"Father wouldn't do it. Father always does the square thing, and I'm his son." Ralph's words returned with a pang unbearably keen. Had Father always done the square thing, or had Father been a coward, a despicable shirk? And what if Ralph should some day come to know?
The man shuddered at the thought of the boy's face--if he knew. Those clear, honest eyes would pierce him through and through, because "Father always does the square thing."
Remorsely, the need of confession surged upon him. There was no confessional in his church--he even had no church. Yet Thorpe was his friend. What would Thorpe tell him to do?
Then Anthony Dexter laughed, for Thorpe had unconsciously told him what to do--and he was spared the confession. As though written in letters of fire, the words came back: The honour of the spoken word still holds him. He asked her to marry him, and she consented. He was never released from his promise--did not even ask for it. He slunk away like a cur. In the sight of God he is hound to her by his own word still. He should go to her and either fulfil his promise, or ask for release. The tardy fulfilment of his promise would be the only atonement he could make.
Had Evelina come back to demand atonement? Was this why the vision of her confronted him everywhere? She waited for him on the road in daylight, mocked him from the shadows, darted to meet him from every tree. She followed him on the long and lonely ways he took to escape her, and, as he walked, her step chimed in with his.
In darkness, Anthony Dexter feared to turn suddenly, lest he see that black, veiled figure at his heels. She stood aside on the stairs to let him pass her, entered the carriage with him and sat opposite, her veiled face averted. She stood with him beside the sick-bed, listened, with him, to the heart-beats when he used the stethoscope, waited while he counted the pulse and measured the respiration.
Always disapprovingly, she stood in the background of his consciousness. When he wrote a prescription, his pencil seemed to catch on the white chiffon which veiled the paper he was using. At night, she stood beside his bed, waiting. In his sleep, most often secured in these days by drugs, she steadfastly and unfailingly came. She spoke no word; she simply followed him, veiled--and the phantom presence was driving him mad. He admitted it now.
And "Father always does the square thing." Very well, what was the square thing? If Father always does it, he will do it now. What is it?