He turned and walked toward the door, the elder Whitney's conciliatory phrases delivered to his back. The door knob in his hand he wheeled round, the anger he had been struggling to subdue fierce in his face:
"Don't think for a moment you've fooled me. I was ignorant when I came in here, but I'm on to the whole dirty business now. I see through this pussy-footing round the divorce. It's the Janneys—the blow in the back I might have known was coming. They've got my child, set you on to wheedle her out of me. But that wasn't enough—they're going to try and finish the good work—put me out of business so there's no more trouble coming from me. Brand me as a thief—that's their game, is it? Well—they've gone too far. I've held my hand up to this but now I'll let loose. They'll see! By God, they'll see that I can hit back blow for blow."
[CHAPTER XV—WHAT HAPPENED ON FRIDAY]
The Friday morning when Suzanne was to go to town broke auspiciously bright and cloudless. As Annie was not the proper person to take Bébita to the oculist, and as Suzanne would be too busy to go herself, Miss Maitland had been impressed into the service. It had been decided two days earlier, and though she had received some instructions at the time, on the drive in, Mrs. Price went over her plans with a meticulous thoroughness. They would go first to the Fifth Avenue house, pick up there some clothes of Bébita's needing alteration, and then separate. Esther would take a cab from the rank on the side street, and go with Bébita to the oculist, to the dressmaker with the clothes, and execute several minor commissions in shops along the Avenue. Bébita begged for a box of caramels from Justin's, the French confectioner, a request which was graciously acceded to by her mother, Miss Maitland jotting it down on her list. Mrs. Price would take the motor and go about her own affairs, which would occupy probably an hour. She would then return to the house and wait for them—for she would have finished before they did—and afterward they would go out to lunch somewhere. She said she thought it would be fully an hour and a half before they got back and Miss Maitland, eyeing the long list, said it might be even longer.
Aggie McGee had the clothes tied up in a box and Suzanne and Bébita stood on the steps waiting while Miss Maitland went for the cab. The rank was just round the corner and in a few minutes she came back with a taxi running along the curb behind her.
"Quite a piece of luck to find one," she said, as she took the box. "They're not always there in the dead season."
Bébita jumped in, settling herself with joyful prancings and waving a little white-gloved hand. Esther followed, snapped the door shut, and they glided away. Suzanne watched them go, then stepped into the big motor and was swept off in the opposite direction.
She came back before the hour was up. She had hurried as she wanted to have done with Larkin before they returned. It would be extremely uncomfortable if they found her in confab with the detective; it would necessitate boring explanations and the inventing of lies.
She sat down in the reception room close to the window, pulled up the blind and waited. Drawn back from the eyes of passers-by she could command the sidewalk and the street for some distance and if, by any evil chance, Larkin should be late, she could see him coming and tell Aggie McGee to say she was not there.
Up to now Larkin had been punctual to the dot, but on this, the one occasion when punctuality was vital, he was not on time. Twelve passed, then the quarter, and the sun-swept length of the great avenue gave up no masculine figure that bore any resemblance to him. She was growing nervous, wondering what she had better do, when he hove in sight walking quickly toward the house. A glance at her wrist watch told her it was twenty minutes past twelve—Miss Maitland and Bébita might not be back for another half hour yet. She would chance it, for she was extremely anxious to see him, and anyway, if they should come in before he left, she could tell him to go into the drawing room and slip out after they had gone. Relieved by the decision she rose and was turning toward the mirror, when she caught sight of a taxi scudding up the street with Esther Maitland's face in the window.