Gilderman laughed. “Very well, my dear,” he said; “I promise you faithfully that I won’t try to sell a cent’s worth, nor give away a dime to the poor more than I have to.”
Just then the nurse came in to say that Mrs. Caiaphas was down-stairs.
“Go down and see her, Henry, won’t you?” said Mrs. Gilderman, and Gilderman went, though reluctantly.
Gilderman made another confidant during the day. He was led rather inadvertently into doing so. It was Stirling West. There had been many visitors in the morning, and West had come around from the club a little before noon to congratulate his friend. The two were sitting together comfortably in the library smoking and looking out into the street. The newspapers lay in a pile upon the floor, and upon the uppermost sheet was a big pen-and-ink portrait of the Man of whom so many were now talking. West pointed to it and made some comment upon it. Gilderman looked down at the paper through the blue mist of tobacco smoke. “It doesn’t look at all like Him,” said he.
“Doesn’t it?” said West, and then he suddenly looked up at Gilderman. “Eh!” said he, “by Jove! How do you know it doesn’t look like Him? Did you ever see Him?”
Gilderman had spoken without thinking. His first impulse was to equivocate, but he did not. It was easier to tell about it now that he had already spoken of it to his wife. He made a sudden determination to take West into his confidence and see what he said about it all. “Yes,” he said, “I have seen Him.”
“The deuce you say! When did you see Him?”
“Not long ago. Yesterday and day before yesterday.”
“Where?”