The Wild Olive | Page 5

interior
firmly on his memory. The risk was great, but the glimpse of life was
worth it.
With powers of observation quickened by his plight, he noted that the
home was just such a one as that from which he had sprung--one where
old engravings hung on the walls, while books filled the shelves, and
papers and periodicals strewed the tables. The furnishings spoke of
comfort and a modest dignity. Obliquely in his line of vision he could
see two children, seated at a table and poring over a picture-book The
boy, a manly urchin, might have been fourteen, the girl a year or two
younger. Her curls fell over the hand and arm supporting her cheek, so
that Ford could only guess at the blue eyes concealed behind them.
Now and then the boy turned a page before she was ready, whereupon
followed pretty cries of protestation. It was perhaps this mimic quarrel
that called forth a remark from some one sitting within the shadow.
"Evie dear, it's time to go to bed. Billy, I don't believe they let you stay
up as late as this at home."
"Oh yes, they do," came Billy's answer, given with sturdy assurance. "I
often stay up till nine."
"Well, it's half past now; so you'd both better come and say
good-night."
With one foot resting on the turf and the other raised to the first step of
the terrace, as he stood with folded arms, Ford watched the little scene,
in which the children closed their book, pushed back their chairs, and
crossed the room to say good-night to the two who were seated in the
shadow. The boy came first, with hands thrust into his trousers pockets
in a kind of grave nonchalance. The little girl fluttered along behind,
but broke her journey across the room by stepping into the opening of
the long window and looking out into the night. Ford stood breathless
and motionless, expecting her to see him and cry out. But she turned
away and danced again into the shadow, after which he saw her no

more. The silence that fell within the room told him that the elders were
left alone.
Stealthily, like a thief, Ford crept up the steps and over the turf of the
terrace. The rising of the wind at that minute drowned all sound of his
movements, so that he was tempted right on to the veranda, where a
coarse matting deadened his tread. He dared not hold himself upright
on this dangerous ground, but, crouching low, he was blotted from
sight, while he himself could see what passed within. He would only,
he said, look once more into kindly human faces and steal away as he
came.
He could perceive now that the lady who had spoken was an invalid
reclining in a long chair, lightly covered with a rug. A fragile, dainty
little creature, her laces, trinkets, and rings revealed her as one clinging
to the elegancies of another phase of life, though Fate had sent her to
live, and perhaps to die, here on the edge of the wilderness. He made
the same observation with regard to the man who sat with his back to
the window. He was in informal evening dress--a circumstance that, in
this land of more or less primitive simplicity, spoke of a sense of exile.
He was slight and middle-aged, and though his face was hidden, Ford
received the impression of having seen him already, but from another
point of view. His habit of using a magnifying-glass as, with some
difficulty, he read a newspaper in the light of a green-shaded lamp,
seemed to Ford especially familiar, though more pressing thoughts kept
him from trying to remember where and when he had seen some one do
the same thing within the recent past.
As he crouched by the window watching them, it came into his mind
that they were just the sort of people of whom he had least need to be
afraid. The sordid tragedy up in the mountains had probably interested
them little, and in any case they could not as yet have heard of his
escape. If he broke in on them and demanded food, they would give it
to him as to some common desperado, and be glad to let him go. If
there was any one to inspire terror, it was he, with his height, and youth,
and wildness of aspect. He was thinking out the most natural method of
playing some small comedy of violence, when suddenly the man threw

down the paper with a sigh. On the instant the lady spoke, as though
she had been awaiting her cue.
"I don't see why you should feel so about it," she said, making an effort
to control a cough. "You