“Shall we go to the train, Albert?” said Alice, as the party made ready to go.
“No,” said I, “unless you particularly wish it; we shall go home.”
“Mr. Barslow,” said one of the maids, “you are wanted at the telephone.”
“Is this you, Al?” said Jim’s voice over the wire. “I’m up here at Josie’s, and I am afraid there’s trouble with her father. When we got here we found him gone. Hadn’t you better go out and look around for him?”
“Have you any idea where I’m likely to find him?” I asked. I saw at once the significance of Bill’s absence. He had taken advantage of the fact of his wife and daughter’s going to the wedding, and had yielded to the thing which drew him away from them.
“Try the Club, and then O’Brien’s,” answered Jim. “If you don’t find him in one place or the other, call me up over the ’phone. Call me up anyhow; I’ll wait here.”
The Times man heard my end of the conversation, saw me hastily give Alice word as to the errand which kept me from going home with her, observed my preparations for leaving the company, and, scenting news, fell in with me as I was walking toward the Club.
“Any story in this, Mr. Barslow?” he asked.
“Oh, is that you, Watson?” I answered. “I was going on an errand which concerns myself. I was going alone.”
“If you’re looking for any one,” he said, trotting along beside me, “I can find him a good deal quicker than you can, probably. And if there’s news in it, I’ll get it anyhow; and I’ll naturally know it more from your standpoint, and look at it more as you do, if we go together. Don’t you think so?”