“Business of importance called him very suddenly,” said the clerk.
“How long is he to be gone?”
“It is uncertain. From two to three months, I should say.”
“Did he leave any letter or message for me,—Gilbert Greyson?”
The clerk shook his head.
“Nothing at all,” he answered.
Gilbert left the office in great perplexity. How was he to pay the week’s board now due, he asked himself, with less than a dollar in hand, and no income?
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE COUNT’S SECRET.
On the morning after Alphonso Jones had enjoyed his memorable interview with the Count Ernest de Montmorency, he bore himself in a loftier and more consciously superior manner than usual. He felt that he was entitled to a larger measure of consideration, on account of his intimacy with one of the nobility.
“The count must have seen something in me, or he would not have invited me to visit him at his chateau,” reflected Alphonso.