THE MAN IN SADDLE
of the night before, perhaps the scholar had given him up, a hopeless case; or it might be only that he was surrounded as he was usually in the morning, with his habitual mist of thoughts. But Blanche raised great, prompt eyes from her business of copying, and gave him a look difficult to interpret—love, envy of his gay morning looks, and the intent, insinuative gaze of one who would recall to another a secret, remind him of some wonderful thing both knew, and no one else in the world. How at that look, last night's adventure returned to him like a ghost rising in broad daylight—the race with the moon, the ascent of the Sphinx. Footsteps on the edge of death! He was appalled at the risks he had let her take. He must have been insane last night! And when she was alone, think of it! It was good all this was to end.
Sitting on the table, between father and daughter, Carron explained himself. He was off, he said, for his last two days of hunting. He expected to be back day after to-morrow night. He wondered if the scholar would suspect anything from this—but Rader's eyes which seemed fixed upon him were probably fixed on some theory a hundred miles beyond him.
He wondered if Blanche would think his departure strange, coming so quickly on the heels of
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