Madeleine’s absence, but we didn’t think of it seriously at all.”
“No, I suppose not. Didn’t she tell you, Rose, that she planned to go to the Locke place before she went to Emmy’s?”
The man looked at her earnestly, as if much depended on her answer.
But Mrs. Sayre said, “No, I don’t think she did. No, I remember now—she said she was going on an errand first, but she didn’t say where.”
“And didn’t she have on that fancy dress?”
“No; she only had a kimono—a mere dressing gown.”
“And you came right home, from our house—and you went right to the Gardners’? Forgive me if I seem inquisitive—I’ve a notion in my head.”
“I came home, and dressed,” Mrs. Sayre said, striving to remember. “Then I went down to my dressmaker’s for a few minutes for an important fitting, and then I came back and picked up Harrison and we went to Emmy’s.”
“What time did you get there?”
“A little after eleven—I remember we were the last to arrive. Why all the catechism, Drew?”
“Nothing,” and his brows came together in perplexity. “I just want to find somebody to whom Madeleine mentioned that artist chap. How did she come to go there?”
“Can’t you imagine?” and pretty Mrs. Sayre wrinkled her own brows in similar puzzlement.
“No, I simply cannot. I never supposed she knew such people.”
“What do you mean by such people?”
“People outside her own circle or circumstances.”
“Well, apparently she did. What are you going to do, Drew, as to finding out”
“The truth? I’m not obliged to do anything, Rose, the
