The Way of a Man by Emerson Hough
page 46 of 356 (12%)
page 46 of 356 (12%)
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Then he said "Lizzie!" and opened wide his arms. Presently he said, "Jack, lay my head down, please." I did so. He was dead, there in the moon. I straightened him, and put my coat across his face, and spurred back down the road again and over the gate. But my mother already knew. She met me at the hall, and her face was white. "Jack," she said, "I know!" Then the servants came, and we brought him home, and laid him in his own great room, as the master of the house should lie when the end comes, and arrayed him like the gentleman he was. Now came that old wire-hair, Doctor Bond, his mane standing stiff and gray over a gray face, down which tears rolled the first time known of any man. He sent my mother away and called me to him. And then he told me that in my father's back were three or four pierced wounds, no doubt received from the sharp stubs of underbrushes when he fell. But this, he said, could hardly have been the cause of death. He admitted that the matter seemed mysterious to him. Up to this time we had not thought of the cause of this disaster, nor pondered upon motives, were it worse than accident. Now we began to think. Doctor Bond felt in the pockets of my father's coat; and so for the first time we found his account book and his wallets. Doctor Bond and I at once went out and searched the saddle pockets my father had carried. They were quite empty. |
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