Indiana State Sentinel, Volume 35, Number 5, Indianapolis, Marion County, 6 March 1889 — Page 1

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VOL. XXXT-NO. 5. INDIANAPOLIS. WEDNESDAY. MARCH 6. 1889. ONE DOLLAR PER YEAR.

GU ILDEROY

BYi'OUIDK Author of "Under Two Rags," "Two Little Wooden Shoes," "Chandos," "Don Gesualdo," Etc. Sow first published. AH rights reserTaJ. CHAPTER LIV. With evening he had left his own house, having learned nothing more than he bad known before, but carrying with him in his eoul the thorns of a restless disquietude and of an impotent regret. He reached London in the morning and vent straight to Balfrons house. I'arl lament had met and Aubrey was in town. There was a heavy rain falling, and the air was full of ice and fleet The streets at that early hour were deserted. The city seemed a vast, colorless, emokincr city of the dead. Aubrey had risen with the day, after an hour or two's rest after a prolonged debate. He was in his study, walking up and down the room and dictating to his secretaries before he broke his fast. The yellow and sickly air poured through the chamber, dark with bookshelves and bronzes and tables laden and littered with documents of all kind3. When he saw his cousin enter he paused in the dictation ot his letters and ptood still, without any word of gesture or greeting"Canlseeyou alone for a moment?'' asked Guilderoy as he entered. Aubrey motioned to the young men to leave them; they parsed into the large library beyond and closed the door. Aubrey still spoke no word. Ho stood erect, the habitual stoop in his great hight changed to a 6tateliness that was almost stillness. He never held out his hand or said any syllable of greeting or of Inquiry, his ieatures were cold and stern. Guilderoy heeded neither hia attitude Cor his expression. Twelve months and more had passed by eince they had met at Venice and had farted with nnuttered but mutual hostilty and offense. The knowledge which he had of Aubrey's certain scorn and condemnation of him cave to him an hauteur and an impervious impatience which peemed to his cousin mere arrogance, and unbecoming, insolent and out of place. Guilderoy was very pale, and his eyes looked sleepless, but he had the manner end the courage of a man who arraigns another for wrong done to him, and is very far from all confession of error in himself. "I am about to put to you a question which no man answers," he said rapidly and without preface of explanation of his appearance there. "At leat no man answers iu the affirmative. But whether affirmative or denial le in your ca.se the truth, I expect the truth from you, having regard to the blood relationship between us and the position in which we have always stood to one another." Aubrey looked him full in the eyes. "What is your question?" he asked in his coldest voice; a passing expression of ineffable disdain came over his features as he Fpoke. "It is a very 6im pie one," 6aid Guilderov. "Are vou, as the world says, my wife's lover?"" Aubrey's eyes met his fully. "I certainly need not answer," he re-p-iied with a prave rehuke and scorn in his voice and in his gaze. "You have lost all title to put such a question." "I have not lost the right, since ehe bears my name." "You "have lost it morally, not legally. You could not be so ungenerous as to refuse a liberty which you take." Guilderoy's face flushed hotly. If you prevaricate, I shall consider prevarication admission. Aubrey smiled slightly; a very cold, contemptuous smile. "It is not my habit to prevaricate. I answer your question, though I shall refuse to admit your title to put it to me. I am not your wife's lover, and if you had the slightest knowledge of your wife's character you would not come to me on euch an errand." Guilderoy was silent. He did not doubt the truth "of the speaker; the whole country would have taken Aubrey's word tin witnessed against that of all other men ; but be wa dissatisfied. "If vou deny that you are her lover," he said, afur a long silence, "you cannot deny that you have for her a feeling which is far beyond friendship; that you visit her in her solitude; that your assiduous attentions to her are matter of notoriety." "Am I bound to account to you for feelings unuttered to any human ear? Am I bonnd to respect for you ties which you have yourself strained to rupture? I5y what title do you come here? You have forsaken your wife utterly. You have told me that she was wearisome, unsympathetic, indifferent to you. What is it to you what I feel for her, or what I do not feel? I deny your right to attempt to penetrate my feelings, or to arraign my acts." He spoke with a force which was almost violence, and with a scorn which penetrated the very innermost fibers of his hearer's nerves. "In every syllable of your answer you confess what you feel !"h"e said with equal violence. "I may have no title to command my wife's atfections; I never pos-ees-sedthem; but ehe is the holder of my came, and my name is dear to me, and no man shall play with it without being compelled to atone to me." Aubery looked at him with unspeakable disdain. "What would you do? What could you do? A man who has abandoned his wife cannot challenge either her enemies or her lovers; he is nothing in her life. If I were to her what you suppose, what could you say to me in common decency or justice? I should but have filled up the place you left vacant. I should have but soothed the wounds which you caused. Yoa would have no sha low of title to arraign me for it. Even the world itself would prefer my errors to yours; would admit that you had but the payment that yon merited." I care neither what the world would Bay nor what yon would think," aaid Guilderoy, now white with passion. "1 care for the honor of my name, and I should not pause either for your relationship to me or for the admirable lucidity of your reasonings if I believed that vou had done me any wrong which would make me absurd and degraded before other men k nKpoff vmilAjl 4t-tA I4m L i ? rr rsT tmptaoas, fleeting smile, which stung Guilderoy like the stroke ef a whip ttong

