Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 20, Number 89, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 July 1899 — HIDDEN TERROR [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HIDDEN TERROR

CHAPTER XIX. "Good-night,” answered John CharlI ' ■•rd, abstractedly, without moving from L where he stood. E? And there he remained, with eyes downB’,’ cast, for three or four minutes after his | companion had betaken himself to his f *com —remained in deep reverie, his brow f tenowsd with care. Presently a word or two escaped him. | “Dick is on my mind!” he muttered. £ “Dick will give us trouble. Filton is rash R -eery rash. I have lost confidence in I Mm. and he has lost confidence in himK ceif- And he is a bad man—a very bad | Mn! He is meditating an evil deed f nowr Then the soliloquizer heaved a sigh—a I weary, heavy sigh, as if his schemes for | Stealth bad hardly brought him much to r care for. He moved two paces forward, then came to a standstill again, hesitating ■a a person who had not yet fully made ft. np his mind about some perplexing thing which he had decided on. | “No one would ever guess the truth,” muttered again. “It was all cleverly K ■aanaged; and years have rolled between. Lane would hold his tongue for his own Bake. Why should I be so disturbed? Ah, it that letter was safe in my keeping, or if I could satisfy myself that the fire had | consumed it, I would defy the world!” L He raised his head at this juncture, and J.. Mabel. whom hope had come back —for : the probability was that, as his face was turned away from her hiding place, he would ot detect her—saw with renewed torture that he made another stand by the hall table. “He had better have consented to leave Mabel where she is!” he went on, in a low r tone. “Here she is safe—everybody thinks her nsane; why cannot he let well alone?” ’ He clapped his hand upon his brow, as if i distracted with miserable surmises, then te low-breathed words once more gave lent to his many fears. “With Mabel disposed of in some obscure German village and Dick in South America, he thinks he will be secure. ? Madman — he will risk too much, and he will ot listen to reason! Will Caroline he silenced? Will not even Netta and Miss Gray begin to ask where Mabel is, and why Dick does not come back? And he will come back—at last!” Another weary sigh, telling of deep unrest within; and then he moved slowly with heavy step from the hall, and Mabel, hardly trusting yet that he would not come back, heard him ascend the stairs, and a door open and close again. She had escaped such terrible dangers, such awful peril, that she said to herself •access must reward her now. Still she knew well enough that the least want of nerve, the slightest noise, might betray her; her hands were trembling so that she ■right easily let fall a bar or overshoot a bolt a her efforts to unfasten the house door. Two or three nights before she had taken the precaution to secrete matches and a small piece of candle, but she did not dare to strike a match while her uncle at least was ajvake in a room over the I. porch; yet, if she delayed, Jane might awake, discover that she had left the R room. and rouse the inmates of the cottage. If so. discovery was certain. In this agonizing dilemma she felt softly for the lock of the door. Was the key in it? Yes —heaven be praised! The heavy handle of the huge key touched her fingers. Oh, for a gleam of light to enable her to take down the long bar which was ane of the fastenings! But she was in perfect darkness, with her heart beating almost to suffocation and her limbs shakteg. Two solemn strokes boomed out upon the night air. Two o’clock! Dared she hesitate any longer? How many minutes had she remained there in deadly peril? She was about to strike a match, and at aB hazards make a dash for freedom, | when she heard a door open above and a footstep—a man’s footstep—descend the stairs. Yes. yes—the footsteps were those of the man who called himself her father! was lost then! She was not to es, eape! Ah. he was returning to the hall! Farewell hope so sweet and fleeting! She could not dream of escaping detection this time. With the blind instinct of despair, she groped, her way back to her shelter, and theo eensciousness left her as she crouched against the wall. When Mabel reopened her eyes, the ■aoraing light was creeping into the hall from a window above. Daylight—and she was stilt where she had fainted, nor was •he household yet astir! Slowly recollection returned to her, and *e realized how she had come there, and bow it was that day was breaking and that she was in the hall instead of in her •wa chamber. Staggering to her feet, she Batened for an instant, her senses sharp-1 eaed by keenest terror. One thing was dear notwithstanding all her bewilder- < anrat. On the next few moments hung her life's happiness! Dick had in some ' manner been sent away from her to a distant land—she herself was to be taken far treat England in a few short hours. In the dam light she unbarred and unbaked the heavy door and turned the key. There—it was open—the cruel obstacle i which had stood between herself and freedom; and Mabel tottered out into the chill | .Bit of the November dawu. The light very dim —under the trees it was yet sprite dark and the affrighted girl fled to ■be friendly shelter. She had almost gained it when a hand was laid upon her shoulder and a man in sough country garb stood before her. She P dte not recognize him at first, so perfect I an* his disguise; but when he said, in agitated tones, “My darling—is it you int deed? I have watched for you all night!" I she fainted a second time, but he caught i bar in Ns arms. It was Neville who carried her to a fly which all this time had been either driven steady up and down the grassy lane or ! VW drawn up by the roadside, awaiting g What the driver believed to be a runaway : tMpte, tor Neville had feed him heavily while impressing Nm with this belief. ' Wbea Mabel unclosed her eyes once ' asere aha became aware of the joyful fact < feat the vehicle In which she was seated was traveling swiftly and that Neville ‘Ob, Neville, am I indeed free? Where are we going?" sbe asked, hysterically. ' my sister. Try to calm yourself,

