"I am alone in the house; even the servants are away. It is rather a
desolate sensation; and yet some people profess to feel more keenly the
loneliness of being in a crowd of strangers, than that of being entirely
by themselves. The former is your sort of loneliness at present. I
wonder if you dislike it? I wonder--you always seem so sufficient unto
yourself, so much more a man of intellect than of heart--I wonder if you
ever feel, as I do more and more strongly every day, our dependence on
each other?"
There was nothing more save the conventional ending. Page scarcely
glanced at the signature. Something seemed to mount to his head, as his
eyes dwelt fascinated upon the last sentence recorded. The sweetness of
his instant interpretation of it so possessed and intoxicated him that
no other thought could obtain entrance. All the processes of his system
seemed arrested for one overwhelming moment, then the pulses, reacting,
sent the blood boiling through his veins.
Mechanically he rose, and going to the bureau began throwing articles of
clothing into an open valise near by.
Recollecting himself, and duties still undone, he stopped these
premature preparations and, the valise happening to be the object under
his vision, he gave it the most prolonged amorous gaze that ever fell to
the lot of insensate leather. Then catching up the letter again, he
read it over and over.
That evening a messenger boy ran up the Van Tassel steps, and five
minutes afterward Clover was smiling and frowning in perplexity over a
telegram addressed to her.