he tried to recall who had passed the
door of the compartment, he remembered no one except trainmen. The
bag, therefore, had been carried out the rear door, and the man who had
opened it, if a passenger, must still be in the rear part of the train.

Eaton, refilling his cigar-case to give his action a look of
casualness, got up and went toward the rear of the train. A porter was
still posted at the door of the Santoine car, who warned him to be
quiet in passing through. The car, he found, was entirely empty; the
door to the drawing-room where Santoine lay was closed. Two berths
near the farther end of the car had been made up, no doubt for the
surgeon and Harriet Santoine to rest there during the intervals of
their watching; but the curtains of these berths were folded back,
showing both of them to be empty, though one apparently had been
occupied. Was Harriet Santoine with her father?

He went on into the observation-car. The card-room was filled with
players, and he stood an instant at the door looking them over, but
"Hillward" was not among them, and he saw no one whom he felt could
possibly be one of "them." In the observation-room, the case was the
same; a few men and women passengers here were reading or talking.
Glancing on past them through the glass door at the end of the car, he
saw Harriet Santoine standing alone on the observation platform. The
girl did not see him; her back was toward the car. As he went out onto
the platform and the sound of the closing door came to her, she turned
to meet him.

She looked white and tired, and faint gray shadows underneath her eyes
showed where dark circles were beginning to form.

"I am supposed to be resting," she explained quietly, accepting him as
one who had the right to ask.

"Have you been watching all day?"

"With Dr. Sinclair, yes. Dr. Sinclair is going to take half the night
watch, and I am going to take the other half. That is why I am
supposed to be lying down now to get ready for it; but I could not
sleep."

"How is your father?"

"Just the same; there may be no change, Dr. Sinclair says, for days.
It seems all so sudden and so--terrible, Mr. Eaton. You can hardly
appreciate how we feel about it without knowing Father. He was so
good, so strong, so brave, so independent! And at the same time so--so
dependent upon those around him, because of his blindness! He started
out so handicapped, and he has accomplished so much, and--and it is