The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1886-06-19 00:00:00

[ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.]
THE HEIRESS

ATEERSTONE GRANGE.

BY THE AUTHOR OF

"Allan Thornton," "Effie Baird," "Almost a
" Leonora's Legacy," 4.c.
CHAPTER XV,
A GOLDEN SORROW.
Verily
I swear 'tis better to be lowly born,
And range with humble lovers in content,
Than to be perked up in a glistening grief
And wear a golden sorrow.—SHARESPEARE.

"SAY I will come," was Mrs. Dalton's answer; and
bathing her face, for she had been weeping with the
bitter, scalding tears of a strong, hard nature, which
blister and sear as they fall, she went down to the
little sitting roonf4where she gave audience to guests
and applicants for apartments. The blinds were down,
but the sunshine streaming in would have been suffi-
cient reason, and the visitor had noticed nothing in the
appearance of the house. All the houses on the same
Side of the street had their blinds drawn, and Mrs.
Dalton's establishment, therefore, had no unusual ap-
pearance.
A pleasant-looking gentlemanly young man, with
an honest, open face, and intelligent grey eyes, turned
towards the mistress of the house as she entered the
room, and it seemed with a little surprise.
"Mrs. Atherstone, I presume," he said. "I have
just arrived, madame, by the Psyche, with news for
you.,,
"Pardon me, sir, I am not Mrs. Atherstone,

"Then will you let her know I am here, please; or
if she is from home, tell me where to find her. I must
fiee her at once."

" That will be difficult, sir."
He was so intent on his business, whatever it was,
that he did not mark the agitation of her face nor the
solemnity of her tone.
"I do not understand you," he said.
"You will very soon. May I ask are you a relative
of Mrs. Atherstone ?"
"No."

"A dear friend perhaps?"
" nor that either. I am a total stranger. I
never saw the lady in my life, though I have often
heard of her. My visit to her is purely a matter of
business."
"I am glad of that, because what has happened will
not be such a shock to you."
"What has happened?"
"Mrs. Atherstone is dead."
" Dead ? " _ _ _

Mrs. Dalton bent her head in confirmation of her
Words, and the young man turned very pale.
"Good heavens!" he exclaimed. "When?"
"Not an hour since. I came from the task of corn-
Posing her dead body to see who it was that was ask-
ing for her. I have startled and pained you, I see."
"You have, indeed. I was not prepared for news
like this. Miss Atherstone is here I presume? S4e is
not dead, too, is she?"
"Miss Atherstone is upstairs, and, but for grief,
quite well," replied Mrs. Dalton. "She is pale and ill
With her unremitting attendance on her mother, and
just now is quite prostrate. I doubt her being aLle to
Speak to anyone to-day at all."
"Of course not. It is not to be thought of," said

the young man, hastily. "Will you speak to her for
rne, madame, and ask her to try to sea me to-morrow?
Illy business is urgent, or I would not press it."
" Surely I will. Beryl Atherstone is a sensible girl,
and none of your puling sentimental fools. She will
see you, of course, if it is necessary; she is of the true
Atherstone blood, and not one to lie down and die
under a load of grief."
"You speak as if you knew the family," said the
Young man, regarding her curiously.
"I did once, a long time ago. I knew Pierce Adler-
atone, this girl's grandfather, when I was young, and
he too—before you were born, many a year. Will you
leave any message for Miss Atherst)ne ? Is your
business anything which can be trusted to me ? "
"It will be public enough before long, and perhaps
You will manage the telling of it better than me. It
Will be a great surprise, perhaps shock, to the young
lady, though one from which she will soon recover. The
gentleman you spoke of just now—Pierce Atherstono.
Esq., of the Grange, is dead; he has left no will, and
the young lady who has just lost her mother is the
proprietress of one of the finest estates and largest
Private fortunes in England."
Mrs. Dalton stared at the speaker in speechless
amazement.
"Beryl Atherstone !" she gasped.
"Even so, madam. Her identity once proved—and
I am advised there will be no difficulty about that—she
Will step into a fortune a princess might covet. It is
Waiting for her, and plenty of friends and relations to
boot, ready to take her by the hand and welcome her
to her new position."
"And they sent a stranger out here to fetch her!"
Vi.as Mrs. Dalton's next rather curious remark.
"Lukewarm kindred they seem to be these Ather-
stones.,l
"It would have been all the 'same who cone," the
Young man replied; "they would have been all
strangers alike. Not one of them have ever seen Miss
Atherstone, or have the least idea what she is like.
We could not foresee what has happened; and with a
Mot hees care, my escort would have been sufficient.
.As it is, I am very awkwardly placed, and must do
the best I can."

