It was impossible for us to stop our work to read it then and there,
or to do more than give it a cursory glance. We turned feverishly to
those years that covered, as we figured, the period of the Hynds
tragedy. And he had written:
This day was Accus'd Rich'd. my Bro. of robbing us of our
Jewells. He protests he knows Naught & my Mthr. believes him
as doth Emily. Has a true Heart, Emily. Horrid Confusion &
my Fthr. Confound'd.
Impatiently I turned over the pages, raging to read the end, my
heart pounding and fluttering.
Two nights since dy'd Scipio, son of old Shooba's wife, the
which did send for me--
Thus far had I read, Alicia and I sitting head to head on the hall
stairs. In came Schmetz the gardener, raving, gesticulating, and
after him old Uncle Adam, stepping delicately, and with a placating
smile on his wrinkled countenance.
"Those bulbs that I have planted under the windows of you," raved
Schmetz, "the demon hens of _le docteur_ Geddes are with their paws
upturning! They upturn with rapidity and completeness, led by a
shameless hog of a rooster. Is it the orders of you that I devastate
those fowls, Mademoiselle?"
Schmetz was furiously angry, and small wonder.
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