But now it was a man's room, with the pleasant litter of a man's
belongings. There was a square writing-table in the window, with a
wooden chair drawn up in front of it. There were many pipes, old and
new, and whips and hunting-crops; and a gun-case standing by the wall
and some crossed weapons on the wall. I saw a pair of spurs in one
corner, and, flung carelessly on the writing-table, as though the owner
might return at any moment, there was a glove.
I took up the glove and kissed it furtively. I wished I might have taken
it to comfort me, for a sense of the hand it had held seemed to linger
about it. As I stood pressing it to my breast my eye fell on a picture
that stood on the writing-table--a picture that was like yet unlike
myself. It was a reproduction of the miniature I remembered.
There were other pictures and photographs about--men in uniform, women
of many ages, horses and dogs: one of Anthony Cardew himself, which made
my heart beat to look at it. I wished I might have taken it also, and
had the will to do it but I dared not. Besides, what right had I to such
things? Already I was trying to steel myself to destroy the one letter
he had written me.
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