He studied the fellow keenly a moment, and then turned to the crowds, surging along the banks in every direction. Not a soul in all that multitude even knew his name.
A feeling of utter loneliness crept over him, and when the boat landed he was saying to himself that he would give the finest colt in his pastures for the sight of a familiar face.
A few steps farther, and he saw one. It was in the government building, where an amused crowd was exclaiming over the Dead Letter Exhibit. Jerry edged along in front of the case, wondering at the variety of shipwrecked cargoes that had drifted into this government haven.
A vague pity stirred in him for all the hopes that had gone into the grave of the dead letter office—rings that had never found the fingers they were to have clasped, gifts that might have unlocked long silences, tokens of friendship that were never received, never acknowledged—all caught in this snarled web that no human skill could possibly unravel.
Then he saw the familiar face. It smiled out at him from the case of an old daguerreotype, till his heart began to beat so hard that he glanced guiltily around, to see if any one else heard it. The blood rushed to his head, and he felt dizzy.
It was that picture of himself, taken so long ago up in Vermont! He was not likely to be mistaken in it—the only picture he had ever had taken in his life.
He chuckled as he recalled the anxious oiling he had given the curly hair to make it lie flat, the harrowing hesitation over his necktie, the borrowing of the watch-chain that stood out in such bold relief against his brocaded vest. How quaint and old-fashioned it looked!
He passed his hand over his grizzled beard with a sigh, for the smooth, boyish face was not all he saw. It brought back the whole faded past so overwhelmingly that for awhile he forgot where he was.
Thirty-three years since he had dropped that little package in the office! He did not question why the letter had gone astray. He had lost his boyish faith in his own infallibility. He had probably mailed it with only half the address, perhaps none.