Evie slipped the card back into the pocket-book, which she threw on the table, where Miriam let it lie.  “I won’t look at anything else,” Evie said, with dignity, turning away.

“I want you to,” Miriam said, authoritatively.  “I beg you to.”

Thus commanded, Evie drew forth a flat document, on which she read, in ornamental letters, the inscription, New York, Toronto, and Great Lakes Railroad Company.  She unfolded it slowly, looking puzzled.

“It’s nothing but a lot of little square things,” she said, with some disdain.

“The little square things are called coupons, if you know what they are.”

“I know they’re things people cut—­when they have a lot of money.  I don’t know why they cut them; and still less do I know why he should be bringing them to you.”

Miriam had a sudden inspiration that made her face beam with relief.

“I’ll tell you why he brought them to me, dear—­though I do it under protest, as you say yourself.  Your curiosity forces my hand, and makes me show it ahead of time.  He brought them to me because it’s a wedding-present for you.  When you get married—­or begin to get married—­you can have all that money for your trousseau.”

“Aunt Helen is going to give me my trousseau.  She said so.”

“Then you can have it for anything you like—­for house-furnishings or a pearl necklace.  You know you wanted a pearl necklace—­and there’s plenty for a nice one.  Each of those papers is worth a thousand dollars, or nearly.  And there are—­how many?”

“Three.  You seem very keen on getting rid of them.”

“So I am—­to you, darling.”

Evie prepared to depart, looking unconvinced.

“It’s awfully nice of you—­of course.  But still—­if that’s what you had meant at first—­from the beginning—­you would have—­Well, I’ll tell Aunt Queenie you’ll come.”

Left alone, Miriam made haste to read the card in the pocket-book.

/#
   As deep calls to deep, so Spirit speaks to Spirit.  It is the only true
   communion between mutually comprehending souls.  But it is
   unerring—­pardoning all, because understanding all, and making the
   crooked straight.
#/

She read it more than once.  She was not sure that it was meant for her.  She was not sure that it was in Ford’s own handwriting.  But in their situation it had a meaning; she took it as a message to herself; and as she read, and read again, she felt on her face the trickling of one or two slow, hard tears.

XVII