him in his pride, his sensitiveness and his conscience all at once. "You would make a scandal?" said Aubrey coldly. "You would do unwisely. Men whose names are before the world should keep them clean and hold them high. We might agree to kill each other en carheite, but if we called thj public in to witness our quarrel we should be worse than fools. We are not playing a melodrama of elective a'Jinites; we are living out our lives before a world which hates us, and is every hour of its day gapinsr at us to lind a chink in our harness or a stain on our shields. You must gratify it if you will. I shall not aid you. I am not the lover of your wife. I Lave never spoken any word to her that you would not have been free to hear. I have stood by her, certainly, under the unmerited neglect and obloquy which have fallen on her through you. I should soetandbyany innocent woman whoee friend I once had been. And so much I admit to you, not for my own sake or yours, nor vet because I in any way admit your rights or am moved by your menaces, but because such a declaration is due to her since it is the truth, so help me God!" There was a tone in the last solemn words which stilled the fury and awed the soul of his hearer. Guilderoy doubted no more. "I believe you," he said, briefly. "The whole nation would believe your bare word. 1 wish to heaven," he added, with emotion, "that she had been yours, not mine ; we should all have been much happier than we are." "Jnich regrets are useless," said Aubrey. "The greatest burden of man's life has been created by man, and it is called t! e holy state of matrimony. I?ut this I must say to you, too if you imagine that she cares for me you are in great error. .She cares for you alone. You may bruise her heart as you choose; your name is still the only one written on it." "Do not tell me so," said Guilderoy hastily and with pain. "It can make nb difference now." "I have told you so because it is so." "That mav be. It can make no difference in me.'5 "Aubrey was silent. "You intend always to live as you are living now." "I must in honor." "And you leave her virtually widowed at twentv-two years of age, and you exact her fidelity ?" "I exact nothing. And I beg to apologizo to you for the time which I have wasted for you in a demand, as I have expressed my belief, was founded on unjust suspicions." lie lingered a moment, waiting for some expression in return from Aubrey, some farewell, Bone acknowledgment of his last words. Cut Aubrey remained standing where he was and said nothing. Ho did not offer his hand; his features were very cold, his expression almost harsh. He allowed his cousin to leave him without any word or gesture of valediction. Guilderoy bowed to him in silence and quitted the room. "If he did not belong to my family and my country I would kill him before he reaches the street," thought Aubrey when the door closed, as the lire ran through his veins of that old barbaric passion which sleeps in tho blood of all men of high courage and strong feeling. CHAPTER LV. In the following week his cousin stood on the cliff above Christslea, he having responded to a wistful message asking for his return there. "Why have you sent for me?" he asked her. "Whv do you never come to me unless I Fend?" He looked away from her. "Why?" she persisted. "Yoa used to come and see me very oiten." Aubrey hesitated. "Tfu; world is suspicious, my dear," he said at last; "and you are very young, and, though you always seem to forget it, a beautiful woman. I do not wish them to say evil things of you." She. colored violently. "They would never dare to eay of us" "I fear they do, dear." She was silent; her face was very flushed and pained. "How evil the world is," she murmured. "But let them say what they will. It does not matter. We know ' "It matters for you." He moved uneasily; his position toward her became every day of his life more embarrassing to him, more strained, more ditlicult. The very frankness and perfectn ss of her confidence in him was an ad'U'd embarrassment th" m re. li seemed brutal to ri' h r of her only solace, to suggest misconstruction to 60 much innocence and courage, 1 1 place between himself and her the constraint which such a warning must of necessity create. She sat on the edge of the cliff, unconsciously plucking the little Uowerets of wild thyme which grew so tnicklv there. He stood beeide her and looked down on her. "Gladys," he said abruptly, "my cousin came to me a few days ago. Her face lost its warmth and grew very COld. "I heard that he had been a night at Ladysrood." she answered. "Yes. He did not approach you?" "Can you think that he would dare?" "You forget, he has still the right." "He has no moral right; no right on earth that I acknowledge." "You are too harsh, my dear. His rights always exist; and, whether you will hear it or not, I must 6ay to you that I believe his feelings for yoü are not wholly dead, as you think." bhe cast the gathered thyme upon the grass and rose to her feet. "I care nothing what they are or are not. His life is dead to mine." "la that how your father would have had you speak ?" "My father was a good and wise man, but he knew nothing of a woman's heart." "Perhaps ho knew so much that he believed its forgiveness inexhaustible and its patience divine as they both should b." She was silent. She stood and looked out to the grav, wind-blown sea. Her eyes were cold and had no relenting in them, her face had grown pale. "Some women may bo made like that," she said, at last. "I am not. He has made his life without me. I have made mine without him. That is all. Why talk of it?" "How have you made your life? Child that you are, Jo yon mean that you can live all your lonely yearslike this always like this until old äge comes to you?" "Women live in convents. Why not I?" "Women in convents live unnatural lives as, from mistaken motives, yoa are doing. Every life, without the natural indulgence of its sentiments and affections, is restricted, barren, and unblessed." She was aeain silent; her eyes watching afar off a fishing-boat tossing in the deep trough of the waves. "Why do you say these things to me?" she asked at last "Surely, when one is left alone, there are more dignity and decency in passive acquiescence ia one's

