since she has turned the corner of the forties, nobody dreams of disputing her right to do as she thinks best in the matter. From little beginnings she has risen to solid, if not great ends; and now, at the age when most women, if not married, have become soured through disappointment, Mrs. Hephzibah’s days are employed in a continuous round of duty, which leaves her no time for discontent. She does not realize large sums for her work. She is not a fashionable novelist, able to command a thousand dollars for a thousand pages of bad grammar and worse taste; she is obliged to he as careful of her diction as of her subject, for she writes chiefly for the press, and there are too many competitors entered for that race not to render it necessary to keep one’s eye fixed upon the winning post. A low tapping has been going on at the door; but it is some time hefhre she notices it.

“Come in,” she calls out rather impatiently; adding: “If it’s the boy from the Aurora office, Sarah, just tell him that the copy is not ready, and it won’t be ready till to-morrow morning, so it is of no use waiting. I’ll send it by the first post.” “It’s not Sarah, Mrs. Horton; it’s me,” replies the low voice of somebody who has partially opened the sitting room door. Delia Moray, whatever brings you round here on such a night as this?” “I wanted to see you, to speak to you,” says the stranger, in a hesitating manner. “Besides, it is on my way to the theater.” “Now you must take off your things and have some tea with me. It will warm you before your walk to the theater. How cold your hands are. Come nearer to the fire. Why, my dear!—my dear!—what’s this?” For Delia Moray has sunk on a footstool at Mrs. Hephzihah’s feet, and, laying her head upon her lap, commenced to sob bitterly. “Oh! Mrs. Horton, I am very, very miserable.” All the hardness fades out of the elder woman’s face as she lays her hand upon her friend’s head, and pats it soothingly. “I’m sorry to hear it, Delia Moray, but I could have told you as much long ago. What else eau you expect, when you put yourself in the pojver of a man? Don’t you know that tneir tender mercies last just as long as their admiration of you, and that a worn-out woman is much the same to them, as a worn-out suit of clothes —only fit to be chucked away?” “I was so young,” pleads Delia. “I knew so little of the world. I never thought it would c»me to this.” “So every poor fool says, who has made a trial of them.” “But I feel as if I couldn’t stand it any longer. I wouldn’t mind his cruelty to myself, Mrs. Horton! I could bear that—but it is the child!” “What of the child ? How can he harm him?” “He uses him as a tool to extract my submission, and if I rebel in the least thing he makes my poor Willie suffer for it. I can hardly describe to you the pass things have come to. He is hardly ever sober, night or day. I have worked to supply him and the child with the necessaries of life; but he takes every penny I earn for drink, and when I remonstrate with him,_ and show him that Willie has not sufficient food or clothes, he insults and ill-uses me. Last night he threatened to turn me out of doors. Look at my arms!” she exclaims suddenly, as she pushes up the sleeve of her thin alpaca dress, and shows the angry red and blue marks of a fresh bruise.

She is a pretty woman, of five-and-twenty, this Delia Moray, or she would be pretty if she were not so thin and worn. Her Irish breeding is evinced by her blue orbs, black hair and rose-leaf complexion; but all trace of the national archness and espieglerie has deserted her countenance. Her sorrowful eyes are surrounded by dark rims—the effect of constant weeping—and there is a sad drooping about her pretty, quivering mouth. Yet the inherent fire of her race is only sleeping in her. It has nearly been extinguished by ill-usage, but the embers smolder still, and only need a helping hand to fan them into a flame. “And that scoundrel can make a beast of himself upon your hard-earned wages, and then treat you like that,” says Mrs. Hephzibah, meditatively. “Now, be frank with me, and tell*me the whole truth. Have you ever given him reason to be jealous of you?” “Never!” “What made you marry this man?” demands Mrs. Hephzibah. abruptly, as the slight meal is concluded. Delia Moray looks up with a startled, flushed face. “Didn’t you hear my question? I don’t ask it without a purpose. I want to learn all you can tell me about your former life. Perhaps I may be able to help you.” “How can you help me?” “Never mind! We’ll talk of that by and by. Tell me now about your marriage. Where did you meet Mr. Moray?” “Miles away from here, at a little town in Scotland where I was playing.” “Was he on the stage as well?” “Oh, no! He was a clerk in a bank, or some house of business in Glasgow; but he got into trouble, and had to leave.” “He was kicked out, you mean! Did he embezzle money?” “I am afraid so; but he never told me the entire story, and I did not think it of much consequence then. I was only sixteen. James saw me first upon the stage at Greenock, and when he proposed to me I thought it a grand thing to be married to him. I had no parents or relations, that I knew of, and his people were thought a great deal of in Glasgow.” “Was your marriage with him a secret one?”

