Bridgeton pioneer., 1884-01-24
BY THE GATE OF THE SEA.
A NOVEL,.
BY DAVID CHRISTIE MURRAY.
CONTINUED

and always looked circumstances in the
face, the world would be improved out of
knowledge. Mrs. Tregarthen had taken
perhaps the most foolish of possible steps.
had disguised the truth, and now ran awav
from the circumstances she had herself Gre
ated; and yet you shall not despise her if
l can help it. 1t was an innocent courage
which had led her-more for her sisters
sake than her own-to the stage 1t was a
pardonable fear which had kept her. silent
as to that episode in her life. 1t is one of
the ways of women to look their best in
the eyes of the people they love. and this
leads them to reservations and Dretenses.
A weakness characteristic of a whole half
OF humanity must not be judged too Sc
yerely. When she ran away, she did so be-
cause tender conscience hitherto void of
great otfense, exaggerated her little folly
into crime, She made up her innocent
mind that she was one of the wickedest wo-
men in the world. She had married her
husband under false pretenses!
When Tregarthen turned his bacl, upon
her she read final remuneration in the act.
and was persuaded that she had lost him
forever. She had no blame for him then
or afterward, and she recognized the Justice
OF the imagined sentence, even at the mo-
ment when its weight first crushed her
The perfect trust which love should have in
love is flower of slow growth indeed.
Often enough life is over before it has
reached to its full bloom, though there is
this compensation for its laggard coming,
that when once it blossoms it can know no
decay.
Mrs. Tregarthen went to London, and
naturally enough sought the one place there
which she had known before-a respectable,
If somewhat dingy, boarding-house off the
Strand. The stout landlady had not for
cotton her, and received her kindly. There
was faint flavor of home in the stuffy
bedroom, and at least it was better to be
there than to find a nest altogether strange.
But the foolish fugitive had run away with
out any provision, and had made no ar
raugement for those bodily needs which
continue their claim in spite of sins or re-
repentances, She had twenty pounds in
money, and her maid, being hidden to pack
for London, had naturally foreseen festiv-
ity, and had pu, up all the hapless lady's
jewelry. There was no fear of immediate
starvation, therefore, but none the less that
terror lcomed up from the future She was
sure that she was forever parted from her
husband, and when the first agony of that
certainty had settled down into dull pain,
she had to think of ways and means for her
sisters sake, and in a little while (for q rea-
son she had not hitherto dreamed of for her
own.
The maid, who was for the first time in
London, was poorly impressed with town
life, as may be fancied. The stuffy lodg-
lng-house was not the sort of place in which
Mrs Tregarthen's position gave her right
to bestow herself, and the maid knew it.
once or twice she had surprised her mis-
tress in tears, and she had found out very
early in the history of the exposition that
there were no ideas of festivity in Mrs
Tregarthen's mind. She began to put two
and two together, and after week she
spoke.
81 beg your pardon ma'am, but it is my
wish to leave"
How is that, Marysn inquired the mis-
tress, with sinking heart. The heart had
sunk low enough already, in all conscience,
but it fell lower yet when the maid spoke
of leaving. Tregarthen had himself en-
gagged the woman to serve his wife, and
the exile was ready to cling to anything
that bound her, however slightly, to her
home and him.
ell, ma'am" returned the maid ''since
you ask me, don't understand things, and
I'd rather go"
There would be one mouth the less to fill,
but that was little. The maid received her
wages and went away, though she kept an
eye on MIS- Tregarthen, having fancies of
hef own concerning the reasons for this Gu
rl"uS escapade. The expected gallant never
appeared, however, and when Mrs. Tregar-
then went abroad she took the child with
her, ana, after purposeless walk, returned
wlthont having spoken to a single creature.
IN these circumstances the maids interest
IN her late mistress declined and she found
another PLACE and went away, content to
leave mystery unsolved.
Inc poor lady set aside all her gayer
crosses and a;.irea herself in somber raj
ment, as typifying mourning, and when one
d&y MIR. Lorrlmer caught sight of her in
the street by accident he took her for a
widow
'Ran away from the staget to be married,
cid she, poor thing!" said Lorrimer to him
self, not unkindly. "Well, if loves young
dream is over she'll be back again. Pm
a business man, and l can't afford to miss
a chance like Miss Churchill q second
time"
SO, MIR. Lorrilner, without particularly
violating his conscience, lit new cigar,
cooked his lat little, and dogged Mrs Ire
garthen home.
" Boardng-house. Mrs. Barnley. Re-
spectacle poverty. Married a widower.
W Widow left hard up Encountered with
httle girl Poor thing! Poor thing! Get
her now ON easy terms"
III. Lorlimer cooked his hat anew, bit off
the end OF second cigar, struck brown
paper fusee on his trousers, lit the cigar
with an air of victory, and walked home.
Shortly before nine o'clock, being by that
time in the full glory Of evening dress, he
strolled past the house dozen times or SO.
and had begun to examine the windows
with some impatience, when a servant girl
came up the area steps, bearing half dozen
jugs OF different sizes, and made her way
toward the corner pubfic-house Mr. Lor-
rimer intercepted her.
" Good evening, my dear. Don't be
frightened" The girl had pranced into the
middle of the roadway "I only want to
ask you question-quite harmless ques-
tlon. Half crown, my dear" The coin
ratified into one of the jugs. "There's e.
lady staying at Mrs. Barnley's-a young
lady, dressed in morning-goes about with
a little girl. [ want to call upon her-ouite
honorable and correct--I know of some
thing to her advantage. I used to know her
maiden nname-Miss Churchill. What is her