fate than in any noisy revolt against it?" "Yes; but if he r. turned to you? Would your pride stand in the way of reconciliation ?" "Has he told you to ask me that?" ".No; he said nothing which could even suggest it. But it was clear to me that he regretted his own actions, and regret is always near repentance." "He will never feel rep?ntanee, not even any very real regret. He may feel inconvenience, irritation, anxiety lor the world's opinion caprice, fatigue, satiety nothing more." "I begin to think you haye never loved him. Gladys." "Perhaps not." He looked at her, troubled and perElexed by her tone, seeing no way into er real meaning, wondering at her strength in keeping the secret of her own feelings so closely in 6tich long solitude. "There is no love," he said, almost harshly, "where there is any consideration of self. There may be desire, pride, Eique, egotism ; but there is no love. I ave told you so many times. I should wish your own heart to tell it vou without me." "Are all feeling, all sacrifice, all pain, then, to be on one side alone?" "A great love never asks that question, my dear, it gives all it has to give, unweighed." Something in his voice as he spoke, somethine in his expression as he looked down on hir, went to his heart with a sudden sense of what his feeling was for her. She had never thought of it before; she had taken all his faithful and tender friendship as created rather by his position toward Guilderoy than by any personal devotion to herself. She had been engrossed in that absorbing selüshness which great suffering creates and she had passed over unnoticed a thousand things which might have told her what ho f -It had not her whole thoughts and her whole emotions been given to the tragedy of her own fate. Now some vague perception of the truth came to her although he had so loyally concealed it. Some sudden sense of ail which he had done for her, all which he had wasted on her, all which he restrained and denied for her sake, came upon her with a mute, ineffable reproach. How selfish she had been, and how ungeneroi before this immense and unuttered devotion! She dropped her head upon her hands and burst into a passion of tears. "Forgive me, forgive me!" she murmured, weeping, not knowing what she said. "I have nothing to forgive, dear," he said, surprised and touched to the quick. "I want you to forgive, because I know that unices you do so no peace will ever come to you." He waited a moment, but ehe made no reply. "I must go now," he said, "or I shall not bo able to be in London to-night. Will you think of what I have said? The day will come when you will have occasion to think of it. And, my dear, do not deem me unkind if I cetwe my visits to you. They are ill-judged by the world, and they displease my cousin. Of course, if you ever need me greatly I will come; but not habitually, familiarly, as I have come of late." Her face changed and her brows contracted almost sullenly. "You will sacrifice me to him?" "No. Put I will not sacrifice you to the evil construction of either your husband or the world." "I thought you had more courage?" Aubrey smiled sadly. "It is not courage which is wanting to me, my child. Perhaps someday you will understand my motives, if you do not now. Meantime, do not misjudge me nor doubt my sincere regard for all your truest interests." The words seemed very cold to her and conventional. She was very young still, and she longed for tenderness, for indulgence, for an affection which should let her lean her aching life upon it and there find rest. When he went from her in the dusky, windy, cloudy day the sense of an immense loss came over her; tho solitude of her life closed in on her; and she saw night descend with terror of its slecplcs3 hour3. CHAPTER LVI. On that same day Guilderoy sav once more the smiling sunshine, the green gardens and orange woods, the stately marble halls of the Soria palace. It was late in tb.3 afternoon when he reaci ed Naples. A glorious sunset was burning in the west. Innumerable sails covered the sea. The zenith was a deep transient blue, the air clear and buoyant, with gaiety and healing in its breezes. The streets were mirthful with the sports of early carnival, and the shouts and songs and clang of brazen music came softened to the ear, as he sat once more in the little cabinet of the Albini and looked toward the bay through the marble arches of the loggia beyond. Whether from pride, magnanimity or forbearance (he knew not which) Beatrice Soria had asked him no questions. "You have soon returned," she said to him simply, when he first came to her; and she bad male no after allusion to his absence or its causes. She knew well that if he had broken his word to her he would not have so returned, nay, would never have dared to meet her eyes again. He longed to tell her all that he had felt; the sweetest charm of love is the power and privilege of laying bare the soul in all its inconsistencies and follies; but this pleasure was refused to him by his own action in the past. Where he had been once faithless to her before, delicacy made it impossible for him to say one word which should seem to hint at any reeret or any change for or in his present faith to her. That first disloyalty was always there aa a specter between them. It would be impossible to show her all the conflicting emotions which had swayed him by turns during his brief visit to England. He would have been glad to do so; he felt something of the pathetic human instinct to confido in some one he loved the doubts and the self-reproaches which tormented him, and so in a manner be free of their burden of terplexity. But this he dared not do. 