The Road to Understanding Part 26

"Yes. First, he said, he kept his own counsel--here in town. He knew we'd want to avoid all gossip and publicity."

"Of course!"

"He put the thing into the hands of a private detective whom he could trust; and he went himself to Wenton--for a vacation, apparently."

"Good old Brett! Wise, as usual. What did he find?"

"Nothing--except that she was not there, and hadn't been there since she left some years ago, soon after her mother's death. He says he's positive of that. So he had to come back no wiser than he went."

"But--the detective."

"Very little there. Still, there was something. He traced her to Boston."

"_Boston!_"

"Yes."

"What friends has she in Boston?"

"None, so far as I know. I never heard her mention knowing a soul there.

Still, I believe she had a--a position there with some one, before she went to Aunt Eunice; but I don't know who it was."

"There's Gleason--she knows him."

Burke gave his father a glance from scornful eyes.

"My best friend! She'd be apt to go to him, wouldn't she, if she were running away from me? Besides, we've had three or four letters from him since we've been gone. Don't you suppose he'd tell us of it, if she'd gone to him?"

"Yes, yes, of course," frowned John Denby, biting his lips. "It's only that I was trying to get hold of some one--or something. Think of it--that child alone in Boston, and--no friends! Of course she had money--that is, I suppose she cashed it--that check?" John Denby turned with a start.

"Oh, yes. I asked Brett about that. I hoped maybe there'd be a clue there, if she got somebody to cash it for her. But there was nothing.

She got the money herself, at the bank here, not long after we went. So she must have come back for a time, anyway. Brett says Spawlding, at the bank, knew her, of course, and so there was no question as to identification. Still it was so large a one that he telephoned to Brett, before he paid it, asking if it were all right--you being away. Brett evidently knew you had given her such a check--"

"Yes, I had told him," nodded John Denby.

"So he said yes, it was. He says he supposed she had come down from Wenton to get it cashed, and that she would leave the bulk of it there in the bank to her credit. Anyway, all he could do was to a.s.sure Spawlding that you had given her such a check just before you went away."

"Yes, yes, I see," nodded John Denby again.

"She didn't leave any of the money, however. She took it all with her."

"Took it _all_--ten thousand dollars!"

"Yes. The detective, of course, is still working on the case. He got to Boston, but there he's up against a blank wall. He's run a fine-tooth comb through all sorts of public and private inst.i.tutions in Boston and vicinity without avail. He's made a thorough search at the railroad station. He can't find a person who has any recollection of a young woman and child answering their description, arriving on that date, who seemed to be troubled or in doubt where to go. He questioned the matron, ticket-men, cabbies, policemen--everybody. Of course every one had seen plenty of young women with babies in their arms--young women who had the hair and eyes and general appearance of Helen, and who were anxious and fretted. (They said young women with babies were apt to be anxious and fretted.) But they didn't remember one who asked frantic questions as to what to do, and where to go, and all that--acting as we think Helen would have acted, alone in a strange city."

"Poor child, poor child!" groaned John Denby. "Where can--"

But his son interrupted sternly.

"I don't _know_ where she is, of course. But don't be too sure it is 'poor child' with her, dad. She's doing this thing because she _wants_ to do it. Don't forget that. Didn't she purposely mislead us by that note she left on my chiffonier? She didn't say she _had_ gone to Wenton, but she let me think she had. 'Address me at Wenton, if you care to write,' she said. And don't forget that she also said: 'I hope you'll enjoy your playday as much as I shall mine.' Don't you worry about Helen. She's taken my child and your ten thousand dollars, and she's off somewhere, having a good time;--and Helen could have a good time--on ten thousand dollars! Incidentally she's also punishing us. She means to give us a good scare. She's waiting till we get home, and till the money's gone. Then she'll let herself be found."

"Oh, come, come, Burke, aren't you just a little bit--harsh?"

remonstrated John Denby.

"I don't think so. She deserves--something for taking that child away like this. Honestly, as my temper is now, if it wasn't for the baby, I should feel almost like saying that I hoped she wouldn't ever come back.

