as contemplating
taking Anna's place at the lodge, and he comprehended after a moment
that Anna was already gone. Even then the significance of the situation
was a little time in dawning on him. When it did, however, he rose with
a stifled oath.

Mrs. Boyer was speaking.

"It is exactly as I tell you," she was saying. "If Peter Byrne is trying
to protect her reputation he is late doing it. Personally I have been
there twice. I never saw Anna Gates. And she is registered here at the
club as living in the Pension Schwarz. Whatever the facts may be, one
thing remains, she is not there now."

McLean waited to hear no more. He was beside himself with rage. He found
a "comfortable" at the curb. The driver was asleep inside the carriage.
McLean dragged him out by the shoulder and shouted an address to him.
The cab bumped along over the rough streets to an accompaniment of
protests from its frantic passenger.

The boy was white-lipped with wrath and fear. Peter's silence that
afternoon as to the state of affairs loomed large and significant. He
had thought once or twice that Peter was in love with Harmony; he knew
it now in the clearer vision of the moment. He recalled things that
maddened him: the dozen intimacies of the little menage, the caress
in Peter's voice when he spoke to the girl, Peter's steady eyes in the
semi-gloom of the salon while Harmony played.

At a corner they must pause for the inevitable regiment. McLean cursed,
bending out to see how long the delay would be. Peter had been gone for
half an hour, perhaps, but Peter would walk. If he could only see the
girl first, talk to her, tell her what she would be doing by remaining--

He was there at last, flinging across the courtyard like a madman. Peter
was already there; his footprints were fresh in the slush of the path.
The house door was closed but not locked. McLean ran up the stairs. It
was barely twilight outside, but the staircase well was dark. At the
upper landing he was compelled to fumble for the bell.

Peter admitted him. The corridor was unlighted, but from the salon came
a glow of lamplight. McLean, out of breath and furious, faced Peter.

"I want to see Harmony," he said without preface.

Peter eyed him. He knew what had happened, had expected it when the bell
rang, had anticipated it when Harmony told him of Mrs. Boyer's visit. In
the second between the peal of the bell and his opening the door he had
decided what to do.

"Come in."