'nder the circumstances of their late reunion, any such confidence must inevitably appear to be either a hintof desired freedom or a confession of futile regret; either would be an insult to her. lie felt that even any shadow which came over his face, any momentary mood of abstracted thought or of visible depression, must seem a tacit admission that he regretted the price which he had paid for the past year of happiness beside her. He knew that he bad once seemed to her the foresworn, cowardly, and treacherous slave of his own caprices, he dared risk nothing which could by any kind of possibility place him in such a light to her again. What could such a woman as she was think of him if she ever felt that, even in the full blessing and glory of her love, he could fret at and begrudge the cost which it had been to him? lie respected the Stronger courage of her nature; he even

respected her for the scorn which now and then flashed out from her upon himself; and he felt both reverence and gratitude for the faithful and fervent passion which she had spent, and in so much wasted, upon his life. Nothing can be more untrue than that in such relations as theirs reverence is impossible; reverence is excited by character, not by situation, and he had learned to appreciate her nature as he had never done m earlier days. The very completeness and sincerity of the froof which she had demanded from hira lad showed a force in her before which he felt himself wavering, weak, almost worthless of a thought of hers. He did his utmost to conceal the depression which weighed upon hira; the distress with which he was haunted when he thought of that little house in the gloom and silence of the lone sea shore; the anger and impatient shame with which the recollection of Aubrey's words of scorn moved him whenever they occurred to him. He knew he felt, that one living man despised hin ; and that man the one whom of all others he the most esteemed himself, the most admired. He had always been irritably conscious of the greatness of Aubrey's life in contrast with the frivolity and self-indulgence of his own. It was an unendurable humiliation to him to be conscious that ho had made it possible for his cousin to address to him those scathing words which pursued him in memory as though they were the very voices of pursuing ghosts. And alttiough he had received and had accepted his cousin's statement of his relations with his wife, and did honestly in in his soul believe them, vet it made him restless and unhappy to know that their intimacy, however harmless, was familiar and unwitnessed, that even, though only her friend, Aubrey was still her onlv friend and her most loyal servant. It offended, it wounded, it tormented him; and all his efforts could not conceal from the penet ration of Beatrice Soria that the lassitude and dissatisfaction which she had observed in him when in her villa on the Brenta intherwst autumn had increased greatly since his brief absence, ami were rendered even the more visible by the endeavor which he made to hide them under the over-affectation of carelessness or the over-protestation of devotion. She had the intuition and penetration which are alone possible to a woman who is too learned in love to be the servant of it, and toosure of her power ever to be vain with petty vanities ; she saw in him the reflection of that vague disappointment which had haunted her in her meditations amongst the autumn beauty of her gardens in the Veneto; she realized that he, too, like herself, though later than she had, failed to find the same wonderful flower which they had found and gathered together in other years. She was generous, she was proud to arrogance, and she knew human character with a knowledge that made her at once disdainful and impatient of it. She had had her own way; she had ruled hira as she chose; she had exacted and enjoyed her just vengeance to the uttermost iota; what more could the future bring her? And beside this likewise there w."s in her the generous scorn of a patrician temper to hold by obligation what has lied already in will, to enforce a boud from which the soul has already gone. There was much arrogance in her, and there had been some cruelty, but there was more magnanimity than there was either. She said nothing to hira, but she watched him in the weeks which followed on his return; and 6he read his mind as though it had been opened before her like a book. She felt with a pang that what she read there mattered hut little to her; a year before his emotions had been her world, now it seemed of small account that they should wander from her. What joy would there be in slowly-dying illusion, in slowly-fadine rapture, in slowly-chilling passon? What triumph would there be in watching the eure, if gradual, change of ecstasy into monotony, of gratitude, into tedium, of fervor into habit? She knew tho truth of tho Greek counsel, "Break off the laurel bough whilst it is yet green and burn it. Wait not until it withers." She was an Epicurean, and carried into