He broke off suddenly, and the next instant the two men started to their feet as the hoot of a motor-horn sounded loudly outside the house.
"God, Herrick—here's Toni." Owen dashed out of the room followed by Herrick, and the two reached the front door at the same moment.
Andrews, who had come running from the kitchen regions at the sound of the horn, flung open the door, and disclosed the big car with its flaring head-lamps, throbbing itself to a standstill at the foot of the steps.
A young man jumped out—a man whom neither Rose nor Herrick had ever seen before—and, rushing up the steps, looked wildly round him.
"Where is she?" he demanded loudly. "Where is she?"
"To whom do you allude?" asked Owen coldly, his fastidious soul revolted by the spectacle which the young man presented. Dowson was hatless, dishevelled. In his agony of mind at Toni's departure he had torn his collar apart, feeling himself choking, and during the drive to Greenriver he had rumpled his hair so wildly that it stood up in mad disorder over his head. His face was dusty, the mist had soaked his clothes till they clung tightly to his narrow frame, and about his whole figure there was an air of unkempt desolation which was unattractive in the extreme.
"I allude to Toni—your wife, if you like to call her that." The unfortunate young man was distraught between disappointment and anxiety. "Where is she? Has she come home after all?"
"My wife?" Owen raised his eyebrows superciliously. "My good man, what are you talking about? If you know anything about Mrs. Rose be kind enough to tell us at once what it is, but please remember she is not Toni—to you."
"Oh, isn't she?" Beneath the weight of conflicting emotions Mr. Dowson was losing his head. "Well, she was going to be, that's all. She came away with me to-night of her own free will ... and we wore going to cross to Paris, and then ... oh, I don't know what then, but anyway she was going to stay with me, and when you had divorced her——"
"Divorced her?" Owen uttered the words in so ferocious a tone that the young man fell back a pace. "What the devil do you mean by making a suggestion of that sort? And why in God's name should I divorce my wife—for you?"