“He kept It a secret from his family. They were very proud, he said, and he was afraid if they heard he had married an actress they would refuse to help him any further. So we waited till we could cross the border and were married in Berwick.” “I’m sorry for that! If it had been done in Scotland, we might have proved it to be an irregular marriage. What is the name of the place at which you were married?” “Chilton. Oh! I shall never forget that day, Mrs. Hephzibah. I was frightened out of my senses; and jtbe horrible old man who married ns was so tipsy he could hardly get through the service. And the very sajne night the little church in which we were married was burned to the ground.” “Burned to the ground, child! What! entirely destroyed?” “I believe so. They said it was struck tor Mfhtstof, but io»e people thought the

clergyman had set fire*Jo it himself; andj I am sure he was .enough for any-1 thing.” “Delia Moray!” excbrfms Mrs. Hephzi-j bah, suddenly, .“have yon got t your mar-j riage certificate?!’ “Yes! I have a' <SJpy of It. It tv*s given! us before we left die church. Ifot why* do you ask, Mrs; Horton T'- —with, a dis-i tressed countentfnM —“surely you do not/ suspect that I am iß>t : married fco-hikn ?” “No, child! Not ftt would? be much better, may be, if you were'not. Bkzt the, man is a villain, and may turn roraidVuponj you any day. Keep the certificate .sate. Don’t let it go out of your bands, or* you may find your name ruined before you know where you are. ’Burned to the ground! I never heard of such $ thirlg before. And what became of the drunken parson Y* “I have heard nothing of him sinoe. BJor a few months we lived near Glasgow, and then James was unfortunate, and lost |»is situation, and I had to go on the staige again, and have been there ever since.’*’ "While he does nothing." ,f No, nothing. He says he can’t get anything to do.” v “An idle excuse, he prefers to live upon your salary. But it appears to me that things have coane to a crisis, and that you ought to do something to free yourself from the clu’tches of this scoundrel. Your friends canfO help you, because you’ve got none, and Ms friends/ won’t. Nothing remains for ywi, there*! fore, Delia Moray, but to take the law| into your own hands and help yotirself.” At these words the younger woman’s face becomes a picture of despair. “How can I help rhyself ?” she cries. “As other wives hdwe done before you.i Have you never heard,of such a thing as, a protection order?” "Never.” “Really, the ignorance of our sex ugpon{ matters of general information is astovCnd-* ing! I should have thought it was the! interest of every married?woman in Chris-* tendom to make herself ! acquainted with the relief the law contains for her. It’s little enough, my dear, I can tell would burden no one’s brains to get by heart. A protection or dor, obtained! from a magistrate, would render you safe’from the assaults of that man'to-morrow, and enable you to live in peade, and support yourself and your child.” “Oh, Mrs. Horton! can be true? I thought that a woman, married, was bound to remain witn\her husband till his death. I thought he could force her to live with him.” “So he can, if he supports her—not if she supports him. Thank\ goodness! we are not quite such slaves as^that! though, in my opinion, marriage is a one-skled contract, under the best of circumstances. Now, mind you look in again to-mopow evening, and hear if I have Jbeen abife to extract any sense out of my* stupid' old hnvyer.” But long after Delia Moray, .jvitji her bruised body and sick heart, has**,Crept away to her evening’s occupation, tMrs. Hephzibah sits motionless, staring’into the fire, and wondering what she can-do to alleviate her position.

