"For I expect we'll see you round here in a day or two,"
she said with simple archness. She was well used to the demands of
Nancy's beaux. Nancy looked particularly innocent and expectant at
this, "Perhaps Mr. Bradley might come in and cheer you up, if I go
off with Mrs. Featherstone for the week-end?" she suggested
pleasantly. Mrs. Featherstone had been Virginia Belknap.
Bert presently bade her a cold good-bye. His reassurance to Mrs.
Terhune was made the next day by telephone, and life became dark
and dull to him. Certain things hurt him strangely--the sight of
places where she had taken off the shabby gloves; and had seated
herself happily opposite him for luncheon or tea; the sound of
music she had hummed. He wanted to see her--not feverishly,
nothing extreme, except that he wanted it every second of the
time. A mild current of wanting to see Nancy underran all his
days; he could control it, he decided, and to an extent he did. He
ate and worked and even slept in spite of it. But it was always
there, and it tired him, and made him feel old and sad.
And then they met; Bert idling through the September sweetness and
softness and goldness of the park, Nancy briskly taking her
business-like way from West Eightieth to East Seventy-second
Street.
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