“Give me until to-morrow this time to locate him and find whether I am right or wrong, John,” asked Jerry Gaines. “This is a matter into which no man can rush headlong. I will find out beyond a doubt if my suspicions be true. If they are, you shall be put on his track, and when you meet him, you shall deal with him as you see best. Is that satisfactory?”
“I suppose it must be, if you say so,” replied John Dinsmore, sinking back into his chair, his face ghastly pale, every nerve in his entire body quivering with the deep agitation he was undergoing.
His two friends prevailed upon him to remain in New York a week at least, pending their investigation, and to go to the old humble room which he used to share with them in the days when money was at a premium with him.
The next morning his two tried and true friends parted early from him, arranging to meet him at the same hour, and at the same restaurant, suggesting that they might have something of importance to communicate.
To John Dinsmore it seemed as though six o’clock, the hour appointed, would never come; he spent the time in walking up and down the streets, vainly searching for Jess, even in the face of the fact that her letter had said that she intended going far away from the metropolis.
Never before had he realized how intensely he loved little Jess, and what a blank his life would be without her.
And then and there it occurred to him how utterly devoid of good judgment he must have been in those days to allow himself to be carried away with so shallow and utterly false and heartless a creature as Queenie Trevalyn, whom he now abhorred, and whom he knew as she really was—at last.
He said to himself that sometimes God blesses us in denying us that which we believe our greatest good, but which would only have turned out to be our greatest misfortune.
All that day the two friends, spurred on by John Dinsmore’s recital, worked zealously over the plan which they had mapped out for themselves to discover the whereabouts of Jess, the fair young bride.
On the occasion of their former visit to the house of the old miser’s widow, the young artist had made quite a favorable impression upon one of the maids of the household; they decided to make use of that state of affairs now. And under pretext that the paper wanted another statement of the facts, they again presented themselves at the home of young Mrs. Brown.