The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1887-10-15 00:00:00

already taiZen up too much of your time, and have
half forgotten an appointment of my own. Some
other time if you will allow me.'
We shall be very glad, I am sure,' Mrs. Jarvis said,
with an odd feeling that she should like to know more
of this stranger in whom her husband seemed to take
such special interest; she wmdered a little that he
had never told her that Mr. Stone had known Helen's
parents. But she also recollected with a little self-
reproach that, until very lately, she had entirely
ignored any comments he made about his practice,
and so completely evaded any conversation about his
clients that he had ceased to talk to her about them.

He had mentioned Mr. Stone, and that was all;
and he had no idea, of course, that that gentleman
would make the acquaintance of his family in sucla a

fashion as this.

'lf you could stay,' the lady went on, you would
see Mrs. Churchill and her daughters—we expect
them home every minute; I don't know that they
could add anything to what I have told you. But
you might gather something that I have not in speak-
ing to them; they will be glad to know you.'
Mr. Stone was evidently ashy man, for he appeared
quite scared at the notion of meeting the ladies and
was in such haste to go now that he very nearly left
his hat behind him. He did not quite escape them
after all—they arrived just as he was going out at the
gate, and he bowed in a hurried, awkward fashion to
them in passing.
Whoever is that ? Norah said, turning to look at
the rather curious figure crowned by the bushy grey
hair. Do we know him, mamma ?'
I think not, my dear; but he seems to know us.
He stared enough, anyway. What is the matter,
Madge, you are quite pale,' . _ _

I?' said Madge, staring after the retreating
stranger. didn't know; I feel shaky; the sight of
that man set me thinking, that was all.'

1 What about??
'About Frank, and all that wretched time,' Madge
said, the tears rising to her pretty eyes.
Everything reminds us of it,' I think,' Mrs.
Churchill said. 'There was no reason why that gent'e-
man should have recalled anything. Is he a friend of
Mrs. Jarvis, I wonder.'
The V: ree ladies whom Mr. Stone had left were
discussing him as he strolled away thinking over what
he had heard, and pondering what he should do next.
lam so helpless,' he murmured; so hand-tied;
and! would go to the world's end to find her for
them; poor girl. What does it mean? Who is it?
For thero is someone at the bottom of it; some villainy
at work. Great heavens; have they ever thought of
the parson—the man they tell me was so dreadfully
affected by his cousin's death. Be has come into
money lately, and they say he showed a strong pro-
dilection for Iv r. I must put things together. The
bits of gossip I hear are like a kaleidsscope, all dis-
jointed. I wonder if I shall ever be able to piece them
together. I fancy there is something in my notion.
Where is that parson? I'll ask Jarvis what he thinks
—maybe the same notion has struck him!'
'What a funny man,' remarked Henrietta Jarvis,
after Mr. Stone had left them. 'ls he quite right do
you think, mamma?'
'He seemed so, my dear. A little eccentric, perhaps,
an old bachelor, I suppose, and, as he said, "hardly
used to the soeiety of ladies." I think your father
said he had been much abroad.'
" -.He must have known Helen, and poor Frank too,
very intimately,' Phyllis said in her quiet fashion. She
bad hardly spoken while Mr. Stone had been there,
but she had been very observant of him nevertheless.
What makes you think so, child ?' asked her mother.
The way he spoke, mamma. I don't think you
noticed it; but twice in speaking of Helen he was
• going to say fairy." That was poor Frank
Hatherleigh's name for her. Don't you remember his
calling her by it the very first time she came here,
and then apologising for it? Mr. Stone began to say
it twice, and then stopped himself. Do you think it
is possible he has anything to do with her going
away?'
I think you are filling your head with nonsense,
child,' Mrs. Jarvis said, but not sharply as she would
have spoken once. 4 Mr. Stone has never been out of
England since he began to do business with your
papa—npr for sometime before that. I think we
should have found it out if he had had any correspon-
dence with Helen; he's just what he says, an old
friend of her father's—was in India at the time of her
parents' death. I daresay papa will tell us all about
him when he comes back.
Mr. Jarvis's return would not be delayed now; it
was nearer than his family thought. He had ex-
hausted every source of information in and about
Biarritz, and being utterly ignorant of the reasons of
Helen's flight he could get no clue to the direction she
had taken. He had not confined hit iself to the town;
he had visited every place within five miles; every
spot to which it was possible she could have walked,
without success. lie must give it up, he told Limself ;
he must give it up and put it into other hands; lawyer
though he was, he could get at nothing. Every one
he talked to was perfectly open, and told all they knew,
but it all amounted to nothing when it was told, and
Helen was as far off as ever. Besides, he was growing
fanciful; the result no doubt of want of rest and
worry, he could not sleep at night. Every sound out-
side his hotel he construed into some one coming to
him with news, and to rest was impossible—he must
get home. His resolution was brought about by
something which befel him in the gloaming of the
third evening he spent in the pretty wateringeplace.
He had succeeded in getting Mrs. Churchill and the
g:els away, and was alone in the house they had
occupied, making sure that everything was gone.

