It was so agreed. Clifford left Jack with one dominant impression: at least this phase of Mary’s scheme was visibly succeeding—Jack, whom no one had ever been able to get to go to work before, seemed tightly anchored to his job.
The next evening Clifford was at a table in the Grantham at seven. He waited until eight—untroubled—but Jack did not appear and no message came from him. It puzzled him somewhat, but provoked him more. But, remembering his promise to Mary, he swallowed his resentment and the next afternoon he called Jack up at the Morton offices. He was informed that Jack had not come down at all the day previous, nor had he appeared this day.
Clifford began to think. That same afternoon, at six-thirty, which he had learned was the elder Morton’s cocktail-time, he wandered into the lounge of the Biltmore bar. Here he found Mr. Morton, and casually he inquired for Jack.
“I was afraid the boy wouldn’t stick,” said the handsome, middle-aged man of the world, “and now I’ve had proof of it. Here’s a telegram I received from him this afternoon, filed on board the Canadian Express, saying he’d suddenly decided to run away for a bit of shooting. Just like him, to disappear without a word’s notice.”
Clifford read the telegram, and returned it to the Western financier; and after a few commonplace remarks he walked away with a casual air. But within his calm exterior he was seething with suspicions, ideas, questions. He dropped into a chair in the wide corridor, and eyes fixed on an evening paper, he rapidly studied this new situation. That telegram was a fake. Jack Morton, however irresponsible, would never so behave while he felt as he did toward Mary Regan. Jack Morton had disappeared, and some will other than his own had controlled his disappearance.
Who had brought about this disappearance? If there was a plot here, just what was the plot?—and what its purpose? Was Jack himself the victim primarily aimed at?—his father?—Mary?—some other person?
Into his mind there flashed something Mary had spoken of: that menacing demand of Peter Loveman, coupled with Loveman’s jovial declaration that his threat had been only a joke. Was that shrewd, far-scheming lawyer behind the disappearance of Jack? And if so, what was his ultimate object?—what was his present plan?
A new idea occurred to Clifford. A minute later he was in a telephone booth talking to Mary.
“What have you heard from Jack since I saw you?”
“Not a word.” There was concern in her voice. “He always telephones me two or three times a day.”