"Patty, where do you write letters?" he asked. He called her Patty quite naturally. Patty was in no wise offended.
"In the reading-room you will find a desk with paper and pens and ink. Shall I go with you?"
"Not at all. I've only a note to scribble to Senator Henderson."
Warrington found the desk. Upon it lay a tablet. He wrote hurriedly:
"Start your campaign; I am in it now to the last ditch."
As he re-read it, he observed a blur in the grain of the paper. On closer inspection he saw that it was a water-mark. He had seen one similar, but where? His heart began thumping his ribs. He produced the inevitable letter. The water-mark was identical. He even laid the letter unfolded on the tablet. It fitted exactly.
"Patty!" he murmured in a whisper.
Patty had never written him a single line; whenever she had communicated to him her commands, it had been by telephone. Patty Bennington! The window was at his elbow. He looked out and followed the sky-line of the hills as they rolled away to the south. Patty! It was a very beautiful world, and this was a day of days. It all came to him in that moment of discovery. He had drifted along toward it quite unconsciously, as a river might idle toward the sea. Patty! The light of this knowledge was blinding for a space. So Warrington came into his own romance. It was not the grand passion, which is always meteoric; it was rather like a new star, radiant, peaceful, eternal.
"Patty!" He smiled.