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While the choir was chanting, over the body of Willis Enderby, the solemn glory of Royce Melvin's funeral hymn, the script of which had been found attached to his last statement, Banneker, speeding westward, was working out, in agony of soul, a great and patient penance, for his own long observance, planning the secret and tireless ritual through which Camilla Van Arsdale should keep intact her pure and long delayed happiness while her life endured.
In time, the foreman blew a shrill note on a whistle and as though he had applied a brake connected with every man, the shovels dropped and the motley gang scrambled for their dinner pails. Donaldson for the first time then lifted his face to Arsdale. The seventh noon had come, and never had a midday been ushered in to such a sweet note as the foreman had blown on his penny whistle.
Loneliness no longer beset Banneker, even though Io was farther separated from him than before in the unimportant reckoning of geographical miles; for now she was on his errand. He held her by the continuous thought of a vital common interest. In place of the former bereavement of spirit was a new and consuming anxiety for Camilla Van Arsdale.
"Don't you know?" "I do not." The inspector eyed him gravely. "Then I have a bit of news for you. It was hidden in the gloves you took from Mrs. Fairbrother. Miss Van Arsdale was present at their unrolling." Do we live, move, breathe at certain moments? It hardly seems so. I know that I was conscious of but one sense, that of seeing; and of but one faculty, that of judgment.
Arsdale hitched forward and resting his chin in his hands, elbows on knees, stared at the floor. "Like hell," he answered. Donaldson frowned. "You deserve to, but you oughtn't," he said. "Oh, I deserve it all right. I deserve it and more!" "Yes, you do. But that does n't help any." Arsdale groaned. "There is n't any help. I 've made a beastly mess out of my life, out of myself."
"I do not doubt you in the least; not when there is a man to doubt. Miss Van Arsdale, you had better let your uncle take you home. I will see that the hall is cleared for you. Tomorrow I may wish to talk to you again, but I will spare you all further importunity tonight." I shook my head. It would require more courage to leave at that moment than to stay.
Browns, or blues, or reds, if they're not too bright. And you've tied it very well. Did it take you long to do it?" Reddening and laughing, he admitted a prolonged and painful session before his glass. Miss Van Arsdale sighed. It was such a faint, abandoning breath of regret as might come from the breast of a mother when she sees her little son in his first pride of trousers.
"Can't you see it yourself? Can't you feel the thrill of it all?" "Yes," answered Arsdale, his eyes as alive as Donaldson's, "I see. I feel. And if I had your strength " "You have the strength! You have everything you need in just your beating heart and the days ahead of you. Buck up to it! Go and meet life half-way. Throw yourself at life!
I could deny you what you ask but I won't, for I want you to work with quiet confidence, which you would not do if your mind were taken up with doubts and questions. Miss Van Arsdale, one surmise of yours was correct. A man was sent that night to the Ramsdell house with a note from Miss Grey.
"What do you do at night when you can't sleep? Work?" "No." "Well?" "Think." The doctor uttered a non-professional monosyllable. "What will you do," he propounded, waving his arm back along the trail toward the Van Arsdale camp, "when this little game of yours is played out?" "God knows!" said Banneker.
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