Legion X

Legion X "I suppose you think that is clever," said Salome, who could never "You are right: I see it now," says Geoffrey, whitening a little, "Warden wrote that paper, no doubt," glancing at the dirty bit of writing that has led to the discovery. "He evidently had his knowledge from old Elspeth, who must have known of this secret hiding-place from my great-grandfather. My father, I am convinced, knew nothing of it. Here, on the night of my grandfather's death, the old woman must have hidden the will, and here it has remained ever since until to-night. Yet, after all, this is mere supposition," says Geoffrey. "We are taking for granted what may prove a myth. The will may never been placed here, and he himself——",But thoughts such as these occurred to him less and less as the distance between him and the East grew greater. By the time he dropped off the train at Williams, Arizona, where he changed to the day coach that would take him to the Grand Canyon, his mind was so full of the future that there was no room for the things he had left behind him.,"Walk in, Captain Weaver. Pray, take that chair," said Captain Acton. "I can ask you no questions until I make you acquainted with what has happened.","No," answered the man, "I am afraid. Who could look at such dreadful things and live?","You have good custom today, François," he said with a gesture toward the chattering groups at the other tables.，Miss Jinny's eyes twinkled, but Bruce flushed and flicked his cigar ash into the fire with a dexterous finger.，"Why, Ma," he cried, in amazement, "you don't mean to say he's gone?"，This is just a little too much. Mona gives way. Standing well back from her butter, she lets her pretty rounded bare arms fall lightly before her to their full length, and as her fingers clasp each other she turns to Rodney and breaks into a peal of laughter sweet as music."You will get murdered," says his mother, quite as indolently, half opening her eyes, which are gray as Geoffrey's own. "They always kill people, with things they call pikes, or burn them out of house and home, over there, without either rhyme or reason."

But here he found another little hope; some squalls of wet, one very heavy, had set the kennels running shortly after he had met Mr Greyquill, and if that letter had lain exposed to those three or four deluges, it not only stood to be changed into a mere rag to the eye which none would dream of even glancing at, but the writing must have been washed out to a degree to render the sense of the letter unintelligible. He considered that it was not above two or three hours when that letter was in his pocket, and that it must have fallen somewhere betwixt his father's house and the Minorca in that time, for he had taken the same road to and fro. He reflected that that road was but little used compared with the lane that led to the bridge where the Actons' carriage had stopped. Understanding as a sailor the preciousness of time, and conceiving that if the letter had by some strange mischance fallen during his walk unobserved by him it might still rest in the spot where it had dropped, insomuch that chance—for the fellow was a gambler at heart—might concede him yet an hour, even two hours, in which to find it, he put on his hat and marched out of[Pg 153] the house, just saying to his father in the window that he had an appointment and should miss it if he didn't hasten, and then stepped out, casting as he went to right and left of his path eyes as piercingly scrutinising as those which the madman darts when he seeks for the philosopher's stone.,“This here flower aint a mornin’-glory, but the leaves is mighty like it, an’ the flowers is jist as purty.” Moses explained.,"I didn't ring," she explained, standing on the little blue rug by the umbrella stand, and jabbing her dripping umbrella into the stand. "The hall door was open and I came right in." She hesitated, and then rushed on, directing most of her speech to Elinor. "Geraldine Leighton is dying, they say, and I thought we might each send a little note to Doris—she's awfully alone, now that Mrs. Leighton is ill, you know. It mightn't help her much, but it would show her that we——",“Dad made his own way, tackled the job he wanted and made good. I’ve got to do the same. Probably his father wanted him to do something quite different. I’ll ask him about that some time. Besides, if I just took up Dad’s business, it wouldn’t seem right somehow.”,"Well don't go to Dublin, at all events," says her mother, plaintively. "It's wretched form.","I shall do only what you wish," returns he, chivalrously, arranging the cushion that adorns the back of her chair.,She put the question to Griffin when she met her in the hall after the class had broken up in disorder to celebrate the initiation by a general gambol through the deserted halls and corridors. Patricia and Griffin were seating themselves on a drawing-board at the top of the short flight of stone steps that connected the back corridor with the exhibition rooms above.,"I will do as you ask," she says, wondering when the interview will come to an end.,Lucy over-night had said she would join them, but she did not appear at the breakfast table. Her father enquired for her, and was told that she had left the house an hour earlier, or perhaps more, to take the morning air and a walk with her dog.,"That's Eagle!" said Captain Acton. "'Tis[Pg 433] clear that the crew have not mutinied against my interests.","I'll see to it that you don't forget, miss," she said gayly. "Good-bye, Judy; don't be late for lunch, for it's short and sweet with us real artists. We can't potter over our food like you idle Philistines, you know.","Was it the Rubens hat with the long brown feather?" asks Violet, sweetly, turning to Mona, as though compelled by some unknown force to say anything that shall restore the girl to evenness of mind once more..