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BITTER SWEETS:

A LOVE STORY.

BY JOSEPH HATTON,

AUTHOR OF THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF JACOB MORRISTON," ETC.

CHAPTER XXIII.

A PAINFUL DISCOVERY.

THEY had gathered in the hay round about Summerdale; the hops. far away beyond the church had been pruned; the bream and the trench had spawned in the river, the grayling had made havoc amongst the flies; and the old town of Summerdale slumbered on. So slowly and yet so swiftly did time pass away, that the ripening of the corn followed, and the gathering in of the crops, and the browning of the leaves, and the falling of the apples, ere it was hardly remembered that the hay was stacked. In truth the seasons came and went so silently, and so gradually that Summerdale hardly noticed the transitions.

Paul Massey's health had not improved. Indeed his condition had caused Mrs. Massey so much uneasiness, that she had induced Paul to go to London and obtain advice. She had accompanied him thither in the early part of the autumn; and all that the great man whom Paul consulted had said to Mrs. Massey, after his private interview with Paul, was that her husband must not be over anxious about things, must not study too much, or work too hard it would do him good to travel.

This was inexplicable to Mrs. Massey, and Paul said it was the custom of the profession to exaggerate the ailments of their patients.

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"I sometimes think you conceal some trouble from me," Anna said afterwards. "That is mistaken, love, if you do, dear Paul."

But Paul changed the subject, and said he was much better, and he appeared to be so for a few days after their return to Summerdale.

His wife's account of her interview with Mr. Evans had greatly interested Paul, and after kissing his daughter, his first question was about their frequent visitor.

Kate said he had not called during the three days they were away, and the gardener had said that Mr. Evans had left the town.

Both Paul and his wife very much regretted this. Evans would be sure to return; and she was right.

Anna said Mr.

In the course of a fortnight he came back again. The trees were stripped of their leaves; and a bright fire was leaping up the big diningroom chimney of Oak House. Paul was playing chess with his wife, and Kate, with her long brown hair hanging about her white shoulders, was looking on.

A knock at the door startled them; but they were all glad to receive Mr. Evans, for he was a pleasant companion, and his history was deeply interesting to the Masseys.

"We are very glad to see you again,” said Anna.

"Welcome back to Summerdale, mister truant," said Paul heartily. "Did you think I should not return?" said George.

"Oh, no," was Anna's quick reply.

Mr. Grey sat down; the chessmen were put aside; wine and spirits were brought forth; and a pleasant chat commenced. The truant soon told them that he had been to Helswick, and that he did not find it much altered. When Kate had gathered up her wealth of hair, and gone to bed, Mr. Evans said to Paul he supposed Mrs. Massey had told him about her discovery. Paul confessed as much, and said how greatly it had surprised him.

To talk about Helswick seemed now a greater relief than ever to George Grey. He told them of every well known spot, and of the few changes which had taken place. He had heard of his sons, he said, and of his wife, though nobody knew him again. It was a bitter lot his, he said; but it was some comfort to know that those whom he left behind him had prospered, that they had not known want. The thought that they might have done so had cost him many a weary, sleepless night, when he was far away. He was glad she had not suffered in a worldly sense; a bad conscience was a sufficient punishment to any guilty soul.

How everybody and everything told Paul of his terrible crime! It seemed as if nothing could take place, as if a dozen words could not be spoken without his guilt being alluded to in covert bitterness.

Mrs. Massey said she was glad Mr. Grey had come home in a more settled state of mind.

"Yes," he said, "I shall go back a happier man." "Go back, where?" said Anna.

"To Melbourne."

"And when ?"

"In the spring."

"But suppose you were to discover that your wife was not guilty," said Anna.

"Ah, it is useless to attempt to buoy me up with false hopes. The proofs were too strong. No, Mrs. Massey, I am better contented now. She is living in comfort, and with her sons."

Anna made a memorandum in her mind to make a trip to Maryport; but increased anxieties concerning her husband postponed the intended journey.

Whilst they were talking so cosily round the blazing fire, the wind rose, and blew gustily about the old house, and Paul thought of the sea, as he always did, when the wind was high. It blew the leafless elms about in the Summerdale Square, and the old stocks creaked and groaned as George Grey passed them on his way home.

The wind blew loudly elsewhere, and at Maryport amongst other places—screaming amongst the shipping, and shaking the houses. Indeed, the same wind which troubled Paul Massey, and which rumbled in the chimney of the low, old-fashioned room in which George Grey was fast asleep and dreaming of Helswick, shook the window of the little diningroom, at Purdown, where Frank Grey and his mother were having a quiet chat before retiring to bed. Mrs. Grey had become more affectionate in her manner towards Frank, since the night, long ago now, when she had come home in tears from that painful interview with poor Bessie Martin; and of late she had said much less about her son Richard than formerly, whatever she might have thought.

"I believe I saw that poor girl the other evening, mother," said Frank, with his feet upon the fender.

"Bessie?" said Mrs. Grey inquiringly, and with a sigh.

"Yes; but I may be mistaken—I hope I am. There was rather a noisy upper-box full of persons at the theatre, last night-it was the Mayor's bespeak as you know-and in the front of the box was a girl whom I could not help thinking, all the night, must be Bessie Martin."