dearest —no one shall tear you from me. We are going to the village of Ulby, about ten miles on the road to London. There my sister’s carriage will meet us —it is safer than a journey by train." “Ah, Neville, you have saved me!” she ejaculated. “And I have such a tale to unfold! But you must not judge by my words; I will show you the proof.” “And I had been taught to suppose that your reason was unsettled!” he returned, looking at her with deepest, fondest anxiety. “For three days I have been watching the cottage disguised.” At Ulby Lady Efflngton’s carriage—sent on the evening before to the little innreceived the pair, Neville having "discarded his corduroy jacket and donned an overcoat which his foresight had provided. Twenty miles further on Lady Effington herself met them; and by nine o’clock Mabel, exhausted by all she had endured, was beyond the reach of any immediate danger. “The first thing to be done is to give her food and let her sleep,” said Lady Effington, regarding Mabel’s white cheeks with anxiety. “Food —rest? I must take neither till 1 have seen our family lawyer!” cried Mabel, now in tears. “Dick is in danger; so are my sisters.” “Do not make her talk any more, Neville. Cannot you see she is exhausted?” observed Lady Efflngton. “But I am safe now!” said Mabel, faintly, and then she became unconscious.

CHAPTER XX. Seated at his ease in his luxurious library, the man who for so many years had usurped a position to which he had no claim and wealth to which he had no right reviewed the crisis through which he had passed. He had paid off his enemy,, who, satisfied that there was no more to be wrung out of him at present, would leave him in peace for several years. Dick would not be back just yet from an involuntary voyage to South America. Caroline, Netta and Bellg, though they mourned their sister’s absence, were perfectly submissive, and in no way reproached him for being the cause of it. As for Mabel herself, she was practically harmless; say what she might, it would be set down to insanity. Had he not Dr. Crane’s opinion to support him? But, in truth, after the first bewildering terror at news of her flight, he had experienced a sensation of relief; and, if she ever returned he would have the more plausible reason for sending her to a private asylum. No, he did not much fear Mabel. Not a whisper had gone forth against him; all his neighbors vied with each other in respectful sympathy with his grief; he would escape the pitfail which had yawned to engulf him. Then his thoughts traveled on into the future.

“It is like my own possession now,” he said within himself, with a sardonic smile, as he glanced round the lofty walls on which hung costly paintings, beneath which marble statues of statesmen and poets and busts of bygone Charlfords were ranged. “It was a bold move, and it succeeded!” he muttered. “I should not have the hardihood to play the part twice over, but, having played it, I will sustain it to the end. A place like this is surely worth running a risk for.” Miss Gray was still at Charlford House with Netta and Bella, who would have been lonely enough without her, for Caroline was not much of a companion to her young sisters, and had gone to London on a brief visit to a friend. She felt restless and miserable, she had said, and would be glad of any change in the anxiety she felt concerning Mabel. And the so-called Mr. Charlford was relieved at her absence, and, in his then state of mind, offered no opposition to her departure. By his neighbors and by the inmates of his house he was supposed to be sitting brooding by his lonely hearth, mourning for his lost daughter, when in reality he was enjoying his ease. On this night, however, his uneasy sense of possible danger died down. An unexpected ring at the hall door, succeeded by the announcement of Mr. John Charlford, was sufficient to revive his fears in a very uncomfortable manner. He started from his seat and grew deathly pale when he perceived that his visitor was agitated. “Why have you come?” he gasped, the moment the servant had closed the door. “Why?” echoed John Charlford. “Because I cannot rest! Because I dread that something may happen! Filton, it was an ill deed that you forced me to do, and I had better have suffered then than have lived all these years to suffer now.” “Stop this folly!” cried the other, savagely. “Am I safe? You got what you sinned for. We must all pay a price for what we get in this world!” “I can feel the storm brooding in the air before breaking,” moaned John Charlford. "When it does break, who will pity us?” “Pity? Of what use will that be to us? Do stop that moaning and tell me, while you have your senses, whether anything has occurred to cause you to speak like this.” “Has not enough occurred already?” whispered his miserable listener. “Hush! Was that some one at the door?” and he started from his seat. “You will be your own destruction, and mine, too, if you act in this fool’s way!” cried Filton. “If a dozen people were at the door, how would that endanger you? Your own face is enough to hang you, though, it is true. I shall tell the servants you are not well, and you will go to bed and remain there until you have your wits more under control. Now hold your tongue while I give orders about your room.” And soon the weaker culprit of the two —unable to resist the other’s will, still more a slave to it, if that could be, than he had felt himself so many years before, when he had consented to save himself from the consequences of an evil deed at tiie expense of his dead brother’s children —was installed in one of the visitors’ rooms at Charlford House, the servants being informed that he was an invalid in very delicate health. When the other man found himself alone again, he paced the room frantically. The fact was, his nerves were unstrung by his late continual watching for what might overwhelm him; and this unlooked-

