The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1885-12-05 00:00:00

had been long in their master's service, and humbly
worshipped the young heir—as, indeed, who did not?
And, moreover, the guns they each carried with them
that night were found leaded the next morning.
But his father? How was this strange man affected
by his beloved one's death?
In such a manner as might have been expected
from his desperate and sinful character.
He cursed God, but did not die. His first burst of
tender and passionate grief. over, the man's heart
hardened into a stone.

He shut.himself up in his room, and refused to
look on any face, save the black one of Domingo.
He would not leave it, he would not unlock the door,
or hold any communication with those outside.
Cleland was lying in a brain fever, all but dead;
yet he would not see her.
He would not follow his son's body to the grave;
and Catherine Waco was the only mourner there.
Straight from the open mouth of the vault the
lady walked, through the park, and towards the
hateful wood.

The wind was fresh, and full of rain; no sun in
the sky, nor brightness over the land. The corn,
more golden than it was five days before, seemed to
rustle with a plaintive sigh, a sad and ominous sound.
The lady shivered from heai to foot, and her
mournful eyes appeared ,to have gathered in them-
selves a fresh and heavy load of sorrow.
"Truly have I seen much, and many sorrows in
my brief life!" she mused. "Worst, 0 Father above!
worst grief of all, to see those I love fall from me by
sudden and violent death. The blood of father,
mother, and child, have I seen; and now I behold
that of the one who, to me, was the living likeness of
all I lost. Oh, Ross! Ross! in you all that was good
in your father lived again! How could I—could I
lose you ?"
She came to the wood, came to the spot where
they had found him lying, and from whence the
labouring men had carried him on the gate his own
hand had so often opened.
No rain had fallen since that black, still night, and
the sod was yet marked with the dull stain of the
blood in which he had lain.

The lady staggered with a deadly faintness from
the spot; she could not open her eyes upon it; the
smell of blood was in her nostrils—blood, near which
the herbage withered, and the creeping things of the
earth refused to lodgo.
She went on, unconsciously following the track by
which the murdered boy had ascended from the
hollow.
A steep, stony path, with the blackberry and
wild rose tangled across it under foot, and arching
boughs of oak saplings, young ashes, and hazel trees,
thickly entwined overhead. And here again she
saw the blood in a straight even flow, down, down,
uhtil a larger pool came, splashes all around on bush
and leaf, showing the spot where he had first
fallen, struggled to his feet again, and staggered out
to die.
And then Catherine stoopl still, her dark face wear-
ing an expression of fierce and savage wrath. She
clenched her hands and lifted them above her head.
She said aloud, so that anybody then in the wood
might have heard her—
"l loved that boy; he was to me the child I lost,
and the father that gave it me. His young life shall
not be taken without exchange. The scent of his
blood at my feet calls out for blood again. Death to
the murderer of my child, I say; and I will not rest
upon the earth—l would return from my grave if
God did allow, to point out to men the devilish hand
that slew him."
The Indian blood of the woman had risen to
tempest-heat in her veins. English manners, laws,
and customs, English principles had toned it down;
but with the life of a loved one crying out to her
from the grave, she had no ear but from the prompt-
ings of revenge—no instinct but that which bade her
thirst for the murderer's punishment.
It was as a mother deprived of her offspring—a
woman clasping her hands on a barren breast:
"Blood of my blood; bone of my bone: a life for a
life!"
Her vow was registered, and a subtle enemy was
on the murderer's track—yes, on it ; for of all those
who were giving chase far and near, this woman
alone had a firm and unconquerable suspicion.
She had not come to that wood merely to look upon
the blood of Ross. She trusted to her half-Indian
sagacity to put her on the track, while beating round
the place where he had fallen.
She crept on hands and knees among the cover,
and looked from side to side all round the place, to see
where a dead twig was withered from its parent
bough, where a blade of grass was flattened down, a
footprint in the soft, dark soil (damp under the thick
brush), or a fern leaf lying bruised among the rest.
Yet nothing of these she saw.
The surgeon said the gun had been within a dozen
yards of the body when fired, pointed from the left-
hand side of the boy, and discharged most likely in a
crouching posture, as the wounds were low.
The gun had been loaded with an excessive charge
or else the contents of two barrels had been fired into
him; and there would probably be some shots
spattered near the spot, he thought. But none were
found—they were all in the body.
Then she crossed the path, and entered the other
side in the same manner, counting by paces the
__ _ _

