It seemed to her an incalculably long time between her first glance at the words and her understanding of them, but when she emerged from the blackness and void, into the flaunting sunlight, the roaring still in her ears, the paper still in her hands, the scrawled words still venomous upon it, she saw that not a moment could have passed, for Felix and her aunt were unfolding letters of their own, their eyes beginning to run quickly over the pages.

Sylvia stood quite still, feeling immeasurably and bitterly alone.  She said to herself:  “Mother is very sick.  I must go home at once.  Judith.”  But she did not know what she said.  She felt only an impulse to run wildly away from something that gave her intolerable pain.

Mrs. Marshall-Smith turned over a page of her letter, smiling to herself, and glanced up at her niece.  Her smile was smitten from her lips.  Sylvia had a fantastic vision of her own aspect from the gaping face of horror with which her aunt for an instant reflected it.  She had never before seen Aunt Victoria with an unprepared and discomposed countenance.  It was another feature of the nightmare.

For suddenly everything resolved itself into a bad dream,—­her aunt crying out, Helene screaming and running to her, Felix snatching the telegram from her and reading it aloud—­it seemed to Sylvia that she had heard nothing for years but those words, “Mother very sick.  Come home at once.  Judith.”  She heard them over and over after his voice was silent.  Through their constant echoing roar in her ears she heard but dimly the babel of talk that arose—­Aunt Victoria saying that she could not of course leave at once because no passage had been engaged, Helene foolishly offering smelling-salts, Felix darting off to get a carriage to take them to the hotel where she could be out of the crowd and they could lay their plans—­“Oh, my poor dear!—­but you may have more reassuring news tomorrow, you know,” said Mrs. Marshall-Smith soothingly.

The girl faced her aunt outraged.  She thought she cried out angrily, “tomorrow!” but she did not break her silence.  She was so torn by the storm within her that she had no breath for recriminations.  She turned and ran rapidly some distance away to the edge of the wharf, where some small rowboats hung bobbing, their owners sprawled on the seats, smoking cigarettes and chattering.  Sylvia addressed the one nearest her in a strong, imperious voice.  “I want you to take me out to that steamer,” she said, pointing out to the liner in the harbor.

The man looked up at her blankly, his laughing, impertinent brown face sobered at once by the sight of her own.  He made a reply in Italian, raising his shoulders.  Some ill-dressed, loafing stragglers on the wharf drew near Sylvia with an indolent curiosity.  She turned to them and asked, “Do any of you speak English?” although it was manifestly inconceivable that any of those typical Neapolitans should.  One of them stepped forward, running his hand through greasy black curls.  “I kin, lady,” he said with a fluent, vulgar New York accent.  “What ye want?”