“Her millions!”

It was inspiriting to repeat those two words to herself.  It strengthened her resolve and made her feel how wise she had been to break with Frank.  Perhaps, after all, it were better for him not to come back.  He was right about the gulf between them, and even since his departure it was widening appreciably.

Then she realised what all rich people realise sooner or later.

“I don’t own all that money,” she said to herself.  “It owns me!” And with that she went indoors and cried part of the forenoon and spent the rest of it in trying on her new clothes.

Wealth, if it did not bring happiness, at least brought some pleasant distractions.

 II

It was fully a year before Frank saw her again; a long year to him, soberly passed in his shipboard duties, with recurring weeks ashore at New York and Buenos Ayres.  He had grown more reserved and silent than before; fonder of his books; keener in his taste for abstract science.  He avoided his old friends and made no new ones.  The world seemed to be passing him while he stood still.  He wondered how others could laugh when his own heart was so heavy, and he preferred to go his own way, solitary and unnoticed, taking an increasing pleasure in his isolation.  He continued to write to Bridgeport, for there were a few old friends whom he could not disregard altogether, though he made his letters as infrequent as he could and as short.  In return he was kept informed of Florence’s movements; of the sensation she made everywhere; of the great people who had taken her under their wing; of her rumoured engagements; of her triumphs in Paris and London; of her yachts and horses and splendour and beauty.  His correspondents showed an artless pride in the recital.  It was becoming their only claim to consideration that they knew Florence Fenacre.  Her dazzling life reflected a sort of glory upon themselves, and their letters ran endlessly on the same theme.  It was all a modern fairy tale, and they fairly bubbled with satisfaction to think that they knew the fairy princess!

Frank read it all with exasperation.  It tormented him to even hear her name; to be reminded of her in any way; to realise that she was as much alive as he himself, and not the phantom he would have preferred to keep her in his memory.  Yet he was inconsistent enough to rage when a letter came that brought no news of her.  He would tear it into pieces and throw it out of his cabin window.  The fools, why couldn’t they tell him what he wanted to know!  He would carry his ill-humour into the engine-room and revenge himself on fate and the loss of the woman he loved by a harsh criticism of his subordinates.  A defective pump or a troublesome valve would set his temper flaming; and then, overcome at his own injustice, he would go to the other extreme; and, roundly blaming himself, would slap some sullen artificer on the back and tell him that it was all a joke.  His men, amongst themselves, called him a wild cracked devil, and it was the tattle of the ship that he drank hard in secret.  They knew something was wrong with him, and fastened on the likeliest cause.  Others said out boldly that the chief engineer was going crazy.