He saw Enschede, putting out to sea, alone, memories and regrets crowding upon his wake. Her father was right: Ruth must never know. The mother was far more real to her than the father; the ghostly far more substantial than the living form. So long as he lived, Spurlock knew that in fancy he would be reconstructing that scene between himself and Ruth's father.
Their heads touched again, their arms tightened. Gazing into each other's eyes with new-found rapture, neither observed the sudden appearance in the doorway of an elderly woman in travel-stained linen.
There was granite in her face and agate in her eyes. The lips were straight and pale, the chin aggressive, the nose indomitable. She was, by certain signs, charged with anger, but she saw upon the faces of these two young fools the look of angels and an ineffable kindness breathed upon her withered heart.
"So, you young fool, I have found you!" she said, harshly.
Ruth and Spurlock separated, the one embarrassed, the other utterly dumfounded.
"Auntie?" he cried.
"Yes, Auntie! And to date you have cost me precisely sixteen thousand dollars—hard earned, every one of them."
Spurlock wondered if something hadn't suddenly gone awry in his head. He had just passed through a terrific physical test. Surely he was imagining this picture. His aunt, here at McClintock's? It was unbelievable. He righted a chair and sat in it, his face in his hands. But when he looked again, there she was!
"I don't understand," he said, finally.
"You will before I'm done with you. I have come to take you home; and hereafter my word will be the law. You will obey me out of common decency. You can scribble if you want to, but after you've given your eight hours daily to the mills. Sixteen thousand! Mark me, young man, you'll pay it back through the nose, every dollar of it!"