He did not look at me.
His eyes went circling low, like swallows before rain. They settled on the coverlid till, slowly, he had come and stood beside me.
Then Ranny lifted his eyes....
Oh, poor eyes! Poor soul looking out of them!
"Ranny," I whispered, "speak to me."
"I have failed," he said. He leaned heavily against the chair.
"I have heard," I managed to say, "how hard you have been trying...."
"But I have failed!" he said once more; and I hope I may never again hear such an accent.
I pointed to the chair ... we could neither of us speak for a while. And then he cleared his throat.
"They took her out of that house and hid her," he said. "And then they took her abroad. I traced her to their house in Paris. But she had gone. Always I have been too late."