Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 October 1899 — BETWEEN TWO LOVES [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

BETWEEN TWO LOVES

BY CHARLOTTE M. BRAEME.

CHAPTER ll—(Continued.) “How can I teach them when I know | nothing?” she asked. I; “Yon have plenty of knowledge, and | iwhen it fails I will supply what you may H Steed,” he said. “I have succeeded in a | pleasure. But one life is not long enough lor the work. You must carry it on for ?■ jne. The grace and beauty of the woman l teacher will do more even than the fame I and skill of the man. Leah, try to appreciate, to understand, the grandeur of the f mission I give to you.” A light shone on the girl’s face. “And do you think I could do all this, father?” , “Think! I am sure of it! Did not Joan of Arc, a girl feeble and frail ns you, lead ‘tast bodies of troops on to victory?” “Heaven called her,” said the girl, reverently. “Heaven calls you,” he declared solemnly. “A girl saved the French crown; « girl-queen saved Hungary from deetruction in the olden days; Judith saved her country, Queen Esther her nation. It neems to me that from time to time women are raised, up to save a great people from destruction. You, my daughter, are one of these.” She grew pale, and trembled under the weight of his words. He took her hands In his, and looked at them lovingly. If ?' he-were a false pretender himself, he did not mean for her to be one, and he knew that nothing succeeds like truth and earnestness. “These are little hands,” he said, “to hold the great, bleeding heart of the peo-ple-little hands to plead and implore, to raise and beat down. But you must do It, Leah. I see the grand spirit of noble women sweeping over you. Be a modern Judith, and slay the monster Royalty.” She shrank back pale and trembling at these words. I “I can slay nothing,” she enid.

•■ ’ But he did not scorn to hear her. He wa* looking at her, trying to weigh the effect of her graceful young loveliness on the hearts of men. p “Leah,” he said slowly, “yon will do better than 1 have done. You will make a fortune.” 4 A flame, almost of fire, spread over her beautiful face. ; “Make a what, father—a fortune? I thought you gave up everything to the people you taught— not took from them?” i “Certainly,” he answered hastily. "But there must be funds provided for the organization of such a grand movement as ours. Nothing in this very prosaic world can be done without money, Lenk. One f way of raising money is by giving these I lectures. They serve two purposes—they find the means to enable us to carry on | ! the war, and they teach the people.” The girl’s face fell, and the light died f out of it. || ; ‘I would rather enrn money in some | other way,” she said. | He interrupted her eagerly. “The earning of money is the least part f of it, Leah; do you not see? It is true we f must have money, but the teaching of the I people is the principal thing.” “Tell me what they waut to be taught,” riie requested. “I have no more time Just now,” said f Wartin Ray. “There is a meeting of the | delegates at three, and I must be pres- | ent. I will find leisure to teach you, } Leah; and, believe me, a grand mission lies before you.” | But on the face of the girl there was * no light of enthusiasm—nothing but the shadow of doubt and of fear. Leah Ray hud plenty of spirit—she inherited it from the Hattons, but, with ail her courage, she dared not tell her father what was in her heart. She had been Indifferent at first as to what she had to

do, now she hated and loathed it. When, one evening, her father gave her permission to leave a conclave of some of his political friends who had gathered to hear her repeat a speech he had taught her, she went to Hettie to seek comfort and consolation. “I can never go on with this work, my gpiding!” she sobbed. “Ob, Hettie* what must I do? 1 hate it all so. What shall ;I do? My father will be ao angry when I tell him.” “It seems almost a pity that you are so beautiful and so gifted, Leah,” said Kettle, compassionately. Leah stood by the window, her face raised to the sky, where the golden stars [ were ahining. k| “Do you remember, Hettie,” she said, | “how the three Hebrews prayed in the I fiery furnace? I am in a furnace of fire |VOW. I stand between my own hatred j«f what my father wants me to do and jfny father's anger if Ido not do it. Who deliver me from it? Who will take |pity on me? lam so helpless. I have Sift friend. Oh, Hettie, Hettie, I feel I moat pray to heaven to save me from this |<urnace of fire!” ip* next afternoon was close, heavy fluid dull. Out of doors the atmosphere Was oppressive—in the house there was Warmth without brightness; and Leah play, with a dull pain at her heart, stood ■Waiting her father’s return—waiting to pell him that she never could and never Would become what he wished her to be. [ It was late when Martin Itay returned. |He was not in the most amiable of lesoods; something had gone wrong among 3U>e delegates, and he was ruffled and anIpQlve me my dinner,” he said, brusqueH&-; and the two girls hastened to serve gptai. “Mind,” he added half fiercely to pda eldest daughter—“mind that you IjiftUdy well to-day. I must give you a Besson this evening; last night you did seem so willing as I should like to §j|»ave seen you. Understand that there pi td be no shirking; you must do what jpLeah,” said Hettie, trembling, “do Ipot ppeak to him to-night—he is angry, IgOn aee; wait until to-morrow.” ; *%»’, I could not rest another hour,” her pjfhe Voice of the People” had dined Kell; he bad taken up the only consolagpen that never failed him—his newspaliftf and Leah, looking paler and more

