The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-04-03


you can have him. He has had young
Fergus under him all this while and has SO
innoculated him into his own habits and
doctrines that. in point Of fact, / think
might get on without him. In two or three
years. time, il you care about il, Julia, we
may have new figat. Dom against Fer
gus.n
"O," she cried, you're really too bragga-
docio. 1t would delight my soul to take you
down a peg"
"Well.n returned Sir Eustace, there's the
gauge Of battle. Persuade Weybridge to
take It up and I'll fight you on those lines"
There was still Mons Dom TO be settled
with and it turned out that he ives not will
ing to be uprooted. He bad shaken down
TO his English home, and gathered his
household gods about him, and had found
that they planted a fixed foot. They
would not willingly seek Lavinn shores
Weybridge. being communicated with, Of
fered a handsome advance upon the salary
Sir Eustace had paid him. but still he OBJ
jected to he moved, and it was not until
Mrs. Weybridge enoroached, to the extent Of
ESQ pounds year upon her own ample sup
ply of pin money, that he consented.
All this time Hetheridge had been living
In the surety of escape from all possible
consequences Of his crime. He cherished
that insane belief even whilst the crime
poisoned every well-spring Of bis life and
made his days and nights a slow drawn In
escapable purgatOry. He was at once the
torturer and the executioner. Nothing is
eternally the same, and there we're changes
in his sutferings, and even spells of repose,
but he never knew when the mandate would
issue for the self-infiiction OF new agonies-
Sometimes for a week together, he could
be alone at night time without fear, but as
q rule solitude in darkness was the one
thing he most dreaded in the world. After
all hts main mis- Inv in, ba hat ba
had achieved the one purpose 70 which his
whole being had been bent. Could he
have slain his enemy and have had him still
to slay. the pangs of conscience would have
mattered nothing. and the excitement of
hate and hope would have upborne him be-
yond the reach of fear. But Redwood had
escaped him by the one gateway through
which he could not pass. Hetheridge's own
hand had robbed him of his one great aim.
his one delight, his pre-occupation, his
solace, his hope his almost everything.
He could not escape from the knowledge
of the fact his passion for Mrs. Redwood
was not what it had been. He had always
had vulgar amours, the nearest animalisms,
in which affection had no place, but Ellice
had always been the one woman in the
world to him, and in spite Of the failing ma
ture of his desire for her, she was 30 still.
He knew full well that there could be no
more hope Of happiness or even of duh
commitment for him. He knew that even
is he should win her regard, which seemed
improbable, and should secure her for his
wife, her presence in his house would be a
continuous threat and terror to him, and
yet there was something, in spite of cold
judgment aud fading desire, which prompt
cd him to pursue. II she resisted him until
the end, his revenge upon George Redwood,
baffled already by its very nature, would be
incomplete indeed.
His business affairs had assumed such n
magnitude and complexity that he some
times grew giddy in tho contemplation Of
them. By this time he was a millionaire,
but he found his wealth of little advantage
TO him, apart from the fact that it afforded
him the wherewithal for an exciting and
protracted gamble which did in some meas
ure absorb his mind and hold him from the
consideration of those terrible and unwel-
come themes which waited on his leisure. lt
had grown to be a regular habit with him to
visit Wellsted for the first Sunday of the
month"; arriving on the Saturday afternoon
and leaving by the first train on Monday
morning. On these occasions he invariably
made two cerenonious visits, one to the
Rev. Jordan Farrell, where he awkwardly
inspected little Ellice, feeling abashed and
clumsy in her presence, and the other to
Mrs. Redwood, who, though she received
him with an unchauging cold kindness, had
no power TO put him at his ease. AS time
went on, be dropped hints, sometimes yelled
and reticeut, but oftener awkwarkly Ill
concealed, az to the purports of his visits.
These conveyed no information to Mrs.
Redwood's mind, for she had long since rec
oSnized his purpose. In a way, she was
sorry for him, for she thought him honest
and devoted. Mrs. Weybridge occasionally
rallied her on her coldness to a sutton, who,
at all events on the financial side, was so
desirable.
"You know, dear" she would say. "the
man ia dying to marry you. You've only
TO give him the least bit OF encouragement.
A million is q large sum, and there are not
many men who are allowed to go wooing
with il uusuccessfully."
Mrs. Redwood would have none of him.
Perhaps II poor Georges death had been
less tragic she might have learned, in course
of time, as other women had done before
and have done since them, to accept conso-
lation, but as things stood her heart was in
the coffin there with Caesar, and there was
no remotest hope OF its coming back to her
The whole township of Wellsted thought
the more of her for having SO wealthy a
suitor and what with her own modest COM
petence and the countenance afforded her by
Mrs. Weybridge, she occupied a better So
cial position by this time than she had ever
hoped for during her husbands life. She
so far as it affected herself alone, afforded
her little qualification, though for her boy IS
sake, she could find the heart to be glad OF
it. George was just turned Is, was grow
ing to be the very image of his father. and
was the apple of the Widows eye. There
was no making the lad effeminate, or there
might have been some danger to him In the
natural selishness of the bereaved mother
intense affection. She could scarcely bear
to trust him from her sight, and when his
spirit of boyish adventure led him away, as
it did often, she would conjure up more
mishaps in the course of a spring morning
than would have made a chapter of acci.
dents for one unfortunate lifetime.
1t came about that on the very dav on
which Andre Dom entered upon his duties
at Weybridge Hall, Hetheridge made the
first deviation from his settled habit, and
month upon a Wednesday, After long
butfeting to and fro, he had at length made
up his mind to speak to Ellice Redwood.
His purpose had burned in him with an I'M
expected warmth for days, aud had grown
hotter than ever as the train bore him down
from London through the flat southeastern
country. But by the time he had reached
the town be had gone cold upon it. The
figure of George Redwood stood between
himself and Redwood's wife, and he felt
that he scarcely dared the proposed encoun-
ter. His wandering indeterminate footsteps
led him away from the town when he landed
at the railway station, which in the last
year or two had intruded on the sleepy quiet
of the place. and il was not until an hours