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34                                                  
                       4th Draft  1750 words


RETURN

by
Forman H. Craton

The night was one when the past briefly emerges from its darkness and lives again. Four hundred years ago Jacques Cartier had sailed through the Straight of Belle Isle and raised the Cross and the lilies of France at Gaspe. Quebec was in gala costume for the celebration of this quadricentennial, at once proud, sad and happy in the remembrance of the glory that was France and that time and change could never take away. Brilliant with light and color, Dufferin Terrace hummed with excited French voices as the crowd moved to and fro on the broad esplanade above the Lower Town. A wreath of white roses lay at the foot of the obelisk in memory of Montcalm and Wolfe. The turreted pile of the great Chateau, housing the delegation from France, reared high above the eddying current of men and women contemplating the glory and tragedy of their history.
  For the tall young American walking leisurely among the people in the foyer of the Chateau, this was a peculiarly happy occasion. That afternoon he had arrived with the girl whom he hoped to marry. They were returning with her mother from a Maine vacation and at Mimi's suggestion had arranged to spend a few days in Quebec on the way. Robert Henderson smiled, thinking of the pleasure of showing Mimi this quaint and charming city with which he was familiar but she had never visited. And she had been so anxious to come at this time, so anxious. His pleasant tanned face was animated again by a whimsical smile. If she had had a rendezvous here with a secret lover, she could not have been more insistent. How fortunate he, to be the lover. He glanced at his watch. In a few minutes he would meet her.

Stopping before a bronze statue in a wing of the foyer, he lighted a cigarette, then stood regarding the tall spare figure. It was an 18th century soldier enveloped in the folds of a long army cape, one hand resting on the hip, the other, slender and delicate, holding a telescope across the body. Robert Henderson took in this general impression but his gaze passed almost immediately to the face, whose features were aesthetic, sensitive, not the face of a soldier, coming to a point at tip of nose and receding toward brow and chin. The glance was directed slightly upwards as if toward a distant goal. Suddenly Robert was conscious of the remarkable eyes. In them he saw unmistakably the secret of