Hawkins went straight to the telegraph office and
disburdened his conscience. He said to himself,
“She’s not going to give this galvanized
cadaver up, that’s plain. Wild horses can’t
pull her away from him. I’ve done my share;
it’s for Sellers to take an innings, now.”
So he sent this message to New York:
“Come back. Hire special train.
She’s going to marry the materializee.”
Meantime a note came to Rossmore Towers to say that
the Earl of Rossmore had just arrived from England,
and would do himself the pleasure of calling in the
evening. Sally said to herself, “It is
a pity he didn’t stop in New York; but it’s
no matter; he can go up to-morrow and see my father.
He has come over here to tomahawk papa, very likely—or
buy out his claim. This thing would have excited
me, a while back; but it has only one interest for
me now, and only one value. I can say to—to—
Spine, Spiny, Spinal—I don’t like
any form of that name!—I can say to him
to-morrow, ’Don’t try to keep it up any
more, or I shall have to tell you whom I have been
talking with last night, and then you will be embarrassed.’”
Tracy couldn’t know he was to be invited for
the morrow, or he might have waited. As it was,
he was too miserable to wait any longer; for his last
hope—a letter—had failed him.
It was fully due to-day; it had not come. Had
his father really flung him away? It looked so.
It was not like his father, but it surely looked
so. His father was a rather tough nut, in truth,
but had never been so with his son—still,
this implacable silence had a calamitous look.
Anyway, Tracy would go to the Towers and —then
what? He didn’t know; his head was tired
out with thinking— he wouldn’t think
about what he must do or say—let it all
take care of itself. So that he saw Sally once
more, he would be satisfied, happen what might; he
wouldn’t care.
He hardly knew how he got to the Towers, or when.
He knew and cared for only one thing—he
was alone with Sally. She was kind, she was gentle,
there was moisture in her eyes, and a yearning something
in her face and manner which she could not wholly
hide—but she kept her distance. They
talked. Bye and bye she said—watching
his downcast countenance out of the corner of her
eye—
“It’s so lonesome—with papa
and mamma gone. I try to read, but I can’t
seem to get interested in any book. I try the
newspapers, but they do put such rubbish in them.
You take up a paper and start to read something you
thinks interesting, and it goes on and on and on about
how somebody—well, Dr. Snodgrass, for instance—”
Not a movement from Tracy, not the quiver of a muscle.
Sally was amazed —what command of himself
he must have! Being disconcerted, she paused
so long that Tracy presently looked up wearily and
said:
“Well?”
“Oh, I thought you were not listening.
Yes, it goes on and on about this Doctor Snodgrass,
till you are so tired, and then about his younger son—
the favorite son—Zylobalsamum Snodgrass—”
