Golden Butterflies

If you are one of those captious people who must
verify by the calendar every new moon you read of in
a book, and if you are pained to discover the historian
lifting anchor and spreading sail contrary to the reckonings
of the nautical almanac, I beg to call your attention
to these items from the time-table of the Mid-Western
and Southern Railway for December, 1901.

The south-bound express passed Annandale at exactly
fifty-three minutes after four P. M. It was scheduled
to reach Cincinnati at eleven o'clock sharp. These
items are, I trust, sufficiently explicit.

To the student of morals and motives I will say a
further word. I had resolved to practise deception in
running away from Glenarm House to keep my promise
to Marian Devereux. By leaving I should forfeit
my right to any part of my grandfather's estate; I
knew that and accepted the issue without regret; but I
had no intention of surrendering Glenarm House to
Arthur Pickering, particularly now that I realized how
completely I had placed myself in his trap. I felt,
moreover, a duty to my dead grandfather; and-not
least-the attacks of Morgan and the strange ways of
Bates had stirred whatever fighting blood there was in
me. Pickering and I were engaged in a sharp contest,
and I was beginning to enjoy it to the full, but I did not
falter in my determination to visit Cincinnati, hoping
to return without my absence being discovered; so the
next afternoon I began preparing for my journey.

"Bates, I fear that I'm taking a severe cold and I'm
going to dose myself with whisky and quinine and go
to bed. I shan't want any dinner,-nothing until you
see me again."