She turned and left the bridge, still with the feeling of that little hand in hers, and a sense of relief that was almost rejoicing in her heart. Though she had lost everything, though she trod the stones of the wilderness and the way before her was dark and steep and wholly unfamiliar, yet her fear had gone. The burden was lifted. For she knew that she was not alone. She went back through the rain-soaked streets, and still it seemed to her that that angel-presence went with her, guiding her feet. She had come out to seek a cheap lodging, but now that purpose had gone from her. She returned to the great station and the vast hotel as one led.
She passed in under the echoing glass roof where the shrieking of trains mingled with the noise of the scurrying multitudes. Everyone was in a hurry, it seemed, except herself, and she—she moved without haste and without lingering to a destination unknown.
She turned in to the hotel vestibule, leaving the noise and the seething crowds, conscious of a great quietness that came as it were to meet her and folded her round. It was late afternoon, and her intention had been to give up her room, but she had not done so, and she did not now turn to the office. She went instead to a settee in a corner and sat down there as one who waited. A few people passed to and fro, but no one accosted her. The place was dim and restful. She took no interest in them, or they in her.
Somewhere in the distance a page-boy was calling a number in a raucous voice. No one responded to it, and she vaguely wished he would stop; for he intruded upon the peace of the atmosphere like a yapping dog heard in the silent hours of the night. Now he was drawing nearer and becoming more obtrusive. Why did not someone stop him? If he had a message why couldn’t someone take it and send him away? Or if he couldn’t find the person for whom it was intended, where was the use of continuing that untuneful yell?
“Two—four—nine! Two—four—nine!” Now he had left the lounge and was coming down the corridor to the vestibule! The thing was beginning to get upon her nerves. She drew further back into the corner as he approached. Quite a small boy, with the sharp rat-like features of his type, and gleaming brass buttons all down his front that reflected little knobs of light from a distant lamp! His voice was stupendous, shattering the peace, piercing her brain with its insistence, pulverizing the vision that had brought her thither.
“Two—four—nine! Two—four—nine!” He came close to her, paused, yelled the number straight at her so that she shrank, and then passed on to the almost empty vestibule where he continued his intolerable cry without result.
His voice began to pass into the distance, to merge into the vague sounds that penetrated from without. Now she heard it no longer, and she breathed a sigh of thankfulness, and tried to return to the state of quiescent waiting which he had so rudely disturbed. But something had happened. She realized it with almost a sense of calamity. The little fingers no longer clasped her own, the feeling of peace had left her. The vision had fled.
She made a desperate attempt to call it back, to force her mind to grasp afresh the power that had so magically inspired her. But it was gone. The outer darkness came down upon her once more. The blackness of despair entered into her soul.
She sat for a space in blank hopelessness. Then it was all a myth, that strength so wonderfully bestowed, the trick of an overwrought brain—no more! Her prayer had been in vain. She was alone and sinking—sinking! A sound of great waters suddenly filled her ears. She saw again the grim, dark river flowing to the sea—so deep, so cold, so terrible! She lifted her face, gasping, as though those awful waters were overwhelming her. Her heart had ceased to beat. It felt like a stone within her, and she was cold to the very soul of her.
Ah, God, what was that? A cry in the distance—a voice that called! What was it? What was it? She grabbed her failing faculties to listen. It might be even yet the salvation for which she had prayed and waited. It might be—ah, what was it and why did it hold her so?