Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 11, 2025
Then Alderdene came in, blinking a greeting through his foggy goggles, sloppy, baggy, heavy shoes wheezing, lingered in the vicinity long enough to swallow his "peg" and acquire a disdainful opinion of his shooting from Marion, and then took himself off, leaving the room noisy with his laugh, which resembled the rattle of a startled kingfisher.
"The most difficult shot in the world," Alderdene was explaining, "is an incoming pheasant, sailing on a slant before a gale." "A woodcock in alders doing a jack-snipe twist is worse," grunted Mortimer, drenching another apple in port. "Or a depraved ruffed cock-grouse in the short pines; isn't that the limit?" asked Mortimer of Siward.
Fortune had smitten him hip and thigh; and, a trifle concerned, he began covering a pad with figures until he knew where he stood. Then he drew a considerable cheque to Major Belwether's order, another to Alderdene. Others followed to other people for various amounts; and he was very busily at work when, aware of another presence near, he turned around in his chair.
Lots of native woodcock eh, Blinky?" turning to Lord Alderdene; and again to Siward: "You know all these fellows Mortimer yonder " There was the slightest ring in his voice; and Leroy Mortimer, red-necked, bulky, and heavy eyed, emptied his glass and came over, followed by Lord Alderdene blinking madly though his shooting-goggles and showing all his teeth like a pointer with a "tic." Siward.
Alderdene took that opportunity to revert to the sketch, furnishing a specimen of his own inimitable laughter as a running accompaniment to the story of Quarrier and his dog in North Carolina, until he had everybody, as usual, laughing, not at the story but at him. All of which demonstration was bitterly offensive to Quarrier.
"Not I," said Voucher; "the sport is capital if one can manage to hit the beggars " "Oh, everybody misses in snap-shooting," observed Ferrall; "that is, everybody except Stephen Siward with his unholy left barrel. Crack! and," turning to Alderdene, "it's like taking money from you, Blinky which reminds me that we've time for a little Preference before dressing."
And if, in the corner of the gun-room, there was a man among them who had ever ventured to hold Leila's smooth little hand, unrebuked, in days gone by, none the less he knew that Alderdene spoke truth; and none the less he knew that what witness he might be called to bear at the end of the end of all must only incriminate himself and not that young matron who now, before their very eyes, was budding again, reverting to the esoteric charm of youth reincarnated.
People were now inspecting them with more or less curiosity; Siward found his "hand-painting" so unattractive that he had just tipped it over to avoid seeing it, when a burst of laughter from Lord Alderdene made everybody turn. Mrs.
The hot month dragged on; Quarrier came; Agatha Caithness arrived a few days later scheme of the Ferralls involving Alderdene! but the Siwanoa did not come, and Plank remained invisible. Leila Mortimer arrived from Swan's Harbour toward the middle of the month, offering no information as to the whereabouts of what Major Belwether delicately designated as her "legitimate."
Marion caught it, but her brother Gordon got it away; then Ferrall secured it and dived toward the red goal; but Rena Bonnesdel caught him under water; the ball bobbed up, and Sylvia flung both arms around it with a little warning shout and hurled it back at Siward, who shot forward like an arrow, his opponents gathering about him in full cry, amid laughter and excited applause from the gallery, where Grace Ferrall and Captain Voucher were wildly offering odds on the blue, and Alderdene and Major Belwether were thriftily booking them.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking