Wait a moment. I must take my field-glasses. I
never go without them."
Mr. Heard, resigned to his fate, was filled at the same time with
anxiety. He could not drive Keith's words out of his head. Perhaps
Denis was really up to some mischief. Who could tell? His eagerness--his
curious language! That note of exaltation in his voice. . . . And what
did he mean by saying that something funny would happen? Was he
contemplating--? Above all, his dread of being unaccompanied! Mr. Heard
was aware that persons of unbalanced mind are apt to experience before
some critical outbreak a pathetic horror of solitude, as though, dimly
conscious of what was about to happen, they feared to trust themselves
alone.
He meant to keep a sharp eye on Denis.
Often, in later times, he recalled that trivial conversation. Every
word of it was graven on his memory. How more than strange that Denis
should have dragged him away that afternoon, to that particular spot,
at that very hour! By what a string of accidents had everything
happened.
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