XXII

A few days later she read his name, in a morning paper, in the Asiatic’s list of passengers the steamer having arrived at quarantine the night before:  Mr. John Norrie Ford.  Though flung carelessly into a paragraph printed in small type, it seemed to blaze in fire on the page!  It was as if all America must rise at it.  As she looked from the window it was with something like surprise that she saw the stream of traffic roaring onward, heedless of the fact that this dread name was being hawked in the streets and sold at the news-stands.  She sent out for the evening papers that appear at midday, being relieved and astonished to find that as yet it had created no sensation.

She was not deceived by his ease of manner when he appeared at the apartment in the afternoon.  Though he carried his head loftily, and smiled with his habitual air of confidence, she could see that the deep waters of the proud had gone over his soul.  Their ebb had streaked his hair and beard with white, and deepened the wrinkles that meant concentrated will into the furrows that come of suffering.  She was more or less prepared for that.  It was the outward manifestation of what she had read between the lines of the letters he had written her.  As he crossed the room, with hand outstretched, her one conscious thought was of the chance to be a woman and a helpmeet Evie had flung away.  She had noticed how, on the very threshold, he had glanced twice about the room, expecting to find her there.

They did not speak of her at once.  They talked of commonplace introductory things—­the voyage, the arrival, the hotel at which he was staying—­anything that would help her, and perhaps him, to control the preliminary nervousness.  There was no sign of it, however, on his part, while she felt her own spirit rising, as it always did, to meet emergencies.  Presently she mentioned her fears regarding his use of his true name.

“No; it isn’t dangerous,” he assured her, “because I’m out of danger now.  Thank the Lord, that’s all over.  I don’t have to live with a great hulking terror behind me any longer.  I’m a man like any other.  You can’t imagine what it means to be yourself, and not to care who knows it.  I’m afraid I parade my name just like a boy with a new watch, who wants to tell every one the time.  So far no one has paid any particular attention; but I dare say that will come.  Is Evie here?”

“She’s not here—­to-day.”

“Why not?” he asked, sharply.  “She said she would be.  She said she’d come to town—­”

“She did come to town, but she thought she’d better not—­stay.”

“Not stay?  Why shouldn’t she stay?  Is anything up?  You don’t mean that Miss Jarrott—?”

“No; Miss Jarrott had nothing to do with it.  I know her brother has written to her, in the way you must be prepared for.  But she couldn’t have kept Evie from waiting for you, if Evie herself—­”