“Yes. What do we do then?”
“I’ll tell you when we come to it.” But when that stage of his invention was reached, and Laura had placed the inscribed sheets in his hand, his interest had waned, it appeared. Also, his condition had improved.
“Let’s quit. I thought this game would be more exciting,” he said, sitting up. “I guess,” he added with too much modesty, “I’m not very good at inventing games. I b’lieve I’ll go out to the barn; I think the fresh air——”
“Do you feel well enough to go out?” she asked. “You do seem to be all right, though.”
“Yes, I’m a lot better, I think.” He limped to the door. “The fresh air will be the best thing for me.”
She did not notice that he carelessly retained her contributions to the game, and he reached his studio with them in his hand. Hedrick had entered the ‘teens and he was a reader: things in his head might have dismayed a Borgia.
No remotest glimpse entered that head of the enormity of what he did. To put an end to his punishing of Cora, and, to render him powerless against that habitual and natural enemy, Laura had revealed a horrible incident in his career—it had become a public scandal; he was the sport of fools; and it might be months before the thing was lived down. Now he had the means, as he believed, to even the score with both sisters at a stroke. To him it was turning a tremendous and properly scathing joke upon them. He did not hesitate.
* * *
That evening, as Richard Lindley sat at dinner with his mother, Joe Varden temporarily abandoned his attendance at the table to answer the front doorbell. Upon his return, he remarked:
“Messenger-boy mus’ been in big hurry. Wouldn’ wait till I git to door.”