Page:Fidelia, (IA fidelia00balm).pdf/237

 found herself too timid to drive it, alone. She happened to live only a couple of miles north of his hotel, so after leaving his customer and her car at home, he decided to walk, as the day was clear and pleasant.

When driving, he had passed the Sothron house and he had seen that it was open and as he neared it on foot, he watched the door and the walk; but no one went in or out. He was a block past the house and the stir which it had roused was subsiding within him when he recognized Alice approaching from the south.

In his confusion of feelings, he became keenly self-conscious of his new clothes. He had on a new, well-tailored suit, a new, light overcoat and new hat, evidences of much money spent upon himself, evidences also of great difference in him from the David who used to debate with her whether he "ought" to pay to have an overcoat made for himself.

He proceeded until he was within a few paces of her and then he halted; she came nearly to him and he thought, for a moment, that she meant merely to speak to him and pass. She spoke but she did not pass and he took off his hat and held it at his side.

"How do you do, David?" she asked, in her quiet way and her blue eyes looked up steadily at him.

He said: "I saw in the paper that you were home."

It sounded as though his presence near her home was a result of his having seen the item in the paper. He asked, quickly: "You had a good trip?"

"Yes."

He looked down, not at her eyes, he looked at the