For Waldo gave a low, eager exclamation, gripping the field-glass as though he would crush in the reinforced leather case. A few moments thus, then he laughed in almost fierce glee, thrusting the glass towards his brother, speaking excitedly:
“A crazy fool lunatic, am I? Well, now, you just take a squint at the old house for yourself and see if—biting you, now, is it?”
For Bruno showed even more intense interest as he caught the right line, there taking note of—yes, they surely were white women! Faces, hair, all went to proclaim that fact. And more than that, even.
“Fair—lovely as a painter's dream!” almost painfully breathed the elder Gillespie. “I never saw such a lovely—”
“Injun squaw, of course. Couple of 'em. Nobody but a fool would ever think different. The idea of finding white women—”
“They are ladies, Waldo! I never saw such—and I feel that they must be the ones lost by poor Edgecombe when that storm—”
“That's all right enough, old fellow,” interrupted Waldo, claiming the glass once more. “No need of your playing the porker on legs, though, as I see. Give another fellow a chance to squint. But aren't they regular jo-dandies, though, for a fact?”
The two women in question, clad in flowing robes of white, lit up here and there by a dash of colour, were slowly pacing to and fro upon the temple where first discovered by the keen-eyed youngster. Thanks to the excellent glass, it was possible to view them clearly in spite of the distance, and there could be no dispute upon that one point: both mother and daughter (granting that such was their relationship) were more than ordinarily fair and comely of both face and person.
For the better part of an hour that slow promenade lasted, and until the women finally passed beyond their range of vision, the brothers took eager and copious notes. Then, in spite of the fact that scores of other figures still came within their field of vision, curiosity lagged.
“It's like watching a street medicine show, after hearing Patti or seeing Irving,” muttered Bruno, drawing back and stretching his wearied limbs beyond possible discovery.