He would only, he said, look once
more into kindly human faces and steal away as he came.
He could perceive now that the lady who had spoken was an invalid
reclining in a long chair, lightly covered with a rug. A fragile, dainty
little creature, her laces, trinkets, and rings revealed her as one
clinging to the elegancies of another phase of life, though Fate had sent
her to live, and perhaps to die, here on the edge of the wilderness. He
made the same observation with regard to the man who sat with his back to
the window. He was in informal evening dress--a circumstance that, in this
land of more or less primitive simplicity, spoke of a sense of exile. He
was slight and middle-aged, and though his face was hidden, Ford received
the impression of having seen him already, but from another point of view.
His habit of using a magnifying-glass as, with some difficulty, he read a
newspaper in the light of a green-shaded lamp, seemed to Ford especially
familiar, though more pressing thoughts kept him from trying to remember
where and when he had seen some one do the same thing within the recent
past.
As he crouched by the window watching them, it came into his mind that
they were just the sort of people of whom he had least need to be afraid.
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