He saw recognition spring across it like a shaft of sunlight, as with a quick impulse she started forward—then her arm caught itself, as it were, half extended. He felt himself chill in every nerve, the air was breathless. Mechanically his hand touched hers.
"You have been gone a year," she said, in a low, uneven voice.
Harry's very thought seemed suspended. "Is it—so long?" he answered.
He scarcely knew what he said: the reply was a mere involuntary expression of habit, a conventional phrase to fill the moment's need. He could not know that the very repression with which he was holding himself against the quick thrill of her touch made the words lifeless and inconsequential.
To Echo, however, in the tremulous gladness that had filled her at the knowledge of his return, and the exaltation of the hour, the reply, deserved as at heart she felt it to be, was like a blow in the face. A startled paleness swept up her cheeks like a wave, blotting their hue and misting the clear April of her eyes. She turned half-away, toward her companion, and the next moment the eddying crowd had come between.
On the hurrying pavement Brent dropped his hand on Sevier's shoulder. "I'm not going to congratulate you," he said. "I'm going to congratulate the new party. I'm off to the sanctum to write my editorial while it's red hot. You'll come back for the other session, I suppose. They're liable to nominate to-night."
"No," replied Harry. "I must get away from the crowd somewhere."
Brent caught the lassitude of his tone. "Better walk yourself tired," he counselled, "and then turn in. You'll be all right to-morrow."
They clasped hands and parted.
For a time Sevier walked aimlessly, choosing the less frequented thoroughfares, alone at last to think. He had done his best. Whether or not it would accomplish what Brent had hoped, he had made the strongest effort of which he was capable. The meeting with Echo had shaken him by its very unexpectedness, and had shown him how bitterly hard was to be his struggle with himself. In that instant of their encounter he had realised his own weakness.