"Sent word?" He repeated the words, in a dazed way. "How could I? How could I know?"
"How could you come if you didn't know?" Already the miracle of readjustment which in women is so marvellously quick, had given back to Mary Coombe something of her natural manner. Besides, she had always known that some day he might find her—if he cared to look.
"Why should you come at all?" she flashed, raising defiant eyes. "The time to come was long ago."
"I did come." Callandar spoke slowly. "I came—" he paused, for how could he tell her that his coming had been to a house of death.
The bald answer, the strangeness of his gaze stirred her fear again. For a moment they stared at each other, each busy with the shifting puzzle. Then her quicker intuition abandoned the mystery of the present meeting to straighten out the past.
"Then you followed the letter?"
"Yes, I followed the letter."
"And you saw her—my mother?"
"Yes, I saw your mother."
Impulsively he moved toward her but she shrank back, plainly terrified.