"You—you've been telephoning," he said.
"Not yet," said Anthony, "but if you'll run along and do your share, I'll think up ways of helping you."
"My share?" Vining echoed.
Mentally, he was not more than half himself. Anthony Fry, therefore, grew very firm and very stern, pleasantly certain that Robert was paying no heed to his pallor or the uncontrollable shake that had come to his hands.
"If the girl has really disappeared," he said steadily, "your part is not to be sitting here and whining for help, Robert. Why don't you get out and hustle and see if you can't get track of her? Have you gone to all her friends?"
"Eh? No!"
"Then go now!" said Anthony Fry. "You know her girl friends? Get after the most intimate at first—and get about it!"
Here he scowled, and Robert Vining, rising, shook himself together.
"You're right, Anthony," he said. "I'm an ass; I've lost my head completely this last hour. I—I caught it from her father, I think; the man's going about like an infuriated bull, swearing to kill everybody in the world if Mary isn't returned and—but you're right, old chap. Thank you for steadying me." Robert concluded bravely. "Where's my hat? I've been wearing it all this time, eh? Good-by, Anthony. Good-by, Johnson."
He tried to smile at them—and he fled. This time it was Johnson Boller who turned weak at his going. Mr. Boller, smiling at his old friend in a sickly, greenish way, dropped into a chair and mopped his forehead.