"Poor thing!" said Mrs. Grey, looking into the fire and waiting for Frank to proceed with his story.

Her hair was very black, her eye bright and large; in fact, every feature corresponded with your description. Poor soul, I could hardly follow the play for looking at her, and I was rallied about it by a friend who was with me. He little knew my thoughts, mother! How often people are deceived when they think they are amazingly clever.

Mrs. Grey sighed, and looked mournfully up at her son. "Poor' Bessie!" she said, "I have wished sometimes that she were dead; but I fear, I fear, it is worse than that.'

“I can hear no tidings of Dick," said Frank, after a short pause,

"but I daresay he is all right; he would not have given up his situation, you may depend upon that, mother, unless he had something better to go to; you mustn't trouble about him," said Frank cautiously, and like one feeling his way.

"Trouble, Frank! I cannot help it; I have learnt to disguise my feelings, of late years, and to check my tongue, but my heart is unchanged, and therefore I cannot help its yearning after your brother. Ah, you don't know what it is to be a mother."

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No," said Frank; and he could not resist a smile, though he went up to his mother, and kissing her forehead, said: “I do not, but I know what it is to love a mother."

"My dear boy, you have been very kind to me, and I have often behaved ungratefully," said Mrs. Grey, the remembrance of some peevish fits occurring to her. "But you must admit, Frank, that you were a little to blame in your treatment of Richard; you did not think enough about his earlier years, and the thoughts and ideas which he had got from Mat Duncan."

"Don't hesitate, mother-relieve your mind," said Frank kindly, when his mother paused and looked doubtfully into his eyes.

"If he were never to write to me again, Frank, if I knew that he hated me, I could forgive him; because I know that his mind has been perverted, the same as the mind of another who left me when you were children."

It was useless for Frank to discuss this question with his mother, and he never did. Had he done so she would by degrees have worked herself up into a denunciation of everybody-including even poor Bessie Martin-as betrayers of her poor son's innocence.

"Well, now I shall say good-night, mother," said Frank, putting his arm round her.

"That's what you always say when we talk upon this subject; but I do not blame you, my dear boy-good—”

She did not finish the sentence but exclaimed excitedly : that?"

"What, mother?" said Frank, listening.

"That noise."

"Oh, the wind; why, mother, you are getting nervous."

"What was

"There have been two burglaries in this very parish, Frank," said Mrs. Grey, "this week."

"It does not follow that there is to be third here, mother," said Frank.

An hour afterwards Mrs. Grey rose from her bed, and drew up her blind. The wind had gone down, and all was quiet. The gas which usually lighted that portion of the thoroughfare, which passed by the bottom of the garden, was extinguished; blown out by the wind no doubt, thought Mrs. Grey. Whilst she was thinking so, she thought something stirred in the garden. At first it was like a cautious footstep; then it

was as if a bolt was removed; then it was like the turning of a lock. "How nervous I am to be sure," said Mrs. Grey, listening again for a moment, and then returning to bed. But she could not sleep. Either she was nervous or there was something strange going on below stairs. She went up to Frank's room; but Frank was fast asleep, and she did not like to awaken him.

She never was a coward, and she determined to go cautiously the back way into the kitchen. Listening at every step and creeping on in the dark, Mrs. Grey at last stood at the bottom of the stairs.

A gleam of light flashed out from the kitchen, and then disappeared. A hurried remark was made in a whisper, by some person to another, and then a second flash of light. Mrs. Grey was almost petrified with alarmı, notwithstanding her courage.

The light came towards her. She stepped aside, concealed by the door, which was pushed forward, and two men passed her. The light shone upon the foremost one for a moment, and Mrs. Grey had nearly screamed aloud.

They ascended the stairs cautiously and entered the dining-room. She could hear them overhead; but she did not move. Had they gone further she would have followed, fearing that injury might befal Frank, whom she prayed might sleep on.

The minutes were like hours. The quarter of an hour during which the burglars occupied themselves in the rooms above was like an age to Mrs. Grey, in her hiding place.

heard upon the stairs,

At length footsteps, silent cautious steps, were and the light from the dark lantern flashed again in the kitchen; and in a few minutes more the men were gone.

Mrs. Grey crept out silently from her place of concealment and went up-stairs upon tip-toe again to Frank's room.

"Thank God!" she said to herself when she heard him still asleep, and then she staggered back to her own room and crept shivering and trembling into bed.

The next morning when the robbery was discovered Mrs. Grey said nothing. She was pale, and ill, and like one beside herself; so Frank made as little of the affair as he could. He gave the police a list of the articles stolen; it included about thirty pounds taken from a bureau in the dining-room, sundry old coins, a dozen of silver spoons, and as many forks, an old-fashioned silver watch with the initials "G. G." upon the back, and several other minor things of no great importance.

A well-known detective officer examined the house and its fastenings, and explained how the thieves had got in, as well as if he had seen them. There were footmarks near the kitchen window, through which they had entered, and it was not unlikely, he said, that these footmarks would prove strong evidence against the thieves if they were captured, which it was very likely they would be, and that evening.