Detective Bob Bridger — page 66: what you’re looking at

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

DETECTIVE BOB BRIDGER. =—S—s=*8BD “TI stepped from a side door and followed her. “*Ha, ha! Miss Annette ; playing truant from your Music lesson, I perceive,’ I sang out, gayly, asl approached her side. “She paused, and drew aside her vail. Her eyes were red, and on the long lashes hung tell-tale tear-drops. “*Oh, I’m so delighted to see you!’ she exclaimed, with a start, and extending her little gloved hand. ‘But Mrs. Bibby is waiting your coming, and I must not detain you.’ _ “*T see no reason why she should be,’ I replied. ‘Did she not give you your lessons ?’ “*No; she—that is—I am quite sure she said she was waiting your coming, and that you were going to the circus together.’ “*Believe me, Annette, she has no promise of mine to warrant her thinking so. She did ask me to accompany her to the circus, but I replied that that would interfere with your lesson. She then assured me that you would not come to-day. But I believed that you would come, for all that, and have been watching and waiting until you had done your lesson, that | might invite you to accompany me — to the show.’ ‘A startled expression came into the little beauty’s eyes, and she tapped her little foot upon the pavement, and looked at it. | “*It is very strange,’ she said. ‘Mrs. Bibby is confident that you are coming, and said she must be excused from giving my lesson to-day, and that she would be unable _ to give any further instruction as she was engaged to be mar- ried to you.’ “*She has no right to say this,’ said I. ‘The fact is, I only cultivated her acquaintance that I might form yours, for | had seen you on the trains, and though ardently de- siring to know you, felt that | could only do so agreeably to yourself in the way of a proper introduction.’ ““Then you do not love Mrs. Bibby, and are not engaged to marry her?’ she asked, her eyes beaming with innocent pleasure. ‘Believe me, Annette, I never dreamed of such a thing before I met you, and certainly not after. The fact is, I have never loved any woman in the world, and as for get- ting married, I vow that if I ever do that, it will be with the consent of some little lady about your size.’ * “My consent ?’ ’*Yes, your consent, and provided the bride has hair _ like yours, has blue eyes, wears a blue traveling dress Eomicboo <S (E()