THE GHOST OF ADONIRAM CALDWELL
A stable-boy held Miss Octavia's horse at the inn-door. Her face, her figure, her voice expressed outraged dignity as she tested the saddle-girth.
"You need never tell me what had happened to provoke your wrath, for that is none of my affair; but I wish to say that your conduct and bearing won my highest approval. They had undoubtedly hidden the jack of clubs to avoid the drubbing you would have administered to the unfortunate man who would have drawn that card if it had been in the pack."
"I was not in the slightest danger at any time, Miss Hollister," I protested. "By one of those tricks of fate to which you and I are becoming so accustomed, the card had fallen to the floor unnoticed. If you had not arrived so opportunely the lost jack would have been discovered, the cards reshuffled, and very likely Mr. Ormsby would have been dusting the inn-floor with me at this very minute."
"I refuse to believe any such thing," declared Miss Octavia, who had mounted and continued speaking from the saddle. "Your perfect confidence was admirable, and I shudder to think of the terrible punishment you would have given them. I do not particularly dislike Mr. Ormsby, though the possibility of Cecilia marrying him has troubled me not a little as I have recalled the unromantic aspect of Utica as seen from the car-windows; but it is much to your credit that you defied them all and brought them to the fighting-point, and then, by a stroke of cleverness it pleased me to witness, placed them irretrievably in the wrong."
If Miss Octavia wished to view my performances in this flattering light it seemed unnecessary and unkind to object. Now that I was in the open again with a whole skin I was not averse to the victor's crown; I would even wear it tilted slightly over one ear. Birds have been killed by shots that missed the real target; bunker sands are rich in gutta percha and good intentions. I was a fraud, but a cheerful one.
"It was only a pleasant incident of the day's work, Miss Hollister. I'm going to engage a squire and take to the open road as soon as all this is over."
"As soon as all what is over!" she demanded, eyeing me keenly.
"Oh, the work I've undertaken to do here. I flatter myself that I have made some progress; but within twenty-four hours I dare say that we shall have seen the end."
"Your words are not wholly luminous, Arnold."