Then still unwilling to trust himself alone with his thoughts, Donaldson remained about the lobby. He felt in touch here with all the wide world which lay spread out below the night sky. He studied with interest the weary travellers who were dropped here by steamers which had throbbed across so many turbulent watery miles, by locomotives hot from their steel-held course. The ever-changing figures absorbed him until, with her big shouldered husband, a woman entered who remotely resembled her he had been forced to leave to the protection of one old serving maid. Then in spite of himself, his thoughts ran wild again.
He hungered to get back to his old office, where, if he could find nothing else to do for her, he could at least bury himself in his law books. This unknown man strode across the lobby so confidently—every sturdy line of him suggesting blowsy strength. The unknown woman tripped along at his heels in absolute trust of it. And he, Donaldson, sat here, a helpless spectator, with a worthier woman trusting him as though he were such a man.
In rebellion he argued that it was absurd that such a passion as his towards a woman of whom he had seen so little should be genuine. His condition had made him mawkishly sentimental. He had been fascinated like a callow youngster by her delicate, pretty features; by her deep gray eyes, her budding lips, her gentle voice. He would be writing verse next. He was free—free, and in one stroke he had placed the world at his feet. He was above it—beyond it, and every living human soul in it. He rose as though to challenge the hotel itself, which represented the crude active part of this world.
But with the memory of his afternoon, his declaration of independence lasted but a moment. He was back in the green fields with her—back in the blazing sunshine with her, and the knowledge that from there, not here, the road began along which lay everything his eager nature craved.
Well, even so, was he going to cower back into a corner? There still remained to him five days. To use them decently he must keep to the present. The big future—the true future was dead. Admit it. There still remained a little future. Let him see what he could do with that.
A porter came in with a mop and swabbed up the deserted floors. Donaldson watched every movement of his strong arms and felt sorry, when, his part played, he retired to the wings. Then he went to his room. He partly undressed and threw himself upon the bed. It was then ten minutes of four on Sunday morning, May twenty-sixth.
In spite of his apparent wakefulness he napped, for when he came to himself again it was broad daylight. An anxious looking hotel clerk stood at the foot of his bed, while a pop-eyed bell-boy pressed close behind him. Donaldson rose to his elbow.
"What the devil are you doing in here?" he demanded.
The clerk appeared relieved by the sound of his voice.
"Why, sir, we got a bit worried about you. We weren't able to raise you all day yesterday."