"I feel it!" laughed the other, but again that undernote of grimness rang in his tone. "It's done me a lot of good, this little talk with you, Win. You'll never realize just how you've bucked me up."
Winnie puzzled over the significance of the last remark after he had dropped his friend at the Park entrance and turned north again. Could the stab in the back to which Thode referred have come from Starr Wiley, and had their conversation given Thode a clue to a way of striking back at his enemy? Not through Willa and the lost inheritance, of course; that was a bona-fide discovery, even if Wiley had been the instrument in bringing it to light. However, the fact that Wiley had stumbled upon the documents while in Arizona might have given Thode a lead on some ulterior project out there in which Wiley was trying to cut the ground out from under his feet.
In going over their conversation in retrospect, an idea came which Winnie determined impulsively to act upon. Willa's car had been removed from the garage to which he had traced it, but that did not necessarily mean that it had been taken to another. What if she had sold the car, in preparation for a return to Mexico? He felt that she must not go before he had seen her. Heretofore he had not, as he said, intruded upon her retreat, but he could not bear the thought of her departure without at least her knowing what he had to tell her.
He would go to her now, without giving her an opportunity to refuse to see him! She might be angry, and Willa's anger was something to be reckoned with, but he would make her hear him out!
Darkness had already fallen as he drew up before the neat little house with its twin front doors. He rang the bell of the one to the right and when the tall pleasant-faced woman appeared in answer to his summons, he asked without hesitation for Miss Abercrombie.
The woman eyed him somewhat doubtfully, but ushered him into a tiny immaculate parlor.
"Please, tell her it is Mr. Winthrop North. I haven't a card with me, but be sure about the first name. Say that I have an important message for her and no one knows that I have come."
"Yes, Sir." The woman hesitated. "I'm thinking you've made a mistake and got hold of the wrong Miss Abercrombie, but I'll find out."
In a moment, however, there was a rustle of silk on the narrow stairs and Willa entered. Her eyes sought his in a defensive, questioning stare as she held out her hand.
"Your visit is a surprise, Winnie. I thought—I was not aware that any of my friends knew where I was."