for visit of John Charlford’s, thia confession of anticipated evil, affected him in a strange manner. In vain he attempted to battie with the feeling; he detected himself listening for noises and starting without adequate cause. “It is Dick whom I sea he muttered. “But I must tell him a specious tale. Of course he must be made to .believe that I have done all that lay in my power to find him—that I have been silent to his sisters in order not to oppress their hearts with too much misery just when they are mourning their sister Mabel’s loss. Perhaps I made a mistake in getting him drugged and shipped for Rio; but who does not make some mistakes in this miserable world?” Then, sitting down to brood over his fears and dangers, he watched the twilight creeping over the stately cedars in the park and the forest trees, now nearly stripped of their leafy beauty. Me.anwhile Neville Wynmore, about to start for the West Indies in search of the missing Dick, a clew to whose abduction he had received, was hurriedly writing some instructions to his steward before his departure, when a detective he had employed was ushered in. The man was to accompany him, so that Lord Wynmore was not surprised at his visit, though he had not expected him to call. One glance at his face, however, showed Neville that he came with important tidings. “You bring news!” he exclaimed, rising hastily to meet him. “Yes, my lord; and there is no time to lose. Miss Charlford is to meet her lover to-night. She will arrive at the Paddington Station—presumably on a visit to a friend —about 5 o’clock. To be brief, I bribed the maid, who already had her suspicions; To her I am indebted for this news; she managed to read a couple of the young lady’s letters, which informed her of the fact that her young mistress had arranged to meet a gentleman at the Paddington Station to-night-»-I infer the rest. You are well acquainted with Miss Charlford, my lord; disguise yourself in some way and accompany me without loss of time.”

In a moment Neville had darted downstairs. “Here, Turner,” he said —“lend me your oldest hat and coat for a disguise, and be quick about it, and then call a hansom! Quick!” “Yes, my lord,” answered Turner, disappearing the next minute bearing in one hand a wide-brimmed light gray hat and an. overcoat, while from the other hand dangled a false brown beard. In a very short time Lord Wynmore was whirling along in a hansom by the side of the detective, looking very much like a respectable middle-aged farmer who could not afford to wear too new a coat. “Shall we be in time?” he asked, anxiously, as they drove into the yard of the terminus. “A minute to spare, my lord,” answered the detective, springing from the cab. One minute to five! But the train was not in when they hurried on to the arrival platform. They had retained their cab, in view of having to follow Caroline, and now they took up a position as if waiting —like so many others—for the arrival of a friend. Neville stood behind the detective, but he was so disguised that even Mabel would not have recognized him. Scarcely three minutes had elapsed when the train they were so anxiously looking for steamed slowly in. A moment later he touched his companion’s arm. “There she is,” he said hurriedly; “and her maid is with her. Look—that young lady in black velvet! The maid wears a green costume.” At that instant a tall, handsome, evillooking man hurried up to them and took Caroline’s hand. “The carriage is waiting,” they heard him say. Caroline, much agitated, though she endeavored to seem at ease, exclaimed, with a forced smile: “Oh, has my friend sent you to meet me?” “Yes,” he said, with an answering smile; “she did not like you to drive through the streets alone. Where is your luggage? Let me lead you to the carriage.” “Gibbons,” said Caroline, turning to her maid, “as my friend has sent her brother to meet me, I need not take you such a long drive, and you will be glad to get under shelter this cold evening; so you can take a cab aud drive at once to Madame Henriette’s, order the dress and tell her to be ready to fit it on to-morrow, and then go to the lodgings I have engaged for you. As my friend’s house is so full, she cannot take you in for a couple of days. Do you understand?” “Yes, miss,” returned the maid, demurely, perfectly comprehending the ruse, for she had read her mistress’ letters and was certain that this tall gentleman who passed for the brother of Miss Charlford’s friend was a secret lover. “I believe it will be a runaway match this time!” she thought, as she showed a porter her mistress' luggage, and then prepared to obey her orders. "Am I to come to you the first thing tomorrow morning, miss?” she asked, as she was about to enter the cab. “No, not to-morrow —it would only cause confusion when the house is so full!” answered Caroline, with suppressed agitation. “The next day at dinner time—in time to dress me—will be soon enough. Good night.” “Good night, miss,” replied Gibbons, with difficulty repressing a smile. Then she got into the cab and drove off, leaving Caroline and the tall, evil-looking stranger standing together on the platform.

