The Guarded Heights Part 86

George became aware of an ugly and distorted intruder upon his happiness, yet Lambert was clearly right. Sylvia and Dalrymple, impulsively joined together, were nothing to each other, couldn't even resume their long friendship.

"Well?" George asked.

"Mother, Betty, and I talked it over with Sylvia," Lambert answered.

"You see, we've kept Father in ignorance so far. He's scarcely up to such a row. Mother will make him wise very gently only when it becomes necessary."

"But what did Sylvia say?" George demanded, bending toward Lambert, his meal forgotten.

"Sylvia," Lambert replied, spreading his hands helplessly, "would agree to nothing. In the first place, she wouldn't consent to Dolly's staying in the house even to save appearances. I don't know what's the matter with her. She worried us all. She wasn't hysterical exactly, but she cried a good deal, which is quite unusual for her, and she seemed--frightened. She wouldn't let any one go near her--even Mother. I couldn't understand that."

George stared at the fire, his hands clasped. When at last he spoke he scarcely heard his own voice:

"She will get a divorce--as soon as possible?"

Lambert emptied his gla.s.s and set it down.

"That's just it," he answered, gloomily. "She won't listen to anything of the sort."

George glanced up.

"What is there left for her to do?"

Lambert frowned.

"Something seems to have changed her wholly. She declares she'll never see Dolly again, and in the same breath talks about the church and a horror of divorce, and the necessity of her suffering for her mistake; and she wants to pay her debt to Dolly by giving him, instead of herself, all of her money--a few such pleasant inconsistencies. See here. Why didn't you run wild yesterday, or the day before?"

"Do you think," George asked, softly, "it would have been quite the same thing, would have had quite the same effect?"

"I wonder," Lambert mused.

George arose and stood with his back to the fire.

"And of course," he said, thoughtfully, "you or I can't tell just what the effect has been. See here, Lambert. I have to find that out. I must see her once, if only for five minutes."

He watched Lambert, who didn't answer at first.

"I'll not run wild again," he promised. "If she'd only agree--just five minutes' talk."

"I told you," Lambert said at last, "she wouldn't mention your name or let any one else; but, on the theory that you are really responsible for what's happened, I'd like you to see her. You might persuade her that a divorce is absolutely necessary, the only way out. You might get her to understand that she can't go through life tied to a man she'll never see, while people will talk many times more than if she took a train quietly west."

"If she'll see me," George said, "I'll try to make it plain to her."

"Betty has a scheme----" Lambert began, and wouldn't grow more explicit beyond saying, "Betty'll probably let you hear from her in the morning.

That's the reason I wanted you to know how things stand. I'm hurrying back now to our confused house."

George followed him to the door.

"Dalrymple--where is he?" he asked.

"Gone to his parents. He'll try to play the game for the present."

"At a price," George said.

Lambert nodded.

"Rather well-earned, too, on the whole," he answered, ironically.

XIX

George slept little that night. The fact that Lambert believed him responsible for the transformation in Sylvia was sufficiently exciting.

In Sylvia's manner her brother must have read something he had not quite expressed to George. And why wouldn't she mention him? Why couldn't she bear to have the others mention him? With his head bowed on his hands he sat before the desk, staring at the diminishing fire, and in this posture he fell at last asleep to be startled by Wandel who had not troubled to have himself announced. The fire was quite dead. In the bright daylight streaming into the room George saw that the little man held a newspaper in his hand.

"Is it a habit of great men not to go to bed?"

George stood up and stretched. He indicated the newspaper.

"You've come with the evil tidings?"

"About Sylvia and Dolly," Wandel began.

George yawned.

"I must bathe and become presentable, for this is another day."

"You've already seen it?" Wandel asked, a trifle puzzled.

"No, but what else should there be in the paper?"

Wandel stared for a moment, then carefully folded the paper and tossed it in the fireplace.

"Nothing much," he answered, lighting a cigarette, "except hold-ups, murders, new strikes, fresh battles among our brethren of the Near East--nothing of the slightest consequence. By by. Make yourself, great man, fresh and beautiful for the new day."

XX

George wondered why Wandel should have come at all, or, having come, why he should have left in that manner; and he was sorry he had answered as he had, for Wandel invariably knew a great deal, more than most people.

In this case he had probably come only to help, but in George's brain nothing could survive for long beyond hazards as to what the morning might develop. Betty was going to communicate with him, and she would naturally expect to find him at his office, so he hurried down town and waited, forcing himself to the necessary details of his work. For the first time the mechanics of making money seemed dreary and unprofitable.

Goodhue came in with a clearly designed lack of curiosity. Had his partner all along suspected the truth, or had Wandel been talking? For that matter, did Goodhue himself experience a sense of loss?

"Not so surprising, George. Dolly's always been after her--even back in the Princeton days, and she's played around with him since they were children; yet I was a little shocked. I never thought it would quite come off."

It was torture for George to listen, and he couldn't possibly talk about it, so he led Goodhue quite easily to the day's demands; but Blodgett appeared not long after with a drooping countenance. Why did they all have to come to him to discuss the unannounced wedding of Sylvia Planter?

"She ought to have done better," Blodgett disapproved funereally.