United States or Panama ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
As Wrayford leaned back in his corner and looked at her across the wide flower-filled drawing-room he noted, first of all for the how many hundredth time? the play of her hands above the embroidery-frame, the shadow of the thick dark hair on her forehead, the lids over her somewhat full grey eyes.
"He forbade me. You were not to know." Close above them, in the shrubbery, Stilling warbled: "Nita, Juanita, Ask thy soul if we must part!" Wrayford held her by both arms. "Understand this if he comes in, he'll find us. And if there's a row you'll lose your boy." She seemed not to hear him. "You you you he'll kill you!" she exclaimed.
The Red House was the biggest house of the Highfield summer colony, and Cobham Stilling was its biggest man. The motor-boat was Stilling's latest hobby, and he rode or steered it in and out of the conversation all the evening, to the obvious edification of every one present save his wife and his visitor, Austin Wrayford.
"That you've got to sign another promissory note for fifty thousand this time." "Is that all?" Wrayford hesitated; then he said: "Yes for the present." She sat motionless, her head bent, her hand resting passively in his. He leaned nearer. "What did you' mean just now, by worse things?" She hesitated. "Haven't you noticed that he's been drinking a great deal lately?" "Yes; I've noticed."
By a common impulse Mrs. Stilling and Wrayford had moved together toward the fire-place, which was hidden by a tall screen from the door into the hall. Wrayford leaned his elbow against the mantel-piece, and Mrs. Stilling stood beside him, her clasped hands hanging down before her. "Have you anything more to talk over with him?" she asked. "No. We wound it all up before dinner.
I wonder if that infernal skipper took in the launch's awnings before he went home." Wrayford stopped with his hand on the door. "Yes, I saw him do it. She's shipshape for the night." "Good! That saves me a run down to the shore." "Good night, then," said Wrayford. "Good night, old man. You'll tell her?" "I'll tell her." "And mum about my mother!" his host called after him.
As she did so, the profound stillness was broken by the sound of a man's voice trolling out unsteadily the refrain of a music-hall song. The two in the boat-house darted toward each other with a simultaneous movement, clutching hands as they met. "He's coming!" Isabel said. Wrayford disengaged his hands. "He may only be out for a turn before he goes to bed. Wait a minute. I'll see."
"I say, Austin stop a minute!" his host called after him. Wrayford turned, and the two men faced each other across the hearth-rug. Stilling's eyes shifted uneasily. "There's one thing more you can do for me before you leave. Tell Isabel about that loan; explain to her that she's got to sign a note for it." Wrayford, in his turn, flushed slightly. "You want me to tell her?" "Hang it!
"I don't know." He felt her trembling. "I'm not sure this place is as safe as it used to be " Wrayford held her to him reassuringly. "But the boatman sleeps down at the village; and who else should come here at this hour?" "Cobham might. He thinks of nothing but the launch." "He won't to-night. I told him I'd seen the skipper put her shipshape, and that satisfied him."
One would think you were the chap that had been hit by this business." Wrayford threw himself into the chair from which Mrs. Stilling had lately risen. It was the one she usually sat in, and to his fancy a faint scent of her clung to it. He leaned back and looked up at Stilling. "Want a cigar?" the latter continued. "Shall we go into the den and smoke?" Wrayford hesitated.
Word Of The Day