“You will say good night to me? I will hear it. I will say good night to you; you will hear it.”
“Yes, Mother.” She put the worn Hebrew prayer book in his hands.
“You will read the prayer I taught you, every morning, every evening?”
“Yes, Mother.” The boy’s eyes fixed on her face grew deeper; there was a psychic connection between them. She went back to her own childhood. She saw an old man, with that book in his hand, his face lit with religious fervor.
“Julie, you will say the prayer I taught you, every morning, every evening?”
“Yes, Grandfather.” She had kept her promise.
The steamer sailed. Mary remained on deck to get a last glimpse of the solitary man standing on the wharf. Julie gave Floyd’s flowers to the steward to put on the dining table; there was a bouquet of exquisite red roses in her cabin. When they landed she wore one in her corsage.
14
The earth was thirsty; it poured down for three days, a slow soaking rain. Martin thought it would never stop. He walked along the lake in the Park regardless of his dripping hat. He was aching to see the boy again, to hear him say in his mother’s soft voice, “I love you, Uncle Martin.” What a mess he had made of his life; now he must steal what rightly belonged to him. He exulted in his power over Julie. Her illness was a fatality; it was her mother’s dead hand that had struck her daughter down to save her from him. A shiver ran through him; why was he so superstitious? He didn’t believe in anything—but sometimes a peculiar feeling took hold of him; there was another life far back, a mystery—something intangible. He walked hours in the rain—fighting invisible forces, cursing the conditions of his life; it all resolved itself back to the same determination. She had promised to go with him; she must keep her word.
Towards evening he rang the side-door bell at Hippolyte’s, hoping to get some news of her. The dark-skinned valet whisked off his coat, dried his dripping hair and neck, and preceded him into the Turkish room behind the shop. It was Hippolyte’s hour of rest before the night’s activity; he was lying on a divan, a picturesque figure, in a loose red silk robe. He waved Martin a welcome with his small white hand, the diamond, set in platinum on his finger, flashing rose color in the soft electric glow of the pervading red.