The Argosy — page 346: what you’re looking at

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

meme i AOR: GOS Y. MAY, 1885. THE MYSTERY OF ALLAN GRALE. ad + CHAPTER XVI. BELL MATTHEWSON AGAIN. {7 was a miserable hour for that elderly couple, Mr. and Mrs. Grale, as they sat together in the privacy of their chamber in the still night: he striving to pass off his emotional sorrow with a display of indignation—which he really felt ; she giving way helplessly to the bitterest feelings of suspense and terror. ‘Their only son, loved well by both of them, had disappeared from home, the evening of the day before, Tuesday the twentieth of October. Mr. Grale raised his face in a few minutes ; but it did not seem the broad, fresh, arrogant old face his wife knew so well. It was harsh as ever, but it was pinched and scared. She was but a foolish woman, she knew, apt to give way to foolish fears and fancies; but to see this look on his face terrified her worse than all, for it told her that her undefined fears were real. “Oh what is this?” cried the bewildered woman. “ Dick, husband, what is it? What has happened to our boy? Where is. he? * Mr. Grale turned impatiently aside. He said some words which seemed to blanch her very heart, though they failed to convey any definite idea to her mind. ‘“ Nothing has happened to him that I know of,” he went on. ‘‘ He is safe enough, I expect. No fear but we shall hear of him before we want to.” : “O Richard,” she cried, ‘you were not always stern and hard. You are angry now and that makes you so. Won’t you tell me all about it? I am sure you know something. Wherever he is and whatever he has done, he is my boy still, and I can’t forget that.” Mr. Grale looked at her, as she sat beside him swaying to and fro — helplessly, a forlorn picture which bore no resemblance to the buxom, easy-going dame whom he was wont to overawe. ‘There came a great pity into his eyes. VOL. XXXIX. Y CORDNICLIOO cS (SO