Waterbury evening Democrat., 1890-07-24

quietness OA her face vanAsneo suo- "E that busy. restless, selHsh Neil hnds-Ands Mia Chester before tho trial" she said. her cleax xoupR yoice full of passionate anger, will will"
 "WM whaA3S snoered the sister. "Wm never speak to him again, were you going to sayS Suppose he doea not value that threat quite so much as you may fancyP"
 6Be quiet T." cried Marjorie, with quick stamp of her foot. "Even Neil, in this cruel, selfish pursuit of his. iS not so contemptiblO as you are. He wants to be kind to her, only he docs Not know the Hisest way, and loves him. self much better than he loves her. But you-you think of no one but yourself, dressed in hypocritical mourning. There, I knew I should not be able to help saying it some day soon-and now it is said.
 "Haye you quite finished2" quest toned Louisa, with slow scorn in her tone, and raising her light eyebrows languidly. "Your vulgar1ty, with all your care, still peeps out at times, and I am getting hopeless of ever seeing you different"
 "Wnf you never think my words are real and earnest 2" panted the younger girl. You always treat me as If were a baby or an idiok If am vexed, you enjoy my vsxation if am glad, you sheer at my happiness if am sad, you laugh at my silence. Oh, I am so tired ofiti"
 The cry rushed up from an overbur. dened heart, and though Louisa's ears dull and selfish ever-distinguished none of its yearning pathos, she uttered her next words little more gently.
 "It is most strange to see Neil eager in this chase he is so lazy always, so afraid of exertion, so indifferent to other peoples troubles"
 'FI watch him in astonishment," said Marjorie. presently, too thoroughly en- crossed with other thoughts to resent anything her sister had said-"an as- tonishment that now and then borders on admiration, for, under all his lazy in. difference, there actually seems to throb & real, passionate power and earnest ness."
 "I am sorry it is there, if it is to be directed so," said Louisa, with pre- voking leisureliness.
 A quick look Marjorie gave into the sharp, fair face.
 "f am very sorry it is directed so, {" she said, truthfully; "but I don't sup pose our reasons are quite the same."
 "Of course," ruminated Miss Cas- tillain, complacently, "the girl is sure to be found before the assizes. Still, her evidence, though it would be satisfac- tory to have it, is not necessary. We three are quite enough to have seen poor Eustace murdered"
 "Don't cry, Louisa." remarked her sister dryly, seeing Louisa putting her handkerchief to her eyes at the mention of MT. Jerhey by his Christian name Ga luxury of speech which she had adopted with her black dress). "You needn' t cry don't suppose he is dead at all. " "Marjorie 1" exclaimed Miss Castillian, as she had many times before exclaimed at this coolly pronounced idea, "how can you hurt and insult me as you do ? Do you suppose that was blind or mad that evening?"
 "I don't say that he did not fall into the pool" put in Marjorie, gently ; "only say believe he is not dead.
 "You only insist on it to aggravate me-" whined Louisa "and you didn't let me finish what I was going to say. Do you suppose that, if he were alive, he would not be here-that he would not have come to mel"
 "I cannot tell," replied the younger girl, with a gleam of her old humor "because I never did and never shall understand any one of his inscrutable designs. Did you ever quite under stand him?"
 The scarlet mounted to the very roots of Miss Casti1lain's fair, frizzled hair, sl she met her sisters eyes-the eyes that were so brightly honest in their ques tioning-and she answered as she would not have done if she had been at hel ease.
 {" It is not many girls who would side with the murderer of their sister lover,
 "It is astonishing" said Marjorie quietly turning aside the remark, "tG see how greatly Lady Athelston missel Miss Chester.
 "Perhaps it is for his mothers sake then, that Neil is so indefatigable in hi search" proposed Louisa, spitefully.
 Perhaps so and it is just as astonish ing to see how Col. Stuart takes thi affair to heart. He has been to tn jail, he has been to see Mir. Spendil again and again, and he tries Louie, she added, checking herself with sud den tightening of her lips, "you hear' that strange story which Neil told us tn other night about Mfr. Spendir calling himself an Athelston?"
 Ridiculous l " snapped Miss Castil lain. "Yes, heard, of course, and didn't wonder at his laughing over it Q an absurdity. I only wonder at the man volunteering to cast a slur on his ow birth just now, and at Neil's condescend ing to repeat such rubbish, even to us. "I think," said Marjorie, thoughtful ly, "that Neil told us as piece of diplC
 macy. for which shoald hardly hay given him credit He fancied Mr. 6pen dir would tell 1t all to the magistrates and he wanted us to hear his own from cal version of it first, that we might b prepared to look upon it only as absur and idiotic, and a sign of MT. Spendir' crowning gdegradation-as he represente it."
 "Absurd and idiotic and degrading |, | indaod. r Shnr11d Rbinb kb