Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 February 1899 — A LIVING LIE [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

A LIVING LIE

The Duchess.

CHAPTER XlX.—(Continued.) “You have told me of that already. Lady Swansdown having failed you, may I ask” —with studied contempt—“who are you going to take with you now?” “What do you mean?” says he, wheeling round to her. “What do you mean by that?” laying his hands upon her shoulders, and looking with fierce eyes into her pale face, “a man might well kill you!” “And why?” demauds she, undauntedly. “You would have taken her—you have confessed so much—you had the coarse courage to put it into words. If not her, why”—with a shrug—“then another!" “There! think as you will,” says he, releasing her roughly. “Nothing I could ■ay would convince or move you. And yet, I know it is of no use, but 1 am determined I will leave nothing unsaid. I will give yon no loop-hole. I asked her to go with me in a moment of irritation, of loneliness, if you will; it is hard for a man to be forever outside the pale of affection, and I thought—well, it is no matter what I thought.* I was wrong, it seems. As for caring for her, I care so little that I now feel actually glud she had the sense to refuse my senseless proposal. She would have bored me, I think, and l should undoubtedly have bored her. The proposition was made to her in a moment of folly.” “Oh, folly!” says she, with a curious laugh. “Well, give it any other name you like. And after all,” in a low tone, “you are right. It was not the word. If I had said despair I should have been nearer the mark.” “There might have been another word,” ■aid she, slowly. “Even if there were,” says he. “the occasion for it is of your mailing. You have thrown me over; you must be prepared, therefore, to accept the consequences.” “You have prepared me for anything,” ■ays she, calmly, but with bitter meaning. “See here,” says he, furiously. “There may still be one thing left fof"you which 1 have not prepared. You have just asked me who I am going to take with me when I leave this place forever. Shall I answer you?” Something in his manner terrifies her; •he feels her face blanching. Words are denied her, but she makes a faint movement of assent with her hand. What is he going to Bay ? “What if I should decide, then, on taking my son with me?* says he, violently. “Who is there to prevent me? Not you, or another. Thus I could cut all ties and put you out of my life at once and forever !” He had certainly not calculated on the force of his words or his manner. It had been a mere angry suggestion. There was no cruelty in Baltimore’s nature. He had never once permitted himself to dwell upon the possibility of separating the boy from his mother. Such terrible revenge as that was beyond him—his whole nature would have revolted against it. He had •poken with passion, urged by her contempt into a desire to show her where his power lay, without any intension of actually using it. He meant, perhaps, to weaken her intolerable defiance, and show her where a hole in her armor lay. He was not prepared for the effect of his words. An ashen shade had overspread her face; her expression has become ghostly. As though her limbs have suddenly given way under her, she falls against the mantelpiece and cl togs to it with trembling fingers. Her eyes, wild and anguished, seek his. “The child!” gasps she, in a voice of mortal terror. “The child! Not the child! Oh! Baltimore, you have taken all from me except that. Leave me my child!” “Don’t look at me like that,” exclaims he, inexpressibly shocked—this sudden and complete abandonment of herself to her fear has horrified him. “I never meant it. I but suggested a possibility. The child shall stay with you. Do you hear me, Isabel? The child Is yours. When I go, I go alone!” There is a moment’s silence, and then ■he bursts into tears. It is a sharp reaction, and it shakes her bodily and mentally. A wild return of her lovo for him—that first, sweet and only love of her life returns to her, born of intense gratitude. But sadly, slowly, it dies away again. It seems to her too late to dream of that again. Yet perhaps her tears have as much to do with that lost love as with her gratitude. . Slowly her color returns. She checks her sobs. She raises her bead and looks at him still with her handkerchief pressed to her tremulous lips. “It is a promise,” says she. “Yes; a promise.” “You will not change again”—nervously. “You ” “Ah! doubt to the last,” says he. “It is a promise from me to you, and of course the word of such a reprobate as you consider me can scarcely be of any avail.” “But you could not break this promise?” ■ays she, in a low voice, and with a long sigh. “What trust you place in me!” says he, with an open sneer—“well, so be it. 1 give you home and child. You give me—not worth while to go into the magnificence of your gifts, is it?” “I gave you once a whole heart, an unbroken faith,” says she. “And took them back again! Child’s play!” says he. “Child’s promises. Well, If you will have It so, you have got a promise from me now, and 1 think you might say ’thank you’ for It, as the children do.” “I do thank you!” says she, vehemently. “Does not my whole manner speak for me?” Once again her eyes fill with tears.

