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Gryce's employ, and hasted on towards the avenue; when what was my surprise to find on the corner another person, who, while pretending to be on the look out for a car, cast upon me, as I approached, a furtive glance of intense inquiry.
The emphasis with which this announcement was made perhaps gave it point; at all events this one brief sentence sank into Mr. Gryce's ear just as he began to notice a woman who sat with her back to him on the hotel piazza. He was not thinking of Madame Duclos at that moment; nor was there the least thing about this woman to recall his secret quarry to mind.
Gryce's employ was before me, till, catching his eye, I saw such a keen, enjoyable twinkle sparkling in its depths that all doubt fled, and, returning his bow with a show of satisfaction, I remarked: "You are very punctual. I like that." He gave another short, quick nod. "Glad, sir, to please you. Punctuality is too cheap a virtue not to be practised by a man on the lookout for a rise.
Gryce's eye, though that member was fixed, according to his old habit, on the miniature of her father which she wore, in defiance of fashion, at her throat. "I wonder," said she, in a musing tone, "if I imagined or really saw on Mr. Adams's face a most extraordinary expression; something more than the surprise or anguish following a mortal blow?
"And do you imagine you have done this?" "I do." His eyes stole a little nearer my face. "Well! that is good; go on." "When I undertook this business of clearing Eleanore Leavenworth from suspicion," I resumed, "it was with the premonition that this person would prove to be her lover; but I had no idea he would prove to be her husband." Mr. Gryce's gaze flashed like lightning to the ceiling.
The register had an expression of slow cunning as he cast a glance up at the overbearing ranger. "What ailed the stray-book ter bide hyar in the court-house all night, Tobe? Couldn't ye gin it house-room? Thar warn't no special need fur it to be hyar." Tobe Gryce's face showed that for once he was at a loss. He glowered down at the register and said nothing.
Why should Percy Gryce's millions be joined to another great fortune, why should this clumsy girl be put in possession of powers she would never know how to use? She was roused from these speculations by a familiar touch on her arm, and turning saw Gus Trenor beside her. She felt a thrill of vexation: what right had he to touch her?
Gryce's manner, she had started back from the carriage door and was saying to him in a tone of modest embarrassment: "There is a gentleman in the carriage; you must have made some mistake." Mr. Gryce, who had evidently expected a different result from his stratagem, hesitated for a moment, during which I felt that he read her through and through; then he responded lightly: "I made a mistake, eh?
It was an elegant specimen of millinery, and was in the latest style. It had ribbons and flowers and bird wings upon it, and presented, as it was turned about by Mr. Gryce's deft hand, an appearance which some might have called charming, but to me was simply grotesque and absurd. "Is that a last spring's hat?" he inquired. "I don't know, but I should say it had come fresh from the milliner's."
Very slight, almost fragile, but beautiful, and with a delicate bloom which showed her to be in better health than one would judge from her dainty figure. It was a private wedding, sir, celebrated in a hotel parlor; but her father was with her " "Her father?" Mr. Gryce's theory received its first shock. Then the old man who had laughed on leaving Mr.
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