"And I did my best to make that match—I encouraged Blanchard all I could. I threw her at his head! I found them here at luncheon. He's been trying for years to get her to marry him. You don't think it's possible that she would do anything rash, do you?"
Granthope's heart sickened. "In what way? How?"
"She said—what was it—the last thing. She said that he had threatened to elope with her, and perhaps they mightn't come back for some time. I thought it was a joke, but now I think of it—"
Granthope sprang up. "What time did they go?" he asked.
"Just before you came—they took the one forty-five."
"We can't reach her by telephone—they're not there yet. What time does the next train go?"
Mr. Payson turned to an Argonaut and looked at the time-table on the last page. "Saturdays—four thirty-five," he said.
"I must go after her!" Granthope cried, almost desperate. "Don't you see—don't you know women well enough to understand what a state of mind she must be in, now? After our scene last night, the despair of it would drive her to almost anything reckless, anything to make her forget! It seemed wicked, monstrous, for us to meet again—it seemed irrevocable, final. If Cayley has been pursuing her, as you say, she may accept him in sheer desperation!"
"Go up there," said the old man. "Go up, and tell her everything. It is better for you to tell her. Cayley will resent your appearance, but don't mind that—get rid of him at any cost. You will have to manage him. If Clytie is in love with you, I'll stand by her in whatever she says. Don't think I'm a doting fool, Granthope, that I veer with the wind, this way. I wanted her to marry Cayley, because I thought she'd never know this, and he was a man of honor and intelligence. But I didn't know that Felicia's boy was alive."
Granthope left in a tumult of doubt. He knew little of Cayley, save that he was subtle and indefatigable with women—and that he was unscrupulous enough to have betrayed his friend to Vixley. But how far Clytie's revulsion of feeling would have carried her by this time, he dared not think. She was in a parlous state, and ripe for any extreme impulse.