Carr said, “Oh, I beg pardon,” and stepped aside, but Jeannette’s thoughts followed him.
“What is it, Doc?”
“Martin had better go home, Mrs. Devlin. He’s been downstairs at the bar, and I guess he’s had a bit too much. I was going to take him home myself but I didn’t know how to get into your house.”
“Martin?”
“He’s been downstairs at the bar, and I’m afraid the fellows there wouldn’t let him get away.”
“Martin?”
Reality came blindingly upon her with a glare of hideous white light. Her dream shattered. Ugliness obtruded,—things naked and angular, harshness and cold cruelty! She felt as if she were being jerked from enchanted slumber by a rude and horrid hand.
She clutched at her heart as if to tear out the pain that had already stabbed her there.
“Martin!” she breathed again, gasping a little, the blood draining from her face.
“He’s all right, Mrs. Devlin,—quite all right, I assure you. Nothing’s happened to him—nothing wrong. There’s been no accident.”