I don't want to see her. But, of course, with the baby, that's another matter."

"I should say so!" exclaimed John Denby emphatically.

"Yes; but, see here, dad! Helen knew where she was going. She's gone to friends. Wouldn't she have left some trace in that station if she'd been frightened and uncertain where to go? Brett says the detective found one cabby who remembered taking just such a young woman and child from an evening train at about that time. He didn't recollect where he took her, and he couldn't say as to whether she had been crying, or not; but he's positive she directed him where to go without a moment's hesitation. If that was Helen, she knew where she was going all right."

John Denby frowned and did not answer. His eyes were troubled.

"But perhaps here--at the flat--" he began, after a time.

"The detective tried that. He went as a student, or something, and managed to hire a room of Mrs. Cobb. He became very friendly and chatty, and showed interest in all the neighbors, not forgetting the vacant flat on the same floor. But he didn't learn--much."

"But he learned--something?"

An angry red mounted to Burke's forehead.

"Oh, yes; he learned that it belonged to a poor little woman whose husband was as rich as mud, but quite the meanest thing alive, in that he'd tried to buy her off with ten thousand dollars, because he was ashamed of her! Just about what I should think would come from a woman of Mrs. Cobb's mentality!"

"Then she knew about the ten-thousand-dollar check?"

"Apparently. But she didn't know Helen had gone to Boston. The detective found out that. She told him she believed she'd gone back home to her folks. So Helen evidently did not confide in her--or perhaps she intentionally misled her, as she did us."

"I see, I see," sighed John Denby.

For a minute the angry, perplexed, baffled young husband marched back and forth, back and forth, in the great, silent room. Then, abruptly, he stopped short, and faced his father.

"I shall try to find her, of course,--though I think she'll let us hear from her of her own accord, pretty soon, now. But I shan't wait for that. First I shall go to Aunt Eunice and see if she knows the names of any of the people with whom Helen used to live, before she came to her.

Then, whatever clues I find I shall endeavor to follow to the end.

Meanwhile, so far as Dalton is concerned,--_my wife is out of town_.

That's all. It's no one's business. The matter will be hauled over every dinner-table and rolled under the tongue of every old tabby in town. But they can only surmise and suspect. They can't know anything about it.

And we'll be mighty careful that they don't. Brett--bless him!--has been the soul of discretion. We'll see that we follow suit. _My wife is out of town!_ That's all!" And he turned and flung himself from the room.

As soon as possible Burke Denby went to his Aunt Eunice and told her his sorry tale. From her he obtained one or two names, and--what he eagerly grasped at--an address in Boston. Each of these clues he followed a.s.siduously, only to find that it led nowhere. Angrier, but no wiser, he went back home.

The detective, too, reported no progress. And as the days became weeks, and the weeks a month, with no word of Helen, Burke settled into a bitterness of wrath and resentment that would not brook the mention of Helen's name in his presence.

Burke was feeling very much abused these days. He was, indeed, thinking of himself and pitying himself almost constantly. The woman to whom he had given his name (and for whom he had sacrificed so much) had made that name a byword and a laughing stock in his native town. He was neither bachelor nor husband. He was not even a widower, but a nondescript thing to be pointed out as a sort of monster. Even his child was taken away from him; and was doubtless being brought up to hate him--Burke forgot that Dorothy Elizabeth was as yet but slightly over two years old.

As for Helen's side of the matter--Burke was too busy polishing his own shield of defense to give any consideration to hers. When he thought of his wife, it was usually only to say bitterly to himself: "Humph! When that ten thousand dollars is gone we'll hear from her all right!" And he was not worrying at all about her comfort--with ten thousand dollars to spend.

"She knows where _she_ is, and she knows where _I_ am," he would declare fiercely to himself. "When she gets good and ready she'll come--and not until then, evidently!"

In March a line from Dr. Gleason said that he would be in town a day or two, and would drop in to see them.