"Let the lassie lie still the day," said he, "with Kate, perhaps, to
read to her. Your sister might not choose a cheering book. Then
perhaps we'll have her riding Punch again to-morrow." But Graham did
not smile when meeting Janet by the parlor door.
He was thinking of the contrast in these two, his patients, as with
professional calm he studied the troubled features of the major's wife
when the voice of Sergeant Shannon was heard in the lower hall,
inquiring for the major, and in an instant Plume had joined him. In
that instant, too, Elise had sped, cat-like, to the door, and Mrs.
Plume had followed. Possibly for this reason the major led the
sergeant forth upon the piazza and the conversation took place in
tones inaudible to those within the house; but, in less than a minute,
the doctor's name was called and Graham went down.
"Look at this," said Plume. "They raked it out of the sand close to
where Mullins was lying." And the major held forth an object that
gleamed in the last rays of the slanting sunshine. It was Blakely's
beautiful watch.