And then, suddenly, a thought seared through the girl's mind. Something that Ida May Bostwick had said just before Tunis hurried her out of the house!
"I believe I've seen her before. Somehow, she looks familiar."
These two sentences, spoken in Ida May's sneering way, had made little impression on the excited Sheila at the time they were spoken. But now they made the girl's heart beat wildly.
Suppose it were true! Suppose Ida May should really remember who Sheila was? It was not impossible that the girl from the lace counter of Hoskin & Marl's knew of Sheila's disgrace.
Sleep was not within her reach. The long hours of the night dragged past. Dimly dawn crept along the dark line of the horizon, circling all her world as far as Sheila could see it from her bed. But it was still dark below her north window when she caught the sound of a familiar step, the crunch of gravel under Tunis' boot.
She lay shaking for a moment, holding her breath. She heard the tiny pebbles rattle upon the window sill. For the first time she had not been downstairs to greet Tunis on his way to the port. Could she let him go now without a word?
But she must! She must be firm.
Nevertheless, she slipped softly out of bed. The pebbles rattled again. She caught up a dark veil from her bureau and wrapped it about her face. She crept to the north window. The veil would mask her face so that he could not distinguish it in the shadow.
But she could look down upon him. She saw him standing there so firmly—so determinedly. His was no nature to give over easily anything he had set his heart on. All the more reason why Sheila should not appear to weaken.
She crouched there breathlessly as he tossed up more pebbles. Then she heard him sigh. Then he turned slowly away, and his feet dragged off along the path, and he went out of sight.