"If only Billy had been different ..." she kept saying to herself.
Suddenly the palms were parted, and a fat man approached her table. On seeing it occupied, he mumbled his surprise and backed out again. But while pushing his way through the palms he extended a short arm and said:—
"That table over there, then."
The remark was made to a companion, whom as yet Shirley could not see. An answer, however, came in a man's voice; both men seemed disappointed: evidently, this corner was a favourite with others as well as herself. And the fat man—his face was strangely familiar. Who might he be? Shirley was sure....
Broderick. That was the man: the funny, vulgar politician who had been pointed out to her at the Challoner trial. Shirley wondered what a man of his stamp was doing in the quietude of the Bellerophon. Somehow, he did not seem to belong there; she laughed silently to herself as through the palms she watched him settle himself laboriously at a table in another corner. The seat he had taken faced away from her, and she noted how broad, how terribly broad was his back.
"But a power in politics—the real thing!" she cried half-aloud. It was not surprising, she told herself, that men of refinement hesitated a long time before going into politics, if this were a type of the men they had to compete with. Her thoughts running on in this strain, she determined out of curiosity to get a glimpse of Broderick's companion. It was not difficult to get a good look at him, as the man sat facing her.
At the first glance, Shirley had a faint suspicion that likewise she knew that face; then she looked again and for a moment she was startled. "No, it can't be possible that—" At that instant the stranger looked up and dispelled her doubts. She was face to face with the man who had filled her thoughts for the last two hours.
"And so that is Billy Murgatroyd!" she murmured to herself. He was the same Murgatroyd she had known, but different from the man she had pictured. And she would have gone on indefinitely criticising his looks, but she was suddenly interrupted by the sound of voices. It was Broderick talking, his big voice filling the room. Shirley listened attentively.
"Blamed good place to get away from the gang," he was saying; and there was a satisfied look on his face as he glanced about the room.
While Broderick ordered the dinner, Murgatroyd leaned forward and made some remark. Instantly something in the tone of his voice, or it may have been his manner, told the girl that the relations between the two men were, in a degree, confidential. The back of Broderick assumed the attitude of a political adviser. Shirley observed that he gesticulated a great deal and often wiped his brow with a handkerchief which, even at a distance, she could see was over-embroidered, but in none of his movements so far was there the slightest suggestion of hostility.