“No, thank you,” replied Lexy.
Miss Craigie went out, closing the door[Pg 322] softly behind her. Lexy took off Caroline’s hat and coat and laid them on the bed.
“I wonder if I’ll ever see her wearing them again!” she thought.
For a long time she stood motionless, looking down at the things that Caroline had worn. Most pitifully eloquent, they seemed to her—the hat that had covered Caroline’s fair hair, the coat that had fitted her slender shoulders. Lexy looked and looked, grave and sorrowful—and in that moment her resolution was made.
“I’m going to find her!” she said, half aloud. “I don’t care what any one else does or what any one else thinks. I know she’s in trouble of some sort, and I’m going to find her!”
The last trace of what Lexy had called “mawkish self-pity” had vanished now. She was no longer concerned with Mrs. Enderby’s attitude toward herself. It didn’t matter. Finding another job didn’t matter, either. She had a little money due her, and she meant to use it—every penny of it—in finding Caroline.
She washed her hands and face, brushed her hair, put on her own hat and jacket, and went downstairs again. Mrs. Enderby was standing in the tiny hall, and from the sitting room there came a sound of muffled sobbing.
“She is an imbecile, that woman!” said Mrs. Enderby, with a sigh; “but she will hold her tongue. And you?”
“I’ve got to do as I think best,” answered Lexy. “I’ll say good-by now, Mrs. Enderby.”
“There is no train until three o’clock. It is now after one. We shall have lunch directly.”