When set at liberty, Ward Heathcote returned to New York.
The newspapers everywhere had published similar versions of Père Michaux's agency in the discovery of the murderer, and Anne's connection with it was never known. To this day neither Mrs. Blackwell, Mrs. Strain, nor Mr. Graub himself, has any suspicion that their summer visitors were other than the widow Young and her niece Ruth from the metropolis of Washington.
Heathcote returned to New York. And society received him with widely open arms. The women had never believed in his guilt; they now apotheosized him. The men had believed in it; they now pressed forward to atone for their error. But it was a grave and saddened man who received this ovation—an ovation quiet, hardly expressed in words, but marked, nevertheless. A few men did say openly, "Forgive me, Heathcote; you can not be half so severe on me as I am on myself." But generally a silent grip of the hand was the only outward expression.
The most noticeable sign was the deference paid him. It seemed as if a man who had unjustly suffered so much, and been so cruelly suspected, should now be crowned in the sight of all. They could not actually crown him, but they did what they could.
Through this deference and regret, through these manifestations of feeling from persons not easily stirred to feeling or deference, Heathcote passed unmoved and utterly silent, like a man of marble. After a while it was learned that he had transferred Helen's fortune to other hands. At first he had tried to induce Miss Teller to take it, but she had refused. He had then deeded it all to a hospital for children, in which his wife had occasionally evinced some interest. Society divided itself over this action; some admired it, others pronounced it Quixotic. But the man who did it seemed to care nothing for either their praise or their blame.
Rachel asked Isabel if she knew where Anne was.
"The very question I asked dear Miss Teller yesterday," replied Isabel. "She told me that Anne had returned to that island up in the Northwest somewhere, where she used to live. Then I asked, 'Is she going to remain there?' and Miss Teller answered, 'Yes,' but in such a tone that I did not like to question further."
"It has ended, then, as I knew it would," said Rachel. "In spite of all that display on the witness stand, you see he has not married her."
"He could not marry her very well at present, I suppose," began Isabel, who had a trace of feeling in her heart for the young girl.
But Rachel interrupted her. "I tell you he will never marry her," she said, her dark eyes flashing out upon the thin blonde face of her companion. For old Mrs. Bannert was dead at last, and her daughter-in-law had inherited the estate. Two weeks later she sailed rather unexpectedly for Europe. But if unexpectedly, not causelessly. She was not a woman to hesitate; before she went she had staked her all, played her game, and—lost it.