The Argosy — page 123: what you’re looking at

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

108 The Mystery of Allan Grale. “You posted your first letter to me from Sprogston,” he observed, “the one in which you said you had left home and scarcely knew where you were going.” “Yes, I walked all the way there, through bye-lanes,” said Rose.. “T felt frightened, lest I should be discovered and sent back.” ‘That would have been better for you.” ; Rose glanced at him, and shook her head sadly. She was saying within herself, ‘‘ I will never go back.” But what she said aloud was : ‘From Sprogston, I went to Southampton, and from Southampton I came here. I don’t think they will trace me easily.” ‘What made you come here ?—to these lodgings, I mean ?” asked. Mr. Forester. ‘‘ Do you know the people ?” ‘“‘T had heard of Mrs. Wilson, the landlady,” Rose answered: “a. young married couple, who lived awhile with my uncle, had stayed here before, and I heard them speak of her. ‘They said she was kind, and careful. Her husband was a bookseller. She is quite superior.” ‘‘ And as soon as you got to these lodgings you wrote to me again ?” ‘““Ves—but it seemed as if I was never to hear from you,” she replied, the pain of her lonely terrors returning upon her. ‘‘ And when your letter did come, you did not follow so soon as it promised.” ‘““T came as quickly as I could,” he answered, gravely. ‘‘ You see I was ata great distance. And now the question is, Rose, what are you going to do?” , She looked at him with bewildered, incredulous eyes. He had never known a moment of such exquisite misery. He had believed. himself sincere when he had wandered with this girl through the greenwood shades, and had vowed to her that he could ask nothing more from life than her love, and long quiet days of peaceful happi- ness in some rural cot. But he felt doubly sincere now as he wished that he had never gone to Redbourne, never seen Rose Raynham, and that she was back again, in her uncle’s parlour, busy with her patterns. and her paintings, and with appropriate village wedding bells in pro- spective. “ What—am—I—going—to do?” Rose repeated, slowly. It was not the words so much as the way in which they were spoker which hurt her. ‘The colour faded from her face, and her voice did not sound like hers. ‘ Are you angry with me for coming away ?” Was she going to faint? What could he do? Poor, innocent ~ jittle girl, surely she had been wounded very sorely. ‘‘ How can I be angry?” he asked. ‘I see how you must have suffered. I am sorry for the cause of your coming—sorry that I have somehow offended your friends and made them quarrel with you—most of all, sorry for the annoyance you are enduring, and which I shall not be able altogether to avert, do what I may.” She sat forward in her chair. <A strange hardness seemed settling on her young face. It was strange that the moment she seemed to draw away from him, he felt once more inclined to draw her back. m CORNICLIOOKS ,CO)