"Sounds like—going away. Nothing more drastic."
"Drastic enough! And she can't get away with that! I won't let her! We'd have made it."
"What did you do? Bloodhound around the city?"
"Went to her old apartment, first. Then—to the people who'd been her friends. Routing them out. Bribing doormen to let me knock and wake them up. Finally—when I ran out of ideas—I went to Hattie Blaine's. Good God—what a hideous place!"
I skipped that one, too. It was no time to argue that Hat's, while it had a few dim facets of one sort or another, was in my opinion (or had been, anyhow)—rather enchanting. A kindlier spot than many a hearth or any city street.
"What did Hat say?"
"Ye gods! She talked. She talked the grimmest bunch of obscene sophistries I ever heard in my life! She tried to get me drunk! She even tried to get one of the girls to—entertain me!"
"It never passed through your cold, reasoning, scientific cranium that perhaps she was trying to be decent to you?"
"Decent!"
"Did she know where Marcia was?"