the passions of her life at once the fires of the senses and the coldness of philosophy. When she had loved him first sh'3 had been all fire; now her wisdom was greater than her love; now she could bear to put her heart under the spectrum and watch its pulses change from fast to slow. The months of carnival follies passed, and the spring equinox blew open the spathes of the narcissi and called up tho golden scepters of the asphodel in all the southern pastures. One night they strolled together along the white terrace which overhung the sea, as they bad done a thousand times in the year just passed, and in the other years of a still more gracious time. The full moon was shining, the murmur of the waves was audible, the air was heavy with the scent of lemonflowers from the gardens beyond. It was Italy luminous fragrant, amorous; yet amidst it all lie sighed. The sigh was unconscious, but it was eloquent. She paused and looked at him. A slight smile came on her mouth, half of pity, half of scorn. "If you are not happy," she said slowly, "remember I am not your jailer. Say so, and go!" He started violently, ashamed and bewildered, and ignorant of what he had betraved. "What, do you mean?" he asked. "Happy? you have given me a happiness of which one needs to be god, not man, to be worthy!" "Ye?, you have been happy," 6he said thouzhtfully. "It is something. Well, go whilst you 6till are grateful for it." "Go? Go where?" "Go to your wife." Even by the moonlight she saw how white his face grew as he heard her; he was paralvzed with fear and wonder. "Why do you insult me?" he muttered; 'you have mv word." "Yes, I have had your word," she said, with disdain, but with no anger. "What is a corpse worth when its eoul has fled?" "You cannot think " "I think you aro like all men. Once I thought you were unlike them. But that ia long ago!" He winced under the words as though she had struck him. "Is it dead in you?" he cried with the passion of despair. "Can no love live?" "I know not," she said wearily. "Perhaps not; who can tell?" "I can tell you. I love you for ever." "In a sense you do yes." She sat down on one of the marble chairs of the terrace ; the seat was shaped like Attila' chair, and was covered with a lion's skin. She looked like somo great queen come to pass judgment; the silvery tissues and silvery fur of her cloak gleamed in the moonbeams, the diamonds which were round her throat shone, her eyes were full of light and heavy with tears. "My dear, do not let ns part in any anger, ehe said calmly. Anger is so base in thosa who have been lovers. Once I 1

was angry often, and to fury even. I would that that time were here still in all its madness, in all its abasement. But it is dead. You have been happier than I in our reunion. I was haunted by the past, which you forgot. I wanted what I could not have my youth. You had belonged to my youth, and my mind had outgrown yon, though 1 knew it not. Nay, I mean nothing unkind. We change in body and mind. No passion, once broken, will ever bear renewal. She sighed heavily. He was silent; he was deeply and cruelly humiliated, and yet he knew that she had spoken the truth of herself, if not of him. "Go to your wife," she repeated. "I am sure that you have 6een her, though 1 am equally sure that you have not spoken with her, "for you would never have dared to return to me if you had. You do not care for her; you will never care for her. But she embodies to you peace of mind, social repute, and personal disunity. You attach weight to the opinion of the world. You are wretched if men speak ill of you. With that character neither man nor woman should ever brave the world. They should leave that temerity to those who have both a great passion and a great courage. They alone can do it and never repent. You repent now every hour of your life." "You are cruelly unjust! Never once have I said or thought or felt anything but the very deepest gratitude to you." "In a sense, no. I am not denying that you love me still. I say that, having the the temperament you possess, you cannot be content without the world's esteem. It wearies you to earn it, but without it you are uneasy and ashamed." "You would make meout theverypoorest of fools." "No; your feeling is not ignoble, for it comes rather from faithfulness to your race and your traditions than from any minor timidity or selfishness. But, let it spring from what it may, it is you. You are not a man who can long forget himself in love. You have been ever lxvetace, never Montrow. You are incapable of a life-long devotion." "Try me, and you will see how mercilessly unjust you are." "No; you would promise what you could not fulfil. Every year, every day, our relations would grow more familiar to you, and so less powerful to hold or satisfy you. Every year, every day, you would remember with more bitterness all that you have given up in sacrificing your good name and your position in your own country. Your country is intolerable to you ; you hate its weather, its society, its politics, its hypocrisies, and its climate; put yet, having given it up, you sigh for it. And it is with your country, so it is with your wife. You do not care for her you will never care for her. But 6he represents something which you have lost bv your own act, and so you fret for her."' Where he stood beside her in the moonlight his face flushed painfully. "It is not that. It is not what you think," he said with agitation. "You know well I have no feeling for her of that sort. But I know that she lives in suffering, possibly in temptation; and I cannot forget that when I married her 1 swore to her father that I would make her happiness ns far ns a man can make a woman's. Of course those promises are made and forgotten in all marriages people