Audley did not doubt the truth of Toft’s story. It confirmed his fears only too well; and the family tradition—that too weighed with him. He sat for a long time staring before him, then, uneasy and restless, he rose and paced the floor. He went to and fro, to and fro, until by-and-by he came to a stand before one of the windows. He drummed with his fingers on the glass. There was one way, certainly. Stubbs had said so, and Stubbs was right. There was one way, if he could make up his mind to the limitations it would impose upon him. If he could make up his mind to be a poor man.
The window at which he stood looked on a road of quiet dignity, a little removed from the common traffic of the town. But the windows, looking sideways, commanded also a more frequented thoroughfare which crossed this street. His thoughts far away and sombrely engaged, the young man watched the stream of passers, as it trickled across the distant opening.
Suddenly his eyes recalled his mind to the present. He started, turned, in three strides he was beside the hearth. He rang the bell twice, the signal for his man. He waited impatiently.
“My hat and coat!” he cried to the servant. “Quick, I’m in a hurry!” Like most men who have known vicissitudes he had a superstitious side, and the figure which he had seen pass across the end of the road had appeared so aptly, so timely, had had so much the air of an answer to his doubts that he took it for an inspiration.
He ran down the stairs, but he knew that his comings and goings were marked, and once outside the house he controlled his impatience. He walked slowly, humming a tune and swaying his cane, and it was a very stately gentleman taking the air and acknowledging with courtesy the respectful salutations of the passers, who came on Mary Audley as she turned from Dr. Pepper’s door in the High Street.
He stood. “Miss Audley!” he cried.
Mary was flushed with exercise, ruffled by the wind, travel-stained. But she would have cared little for these things if she could have governed the blood that rose to her cheeks at his sudden appearance. To mask her confusion she rushed into speech.
“You cannot be more surprised than I am,” she said. “My uncle is not so well to-day, and in a panic about his medicine. Toft, who should have come in to town to fetch it, was not to be found, so I had to come.”
“And you have walked in?”
Smiling, she showed him her boots. “And I am presently going to walk out,” she said.