That evening she went back to Westchester absent-minded and depressed.
XXV
It was in early June when she arrived in town again. He was in the lobby as usual; he lunched at the table by the window as usual. There seemed to be nothing changed about him except that he was a handsomer man than she had supposed him.
She ate very little luncheon. As usual, he glanced at her once—a perfectly pleasant and inoffensive glance—and resumed his luncheon and his newspaper. He was always quiet, always alone. There seemed to be a curious sort of stillness which radiated from him, laying a spell upon his environment for a few paces on every side of him. She had felt this; she felt it now.
Downtown her business was finally transacted; she went to a matinée all by herself, and found herself staring beyond the painted curtain and the mummers—beyond the bedizened scenery—out into the world somewhere and into two dark, boyish eyes that looked so pleasantly back at her. And suddenly her own eyes filled; she bent her head and touched them with her handkerchief.
No, she must never again come to the Hotel Aurora Borealis. There were reasons. Besides, it was no longer necessary for her to come to town at all. She must not come any more. . . . And yet, if she could only know what became of him—whether salvation ever found him——