The falling darkness had protected me, I felt confident, from being seen by anybody in the house as I crossed the lawn, and I approached with boldness, which only left me as I reached the window. The curtain hung apart as before, and I could see the fireplace with the lights and shadows travelling fantastically along the polished floor and wall. The white irradiated figure was no longer visible, but undiscouraged by this fact I gently tapped, trusting that Karine might be in another part of the room to which my eyes could not reach. If she were there my knock would startle her perhaps, and she would draw near in curiosity to see what had made the slight suspicious noise; then I could make my presence known, leaving apologies till later, and afterward--well, afterward the rest must depend upon her. But I knocked once, twice, thrice, each time a little louder, a little more insistently than before, and there was no response, no sound, no movement. After all I was thwarted, and had but one comfort in the midst of gloom--I had not been easily repulsed, I had done what I could, and need not feel, when I was far away, that I had let myself be outwitted, outgeneralled, without an effort to resist. Fate had decided that I must go to America without a word, without a look into Karine Cunningham's eyes; and drearily returning to my waiting cab I commenced once more the tedious drive to the station. Never had I felt more utterly disheartened; for, after all, I could not be _quite_ sure that Karine had not acquiesced in the order to exclude me from the house. It seemed that she must have heard my voice in the hall, that if she had chosen she might easily have contrived some means of seeing me while I was briskly taxing my ingenuity to reach her. I guessed at Wildred's powerful influence in the affair, and was ready to fancy others; but, as I was to learn long afterward, I brought forward every reason for Karine's mysterious inertness save the right one. CHAPTER XX The Quest It was a piercingly cold day when I landed in New York--such cold as I had not felt since I had finished my last American visit, four years ago. Everyone else among the many first-class passengers seemed to have some welcoming friend to greet him on shore save only myself. I would not let myself acknowledge that I felt discouragement, but a certain gloomy sense of the hopelessness of my undertaking would obtrude itself, as I rattled over the badly-paved streets of New York in the chill seclusion of my cab. I had myself driven straight to the Fifth Avenue Hotel, which was becoming almost an old-fashioned hostelry now among its many tall new rivals of incredibly many storeys in height, and walking up to the "office" prepared my most affable manner, to win the confidence of the smart "clerk" or book-keeper.