There were moments in which he wondered if she were
not, on her part, trying to forget him, and occasionally, when his
spirits sank lowest, he actually harbored the fear that her affection
might already have returned to Wambush. He recalled something he had
once heard that a woman would love a man who was unfortunate more
surely than one who was not, and this thought almost drove him mad with
jealousy, for was she not likely, through pity, to send her heart after
the exile? Now and then, in passing the hotel, he caught a glimpse of
Harriet on the veranda or at the window, but she always turned away, as
if she wished to avoid meeting him, and this pained him, too, for she
had become his very life, and such cold encounters were like permanent
steps towards losing her forever, which, somehow, had never quite
shaped itself into a possibility in his mind.
It was a warm day in the middle of November, Westerfelt and Washburn
stood at the stable waiting for the hack, which, once a day, brought
the mail and passengers from Darley. It had come down the winding red
clay road and stopped at the hotel before going on to the stable.
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