"But," she said, sitting down on the couch, "I am in such great trouble and I could think of no one but you to advise me."
"What's the matter?" I asked.
"It's Randall. He left the house the day before yesterday, without telling any of us good-bye, and he hasn't written, and I don't know what on earth has become of him."
"Did he take any luggage?"
"Just a small suit-case. He even packed it himself, a thing he has never done at home in his life before."
This was news. The proceedings were unlike Randall, who in his goings and comings loved the domestic brass-band. To leave his home without valedictory music and vanish into the unknown, betokened some unusual perturbation of mind.
I asked whether she knew of any reason for such perturbation.
"He was greatly upset," she replied, "by the stoppage of The Albemarle Review for which he did such fine work."
I strove politely to hide my inability to condole and wagged my head sadly:
"I'm afraid there was no room for it in a be-bombed and be-shrapnelled world."