“David!” he said brokenly.  “Dear old David!” And was suddenly shaken with dry, terrible sobbing.

There was a great deal to do, and Dick was grateful for it.  But first, like David, he went in and sat by Lucy’s bed alone and talked to her.  Not aloud, as David did, but still with that same queer conviction that she heard.  He told her he was free, and that she need not worry about David, that he was there now to look after him; and he asked her, if she could, to help him with Elizabeth.  Then he kissed her and went out.

He met Elizabeth that day.  She had come to the house, and after her custom now went up, unwarned, to David’s room.  She found David there and Harrison Miller, and—­it was a moment before she realized it—­Dick by the mantel.  He was greatly changed.  She saw that.  But she had no feeling of pity, nor even of undue surprise.  She felt nothing at all.  It gave her a curious, almost hard little sense of triumph to see that he had gone pale.  She marched up to him and held out her hand, mindful of the eyes on her.

“I’m so very sorry, Dick,” she said.  “You have a sad home-coming.”

Then she withdrew her hand, still calm, and turned to David.

“Mother sent over some things.  I’ll give them to Minnie,” she said, her voice clear and steady.  She went out, and they heard her descending the stairs.

She was puzzled to find out that her knees almost gave way on the staircase, for she felt calm and without any emotion whatever.  And she finished her errand, so collected and poised that the two or three women who had come in to help stared after her as she departed.

“Do you suppose she’s seen him?”

“She was in David’s room.  She must have.”

Mindful of Mike, they withdrew into Lucy’s sitting-room and closed the door, there to surmise and to wonder.  Did he know she was engaged to Wallie Sayre?  Would she break her engagement now or not?  Did Dick for a moment think that he could do as he had done, go away and jilt a girl, and come back to be received as though nothing had happened?  Because, if he did...

To Dick Elizabeth’s greeting had been a distinct shock.  He had not known just what he had expected; certainly he had not hoped to pick things up where he had dropped them.  But there was a hard friendliness in it that was like a slap in the face.  He had meant at least to fight to win back with her, but he saw now that there would not even be a fight.  She was not angry or hurt.  The barrier was more hopeless than that.

David, watching him, waited until Harrison had gone, and went directly to the subject.

“Have you ever stopped to think what these last months have meant to Elizabeth?  Her own worries, and always this infernal town, talking, talking.  The child’s pride’s been hurt, as well as her heart.”

“I thought I’d better not go into that until after—­until later,” he explained.  “The other thing was wrong.  I knew it the moment I saw Beverly and I didn’t go back again.  What was the use?  But—­you saw her face, David.  I think she doesn’t even care enough to hate me.”