“So much lore for the child!” cries he, in a stinging tone; “and not one thought for the father. Truly your professions of love were light as thistle-down. There! you are not worth a thought yourself. Expend any affection you have upon your son, and forget me as soon as ever you can. It will not take you long, once I am out of your sight.” He opens the door abruptly, and is gone. CHAPTER XX. The cool evening air on Joyce’s flushed cheeks calms her as she sets out for the walk that Barbara had encouraged her to take. , -.r, It is an evening of great beauty. Earth, sea and sky seem blended in one great, soft mist, that, rising from the ocean down below floats ftp to heaven, its heart a pale, vague pink. The day is almost done, and already shadows are growing round trees and corners. There is something mystical and strange in the deep murmurs that come from the nestling woods, the sweet, wild coo of the pigeons, the chirping of innumerable songsters, and now and then the dull hooting of some blinking owl. Through all, the sad tolling of a- chapel bell away, away in the distance, where tiie tiny village hangs over the brow of the rocks that gird the sea. Joyce picks a branch or two as she goes on her way, and thrusts them into the bosom of her gown. And now she has reached the outskirts of the wood, where the river runs, crossed by a rustic bridge, on which she has ever loved to rest and dream, leaning rounded arms upon the wooden railings and seeing strange but sweet things in the bright, hurrying water beneath her eyes. She has gained the bridge now, and leaning languidly upon its frail ramparts lets her gaze wander afield. The little stream, full of conversation as ever, flows on unnoticed by her. Its charm seems dead. That belonged to the old life —the life she will never know again. It seems to her quite a long time since she felt youug. She has learned that life is a failure after all. It takes some people a lifetime to discover thnt great fact; it has taken her quite a short time. A step upon the bridge behind her! She starts into n more upright position and looks round her without much interest. A dark figure is advancing toward her. Through the growing twilight it seems abnormally large and black, and Joyce stares at it anxiously. Not Freddy—not one of the laborers—they would be all clad in flannel jackets of a light color. “Oh, is it you?” says Dysart, coming closer to her. He had, however, known it was her from the first moment his eyes rested on her. No mist, no'twilight could have deceived him. “Yes,” says she, advancing a little toward him and giving him her hand. A cold little hand, and reluctant. “I was coming down to Mrs. Monkton with a message—a letter—from Lady Baltimore.” “This is a* very long way round from the Conrt, isn’t it?” says she. “Yes. But I like this calm little corner. I have come often to it lately.” Miss Kavanagh lets her eyes wander to the stream down below. To this little spot of all places! Her favorite nook! Had be hoped to meet her there? Oh, no! impossible! And besides, she had given it up for a long, long time until this evening. It seems weeks to her now since last she was here. “You will find Barbara,” says she, gently. “I don’t suppose it is of very much consequence,” says he, alluding to the message. He is looking at her, though her averted face leaves him little to study. “You are cold,” says he, abruptly. “Am I?” turning to him xvtih ■ little smile. “I don’t feel cold. I feel dull, perhaps, but nothing else.” There is a pause; it threatens to be an everlasting one, as Miss Kavanagh plainly doesn’t know what to say. He can see this; what he cannot see is that she is afraid of her own voice. Those troublesome tears that all day have been so close to her seem closer than ever now. “Beauclerk came down to see you today,” says he, presently. This remark is so unexpected that it steadies her. “Yes,” she says, calmly enough, but raising her tell-tale eyes. “You expected him?” “No.” “He asked you to marry him, however?” There is something almost threatening in his tone now, aqif he is defying her to deny his overwhelms her. “Yes,” she says again, and for the first time is struck by the meagerness of her fcplisS) “Well?” says Dysart, roughly. “I refused him,” says she, at last, in a low tone, and in a dull sort of way, as if the matter is one of indifference to her. “Ah!” He draws a long btenth. “It is true?” he says, laying his hand on hers as it lies on tfce top of the woodwork. “Quite trutk”* “And yet—you have been crying?” “You can see that,” says she, petulantly. “You have taken pains to see and to tell 1 me of it. Do you think it is a pleasant thing to be told? Most people,” glancing angrily toward him—“every one, I think, makes it a point nowadays not to see when one has been making a fool of one’s self; but you seem to take a delight in torturing me.” “Did I ?” says he, bitterly, ignoring, perhaps not even hearing her outburst—“did it cost you so much to refuse him?” “It cost me nothing!” with a sudden effort, and a flash from her beautiful eyes. “Nothing 7” | “I have Bnid so! Nothing at all. It was mere nervousness, and because—it reminded me of other things.” “Did he see you cry?” asks Dysart, tightening unconsciously his grasp upon her hand. “No. He was gone a long time, quite a long time, before it occurred to me that I should like to cry. I,” with a frugal smile, “indulged myself very freely then.” Dysart draws a long breath of relief. It

