He went into the sitting-room. "Giveen loose—clean got away." The words danced before him and sang in his ears, turned somersaults, and stood on their heads like a troop of tormenting gamins.
In the crisis of a complex and fantastic tragedy such as that of French's, the most galling thing is the inability to seize the whole situation and meet it philosophically. A bank smash which sweeps away one's fortune is a four-square disaster, seizable if stunning; but this business of Garryowen's was ungraspable, and unmeasureable, and unfightable as a nightmare. The horse was in apparent safety one moment, and the next in imminent danger. Fortune was quite close now, and holding out her hand; now she was at a distance, and her hand, fingers extended, was at her nose.
Yesterday the dreaded Giveen was safe in Ireland; to-day he was attending the village bazaar. Now Mr. Dashwood had him a safe prisoner down in the wilds of Essex, and now he had escaped. The fight for fortune had been a long one, vast obstacles had been overcome. Was it all to end at the last moment in disaster?
When Miss Grimshaw entered the room she found Mr. French seated at the table, with the open telegram before him, and at his side a glass of whisky and water and a decanter.
"Read that," said he.
She took the message and read it with a constriction at the heart.
"Well," said he, "what do you think of that?"
Miss Grimshaw, before answering, took the whisky decanter from the table and put it on the side table.
"Oh, you needn't be afraid of me," said French. "I'm too much at the end of my tether to care very much what happens. Faith, I wouldn't take the bother to get drunk."
"All the same," said the girl, "we must meet this with as cool a head as possible. 'Motoring down.'" (She was reading the message.) "Who does he mean, I wonder? Of course, he must mean himself, because he evidently does not know where Mr. Giveen is, or what he's doing. It was handed in at Regent Street this morning at 9.15; received here at 10.2. It is now nearly eleven."