And when Ruby and Pearl dined with her that night she realised that all her old zest in their society was gone. Ida Hook, at least, had “passed on.”
IV
IT was on the morning of this same day that Gregory sat alone in his cabin uncommonly idle, for he still spent the greater part of his time underground, when not away on business connected with his new investments and deals. For the last week he had not left the hill, and although he was on the alert to hear his geological acumen vindicated, he was in no mood to find pleasure in his mine. His conscience, an organ that troubled him little, was restive. In spite of his liberal disbursements, he knew that he had treated Ida unfairly. He had long since made up his mind to obliterate her from his personal life, and, if the truth must be told about a man who had snapped his fingers in the face of the most formidable combination of capital in the world, he was afraid to meet his wife. Vanity, he argued, in such women takes the place of warmth, and he had no mind to burden his memory and resource with an endless chain of subterfuges; nor had he any relish for the bald statement that since he could not have the woman he wanted he would have none; and that his mine, as complex and mysterious, as provocative of dreams, as capricious and satisfying as woman herself—to say nothing of hard work and increasing power—was to fill his life.
Ida might rage, stamp, scream, with her hands on her hips, her superb eyes flashing. Worse still, she might weep, lamenting that he loved her no longer—if he made her hurried friendly calls. Far, far worse, he might succumb to her beauty and superlative femaleness and hate himself ever after. His was to be a life of unremitting and constructive work; he must keep that blue flame burning on the altar in his sanctuary. If he never paused to draw it up into his consciousness he must know it was there.
Better stay away until she understood all that it was necessary she should know, wore out her pique in private, and accepted the situation. But he would have felt better this morning if he had heard that her train had arrived early in the evening. He might be ruthless, even where women were concerned, but he was also sensitive and capable of tenderness.
But he was not thinking of Ida alone. He was listening for the footsteps of Joshua Mann, and in a few moments he heard them, as well as the angry growl of his foreman’s voice. Mann entered without ceremony.
“I’ve been looking for you, sir. We’ve the devil’s own luck again——”
“Apex struck the Primo vein?”
“No, and won’t for fifty feet yet. But—well—I hate to say it—we’ve lost our vein—cut off as short as if it had been sawed. Of course, it’s faulted, and God only knows where its dropped to—or how far. A prettier shoot of ore was never uncovered. What’s worrying me is that—oh, hell!—just suppose that’s what Amalgamated is sinking on. My head’s going round. Can I have something?”
Gregory waved his hand toward the cupboard where his visitors found refreshment. When Mann had braced himself, his employer tapped a large sheet of paper that lay on the table.