The Illegal Marriage — page 213: what you’re looking at

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

THE ILLEGAL MARRIAGE. 208 seemed to be failing daily, although his wound was healing. A deep-seated cough had set in, and the hollow eyes and sunken chest were not the only signs that old Hawks was rapidly nearing his last day on earth. Not yet had Alfred been able to see Doctor Trippe, although he had skulked about the house night after night for an opportunity to speak that one word in his ear. He dared not enter the house boldly; yet he was ready to dare much to get pos- session of Stannard’s secret, which was to be the price of his work. Nota moment did he think of the sick man within; nor did he care what the re- sult might be so that the work was accomplished. Spending the greater part of his time in the Echa- connee woods, he had visited Macon but once, and with the result already related.- That he had been cheated with regard to Cecy Morgan’s property he now believed, and his anger turned upon Stannard, the only man of the three who was an unwilling party to the deception—if it could be called one under the peculiar circumstances of the case. Burning for revenge—for what he could not tell— Alfred had again sought Cecy to be denied her presence. From his hiding-place he saw Stannard enter the jail, and from that moment the ground seemed sinking from beneath his feet. | “What have 1 gained,” he thought, while stand- ing beside his horse in the woods; “what have I gained at last? Cecy is lost to me—I cannot replace his money—detection and—” . He trembled at the thought, and for the first time the consequences of detection came home to his mind. | Sullen and moody he rode back to Echaconnee, knowing that he, too, must follow old Hawks, and both together leave the country. It was near midnight when he reached the EKcha- connee bridge, and riding across it, dismounted in a - clump of pines, intending to pay old Hawks a visit, and tell him that the worst had come. Scarcely had he again stepped into the road be- fore a man, well-dressed and evidently a stranger GEomichbooks.co