Nevertheless,
he dreaded to hear him speak again of her; and the fear was realized in
a question.
"Does she know you are here?"
"Who?" said Brant curtly.
"Your wife. That is--I reckon she's your wife still, eh?"
"Yes; but I do not know what she knows," returned Brant quietly. He had
regained his self-composure.
"Susy,--Mrs. Senator Boompointer, that is,"--said Hooker, with an
apparent dignity in his late wife's new title, "allowed that she'd gone
abroad on a secret mission from the Southern Confederacy to them crowned
heads over there. She was good at ropin' men in, you know. Anyhow, Susy,
afore she was Mrs. Boompointer, was dead set on findin' out where she
was, but never could. She seemed to drop out of sight a year ago. Some
said one thing, and some said another. But you can bet your bottom
dollar that Mrs. Senator Boompointer, who knows how to pull all the
wires in Washington, will know, if any one does."
"But is Mrs. Boompointer really disaffected, and a Southern
sympathizer?" said Brant, "or is it only caprice or fashion?"
While speaking he had risen, with a half-abstracted face, and had gone
to the window, where he stood in a listening attitude. Presently he
opened the window, and stepped outside.
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