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4‘11 CHAPTER XXV. MI'S.- Darnley was Slttmg in her under the present ones, no," charming little drawing-room, which, all dismantled as it had been when she had departed for Nice, yet looked cosy and pretty in the afternoon dusk and the fireglow. She was resting back luxuriously, glancing through a pile of letters which await-ed her, one of which was from Lady Burton, giving a long and exultant account of dear Maude’s engagement to the young :Sir Richard Boothby, one of the catches of the matrimonial market. “Boothby!” sneere-d Mrs. Darn» ley, as she flung the effusion into the fire. “It should be Boodle, as being nearer noodle'l Poor creaâ€" ture! I suppose he has been caught blindfolded. \Vell, if all reports concerning him are true, they will be well matchedâ€"not a brain between them!” With which kind remark Mrs. Darnley took up her tea and sipped it. The sneer left her face after a while, and a frown came instead, contracting her smooth, handsome brows. “After all, brains do not mean everything; if one’s children are lunaticsâ€"well, they can be man- aged so much the better.” It had been a bitter blow to Mrs. Darnley that her son should have been so utterly crushed by Nancy Hamilton’s apparent falseness and her speedy marriage, and in'her heart there was a strong wave of jealousy to strengthen the dislike» she had always felt for poor Nancy. “I shall speak openly to Derâ€" rick,” she mused on, “and tell him it is his bounden duty to marry Dorothy. The girl is over" head and ears in love with him, and the marriage is desirable in every way. 'l'hank Heaven that creature is saf ly out of his path; it was a strong measure, but a good one, and I don’t regret my share in havâ€" ing given her a husband and a fortune.” ' And yet an uncomfortable ex- pression passed over Mrs. Darn~ ley’s cold, haughty face as she said this to herself, an expression which deepened into something almost like consternation, as the door was opened at that moment and her maid announce-d: “Mrs. Crawshaw.” Mrs. Darnley put down her tea cup with a. hand that trembled slightly, then rose to her feet. “Mrs. Crawshaw E” she repeated, as if doubting her ears; then suave- ly. “This is indeed a surprise! To what do I owe the honor of this visit '2” Nancy flung back her thick veil; her face "was very pale, but calm. “I wish to speak to you on a very important subject,”-she an- swered, quietly; “I shall detain you only a few moments. The. importance of my business must be- my excuse for this intrusion.” Mrs. Darnley bowed. “Will you sit down, and may I give you some tea? Pray‘ excuse the very bald appearance of my room, Mrs. Crawshaw, I really did not anticipate any visitors; I am returning to Nice almost immediâ€" ately.” Nancy did not take the chair placed for her. she felt she must get to her subject at once. She came a step nearer, refusing with a gesture the offered tea. “Mrs. Darnley,” she said, hur~ ricdly, “will you answer me one question? You must forgive me for] putting this question to you, but my position is a desperate one, and it is no tiine for false sentiment. "What question can you have to ask me?” Mrs. Darnley spoke eoldly and rcsentfully. but her handsimovcd nervously, all the same, as she re- placed the tea cup on the tray. Nancy’s blue eyes rested upon her for an instant. “I want to ask you this »â€" were you aware of the reason which. forced me to become Thomas Craw- shaw's wife?” Mrs. Darnley paused, then she unvaricated. “This is, indeed, an extraordinâ€" gry question,” she said. in sharp, dear tones; “I really fail to un- n‘rmtmd you. Mrs. Crawshaw.” .++++++++++++M+ H0 it++++++++++4v+++++++ ++_+. Bill 1, I OR, A LOOK INTO THE PAST + ‘ _ . i lfi¥¢+~+~+~~+~~+w+.*.+~~+~'+-°°++'°'+-"+'°‘+'°'+"'4"°'+“'t"'+"‘+"ifi' “Under ordinary circumstances I grant it would be extraordinary; t e girl answered, feeling all at once that she was getting close to the truth. “Two nights ago my hus- band, in a drunken fit of madness, attempted to take my life; before he did this, however, be poured out a torrent of abuse upon me, and mingling in with this he taunted me with having been easily deâ€" ceived, declaring that he had trick- ed me into marrying him, and that youâ€"you, Mrs. Darnley, had helped him. I have come to you to know if this be true? If I am wronging you by asking the ques- tion, I will humbly beg you to par- don me.” ’ There was dead silence in the room, broken only by the ticking of the clock; then Mrs. Darnley rose from her chair and faced the girl. “And if I say that it is true," she said, with strange