FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128  
129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   >>   >|  
g me up, my young friend. I quite expected to hear your news during the day. No one would really suppose that a respectable man like Starling would be guilty of such a ridiculous action. However, it is pleasant to know. I thank you. I take my coffee and rolls this morning with more appetite." Arnold set down the telephone. Mr. Weatherley, had risen to his feet and walked as far as the window. On his way back to his place, he looked at the little safe which he had made over to his secretary. "You've got my papers there all right, Chetwode?" he asked. "Certainly, sir," Arnold answered. "I hope, however, we may never need to use them." Mr. Weatherley smiled. He was busy choosing another cigar. CHAPTER XIX IN THE COUNTRY They sat on the edge of the wood, and a west wind made music for them overhead among the fir trees. From their feet a clover field sloped steeply to a honeysuckle-wreathed hedge. Beyond that, meadow-land, riven by the curving stream which stretched like a thread of silver to the blue, hazy distance. Arnold laughed softly with the pleasure of it, but the wonder kept Ruth tongue-tied. "I feel," she murmured, "as though I were in a theatre for the first time. Everything is strange." "It is the theatre of nature," Arnold replied. "If you close your eyes and listen, you can hear the orchestra. There is a lark singing above my head, and a thrush somewhere back in the wood there." "And see, in the distance there are houses," Ruth continued softly. "Just fancy, Arnold, people, if they had no work to do, could live here, could live always out of sight of the hideous, smoky city, out of hearing of its thousand discords." He smiled. "There are a great many who feel like that," he said, his eyes fixed upon the horizon, "and then, as the days go by, they find that there is something missing. The city of a thousand discords generally has one clear cry, Ruth." "For you, perhaps," she answered, "because you are young and because you are ambitious. But for me who lie on my back all day long, think of the glory of this!" Arnold slowly sat up. "Upon my word!" he exclaimed. "Why not. Why shouldn't you stay in the country for the summer? I hate London, too. There are cheap tickets, and bicycles, and all sorts of things. I wonder whether we couldn't manage it." She said nothing. His thoughts were busy with the practical side of it. There was an opportunity here, too, to prepare her f
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128  
129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Arnold
 

smiled

 

thousand

 
Weatherley
 

discords

 

answered

 

softly

 

distance

 

theatre

 

replied


nature

 
Everything
 

strange

 
hideous
 
singing
 

houses

 

continued

 

hearing

 

listen

 

thrush


orchestra

 

people

 

generally

 

tickets

 

bicycles

 
things
 

London

 

shouldn

 

country

 

summer


couldn

 

opportunity

 
prepare
 

practical

 

manage

 

thoughts

 

exclaimed

 

missing

 

horizon

 

slowly


ambitious
 
meadow
 

window

 

looked

 

walked

 
appetite
 

telephone

 
papers
 
Chetwode
 

Certainly