from his victim. She counted , and ~uen
began her search, in a small circle at first, gradually
increasing.
Not a broken twig, not a bruised leaf, not a foot-
print in the sod, only this—only what? A rag, a
shred of calico, sticking to the strong thorn of a
blackberry branch.
Calico, did I say 2—no, not calico—merely a dice.
like square of fine cambric, with a little brown mark
in one corner—a single letter.
A thing of not much moment to either finder or
loser, surely; but the lady, for all that, put it in her
pocket-book, steel-clasped, and then hid that in her
bosom. Afterwards she crept out of the cover, and
walked swiftly home.
CHAPTER XXXV.
A WOMAN'S LOVE.
THIS, you will remember, was the evening of the
day on which Ross was buried. Catherine Wace
returned once more to the house from whence he had
gone for ever.
She went upstairs and removed her mourner's hood
and cloak, and then walked softly to the sick room
of the poor sister.
All Cleland's long black locks were gone, her head
was shaven, and her once bright rosy face had faded
to a very shadow of its former self. She was sleeping
quietly, and the lady, after watching her for a few
moments, stole noiselessly away.
She passed Mr. Ingestre's door; not a sound was
there within. Then came a long passage, and
Maxall's room at the end of it. She tapped at the
door, there was no reply; she turned the lock, and
entered.
Maxall -was lying in a heavy sleep on the bed,
and the powerful scent of opium pervading the air
told plainly how that dreamless sleep had been
obtained. On the table at his bedside was a small
bottle bearing the label, and a larger one filled with
brandy.
Catherine Waco smiled pityingly as she stood
there, and looked at the dark face of Mr. Ingestre's
ward.
His very being was a mystery. Who and what
was he, and wherefore in that house?—hated and
yet cherished by its master—a small, dark, unac-
knowledged image of himself. For there, in his
Indian features, in his swarthy complexion, in his
bloodless skin, dwelt a strange and startling likeness
to another face in that house, all large, and bold,
and English. Most startling was that resemblance
now, because the creole's face in shadow and at rest
might well have passed for a pure bred Indian's—a
creature guiltless of white blood in its veins.
Yet there it was, and Catherine noted it, not for the
first time, with a bitter smile. She only, perhaps, of
all in the house guessed why that face had a mysteri-
ous likeness to the master's. _ _

He was in a heavy, dreamless sleep, as I have said,
and her presence there did not arouse him.
First of all, she moved gently to the window, and
looked out. The Lebanon cedar touched the lattice-
panes, the huge bows swayed up and down not a foot
from the brick-work ; and one nimble and light of
hand might ascend or descend with the greatest
facility, either from or to the window.
Then she turned a/way and went to the cupboard,
where she knew the boy ,kept fire-arms. It was
locked, and the key gone; but Catherine, as house-
keeper, had duplicate keys of all the closets in the
house. She opened it with one on her own bunch,
and then went in.
A solitary gun stood in the corner, with the dead
boy's initials and crest on the stock. She recognised
the gun as the one Maxall had used that evening, had
perilously loaded with a heavy charge behind the
bush, and carried away, still loaded, home with him.
Was it loaded now? That was the question she set
herself to answer.
She pondered for a moment on the best means to
do so, and at length hit on the only certain way,
namely, pulling out the ramrod and driving it home.
The barrels were empty; the gun hail been fired.
She replaced it, and locked the door, as she had
found it, and then commenced a systematic
.search
through the room for something else.
She found it at last, in the pocket of a shooting
coat—only a cambric handkerchief, with a dice like
square torn out from one corner of it. She folded
the handkerchief and hid it in her bosom.
Domingo met her in the corridor. He was
trembling and wringing his hands.
"Ali, Missy Wace, come and speak a word to de
massa I'se had so many year; do massa what's
been so bery good to poor old Mingo! He quite kill
himself, I sure he quite kill himself, with all do
brandy in de cellar. I fetch up two, four bottles in
de day, and still him always thirsty. Ah, missy,
speak one word to my dear massa!"
He shuffled along before her, the tears pouring
down his shining black cheeks.
"He not say no to you; go in and speak a word,
missy."
And he opened the door of the library, and almost
pushed her in, then closed and locked it on her.
Have you ever seen a man who has lived for days
on raw brandy and a great grief —drank the one, and
devoured the other?
• If you have, then you will .know what George
Ingestre looked like when Catherine entered the
room. Horror, absolute horror, seized the beholder,
and she would have turned and fled, but that the
door was locked, and she remained a prisoner there.

