Part 19 (1/2)

And, by George, I was perfectly right, don't you know. In a day or two along came the usual telegram from Florence, telling me to come to Madison Avenue.

The mere idea of Madison Avenue was beginning to give me that tired feeling, and I made up my mind I wouldn't go near the place. But of course I did. When it came to the point, I simply hadn't the common manly courage to keep away.

Florence was there as before.

”Reginald,” she said, ”I think I shall go raving mad.”

This struck me as a mighty happy solution of everybody's troubles, but I felt it was too good to be true.

”Over a week ago,” she went on, ”my brother Edwin came up to New York to consult a book at the library. I antic.i.p.ated that this would occupy perhaps an afternoon, and was expecting him back by an early train next day. He did not arrive. He sent an incoherent telegram. But even then I suspected nothing.” She paused. ”Yesterday morning,” she said, ”I had a letter from my aunt Augusta.”

She paused again. She seemed to think I ought to be impressed.

Her eyes tied a bowknot in my spine.

”Let me read you her letter. No, I will tell you its contents. Aunt Augusta had seen Edwin lunching at the Waldorf with a creature.”

”A what?”

”My aunt described her. Her hair was of a curious dull bronze tint.”

”Your aunt's?”

”The woman's. It was then that I began to suspect. How many women with dull bronze hair does Edwin know?”

”Great Scott! Why ask me?”

I had got used to being treated as a sort of ”Hey, Bill!” by Florence, but I was darned if I was going to be expected to be an encyclopedia as well.

”One,” she said. ”That appalling Darrell woman.”

She drew a deep breath.

”Yesterday evening,” she said, ”I saw them together in a taximeter cab. They were obviously on their way to some theatre.”

She fixed me with her eye.

”Reginald,” she said, ”you must go and see her the first thing to-morrow.”

”What!” I cried. ”Me? Why? Why me?”

”Because you are responsible for the whole affair. You introduced Douglas to her. You suggested that he should bring her home. Go to her to-morrow and ascertain her intentions.”

”But----”

”The very first thing.”

”But wouldn't it be better to have a talk with Edwin?”

”I have made every endeavour to see Edwin, but he deliberately avoids me. His answers to my telegrams are willfully evasive.”