The Argosy — page 348: what you’re looking at

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

332 Between the Songs. tion. Then long after, ten years after or so, in the very zenith of her power, another stray scrap had come drifting over the ocean. Shooting on the rocky mountains, the same man who had before been her informant had met with Reuben. He had heard from Reuben just two or three little details, and this—that Geoffrey had broken his father’s heart. What of Oliver, what of Oliver, she had cried to the man, forgetting her self-enforced reserve. He had then explained that, not being sure whether Madame Albranzo would wish her name mentioned, knowing only of her interest in the family, he had made inquiries of Reuben without revealing their cause. Reuben had a little resented them, and had answered only as regards Oliver— that he was one of those “that go down to the sea in ships; that do business in great waters.” And this was all that she knew of Oliver! Oh, and listen to the boom of the waves, and the two weird notes, the high note and the low note, whispering about the window. Where was Oliver? Well, before she lay down to rest that night she would begin to take steps for tracing him and the rest of them. ll these years she had stuck to her pride, but this old room had broken it down at last. It did not matter if she had the whole world to search; it did not matter if she had to search it herself. She had plenty of money ; she was still a young woman. She hurried out of the drawing-room and through the ante-room, remembering, not so much that it must be nearly time for her second song, as that she must hasten at once to take steps for tracing her father and brothers. Reuben had not said that her father was dead: only that his heart was broken. Geoffrey must be found, every- ting made right that he had done wrong ; himself reclaimed, it that was necessary. She would be the binder of her father’s wounds. On the way downstairs she cast a look into what had been the two younger boys’ room. The window was high open; the moonlight silently falling, fair and wide, upon a bed littered with coats and sticks which might have been Geoffrey’s and Oliver's. Upon the soiled table were flung down a couple of razors, showing that somebody had rushed in here to dress—so like a habit of Reuben’s. She just looked in and then hastened on to the hall door ; her mind engrossed with the prospect of searching the world for them. At the door she paused, then once again turning, hurried a step or two down a back passage. She thought that just before leaving, she would like to have one peep into what used to be her own room. She opened the little door softly ; she knew it well. There was very little light here, a dark green blind being pulled to the foot. She cast her eyes round the familiar objects ; the small arched fire- place ; the press at the further end of it ; and then, as her glance travelled naturally to the bed in the corner, she gave a violent start. There was a figure lying sound asleep in tt. comicbooks.com