Hot Springs weekly star. (Hot Springs, S.D.) 1892-1917, 1896-09-11
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CHAPTER X,
"But. AIycrnOn-"

81 will have it so, or else shall have
to obey the commonest rules of prudence;
to think exclusively of my own health and
to net accordingly. OF course YOU can for
ward my wishes or thwart them. as You
please. I have not lived so long in the
world without being keenly alive to the
amount-the sickening amount-of heart
less seltshness that prevails. have no
right, of course, also, to expect to lind
an exception in your ladyship's case
But"
"Algernon, dear Algcrnon-"
But l have the right, and shall en-
force it, to demand consideration not
merely for the wishes, but for the welfare
of an ailing and suffering perhaps dying
husband. L shall make arrangements
for a protracted stay at Davos or ut st.
Moritz, unless you choose to exert your
self, as duty dictates. My health has
brought me to Yorkshire, as, before long
it may probably take me to the Upper
Engadine or elsewhere. | hear good re-
ports of the Rocky Mountains. and of
wonderful cures effected among log-cabins
high up in Colorado. but, if consent to
stay here, l must protest against being
moped to DEATH"
This last speech, emphatically cnunci-
ated from amid the downy pillows and
wadded wraps of his equity chair by the
Right Honorable the Earl of Thorsdale,
did strike his perturbpd countess as be-
ing suprcmely unjust and veXatiously pro-
voking. Lady Thorsdale, however, could
not afford to be provoked. Her lord was
in very truth lord to her. He was II
mlsterful invalid, but at any rate he be-
lieved in himself, and in the ailments of
which he complained so querulously.
Lord Thorsdale rode his present hobby
very hard. His wife, Constance, had been
daughter of the late Sir Richard Mort
main. and was a sister of the rcigning
Sir Richard. She had hard time of it.
She was handsomc-most of the Mort
mains had been liundsome--,lnd frivolous,
and had still some pretensions to take
rank as professional beauty in London
drawing rooms. Nor was she unfit to
hold her own, had she but an ordinary
husband to deal with. But she was quite
incompetent to resist the energetic will of
her earl. who carried all before him by
dint of fluent discourse. a resolutc self
isEness and the magician's wand that
ready money supplies. Only last June he
had hurried his wife off to the Engadine
for two months residence among the
snow-sllOwers. cOw-shcds and general dis
comforts of that enchanting region. lcav
ing little Lord Thirsk and little Lady
Flora nj home. The year before he had
chosen to waft the entire family i'll his
steam yacht. the "Hecla." first to Ice
lind. and later to the glacial const of
Greenland itself: and what the countess
had endured from milges. the glare of
the Arctic summer sun. solitude. and the
terror of the Arctic icebergs and ice foes.
even her lady correspondents only par
tally knew. Now. at the end of June.
this impetnous earl had abruptly rushed
down TO Thorsdale. declaring that no
place was worse than London for his tor
menting gout; and. once i'll Yorkshire. had
proclaimed that il was designed TO kill
him by mental depression and physical
isolation. because the big lonely mansion
did not swarm with visitors.
But if you will leave London so early.
you can't-indccd you can't-bring Lon
don along with YOU" pleaded the coun-
tess. half crying as she spoke.
II don't know that!" snapped the earl
from among his cushions. .'1'hcrc are
people to be had always who are sick
of the worry and racket of that precious
season which 10 yon seems like Mecca to
the Moslem. In my state of health
must consider myself shamefully neg
lected as am Either this place must be
enlivened-and you used to like that sort
of tling--or else the sooner I send for
Schultz the courier. and pack up for the
Engadine, the better"
"Ah, we'll! 1 think can manage it,"
said Lady Thorsdale to herself; and then
she began to write. Her pen flew fast
across the perfumed and coroneted paper.
Presently, when the pretty perfumed
notes lay strewed in heaps upon the ivory
table. the countess conceived a bright
idea. She had heard through the tattle
Of servants-for there was little of fra
ternal intercourse kept up between her.
self and the baronet-that Sir Richard
Mortmain was at Helston, hard by, and
that he seemed disposed to stay there.
Now. Lady Thorsdalc was not on very in
timate terms with her brother. There
had been some unpleasantness in their
fathers lifetime about the marriage por-
tion of the countess expcctant. Richards
signature was required for the raising of
the necessary sum, and Richard would
sign nothing without being handsomely
paid for 1t. And then his dubious re-
pute, and the queer things that were whis-
HsASN SVASSAu.M6 AAAA duU liz 80SOGNIGA.
had caused eoldness to exist between
the present master Of Mortmain and hi.
sister ennobled. Now, however. she ls--
thought her OF her brother, of his tac,.
Of his social resources, and of what ST.
had seen him do when he chose to mal,.
himself agreeable. 80 she penncd h:
the sweetest of little sistcrly notes. CO.,
graduating herself on having him as ;.
neighhor. warmly inviting him to Tho-r
dale, and cntreating hin, 10 be- charitah..
enough TO do his best to brighten up the
old house, and aid to enliren Door dear
Algernon in the blues. And she signed
herself his ''cver affectionate sister Con-
stance Thorsdale," and she sent off the
aetter by mounted groom.
Sir Richard Mortmain, when he read his
sister's charming little epist,c, smiled as
Aephistopheles or Talleyrand might have
done. "Conny wants somcthing!" he re-
marked, grimly; $50 do 1. This win help
me with the Woodbnrn Parsonage people
better than she dreams Of
CHA 1NtslryR Nj