Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 January 1899 — A LIVING LIE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

A LIVING LIE

By The Duchess.

CHAPTER XVIII. Joyce, on the whole, had not enjoyed last night’s dance at the Court* Barbara had been there, and she had gone home with her and Monkton after it, and on waking this morning a sense of unreality, of dissatisfaction, is all that comes to her. Joyce, however, had not been the only one to whom last night had been a disappointment. Beauelerk’s determination to propose to her —to put bis fortune to the touch and to gain hers —failed. Either the fates were against him. or else she herself was in a willful mood. She had refused to leave the dancing room with him on any protect whatever, unless to gain the coolness of the crowded ball outside. or the still more inhabited supper room. He was not dismayed, however; and there was no need to do things precipitately. There was plenty of time. There could be no doubt about the fact that she preferred him to any of the other men of her acquaintance; he had discovered that ahe bad refused Dysart not only onee, but twice. Well, she shall bo rewarded now, dear little girl! He will make her happy for life by laying his name and prospective fortune at her feet! To-day he will end his happy bachelor state and sacrifice himself on the altar of love. Thns resolved, he waiksilp through the lands of the Court, through the valley filled with opening fronds of ferns, and through the spinny beyond that again until he comes to where the Monktons live. The house stems very silent. Knocking at the door, the maid ,comes to tell him that Mr. and Mrs. Monkton and the children are out, but that Miss Kavanagh is within. “Ah! How good of you!” says he as she enters, meeting her with both hands outstretched. "I feared the visit was toe early?’ “Early!” says Joyce, with a little laugh. “Why. you might have found me chasing the children round the garden three hours ago. Providentially,” giving him one hand, the ordinary one, and ignoring his other, “their father and mother were bound to go to Tisdown this morning or 1 should have been dead long before this.” “Ah!” says Beanclerk. And then with increasing tenderness. “So glad they were removed; it would have been too much for you, wouldn’t ft?” “Yes—l dare say. On the whole, I believe I don't mind them,” says Miss Kavanagh. “Well—and what about last night? It was delightful, wasn’t it?” Secretly ahe sighs heavily, as she makes this most untruthful assertion. “Ah! Was it?” asks he. “I did not find it so. How could I when you were so unkind?” Then be precipitately launches into a proposal and is as precipitately rejected. “Ah. you’ll regret this,” he bitterly exclaims. “I shall not regret it,” says she. coolly. “Not even when Dysart has sailed for India, and then *the girl he left behind him’ is disconsolate?” asks he, with an insolent laugh. “Hah! That touches you!” It had touched her. She looks like a living thing stricken suddenly into marble. as she stands gazing back nt him, with her hands tightly clinched before her. India? To India? And she had never heard. Extreme anger, however, fights with her grief, and overcoming it, enables her to answer her adversary. "I think you. too. will feel regret,” says she. gravely, “when you look back upon your conduct to me to-day.” There is such gentleness, such dignity, in her rebuke, and her beautiful face is so full of mute reproach, that all the good there is in Beauclerk rises to the surface. He flings his hat upon a table near, and himself at her feet. “Forgive me!” cries he, in a stifled tone. “Have mercy on me, Joyce! I love you— I swear it! Do not cast me adrift! All I have said or done I regret now! You said I should regret, and I do.” Something in his abasement disgusts the girl, instead of creating pity in her breast. She shakes herself free of him, by a sharp and horrified movement. “You must go home,” she says, calmly, yet with a frowning brow, “and you must not come here again. I told you it was all useless, but you would not listen. No, no; not a word!” He has risen and would have advanced toward her, but she waves him from her. with a sort of troubled hatred in her face. “You mean ” begins he hoarsely. "One thing—one thing only,” feverishly, "that I hope I shall never see you again!” Two hours later Barbara has returned and has learned the secret of Joyce’s pale looks and sad eyes, and is now standing on the hearth-rug looking as one might who has been suddenly awakened from a dream that had seemed only too real. "And yon mean to say—you really mean, Joyce, that you refused him ?” “Yes. I actually had that much common sense,” with a laugh that has something of bitterness in it. “But I thought—l was sure — "I know you thought be was my ideal of all things admirable. And you thought wrong.” “But if not he ” “Barbara!” says Joyce, sharply, "was it not enough that you should have made one mistake? Must you insist on making another?" “Well, never mind,” says Mrs. Monkton, hastily. “I’m glad I made that one, at all events: and I’m only sorry you have felt it your duty to make your pretty eyes wet about it Good gracious!” looking out of the window, "who is coming now? Picky Browne and Mr. Courtenay, and

