ousness."

I took the telegram. The wordy seemed meaningless, all save those of the
last sentence. "The situation is serious, but by no means hopeless."
Nancy had not spoken of that. The ignorant cruelty of its convention! The
man must have known what Hambleton Durrett was! Nancy read my thoughts,
and took the paper from my hand.

"Hugh, dear, if it's hard for you, try to understand that it's terrible
for me to think that he has any claim at all. I realize now, as I never
did before, how wicked it was in me to marry him. I hate him, I can't
bear the thought of going near him."

She fell into wild weeping. I tried to comfort her, who could not comfort
myself; I don't remember my inadequate words. We were overwhelmed,
obliterated by the sense of calamity.... It was she who checked herself
at last by an effort that was almost hysterical.

"I mustn't yield to it!" she said. "It's time to leave and the train goes
at six. No, you mustn't come to the station, Hugh--I don't think I could
stand it. I'll send you a telegram." She rose. "You must go now--you
must."

"You'll come back to me?" I demanded thickly, as I held her.

"Hugh, I am yours, now and always. How can you doubt it?"

At last I released her, when she had begged me again. And I found myself
a little later walking past the familiar, empty houses of those
streets....

The front pages of the evening newspapers announced the accident to
Hambleton Durrett, and added that Mrs. Durrett, who had been lingering in
the city, had gone to her husband's bedside. The morning papers contained
more of biography and ancestry, but had little to add to the bulletin;
and there was no lack of speculation at the Club and elsewhere as to
Ham's ability to rally from such a shock. I could not bear to listen to
these comments: they were violently distasteful to me. The unforeseen
accident and Nancy's sudden departure had thrown my life completely out
of gear: I could not attend to business, I dared not go away lest the
news from Nancy be delayed. I spent the hours in an exhausting mental
state that alternated between hope and fear, a state of unmitigated,
intense desire, of balked realization, sometimes heightening into that
sheer terror I had felt when I had detected over the telephone that note
in her voice that seemed of despair. Had she had a presentiment, all
along, that something would occur to separate us? As I went back over the
hours we had passed together since she had ac