can't keep them even if they would ; but he was a man whom I honored and he is dead; and it seems vile to have been false to him. That is all the regret that I feel that I have felt. I do not tnink it is a feeling which, if you could wholly understand it, you would despise." "I do not despise it; but I do not see whv it comes to you so late." lie was silent. He knew well enough that yonder on the sea, the night that he had been bidden by her to mako and abide bv his choice, he had chosen the sacrifice of his happiness rather than of his word, but that the anger into which his wife's unbidden presence had hurried him, and the impetuosity of his emotions, had hurried him into the choice which had appeared to hid companion to be wholly voluntary and dispassionately meditated. But he could not say this to her; and, after all, he knew that his conscience had not 6poken to him until in the streets of Venice ho had heard tho jest about his cousin's visit to Christslea. "But I love you, I love you! I could not bear my life without you !" he cried, as he kissed the silvery furs of her mantle. "Oh yes, you will bear it," she said with a smile which was half sad, half scornful. "You love me as much as you can love, but it is not very profoundly. And I am quite sure that you will love many after me. The only woman you will never love is your wife. Of that I am satisfied. i:ut you will go back to her. You will place yourself risrht in tho world's eyes. I dare say you will have many children, like the virtuous prince in the fairy tales, and you will never see me in the world without a sigh. It .will be your contribution to the past, and you will imagine that you are wretched because you have lost me; it will even serve you, perhaps, as a pose to interest other women !" lie rose to his feet, stung and wounded beyond words. There was germ enough of truth in the cruel words to hurt him more profoundly than any accusation wholly unjust, and yet there was injustice enough in them to rouse an agony of indignation in his heart. "Have I deserved this from you ?" he said with hot tears standing in hia eyes. "Have I ever given you right or cause to say such things of me? Once, indeed, I sinned against you, I offended you. I have done my best to atone for that. Which of us is it now who first speaks of severance and of disillusion? Which of us is it now who finds our relations insufficient and monotonous? You are unjust tome cruelly, barbarously unjust. I have told you the truth of my own feelings as I analz.se and find them. If my candor wrongs me in your sight I cannot help it. If a man and a woman, after years of intimacy, cannot speak tho truth to one another, who can ? The remorse that I feel for mv own failure to pledges which I voluntarily took has nothing to do with my devotion to you. I am neither a great man nor a good one, but such as I am I have given you all my life. I ask nothing of you or of" Fate but to be allowed to so give it ever !" The tears which had dimmed his eyes rolled down his cheeks. He felt passionately and profoundly 1 And he felt also his own utter impotency to persuade her that be did so. She looked at him with the tender but tranquil gaze of a woman who haa loved but loves no more. "Whilst I could and did believe that I loved you greatly, I had the right to take your life to mine. Now that I do not believe that, now that I look in my own heart and feel that in much it has ceased to respond to yours, I have no longer such a right. I am bonnd to restore you to your world, to your freedom, to your friends." "And do you think that my lifo is to be

thrown aside like that a3 if it were a toy of which you had tired ?" "I have never treated it as a toy, nor ever treated it lightly, though once you treated mine so. You are unhappy and you will be unhappy for a time. But you will be reconciled to yourself, to your society and to vour wife. Our position is one in which there can be the most perfect happiness, whatever moralists may say, so long as there is perfect love. But so long only; and that is not between us now, though there are memories of it. They must be Bacred enoush to preserve us from all recrimination, from all enmity." The silence which followed on her words was tilled only by the voice of the sea. The splendor of the night was around them, and in its Btillness there arose the song of an early-sinking nightingale, breaking its heart in the orange grove. He cave a gesture of despair and cast himself once more at her iVet. "I cannot live without you! I cannot I cannot!" She stooped and kissed him fondly, and with lingering touch, upon his brow and hair. "Yes, 3'ou can ; and vou will. Po not wait to feel our love perish by inches day by day. Let ns part while we still care enough to part in tenderness. So, dear good night." ( To be continued ncH ir,vi) MURDERED BY MASKED MEN.

An Aged I'armer Shot Down in Cold Blood and Kol.bed or 913,000. Ltgoxier, Pa., Feh. 28. The entire county is ia a fever of excitement and rage over the news of oue of the most cold-hlooucd murders ever committed in this county. The scene of the crime is a prosperous farmer on the pike, about ten miles east of here, near Jenuerstown, Somerset county. About 7 o'clock last nicht while Herman Uniberger and his wife were seated coziiy before their dining room fire, they were aroused by a knock at the door, if r. Umberger hastened to respond, and on opening tiie door was confronted by two masked men. who informed him that they were officers. They said they had a warrant to make an investigation of his premises for jewelry that had been stolen from a peddler in that neighborhood some time ago. They also showed papers upon which were names of a number of farmers in the vicinity, w hich they claimed they had