The Belgrave mystery : a novel / Treve Roscoe.

  • Roscoe, Treve.
Date:
1904
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Belgrave mystery : a novel / Treve Roscoe. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    with a meaning glance towards the frail figure over in the fire- light. The girl nodded as they shook hands. CHAPTER VI Long before Sunday davmed Egerton had made up his mind that he would not avail himself of that eagerly sought permission to call at Upper Baker Street. Prudence had re-asserted her claims with no uncertain voice. It was palpably absurd, he argued with himself, that a man, who for so many years had prided himself upon being the possessor of certain qualities denied to the majority of men, should allow impulse to override him in such a high-handed fashion. Certainly, if only to prove to himself his right to the reputation he had gained, he would not go. His mind was made up. Yet, the room in its Sunday morning desolation —^all the more desolate by reason of Fitzgerald’s absence (for he had gone to spend the week-end at Edenham)—struck him with a chill of premonition. It was during the long hours before noon, in which he alternately tried to concentrate his attention upon his worlc and paused to listen with a weakness for which he mentally scourged himself, to the allurements of longing, that perhaps he first realized the grip with which this woman held him. He lunched disconsolately and inadequately, at an ab- normally early hour, to break the monotony of the tedious day, missing with a pang of foreboding Jack’s inconsequent chatter. After all, he was not surprised to find himself brushing his hat with elaborate care, previous to what he promised himself would be nothing more than a short stroll. He sauntered west through the quiet, almost deserted streets, meeting here and there a gaily dressed shop-girl starting on her Sunday afternoon ramble with eyes alert for promising-looking young men. More than one of these damsels cast more or less inviting glances in the direction of the tall, well-groomed figure, so typically English in its look of easy strength. He was still assuring himself with the too much protestation of insincerity of his detennina- tion not to call, even while his eye was diligently scanning the numbers over the houses in Upper Baker Street. That,then, was the house, across