deliberation, “what then?” Nancy shrank back from her. “Whatâ€"what could have made you do such a thing?” broke from her pale lips. “What had I ever done to you that you should deâ€" liberately wreck my life, my whole happiness, as you have done?” “I will tell you what you did,” the other returned, fiercely, “you stole my son’s heart from me; you crept in where'I should have been alone; you bewitched him, and it was necessary to save him from you.” Nancy stood motionless, speech- less, and the other woman, seeing this, went on swiftly, moving rest- lessly to and fro as she spoke. “I did not intend to stand by and see my son ruin himself and his career for you; if it had 'to be- done again, I would do it. After all, what do you want more? You have money, and money can do much for persons of your status.” The insult made Nancy wince. She half turned away, but as she was going she looked back. “I beg to tell you that my soli~ citors will require you to confirm what you have just told me,” she said, in a quiet, very cold tone. Mrs. Darnley started as if she had ben shot. ' . “Whatâ€"what are you going to do?” she asked, hurriedly, for once frightened out of her calmness. “You surely are not mad enough to think you can get freedom through this?” ' “Mad or no, I'am going to try,” was the girl’s firm answer. Mrs. Darnley gasped. In that second, visions of dis- grace, public dishonor, perhaps punishmentâ€"for if she had not ac- tually forged that letter of Henry Chaplin’s, which had been the chief instrument in working on the girl’s mind, she had been a consenting and active party to the fraud â€" flashed hideously clear before her eyes. This must be prevented at all hazardâ€"at any cost. “And Derrickâ€"haveâ€"have you no thought for him?” she murmur- ed, huskily. “Ifâ€"if you do thisâ€" I shall be disgraced, and my shame will be his shame.” A mist rose before Nancy’s eyes, she paused. Then she said in a low voice: “Your son has nothing to fear; he has done nothing dishonorable â€"your shame cannot touch him.” Mrs. Darnley drew a deep breath. She had one more card left, she must play it without delay; it was a cruel, a wicked act, but there was no other escape from the net that was closing round her. Bending forward, her face white to the lips, she looked at Nancy. “Don’t be so easily deceived,” she murmured, “if I am dishonor- ed, so will Derrick be also, since â€"â€"since he too, was party to the trick, as you call it, which gave you, a pcnniless girl, such a mag- nificent fortune! Yesâ€"Derrick stands with me in this.” “It can’t be trueâ€"it can’t be 1)) true . . Nancy stretched out henliands 'and retreated till she reached the wall, where she rested a- moment, stunned, overwhelmed with this awful statement. The mother waited with sickenâ€" ing anxiety for the girl to speak, and as no words passed the strain- ed, white lips, she spoke herself: “Do you know why he did this? â€"because he wished to be free, and yet see you well cared for. He thought it was for your good to marry this other manâ€"my son is poor andâ€"” But Nancy stopped her with an imperative gesture. “Don’t say another word,” she said, in low, husky tones; “Iâ€"I have heard enough.” “And you will do nothing? Promise me you will do nothing.” Mrs. Darnley almost knelt in her eagerness and despair. Nancy looked at her in silence. There was no need for words. Her eyes spoke when her lips refused to move, and after a while she turned away and walked steadily out of the room, out into the cheerâ€" ' less streets, with a heart as cold as ice in her young breast. Mrs. Darnley stood motionless for nearâ€" ly a quarter of an hour when she was alone. Then she shuddered. She felt abased, degraded by what she had done. “Derrick, it was for you ~â€"- for you 1” she. whispered, and she shivered again. “What an escape 1” she muttered, pacing to and fro. “But am I safe? Will she betray me?” She passed her hot hands over her eyes, then, as the vision of Nancy’s face returned to her, she drew a deep breath; it was. an expression of convincing relief: Derrick would never know the truth from Crawshaw’s wife. Then Mrs. Darnley started, and came to a standstill. Her quick ears had caught the sound of footâ€" steps running up the stairs. She had forgotten until then that the hour she had appointed to see her son was near. . . “He is coming,” she said to her- self, and with a swift movement she flung herself into her chair and took up her book. The strong call on her nerves brought back her real self. “How fortunate that she has been gone so long! A quarter of an hour earlier they must have met,” she thought, and