e ready if the time ever
came. He must forge ahead in the next six months, and be in a position by
the time Eleanor had tried out her experiment to put his fate to the
test. He must make up to old Bangs, and stop criticizing his methods and
saying things that annoyed him. He must sacrifice everything now to the
one great object of pleasing him. Pleasing him meant advancement;
advancement meant success; success might mean Eleanor!

He got up restlessly and tiptoed to the door. The light over Rose's
transom was gone and the house was silent.

CHAPTER 27

Eleanor did not leave for New York the following day. Neither did she see
Harold Phipps when he arrived on the morning train. His anxious inquiries
over the telephone were met by Rose's cool assurance that Miss Bartlett
was spending the week-end with her, and that she would write and explain
her silly telegram. His demand for an immediate interview was parried
with the excuse that Miss Bartlett was confined to her bed with a severe
headache and could not see any one. Without saying so directly, Rose
managed to convey the impression that Miss Bartlett was quite indifferent
to his presence in the city and not at all sure that she would be able to
see him at all.

This was an interpretation of the situation decidedly more liberal than
the facts warranted. Even after Eleanor had been served with the
unpalatable truth, generously garnished with unpleasant gossip, she still
clung to her belief in Harold and the conviction that he would be able to
explain everything when she saw him. Quin's report of Madam's offer to
send her to New York was received in noncommittal silence. She would
agree to nothing, she declared, until she saw Harold, her only concession
being that she would stay in bed until the afternoon and not see him
before evening.

About noon a messenger-boy brought her a box of flowers and a bulky
letter. The latter had evidently been written immediately after Harold's
talk with Rose, and he made the fatal mistake of concluding, from her
remarks, that Eleanor had changed her mind after sending the telegram and
had not come to Chicago. He therefore gave free rein to his imagination,
describing in burning rhetoric how he had received her message Saturday
night just as he was retiring, how he tossed impatiently on his bed all
night, and rose at dawn to be at the station when the train came in. He
pictured vividly his ecstasy of