or was it an instinctive suspicion, or merely the explosion of
helpless temper and dislike?

The ride was brief, and the block in which Dalrymple lived was,
fortunately, at that moment free of pedestrians. Wandel descended and
rang the bell. When the door was opened George relaxed his grasp.
Dalrymple tried to spring from the opposite side of the cab. George
caught him, lifted him, carried him like a child across the sidewalk,
and set him down in the twilight of a hall where a flunky gaped.

"There's your precious friend," he accused Wandel.

He returned to the cab, rubbing his hands as if they needed cleansing.

"There's no one like you, great man," Wandel said when he had come back
to the cab. "You've done Dolly and everyone he would have seen to-night
a good turn."

But George felt he had done himself a bad one. During the rest of his
time at Princeton, and afterward in New York, he would have a dangerous
enemy. Dirty hands! Trust Dalrymple to do his best to give that
qualification its real meaning. And these people! You could trust them,
too, to stand by Dalrymple against the man who had done them a good
turn. It had been rotten of Wandel to ask it, to take him away at that
vital moment. Anyway, it was done. He forgot Dalrymple in his present
anxiety. The ride seemed endless. The ascent in the elevator was a
unique torture. The cloak-room attendants had an air of utter
indifference. When he could, George plunged into the ballroom, escaping
Wandel, threading the hurrying maze to the other end of the room where
earlier in the evening he had seen Sylvia's mother sitting with Mrs.
Alston. George passed close, every muscle taut. Mrs. Planter gave no
sign. Mrs. Alston reached over and tapped his arm with her fan. He
paused, holding his breath.

"Betty asked me to look for you," she said. "Where have you been? She
was afraid you had found her party tiresome. You haven't been dancing
much."

He answered her politely, and walked on. He braced himself against the
wall, the strain completely broken. She hadn't told. She hadn't demanded
that her mother take her home. She hadn't said: "Betty, what kind of men
do you ask to your dances?" Why hadn't she? Again he saw his big,
well-clothed figure in a glass, and he smiled. Was it because he was
already transformed?

Here she came, dancing with Goodhue, and Goodhue seemed trying to lead
her close. George didn't understand at first that he silently asked for
news of Dalrymp