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The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel by Florence Warden
page 131 of 286 (45%)


CHAPTER XIII.

THE SEQUEL TO A TRAGEDY.


It was on the evening after that of his expedition to Limehouse that Max
Wedmore found himself back again at the modest iron gate of the park at
The Beeches. He had not sent word what time he should arrive, preferring
not to have to meet Doreen by herself, with her inevitable questions,
sooner than he could help.

As he shut the gate behind him, and hurried up the drive toward the
house, he felt a new significance in the words "Home, Sweet Home," and
shuddered at the recollection that he had, in the thirty odd hours since
he left it, given up the hope of ever seeing it again.

It was a little difficult, though, on this prosaic home-coming, to
realize all he had passed through since he last saw the red house, with
its long, dignified front, its triangular pediment rising up against the
dark-blue night sky, and the group of rambling outbuildings, stables,
laundries, barns, all built with a magnificent disregard of the value of
space, which straggled away indefinitely to the right, in a grove of big
trees and a tangle of brush-wood.

Lines of bright light streaming between drawn window curtains showed
bright patches on the lawn and the shrubs near the house. As Max passed
through the iron gate which shut in the garden from the park, a group of
men and boys, shouting, encouraging one another with uncouth cries,
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