"I must wish you good-bye, here," said Roger to the interviewer. "Mind your coat. It's caught in the door. Mind you thank your editor." The cab snorted off, honking. The interviewer gazed after it. "H'm," he said, with that little cynical nod with which the unintelligent express comprehension. "So that's the new drama, is it?"
The car reached Trafalgar Square without being stopped by the traffic. St. Martin's clock stood at a few minutes to ten. Roger was in the dismal mood of one who, having given up hope, is yet not certain. He dropped Pollock at the Gallery, and then sped on, through Leicester Square, up a little street full of restaurants and French book shops. The car was stopped by traffic at the end of this street. Roger leapt out, paid the man hurriedly, and ran into the Avenue. Within thirty seconds, he was running up four flights of stairs to the door on which he had knocked in his vision.
He peered through the glass in the door. As in his dream, something lay in the passage beyond, some glove or handkerchief or crumpled letter, with a shaft of sunlight upon it from an open door. No one came to open to him; but Roger, knocking there, was conscious of the presence of Ottalie by him and in him; he felt her brushing past him, a rustling, breathing beauty, wearing a great hat, and those old pearl earrings which trembled when she turned her head. But no Ottalie came to the door, no Agatha, no old Mrs. Hicks the caretaker. The flat was empty. After a couple of minutes of knocking, an old, untidy, red-faced woman came out from the flat beneath, gasping for breath, with her hand against her side.
"No use your knockin'," she said crustily. "They're gawn awy. They i'n't 'ere. They're gawn awy."
"When did they go?" asked Roger, filled suddenly with leaping fire.
"They're gawn awy," repeated the old woman. "No use your knockin'. They're gawn awy." She gasped for a moment, eyeing Roger with suspicion and dislike; then turned to her home with the slow, uncertain, fumbling movements of one whose heart is affected.
Roger was left alone on the stairs, aware that he had come too late.
The stairs were covered with a layer of sheet-lead. When the old woman had shut her door, Roger grovelled down upon them, lighting match after match, in the hope of finding footmarks which might tell him more. Agatha had rather long feet, Ottalie's were small, but very well proportioned. Mrs. Hicks's feet were disguised by the boots she wore. A scrap of brown linoleum on the stair-head bore evident marks of a man's hobnail boots which had waited there, perhaps for an answer. There were other, non-committal marks, which might have been made by anybody. On the whole, Roger fancied that a woman had made them, when going out, with dry shoes, that morning. The problem now was, had she left London for Ireland or for the Continent? With some misgivings, he decided against Ireland. On former occasions she had always made her stay in London after her visit to the Continent. If she had been staying in London for more than one night, she would have written to him; he would have seen her. As she had not written to him, she was plainly going abroad, probably for a month or six weeks, after resting for one night on the way. He would not see her till the middle of the summer. That she had been in town, for at least one night, was plain from what the woman had said. The thought that only a few hours ago she had passed where he stood, came home to him like her touch upon him. He sat down upon the stair-head till his disappointment was mastered.
He took a last look through the door-glass at the crumpled thing, glove, letter, or handkerchief, lying in the passage. Then he went out into the avenue. The disappointment was very bitter to him. It was so strong an emphasis upon the prophetic quality of his dream. Ottalie had been there, waiting for him. He had come there too late. He had missed her. The thought that he had missed her, suggested the cause. He would have to go back to Pollock. He could not leave his friend alone in that wild state of mind. A smaller man would perhaps have felt resentment against the cause. Roger was without that littleness. He saw only the tragic irony. He saw life being played upon a great plan. He felt himself to be a fine piece set aside from his own combination by one greater, stronger, more wonderful. It seemed very wonderful that he had been kept (so unexpectedly) from Ottalie, by the one thing in the world strong enough so to keep him. Nothing but a matter of life and death could have kept him from her.
A lively desire sprang up in him to know whither she had gone. This (he thought) he could find out, without difficulty, from a Bradshaw. If she were going to Greece, she would go by one of two ways. For a few minutes he had the hope that she might not yet have left London, that he might catch her at the station. A Bradshaw showed him that this was possible, since, going by one route, she would not have to start till after seven in the evening. But, if she had chosen that route, why should she have closed the flat so early? He saw no answer to the question. Still, the uncertainty preyed upon him and flattered him at the same time. She might be there at seven. He would go to the station, in any case. Would it were seven! He had nine hours to live through.