“Why not ask him to lunch one day? Oddly enough, Johnson, Miss Hagerston, whom he is to marry, has greatly changed too. This is not imagination on my part, I can assure you.”
But before Johnson could invite Preston to lunch, something happened.
This was a visit which Johnson received from Cora Hartsilver; she had become acquainted with him about the time when Yootha was in trouble regarding the pearl necklace.
Cora had made an appointment by telephone, and during the afternoon she called.
“I have come to see you,” she said, “about my friend, Miss Hagerston, who tells me she had the pleasure of meeting you at Henley.”
“Yes, and I had the pleasure of congratulating her upon her engagement. She is not indisposed, I hope?”
“Indeed she is, seriously indisposed, though not in the way you mean. She is mentally indisposed, if I may put it so.”
“I am sorry to hear that. Can you give me a few particulars?”
“Well, she is staying with me at present, and has been since Henley week. She asked me if she might come to stay with me because she could no longer sleep at night in her flat—she got frightened and had terrible nightmares, she said. That she has something on her mind I am absolutely convinced; yet though we are such intimate friends she positively refuses to tell me anything, though she as good as admits that she is worried. So I thought I would take the liberty of asking your advice without telling her.”
“Hadn’t I better see her?”