determined than she had ever looked before, went tib to him. At that very moment a carriage rolled up the street and stopped at their door; then came a loud peal at the bell, which the little drudge of the bouse, with a very black face and hands, hastened to answer. They heard a loud, peremptory voice asking if Martin Ray was at home, and the girl’s answer: “Yes.” “Give him this,” said the same voice, “and tell him that I am waiting—waiting, you understand.” “Who can this be?” observed Martin, with a wondering look at his daughters. The little maid solved the mystery by appearing with a card. “He says he’s waiting,” she half tvhispered, with a nod of her head toward the door. Martin Ray took up the card and read: “General Sir Arthur Hatton, K. C. B.” “Sir Arthur Hatton?” he murmured. “I know no such name. Hatton?” Then memory suddenly awakened. Was not Doris Hatton the name of the only woman he had ever loved, and who had died because he was not what she believed him to be? Sir Arthur Hatton? It must be some relative of hers and of the proud father who had died without forgiving his only daughter for marrying him. Then he remembered that his wife had spoken more than once of a soldier brother away in India. “Ask the gentleman to walk in," he said to the servant, and the next minute Gen. Sir Arthur Hatton was ushered in. At the sight of the two beautiful faces he uncovered his head and bowed lo\v. “Are you Martin Ray, demagogue and agitator?” he asked. “I am Martin Ray,” replied the master of the house. “I am Gen. Hatton, the brother of the unfortunate lady whom you stole front her home.” “What is your business with me?” asked Martin Ray. “I want the satisfaction, first of all, of speaking my mind to you; and, secondly, I wish to know what has become of my sister’s children.” Hatred flamed in both faces as the two men looked at each other; hatred fiasned from their eyes. “I have not asked you to my house,” said Martin Ray, “nor do I wish to see you here. State your business quickly, aud begone.”

CHAPTER 111. It was an impressive scene. The fine, tall figure of the officer was drawn to its full height, his face was expressive of intense scorn. Martin Kay seemed to shrink into insignificance before him, and yet he faced him with a desperate kind of courage. The two girls had drawn close together. as though seeking protection from each other. The wan sunlight lay in yellow bars along the floor. “I have not come hither," said Gen. Hatton, “to bandy words with you—to seek a quarrel with you. You are one with whom no gentleman could quarrel. I have a message from the dead, and I wish to deliver it. Show me my sister’s children.” “They are here,” said Martin Ray, not without a certain amount of dignity—“the good children of a good mother.” Gen. Hatton waved his hand with a gesture of scorn. No word about his dead sister could be tolerated from the man whom he thought utterly vile and base. He went to the girls, who stood, with fear on their faces, hand in hand. The composed, well-bred manner, the low bow, and the courteous bearing were something novel to them. He looked into each sweet, shrinking face. “My sister'a children,” he said, “have you uny word of welcome for me? I bring a message from your mother.” Leah freed her hand from her sister’s clasp and held it out to him. He drew her to him, and kissed the pale young face. She found that he was trembling with agitation and emotion. Then he took Hettie in his arms and kissed her also. “when I left home, and your mother was much younger than I. She was my dearly beloved sister, playmate, and treasure. It was a great grief to me to be obliged to part from her when I went abroad. I remember her face, and in yours I see some trace of it. What word of welcome have you for me?” Impulsive Leah threw her arms around him, and raised her face to his. "Welcome home, dear uncle,” she said. “What is your name, dear child?” he asked.

