Esther went slowly down stairs and out into the garden. Callandar was coming up the path from the gate. He walked slowly. When they met, he no longer avoided her glance.
"Well?" She had no need to ask. Yet she did ask, falteringly.
"We have failed," he said briefly.
The quiet hopelessness of his voice left no room for argument. Esther opened her lips to protest, but found nothing to say.
"She has outwitted us," he went on. "How? who can say? They have the cunning of the devil! There is only one thing to do now. Only one way—"
"You mean?—"
"The wedding must take place at once. I suppose the farce is really necessary. But there must be no more delay. Only the unsparing use of a husband's authority can save her now. I shall take her away. I must be with her day and night. In France there is a place I know, beautiful, isolated. I shall take her there. If all else fails there is the treatment of hypnotic suggestion. But—I shall not fail, I dare not!"
Blindly she put out her hand—he clasped it gently—yet not as if he knew whose hand it was. Then, laying it aside, he passed by, and, leaving her sobbing in the dusk, went on into the house and up the stairs to the closed room.
CHAPTER XXXII
It became quickly known in Coombe that, owing to Mrs. Coombe's delicate health, the wedding would take place much sooner than had been expected. A sea voyage, it was conceded, was the necessary thing and as Dr. Callandar would not allow his fiancée to go away alone it seemed only fair that he should make haste to go with her. Comment on all these points was much more restrained than usual because, just at this time, Coombe withstood the shock of finding out that Dr. Callandar was no less than Dr. Henry Chedridge Callandar of Montreal. No, not his brother, nor his cousin, but the man himself!