searched. Alter considerable deliberation Mr. Umberger finally consented to permit the search. After several articles had been searched, he opened a drawer in which lay a pocket-book containing $13,000. He informed his visitors that the book contained nothing but valuable papers end placed it in his pocket They replied that they were not after his money, but were simply doing their duty as oQicers of the law. The old lady who was with them up to this time went back to the kitchen. Mie had scarcely reached there when she was startled by hearing the murderous exclamation: "Money or your life." She hurried toward the room, but before she reached there a terrible struggle was on. Several shots were lired and she rushed to the farm bell and commenced to ring it violently. She returned to the house and the seufile was still coins: on. A moment later she heard five phots fired and then all was still, fc-he went into the house and found the old man lyin? dead upou the floor. Two of the shots took et'ect in his body, one passing through his heart, the other making a flesh wound in his side. Death had resulted intently. Tfie villains, nfter Becurlfi; the pocket-book containing sl.'UW, fled into the darkness and made their escape. They were tracked in the direction of tiie mountains when the trail was lost. The murderers were described as one being tall, wearing a derby hat; the other being khort and heavy-set. wearing a slouch hat. The murdered man was also about seventy years of at;e, and lived all aione with his need wife. He had been an invalid for several years, and the only reason that can be essiuned for the kiiling is that he reeo-inized the mt-n. His wife was the enly eye-wilnen to the coldblooded deed, but she was too feeble to aid her husband. Parties are scouring the country and will shoot down the limrJcrers if cajght. The whole county is greatly excited over the terrible aUair. THEY REGISTERED A VOW And Kept It Th Myaterloci Disappearance of Three St. Loui People. St. Lor is, Feb. C3. For two years or more three familiar figures have not been seen on the streets of St. Louif, and no-.v comes a strange story of their mysterious disappearance. They are Col. Celcus Price, his brother Quinins Price, sons of the famous Confederate general "Pap" Price, and Dr. Sylvester Xidelet, at one time coroner of the city of St. Louis. There was a wcrtn intimacy between the trio, who devoted considerable time together to psychic research and the explanation of the intitiite. The three friends had by their long study of the mysteries of the universe, reached a 6tate of exaltation that wus absolute belief in the power of the divine. A near and dear relative of Col. Price, n lady now living and well-known in Missonri Mrs. Willis was compelled to undergo a dangerous surgical operation in New York. The three friends on their knees at the bed-side registered a vow thai if the lady be Bpurt-d they would devoted the remainder of their lives to the propagation of the holy truths in which they believed, would renounce the world and work for the spiritual elevation of mankind. The lady lived and the trio kept their vows. They preached on the streets and were last seen by a nephew of Col. Price engaged in that caliin j in Ilui'alo, N. Y. This is thestory told by relatives and near friends and the prominence of tbe parties has attracted much attention and cotuiii en t upon the rare and peculiar occurrence. KILLING MAD DOGS. Cattle Affected YTitli Hydrophobia Slaughtered and lliirned. Fraxkliic, Feb. 2S. Special. The farmers in White River township, this county, are greatly excilcd over the appearance of mad dogi in large numbers. The men in that vicinity are organizing to hunt down and destroy the rabid canines, and during the past few days twenty-five or thirty dogs have been killed. About a week ago a dog sutlering from hydrophobia passed through that neighborhood and bit a number of animals amoug them some cattle belonging to a man named Sutton. The cattle were so badly atleeted with the disease that they were killed and burned. 1 he smell of the burning meat attracted dosfs from the whole neighborhood aid during the night they feasted on the diseased meat. The result was that every do- that ate the roasted tiesh soon showed 6igns of madness, and the wholesale destruction of dogs began and is still being kept up by the farmers. Yesterday a cow belonging to Alf Tressler was noticed to b suti'criiig with the disease and it took a dozen men to capture her and place her in a neu. 1 In ml reds of dollars are being lost by the farmers of that township on account of the havo? among their stock. If great care is not taken it is feared the dreaded disease will 6pread to an alarming extent. i Asbary IUgc MUnlnjr. Fort Watjje, Ind., Feb. 2S. Asbary Eipgs ran a boarding house at Auburn, Inj., and about a week ago left ostensibly for Michigan, point unknown, on a six weeks' visit. Since then nothing has been beard of hiujsii' Auburn people knuw n l bin of h.s suicide, ho'liinc ikl,n,le is known of his character at Auburn, but hia boar ling Iioum m Utile "qS." Fashionable Wedding; nt Dayton. DlTTOH, O., Feb. 23. Valentine Winters, jr., end Miss Helen Clegg, members of wealthy families, were married this evening In th episcopal church. The wedding presents, which were in siWer, (fold and checks, aggregated f 100,000. John 1L Winters, father of the groom, presented hht two daughters with SöO.UoO each. The Wires Must Go Under. IIarrisbcbo, Fa., Feb. 28. In the state senate to day a bill was introduced prohibiting all auended electric wires ia cities of over 30,000 population. Tbe bill is designed to go into effect on Auc. i, 1SS9, and penalty ot S00 per day is prescribed lor all cempaniea violating Iba provisions ot the bill.