oaurclororhd prnhahli; bc:prfr Rtati ()fled_
MYSTERIOUS D

He turned his glassy eyes upon her,:
"Catherine at last! Catherine, come here and
comfort me. I need it ; he is dead I"
He stretched out his trembling, shaky hands, and
gently took the folds of her mourning dress between
them.
"And you wear this for Mm I How kind of youl
but then you always loved him."
His eyes closed, and he seemed to -sleep for two
or three minutes—a fitful, dozy sleep, such as persons
in a high fever experience.
Then he started up with a terrible oath.
"Where's that black? Give me the brandy—
there, on the table! Woman! whoever you are, give
it here! I am parched with thirst. A drink! a
drink! in Heaven's name t"
He leaned forward to clutch the bottle, but
Catherine snatched it from the table, and flung it
beneath the grate.
"Mr. Ingestre, you must have no more; try and
stifle the awful craving I"
it, I - as the lake is now:

I cannot. am dry- Ary ,
and yet I have been drinking all day. Catherine!
never look at me like that; your eyes murder me.
Murder I 0 God! he ü dead."
A fit of frenzy came on, and he was no better than
an unchained maniac.
But the paroxysm passed, and he sank back,
quietly and half insensible, into the arms of the only
spectator of his degradation, who gently and pity-
ingly held his heavy head on her frail arm, and
wiped the clammy sweat from his burning head and
lips.
And thus he lay for more than an hour, while
Catherine looked dcwn on the man's face, and con-
fessed to herself at last that, in spite of all—his guilt,
her wrongs, his shame, his degradation—she still
loved it.

Ah ! no need to hide the secret from herself now.
With that guilty head upon her bosom, with that
man's dark stream of life pictured before her eyes,
she could yet say she loved him!
r Her tears rained down upon his face, and, in her
passionate sorrow, she could have kissed it, wild and
haggard as it was, turned up towards her own.
Surely there was a healing balsam in that woman's
presence; or it might have been that not for many a
long year of unworthy life had George Ingestre's head
rested on a true woman's heart. Be that as it may,
he fell into tt sweet and soothing alwarb. And for
Another hour slumbered calmly.
He awoke with a low sigh, and his eyes opened on
the weeping ones' above him. He gazed fixedly for a
moment, then closed them again.
"Catherine !" he moaned; "Catherine, I am a
vile wretch ! Leave me!"

But still his head remained heavy on her arm.
"Go away, and leave me. I cannot bear that you
should see me like this. I have been drinking ever
since I saw you last, for I have no other way of
blunting grief."
"No other way? Oh, Mr. Ingestre
"No other way. I am not a Christian man, and
cannot solace myself with religion; therefore I go to
drink. That's a cowardly thing to do,' you will
say. Bear it like a man, face it out.'
"Ay, Catherine; but suppose a man has lost his
manhood at the outset of life, and turns coward all
of a sudden, what then? My boy never played the
part of a villain in all his life; it was young and fair
in his Maker's eyes; it was as fresh in men's nostrils
as the flowers of the field; he was pure of heart and
simple of mind—eh, Catherine? Tell me."
And then she told him of many things in that poor
youth's life which had never come to his knowledge—
of many things which proved the holy, simple faith
his heart held—the touching reverence all his young
life's deeds displayed for one other Father besides his
earthly one.
While she spoke of these things, the half-demented
man turned round upon his side, and eagerly watched
her earnest lips.
"A child of mine fit for heaven !" he cried. "Then.
God is merciful, Catherine! the sharp edge of my
grief is turned. Better there than here, where my
love could not have saved his soul from sin. Still, he
was my all—my pride—my darling; never, never, to.
see his bonny face again! And, oh! so cruelly
murdered! Never look at my tears, but let them
come; they cool my burning eyes !"
And he wept on her breast, and folded his arms
round her as the briny tears fell down. She wiped
them away, and lifted the damp masses of hair from
his forehead—hair turned greyer in these few days.
"Catherine," he said, "this is rest for me, indeed.
It must be mine always.'
There was no reply.
"Mine," he went on; "my own, until I give it up
for the cold pillow nay son has laid his dear head on
to-day."
Then she said, "It shall be yours, your own."
"Catherine, you love me ?"
"I love you."
"God is merciful! lam not a castaway. Thanks
be to Him."
And then came & long pause.
"You will marry me—you will be my wife?"
"George, I will be your wife; but speel; no more
to-night, sleep and grow well again.,"
(To be continued.)