The Secret House by Edgar Wallace

Author:Edgar Wallace
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: ManyBooks.net

CHAPTER XIII

Doris Gray was face to face with a dilemma. She stood in a tragic position; even now, she could not be sure that her guardian was dead. But dead or alive, he had left her a terrible problem, for terrible it seemed to her, for solution.

She liked Frank Doughton well enough, but she was perhaps too young, had too small a knowledge of the great elements of life to appreciate fully her true feelings in the matter; and then the influence of this polished man of the world, this Count of the Roman Empire as he described himself, with his stories of foreign capitals, his easy conversation, his acquaintance with all the niceties of social intercourse, had made a profound impression upon her. At the moment, she might not say with any certainty, whether she preferred the young Englishman or this suave man of the world.

The balance was against Frank, and the command contained in the will, the knowledge that she must, so she told herself, make something of a sacrifice, was a subject for resentment. Not even the sweetest girl in the world, obeying as she thought the command of a dead man, who was especially fond and proud of her, could be compensated for the fact that he had laid upon her his dead hands, charging her to obey a command which might very easily be repugnant and hateful to her.

She did not, in truth, wish to marry anybody. She could well afford to allow the question of her fortune to lapse; she had at least five years in which to make up her mind, as to how she felt toward Frank Doughton. She liked him, there was something especially invigorating and wholesome in his presence and in his very attitude towards her. He was so courteous, so kindly, so full of quick, strong sympathy and yet--there were some depths he could not touch, she told herself, and was vague herself as to what those depths were.

She was strolling in Green Park on a glorious April morning, in a complacent mood, for the trees were in fresh green bud and the flower beds were a blaze of colour, when she met Frank, and Frank was so obviously exhilarated that something of his enthusiasm was conveyed to her. He saw her before she had seen him, and came with quickening footsteps toward her.

"I say," he said explosively, "I have some splendid news!"

"Let us sit down," she said, with a kindly smile, and made a place for him by her side on a bench near by. "Now, what is this wonderful news?"

"You remember Mr. Farrington gave me a commission to find the missing heir of Tollington?"

She nodded.

"Well, I have found him," he said, triumphantly; "it is an extraordinary thing," he went on, "that I should have done so, because I am not a detective. I told Mr. Farrington quite a long time ago that I never expected to make any discovery which would be of any use to him. You see Mr.

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