Page:The Breath of Scandal (1922).djvu/345

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THE BREATH OF SCANDAL
335

there with him after I realized that he planned, he expected—I went home and he—he went back to the girls he'd given up; or to one of them." She stopped again.

"To one physically like you," Gregg continued, breathing very deep. "When the reporters described her, they gave me an awful minute, Marjorie; then they went on—and I knew she wasn't you. But of course, Bill didn't know that last night. He came into Cragero's sure you were there; it was just a frightful mistake all around. Rinderfeld—of course I had my time when I wanted to get him; but not a newspaper man blamed him. Not one; no, they were fair; they said nobody wanted to kill Bill or even hurt him." Gregg looked down, cleared his throat and looked at her again.

"People who were there—lots of them decent people—gave their names and agreed that nothing was going on that was wrong when Bill came in and tried to smash into a private dining room. Cragero tried to argue with him; then they tried to put him out; that was all; so he went for the bouncer and—it happened, Marjorie.

"I've just come from there, you know. That's the truth of the end of Bill. He died all at once, just as he was; and he knows now, Marjorie, if he knows anything, that you weren't there; that'd be the one thing he'd want to know. He's found it out; so he's happy and not—not bucking life, not just forever hopelessly fighting and trying to make over life, Marjorie. That's what he'd always have to do; that's what he always did; from the first day I met him at the U. of M., he was always wanting to make over—make over things and people, no matter how impossible it was. He