It was not until after supper, when Tim had been sent to bed, rather joyful than otherwise in his excitement over the return to the Carys', and Eleanor was trying to put him to sleep by telling him a story, that Rosamund went upstairs to the room that had been Yetta's, to be alone with her thoughts. She was never one of those, usually members of a large family, who can take council with themselves while others are in the room; she needed solitude, if she would adjust herself and set the chambers of her mind in order. Now she had much to think of, for the events of the past three days had been incongruous enough. She smiled as she remembered that, scarcely forty-eight hours before, she had been sitting in an opera box listening to Pendleton's inanities; but there was no smile when she thought of Ogilvie.
Presently she was aware, through the silence, of a timid hand on the door. She had scarcely had time to do more than speak to Grace, who had sat, through the earlier part of the evening, as if turned to stone; now something told her she was there.
Grace, white and wan, came over the threshold and threw her arms about her friend, resting her head on Rosamund's shoulder. For a few moments they stood so, clasped in the sympathy that women convey to each other in that silent manner. Then Grace released herself a little, looked into Rosamund's face, and whispered.
"Miss Rose, he did it!"
Rosamund's thoughts had been of Ogilvie alone; for a moment she did not understand. Then Eleanor's words came back to her; and all the while she protested, she knew the truth of what Grace said.
But, out of pity, protest she must. "Oh, no, Grace! No! Don't think that! Don't let yourself think it!"
But Grace, even whiter than before, met her eyes steadily. "I don't have to think it," she said, quietly. "I know it. You know it, too."
At the agony in the poor creature's eyes Rosamund forgot all her own. "No," she cried, almost aloud. Their lowered voices in the silence of the house seemed to add to the horror of it. "No, I do not know, and neither do you! Don't say it, Grace. Don't think it. Grace! Oh, my poor, dear Grace!"
But Grace shook her head impatiently, as if it were not the time for sympathy. She clasped Rosamund's two hands, looked at her intently, and said, "Miss Rose, I tell you I don't have to think; I know!"
Rosamund gasped, but Grace went on. "I saw him from my window, an' Rob Tobet and Nels' Dunn were with him. They were skulkin' in the shadow, but I made 'em out. It was the first time I'd seen Joe, since—the first time, and to see him that a way!"