Oswald answered both queries in a single sentence.
“Yes, I’ve heard of the accident—the clerk was just this minute telling me about it: and I haven’t seen David.”
Miss Virginia was plainly anxious and disturbed She hesitated for a moment, a little frown coming and going between the straight-browed eyes, and Oswald noted that she was nervously twisting a bit of paper between her fingers. “I must see David—at once,” she said, half as if she were thinking aloud. “May I ask you to go and tell him so, Herbert?”
Since Virginia had shown herself more than friendly in his own trying involvement, Oswald consented willingly.
“I’ll find him for you,” he promised; and a minute later he was on his way down to the construction yard.
It so happened that he had to go no farther than to the office bunk car. The door was open and he went in. David Vallory was sitting behind the small mapping-table, checking dimensions on a set of blue-prints. At the sound of Oswald’s footsteps he looked up with a scowl of impatience, and his greeting was a challenge.
“Oh, it’s you, is it? I’ve been thinking it was about time you were showing up. When do you start back to Middleboro?”
Oswald ignored the ungracious demand and said what he had been sent to say.
“Miss Virginia is at the hotel, and she wishes to see you.”
“What for?”