The Streets of Ascalon

"I don't care."

"Everybody cares whether they live or die."

The girl looked at her, surprised.

"I don't," she said, " – really."

"Of course you do."

"But why should I?"

"Nonsense, Strelsa. No matter how they crack up Heaven, nobody is in a hurry to go there."

"I wasn't thinking of Heaven… I was just curious to see what else there is – I'm in no hurry, but it has always interested me… I've had a theory that perhaps to everybody worthy is given, hereafter, exactly the kind of heaven they expect – to Buddhist, Brahman, Mohammedan, Christian – to the Shinto priest as well as to the Sagamore… There's plenty of time – I'm in no hurry, nor would it be too soon to-morrow for me to find out how near I am to the truth."

"You're morbid, child!"

"Less this very moment than for years… Molly, do you know that I am getting well? I wish you knew how well I feel."

But Molly was no longer listening. High above the distant hangars where the men had gathered since early morning, a great hawk-like thing was soaring in circles. And already the distant racket of another huge winged thing came to her ears on the summer wind.

"I hope Jim will be careful," she said.

CHAPTER XIV

Into the long stables at South Linden, that afternoon, Langly Sprowl's trembling horse was led limping, his velvet flanks all torn by spurs and caked with mud, his tender mouth badly lacerated.

As for his master, it seemed that the ruin of the expensive hunter and four hours' violent and capricious exercise in his reeking saddle had merely whetted his appetite for more violence; and he had been tramping for an hour up and down the length of the library in his big sprawling house when Mr. Kyte, his confidential secretary, came in without knocking.

Sprowl hearing his step swung on him savagely, but Kyte coolly closed the door behind him and turned the key.

"Ledwith is here," he said.

"Ledwith," repeated Sprowl, mechanically.

"Yes, he's on the veranda. They said you were not at home. He said he'd wait. I thought you ought to know. He acts queerly."

Langly's protruding eyes became utterly expressionless.

"All right," he said in dismissal.

Kyte still lingered:

"Is there anything I can say or do?"

"If there was I'd tell you, wouldn't I?"

Kyte's lowered gaze stole upward toward his employer, sustained his expressionless glare for a second, then shifted.

"Very well," he said unlocking the library door; "I thought he might be armed, that's all."

"Kyte!"

Mr. Kyte turned on the door-sill.

"What do you mean by saying that?"

"Saying what?"

"That you think this fellow Ledwith may be armed?"

Kyte stood silent.

"I ask you again," repeated Sprowl, "why you infer that this man might have armed himself to visit this house?"

Kyte's eyes stole upward, were instantly lowered. Sprowl walked over to him.

"You're paid to act, not think; do you understand?" he said in a husky, suppressed voice; but his long fingers were twitching.

"I understand," said Kyte.

Sprowl's lean head jerked; Kyte went; and the master of the house strode back into the library and resumed his pacing.

Boots, spurs, the skirts of his riding coat, even his stock were stained with mud and lather; and there was a spot or two across his sun-tanned cheeks.

Presently he walked to the bay-window which commanded part of the west veranda, and looking out through the lace curtains saw Ledwith sitting there, his sunken eyes fixed on the westering sun.

The man's clothing hung loosely on his frame, showing bony angles at elbow and knee. Burrs and black swamp-mud stuck to his knickerbockers and golf-stockings; he sat very still save for a constant twitching of the muscles.

The necessity for nervous and physical fatigue drove Sprowl back into the library to tramp up and down over the soft old Saraband rugs, up and down, to and fro, and across sometimes, ranging the four walls with the dull, aimless energy of a creature which long caging is rendering mentally unsound.

Then the monotony of the exercise began to irritate instead of allaying his restlessness; he went to the bay-window again, saw Ledwith still sitting there, stared at him with a ferocity almost expressionless, and strode out into the great hallway and through the servant-watched doors to the veranda.

Ledwith looked up, rose. "How are you, Langly?" he said.

Sprowl nodded, staring him insolently in the face.

There was a pause, then Ledwith's pallid features twitched into a crooked smile.

"I wanted to talk over one or two matters with you before I leave," he said.

"When are you leaving?"

"To-night."

"Where are you going?"

"I don't know – to the Acremont Inn for a few days. After that – I don't know."