Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1916-02-17

LOCK, StocE ard barrel, aid retired to
the country, it was not known ex.
actly where. And with the new ad-
tons and furnishings and complete
change of personnel-not even one of
the old walters remained.
All are gone, the old. familiar
faces" Lanyard quoted in vindictfve
meiancholy-"damn 'eml"
Happily it was demonstrated that
the cuisine was being maintained on
its erstwhile plane OF excellence-one
still had that comfort!
Other impressions, less intimate
proved puzzling, disconcerting and
paradoxically reassuring.
Lanyard commanded a fair view of
Roddy across the waist OF the room
The detective had ordered a meal that
matched his aspect well, both of true
British simplicity. He was a square
set man with square jaw, cold blue
eyes, fat nose, 4 thin-lipped trap of
a mouth, face as red as rare beef
steak
His dinner comprised a cut from
+. the joint, boiled potatoes, brussels
sprouts, bit of cheese, q bottle of
Bass. He ate slowly, chewing with
the doggedness of strong character
hampered by a weak digestion, and
all the while kept his eyes fixed to an
issue of the Paris edition of the Lon
don Daily Mail with an effect of con-
centration quite too convincing
Now one doesn't read the Paris edi
ton of the London Daily Mail with in
tense excitement. Humanity speaking
it can't be done.
Where, then, was the object of this
so sedUloUsly dissembled interest?
Lanyard wasn't slow to solve this
| riddle to his satisfaction--in so far
that is, as it was satisfactory to feel
/ yet more certain that Roddy's quarry
was another than himself
Despite the lateness of the hour,
which had by now turned ten o'clock
the restaurant had still a dozen tables
or so in the service of guests pleas
antly engaged in lengthening out an
agreeable evening with dessert, coffee,
Hqueurs and cigarettes. The majority
/ of these were in couples, but at a table
] one removed from Roddys sat a party
/ Of three; and Lanyard noticed, or
/ fancied, that the man from Scotland
| Yard turned his newspaper only dur
! ing lulls in the conversation in this
| quarter.
/ Of the three, one would pass for an
| American of position and wealth.
| man of something more than sixty
! years, with an execrable accent, a
! racking cough, and a thin, patrician
cast of countenance clouded darby by
! the expression of a soul in torment,
! furroWed, scanned, twisted-a mask of
! mortal anguish. And once, when he
! looked up and casually encountered
| Lanyard's gaze the adventurer was
shocked to find himself staring into
| eyes that were as the eyes of a dead
man-eyes of gray so light that at
/ little distance the color of the iris
! blended indistinguishably with their
whites, leaving visible only the ropnd,
black points Of pupils abnormally dis.
tended and staring, blank, fixed, pas
| sionless, beneath lashless lids
For the instant they seemed to ex-
plore Lanyard's very soul with a look
! of remote and impersonal curiosity;
then they fell away, and when next
! the adventurer looked the man had
| turned to attend to some observation
| Of one of his companions with a
smile that fairly TRANSPORTED his face,
| the smile of a charming child.
| On his right sat a girl who might
be his daughter, for not only was she,
| too, obviously American, but she was
far too young to be the others wife.
A demure, old-fashioned type, well
poised but unassuming, fetchingIy
gowned, and with sufficient individu-
ality Of taste, but not conspicuously;
a girl with soft, brown hair and soft,
brown eyes; pretty, not extravagantly
so when her face was in repose, but
with slow smile that made her
scarcely less than beautiful-in all,
Lanyard thought, the kind of woman
who is predestined to comfort man
| kind, whose strongest instinct is the
maternal
She took little part in the CONVEX
sation, seldom interrupted what was
practically a duologue between her pu-
tative father and the third member of
the little party.
This last was one whom Lanyard
was sure he knew, though he could
see no more than the back of NJ. le
Comte Remy de Morbihan.
And he wondered with a thrill of
amusement if it were possible that
Roddy was on the trail of that ire
mendous buck. If so, it would be a
chase worth following-a diversion
rendered the more exquisite to Ian
yard by the spice of novelty, since for
once he would figure as a dispassion-
ate bystander.
The name of Comte Remy de Nor
bihan, although unrecorded in the AL
manach de Gotha, was one to conjuTe
with in the Paris of his Cay and gen
Grafton. He claimed the distinction
OF being at once the ugliest, one of
the wealthiest and the most-liked man
in France.
As to his looks, good or bad, they
were said to prove infallibly fatal with
women, while not a few men, perhaps
for that reason, did their possessor the
honor to initiate them. The revues
burlesqued him; Sem caricatured