“I speak because I have your welfare at heart, Wilford,” he answered in a kindly tone. “I only regret now that I asked you to my table to meet her. It is my fault—entirely my fault.”
“You talk as though she were some genius of evil,” I laughed. “Let me act as I think fit, my dear Channing.”
“Let you go headlong to the devil, eh?” he snapped.
“But to love her is not to go on the downward path, surely?” I cried incredulously.
“I warn you, once and for all, to have nothing whatever to do with her,” he said. “I know her—you do not.”
But I laughed him to scorn. His words seemed utterly absurd, as though his mind were filled by some strong prejudice which he dared not to utter for fear of laying himself open to an action for slander. If her acquaintance were so extremely undesirable, why did he invite her and her mother to his table? His words were not borne out by his own actions.
So I bade him farewell rather coolly, and left the club abruptly, in anger with myself at having sought him, or bestowed a single thought upon his extraordinary warning.
In the days that followed my mind was fully engrossed by recollections of her charm and beauty. Like every other man, I had had, before my blindness, one or two minor affairs of the heart, but never before had I experienced the grand passion. I had, indeed, admired several other women of various ages and various stations, but none had ever approached in grace, beauty, or refinement the woman who had so suddenly come into my life, and so quickly gone out of it.
Yes, I openly confess that I, who had of later years determined to remain a bachelor, was deeply in love with her. Indeed, for the time, I actually forgot the grim shadow of evil which had in my blindness fallen upon me.
Hither and thither in the great world of London I went with my eyes ever open in eagerness to catch a glimpse of her. I lounged in the Row at the fashionable hour; went to the opera, and swept boxes and stalls with my glasses; and strolled about Regent Street, Oxford Street, and High Street, Kensington, in the vicinity of those great drapery emporiums so dear alike to the feminine heart and to the male pocket. For ten days or so I spent greater part of my time in searching for her slim, erect figure among the bustling London crowds. I knew her address, it was true, but my acquaintance was not sufficient to warrant a call, therefore I was compelled to seek a chance encounter.