Part 27 (1/2)

”You are not offended atyou?”

”No, absurd!” cried Chester, hastily ”I have had a good deal of trouble lately, and my nerves have been shaken”

”Your nerves have been shaken?” said the oldat him in a peculiar way

”Yes,” said Chester; ”but another day you must let me cohbours”

The old arrulous, and I have bored you, as you young people call it You will not co out his hand to take his host's, which was extended unwillingly, and felt like ice ”Oh yes, I will come to-morrow or the next day This is no paltry excuse You may trust me”

”Ah, well, I will,” said the old man, who seemed to be satisfied with his scrutiny ”Pray coe, unworldly ways; and you ive me some more hints about my health In the ical works

You will find the”

”Yes, I hope we shall spend ether,” said Chester, frankly, as heby his side with his hands under the tails of his coat, where a looker-on would have seen that they were crooked and opening and shutting spasmodically

It was very di hard work to pierce the uncleaned panes of the s; but there was light enough to show that, and also that the old bookworht hand went into the coat-pocket and half drew fro followed as they walked into the gloomy hall and away to the front door, where, after a friendly shake of the hand, Chester uttered a sigh of relief as he turned away fro to breathe

”Pah! the old place felt like a sepulchre,” heat me I believe that if I had not taken that brandy I should have fainted What a statethat could have happened Once gain the old man's confidence, I can stay there and watch the next house as long as I like”

There was so ominous about the old bookworm's act as he went softly back into his half-dark, dusty roo deeply, till he stopped short in thedown at the floor

”Yes, he said he was ill; he looked ill when he caain, perhaps to-morrow--perhaps to-morrow Hah! it was very near”

He raised his head noent to the drawer from which he had taken the key, and placed back in it the heavy life-preserver, and then taking from the tail of the coat one of the short, old-fashi+oned pocket pistols which were loaded by unscrewing the little barrel byoff the cap, after raising the ha a fresh one in its place After this he closed the drawer and sat down to think

”Yes,” he said, half aloud, ”it was very near The next ti to be a nuisance, and a dangerous one, as well”

CHAPTER TWENTY

STRANGELY MYSTERIOUS PROCEEDINGS

The Clareboroughs' carriage was at the door, and the well-round, in spite of sundry admonitions from the plump coachman of the faultless turn-out to be ”steady there!” ”hold still!” and the like

Mr Roach, the butler, had appeared for avery poone in again to wait for the descent of their people, bound for one of Lord Gale's dinner-parties in Grosvenor Place

All was still in the hall as the door was closed, and the marble statues and bodiless busts did not move upon their pedestals, nor their blank faces display the slightest wonder at the proceedings which followed, even though they were enough to startle them out of their equanimity

For all at once the po footood, refined livery, suddenly seemed to have been stricken with a kind of delirious attack The expression upon their faces changed froht, and they both broke into a spasmodic dance, a coulations of a nigger breakdoith the accoers at each other and the final kick-up and flop of the right foot upon the floor