Page:The time spirit; a romantic tale (IA timespiritromant00snaiiala).pdf/266

 "Yes?"

"She has her father's eyes."

"Very interesting to know that." The Duke laughed, but it was a curious note in which there was not a grain of mirth. "Yet, even assuming that to be the case, it would take a bold man to jump to such a conclusion. Surely he would need better ground to go upon."

"I am sorry to say he has much more than a mere likeness to help him." As Harriet spoke the bright color ran from neck to brow. "He happened to be at my brother-in-law's on the evening the child was first brought to the house."

That simple fact was far more than the Duke had bargained for. A look of dismay came upon him, he shook an ominous head. "It throws a new light on the matter," he said, after a pause, painful in its intensity. "Now tell me this—did he see the child?"

"Oh, yes!"

"That helps him to put two and two together at any rate." A look of tragic concern came into his face. "What an amazing world!"

She agreed that the world was amazing. And in spite of the strange unhappiness in her eyes she could not help smiling a little as a surge of memories came upon her. She sighed softly, even tenderly as she made the confession. "To my mind, Sir Dugald Maclean is one of the most amazing men in it."

"Have you any particular reason for saying that?"—The gaze was disconcerting in its keenness—"apart, I mean, from the mere obvious facts of his career?"

"It is simply that I have watched him rise," said