THREE:Within the same hour I met unexpectedly two other persons. First, Harry Helm; who, before I could speak, was deluging me with words, telling me for the twentieth time how, on that evening of the indoor fight, coming with a platoon of Mississippians which he had procured merely as a guard, he was within a hundred yards of the house before our shots in the bedroom told him he was riding to a rescue. Then suddenly he began to assure me that in what he had said about the two sisters he had sought only to mislead the surgeon, who, he declared, was more utterly dead-gone on Camille than both of us put together. We parted, and within the next five minutes I confronted the maiden herself.Well, and I dare say it wont be long before you are finely surprised then. Pray tell me what Lord{242} Inverbroom says. I am sure it is about the opening of the hospital to-morrow. I have practised my royal curtsey. I can get down and up quite easily, indeed Mamma thought it most graceful, and she does not praise without reason. Perhaps Lord Inverbroom wants me to come down to the bottom of the steps and make my curtsey there. If he insists, of course I will do it, for naturally he knows more about court etiquette than I do at present. I will certainly bow to his superior knowledge.
THREE:At this moment the boy covered with buttons entered."The way of it was this. The lookout in the cross-treeswe always keep a man up aloft to look out for whales when we're on cruising groundthe man had called out, 'There she blows!' and everybody was on his feet in an instant.
THREE:Yes, sir, I will gladly do you one, she said. Shall I draw a design and see if you approve of it?It had begun to snow thickly outside, and she stood for a minute or two before the fire, shaking from her cloak the frozen petals, which fizzed on the coals. Certainly she had felt a disconcertment at the moment of her entry and passage through the hall, had found fault with the ill luck that had caused her to meet the gorged galaxy from the dining-room on the one and only night when her brother had not been with her. But the encounter did not long trouble her, and like warmth coming over frozen limbs, the fact of being here alone gave her a thrill of pleasure that surprised her. She was in his secret garden all by herself, without Charles to intrude his presence, without even Keeling himself. She did not want him here now; she was surrounded with him, and presently she plunged like some ecstatic diver into the work she had come to do for him. Soon the buzz of mens conversation drifted past the door, prominent among which was Silverdales expressive and high-pitched voice, and without intention she found herself listening for Keelings. Then the murmur was cut off by the sound of a shutting door, and she went on with her work on the catalogue cards. Faint tinkles of a piano were heard as Alice performed several little pieces, faint{136} screams as Julia Fyson sang. Keeling was there, no doubt, and still she did not want him in his bodily presence. He was more completely with her in this room empty but for herself.
TWO:A slight smile appeared on Keelings grim face. He could not resist replying to this.