Page 268 - The snake's pass

256 THE snake's pass.
That afternoon I wrote to my solicitor, Mr. Chapman,
and asked him to have inquiries made, without the least
delay, as to what was the best school in Paris to which
to send a young lady, almost grown up, but whose edu-
cation had been neglected. I added that I should be
myself in London within two days of my letter, and would
hope to have the information.
That evening I had a long talk on affairs with Dick,
and opened to him a project I had formed regarding
Knockcalltecrore. This was that I should try to buy
the whole of the mountain, right away from where the
sandy peninsula united it to the mainland—for evi-
dently it had ages ago been an isolated sea-girt rock-
bound island. Dick knew that already we held a large
part of it—Norah the Cliff Fields, Joyce the upper land
on the sea side, and myself the part that I had already
bought from Murdock. He quite fell in with the idea,
and as we talked it over he grew more and more
enthusiastic.
"Why, my dear fellow," he said, as he stood up and
walked about the room, "it will make the most lovely
residence in the world, and will be a fine investment for
you. Holding long leases, you will easily be able to
buy the freehold, and then every penny spent will
return many fold. Let us once be able to find the
springs that feed the bog, and get them in hand, and
we can make the place a paradise. The springs are evi-
dently high up on the hill, so that we can not only get
water for irrigating and ornamental purposes, but we