“I’ll see her when I return,” he thought, and so went his way to the train, which would take him to his next point of destination.

Never once dreaming how near he was to her, Ethie drew her veil and furs more closely around her, and turning her face to the frosty window, gazed drearily out into the wintry darkness as they sped swiftly on.  She hardly knew where she was going or what she could do when she was there.  She was conscious only of the fact that she was breaking away from scenes and associations which had been so distasteful to her—­that she was leaving a husband who had been abusive to her, and she verily believed she had just cause for going.  The world might not see it so, perhaps, but she did not care for the world.  She was striking out a path of her own, and with her heart as sore and full of anger as it then was, she felt able to cope with any difficulty, so that her freedom was achieved.  They were skirting across the prairie now; and the lights of Olney were in sight.  Perhaps she could see the farmhouse, and rubbing, with her warm palm, the moisture from the window-pane, she looked wistfully out in the direction of Richard’s home.  Yes, there it was, and a light shining from the sitting-room window, as if they expected her.  But Ethie was not going there, and with something like a sigh as she thought of Andy so near, yet separated so widely from her, she turned from the window and rested her tired head upon her hands while they stayed at Olney.  It was only a moment they stopped, but to Ethie it seemed an age, and her heart almost stopped its beating when she heard the voice of Terrible Tim just outside the car.  He was not coming in, as she found after a moment of breathless waiting; he was only speaking to an acquaintance, who stepped inside and took a seat by the stove, just as the train plunged again into the darkness, leaving behind a fiery track to mark its progress across the level prairie.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE DESERTED HUSBAND

Richard had been very successful in St. Louis.  The business which took him there had been more than satisfactorily arranged.  He had collected a thousand-dollar debt he never expected to get, and had been everywhere treated with the utmost deference and consideration, as a man whose worth was known and appreciated.  But Richard was ill at ease, and his face wore a sad, gloomy expression, which many remarked, wondering what could be the nature of the care so evidently preying upon him.  Do what he might, he could not forget the white, stony face which had looked at him so strangely in the gray morning, nor shut out the icy tones in which Ethie had last spoken to him.  Besides this, Richard was thinking of all he had said to her in the heat of passion, and wishing he could recall it in part at least.  He was very indignant, very angry still, for he believed her guilty of planning to meet Frank Van Buren at the party and leave him