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adda52.coml Register +188K The girls had been talking of the initiation and the part that Elinor had played.,That she did not desire Maurice for a son-in-law was an insufficient motive for the commission of a triple crime. She had declined to sanction the engagement; she had forbidden Maurice the house; and, assisted upon all points by social rules, she had ample power to prevent the match, which, as she averred, was distasteful to her. Why, then, with this power, should she jeopardize liberty and life by thieving the devil-stick and killing the man? In his perplexity, Jen sought out David and asked his opinion. The young lawyer gave a very decided verdict in favor of Mrs. Dallas.,"I don't know anything about the devil-stick. I never saw it; but with regard to the perfume I can explain. I was ill on that night, as you know, and Dido applied some of her negro remedies; among them the perfume with which that handkerchief of my mother's was saturated. It was bound across my forehead to soothe the nerves. During my journey to your house I snatched it off, and--","Tom Hughes is an awfully nice boy," she said, slipping a hand into Judith's and Elinor's arm, as they paced the platform, waiting for Miss Jinny's train. "But for pure, sheer adorableness, give me Mr. Hilton, every time. Don't you think he's a perfect duck, Elinor?","Yes, Aunt Adeline, I'll go take it off this very minute," I heard myself answer her airily, to my own astonishment. I might have known that if I ever got one of those smiles it would go to my head! Without another word I sailed into my room and closed the door softly.，Patricia watched her disappear behind the big screen of the composition room, and then she turned excitedly to Elinor.，"What's Bruce doing here?" asked Patricia, as they resigned themselves to the inevitable and prepared to await the event.，"I think we'll have to begin with the feeding," said Bruce, as Miss Jinny and Mrs. Shelly, gorgeous in their very best raiment, entered from their bedroom. "Madam, may I have the privilege of escorting you to the head of the table?"Doris Leighton's lashes drooped till her eyes were a narrow line of inscrutable blue.

"The devil-stick, by heaven!" he said aloud.,"Griffin says not to wait—she's got to finish stretching a canvas," Margaret Howes told them, but Patricia and Judith would not hear to beginning the little feast without the staunch and genial Griffin.,"I haven't had my criticism yet, and if I don't get it next pose, you'll have to go to the station without me," said Elinor to the other two girls as she met them in the corridor the next morning. "Mr. Benton's awfully slow, but I can't miss this first criticism, you know.","Yes, I know," said Judith, expectantly, but Miss Jinny had whisked to her feet and whirled about towards the door.,They went up in the little box of an elevator, and as they got out, Bruce jingled his keys invitingly.,It was a melancholy procession which bore the body up to the house. Four men carried the bier--for it was nothing else since it bore the dead body of a young man--and behind came Major Jen bowed to the ground with sorrow. He could hardly believe that Maurice was dead--that he had perished upon a lonely country road by an unknown hand. But that was the question! Jen began to think the assassin was not unknown; that he had a clew to find the guilty one; and he waited the coming of Dr. Etwald with great impatience to see what his opinion was regarding the course to be pursued.,"Git your night-gown and your tooth-bresh quick, Molly, if you want to pack 'em in my trunk!" he exclaimed with his eyes dancing and a curl standing straight up on the top of his head, as it has a habit of doing when he is most excited. "You can't take nothing but them 'cause I'm going to put in a rope to tie the whale with when I ketch him, and it'll take up all the rest of the room. Git 'em quick!","I knew that you possessed it, my dear major, as I had been informed of its existence and of its owner by Dido. Over this negress, by means of the Voodoo stone, I possessed complete power. She was ready to do whatever I wanted, and I employed her in forwarding my schemes. Her grandmother had come from 'Ashantee,' the native country of the wand of sleep, and knew all about it; also she knew how to prepare the poison. These secrets she transmitted to Dido, and I resolved to obtain the devil-stick, to make Dido prepare fresh poison, and to use the devil-stick against my rival, Mr. Alymer.,Her eyes sought the pale pure outline of Elinor's profile, caught between the intervening faces, and held it during the brief explanatory speech, wherein Mr. Benton paid his tribute to Elinor's generous silence, and apologized in the name of the Board for the unjust accusation. She saw the wave of color sweep over it at the commendatory words, and the dark eyes fall under the shame of the hinted treachery of the unnamed student whose face was in every one's mind. Then at the next words she saw the light flash into full radiance, as Mr. Benton, with something in his extended hand, turned full toward Elinor where she sat.,"That's why I call him Frad," said Patricia, with a twinkle. "Combines the whole and is entirely original, and so suited to his situation. I don't think he ought to drop all the Carson name, particularly while we're all living comfortably on the Carson money. It seems sort of ungrateful to me.","Because Maurice was an unusually heavy man," replied the major, "and he could not have been carried off--that is, his body could not have been carried off," he corrected, with a sigh, "unless by two men. There may have been three, for all I know. But what is the meaning of it all?" cried Jen, in bewildered dismay. "Why was the poor lad's body stolen?",David took the devil-stick firmly in his grasp and compressed the handle. At once the iron tongue with its drop of venom appeared. With the sharp point he made an irregular wound on the palm of his hand, and cast the devil-stick on the table before him. A moment afterward, amid the silent horror of the crowded court, he fell down--dead..