He stepped from the porch and took his horse from the patient "hired" man, who promptly vanished to his rest in the harness room of the barn. He sprang lightly into the saddle.
"That's a good notion, Sharpe," Angus went on, as he gathered up the reins. "Guess we'd run a cracking hotel together. Well, so long. We'll talk it over later. So long."
He turned his horse about and set off down the trail, and, in a few moments, he, too, was swallowed up by the woodland shadows.
CHAPTER XVII
PAYING THE PRICE
The sumptuous library at Deep Willows held a great fascination for Monica. She used it in her solitary moments, during her husband's absences, more than any other living-room in the great house. Perhaps the attraction was the suggestion of office which the beautifully carved mahogany desk gave it. There was the great safe, too, let deep into the wall just behind it, with its disguising simple mahogany door. There were the elaborate filing drawers, and various other appurtenances necessary in a room where business was transacted. Perhaps these things helped to remind her of other days, days that had been often troublesome, but, nevertheless, of a memory that was very dear.
But the official atmosphere of the room was very limited. There was nothing official in the bookcases lining the walls, containing their hundreds of volumes of modern and classical literature. There was nothing suggestive of commerce in the bronzes and marble statuary which adorned the various antique plinths and pedestals. And the pictures, too, modern certainly, but both oil and water colors were by the best living masters. Nor were the priceless Persian rugs the floor coverings one would expect to find on an office floor.
Monica loved the room. There was the character of the man she loved peeping out from every corner at her, every shelf of the bookcases. There was a simple, direct, almost severe style about the place, which reminded her so much of the strength of the man who had taken possession of her soul.
Something of this was in her thought as she sat there in a comfortable rocker on this particular night. A book was in her lap, but she was not reading. There was too much rioting through her busy brain for her to devour the translation of a stodgy, obscure Greek classic. She had taken the book from its place almost at haphazard, as women sometimes will, and her sincere purpose had been to read it. But her purpose lacked the necessary inclination, the moment the cover had been opened.