Page:The Whisper on the Stair by Lyon Mearson (1924).djvu/297



street car was crowded, but long before they got to Hampton Val had been able to catalog every person in it; there was no one he knew; no one, so far as he could determine, connected with Teck. So far, so good. He promised himself a little fun this morning, if they managed to elude Teck.

It was the last act of the play, he told himself. The girl was sitting beside him—he was thrillingly conscious of that—and they were on their way to uncover the treasure; it made little difference to him, actually, whether or not there was a treasure. He had had his thrill out of the chase. That had become his philosophy—that the joy of Life was not in the capture but in the chase—the chase was the important thing. He was not able to relinquish himself absolutely to this philosophy, however, for the simple reason that there was the slight matter of the capture of Jessica to be still attended to—surely his joy in that would not be ended with the chase.

There are those who would say that, did he but know it, his great moment of fulfillment, as regards to Jessica, in the chase, and he would come to realize that in the end; Val, however, cast that thought aside negligently, scornfully. To possess Jessica. He knew of no simple chase that could compare to that. No perhaps his philosophy was not exactly all Rh