The rector instituted a quiet search, but only succeeded in learning
that she had conducted her preparations for departure with the
greatest secrecy, and that to no one had she imparted her plans.
Whenever a young woman shrouds her actions in the garments of
secrecy, she invites suspicion. The people who love to suspect their
fellow-beings of wrong-doing were not absent on this occasion.
The rector was hurt and wounded by all this, and while he resented
the intimation from another that Miss Irving's conduct had been
peculiar and mysterious, he felt it to be so in his own heart.
"Is it her mother's tendency to adventure developing in her?" he
asked himself.
Yet he wrote her a letter, directing it to her at the old number,
thinking she would at least leave her address with the post-office
for the forwarding of mail. The letter was returned to him from that
cemetery of many a dear hope, the dead-letter office. A personal in
a leading paper failed to elicit a reply. And then one day six
months after the disappearance of Joy Irving, the young rector was
called to the Cheney household to offer spiritual consolation to Miss
Alice, who believed herself to be dying. She had been in a decline
ever since the rector went away for his health.
Since his return she had seen him but seldom, rarely save in the
pulpit, and for the last six weeks she had been too ill to attend
divine service.
Pages:
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138