He was keenly observant of
details, and knew that these things had been missing a short time
before. The pleasure of their meeting that afternoon, after a
separation of nearly two years, had dispelled for a time the
trouble which he now saw revealing itself in his companion's face
and attitude, and the lightness of Whittemore's manner in
beginning his explanation for inducing him to come into the north
had helped to complete the mask. There occurred to him, for an
instant, a picture which he had once drawn of Whittemore as he had
known him in certain stirring times still fresh in the memory of
each--a picture of the old, cool, irresistible Whittemore, smiling
in the face of danger, laughing outright at perplexities, always
ready to fight with a good-natured word on his lips. He had drawn
that picture for Burke's, and had called it "The Fighter." Burke
himself had criticized it because of the smile. But Gregson knew
his man. It was Whittemore.
There was a change now. He had grown older, surprisingly older.
There were deeper lines about his eyes. His face was thinner. He
saw, now, that Philip's lightness had been but a passing flash of
his old buoyancy, that the old life and sparkle had gone from him.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25