“Something is wrong?” cried the congressman, who had not failed to observe the pallor of his friend’s face.
“Yes; my father is paralyzed at Carlsbad, and mother has cabled me to start to her at once. I shall go on tonight to New York, and sail on the first steamer.” After a moment’s embarrassing pause, he added: “I have been calling on Miss Van Lew—to tell her we must leave off the sittings until my return, and to—bid her farewell.”
His voice was so wrung with emotion that it sounded strange in his own ears, for an almost unconquerable impulse had come over him to confide to this loyal friend the story of his betrothal to Viola and his distress at the separation.
Had he yielded to the temptation how much of the pain and tragedy of the future might have been spared both their hearts!
But he was a man of honor, and he remembered just in time his promise to Viola to keep secret their engagement.
He crushed back the words struggling for utterance on his lips, and said instead:
“I can not tell how long I may be absent—not long, if I can help it—but of course it will depend on the duration of my father’s illness. Do not forget that I shall hope to resume the sittings for your portrait as soon as I return. Now, I must hurry away. Good-bye,” and he held out his hand.
Professor Desha grasped it heartily with many expressions of sympathy and good will, and they parted thus in the cold air of December, not to meet again for several months, and then under the lowering shadow of tragic circumstances.
Desha had seen his friend coming down the steps of the Van Lew mansion, and he had drawn his own conclusions.
It did not seem to him that even the news of his father’s seizure was sufficient to bring that despairing look to Florian Gay’s handsome face. He said to himself: