“Miss Lucia Gore.”
Mr. Solley was silent, and looked at Babbie oddly under his white eyebrows, so that her cheeks began to burn, and she was not a little frightened, though quite determined and eager.
“Miss Lucia lost all her money when the banks failed, and she sold the Gore house, and got enough interest to pay her dues and a little more; but it seems so sad for Miss Lucia, because people will patronize her, not meaning to. But they 're so stupid—or, at least, it doesn't seem like Miss Lucia.”
“I did not know she was living,” said Mr. Solley, quietly.
“Oh, how could you—be that way!”
Mr. Solley looked steadily at Babbie, and it seemed to him as if her face gave him a clue to something that he had groped for in the darkness of late, as if some white mist were lifted from the river and he could see up its vistas and smoky cataracts. How could he be that way? It is every man's most personal and most unsolved enigma—how he came to be that way, to be possible as he is. Up the river he saw a face somewhat like Babbie's, somewhat more imperious, but with the same pathetic eagerness and desire for abundance of life. How could young John Solley become old John Solley? Looking into Babbie's eyes, he seemed able to put the two men side by side.
“At one time, Miss Barbara,” he said, “—you will forgive my saying so,—I should have resented your reference. Now I am only thinking how kind it is of you to forget that I am old.”
Babbie did not quite understand, and felt troubled, and not sure of her position.
“Mr. Solley,” she said, “I—I have a letter from Miss Lucia. Do you think I might show it to you?”
“It concerns me?”