This plunge sent Larry to the wall. When a slow man does make a drive, he does deadly work.
“Well, then”––Larry looked sullen––“I’ve left the house and mean to stay out until Mary-Clare comes to her senses!”
“All right, old man. I rather smelled this out. I only wanted to make sure. It’s this Northrup, eh? Now, Rivers, I could send you off on a trip but it would be the same old story. I hate to kick you when you’re down, but I will say this, your wife doesn’t look like one mourning without hope when you’re away, and with this Northrup chap on the spot, needing entertainment while he works his game, I’m thinking you better stay right where you are! You can, maybe, untie the knot, old chap. Give her and this Northrup all the chance they want, and if you leave ’em alone, I guess the Forest will smoke ’em out.”
Maclin came nearer to being jubilant than Rivers had ever seen him. The sight was heartening, but still something in Larry tempered his enthusiasm. He had been able, in the past, to exclude Mary-Clare from the inner sanctuary of Maclin’s private ideals, and he hated now to betray her into his clutches. Maclin was devilishly keen under that slow, sluggish manner of his and he hastened, now, to say:
“Don’t get a wrong slant on me, old man. I’m only aiming for the good of us all, not the undoing. I want to show this fellow Northrup up to your wife as well as to others. Then she’ll know her friends from her foes. Naturally a woman feels flattered by attentions from a man like this stranger, but if she sees how he’s taken the Heathcotes in and how he’s used her while he was boring underground, she’ll flare up and know the meaning of real friends. Some women have to be shown!”
By this time Larry suspected that much had gone on during his absence that Maclin had not confided to him. He was thoroughly aroused.
“Now see here, Rivers!” Maclin drew his chair closer and laid his hand on Larry’s arm––he gloated over the trouble in the eyes holding his with dumb questioning. “It’s coming 92 out all right. We’re in early and we’ve got the best seats––only keep them guessing; guessing! Larry, your wife goes––down to the Point a lot––goes missionarying, you know. Well, this Northrup is tramping around in the woods skirting the Point.”
Just here Larry started and looked as if something definite had come to him. Had he not seen Northrup that very day in the woods?
“Now there’s an empty shack on the Point, Rivers––some old squatter has died. I want you to get that shack somehow or another. It ought to be easy, since they say your wife owns the place; it’s your business to get it and then watch out and keep your mouth shut. You’ve got to live somewhere while you can’t live decent at home. ’Tisn’t likely your wife, having slammed the door of her home on you, will oust you from that hovel on the Point––your being there will work both ways––she won’t dare to take a step.”
Larry drew a sigh, a heavy one, and began to understand. He saw more than Maclin could see.