“Why do you ask that?” she demanded.
“I really do not know,” her father replied, thoughtfully, “except that his appearance seemed a little singular. In some respects he appeared so commonplace. His clothes and bearing, in fact, were so ordinary that I was surprised to find him here with you. And, on the other hand, his face—you must remember, my dear, that this is entirely a professional instinct; I am still interested in faces—”
“Quite so,” she admitted. “Go on. The young man rather puzzles me myself. I should like to hear what you make of him. What did you think of his face?”
“There was something powerful about it,” he declared, “something dogged, splendid, narrow, impossible,—the sort of face which belongs to a man who achieves great things because he is too stupid to recognize failure, even when it has him in its arms and its fingers are upon his throat. That young man has qualities, my dear, I am sure. Mind you, at present they are dormant, but he has qualities.”
She led him to the door.
“My dear father,” she said, “sometimes I really respect you. If you should come across that young man again, keep your eye upon him. He knows one thing at least which I wish he would tell us—he knows where Beatrice is.”
Her father looked at her in amazement.
“He knows where Beatrice is and he has not told you?”
She nodded.
“You tried to have him tell you and he refused?” the professor persisted.