"It's hard enough for me to leave you, at such a time as this," said
Betteredge. "But she died a dreadful death, poor soul--and I feel a kind
of call on me, Mr. Franklin, to humour that fancy of hers. Besides,"
he added, confidentially, "there's nothing in the letter against
your letting out the secret afterwards. I'll hang about in the fir
plantation, and wait till you pick me up. Don't be longer than you can
help, sir. The detective-fever isn't an easy disease to deal with, under
THESE circumstances."
With that parting caution, he left me.
The interval of expectation, short as it was when reckoned by the
measure of time, assumed formidable proportions when reckoned by
the measure of suspense. This was one of the occasions on which the
invaluable habit of smoking becomes especially precious and consolatory.
I lit a cigar, and sat down on the slope of the beach.
The sunlight poured its unclouded beauty on every object that I could
see. The exquisite freshness of the air made the mere act of living and
breathing a luxury. Even the lonely little bay welcomed the morning
with a show of cheerfulness; and the bared wet surface of the quicksand
itself, glittering with a golden brightness, hid the horror of its false
brown face under a passing smile.
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