I shook my head.
“It's true,” she went on. “You don't believe it, but it's true. It's a presentiment and you haven't believed in my presentiments before, but they've come true. Why, you didn't believe we'd ever find Little Frank at all, but we did. And do you suppose all that has happened so far has been just for nothin'? Indeed and indeed it hasn't. No, this isn't the end; it's only the beginnin'.”
Her conviction was so strong that I hadn't the heart to contradict her. I said nothing.
“And that's why,” she went on, “I don't like to have us leave here right away. She knows we're here, here in England, and if—if she ever should be in trouble and need our help she could find us here waitin' to give it. If we was away off on the Cape, way on the other side of the ocean, she couldn't reach us, or not until 'twas too late anyhow. That's why I'd like to stay here a while longer, Hosy. But,” she hastened to add, “I wouldn't stay a minute if you really wanted to go.”
I was silent for a moment. The temptation was to go, to get as far from the scene of my trouble as I could; but, after all, what did it matter? I could never flee from that trouble.
“All right, Hephzy,” I said. “I'll stay, if it pleases you.”
“Thank you, Hosy. It may be foolish, our stayin', but I don't believe it is. And—and there's somethin' else. I don't know whether I ought to tell you or not. I don't know whether it will make you feel better or worse. But I've heard you say that she must hate you. She doesn't—I know she doesn't. I've been lookin' over her things, those she left in her room. Everythin' we've given her or bought for her since she's been here, she left behind—every single thing except one. That little pin you bought for her in London the last time you was there and gave her to wear at the Samsons' lawn party, I can't find it anywhere. She must have taken it with her. Now why should she take that and leave all the rest?”
“Probably she forgot it,” I said.
“Humph! Queer she should forget that and nothin' else. I don't believe she forgot it. I think she took it because you gave it to her and she wanted to keep it to remind her of you.”
I dismissed the idea as absurd, but I found a ray of comfort in it which I should have been ashamed to confess. The idea that she wished to be reminded of me was foolish, but—but I was glad she had forgotten to leave the pin. It MIGHT remind her of me, even against her will.