"Why are we stopping? This is not Granny's," Madame
Olenska exclaimed.
"No: I shall get out here," he stammered, opening
the door and jumping to the pavement. By the light of
a street-lamp he saw her startled face, and the instinctive
motion she made to detain him. He closed the
door, and leaned for a moment in the window.
"You're right: I ought not to have come today," he
said, lowering his voice so that the coachman should
not hear. She bent forward, and seemed about to speak;
but he had already called out the order to drive on, and
the carriage rolled away while he stood on the corner.
The snow was over, and a tingling wind had sprung
up, that lashed his face as he stood gazing. Suddenly he
felt something stiff and cold on his lashes, and perceived
that he had been crying, and that the wind had
frozen his tears.
He thrust his hands in his pockets, and walked at a
sharp pace down Fifth Avenue to his own house.
XXX.
That evening when Archer came down before dinner
he found the drawing-room empty.
He and May were dining alone, all the family
engagements having been postponed since Mrs. Manson
Mingott's illness; and as May was the more punctual
of the two he was surprised that she had not preceded
him. He knew that she was at home, for while he
dressed he had heard her moving about in her room;
and he wondered what had delayed her.
He had fallen into the way of dwelling on such
conjectures as a means of tying his thoughts fast to
reality.
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