development of friendship
and yielded, as a flower its fragrance, the warmth and gladness, the
surety and genuineness, that so long he had looked for. Apparently
she was as unconscious as Dorothea, and yet too many men had loved
her for her not to understand. Not by the subtlest sign had she
shown, however. Indifference or dislike would have been more
encouraging, but her cordial frankness had been that of unstirred
depths.

Suppose she was engaged to another man? Was that any reason why he
should not tell her of his love, ask her to be his wife? Puritanic
scruples such as his were beyond pardon. A sense of honor might go
too far. Why didn't he find out if it were true what Dorothea had
told him? God! To have had a vision, only to go through life in
darkness!

An hundred times in fancy he had heard the sweep of her skirts, the
sound of her footsteps, the tones of her voice, and laughter gay and
sweet and soft; an hundred times had seen the glad eyes grow grave,
the forehead wrinkle in fine folds, the quick turn of her head; an
hundred times had felt the touch of her hands; and he had never asked
Hope to bring her to his home, lest her spirit should not come again.

The badinage of other days came to him, the days when women had
rather bothered. They would be amused, these women, did they know
his surrender to the god unknown at that time--the god he had
sometimes smiled at because he had not known. Day after to-morrow
she was going home. He had not seen her since the afternoon they had
been shopping together. The man from Washington had claimed her
time, and he had stayed away. Who was this man? To ask Hope or
Channing had been impossible. Dorothea would be delighted to tell
him. The instincts of her sex were well developed in Dorothea; and
she missed no chance of letting him know of Claudia's engagements, of
what she did, and where she went, and from whom her flowers came.
Doubtless she would be delighted to tell him even more.

He got up and began to walk the length and breadth of the room. The
sound of his footsteps was lost in the heavy rugs, and only the
ticking of the clock broke the stillness, and presently it struck the
hour of midnight. He took out his watch and looked at it. "Tomorrow
she is going home," he said.

XIV

AN INFORMAL VISIT

At the door of what was still called the nursery Laine stood a
moment, hesitating whether to go in or to go away. In a low
rocking-chair