He cheerfully promised to do so. Then, feeling greatly relieved, Edith settled herself contentedly for a nap, for she was very weary and heavy-eyed from the long strain upon her nerves and lack of sleep.
She did not wake for more than three hours, when she found that daylight had faded, and that the lamps had been lighted in the car.
At New Haven she obtained a light lunch from a boy who was crying his viands through the train, and when her hunger was satisfied she straightened her hat and drew on her gloves, knowing that another two hours would bring her to her destination.
Then she began to speculate upon possible and impossible things, and to grow very anxious regarding her safety upon her arrival in New York.
Perhaps Royal Bryant had not received her message.
He might have left his office before it arrived; maybe the officials at Framingham had even neglected to send it; or Mr. Bryant might have been out of town.
What could she do if, upon alighting from the train, some burly policeman should step up to her and claim her as his prisoner?
She had thus worked herself up to a very nervous and excited state by the time the lights of the great metropolis could be seen in the distance; her face grew flushed and feverish, her eyes were like two points of light, her temples throbbed, her pulses leaped, and her heart beat with great, frightened throbs.
The train had to make a short stop where one road crossed another just before entering the city, and the poor girl actually grew faint and dizzy with the fear that an officer might perhaps board the train at that point.
Almost as the thought flashed through her brain, the car door opened and a man entered, when a thrill of pain went quivering through every nerve, prickling to her very finger-tips.