“I must thank you, Mr. Pawson,” he said in his old outspoken, hearty way “for your frankness, and I must also apologize for my apparent rudeness when I first entered your door; but, as I told you, I was so astounded and angry at what I saw that I hardly knew what I was doing.  And now one thing more before I take my leave:  if Mr. Temple does not want his present retreat known—­and I gather from the mysterious way in which you have spoken that he does not—­let me tell you that I do not want mine known either.  Please do not say to any one that you have seen me, or answer any questions—­not for a time, at least.  Good-night!”

With the closing of the front door behind him the exile came to a standstill on the top step and looked about him.  Across the park—­beyond the trees, close sheltered under the wide protecting roof, lay Kate.  All the weary miles out and back had this picture been fixed in his mind.  She was doubtless asleep as it was now past eleven o’clock:  he would know by the lights.  But even the sight of the roof that sheltered her would, in itself, be a comfort.  It had been many long years since he had breathed the same air with her; slept under the same stars; walked where her feet had trodden.  For some seconds he stood undecided.  Should he return to the Sailors’ House where he had left his few belongings and banish all thoughts of her from his mind now that his worst fears had been confirmed? or should he yield to the strain on his heart-strings?  If she were asleep the whole house would be dark; if she were at some neighbor’s and Mammy Henny was sitting up for her, the windows in the bedroom would be dark and the hall lamp still burning—­he had watched it so often before and knew the signs.

Drawing the collar of his rough peajacket close about his throat and crowding his cap to his ears, he descended the steps and with one of his quick, decided movements plunged into the park, now silent and deserted.

As he neared the Seymour house he became conscious, from the glow of lights gleaming between the leafless branches of the trees, that something out of the common was going on inside.  The house was ablaze from the basement to the roof, with every window-shade illumined.  Outside the steps, and as far out as the curb, lounged groups of attendants, while in the side street, sheltered by the ghostly trees, there could be made out the wheels and hoods of carryalls and the glint of harness.  Now and then the door would open and a bevy of muffled figures—­the men in cloaks, the girls in nubias wound about their heads and shoulders—­would pass out.  The Seymours were evidently giving a ball, or was it—­and the blood left his face and little chills ran loose through his hair—­was it Kate’s wedding night?  Pawson had said that a marriage would soon take place, and in the immediate future.  It was either this or an important function of some kind, and on a much more lavish scale than had been old Prim’s custom in the days when he knew him.  Then the contents of Alec’s basket rose in his mind.  That was why his father had sent the pheasants!  Perhaps both he and his mother were inside!