“I’m sure I’m glad you called,” returned Mary.
“Then we’ll have a little visit—yes?” He slipped off his overcoat. “Mr. Clifford, I know Mrs. Grayson would be glad to have you remain as our chaperone. Mr. Loveman”—with the faintest of ironic smiles—“I know I would not have a ghost of a chance with such a famous lady’s man in the company, so I am going to have the audacity to ask you to call again.”
He had spoken with lightness, but there had been autocratic demand behind his words. Loveman disappeared into the room whence Clifford had seen him emerge, and returned with hat and coat. He tried to speak an offhand good-bye—though Clifford read that his soul was agitated with acute uneasiness—and started out.
“I’ll be back in a moment,” Clifford said to the two, and followed the little lawyer. He caught him in the hallway and held him with a hand on either shoulder.
“Loveman,” said he, looking down into the round face, “I certainly was up in the air for a time. But I’ve sized up the whole situation now.”
“What situation?”
“The situation between you, Miss Regan,—Mrs. Morton, I mean,—and Hilton. I thought that, of course, you, Bradley, and Hilton were in the game together.”
“Well?”
“I thought there was just one scheme on foot to blackmail Mrs. Morton. I’ve just tumbled to the fact that there were two schemes—and that there’s just been a head-on collision between the two.”
“Bob, my boy, please elucidate.”