those detestable Blakes. Tommy,” turning sharply to her first-born, “if you and Mabel stay here you must be good. Do you hear now, good! You are not to ask a single question or touch a thing in the room, and you are to keep Mabel quiet. I am not going to have Sirs. Blake go home and say you are the worst-behaved children she ever met in her life. You will stay, Joyce?” anxiously to her sister. “Ob, I suppose so. I couldn’t leave you to endure their tender mercies alone.” “That’s a darling girl! You know 1 never can get on with that odious woman. Ah! how d’ye do, Mrs. Blake? How sweet of you to come, after last night’s fatigue!” “Well, I think a drive a capital thing after being up all night,” says the newcomer, n fat little ill-natured woman, nestling herself into the cosiest chair in the room. “1 hadn't quite meant to come here, but I met Mr. Browne and Mr. Courtenay, so I thought we might ns well join forces, and storm you in good earnest. Mr. Browne has just been telling me that Lady Swansdown left the Court this morning. Got a telegram, she said, summoning her to Gloucestershire. Never do believe in these sudden telegrams myself. Stayed rather long in thnt ante-room with Lord Baltimonrhtst night.” • “Didn't know she had been in any anteroom,” says Mrs. Monkton. coldly. “I dare say her mother-in-law is ill again. She hasmlways been attentive to her.” “Not on terms with her son, you know; so Lady Swansdown hopes, by the attention you speak of, to come in for the old lady’s private fortune. Very considerable fortune. I’ve heard.” “Who told yon?” asks Mr. Browne, with a cruelly lively curiosity. “Lady Swansdown?” “Oh, dear, no!” Pause! Dicky still looking expectant and Mrs. Blake uncomfortable. She is racking her brain to try and find some person who might have told her, but her brain fails her. “Have you heard,” asks Mrs. Blake, “that Mr. Beauclerk is going to marry that hideous Miss Maliphant? Horrid Manchester person, don’t you know! Can’t think what Lady Baltimore sees in her, except”—with a giggle—“her want of beauty. Got rather too much of pretty women, I should say.” “I’m really afraid,” says Dicky, "that somebody has been hoaxing you this time, Mrs. Blake,” genially. “I happen to know for a fact that Miss Maliphant is not going to marry Beauclerk.” “Indeed!” snappishly. “Ah. well, really he is to be congratulated, 1 think. Perhaps,” with a sharp glance at Joyce, “I mistook the name of the young lady; I certainly heard he was going to be married.” “So am I,” says Mr. Browne, “some time or other; we are all going to get married one day or another. One day. indeed, is as good as another. You have set us such a capital example that we’re safe to Mr. and Mrs. Blake being a notoriously unhappy couple, the latter grows rather red here; and Joyce gives Dicky a reproachful glance, which he returns with one of the wildest bewilderment. What can she mean? “Mr. Dysart will be a distinct loss when he goes to India,” continues Mrs. Blake, quickly. “Won’t be back for years, 1 hear, and leaving so soon, too. A disappointment, I’m told! Some obdurate fair one! Sort of cEwt affection, don’t you know, ha, ha! India’s place for that sort of thing. Knock it out of him in no time. Thought he looked rather down in the mouth last night. Not up to much lately, it has struck me. Seen much of him this time, Miss Kavanagh?” “Yes. A good deal,” says Joyce, who has, however, paled perceptibly. “Thought him rather gone to seed, eh? Rather the worse for wear.” “I think him always very agreeable,” says Joyce, icily. A most uncomfortable silence ensues. Barbara tries to get up a conversation with Mr. Courtenay, but that person, never brilliant at any time, seems now stricken with dumbness. Finally Mrs. Blake rises and takes her departure. She carries off Mr. Courtenay. Dicky goes, too, and Barbara, with a sense of relief, turns to Joyce. “You look so awfully tired,” says she. “Why don’t you go and lie down?” “I thought, on the contrary, I should like to go out for a walk,” says Joyce, indifferently. “I confess my head is aching horribly. And that woman only made me worse.” “What a woman L I wonder she told so many lies. I wonder if ” “If Mr. Dysart is going to India,” supplies Joyce, calmly. “Very likely. Why not? Most men in the army go to India.” “True,” says Mrs. Monkton, with a sigh. Then, in a low tone, “I shall be sorry for him.” “Why! If he goes”—coldly—“it is by his own desire. 1 see nothing to be sorry about.” “Oh, I do,” says Barbara. And then, “Well, go out, dearest. The air will do you good.”

