As he got into his car and threw in the clutch, it suddenly came to him what he must do. His people were off alone, in possible trouble, and he must be at hand ready if they needed him! He must go to New York and find them.
But how could he find them since each detachment of them had the start of him, and might be lost in New York long before he could get there?
He began to calculate distance and time. Marguerite a whole night ahead of him, and her mother several hours' start! When he reached New York, they might have already left it. Marguerite might already be married. And even if he were there, unless he got there ahead and met their trains, how would he know where they had gone?
Stay! Hadn't that note told a place where Marguerite was going? He pulled out the crumpled paper and smoothed it, getting the number fixed in his mind. — Fifth Avenue! Well, at least, he knew one place where she intended to go, if there was such a place. Her note seemed to imply that she doubted it. But there would at least be the number whether the person whose existence she was seeking to disprove, was there or not.
Yes, with only that little clue, and no chance at all of getting there on time, he meant to go after her! For what could her mother do? True she might have more information of her whereabouts than was contained in that note, but even so, she was a woman of another day and generation, a woman used to being cared for, and not accustomed to traveling by herself. That other woman had looked capable, of course, as if she might go around the world by herself, and have no trouble whatever, but who knew whether that other woman—Dunlap her name was, wasn't it—who knew, whether she was going all the way to New York or not?
Yes, he must go! And there was only one way to get there in time to be of use. Could he do it?
He drove hard down to his office, a very new office with a new secretary and office boy, new desks and chairs and typewriter, and new clientele. This was a busy day, too, but that couldn't be helped either. His boss in Chicago was not a hard master, and anyway his secretary was efficient if she was rather old and homely.
He plunged into his morning mail. That must be got out of the way first. Matilda Herrick, the shell-rimmed secretary, had it all in neat order for him; the new orders, the old customers, the complaints, the letter from the head office in Chicago. He went through the piles rapidly, giving a word of direction now and then.
"Get these letters ready for me as soon as you can," he said. "I may have to go to New York to-day. Call up Bainbridge and find out if he is ready to talk business yet. Get Hetherington on the phone and see if he has heard from that order he took yesterday, and send the boy up to my home to get my suit case. He had better go as soon as he has those envelopes addressed. There'll be time."
When Matilda Herrick had taken her gaunt ability out of his private office, he locked his door and went down on his knees beside his desk. He was a young man who traveled under Guidance and went nowhere without orders.