The Argosy — page 190: what you’re looking at

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

The Mystery of Allan Grale. ‘73 ‘““Tll go straight to the house and do so instantly,” answered Edgar, who was holding the box in his‘hands. It was not at all heavy. ‘“‘ Don’t trouble yourself about the hamper. Leave it where it lies, and as you go past the gate-house, tell the lodge-keeper to send his boy for it, and to see that it goes back to Moorland Hall. But need you go off at once?” he added hastily, suddenly recalling his sister’s expressed wish to see Allan when he came, though she might not care to see him in the general distress. ‘‘Won’t you come up to the house, and hear what the Doctor says? A friend’s face will reassure poor Maria.” “No, no,” dissented Allan Grale quickly, whether to the general invitation or to the last particular assertion it was hard to say. ‘ T’ll not come in now—I’ll send up to inquire in the evening, and I hope all will be fairly well by then.” Edgar shook his head doubtfully. ‘* Anything more about young Carr?” he asked. “Not that I know of. I have not been to the Works since the morning.” “Wait a moment, Grale. Iwishyou’d come in. Maria was saying that she had not seen you for a long time.” Allan’s face flushed. ‘““When did she say that?” he asked in a low voice. ‘Only this afternoon—before this happened to my uncle.” “Did you tell her anything about Charlie Carr?” said Allan, who was looking not at Edgar, but another way. Edgar Vivian felt this question awkward. Perhaps he had been a little rash in his confidences. ‘““T had to tell her there was something not quite right,” he said, ** because she wanted to go calling on the Palmers. Was I wrong in saying so much? You may trust Maria to keep a secret, when telling it would be to anybody’s disadvantage.” “T know that!” replied Allan, with a strange, flashing fervency. “Well, you need not tell her that box belongs to me, for you remember what I told you this morning—that it might set her thinking of her own letters. And I don’t want to have to give them back, or to pain her with any reflection on the subject.” “She shall know nothing about it,” Edgar cordially assured him. He took it for granted there had been some lovers’ quarrel between this young man and his sister, which time would put straight. Shaking hands with each other, Allan went off, trailing the hamper behind him, and nodding acquiescence to Edgar’s called-out injunction to be sure and leave it with the lodge-keeper. Allan Grale did no such thing. When he was out in the open road, he carried the basket with him for some distance, then threw it over a hedge into a plantation, and leaping over a gate close by, sought about for a very thick growth of bracken, under which he carefully concealed the hamper. GoOnmilGaooks (SO