“I must know where he is; there’s an important matter waiting—a very serious matter it may prove for him if he isn’t here to-day to pass on it. I must wire him at once.”
“Very good. You had better do so, Mr. Bosworth. He’s at the Peach Tree Club, Atlanta.”
“Atlanta! Do you mean to say that he isn’t even in this state to-day?”
“No, Mr. Bosworth, and I advise you to telegraph him immediately if your business is so urgent.”
“It isn’t my business, Barbara; it’s the state’s business; it’s your father’s business, and if he isn’t here to attend to it by to-morrow at the latest, it will go hard with him. He has enemies who will construe his absence as meaning——”
He spoke rapidly, with rising anger, but some gesture from the girl arrested him, and he turned frowningly to see Griswold calmly intent upon an engraving at the farther end of the room. The coloured woman was dozing in her chair. Before Bosworth could resume, the girl spoke, her voice again raised so that every word reached Griswold.
“If you refer to the Appleweight case, I must tell you, Mr. Bosworth, that I have all confidence that my father will act whenever he sees fit.”
“But the people——”
“My father is not afraid of the people,” said the girl quietly.
“But you don’t understand, Barbara, how much is at stake here. If some action isn’t taken in that matter within twenty-four hours your father will be branded as a coward by every newspaper in the state. You seem to take it pretty coolly, but it won’t be a trifling matter for him.”