At the Time Appointed


At the Time Appointed, by A. Maynard Barbour

The Project Gutenberg EBook of At the Time Appointed, by A. Maynard Barbour This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
Title: At the Time Appointed
Author: A. Maynard Barbour
Illustrator: J. N. Marchand
Release Date: June 21, 2007 [EBook #21892]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AT THE TIME APPOINTED ***

Produced by Mark C. Orton, Dave Macfarlane, Linda McKeown and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

AT THE TIME APPOINTED
TWELFTH EDITION
* * * * *
By A. Maynard Barbour
THAT MAINWARING AFFAIR
ILLUSTRATED BY E. PLAISTED ABBOTT
12mo. Cloth, $1.50
"Possibly in a detective story the main object is to thrill. If so, 'That Mainwaring Affair' is all right. The thrill is there, full measure, pressed down and running over."--Life, New York
"The book that reminds one of Anna Katherine Green in her palmiest days.... Keeps the reader on the alert, defies the efforts of those who read backward, deserves the applause of all who like mystery."--Town Topics, New York
"The tale is well told, and the intricacies of the plot so adroitly managed that it is impossible to foresee the correct solution of the mysterious case until the final act of the tragedy.... Although vividly told, the literary style is excellent and the story by no means sensational, a fact that raises it above the level of the old-time detective story,"--Brooklyn Daily Eagle

[Illustration: AS DARRELL DISMOUNTED, SHE CAME SWIFTLY TOWARDS HIM, EXTENDING HER HAND. Page 110]

AT THE TIME APPOINTED
BY
A. Maynard Barbour
AUTHOR OF "THAT MAINWARING AFFAIR," ETC.
WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY J. N. MARCHAND
"Yes, greater they who on life's battle-field, With unseen foes and fierce temptations fight" JOHN D. HIGINBOTHAM
GROSSET & DUNLAP Publishers New York
Copyright, 1903 By J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY Published April, 1903
Electrotyped and Printed by J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, U.S.A.
TO JOHN D. HIGINBOTHAM
"AS UNKNOWN, AND YET WELL KNOWN"

CONTENTS PAGE
Chapter I--John Darrell 9
" II--A Night's Work 25
" III--"The Pines" 32
" IV--Life? or Death? 43
" V--John Britton 48
" VI--Echoes from the Past 62
" VII--At the Mines 68
" VIII--"Until the Day Break" 81
" IX--Two Portraits 86
" X--The Communion of Two Souls 95
" XI--Impending Trouble 104
" XII--New Life in the Old Home 109
" XIII--Mr. Underwood "Strikes" First 123
" XIV--Drifting 134
" XV--The Awakening 146
" XVI--The Aftermath 166
" XVII--"She knows her Father's Will is Law" 180
" XVIII--On the "Divide" 194
" XIX--The Return to Camp Bird 206
" XX--Forging the Fetters 216
" XXI--Two Crimes by the Same Hand 224
" XXII--The Fetters Broken 237
" XXIII--The Mask Lifted 247
" XXIV--Foreshadowings 254
" XXV--The "Hermitage" 262
" XXVI--John Britton's Story 269
" XXVII--The Rending of the Veil 274
" XXVIII--"As a Dream when One Awaketh" 278
" XXIX--John Darrell's Story 285
" XXX--After Many Years 295
" XXXI--An Eastern Home 300
" XXXII--Marion Holmes 308
" XXXIII--Into the Fulness of Life 316
" XXXIV--A Warning 321
" XXXV--A Fiend at Bay 330
" XXXVI--Se?ora Martinez 337
" XXXVII--The Identification 343
" XXXVIII--Within the "Pocket" 352
" XXXIV--At the Time Appointed 360

AT THE TIME APPOINTED

Chapter I
JOHN DARRELL
Upon a small station on one of the transcontinental lines winding among the mountains far above the level of the sea, the burning rays of the noonday sun fell so fiercely that the few buildings seemed ready to ignite from the intense heat. A season of unusual drought had added to the natural desolation of the scene. Mountains and foot-hills were blackened by smouldering fires among the timber, while a dense pall of smoke entirely hid the distant ranges from view. Patches of sage-brush and bunch grass, burned sere and brown, alternated with barren stretches of sand from which piles of rubble rose here and there, telling of worked-out and abandoned mines. Occasionally a current of air stole noiselessly down from the canyon above, but its breath scorched the withered vegetation like the blast from a furnace. Not a sound broke the stillness; life itself seemed temporarily suspended, while the very air pulsated and vibrated with the heat, rising in thin, quivering columns.
Suddenly the silence was broken by the rapid approach of the stage from a distant mining camp, rattling noisily down the street, followed by a slight stir within the apparently deserted station. Whirling at breakneck pace around a sharp turn, it stopped precipitately, amid a blinding cloud of dust, to deposit its passengers at the depot.
One of these, a young man of about five-and-twenty, arose with some difficulty from the cramped position which for seven weary hours he had been forced to maintain, and, with sundry stretchings and shakings of his superb form, seemed at last to pull himself together. Having secured his belongings from out the pile of miscellaneous luggage thrown from the stage upon the platform, he advanced towards the slouching figure of a man just emerging from