CHAPTER 11. Delia Moray, drawing her woolen wrap closely about her mouth to prevent the thick November fog finding its way down her throat, traverses the sloppy streets to the stage entrance of the Corinthian Theater, where she has been employed, on and off, for three years. Inside the theater little is known of the girl’s private history, except that she is married. Of this fact she has never made concealment, using it as a protection in her dangerous position; but since her husband never appears upon th<* scene, either 1 to conduct her to the theateir or to take her home, she has not found bus name of nearly so much use to her as her own. Most of the women employed in the same line of business consider that Miss Merton “gives herself airs.” The part she has to play to-night—a secondary character In the opening' farce —she has acted over and over again, until she is utterly sick of it. She dresses for it almost in silence, while the girls around her are relating all the adventures that have befallen them since the evening before, and she is pondering on the conversation she held with Mrs. Hephzibah Horton* She walks on the stage and goes through her part almost mechanically; words and gestures following each other in the old accustomed way, while the actress’ heart is brooding over the probability—nol not the probability, the possibility—of a release from her present intolerable bondage. Her lodgings are situated a long way from the theater, somewhere in the back streets of the city; but how can three people live decently on a couple of pounds a week? It is half an hour or more before Delia Moray reaches the dingy old house in which she and her husband live, in company with half a dozen other families, as poor as themselves. The door is opened to her by her landlady, a battered old woman, who rejoices in a wig of disheveled curls—a legacy, probably, left her by some of her theatrical lodgers in exchange for rent—surmounted by a black cap adorned with every sort of dirty artificial flower, but who keeps a kind heart in her bosom, nevertheless, and is particularly interested in Delia, whom she constantly declares she will not see "put upon.” The mother is in a hurry to see her boy. She runs up one, two, three flights of 6tairs and quickly enters a dingy sitting room. There is a strong smell of beer and tobacco pervading the place; but it is empty and the fire has burned down In Ibe grate. Delia turns into the bedroom. All is in darkness. She makes her way up to the bed, and lays her cheek down upon the pillow. The bed is vacant—no one is there! Then a sudden fear attacks her. What has become of her child? She rushes out upon the landing, and calls to the woman who let her in at the front door: “Mrs. Timson! Mrs. Timson! Where is my Willy? Who has taken my boy away? Speak to me; tell me where he is gone to —for the love of heaven!” The woman in the brown curls and artificial flowers comes limping up the stairs. “Lor 1 bless yo», Mrs. Moray! you’re no call to be in such a stew. I would have told you where he was at first, if you -’adn’t run past me like a whirlwind. The boy’s only gone out with his pa.” “With Mr. Moray, and at this time of the night! Wherever can they have gone?’ ; “That I can’t tell yon. All I know is that I was just'going to slip off the child’s things and put him to bed, when your ’usband called to me to put on his ’at and comforter, as he was going to take him along of him. I said it wasn’t fit weather to take the boy out, with his cough, too; but all I got for my pains was to be told to mind my own business. The other gentleman was here, too, and went out with them.” “What! Mr. William Moray, his brother?” “To be sure. They left about seven, and 'aven’t been back since. When I ’eard your knock I ’oped it was them; for I knew you’d worry terrible to come home and find Willy gone.” “Oh, Mrs. Timson! it will kill him—in m weatfcwl” I9bi Della,

“Don’t go to talk such nonsense, ma’am. The boy won’t tafae no ’arm, though he was coughing terrafle, to be sure, as I let ’em out The gentleman seemed in high feather, though. Perhaps your ’usband ’ad some good news—’eard of an appointment maybe, or \ something of that sort—and it’ll tarn outfall for the best; so don’t you take on like that now.” “Oh, will he ever come back, Mrs. Timson—will he ever come back? Surely something dreadful must have happened to them! Mr. Moray is taken ill, or Willy has been run over by a cab! What else should keep them so late? I am frightened out of my life waiting for them in v horrible suspense!” this sense, my dear!” returns the laod“Noik *eally. “You know your good lady prady bits well enough. It’s much gentlemanrs ‘a. K een a bit overtaken by more likely he's; * his way *ome. But, liquor, and can’t fiau are!” bless my soul, ’ere they . ’ey must be— And here, sure enough, tn.. 't be—for or at all events, somebody mu*>. -mces the knocker on the hall door comtu. to sound and continues to sound as in* orously as it can, until every lodger in the" house is wakened from his slumbers. Delia flies downstairs to open the door, while Mrs. Timson limps after her, growling audibly at the unnecessary commotion mjhde by the returning party.

“As if it wasn’t enough to keep honest ftolk out of their beds till the small hours 'of the morning, but what ’e must come ’ome with row enough for the Prince of ’isself.” But Mrs. Moray heeds nothing but the ‘fact that her child is close at hand. She the fastenings of the door with (trembling eagerness, and flings it open. ’’On the threshold stand three figures. She .’sees but one; and sinking down upon her y knees, clasps the fragile little boy in her Farms. “Get out of the way, will you?* ex(claims the stuttering, drunken voice of •her husband. “What do you mean by {blocking up the door in this fashion? fon’t you see we want to come in?” (To be continued.)