Jane was ill and did not leave her room during the two days following the visit to the penitentiary. She was haunted by the face of James Bansemer, the convict. It was beyond her powers of imagination to recall him as the well-groomed, distinguished man she once had known. Graydon was deeply distressed over the pain and humiliation he had subjected her to through Droom's unfortunate efforts. The fact that she could not or would not see him for two days hurt him more than he could express, even to himself. The day before he left for New York, however, she saw him in their parlour. She was pale and very quiet.
Neither mentioned the visit to the prison; there was nothing to say.
"You will be in New York next week?" he asked as he arose to leave. His spirit was sore. She again had told him that he must not hope. With an hysterical attempt to lead him on to other topics, she repeated her conversations with Teresa Valesquez, urging him with a hopeless attempt at bravado, to seek out the Spanish girl and marry her. He laughed lifelessly at the jest.
"We will leave Chicago on Monday. Father will have his business affairs arranged by that time. I would not let him resign the presidency. It would seem as if I were taking it away from him. We expect to be in Europe for six or eight months. Then, I am coming back to New York, where I was born, Graydon--to work!"
He went away with the feeling in his heart that he was not to see her again. A single atom of determination lingered in his soul, however, and he tried to build upon it for the future. Rigby's wedding invitation had come to him that morning--almost as a mockery. He tore it to pieces with a scowl of recollection.
Droom's effects were on the way to New York. He hung back, humbly waiting for Graydon to suggest that they should travel East on the same train. His grim, friendless old heart gave a bound of pure joy--the first he had known--when the young man made the suggestion that night.
Together they travelled eastward and homeward, leaving behind them the grey man in stripes.
Jane's six months in Europe grew into a year--and longer. It was a long but a profitable year for Graydon Bansemer; he had been enriched not only in wealth but in the hope of ultimate happiness. Not that Jane encouraged him. Far from it, she was more obdurate than ever with an ocean between them. But his atom of determination had grown to a purpose. His face was thinner and his eyes were of a deeper, more wistful grey; they were full of longing for the girl across the sea, and of pity and yearning for the man back there in the West.