He carried it to his lips.
“Good-bye,” he answered. “Good-bye and may God bless you.”
He turned away abruptly and left the room. But as he was quietly making his way out of the house, hoping to get to his horse unobserved, he came suddenly upon Mrs. Dyke and Sidney on the porch of the house. He had forgotten that since the affair at the ditch, Los Muertos had been a home to the engineer's mother and daughter.
“And you, Mrs. Dyke,” he asked as he took her hand, “in this break-up of everything, where do you go?”
“To the city,” she answered, “to San Francisco. I have a sister there who will look after the little tad.”
“But you, how about yourself, Mrs. Dyke?”
She answered him in a quiet voice, monotonous, expressionless:
“I am going to die very soon, Mr. Presley. There is no reason why I should live any longer. My son is in prison for life, everything is over for me, and I am tired, worn out.”
“You mustn't talk like that, Mrs. Dyke,” protested Presley, “nonsense; you will live long enough to see the little tad married.” He tried to be cheerful. But he knew his words lacked the ring of conviction. Death already overshadowed the face of the engineer's mother. He felt that she spoke the truth, and as he stood there speaking to her for the last time, his arm about little Sidney's shoulder, he knew that he was seeing the beginnings of the wreck of another family and that, like Hilda Hooven, another baby girl was to be started in life, through no fault of hers, fearfully handicapped, weighed down at the threshold of existence with a load of disgrace. Hilda Hooven and Sidney Dyke, what was to be their histories? the one, sister of an outcast; the other, daughter of a convict. And he thought of that other young girl, the little Honora Gerard, the heiress of millions, petted, loved, receiving adulation from all who came near to her, whose only care was to choose from among the multitude of pleasures that the world hastened to present to her consideration.
“Good-bye,” he said, holding out his hand.