The palmist walked over to the fireplace, stood leaning against the mantel and kicked the fender meditatively, somewhat disturbed by Madam Spoll's presence. He had seen Miss Payson only twice, yet he had already come to the point where he was annoyed to hear her so cold-bloodedly discussed, and his own heartless notes quoted. Even less could he enjoy thinking of so fine and delicate a creature in the toils of Vixley and Spoll. No, she was for his own plucking. She was a quarry well worth his chase. To share his plans with such vulgar plotters seemed to cheapen the prize, to rub off the bloom of her beauty and charm. He would play a more exquisite, a more subtle game. It would not do, however, to break with the mediums. They were still useful to him, in spite of his assertion of independence. They knew, besides, altogether too much about him for him to dare to kindle their resentment.
If Madam Spoll had noticed his detachment she did not show it. She herself had, evidently, been thinking something over, and now she interrupted his meditation.
"Say, Frank, about that old Madam Grant, now—"
"She wasn't so old, was she?"
"How d'you know she wasn't?"
He covered his mistake as well as he could with: "Oh, I've heard she was a young woman, not more than thirty, when she died."
"Well, it's so far back, it seems as though she must have been old. You know I fished a little with what you give me about her and Payson; putting that together with what Lulu Ellis got, I believe I can work him. Funny you happened on that bit. Did the Payson girl tell you?"
"Oh, I got it—she let it out in a way. You know."
Madam Spoll chuckled. "Lord, they tell us more'n we ever tell them, don't they! But I was saying: I wish I could find out more about that little boy Madam Grant used to keep. I wonder was he her son, now?"
"I suppose you might find out something if you looked up the files of the Chronicle."