The Argosy — page 39: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

20 Faithful unto Death. ‘“'That’s the best joke I’ve heard for many a week, Gracie. Quite romantic! Sworn, have you, to be true to one another till death ?” “Yes. ‘Faithful unto death.’ Only a little while ago—since this trouble began—he told me he should keep it. So shall I.” Tom was silent. ‘Any way, Grace, he must choose between you,” he spoke, after consideration. ‘‘I should, in your place, call my own proper pride to my aid, and fling him to the winds. He shall not carry on with both of you; rely upon that. If he chooses (as you seem to wish it) to come back to his allegiance, he must not again meet Eva Bellair. If he prefers her, why then I hope I need not suggest how you, Grace, ought to act, oath or no oath.” Tom was as good as his word. ‘The first thing he did after break- fast the next morning, was to present himself at Lionel Payne’s rooms: and there he learnt that Fate had been, so to say, quicker than he. When Lionel got home the previous night, after leaving the theatre, he found a telegram awaiting him from Sweden. Some mischief had occurred in the works then in process there, and Lionel was needed. The order to him was imperative—to set off without an hour’s delay. As Tom went in, Lionel was fastening down his portmanteau and col- lecting his rugs and overcoats together. Another minute or two must see him on his way to the train, if he would catch it. What passed between them I do not know ; it could not have been much. Lionel said, looking very foolish, that he was aware the present state of affairs could not and ought not to goon; that as he sat at the theatre last night he had taken more shame to himself than anybody else could award him, and had resolved there and then that it should end. He added that he would write to me; on the journey if he could possibly get a moment for it; if not, as soon as he reached Sweden. The letter came to me; it had been written in pencil on his knees as he travelled along in the train. It was, if IJ may so put it, an abject kind of letter, betokening misery. He did not expressly release me; but he said that he knew I must consider him too con- temptible to retain any regard for him; and that his best and only plan now was to remain in Sweden for good, away from the civilized world. As to Miss Bellair, he should never again see her. ‘The spell of infatuation which had seized hold of him, and he had been weak and wicked enough to yield to, was gone for ever. That was the substance of the letter. It did not say, ‘‘ will you in future, when my time of penitence shall have spent itself, suffer our engagement to be renewed ;” but yet, it did not explicitly release me from it. ‘The oath was not alluded to by word or hint. CORMMIECOOOKS.E@