Granger hid his face upon his arms.
"My God!" he cried, "is that the answer?"
It was the answer. It was all the answer Granger ever received. He did not kill himself. He did not attempt to follow or even write to her. Why should he? She had come and had gone,—a beautiful, bewildering, maddening vision.
Neither did he try the old remedy of dissipation, as a meaner nature might have done; but he could not bear the quiet meaning of Mrs. Rogers' looks, nor the mute, reproachful face of his wife, and he fell into a habit of wandering with dog and gun through the mountains, coming home with empty game-bag, late at night, exhausted and dishevelled, to throw himself upon his bed and sleep long, heavy slumbers. Without knowing it, he had taken his sore heart to the surest and purest counsellor; and little by little those solitary communings with nature had their healing effect.
"Let him be, Ruby," her mother would say, as Ruby mourned and wondered. "Let him be. The Grangers was all of 'em queer. Rob'll come round all right in course of time."
Weeks and months went by in this way, and one morning, after a night of desperate pain and danger, Robert Granger's first-born was laid in his arms. Then he buried his face in the pillow by pale, smiling Ruby, and sent up a prayer for forgiveness and strength. True, only God and attending angels heard it, but Ruby Granger was a happier woman from that day.
Mrs. Van Cassalear was passing along the city street, leaning upon her husband's arm. It was midsummer. "Everybody" was out of town, and the Van Cassalears were only there for a day, en passant. They were walking rapidly, the lady's delicate drapery gathered in one hand, a look of proud indifference upon her face.
"Pond-lilies! Pond-lilies!"
She paused. Upon a street-corner stood a sun-burned, bare-foot boy, in scant linen suit and coarse farmer's hat. His hands were full of lilies, which he was offering for sale.