Miss Remington was seated next to Dunham at the table, with the Judge on
her other side. The young man was pleased with the arrangement, and sat
furtively studying the delicate tinting of her face, the dainty line of
cheek and chin and ear, the sweep of her dark lashes, and the ripple of
her brown hair, as he tried to converse easily with her, as an old friend
might.
At length the Judge turned to the girl and said:
"Miss Remington, you remind me strongly of a young woman who was in my
office this afternoon."
The delicate color flickered out of the girl's face entirely, leaving even
her lips white, but she lifted her dark eyes bravely to the kindly blue
ones, and with sweet dignity baffled the questioned recognition in his
look.
"Yes, you are so much like her that I would think you were--her sister
perhaps, if it were not for the name," Judge Blackwell went on. "She was a
most interesting and beautiful young lady." The old gentleman bestowed
upon the girl a look that was like a benediction. "Excuse me for speaking
of it, but her dress was something soft and beautiful, like yours, and
seemed to suit her face. I was deeply interested in her, although until
this afternoon she was a stranger. She came to me for a small matter of
business, and after it was attended to, and before she received the
papers, she disappeared! She had removed her hat and gloves, as she was
obliged to wait some time for certain matters to be looked up, and these
she left behind her. The hat is covered with long, handsome plumes of the
color of rich cream in coffee."
Young Dunham glanced down at the cloth of the girl's gown, and was
startled to find the same rich creamy-coffee tint in its silky folds; yet
she did not show by so much as a flicker of an eyelash that she was
passing under the keenest inspection. She toyed with the salted almonds
beside her plate and held the heavy silver fork as firmly as if she were
talking about the discovery of the north pole. Her voice was steady and
natural as she asked, "How could she disappear?"
"Well, that is more than I can understand. There were three doors in the
room where she sat, one opening into the inner office where I was at work,
and two opening into a hall, one on the side and the other on the end
opposite the freight elevator. We searched the entire building without
finding a clew, and I am deeply troubled."
"Why should she want to disappear?" The question was asked coolly and with
as much interest as a stranger would be likely to show.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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