She fully believed that Frederic knew her, simply because she recognized him, and his failing to acknowledge the recognition filled her with indignation and determination to forget him if it were possible. Ah, little did she dream then of the lonely man, who, in the same room where she so recently had been, sat with bowed head, and thought of her until the distant bells tolled the hour of midnight.
It was now three weeks since he commenced his search, and he was beginning to despair of success. His presence he knew was needed in Kentucky, where Alice had been left alone with the negroes, and where his arrangements for moving were not yet completed. His house on the river was waiting for him, the people wondering why he didn’t come, and as he sat thinking it all over, he resolved at last to go home and bring Alice to Riverside—to send for Mrs. Huntington as had previously been arranged, and then begin the search again. Of Isabel too, he thought, remembering his hasty promise of going to New Haven, but this he could not do. So he penned her a few lines, telling her how it was impossible for him to come, and saying that on his return to Riverside with Alice, he should expect to find her mother and herself waiting to receive him.
“I cannot do less than this,” he said. “Isabel has been with me a long time, and though I do not feel toward her as I did, I pity her; for I am afraid she likes me better than she should. I have given her encouragement, too; but when I come back, I will talk with her candidly. I will tell her how it is, and offer her a home with me as long as she shall choose to stay. I will be to her a brother; and when Marian is found, the two shall be like sisters, until some man who has not a wife already takes Isabel from my hands.”
Thus deciding, Frederic wrote to Alice, telling her when he should probably be home, and saying he should stop for a day or so at Yonkers. This done, he retired to rest, dreaming strange dreams of Marian and the girl who sat beside him. They were one and the same, he thought; and he was raising the brown vail to see, when he awoke to consciousness, and experienced a feeling of disappointment in finding his dream untrue.
That morning a vague, uneasy feeling prompted him to stroll slowly down the street whither the young girl had gone the previous night. The window in the third story was open again, and the geranium was standing there still, its broad leaves growing fresher and greener in the sunshine which shone warm upon the window sill, where a beautiful kitten lay, apparently asleep. Frederic saw it all, and for an instant felt a thrill of fear lest the cat should fall and be killed on the pavement below. But a second glance assured him of its safety—for, half buried in its long, silk fur, was a small white hand, a hand like Marian’s and that of the girl with the thick brown vail. “Its owner was the mistress of the kitten,” he said; and the top of her head was just visible, for she sat reading upon a little stool, and utterly unconscious of the stranger who, on the opposite side in the street, cast many and wistful glances in that direction, not because he fancied that she was there, nor yet for any explainable reason, except that the fringed curtain reminded him of his boyhood; and he knew the occupant of that room had once lived in the country, and bleached her linen on the sweet, clean grass, which grew by the running brook.
“Marian,” said Mrs. Burt, “who is that tall man going down the street? He’s been looking this way ever so much. Isn’t it——”
She did not need to repeat the name, for Marian saw who it was, and her fingers buried themselves so deeply in the fat sides of the kitten that the little animal fancied the play rather too rude for comfort, and, spitting at her mistress pertly bounded upon the floor.
“It’s Frederic!” cried Marian. “Maybe he’s coming here, for he has crossed the street below, and is coming up this side.” And in her joy Marian forgot the harsh things she had said of him only the night before.
But in vain Marian waited for the step upon the stairs—the loud knock upon the door—neither of them came, and leaning from the window she watched him through her tears until he passed from sight.
That afternoon, as Frederic was sauntering leisurely down the street in the direction of the depot—for he intended going to Yonkers that night—he stumbled upon Ben, whose characteristic exclamation was, “Wall, Square, glad to see you out agin, but I didn’t b’lieve I ever should when I sent word to that gal. She come, I s’pose?”