He rose as he spoke, and drew out his pocket-book,

Putting a card into Mr. Dalton's hand. -
"If you will kindly prepare Miss Atherstgne for my
viSt," he said, " I will call about mid-day to-morrow.
That is my name—my father, Mr. Carson, is the
family solicitor. I have a letter from her cousin, Mr.
Atherstone, the rector of Lillington."
He to-,k his leave, and Mrs. Dalton sat staring, after
him with a look of blank amazement on her handsome
face.
"Graham Carson." she reads from the card. she

fremeMber the name of Carson well! It
Was the lawyer—the young, clear-headed, shrewd man
Who advised Pierce Atherstone in every thing he did.
It was he who counselled my ruin—the blighting of
every hope that made life worth having. I swore a
bitter oath once that I would have my revenge; may
be it is coming. But for this Graham Carson's father
I should have been—bah! the past is past—the future
only is before us. I must go up to that poor child and
comfort her if I can. Fortune's wheel turned strangely
When it sent Pierce Atherstone's son's widow to mu
house to die. Can the dead look down, I wonder?
What does he feel when he sees Angela Delphine bend-
ing over that lonely corpse, and playing the part of
comforter to their stricken child—Beryl Atherstone,
heiress of the Grange, and he in his grave at last?
Curious things happen in this lower world. It was
dtstiny, not chance, that sent them here."
This stern, proud, old woman, with the stately bear-
ing, was the Angela Delphine of the squire's youthful
days—the dancer, for the sake of whose perfidy he had
hated with such a bitter, bitter hatred all members of
her profession from that hour. Her daughter's child,
Ursula Rhodes, was the old man's granddaughter too,
and she thought, with bitterness and passionate grief,
of the past old time, when all her arts had failed to
make her rich dupe marry her. She was a virtuous
Woman now was Mrs. Angela Dalton (she thought the
name of Delphine smacked too much of the stage when
She settled down into respectability). She attended
Church regularly and the minister shook hands with
her when he met her, and called upon her occasionally,
and all traces of the Behernianism of her youth were
stowed away in a corner of her memory and never
eaw the light.
No ono in Melbourne knew her for aught but a res-
Pcetable, well-doing widow, who was currently re-
Ported to have a snug sum in the bank, and was a
credit to the town in all her ways.
She really liked Beryl for her own sake, and very
tenderly she strove to comfort her when she once more
Went up to her room, when Carson was gone. The
Poor girl was in no state to hear the news, good or
had, just then; she was prostrate and hysterical, and
scarcely conscious of what was said to her. There
Was nothing for it but to give her something to soothe
her to sleep, and trust to her waking refreshed, and fit
to be told what was before her.
Mrs. Dalton and Ursula watched her till she fe-A
asleep, and then went downstairs to rest a little them-
selves. They had other duties to perform. Life must
go on for those who are left, in spite of the shadow of
death which crosses the threshold from time to time,
and they might not needlessly spend their strength
and time even in that solemn death chamber.
"How you look, grannie," said Ursula, as Mrs.
Dalton sat staring blankly into vacancy, and let her
untouched tea get cold. "Drink your tea while it's
Warm. This miserable business has knocked you up.
You look quite ill."
I'm not ill, child--I'm thinking."
"Think away, grannie," retorted the young
,lady. "Only do it out loud, so that I may have the
oenefit of it."
She was her grandmother's adviser and counsellor
Was the fair-haired Ursula; quick-witted and keen,
the old woman found her very useful, and generally
tnade her her confidante. She told her in a few words
of the arrival of Graham Carson, and the message he
as charged with for Beryl, and Ursula's glittering
blue eyes opened very wide at the news.
„," My ! " she exclaimed. "A great fortune !
"ouldn't I like to be her. But there's something
Store you haven't told me, grannie."
'What do you mean, child? I have told you all the
Y°l-Ing man said to me."
, " Ah, but there's something behind it all; there's a
!ook in your face that always comes there when you
,alk of these Atherstones. Are we any kin to them ?"
" What makes you ask such a question, Ursula ?"
" Because you always speak of them so strangely—
"eoause I am like them."
"Like them, child 1"
in': Yes, grannie, I am. You know it. When I look
41_ the glass, it is Beryl Atherstone's face, bar the eyes,
(‘'.llat looks back at me; and they haves portrait of her
Tther that I am more like than I am to her. What
`-ioes it mean, grannie?"
" It means that but for treachery and villainy my
f)r_andchild might have had what is coming to that
r girl upstairs. I ought to have been Fierce Ather-
Zr?Ys wife in the years gone by, Ursula-, and you are
quich his grandchild as Beryl Atherstone :herself"

Ursula had been morally brought up, but she was by
no means as horrified at this startling announcement
as a well-conducted young person should have been.
She had plenty of spirit and keen common-sense, and
she drew a little closer to her grandmother, and slid
her hana into that of the old woman.

"I always thought you had a history, grannie,
dear," she replied quietly. "Tell it me, please."
And Mrs. Dalton did tell her, and for the first time
in her life Ursula Rhodes heard what were her
mother's antecedents.