CHAPTER XXI. Neville and the detective were close at hand, Neville’s back toward the couple, while the detective had taken him by the buttonhole, and was apparently pouring some story into his ear. “Oh, Horace, where are we going?” faltered Caroline. “Can you ask, dearest?” he replied. “One more night in England, and then a new life begins for me—for us! Then hey for the far West—for love —for you?” “Oh, Horace,” she said .while tears rolled down her cheeks, “gan happiness come to us like this?” “Be sure it will, darling!” he answered. “Come—all is ready for our bridal.” “Is this your luggage, miss?" asked a porter, coming up. Caroline nodded —she could not speak. “Want a four-wheeler, sir?’ asked the porter. “Yes—be as quick as you can?’ answered Caroline’s companion. The luggage was soon put up and the trembling girl seated within the cab. “Where to, sir?” asked the driver. “Drive to Teviot street. Poplar. I’ll stop yas at the house —I’ve forgotten ths

number,” said the man who was bearing; off the unhappy girl. “Keep that cab within sight, and I will give you five pounds!” said Neville to his driver; and soon the two cabs—one following the other —were on their way to the East End of London in the twilight. “What a dreadful sight these streets present!” said Caroline, with a shudder. “Horace, all my love for yon cannot blind me to the fact that I have done very wrong. Oh, what a sad bridal mine will be —hurried, late, and among strangers!” “I will, make up to you for all,” replied her companion, taking her hands in his. Caroline trembled without replying, but he drew her head on to his shoulder with well-simulated affection, and the cab jolted slowly on —op through the gas-lighted streets, where miserable women and halfclad children were to be seen at every turn, and where drunken men thronged the doors of the gin shops. “A pretty place he’s taking the lady to, my lord!” said the detective, as they drove along. Neville nodded, without averting his gaze from the vehicle in front. If they should lose it for a moment! How much depended on a successful issue to their quest! What an endless drive it seemed from Paddington to Poplar! How Neville’ja eyes ached, and his heart too! A dozen times he thought he had lost sight of the cab he was pursuing; once it stopped in order that the driver might ask his way, once again because of a street accident; but through all mischances Neville never withdrew his gaze from the cab in front of them. “Good heavens, is this where he is taking Caroline? Then indeed he must think it well to keep out of sight!’ he said to himself as he got out and watched from the other side of the street the ill-assorted couple alight and enter a house. The man had thrown a large dark shawl over Caroline’s head and shoulders —perhaps -because he wanted to screen her from the notice of passers-by, perhaps because he did not wish her to be too much shocked by the quarter to which he had taken her. “Now, then, my lord,” said the detective, crossing the street. Without the loss of a moment Neville put the promised gold into the hands of the delighted cabman. “Wait,” he said, “and you may get a fare back.” Then he hastened after his guide. A man loitering in the street exchanged a word or two with the detective as they paused before the house which Caroline had entered. “Who is that?” asked Neville, stopping short. “A brother officer —there is another in the background. We may want help, my lord,” replied the detective, as he knocked softly at the door. A woman with unkempt hair and sleeves turned up presented herself. She stared at the two men who stood there. “We want lodgings—have you a spare room?” said the detective, softly advancing along the passage, followed by Neville —an entrance must be effected at all hazards. “My rooms are all took for to-night, gentlemen,” responded the woman. “It’s no use you stopping. The day after to-mor-row you may come, if so be you’re in want of rooms then.” “No; we want them to-night,” said the | detective, listening anxiously tq a murmur of voices above. The woman stepped quickly to the foot of the stairs. “I tell you I’ve no lodging to spare. Be off or I’ll call my husband,” she said, menacingly. “Hush!” returned the detective, whispering in her ear. “I am a police officer, and there are two more outside. Don’t get yourself into trouble, but let me do my duty.” The woman turned pale, hesitated, then stood back, while the detective, followed by Neville, went up the wooden staircase three steps at a time, but not before he had unlatched the house door, admitting his colleagues, who were in readiness to support him. (To be continued.)