and waited.

"I, naturally, don't ask you to violate any confidence," she went on,
"but I fancy you may tell me this: was the particular business in which
Geoffrey was engaged, when I saw him in Annapolis, a success or a
failure?"

"Why do you ask!" Macloud said. "Did he tell you anything concerning
it?"

"Only that his return to Northumberland would depend very much on the
outcome."

"But nothing as to its character?"

"No," she answered.

"Well, it wasn't a success; in fact, it was a complete failure."

"And where is Geoffrey, now?" she asked.

"I do not know," he replied.

She laughed lightly. "I do not mean, where is he this minute, but where
is he in general--where would you address a wire, or a letter, and know
that it would be received?"

He threw his cigarette into the grate and lit another.

"I am not at liberty to tell," he said.

"Then, it is true--he is concealing himself."

"Not exactly--he is not proclaiming himself----"

"Not proclaiming himself or his whereabouts to his Northumberland
friends, you mean?"

"Friends!" said Macloud. "Are there such things as friends, when one
has been unfortunate?"

"I can answer only for myself," she replied earnestly.

"I believe you, Elaine----"

"Then tell me this--is he in this country or abroad?"

"In this country," he said, after a pause.

"Is he in want,--I mean, in want for the things he has been used to?"

"He is not in want, I can assure you!--and much that he was used to
having, he has no use for, now. Our wants are relative, you know."

"Why did he leave Northumberland so suddenly?" she asked.

"To reduce expenses. He was forced to give up the old life, so he chose
wisely, I think--to go where his income was sufficient for his needs."

"But _is_ it sufficient?" she demanded.

"He says it is."

She was silent for a while, staring into the blaze. He did not
interrupt--thinking it wise to let her own thoughts shape the way.

"You will not tell me where he is?" she said suddenly, bending her blue
eyes hard upon his face.

"I may not, Elaine. I ought not to have told you he was not abroad."

"This business which you and he were on, in Annapolis--it failed, you
say?"

He nodded.

"And is there no chance that it may succeed, some time?"

"He has abandoned it."

"But may not conditions change--something happen----" she began.

"It is the sort that does not happen. In this case, abandonment spells
finis."

"Did he know, wh