DUDLEY DARE NOT DENY IT

FOR FEAR OF CRIMINATING HIMSELF. The Original Blocks of rive Letter Sate mitled to Its Author, Who Refuse to Acknowledge or Disclaim It Republican Leaders Called On. "WAsnrsGTOy, I). C Feb. ÜS. Special. Judge James to-day refused to quash a subpena that had been issued in the libel suit of YV. W. Dudley againbt the New York Evening Poet with reference t the "blocks of five" letter. The subpena was to compel Dudley to teatify before the examiner in chancery. Dudley refused to appearand filed a motion to qaah the subpena which was certified to Judge James. The hearing before the examiner proceeded this afternoon before F. XV. Hackett, a commissioner of the New York court. Dudley wu represented by two very able lawyers Jera Wilson and A. S. Worthingtou. The Erfniwj Pod was represented by E. P. Wheeler and I-awreuce Godkin. There was a long wrangle, and, taken altogether, the examination was not hs satisfactory as it ruiht have been to th New York parties. The famous "blocks of five" letter that U claimed to be the original copy, was produced, and Dudley was asked in the most direct and positive manner to testify whether or not he was the author of the letter. lie declined to answer, claiming there was a criminal proceeding being made against Lim, and substantially claiming that either to affirm or deny would criminate him. The attorneys for the Evening Pt insUted on his reulying to the questions, but tbe lawyers for Dudley had him coached thoroughly, and he had a carefully prepared written statement which, though it was brief, was in accordance with the facts related above. Judge Claypool of Indianapolis is still here, but expects to leave for borne to-morrow afternoon. He was not present at the examination. The lawyers and friends of Dudley have been exceedingly anxious to get possession of tha "blocks of five" letter, which Judge Claypool Las in his possession. They would feel quiro easy and comfortable could they get hold of that document, but they will not succeed. Th commissioner appeared to be disposed to favor the Dudley side, and it can not truthfully b said the examination to-day was either favorable or satisfactory to the New York papers. They ore going back to New York to strfngthea their case, and will make another pass at Dudley. Theyeipectto push him closely in th civil suit, and, although the Indiana warrant will hardly be served in view of the coming change of administration, CoL Dudley is by no means out of the woods. His friends bera are very much worried and excited and ara doing all they can to prevent him from getting in the toils of the law. Dudley haa been so prominently connected with many ot the bi; republican schemes that tha party leaden art being urged to stand by him in this fight. A "WHITE CAP" OUTRAGE. An Attempt to Murder J. V. Smith, Edita of th Minneapolis "Furniture Xewi," Minneapolis. Feb. 28. The White Cap attempted to murder J. I. Smith, editor of th Furniture Xeu-t of this city, to-niht. Mr. Smith has been the recipient of fourteen letters, all received since Jau. 27, all 6iencd Whit Caps with the usual skull and cross bones, and all threatening summary vengeance unless he should leave the city immediately. Tha last letter was received last night and threatened a dose of cold lead unless its demands were complied with forthwith. Mr. Smith gave no heed to the letter. This evening, as he was sitting in his office, tho door n-as opened by a man muffled up to th ears in a heavy coat and wearing a broadbrimmed slouch hat well down over hia eye. Without a word he presented a pistol at Mr. Smith's bend and fired. The bullet pierced Smith's ear, but being of but twenty-two calliber, was flattened agaiost bis skull. Tha would-be murderer lied and no trace of hiia bas yet been found. The wounded man apparently experiemrd liitie trouble from tha wound, but the doctors say that a Fhock ma possibly have been inllieted upon the base f the brain which will prove serious. Mr. temith, is at a loss to account for the attack, he having, to his knowledge, no enemies who would with to take his life. CERTIFICATES OF ELECTION Issued ty Gov. WiUon Repiibliraue Wilt lindenvor to Test Their Validity. Ciiam-Estox, W. Va.,Feb. 2S. Gov. Wilson issued his certificates to-day to John D. Alderson in the Third district and James M. Jackson in the Fourth district, both democrats, as the elected members from those di-.tricts to the Fifty-fiit congress. In reaching the conclusion to issue these certificates. Gov. Wilson declined to consider the vote of Kanawah county, which cast over 9,0 ) votes aud gave McGinnis 1.34J plurality. His reason for this action is that there arc some proceedings pending in the court in relation to the vote in that county. The governor reached his conclusion in the Fourth district by reading the returns from Pleasants county as X12 instead of JCC. The word two was spelled "twe." and the governor made it read twelve. The republican ari' out little disappointed, and now say they will carry the contest to the houe. Mr. MeGiiinis is" here, but refuses to be interviewed. He says he will carry the contest to the hotisa and believes that the governor ha mistaken hia powers aud duties in the matter. A DOUBLE SUICIDE. A Conrle Take Poison Hecause of tbo Death of Their Hoy. ArCüRV, Ind., Feb. 2?. A singular doubl suicide occurred lait night five miles west of ; here. Asbury Kiggs and his wife both took ! poison and were this morning found dead on j their bed. A letter on the table stated they could not endure life since the death of their i only child, a son aged eighteen, who died about three weeks ago. A Campaign Krho. Toledo Blade "Ah, my darling," murmured J. Court Platter, as they sat on a sofa iu the softly-Iigbted parlor, "on must forgive 'our ducky for what he said to little brother at the supper table, ba little brother was naughty, ou Know, n nan the matter with Johuny lately, birdie, anywav?" Johnny (from behind the aofa "He'a all right!" m Exchange of Confidence. N. V. Weekly. Mr. Jinks "I don't know how you xrül feel about it, sir, but the fact is that ray wife, your . i ,r ni i ! diiugnter, is a ureaaiuiiy naru woman to uv I with." Mr. Rlinks "I can sympathue with yoa, ur. I married her mother." A Slmpl rian. N. Y. Weekly. Mr. Youngman (after long thought) "Is thera any way to and out what a woman thinks of you without proposing?" Mr. Benedict (absently "Yes; make her mad." An Experimenting Student Injured. Faas-Kt. x, Feb. 28. 5pecial. Last night white Alvla Neil, a stndect In tbe laboratory of Franklin college, was generating hydrogen fas tbe apparatus exploded, throwing sulphuric snd all over his face and neck and severcl burning him. Fort a ostein nont of tbe fluid reahed his errt. As it ü be wlH be laid a p for soma time and will probably bats badly scarred face aad neck.