“Leah,” she replied. “Leah! It is a beautiful, sorrowful name. Why did your mother give It to you? Did she foresee a shadow in your life? You look like Leah; no other name would suit you. And you?” he continued, turning to the younger sister. "I am Hettie,” she said. “Heaven bless you, my dear; you have a sweet face of your own! Your mother bade me—here is the letter—you can read it—she bade me, when I returned home, seek you, find you and save you.** “Save us!” cried Leah. “From what?” “She must have known what she was writing,” replied the general. “She was sweet-tempered and never complained; but she died young, nnd «*f no /complaint to which men could give g name. She was not happy, and she asked me to save you.” Martin Ray stepped forward. “I will not allow you to speak in that fashion,” he said. “Their mother loved me, and they love me; you willloever set my children against me.” “I have no wish to do so,” said the general, coldly. “Knowing your true character, as I suspect my sUter knew it before her death, I can imagine you to be quite unfit to have the charge of young girls; therefore I bring their mother’s message to them, and they can make their choice." “Why am I unfit?” cried Martin Ray, his face white with rage—“in what way?” “i, judge you from your public character. You are without honor, honesty and loyalty; you are the very ringleader of sedition; treason is a natural atmosphere t H

to you. Yon live on the hard earnings of the people you mislead. Yon spread disaffection, rebellion, ruin, misery and death wherever you go.” A low cry came from Leah’s lips. It seemed to her that these words of her uncle’s gave life to a horrible specter that bad always haunted her. “If,” continued the soldier, “you were honest, I should have some respect for you. But you are an impostor; yon, and such as you, live on the bard-ehrned peace of the men you deceive. If you gave to the people, instead of taking from them, one might have some little faith in you.” “I have given my life to the cause I have at heart," rejoined Martin Ray. “You are not a fit person to |pve the charge of girls like these. You vyould sell them, heart and soul, to further your cause;” and Leah shrank at the words a sudden pain piercing her heart. “Yob value their youth, their fresh, sweet grace and beauty, only so far as they will help you and lure men to yorfr belief whom you cannot teach yourself. I declare to heaven,” he continued passionately, “that 1 am relieved and grateful to find them as they are. I should not bAve been surprised had I discovered that you bad, even youug as they are, tried to make platform orators of them.” The random shot went home to the very heart of Martin Ray, and blanched Leah’s face with a great fear. This was indeed the furnace of fire from which she had longed to be free. “My children are my own,” said Martin, “to do as I will with.” “They are not all your own,” rejoined Gen. Hatton. “A dead hand is stretched out from their mother’s grave to save them. They belong to her, dead though she may be, as much as they belong to you. They have no business with you; you are no fitting guardian for them. Those two girls have good blood in their veins. Their ancestors were loyal; they gave their lives for the safety and wellbeing of the throne that you are trying to overthrow; they lived and died in the service of the royal race that you would destroy.” “There is one thing you must allow me to say; you have not been in any great hurry to fulfill your sister’s wishes. She had been dead some years; it must, therefore, be rather late to save my children, as you choose to express it.” A deep flush coveted the soldier’s face. "It is true,” he said, "that I have been neglectful in this matter; I reproach myself bitterly for it. When that letter came, I ought to have started for England at once; but 1 did not, and other interests drove the subject from my mind. I will make all the amends I can. Armed with my sister’s authority, I am here by her wish to save her children from the fate that, living with you, an agitator and impostor, must of necessity bring upon them.”

“My children are my own,” repeated Martin Ray, with difficulty repressing his passion, "and I shall keep them.” "You are unfitted for the charge. You are a disloyal subject—you have spent some of the best years of your life in prison; what can you have to do with the training of innocent young girls?” A cry from Leah interrupted him. “Is it true, father?” she said. “Have you been in prison?”—while Hettie went up to him silently, and placed her hand in his. In the midst of his shame and exposure one at least of Martin’s daughters was faithful to him. "Is it true?” repeated Leah, in a voice of anguish that smote both men with regret. “I was a political prisoner, Leah,” he replied; “and that is a very different matter from being a common felon. Kings have been political prisoners before now. I am not ashamed of it” —yet his eyes drooped before the wistful, imploring gaze of his best-loved child. “1 am not ashamed of it, Leah,” he repeated. "I come,” said the general, “to make a proposition; how it will be received I know not. I make it in my dead sister’s name. I abhor and detest the principles and teachings of Martin Ray; I hold them in such supreme contempt that I can never after this day have any communication whatever with him. I would rather cut off my right hand than let it touch his. But his children are the children of my dead sister, and I am here to make them an offer. I am a rich man; I have been married, and my wife, in dying, left me a large fortune; besides which, all that I have undertaken has prospered. I have no children, no relatives save my two nieces, and consequently no one to succeed to my wealth. • I shall never marry again; and I propose, in accordance with my sister’s wishes, to adopt Leah and Hettie and treat them as daughters of my own. I will educate them, find a proper chaperon for them, introduce them to their proper sphere, and I will divide my money equally between them.” (To be continued.)