The Argosy — page 93: what you’re looking at

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

THE ARGOSY. FEBRUARY 1, 1873. THE MASTER OF GREYLANDS. BY THE AUTHOR OF ‘* EAST LYNNE.” CHAPTER IV. FORESHADOWINGS OF EVIL. HE stone walls of Greylands’ Rest lay cold and still under the pale sunshine of the February day. The air was sharp and frosty ; the sun, though bright to the eye, had little warmth in it ; and the same cutting east wind that John Bent had complained of to the traveller, who had alighted at his house the previous afternoon, was prevailing still with an equal keenness. Mr. Castlemaine felt it in his study, where he had been busy all the morning. He fancied he must have caught a chill, for a slight shiver suddenly stirred his tall, fine frame, and he turned to the fire and gave it a vigorous poke. The fuel was wood and coal mixed, and the blaze went roaring up the chimney. The room was not large. Standing with his back to the fire, the window was on his nght hand ; the door on his left; opposite to him, against the wall, stood a massive piece of mahogany furniture, called a bureau. It was a kind of closed-in desk, made somewhat in the fashion of the banker’s desk at Stilborough, but larger; the inside had pigeon-holes and deep drawers, and a slab for writing on. This inside was well filled with neatly arranged bundles of papers, with account-books belonging to the farm business and else, and with some few old letters: and the Master of Greylands was cautious to keep this desk closed and locked from the possibility of the view of those about him. The Castlemaines were proud, reticent, and careful men. For a good part of the morning, Mr. Castlemaine had been seated at this desk. He had shut and locked it now, and was standing |with his back to the fire, deep in thought. Two letters, of the large size in VOL, XV. COMIC OOOKS. EO mn —_)