Street to Eighth Avenue and drop him at the
corner. After leaving the cab he ventured into an all-night shop and
bought a cheap raincoat, slouch hat and umbrella. Then, like a thief, he
stole forth and warily made his way toward the dock. It was bad going
and he hailed a second cab. Before climbing into it, he crossed and
dropped an envelope into the mailbox.

"There," he muttered, "that helps my conscience. By Jove, this has been
a corking start for the adventure. Talk about dime novels!"

He instructed the driver to take him to a point not far from the dock, a
precaution which suddenly invested itself. It would be wise to approach
the liner by stealth, taking no chances. They were sailing by one of the
obscure lines, not for economy's sake, but to avoid possible contact
with friends of their own class.

As he rattled off through the night, huddled back in the blackness of
the cab, Hugh began to have the first pangs of uneasiness. The
distressing fear that all had not gone well with Grace flooded his brain
with misgivings and feverish doubts. A clock in a shop window told him
it was nearly ten o'clock. He was cursing himself for permitting her to
rush off alone in a night like this, into a quarter that reeked with
uncertainty and disorder. Vague horrors presented themselves to his
distressed mind; calamity stared at him from the mouth of every dark
alley; outrage, crime, misfortune, danced in every shadow. As for
himself, he was a sorry sight and enough to frighten Grace into
convulsions at one glance. Rain-soaked, muddy, bedraggled, it was not
the debonnaire Chicagoan of old who skulked away from the cab at a
certain black corner and made his way stealthily, even fearfully, toward
the distant dock.

Every sound startled and alarmed him; every pedestrian looked like a
pursuer in plain clothes or blue. A couple of policemen eyed him sharply
and he trembled in his boots. The sudden, overpowering recollection that
he had the passage tickets in his pockets with the reservations and the
luggage checks almost sent him flying through the air, so swift was his
pace. He lost his way twice, but was set straight by unsuspecting
bluecoats.

At last he zigzagged his way through devious channels and into the
presence of a company's official, who informed him that Miss Ridge had
not gone aboard nor had she presented herself at the dock during the
evening. Hugh's jaw dropped and a sick, damp perspiration started on his
forehead.