The stewardess came back to him presently, with rather a discomfited air.
"The lady says she is too ill to see any one, sir," she told John
Saltram; "but under any circumstances she must decline to see you."
"She said that--my wife told you that?"
"Your wife, sir! Good gracious me, is the lady in number 7 your wife? She
came on board with her father, and I understood they were only two in
party."
"Yes; she came with her father. Her father's treachery has separated her
from me; but a few words would explain everything, if I could only see
her."
He thought it best to tell the woman the truth, strange as it might seem
to her. Her sympathies were more likely to be enlisted in his favour if
she knew the actual state of the case.
"Did Mrs. Holbrook positively decline to see me?" he asked again,
scarcely able to believe that Marian could have resisted even that brief
appeal scrawled upon a scrap of paper.
"She did indeed, sir," answered the stewardess. "Nothing could be more
positive than her manner. I told her how anxious you seemed--for I could
see it in your face, you see, sir, when you gave me the paper--and I
really didn't like to bring you such a message; but it was no use. 'I
decline to see him,' the lady said, 'and be sure you bring me no more
messages from this gentleman;' and with that, sir, she tore up the bit of
paper, as cool as could be.
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