“You don’t look too well,” said his friend. “Can I get anything for you, fetch your letters, or anything of that sort?”
“I do not expect letters,” was Ogilvie’s answer; “there may be one or two cables. I shall find out at the hotel.”
Harding said something further. Ogilvie replied in an abstracted manner. He was thinking of Sibyl. It seemed to him that the little figure was near him, and the little spirit strangely in touch with his own. Of all people in the world she was the one he cared least to give his thoughts to just at that moment.
“And yet I am doing it for her,” he muttered to himself. “I must go through with it; but while I am about it I want to forget her. My work lies before me—that dastardly work which is to stain my character and blemish my honor; but there is no going back now. Sibyl was unprovided for, and I have an affection of the heart which may end my days at any moment. For her sake I had no other course open to me. Now I shall not allow my conscience to speak again.”
He made an effort to pull himself together, and as the big liner gradually neared the quay, he spoke in cheerful tones to his fellow-passengers. Just as he passed down the gangway, and landed on the quay, he heard a voice exclaim suddenly—
“Mr. Ogilvie, I believe?”
He turned, and saw a small, dapper-looking man, in white drill and a cabbage-tree hat, standing by his side.
“That is my name,” replied Ogilvie; “and yours?”