The Argosy — page 283: what you’re looking at

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

264 Mrs. Raven’s Temptation. “Very many thanks,” said the young man, again, ‘I should have been very much indebted to you under some circumstances, but an acquaintance has already taken apartments for me.” ‘Oh, you know some Coltburn people?” cried Philip. ‘ That’s nice. I daresay we shall come across you again: my folks know everybody. You may have heard the name. Every Coltburnite, of whatever sect, has had some sort of contact with the Reverend James Connell: and he is my father.” The foreigner’s pale, sensitive face flushed; and there came a curious flash as of awakening in the dark dreamy eyes. ‘‘ My friends in Coltburn are—is—one of Mr. Connell’s younger sons,” he said : ‘Percy Connell.” ‘My brother Percy!” responded Philip heartily, holding out his hand. ‘I’m Philip, the barrister in London, you know: you'll have heard of me. Running down, you see, to be a boy at home for a few days.” “T have heard of Mr. Philip,” said the foreigner, taking the proffered hand, and speaking with that inflection of voice and up- lifting of the eye which conveys the most delicate of compliments. ‘But I cannot expect he has ever heard of me. I had the felicity to make friends with your family last year, when they were taking their holiday by the sea at Sandgate. They—Mr. Percy—have kindly kept up a correspondence with me since. My name is Marco Learli.” Nobody notices when a foreigner’s nouns, pronouns and verbs do not perfectly agree. ‘‘T have heard of you, then,” said Philip; ‘‘and have a distinct idea that you were a great item in the enjoyment of that Sandgate holiday. I am glad you should be down when I am.” And he rather wondered within himself why the household hospitality had not been extended to this acquaintance. For besides that the Connells had a spare bed-room, which had grown absolutely shabby with constant use, the young people could, in their own phraseology, ‘‘condense” themselves to any extent. But the stranger’s next speech explained this. ‘Mrs. Connell invited me to stay in her house,” he said, in that soft, musical voice. ‘‘And I should have been most delighted to do so, but I contemplate a long visit and it will be necessary for me to pursue my usual avocation—that of artist. Yet I hope to see very much of my kind friends, the thought of whom makes Coltburn feel like home to the poor exile who has not even a country of his own.” Philip was accustomed to meet Italians at Miss Agate’s house, and he quite understood their pathetic allusions to their land—in those days lying dismembered among alien tyrannies. But this young fellow was so handsome, and so sad, and so sweet-voiced, that Philip thought within himself it was more than likely the mother must have opened a very warm corner of her heart to him, Gomicbooks.;GeGom