Ruby's Reward — page 290: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A little mouse ran behind it, and I attempted to move it out so that the cat could catch him,” she ex- plained. “It was not an easy thing to do, and in bracing myself between the wall and the desk, I broke a panel out of the back of it. I am very sorry But Ruby did not have a chance to finish her sen- pencee. Edmund Carpenter sprang quickly to his feet when she said she had ‘‘broken a panel out of the back of ie and, with a hurried tread, passed into the li- Irary. He went directly behind the desk, dropped upon his knees, and peered into the aperture where the panel had been, with a face which Ruby, who had shores tollowed him, was sure wore a very anxious ook. He inserted his hand and felt all about, but only drew out the panel that had fallen within. “Did the mouse get in here?” be asked, “Oh, no, he“only ran behind the desk, and Timothy caught him almost immediately after I had moved it out.”’ “Did—did you find anything in here, Miss Ruby?” Edmund Carpenter inquired, feeling about once more in the hole. Ruby’s heart leaped atthe question. | He never would have asked it, she thought, if he had not known something about the will being there, while his anxious, flurried manner condemned him in her opinion. How could she answer him ? For an instant her lips were powerless to move, She could nottella falsehood. She would not give up the will, Then she said, with apparent surprise: “Why! what should I tind, Mr. Carpenter! Have you lost anything down there ?” “No, n0; of course not. Only—sometimes, in these olct desks, valuable papers slip out of sight, and are lost for years,” he answered, hurriedly, and turning: away trom her to hide Whe sep on his face. “Now I am confident that he knew so ing abo it,’ Ruby thought, with a rapidly peatine RB SRRaut