"I supposed so," returned Louise, "and so I took pains not to interrupt you. I wish I could think a quarter as well as you do, dear. I don't feel as if I were the least use."
"Don't be silly, Lou," and Clara embraced her cousin affectionately; "if I could think as well as you imagine I do, we should be out of the difficulty in a day. What do you suppose I should do without you?"
Louise was profoundly convinced that Clara would do exactly as she had been doing all along, but she didn't say so. She would have sympathized acutely with Litizki's self-abasement had she known how earnestly he had striven to be of use, and how utterly he had seemed to fail.
They went first to the Park Square Station, Clara, as usual, deeply absorbed in studying the strange problems that confronted her. The impression she had received this morning that Poubalov might not have been associated directly with Ivan's taking off, grew upon her. How readily he had abandoned the suggestion of elopement! Abandon? he had ignored it utterly. Not once in her conversation with him had he put that forth as an explanation worthy of investigation. Could it have been his subtle purpose to interest her in a line of inquiry that should lead directly away from that? A shiver passed over her frame, and Louise inquired anxiously what was the matter?
"New theories keep occurring to me," responded Clara gravely, "and each one is a shock worse than the one that preceded it. Let me tell you this one. Suppose that Lizzie White," Clara spoke with difficulty, every word seemingly dragged forth by a violent effort, "suppose she were in some way Poubalov's agent; I will not, cannot think that Ivan went away with her, but might it not be possible that this remarkable man, who has such mastery over ordinary minds, had made her an accomplice? Don't you see the cleverness of the plan? If Ivan was forced to go to New York, Lizzie's departure for that city the same day is immediately assumed by everybody to mean that they eloped, and probably all in Boston who think of the matter at all, suppose that they have been married. Ivan may be a prisoner in New York, and Lizzie may be under Poubalov's pay, or influence, the latter more likely, to act, not as his jailer, but as a mask for his presence there.
"Poubalov has some object to attain in keeping him thus guarded, to torture some political secret from him, perhaps. Now what better could he do than divert suspicion in my mind from Lizzie to those whom he calls Nihilists, or even upon himself? He saw at first glance that I would not tolerate the thought of an elopement as among the possibilities, so he had no need to disarm me of suspicion in that direction. Has not everything he has done been done with a view to keeping me in Boston? What does he care how much poor Litizki dogs his steps, so long as the victim of his intrigue and villainy is hundreds of miles away? His one fear in Boston is that Billings, whom he hired to help in the abduction, may confess something. Therefore he tried to dog Billings' steps last night, and whether he succeeded I do not know."
Much of this was Greek to Louise, and she said so, adding: "What I do understand is that you feel now as if it would be necessary to go to New York."
"I think so. We will see."
"Clara," said Louise, "you will not think that I have suspected Ivan of faithlessness, I am sure; but it has seemed to me that unless he returned soon, you would have to go to Lizzie White. You cannot leave any possible explanation unsought. I could not conjecture that she and Poubalov might be concerned together as you have, but I did feel as if you ought to look her up."
"I am glad you think so," responded Clara, "for I was afraid you would oppose my going."