Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 1, 2025
The window was never quite the same, and it had a continued fascination for Bertram Eastford; but this time, he said to himself resolutely, he would not enter, having, as he assured himself, the strength of mind to forego this temptation.
"So far from over-praising it," protested the shopman, "I was about to call your attention to a defect. It is useless as a measurer of time." "It doesn't record the exact hour, then?" asked Eastford. "Well, I suppose the truth is, they were not very particular in the old days, and time was not money, as it is now.
Eastford listened to this announcement with a feeling that there was something wrong about the statement. The man sitting there was calmly talking of a time one hundred and ninety-two years past, and yet he himself could not be a day more than twenty-five years old. Somewhere entangled in this were the elements of absurdity.
Gretlich Seidelmier presented me with the hour-glass you have in your hand, and on it I carved the joined hearts entwined with our similar initials." "So they are initials, are they?" said Eastford, glancing down at what he had mistaken for twining serpents. "Yes," said the officer; "I was more accustomed to a sword than to an etching tool, and the letters are but rudely drawn.
Eastford found himself unable to unravel them, but the more he thought of the matter, the more reasonable it began to appear, and so, hoping his visitor had not noted the look of surprise on his face, he said, quietly, casting his mind back over the history of England, and remembering what he had learned at school: "That was during the war of the Spanish Succession?"
Bertram Eastford had intended to pass the shop of his old friend, the curiosity dealer, into whose pockets so much of his money had gone for trinkets gathered from all quarters of the globe.
There was no clue to the meaning of the hieroglyphics, and Eastford, with the glass balanced on his knee, watched the sand still running, the crimson thread sparkling in the lamplight. He fancied he saw distorted reflections of faces in the convex glass, although his reason told him they were but caricatures of his own. The great bell in the tower near by, with slow solemnity, tolled twelve.
"It is a long story; have I your permission to tell it?" "I shall be delighted to listen," replied Eastford, "but before doing so I beg to renew my invitation, and ask you to occupy this easy-chair before the fire." The officer bowed in silence, crossed the room behind Eastford, and sat down in the arm-chair, placing his sword across his knees.
Eastford remembered seeing something like it on the stage, and knowing little of military affairs, thought perhaps the costume of the visitor before him indicated an officer in the Napoleonic war. "Good evening!" said the incomer. "May I introduce myself? I am Lieutenant Sentore, of the regular army." "You are very welcome," returned his host. "Will you be seated?" "Thank you, no.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking