It
was early when we started, Cora and I, for Waverley Avenue, but not
too early for the approaches to that dreadful house to be crowded
with people, eager to see the daring bride. Why I should have
shrunk so from that crowd I can not say. I trembled at sight of
their faces and at the sound of their voices, and if by chance a
head was thrust forward farther than the rest I cowered back
instinctively and nearly screamed. Did I dread to recognize a too
familiar face? The paper I had seen bore a date six months back.
A man could arrive here from Alaska in that time. Or was my
conscience aroused at last and clamoring to be heard when it was
too late? On the corner of N Street the carriage suddenly stopped.
A man had crossed in front of it. I caught one glimpse of this
man and instantly the terrors of a lifetime were concentrated into
one instant of agonizing fear. It was William Pfeiffer. I knew
the look; I knew the gait. He was gone in a moment and the
carriage rolled on. But I knew my doom as well that minute as I
did an hour later. My husband was alive and he was here. He had
escaped the perils of the Klondike and wandered east to reclaim
his recreant wife. There had been time for him to do this since
the rescue party left home in search of him; time for him to
recover, time for him to reach home, time for him to reach the
east.
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