"You meant it." Bernard's eyes flashed. He, too, was stung now. "I will say 'Good-bye,'" he said, raising his hat.
The girls bowed, and, turning away, walked quietly out of the great house, leaving Bernard to return to his seat a crushed and miserable man.
He thought that it was all over between him and Doris. His mother had spoken the truth in saying the girl had declared she would never marry him. He need not have grieved his mother by refusing to prosecute her father: he need not have lost his home for that. Doris no longer loved him; she no longer loved him at all. He had lost his money, and he had lost Doris. That was the worst blow that had ever befallen him; nothing mattered now, nothing at all: he was in despair. It was far worse to have met Doris and found her altogether estranged from him than not to have met her at all.
"She wasn't like Doris," he said to himself, miserably. "She wasn't like my Doris at all. It might have been another girl; it might have been another girl altogether." The hot tears came into his eyes, and he buried his face in his hands that others might not see them.
"Oh, don't, don't be so unhappy!" said a voice in his ear, suddenly. "Didn't you notice that her manner was forced--unnatural?"
"Oh!" Bernard rose, and stood looking wonderingly into Alice Sinclair's face. It was full of kindness, and seemed to him, then, one of the sweetest faces he had ever seen.
"I have returned," she said in a low, confidential tone, "ostensibly to find a glove I dropped somewhere, but really in order to tell you our address. For I think--that is, I imagine, you might call to see her one of these days."
"Oh, can I? Do you think it is possible?"
"Certainly. This is a free country. Call by all means. Doris was awfully sad a few minutes after we left you. I am sure she was repenting her harshness to you. She was crying, actually crying. And you looked so miserable when we left you, so I thought I might try to help you both."
"You are good!" cried Bernard, taking one of her hands in his, and pressing it warmly.