the next moment she was greeting Derrick with her usual cold smile, and not a sign of the humiliation she had felt so surely left on her handâ€" some face. :IE * ~3- * 9(- Janet watched and waited for Nancy’s return, and as hour passed hour she grew nervous. “What can have happened?” she mused, anxiously. She stood all the time at; the little window gaz- ing down the street, and in her hand was crushed a telegram. “Can she have seen? Can she know already?” she muttered again and again. “But it seems impossible. Who could tell her? Thank Heaven I sent that young lady at Ripstone Hall our address! If I hadn’t done that we should never have known this news. Dearâ€"dear! I wlsh she would come!” And at that very moment her sharp eyes described the slender, black-robed figure walking wearily along. “I have been nearly frightened out of my life, ma’am,” she cried, as she ran to greet Nancy and draw_ her into the room. "Dear heart, how cold and white you look!” And. forgetful of all else, Janet began to chafe the girl’s icy hands and remove 'her bonnet and cloak. “I am all right only tired-â€"only tired 3” i Then Nancy‘s eyes fell on the buff-colored envelope Janet had thrown hastily on the table. “What is that, Janet? What has happened?” Her eys grew wide with fear. Was she traced already? “Can you bear some great news, ma’am? Yes, I see you can. You are as strong and brave as a lion. You see, I disobeyed you, ma’am, and let Miss Leicester know you were safe, for I thought the poor young lady would fret her heart out, maybe, when she heard what had happened that night. I’ve heard from her every morning since I wrote, God bless her! and now she has sent this Let me hold vour hand, child, while you read it.” Nancy’s heart seemed to rise in her throat. For one instant she could see nothing plainly, the next moment she was staring down at the written words, her fatigue, misery,. Derrick Darnley’s cruel treachery, all forgotten, as she read: ' ' ”Bring your mistress once. ME. Crawshaw morning.” (To be continued.) here at died this AN ORIENTAL DETECTIVE. Teapot Was Used to Find Money and Jewels. Tea may be considered as a drink I l [ THE PRESERVING TEST | FOR NEARLY 60 YEARS EXTRA GRANLATD SUGAR ' has stood the searching test of preserving time. This is only possible because of its consistent high quality. FROM YOUR GRO CER. f' The Canada sugar Refining 00., Limited, Montreal of thesages, but one would hardly expect the teapot to play the part of a_ judge. Yet Margaret Cotter Morison says in “A Lonely Summer in Kashmir” that not infrequently 1t.is called upon to perform that function as well as its legitimate one: The author, in one of her tenting trips, lost a box containing one hundred rupees and some jew- elry. Knowing that it must have been stolen in the night, she call- ed for her servants. They showed much surprise and distress. They searched the woods, and found the empty box thrown away by the thieves in their haste. I sent for the native police. They proved to be more curious and picâ€" turesque than effective. They would arrive each morning in a bevy of over a dozen, tell the servants opâ€" enly that they suspected them, and s1t in a ring and crossâ€"question them for endless hours, trying to trick them into saying something which could be taken as an acknow- ledgment of guilt. In vain I tried to pornt out that this would only put them on their guard; it was to no purpose. The police were too happy over the bustle and import- ance the occasion offered to adopt outside suggest-ions. , In one elaborate function I was asked to take part. I was placed in solemn state in an easy chair in front of the hut, and round stood a wide circle of turbanned natives. In front of me, on the ground, squatted the chief of police; to my relief, he could talk no English. My young cook squatted opposite; a small native teapot was placed between them, and close at hand Established in 1854 by John Redpath. NIAGARA DISTRICT NEEDS PROTECTION. Enough Peaches in Georgia Alone to Supply America. The relationship between Can- ada and the United States as re- gards the fruit industry, and the manifest need of. a Protective tariff for Canadian fruit growers have been clearly shown in a series of articles by Dr. George Charles Buchanan of Beamsville, Ont., Pre- sident of the Ontario and Western Coâ€"operative Society. Dealing with the Niagara peninsula Dr. Buchanan says 2â€"â€" There are in the Niagara Penin- sula about 350 square miles of land on which fruit can be well grown, not counting such districts as Arr- caster and Dundas. Between T0- ronto and Hamilton there is