The summer was almost over. After a visit to Sally Abbott on Lake
Merritt, she returned to town with the rest of the fashionable world.
People had never been kinder to her; and if their persistent
attentions were strongly diluted with curiosity, who shall blame
them? It was not every day they had a blighted heroine of romance,
who, moreover, looked as if she were going into a decline. She grew
thinner every day. Her white skin was colorless and transparent. They
might not have her for long, poor darling! How they pitied her! But
they never wished they had let her alone. It was all for the best.
And what woman ever had so devoted a husband? He went with her
everywhere. He, too, looked as if he had been through the mill, poor
dear, but at least he had won a close race, and he deserved and
received the sympathy of his faithful friends. As for that ungrateful
brute, Langdon Masters, he had not written a line to any one in San
Francisco since he left. Not one had an idea what had become of him.
Did he secretly correspond with Madeleine? (They would have permitted
her that much.) Would he blow out his brains if she died of
consumption? He was no philanderer. If he hadn't really loved her
nothing would have torn him from San Francisco and his brilliant
career; of course.
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