Page:The Tattooed Countess (1924).pdf/94

 meticulously in his cotton-lined, tin box, the handle of which he was carrying between his teeth; then one, two, three, four more. As Gareth descended the cliff even more carefully and slowly with his burden than he had made the ascent, the mother bird, not making a sound, sailed round and round his head, as near as she dared approach.

Gee, but I'm dirty. He stood before Miss Colman, ruefully surveying his clothes, soiled with clay. . . . But I got the eggs.

You didn't take them all, did you? You left one for the mother bird?

Yes, I took them all. It's a clutch.

What's a clutch?

All the eggs in one nest.

But why do you want a clutch?

So that I can compare them and see how much they are alike, and how much they are different. Also, to show how many eggs there are in a setting. Of course, he added, the number varies.

It doesn't seem right to take them all.

O, there are lots of them. Look at the flock of birds.

But the mother. ..

These are only eggs. If they were young birds, that'd be different.

Let me see them, Miss Colman suggested. Her face was very pale.

Gareth opened the box, and held it before her. She touched the tiny, white shells, in colour scarcely