Page:The Breath of Scandal (1922).djvu/284

 tried to trace the 'phone Rinderfeld called from but got no information.

"He's home!" Billy charged in one impulse; then, "He might be with Marjorie now!" Billy snatched his hat and stick from the closet; but, not really believing Rinderfeld home, he went back in his impotent fury to Gregg. "What did you keep that to yourself for?"

And Gregg still managed to restrain himself. To have told how Marjorie had taken him into her heart that evening when—before he, in turn, offended her—she had protested against the inability of Billy to aid her; to have claimed the information she gave as a secret between her and himself, a confidence which she assumed he would keep and keep particularly from the man most bound to prevent her plan; anything like that would surely make matters worse; so Gregg rejoined only, "You'll get no more change out of Rinderfield than you got over the 'phone. I've seen him, of course. He says, what he's been telling you, that until his client, who in this respect now is Marjorie, wishes her address given, he can not supply it. She does not wish it; and she doesn't reply to letters yet. Of course I've tried."

But that made matters worse. "You haven't given me even a chance to try. I could have written her long ago! I could have made her reply; or made Rinderfeld lead me to her! You—you!" Billy was beside himself now. "You didn't want me to try; you wanted to keep her to yourself. That's why you tell me now, after you've found you can't do anything. You knew she was going, when you could have stopped her—or I could—because you wanted her to go so you could get her from me; you" he thrust, breathless, before Gregg, who went white, believing at that instant