If Miss MacVane's sight had been keener, she would have interpreted the long look which Ellen gave Miss Knowlton. In it were astonishment, resentment, and even defiance. She would break no resolutions, would not endanger her self-control, her ticket for her journey was in her purse, but she would not be escorted to Dr. Lanfair's room by Mrs. Fetzer at Miss Knowlton's suggestion!
Stephen saw her at first dimly across the wide room—could she be a deluding vision? He felt the injured resentment of a man hit when he is down.
When he was convinced of her reality, he clutched the arm of his chair. He did not rise to meet her, realizing that he would need all his physical strength to support his resolution and his pride. When she came toward him, and he saw that some harsh trouble had deepened her eyes, he grew still more weak. He wished for Fetzer or Miss MacVane or Miss Knowlton—he thought with confused rage of Miss Knowlton—if she was worth anything she should have defended him from this!
"I didn't know you were here," said Ellen in her low voice. "Miss MacVane and Miss Knowlton just told me."
"Or I suppose you wouldn't have come!" Had he said the foolish words or merely thought them?
"I'm going to Ithaca to-night," went on Ellen.
She was halfway across the room on her way to shake hands with him when she halted. "I'm going to—" She stood staring, incredulous, at his maimed body. She could not move or speak. It is hard to say which she felt more deeply, an anguished pity or a sharp resentment.
Stephen saw her horror; the theory which he had framed to account for her absence was then quite proved. He even believed that he saw her hands lifted to shield her eyes. Her repulsion and terror were unendurable, they constituted the final insult of fate.
"Does it frighten you?" he asked, wishing to hurt her. She had no business to come now!
Her gaze transferred itself to his eyes and held them for a second. After a long moment she spoke slowly, looking down, with the slightest emphasis on her last word.