"The will, I believe," said Mr. Blunt moodily, "was written on a
half sheet of paper, with his device of an Assyrian bull at the
head. What the devil did he mean by it? Anyway it was the last
time that she surveyed the world of men and women from the saddle.
Less than three months later. . ."

"Allegre died and. . . " murmured Mills in an interested manner.

"And she had to dismount," broke in Mr. Blunt grimly. "Dismount
right into the middle of it. Down to the very ground, you
understand. I suppose you can guess what that would mean. She
didn't know what to do with herself. She had never been on the
ground. She . . . "

"Aha!" said Mills.

"Even eh! eh! if you like," retorted Mr. Blunt, in an unrefined
tone, that made me open my eyes, which were well opened before,
still wider.

He turned to me with that horrible trick of his of commenting upon
Mills as though that quiet man whom I admired, whom I trusted, and
for whom I had already something resembling affection had been as
much of a dummy as that other one lurking in the shadows, pitiful
and headless in its attitude of alarmed chastity.

"Nothing escapes his penetration. He can perceive a haystack at an
enormous distance when he is interested."