Carl found his patience taxed
to the utmost.
The grandfather's clock was booming eight when at length, after a
gauntlet of garrulous servants, he pushed back the great, iron-bound
doors of the old Spanish room in his cousin's house and entered. The
war-beaten slab of table-wood, the old lanterns, the Spanish grandee
above the mantel, the mended candlestick and its unmarred mate, all
brought memories of another night when Starrett's glass had struck the
marble fireplace. Vividly, too, he recalled how the firelight had
stained the square-paneled ceiling of oak overhead, and how Diane had
stood in the doorway. The room was the same. It was a little hard,
however, to reconcile the sullen, resentful, impudent young scapegrace
of that other night with the man of to-night.
He put out his hand to touch the second candlestick--the telephone bell
rang.
Carl frowned impatiently and answered it.
"Hello," said he. "Yes, this is Carl Granberry speaking . . .
Who? . . . Oh! Hello, Hunch, is that you?"
It plainly was. Moreover, Mr. Dorrigan was very nervous and ill at
ease. Carl laughed with relish.
"What's the trouble?" he demanded. "You're stuttering like a kid . . .
Shut up and begin over again. . . . Hello. . . . Yes.
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