"What a queer lottery it seems," she said. "Beryl
and I are cousins—equal relations to this man who is
dead—and yet she will go to England and be feted and
caressed, and set up as a thing to be worshipped,
whilst I, an Atherstone as truly as herself, would be
turned from the doors with scorn if I showed my face
there. Don't let's talk about it any more, grannie, or
I might get envying Beryl her good fortune; and I
vow I love her, too, dearly."
"We won't talk about it any more, my dear," re-
plied Mrs. Dalton. "It was as well you should know,
and now you do know we will let the past die. No
words of ours can mend it."

"And I am quite content," Ursula remarked; but
she thought a good deal that night nevertheless; and
Mrs. Dalton lay awake also, turning things over in her
mind. She told Beryl very gently before she went to
bed of Graham Carson's arrival, and what had
befallen in England; but she was almost too bewil-
dered to understand it.

"It can't be true she sobbed. "It is only some
wild dream; and if it is true, what do I want with
money now she is gone ?"
But it was true, every word of it. The old squire
had died at last, in far-away England, without sign-
ing the bitter will he had been at such trouble to
make. Norton Atherstone, going into the library one
evening, had found the old man placidly asleep, as he
thought, in the twilight., and had gone out quietly for
fear of waking him; but the butler had done the very
same thing more than an hour before, and the squire
was not wont to take such long naps.
The rector grew alarmed when he heard this, and
went back. Mr. Atherstone lay there, his hands
loosely crossed in front of him, and a peaceful look
upon his face that might well have deceived anyone.
He had been dead for some time—probably almost
from the time of his sitting down, the doctor said;
and there was nothing for it but to carry him to his
chamber, and bid his friends together to some and
bury him.
No will was found save the one which lay unsigned
in Mr. Carson's office, and a memorandum in his own
hand-writing, found in his desk, enjoining the lawyer
to see that each of the servants had a present, the
amount of which was named. Norton Atherstone and
his family were disinherited, and the unknown, un-
acknowledged actress at the Antipodes was the sole
possessor of Pierce Atherstone's wealth. Condolences
poured in from all quarters upon what was considered
the rector's ill-luck; but he assured everyone that he
had always been aware of the true state of the case;
and as neither he nor his wife showed any signs of
disappointment, people began to believe, after all, that
die rector did not expect to be his cousin's heir.
Mr. Carson lost no time in dispatching his son,
whom he was shortly going to take into partnership,
to fetch the heiress and her mother.

"I don't know anyone so suitable to send as you,
Dick,' he said. "She has her mother with her, so it
will be all right."
And Dick was nothing loath. He had grown from
a sharp boy into a shrewd man in the years that had
passed since he tracked the squire to the hotel for his
father, and signed himself "R. Graham Carson" now,
and had dropped the " Dick " save in the extreme
privacy of home, declaring it was unbusiness like. He
was to be known in the firm as "Graham Carson
only.
It was terribly awkward to find himself likely to
be the escort of the young lady alone; but he had plenty
cf tact, and did not let it appear that he was at all put
out by the contretemvs. Beryl was able to see and
speak to him the next morning, though she could
hardly comprehend him, or credit him that she, who
till now had worked for her daily bread, was now the
undoubted and sole possessor of sombwhere about
£12,000 a year. Mr. Graham Carson informed her
that he was sent by her nearest relations to find her,
and that they were waiting her arrival in England
with impatlence. Her identity was fully prove,d to
them all, as her whole career had been watched and
her address r.lways carefully noted by his father, who
had all along had an eye to some such contingency.
He was very kind and sympathising with her in
her sorrow, but she could not realise the truth of what
he told her. It was only when she found unlimited
money placed at her disposal, and every wish gratified as
though she were the possessor of Aladdin's lamp, that
she began to understand that her riches were an
actual fact. _ _ _

The young lawyer was invaluable in giving direc-
tions about the funeral. Mrs. Dalton could not under-
take everything, as she had her own duties to attend
to, and Ursula kept strangely aloof. She was very
kind to Beryl, and waited on her devotedly, but there
had come a strange reserve in her manner that would
have puzzled the bereaved girl very much if she had
not been too much occupied with her grief to notice
it.

The day after the funeral Graham Carson spoke to
Beryl about preparing for her voyage.
I ought to return with the Psyche," he said.
"She will he about ten days more here. Can you be
ready ?"
"Oh, yes," Beryl said sadly. In leaving Australia
she was leaving home and all her friends, and all the
bright prospects held out to her could not lighten her
heart of that load.

"Yes, I can be ready," she repeated. "I have not
much to do."

_
"Then, will you hire a maid, and let her assist you
in your preparations?"
"Hire a maid !"

"Yes. You will not make the voyage without one,
surely. Mrs. Dalton will assist you, I dare say. Pray
don't cry, my dear Miss Atherstone. It is very trying
for you; but there is a warm welcome waiting for
you in England."
For Beryl had burst into passionate tears, and de-
clared she was the most miserable girl on the face of
the whole earth.

(To be continued.)