“Have you seen him?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“That he could not explain.”
“Then,” said his wife decisively, “it is some of Lena’s doings. About anything else—anything—he would have told you, Ellery.”
“Very likely, though it is hard to see how Mrs. Percival could be mixed up in affairs like this.”
Madeline was moving about restlessly.
“Ellery,” she said at last, “I feel as though you and I had to be a sort of pair of god-parents to Dick. He is so dear, so lovable, so fine—and so unable to go alone. You, particularly, dearest, are the stanchest thing he has. I know just how he feels about you, for I feel so, too. You are going to push behind him and understand him and back up all his resolves, aren’t you, even if he does half disappoint you? You aren’t going to let anything alienate you or come between your friendship and his, are you? I know you love him, and I’m sure he needs you.”
Ellery smiled down at her questioning eyes and the intoxicating appeal of her confidence in him—Madeline’s!
“I rather think I am Dick’s friend for all I’m worth,” he said slowly, at last. “Even if I were tempted to disloyalty, I should be ashamed to harbor it with your faithfulness standing before me. And I believe this very afternoon was a kind of crisis with him—that he was gathering himself together when I came away.”