Under His Thumb — page 136: what you’re looking at

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

UNDER HIS THUMB. 127 CHAPTER XVII. THE FLIGHT. Stella Brandon, friendless and bewildered by the misfortunes which seemed to have conspired to over- whelm her, hastened along the quiet street toward her boarding-place. “Go, and be a vagabond yourself!’’ had been the harsh command of Mr. Blain, as he turned her away from the mansion of which she had so myste- riously become an inmate. There could be only one interpretation of the words. Carl Brandon, the hated outcast, was her father, and he was under suspicion for the terrible crime at the printing-house. She was true to this vagabond father; she had defended his name against what she believed to be unjust aspersions. And thus had she brought upon herself the heritage of misfor- tune and vagabondage. | Upon the day just dawning and the one to follow, business would be suspended at the printing-house out of respect for the murdered gentleman. ‘Then it would go on again. as usual. but what meant Mr. Blain’s angry remark to Stella? Expulsion from her situation? It could mean nothing less. ‘“T am out of work; I have no friends; and, like my father, I must now become a vagabond, for who will employ me?’’ This was the poor girl’s reflection as she entered the small, cheap room where she lodged. The day dawned cloudy and forbidding, and upon - Eomichbooks (E(o) m