“Jehu!” said Tregarvon under his breath. “So that is her father. If looks count for anything, he is worthy of her; which is more than I would say for any other Tennesseean I’ve met.” Then Carfax’s anxious call was repeated, and this time Tregarvon answered.
“Not lost—only mislaid,” he returned. Then he saw Carfax’s face: “Why, Poictiers!—who is dead?”
Carfax was standing up in his place, clinging to the steering-wheel with one hand and waving the telegram like a flag of distress in the other.
“Read that!” he commanded tragically, when the inspector of brakes came within passing reach.
Tregarvon glanced at the message and became, in his turn, a man stricken down without warning. The bolt was dated at Chattanooga, and it had been filed for sending at nine in the forenoon. It was addressed to Carfax, and it read:
“Here with papa and mamma, and the Pennsylvania battle-monument dedicators. If I should run over to Coalville with Clotilde this afternoon, will you and Vance put me up at the hotel and show me your mine? But, of course, you will.
“Elizabeth.”
“Oh, good heavens!” groaned Tregarvon, when the paralyzing effect of the announcement gave place to the panic of dismay; “E-Elizabeth and her maid?—coming here?”
Carfax laughed rather wildly. “Yes; coming here to stop at—at the hotel!”
Tregarvon read the message again. “She says ‘this afternoon.’ That means to-day—now—this minute; she’s on this train! Poictiers, if you are any friend of mine, you’ll climb down here and find a club and put me out of my misery!”