The Blockade Runner — page 156: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THH BLOCKADH RUNNER. 15% your father’s death. Once I was‘seated at this very window, looking out upon the street, half dreaming, half dozing. It was a lovely day, hke the many we have in Nassau. All at once a pair of eyes became fixed upon me. I saw them peering through the plants in the window like the eyes of a snake. I could not think that they belonged to a man, yet [ knew that they were not a serpent’s orbs. I leaned forward, in- tending to bid the intruder begone, when a young man doffed his hat and bowed. That was my introduction to Flash Gilmor. I afterward discovered that he had come to Nassau in a blockade runner for the purpose of winning a bet which he had made at Charleston— that he would marry Captain Powell’s niece within three months.” Nora could hardly repress an exclamation of sur- prise. “You_may be sure that he lost his money,” contin- ued Dora, with a laugh. “He would have entered this house then if I had not. given Pedro, my Spanish servant, orders to let no serpents cross the threshold. I spoke the command in a tone intended solely for Flash Gilmor’s ears, and he shrunk away abashed. He came back, however, and let slip no opportunity of throwing himself in my path; but I made him the laughing stock of Nassau until a Confederate vessel carried him away. Since then I have not seen him, and your mention of him, Norah, has been the first -time I have heard his name spoken for many a, week.” The two girls continued to converse until a servant called Dora from the parlor, leaving Norah alone. Mowbray’s ward arose and went to the window for COMmicoooks.E@