CHAPTER XIX, It is far into the afternoon, still the spring sunshine is streaming through the windows. Lady Baltimore, in a heavy tea-gown of pale green plush, is .sitting by the fire reading a book, her little sou upon the hearth-rug beside her. The place is strewn with blocks, and the boy, ns his father enters, looks up at him and calls to him eagerly to come and help him. At the sound of the child's glad voice a pang contracts Baltimore’s heart. The child— He had forgotten him. “I can’t Inake this castle,” ‘says Bertie, “and mother isn’t a bit good. Hera always fall down; come you and make me one.” “Not now,” says Baltimore. “Not today. Run away to your nurse. 1 want to speak to your mother." ‘ There is something abrupt and jerky in his manner—something strained, and with sufficient temper in It to make the child cease from entreaty. The very pain Baltimore is feeling has made bis manner •i ■ ■

harsher to the child. Yit. as the latter passes him obediently, hi seizes the small figure in his arms and presses him convulsively to his breast. Then, putting him down, he points silently but peremptorily to the door. “Well?? says Lady Baltimore. She has risen, startled by his abrupt entrance, his tone, and more than nil, by that last brief but passionate burst of affection toward the child. “You wish to speak to me—again.” “There won't be many more opportunities,” says he, grimly. “You may safely give me a few moments to-day. 1 bring you good news. 1 am going abroad. At once, forever!” In spite of the terrible self-control she has taught herself. Lady Baltimore's selfpossession gives way. Her brain seems to reel. “Hah! I thought so—l have touched her at last, through her pride,” thinks Baltimore, watching her with a savage satisfaction. which, however, hurts him horribly. And after all he was wrong, too. He had touched her, indeed! but it was her heart, not her pride, he had wounded. “Abroad?” echoes she, faintly. “Yes; why not? 1 am sick of this sort of life. I have decided on flinging it up.” “Since when have you come to this decision?” asks she, presently, having conquered her sudden weakness by a supreme effort. “If you want day and date, I’m afraid I shall not be able to supply you. It has been growing upon me for some time —the idea of it, I mean—and last night you brought it to perfection.” “I ?” “Have you already forgotten all the complimentary speeches you made me? They”—with a sardonic smile —“are so sweet to me that I shall keep them ripe in my memory until death overtakes me — and after it, I think! You told me, among other wifely things—if my mind does not deceive me—that you wished me out of your life, and Lady Swansdown with me.” “That is a direct and most malicious misapplication of my words,” says she, emphatically. “Is it? I confess that was my reading of them. I accepted .that version, and, thinking to do you a good turn, and relieve you of both your betes noires at once, I proposed to Lady Swansdown last night that she should accompany me upon my endless travels.” There is a long, long pause, during which Lady Baltimore’s face seems to have grown into marble. She takes a step forward now. Through the stern pallor of her skin her large eyes gleam like fire. “How dare you?” she says, in a voice very low, but so intense that it rings through the room. “How dare you tell me this? Are you lost to all shame? You and she to go—to go away together! It is only what I have been anticipating for months. I could see how it was with you. But that you should have the insolence to stand before me”—she grows almost magnificent in her wrath—“and declare your infamy aloud! Such a thought was beyond me. There was a time when 1 would have thought it beyond you!” “Was there?” says he. He laughs aloud. “There, there, there!” says she, with a rather wild sort of sigh. “Why should I waste a single emotion upon you? Let me take you calmly, casually. Come—come now.” It is the saddest thing in the world to see how she treads down the passionate, most natural uprisings within her tigainst the injustice of life. “Makes me at least an courant with your movements, yon and she will go—where?” “Well, you will be disappointed as far as she is concerned. It appears she doesn't think it worth while to accompany me.” “You mean that she refused to go with you ?” “In the very baldest language, I assure you. It left nothing to be desired, believe me, in the matter of lucidity. ‘No,’ she would not go with me. You see there is not only one, bwPtWo women in the world who regard me as being utterly without charm.” “1 commiserate you!” says she, with a bitter sneer. “If, after all your attention to her, your friend has proved faithless, I -” “Don't waste your pity,” says he, interrupting her rather rudely. “On the whole, the decision of my ‘friend,’ as you call her, was rather a relief to me than otherwise. I felt it my duty to deprive you of her society”—with an unpleasant laugh—“and so I asked her to come with me. When she declined to accompany me she left me free to turn to sport.” “Ah! you refuse to be corrupted?” says she. contemptuously. “Think what you will,” says he, restraining himself with determination. “It doesn’t matter in the least to me now. Y’our opinion 1 consider worthless, because prejudiced—as worthless as you consider me. I came here to tell you of my determination to go abroad.” (To be continued.)