an- other 100 square miles; in all at least 288,000 acres. Not all of this is peach land, not even probably 20 per cent. of it. But very little of it is of no use for any fruit. Much can be made fine peach land by drainage, or good apple, plum or grape land; some is only good for berries, but all of it is in a good fruit climate. The unplanted land is waiting to double or quadruple in value, whenever the market demands more fruit. - It may be' assumed that the value of this land for general farming is not over $100 per acre, and that for fruit purposes it is worth $500 per acre; although much of the peach land is worth $1,000 per acre; and that where it has to be drain-ed, draining will average about $20 per acre. It ca nfurther be. state-d that peach land at $1,000 per acre is five tightly rolled scrolls of paper, known to pay a good return on the on which, I was told, were writ- investment in the hands of practiâ€" ten the names of my five servants, one on each. , The teapot had a broad rim round the top. The chief of the police on one side,’ and the cook on the othâ€" er, each placed a finger under the rim, and held the vessel loosely suspended between them. Placing one of the scrolls in the spout, the policeman explained that if the paper held the name of the thief the vessel would give sign. Two papers passed the ordeal. When the third was put in, the teapot made a semirevolution, and almost fell from the hands. There was intense interest. The inspector put aside the paper, re- marking that in it was the name of the thief. At the fourth scroll the teapot swerved again, but remainâ€" cal growers. If We take the very low estimate of 10,000 acres plant- ed at $500 per acre we have a value of $50,000,000 for the orchard and berry lands. Now as our home market grows, and in our home market we have no competition, every acre of this 288,000 has potentially the same value, and fully half is unplanted. There are in Canada about 8,000,‘ 4 000 people, the United States claim 93,000,000. However that may be, our present soft fruit acre- age is fully equal to supplying Canada. It is safe to say there it not over 12,000 acres of peaches in Eastern Canada. If this suppliel 8,000,000 people it would také 150,000 acres to supply 93,000,00‘ ed immovable ‘dlllflingv the tlest oflthe people, but there are 180,000 acre! hm" The 3010 S “319 t 1en mm" ,of peaches in Georgia alone. oughly shuffled and a second trial given them. The teapot made its signs at the two same names. The inspector then said that, as I was so tender of my servants’ welfare, they would be given chance of restoration before they were accused. A heap of loose earth was dug at the back of my tent after dark. Each servant, in >V< JEWELS THAT DECK A QUEEN. At almost all the court functionl which have been so numerous i1 “'London this summer, the Queen’l preference for diamonds over anj other jewels has been invariablj manifested. Beautiful as are sapt 1‘ 1 t iphires, emeralds and other colored turn, was to 30 a one anc C35 aistoncs, it is certaln that no gen basketful of earth 0“ the heap. 1“ i can compete with diamonds in brih this way it was hoped that make restitution, in which case no questions would be asked. . After dark I heard the slntyvelmg. After a while the inspector and I went out to the heap and carefully; sifted the dirt. When they thei holder of the stolen goods would? {are particularly becoming to liance of effect. They are the court stones par excellence and set Ofl the magnificence of ajcourt toilet as no other jewel- can." Diamondi thl Queen, and her Majesty never look! better than when, wearing her high 7 ‘ ' . l “e found nothing. 1crown of alternate Maltese crosses Later, the two servants were arâ€"l . rested and put in jail. ' were released they immediately su-I and flour de lis and her dog collai of diamonds of lattice work design. Queen Alexandra, on the othei Gd me for three weeks’ wages, _that| hand, had a marked preference fol being the time of their imprison- ment. ____.._>I¢._.. “Will it hurt?” asked the precise person as he sat down in the big chair. “Don’t you know that I adâ€" vertise myself as the painless dent- ist?” “Yes. But what I want to know is whether you can guaran- tee me as a painless patient." pearls and colored stones, particua larly amethysts, of which her Maj‘ esty possesses a beautiful parure, which does not form part of the crown jewels but is her own pri- vate property. -â€"----â€" q. I We seek a lawyer toL protect us from our neighbors and a. doctoa‘ to protect us from ourselves. www‘1 -.,> M 'v'vu-{J â€"â€"-‘ J~<w ‘xvvâ€"wVWV ,. _ '\_«-..~..‘~,-