The Mission of Poubalov — page 104: what you’re looking at

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

100 LITIZKI BREAKS HIS APPOINTMENT. ‘Why not?’ Clara gave the man no help by suggesting a possible excuse. “My carriage is engaged—that is,’ he blurted, haven’t got any carriage that would be fit for you.” ‘‘What is the matter with the one in which you took Strobel?’’ “Tt got smashed up and is being repaired. Yousee,” he mumbled his words so that they were almost unintel- ligible, ‘‘the same day a party of toughs hired it; the were kind o’ swell toughs, and they got on a racket, ar the carriage was damaged. "Tain’t fit to use.” ‘‘Mr. Billings!’’ Clara spoke with a sudden energy tha startled the driver, ‘“‘was Mr. Strobel in the carriage wher it was damaged?”’ ‘‘No’m, no’m, he wan’t,’’ stammered Billings. The explanation suggested an entirely new thought Clara. Before her mental vision there came swiftly a pic ture of her lover struggling with somebody—might it not be Poubalov?—in the carriage itself. She seemed to see a violent conflict in which seats and fixtures gave way as men’s bodies fell heavily. And Ivan was overpowered, k enemies triumphed, he was motionless, unconscious perhaps fatally injured, and they had hidden him awa ! somewhere lest their crime come to the light! This was wholly unlike the vision she had seen on the evening of what should have been her wedding day; i had none of the aspects of an hallucination; for as th alarming details shaped themselves in her thoughts, sl was conscious that Billings sat before her, looking fright ened, and that he rose again to go. In this instance shi was but following the suggestions brought out by her in. quiry to what might be their logical, natural conclusion, ‘“T am sorry you cannot drive me to-morrow,” she said recovering and withdrawing her eyes, which had bee! fixed in a strained stare upon Billings for a very brief | riod. ‘‘Before you go, tell me the names and pa 0 ¢books.con the persons you took to the funeral, please, eh oe ‘