The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-09-26
CHAPTER VII.


land. She had kind of grave sweetness
and distant charm which made her no
table at any table or in any ballroom.
Indeed it soon became apparent that she
was to be the pleasant talk, the interest
of the season. This was tolerably COM
forting to the Ar1nours. Again Rich
ards prophecy had been fulfilled, and
as he sat alone at Greyhope and read
The Morning Post, noticing Lali's name
at distinguished gatherings, or, picking
up The World, saw how the lion hunt
ers talked extravagantly of her, he took
some satisfaction to himself that he had
foreseen her triumph where others look
ed for her downfall. Lali herself was
not elated. 1t gratifed her. but she had
been an angel and very unsatisfactory
one, if it had not done so.
As her confidence grew Though out
wardly she had never appeared to lack
it greatly she did not hesitate to speak
of herself as an Indian, her country as
q good country and her people as no
BILE If dispossessed racial the more
SO if she thought reference to her ma
tionality and past was being rather con-
spicuously avoided. She had asked
General Armour for an interview with
her husbands solicitor. This was grant
ed. When she met the solicitor, she
asked him to send no newspaper to her
husband containing any reference to
herself, nor yet to mention her in his
letters.
She had never directly received line
from him but once, and that was after
she had come to know the truth about
his marriage with her. She could read
in the conventional sentences, made
simple as for a child, the strained po-
liteness and his absolute silence as to
whether or not child had been born to
them, the utter absence Of affection for
her. She had also induced General Ar
mour and his wife to give her husbands
solicitor no information regarding the
birth Of the child. There was thus ap-
parently no more inducement for him
to hurry back to England than there
was when he had sent her off on his
mission of retaliation, which had been
such an ignominious failure, for the
humiliation of his family had been short
lived, the affront to Lady Haldwell
nothing at all. The Armours had not
been human if they had failed to enjoy
their daughter r-in-law' success. Al
though they never perhaps would quite
recover from the disappointment con-
cerning Lady Agnes Martling, the result
was SO much better than they in their
cheerfullest moments dared hope for
that they appeared genuinely content.
To their grandchild they were devot-
edly attached Marion was his faithful
slave and admirer, SO much SO that Cap
tain Vidal, who now and then was
permitted to see the child, declared him
self jealous. He and Marion were to be
married soon. The wedding had been
delayed owing to his enforced absence
abroad. Mrs. Edward Lambert, once
Mrs. Townley, shyly regretted in Lali's
presence that the child or enc as sweet
was not hers Her husband evidently
shared her opinion from the exraordi-
nary notice he took of it when his wife
was not present. Not that Richard Jo-
seph Armour, Jr., was always en- evil
dence, but when asked for by his faith
full friends and admirers he was amia-
bly, produced.
Meanwhile Frank Armour across the
sea was engaged with many things
His business concerns had not prospered
prodigiously, chiefly because his judg-
ment, as his temper, had grown some-
what uncertain. His popularity in the
Hudson bay country had been at some
tension since he had shipped his wife
away to England. Even the ordinary
savage mind saw something unusual
and undomestic in it, ant the general
hospitality declined a little. Armour
did not Immediately guess the cause,
but one day about year after his wife
had gone he found occasion to reprove
q half breed, by name Jacques Pontiac,
and Jacques, with more honesty than
politeness, said some hard words and
asked how, much he paid for his Eng
lish hired devils to kill his wife. Strange
to say, he did not resent this startling
remark. 1t set him to thinking. He be-
gan to blame himself for not having
written oftener to his people-and to
his wife He wondered how far his re-
venge had succeeded. He was most
ashamed Of it now. He knew that he
had done a dishonorable thing. The
more he thought upon it the more angry
with himself he became. Yet he dread
cd to go back to England and face it
all--the reproach Of his people, the
amusement Of society, his wife herself.
he never attempted to picture her as a
civilized being He scarcely knew her
when he married her. She knew him
much better, for primitive people are
quicker in the play Of their passions,
and she had come to love him before he
had begun to notice her at all.
Presently he ate his heart out with
modification. To be yoked forever to--a
savagel Itwas horrible Their children?
It was strange he had not thought of
that before Children? He shrugged his
shoulders. There might possibly be a
child, but children - never! But he
doubted even regarding a child, for no
word had come to him concerning that
possibility. He was even most puzzled
at the tone and substance of their let
ters. From the beginning there had
been no reproaches, no excitement, no
railing, but studied kindness and con-
ventionai statements, through which
Mrs. Armour's solicitous affection
scarcely ever peeped. He had shot his
bolt and got--consideration, almost i'm
perturbability. They appeared TO treat
the matter as though hewere wild
youth who would yet mend his ways.
He read over their infrequent letters to
him; his to them had been, still more
infrequent. Inone there was thestate-