“Peter will understand me,” he thought; “and more than that, he will understand Lily.”
The last day of the Formicas’ stay in Saratoga came. Osgood and Dr. Black appeared in traveling costume. Lily saw them enter the breakfast-room, and followed them with her father. As she passed their chairs, she asked, “Do you go to-day?” Osgood bowed. Dr. Black engaged Mr. Tree in making a remark.
“Why do you go?” she asked.
“Because Barclay stays,” he whispered.
She turned a fiery red and passed on. He looked across the table once and met her eyes. She thought they said “Farewell.” A wild wish rose in her heart which compelled all her nature to give way to it, to speak to him once more; to see him alone, and force him to tell her if he loved her. She resolved to find him somewhere, at all hazards.
Dr. Black watched her also. His comment was, that she was “coming to a crisis,” and was beautifully following out the laws which governed her sex. “Why can’t they be something without hysterics?” he lamented. “Osgood will break down if he is not got away.” He mechanically turned back his wristbands.
Lily waited in an ante-room, whose door Osgood must pass on his way out, and when he came, beckoned to him.
“Say your farewell to me as you feel it,” she said, her eyes in a blaze.
“I can not.”