Scarcely less agitated than herself, he took the review and read it hurriedly, then passed it to Carmontelle.
"Can it be my Una?" he exclaimed, pale and agitated, his heart beating wildly.
But the face of Pierre Carmontelle looked calm and grave.
"Dear Eliot, dear Maud, do not give yourself up too ardently to hope," he said. "This may prove but a coincidence. The name may have been chosen as a nom de plume by the writer."
"My publisher promised to find out the name of the critic, if possible," Maud said; and to him Eliot went at once in a fever of anxiety.
Mr. Dudley could not give him any satisfaction. He had written to the New York publisher, asking for information, but had not yet received his reply. As soon as it came, he would be happy to lay his letter before Miss Van Zandt and her brother.
It was almost a week before the reply came, and Mr. Dudley forwarded it at once to Maud.
The New York publisher wrote that he was unacquainted with his able critic, save by the name of Una. All his business with her was transacted through a Boston banker, whose name he gave, and whom the Van Zandts knew as the head of one of the most influential banks in the city.
"She is here, then, in this very city, my lost Una—so near and 'yet so far!'" groaned Eliot. "But I shall go at once to Mr. Chesterton, with whom I have long had a friendly acquaintance."
He went and elicited simply nothing. The great banker would give him no information.