Page:The Blind Man's Eyes (July 1916).pdf/157

Rh Chicago, she would be still watching beside him on the train. Or was her watch beside the dying man over now? And now, if her father were dead, how could Harriet Santoine feel toward the one whom all others—if not she herself—accused of the murder of her father? For evidently it was murder now, not just "an attack."

But why, if Santoine had been taken away, or was dead or dying, had they left Eaton all night in the car in the yards? Since Santoine was dying, would there be any longer an object in concealing the fact that he had been murdered?

Eaton turned the page before him. A large print of a picture of Harriet Santoine looked at him from the paper—her beautiful, deep eyes gazing at him, as he often had surprised her, frankly interested, thoughtful, yet also gay. The newspaper had made up its lack of more definite and extended news by associating her picture with her father's and printing also a photograph of Donald Avery—"closely associated with Mr. Santoine in a confidential capacity and rumored to be engaged to Miss Santoine." Under the blind man's picture was a biography of the sort which newspaper offices hold ready, prepared for the passing of the great.

Eaton did not read that then. The mention in the paper of an engagement between Avery and Harriet Santoine had only confirmed the relation which Eaton had imagined between them. Avery, therefore, must have gone on with her; and if she still watched beside her father, Avery was with her; and if Basil Santoine was dead, his daughter was turning to Avery for comfort.

This feature somehow stirred Eaton so that he could