would bare been intolerable to him that Beauclerk should have' known of her tears. He would take talsen possession of them, as it were. They would have merely helped to pamper bis self-conceit and smooth down his ruffled pride. He wonld inevitably have placed such and such a construction on them; one entirely to his own glorification. * \ “I shall leave you now with a lighter heart,” says Felix, presently. “Now that I know you are not going to marry that fellow.” “Yon are going, then 7' says she sharply, checking the monotonous little tattoo she has been playing on the bridge rail as thpugh suddenly smitten into stone. She had heard he was going, she had been told of it by several people, but somehow she, bad not believed it. It had never come home to her until now. “Yes. We are under orders for India. We sail in abont a month. I shall have to leave here almost immediately.” “So soon,” says she. vaguely. She has begun that absurd tattoo again, but bridge, and restless little fingers, and sky and earth, and all things seem blotted out. He is going, really going, and forever! How far is India away? “It is always rather hurried at last. For my part, I am glad I'm going.” “Yes?” “Mrs. Monkton will—at least, lam sure she will—let me have a line now and then to let me know how you—how yon are all getting on. I was going to ask her about it this evening. You think she will be good enough?” “Barbara is always kind.” “I suppose”—he hesitates, and then goes on with an effort —“1 suppose it would be too much to ask of you?” “What?” “That you would sometimes write me a letter —however short.” “I am a bad correspondent,” says she, feeling as if she were choking. “Ah! I see. I should not have asked, of course. Yes, you are right. It was absurd my hoping for it.” “Would you really care?” says she. “Ah! That is the humor of he. “In spite of all, I should still really care. Come—” He makes an effort to unclasp the small, pretty fingers that are grasping the rails so rigidly. At first they seem to resist his gentle pressure, and then they give way to him. She turns suddenly. “Felix!” her voice is somewhat strained, somewhat harsh, not all her own voice, “do you still love me?” “You know that,” returns he, sadly. If he has felt any surprise at the question he has not shown it. “No, no,” says she, feverishly,. “That you like me, that you are fond of me. perhaps, I can still believe. But is it the same with yon that it used to be? 'Do you,” with a little sob, “love me as well now as in those old days? Just the same? Not,” going nearer to him and laying her hand upon his breast, and raising agonized eyes to him, “not one bit less?” “I love you a thousand times more,” says he, very quietly, but with such intensity that it enters into her very soul. “Why?” He has laid his own hand over the small, nervous one lying on his breast, and his face has grown very white. “Because I love you. too!” “My beloved!” says he in a faint, quick way. He is holding her to him now with all his might. She can feel the quid pulsations of his heart. Suddenly she slips her soft arms around his neck, and now with her head pressed against his shoolder, bursts into a storm of tears. It is a last shower. They are both silent for a long rime, and then he, raising one of her hands, presses the palm against his lips. Looking np at him, she smiles, uncertainly but happily, a very rainbow of a smile, born of sunshine, and, rain drops gone, it seems to beautify her lips. But Felix, while acknowledging its charm, cannot smile back at her. .It is all too strange, too new. He is afraid to believe. As yet there is something terrible to him in this happiness that has fallen into his life. “You mean it?” he asks, bending over her. “If to-morrow 1 were to wake and find all this an idle dream, how would it be with me then? Say you mean it!” “Am I not here?” says she, tremulously, making a slight but eloquent pressure on one of the arms that are round her. He bends his face to hers, and as he feels that first glad eager kiss returned—he knows! CHAFTER XXI. Of course Barbara is delighted. She proves charming as a confidante. Nothing can exceed the depth of her sympathy. When Joyce and Felix came in together in the darkening twilight, entering the house in a burglarious fashion through the dining room window, it so happens that Barbara is there, and is at once struck by a sense of guilt that seems to surround and envelop them. They had not. indeed, anticipated meeting Barbara in that room of all others, and are rather taken aback when they come face to face with her. “I assure you we have not come after the spoons,” says Felix, in a would-be careless tone that could not have deceived an infant, and with a laugh so frightfully careless that it woul have terrified the life out of you. “You certainly don’t look like it,” says Mrs. Monkton, whose heart has begun to best high with hope. “You haven’t the requisite murderous expression,” she says, unable to resist a touch of satire. “You look rather frightened, you two. What have you been doing?” She is too goodnatured not to give them an opening for their confession. “Not much, and yet a good deal,” says Felix. “I—l confess I have stolen something belonging to you.” “Oh, no; not stolen,” says Joyce, in a rather faint tone. “Barbara, I know what you will think, but ” “I know what I do think!” cries Barbara, joyously. “Oh, la it, can it be true?" It never occurs to her that Felix now is ' not altogether a brilliant match for a slater with a fortune—she remembers only In that lovely mind of hers that he had loved Joyce when she was without a penny, and that he ia now what he had always v seemed to her, the one man whs could make Joyce happy. ■ “Yes; It Is truer says Dysart. He has given np that unsuccessful gaycty now and has grown very grave; there ia even a alight tremble in his voice. He cornea np to Mrs. Monkton and takes both her hands. “She has given herself to me. Yon are really glad! You fre not angry abont It 2 I know lam not good enough for her, but ” Here Joyce gives way to a little outburst of mirth that is rather tremulous, and coming away from the unfriendly wall, that been of the least use to her, brings herself somewhat shamefacedly into the only light the room receives through the western window. The twilight at all events is kind to her. It la difficult to aee her face.

