"Breckinridge inquest adjourned. Coroner holds case open for further evidence. Rumor that detectives are working on new and startling clue. Close friend of George W. Breckinridge, millionaire clubman whose body stabbed to the heart was found in a secluded spot on Vanderduycken Road, declares that he has for some time been under a cloud—"
The letters ran together and blurred before Betty's eyes, and crumpling the sheet convulsively, she dropped it at her feet. Then as if suddenly conscious of the conspicuous spot in which she stood, the girl slipped quickly away into the shadows. Her pulse pounded in her ears and her brain seemed reeling, but one fact stood out in terrible, relentless clarity; the pictured face was that of the man who had lain dead in the dining-room of the house among the cedars.
CHAPTER VII.
Ten Thousand Sheep.
For several days thereafter Betty was kept closely confined to the house. Mrs. Atterbury had accepted her statement that she lost her way in attempting a short cut through the park as the explanation of her late return and attributed her own agitation to anxiety over the young girl's welfare. The mask was lifted for an instant, however, and Betty had a glimpse of the sullen fury which seethed beneath her employer's calm austerity.
She was in no sense made to feel like a virtual prisoner once more, but Mrs. Atterbury made constant demands upon her which practically filled her hours of daylight, and no further errands were broached.
The evenings were usually her own, however, and she spent them in fascinated study of the Egyptian translation. Her enthusiasm grew with its development, but she resolutely banished it from her mind during the daily routine, for fear her abstraction be noticed and questioned. Yet always, with every hour of freedom from espionage, she continued her protracted search. Whatever her object she sought it in every place of concealment which suggested itself to her. Betty learned quickly to know when the servants' tasks would lead them to various parts of the house, and managed skilfully to elude them. It was from her employer herself that she most feared discovery, but in this eventuality fortune had so far been with her.
Mrs. Atterbury's correspondence continued to prove negative and devoid of interest, but one morning she dictated a letter which caught Betty's wandering attention. It was evidently in reply to one which had not passed through the girl's hands, and the oddity of its phrasing impressed her so acutely that when her employer went to receive a caller, she sorted it from the pile of envelopes and read it again:
"My dear Shirley:
Your letter received. Send me ten of the thousand circulars quoting sheep prices for March. Home market good this week for forty or fifty and even more points rise if my brokers handled the situation properly. State Senator Laramie advocates strict game laws now up before house. Comet, my horse, sold. Speranza invited us last Thursday out for week-end to see her pink hothouse roses bud. The frost killed them, however. Her sister is safe from submarines on the northern way home from Japan. Demon won red ribbon show held last month in Littleton, near Denver. Mrs. Ardmore's 'Alibi' beat him straight. John will meet your friend Professor Blythe, of Chicago University, on Saturday at eight. He says he has obeyed your instructions about buying new machinery; to substitute old endangers success. He fears block contracts will head off buyers, but he is conscientious. There is no longer any danger of piracy, discovery now patented so you can use the invention this year. Unwritten code among manufacturers in America is letting unions ruin us. Do you know what the result was out West in the Cote vs. Williams affair? Was the end satisfactory to all concerned?