On the instant Sir Tancred filled with the liveliest interest; emotion,
especially curious emotion, in his fellow creatures always aroused his
interest, and not infrequently brought him profit, and Mr.
Biggleswade's emotion seemed to him curiously violent to be excited by
the perusal of a newspaper. He made half a movement to show it to his
wife, caught Sir Tancred's eye, and setting it down, went on hastily
with his breakfast. He had not been so quick but that Sir Tancred had
seen that the paper was _The Daily Telegraph_, and the exciting
paragraph on the first page.
Sir Tancred brightened to the rest of his breakfast; he had little
doubt that he was on the track of some roguery or other, and he
promised himself a hunt through the paper till he found it. When the
Biggleswades, having finished their breakfast, went down to the beach,
he lighted a cigar, took his folding-chair and his pile of newspapers,
and settled down sixty yards away from them. As he had expected, their
first act was to discuss the newspaper with great animation, handing it
backwards and forwards to one another. And he took _The Daily
Telegraph_ from his pile, and set about seeking the source of their
excitement. He passed over the first advertisement in the agony
column, the offer of a reward for the recovery of the stolen child of
Kernaby, the Marmalade Millionaire, merely noting that it had been
raised to 4000 pounds, and came to the conclusion that the second
advertisement was genuine, while the third, which set forth at great
length the woes of a young woman parted from a young man, seemed to him
to read like thieves communicating.
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