Now that the six weeks of her stay had expired--now that the day had really arrived, on the evening of which the first story was to be read, I began to calculate the chances of failure as well as the chances of success.

What if my own estimate of the interest of the stories turned out to be a false one?
What if some unforeseen accident occurred to delay my son's return beyond ten days?
The arrival of the newspaper had already become an event of the deepest importance to me.

Unreasonable as it was to expect any tidings of George at so early a date, I began, nevertheless, on this first of our days of suspense, to look for the name of his ship in the columns of telegraphic news.

The mere mechanical act of looking was some relief to my overstrained feelings, although I might have known, and did know, that the search, for the present, could lead to no satisfactory result.
Toward noon I shut myself up with my collection of manuscripts to revise them for the last time.

Our exertions had thus far produced but six of the necessary ten stories.