Except for the servants in the back premises there
was not a creature about, and Mr. Jarvis, tired and
worried more than he would have liked to confess,
sat down in the favourite arm-chair, and very nearly
. _ _

went to sleep. Helen was uppermost in his thoughti,
of course, and all of a sudden there flashed into his
mind, as it did a few days' later into Mr. Stone's, the
thought of Horace Gayford. Where was he—bad he
had any communication with Helen?
'That's the solution!' he said to himself, half aloud.
'That serpent of a man is at the bottom of it. I
remember what she told me poor child, and how she
dreaded him; I'll seek him, and when I finu him I
shall have the clue in my hand.'
He must have been asleep, and yet it was a most
vivid dream ; he seemed to come to himself all at once
and shake off the drowsiness, and there in front of him
stood the man whom he was execrating in his own
mind, very pale and rattier wild looking, but Horace
Gnyford himself for all that.
1 Villain! where is she?'

He gasped the words out and started from his chair,
but he had spoken to empty air as it seemed; he Was
alone with the deepening shadows and the empty chair
he had been sitting in.
I am going mad, and that's about it. I have
thought till I am stupid,' he said to himself and rang
for lights, and asked the servants who came at his
bidding whether any one had been there. No one,
they told him; not a creature had come to the house
since he had returned from seeing the ladies off ; no
one could have come in at the front door without their
hearing. They were quite sure of that.
Mr. Jarvis was not satisfied, and went hither and
thither in Biarritz inquiring for a gentleman answer-
ing to the description of the young clergyman, but he
was unsuccessful in that quest as he was in the other,
and went to bed dispirited and tired beyond measure.
He was roused in the morning by a waiter, who told
him hewas wanted. He thought' he wasinot sure, that
there was news of the young lady.
Mr. Jarvis never dressed so quickly in his life as he
did on that morning. In an incredibly short space of
time he was downstairs confronting Jules the fisher-
man, the man who had been the last person to speak
to Helen on the night of her departure. Jules was
shy and awkward in imparting his intelligence, and
after all it was not much. At a farm-house, some
two miles distant, where he had friends, he had heard
that on that evening one of the children of the house
had seen a man helping a woman into his cart on the
Great North-road. He did not know who the man
was, and he did not see the woman's face, but she had
a cloak on, and she carried a bag in her hand—a bag
such as ladies carry, not like anything he had ever
seen at home.
A man and a cart were vague items, but they were
• better than nothing, and the lawyer set forth to en-
deavour to follow the information up. Putting to-
gether the tiny bits of evidence he could pick up, with
unerring patience he made out that it was indeed
Helen, and that the man was a certain Pierre Gravelot,
who traded on the road in various ways, and whose
whereabouts was about as easy to discover as that of
the missing tribes.
Put it transpired that he had gone to Orguelet on
that particular evening, and thither Mr. Jarvis
directed his steps. Here there was no doubt; Helen
had been there. The landlady of the queer little
puhliohonse was voluble in her description of the
beautiful young lady that had come there and gone all
In a couple of hours. She was so pretty and seemed
in such trouble. No, she didn't tell what her trouble
was, nor even say there was any, but they could see
It in her eyes, and her dread of being followed.
What became of her: where did she go?' asked
Mr Jarvis, ;n the hest French he could muster, and
whieh the good folks on the shore of the Bay of Biscay
had hard work to understand.
When she did entirely comprehend, the good dame
shook her head and put her apron to her eyes. There
was no doubt vow what had become of her, she said ;
she went to sea that same night with Antoine Pc utet
and 1,14 hrtl•er. They were bound for La Roche'le if
the weather was favourable, but all Orguelet knew by
this time they had been caught in a storm and
drowned
Drowned !' It was all Mr. Jarvis could gasp out
in his amazement and consternation. Helen at sea
with a boatful of fishermen, and lost with them: it
was more mysterious than even her flieht from
Biarritz. He plied the woman with all sorts of
egtions to which she had but one answer. The boat
was lost and the whole village was sorrowing for
the men she contained. Enquiries bad been
made, and news had come from La Rochelle
and the other places that the Charlotte
Corday went to, that she had not been at any of
them; and if Monsieur would remember the storm of
Christmas night, and all the wrecks that had strewed
the shore, it was small wonder that a little fishing
smack should be overcome. The boat was gone, there
was no doubt of it.. Some of her wreckage had gone
the coast, but the news had
bassaehedno.rseeantlotongowrguay peluet, and it had made them all very
There Was confirmation of the story everywhere.
The Charlotte Corday had not been as brave as her
namesake and had come to grief. There was nothing.
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