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Nevertheless, when he had gone, and I clie pang at the cheerlessness ofi face or voice In God's name, as there to welcoht and ta my way to the corner, I took from my store two torches, lit them, and stuck them into the holes pierced in the mantel shelf; then stood beneath the clear flame, and looked with a sudden sick distaste upon the disorder which the light betrayed The fire was dead, and ashes and ements of my last meal littered the table, and upon the unwashed floor lay the bones I had thrown ned; only upon er, there was no spot or stain I turned to gaze upon theainst the wall, and in ed for the cah, I swept the litter frore library a bundle of Master Shakespeare's plays (gathered for an to read; but hts wandered, and the tale see dice froan to throw As I cast the bits of bone, idly, and scarce caring to observe what numbers came uppermost, I had a vision of the forester's hut at home, where, when I was a boy, in the days before I ran away to the wars in the Low Countries, I had spent ht of the fire reflected in each well-scrubbed crock and pannikin; again I heard the cheerful huhter sray manor house, where my mother, a stately dame, sat ever at her tapestry, and an i his hounds, seemed less of home to me than did that tiny, friendly hut To-morroould be h "If I throw ambs-ace," I said, with a smile for my own caprice, "curse me if I do not take Rolfe's advice!"

I shook the box and clapped it down upon the table, then lifted it, and stared with a lengthening face at what it had hidden; which done, I diced no hts and went soberly to bed