United States or Brunei ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The master paused, and, looking back, shook his stick threateningly at the motionless figure of the boy; while Thomas Wyley threw a stone at the dog, which sent him back, yelping piteously, to his young master's feet. Stephen clenched his hands, and bit his lips till the blood started, but he did not move till the last glimpse of his foes had passed away from the hillside.
"Knightley fell by my side. I saw the blow; it must have broken his skull." There was a sound of footsteps in the passage, the door was opened and the fugitive appeared in the doorway. All eyes turned to him instantly, and turned from him again with looks of disappointment. Wyley remarked, however, that Scrope, who had barely glanced at the man, rose from his chair.
Scrope made no movement, but stood with his eyes cast down on the table like a man lost in thought. It was evident to Wyley that both Shackleton and Tessin had obeyed the sporting instinct, and had left the floor clear for the two men. It was no less evident that Knightley remarked their action and did not understand it.
For observe, he has made no mention of his wife. He has been two years in slavery. He escapes, and he asks for no news of his wife. That is unlike any man, but most of all unlike Knightley. He has his own ends to serve, no doubt, but he knows." The argument appeared cogent to Major Shackleton. "To be sure, to be sure," he said. "I had not thought of that." Tessin looked across to Wyley.
There's your grandfather, a poor, simple, helpless old man, and the little girl why, of course we shall have to receive them into the House; and I'll see there is no difficulty made about it. Then we intend to get your sister into some right good service. 'I should not mind taking her into my own house, said the master, Mr. James Wyley; 'she would soon learn under my niece Anne.
The sure thing is he does not know of the dispute between Lieutenant Scrope and himself, and it is of more importance for us to consider whether he cannot after all be kept from knowing. Could he not be sent home to England? Mrs. Knightley, I take it, is no longer in Tangier?" Major Shackleton stood up, took Wyley by the arm and led him out on to the balcony.
"So she would wish," and he went down the stairs into the street. Major Shackleton picked up his hat. "I command this sortie," he said to Wyley; but as he turned he found himself confronted by Scrope. "What do you intend?" asked Scrope. Major Shackleton looked towards Wyley. Wyley understood the look and also what Shackleton intended. He went from the room and left the two men together.
Scrope was in years nearer forty than thirty, dark of complexion, aquiline of feature, and though a trifle below the middle height he redeemed his stature by the litheness of his figure. What interested Wyley was that he seemed a man in whom strong passions were always desperately at war with a strong will. He wore habitually a mask of reserve; behind it, Wyley was aware of sleeping fires.
"No, nothing has changed," he said a third time, and again his eyes began to travel wistfully from face to face. Tessin abruptly turned his back; Shackleton blinked his eyes at the ceiling with altogether too profound an unconcern; Scrope reached out for the wine, and spilt it as he filled his glass; Wyley busily drew diagrams with a wet finger on the table. All these details Knightley remarked.
Upon the Saturday evening after his interview with the master, Stephen loitered in the lane with a very heavy heart, afraid of facing Mr. Wyley, lest he should receive the sentence of dismission from the pit.
Word Of The Day