The landlady, with a delicacy he highly appreciated, cared for the young girl without making her conspicuous by any undue attention.  No tidings had come in of any discovery in the mill-stream or in the river into which it ran, and there being nothing with which to feed gossip, the townsfolk who had gathered about the hotel porches gradually began to disperse, till only a few of the most persistent remained to keep up conversation till midnight.

Finally these too left and the house sank into quiet, a quiet which remained unbroken all night; for everybody, even poor Mr. Ransom, slept.

He was up, however, with the first beam entering his room.  How could he tell but that news of a definite and encouraging nature awaited him?  Some one might have come in early from town or river.  All search had not been abandoned.  There were certain persistent ones who had gone as far as Beardsley’s.  Some of these might have returned.  He would hasten down and see.  But it was only to find the office empty, and though the household presently awoke and the great front door was thrown open to all comers, no eager straggler came rushing in with the tidings he equally longed and dreaded to receive.

At half-past ten the representative of the county police called on Mr. Ransom, but with small result.  Shortly after his departure, the mail came in and with it the New York papers.  These he read with avidity.  But they added nothing to his knowledge.  Georgian’s death was accepted as a fact, and the peculiarities of their history since their unfortunate wedding-day were laid bare with but little consideration for his feelings or the good name of his bride.  With a sorer heart than ever, he flung the papers from him and went out to gather strength in the open air.

There was a corner of the veranda into which he had never ventured.  It was likely to be a solitary one at this hour, and thither he now went.  But a shock awaited him there.  A lady was pacing its still damp boards.  A lady who did not turn her head at his step, but whom he instantly recognized from her dress, and wilful but not ungraceful bearing, as her whom he was determined to call, nay recognize, as Anitra Hazen.

His judgment counseled retreat, but the fascination of her presence held him, and in that moment of hesitation she turned towards him and flight became impossible.

It was the first opportunity he had had of observing her features in broad daylight.  The effect was a confused one.  She was Georgian and she was not Georgian.  Her skin was decidedly darker, her eyes more lustrous, her bearing less polished and at the same time more impassioned.  She was not so tall or quite so elegantly proportioned;—­or was it her rude method of dressing her hair and the awkward cut of her clothes which made the difference.  He could not be sure.  Resolved as he was to consider her Anitra, and excellent as his reasons were for doing so, the swelling of his heart as he met her eye roused again the old doubt and gave an unnatural tone to his voice as he advanced towards her with an impetuous utterance of her name: