West, at least, appeared to think so. He lingered, charmed, until
quarter past eleven o'clock, at which hour Mrs. Weyland, in the room
above, began to let the tongs and poker fall about with unmistakable
significance; and went out into the starlit night radiant with the
certainty that his heart, after long wandering, had found its true mate
at last.
XXIV
_Sharlee's Parlor on Another Evening; how One Caller outsat Two,
and why; also, how Sharlee looked in her Mirror for a Long Time,
and why._
On the very night after West made his happy discovery, namely on the
evening of February 24, at about twenty minutes of nine, Sharlee
Weyland's door-bell rang, and Mr. Queed was shown into her parlor.
His advent was a complete surprise to Sharlee. For these nine months,
her suggestion that he should call upon her had lain utterly neglected.
Since the Reunion she had seen him but four times, twice on the street,
and once at each of their offices, when the business of the reformatory
had happened to draw them together. The last of these meetings, which
had been the briefest, was already six weeks old.
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