“I really cant stay here,** says sho “and listen to my own praises being sang. And besides,” taming to Felix, n lovely bat embarrassed face. “Barbara win not regard it as yon do; she will, on the con trarj, say you are a great deal too good for me, aod that I ought to be pilloried for all the trouble I have givea through not being able to make- up my own mind for so long a time.” “Indeed. I shall say nothing but that you are the dearest girl in the world, and that I’m delighted things have turned out so well. I always said it would be like this,” cries Barbara, exultantly, who certainly never had said it. and had always indeed been distinctly donbtfnl about it. “Is Mr. Monkton in?” says Felix, in a way that leads Monkton’s wife to imagine that if she should chance to say he was oiit. the news would be hailed with rapture. “Oh. never mind him,” says she. beaming upon the happy but awkward couple before her. “I'll tell him all about it. He will be just as glad as I am. There, go away, you two: you will find the small parlor empty, and I dare say you have a great deal to say to each other still. Of course you will dine with us, Felix, and give Freddy an opportunity of saying something ridicnlons to you.” •‘Thank yon.” says Dysarf. “I suppose I can write a line to my cousin, explaining matters.” “Of course. Joyce, take some writing things into the small parlor, and call for a lamp.” She is smiling Mt Joyce as she speaks, and now, going up to her, kisses her impulsively. Joyce returns the caress with fervor. It is natural that she should never have felt the sweetness, the comfort of Barbara so entirely as she does now, when her heart is open and full of ecstasy, and when sympathy seems so necessary. Darling Barbara! But then she must love Felix now juts as much as she loves her. She rather electrifies Barbara and Felix by saying anxiously to the former: “Kiss Felix too.’ It is impossible not to iangh. Mrs. Monkton gives way to immediate and unrestrained mirth and Dysart follows suit. “It ig a command,” says he, and Barbara thereupon kisses him affectionately. “Well, now I bare got a brother at last.” says she. It is indeed her first knowledge of one. for that poor suicide in Nice had never been anything to her—or to any one else in the world for the matter of that —except a great trouble. “There, go.” says she. “I think I hear Freddy coming.” They fly. She goes to the window, and seeing Monkton some way off, flings up the sash and waves to him in a frenzied fashion to come to her at once. There is something that almost approaches tragedy in her air And gesture. Monkton hastens to obey. “Now, what—what—what do you think has happened?” cries she when he has vaulted the window sill and is standing beside her, somewhat breathless and distinctly uneasy. Nothing short of an accident to the children conld, in his opinion, have warranted so vehement a call. Yet Barbara, as he examines her features carefully, seems all joyous excitement. After a short contemplation of her beaming face he tells himself that be was an ass to give up that pilgrimage of his to the lower field, where he had been going to inspect a new-born calf. “The skies are all right,” says he, with an upward glance at them through the window. “And —you hadn’t another uncle. had yon?” “Oh, Freddy,” she says, justly disgusted. “Well, my good child, what then? I’m all curiosity.” “Guess,” says she. too happy to be able to give him the rough scolding he deserves. “Oh! if it’s a riddle,” says he. ''‘you might remember 1 am only a little one, and unequal to the great things of life.” “Ah! but. Freddy. I've something delicious to tell you. There, sit down there, you look quite queer, while I ” “No wonder I do.” says he at last, rather wrathfully. “To judge by your wild gesticulations at the window jnst now, any one might have imagined that the house was on fire and a hostile race tearing en masse into the back yard. And now—why, it appears you are quite pleased about something or other. Really such disappointments are enough to age a man —or make him look ‘queer;’ that was the word you used. I think?” “Listen,” says she, seating herself beside him and slipping her arm around his neck. “Joyce is going to marry Felix—after aIL There!” Still with her arm holding him. she leans back a little to mark the effect of this astonishing di» closure. ‘ (To be continued.)