Grayle walked to the sofa, picked up my coat and tossed it to me.
"I don't know where she is," he said shortly. "And I don't care."
My hat followed the coat through the air and dropped on to my knees.
"Dainton wants to stop the divorce," I said. "That must have a certain academic interest for you, Grayle. He's seeing O'Rane to-morrow morning."
I looked in vain for any sign of pleasure, relief or concern.
"I tell you, I don't know where she is," he repeated. "She left this place to-day—and—she's—not coming—back."
"You mean you turned her out," I suggested.
"Oh, I'm sick of this!" He limped to my chair and caught my wrist in one hand, bending it back until I had to get up to prevent his breaking my arm off at the elbow. "As a matter of courtesy I told you she'd gone, and the best thing you can do is to follow her. You've found time to meddle with my affairs for a good many months, but I'm tired of it now; it's got to end. I give you fair warning, Stornaway, that I am instructing my servants not to admit you, if you come here again; and, by God! if you try to force your way in, I'll thrash you out with a crop. Now—march!"
My exit was painless, though I will not pretend that it was dignified. I walked a few yards along the Brompton Road, wondering what to do next. It was futile to speculate where Mrs. O'Rane was gone; she could not return to "The Sanctuary," she could not go home to her parents; after abandoning her husband and being abandoned by her lover within six months, she could hardly—with her pride and temper—ask a friend to take her in. Any grandeur with which she had tried to invest her recklessness and infidelity at our last meeting was sorely draggled. And she was about thirty—a year or two more, a year or two less—in the full bloom and beauty of her life, with some hundreds from her father to pay her hotel bills, debarred by the war even from hiding herself for a few months abroad. I stood still to wonder where she was at that moment, how she was facing the future.
Then I turned down Sloane Street and made for the Underground station. I had meant to go home and, perhaps, to telephone to Dainton, but it could do no good, and I wanted to hold a council of war with the Oakleighs. In Sloane Square I met Beresford hobbling along on a stick and made him turn round and keep me company. In some way I felt that he deserved to be present. Bertrand was in bed when we reached "The Sanctuary," but I found George reading a book with his feet up on a sofa, and, when I told him that my business was urgent, we adjourned upstairs to the scene of more than one early morning session. I told them as shortly as I could of my interviews with Dainton, Bannerman and Grayle and left the facts to sink in. The ensuing silence was broken by Beresford, speaking more to himself than to the room.