Page:Vance--The trey o hearts.djvu/72

50 A surmise slowly settled into conviction that the woman Judith Trine, sister to the Rose he loved so well, was as mad as that monomaniac, her father, who sat helpless in his cell of silence and shadows in New York, impatient for the word that his vengeance had been consummated by the daughter whom he had inspired to execute it. …

In the dusk of evening the train lumbered into Portland station; and, heart in mouth, Alan helped Rose through the crowd and into a taxicab.

"Best hotel in town," he demanded. "And be quick—for a double tip."

He did not dare plume himself on a new escape. He dared not even trust this public chauffeur. Yet that one he distrusted, it seemed, without reason: shortly the cab stopped before a hotel of tolerable pretensions on a quiet street.

He had communicated his scheme to the girl en route, receiving her endorsement of it. Now, having registered for her and seen her to the door of the best available room in the house within call of the public lobby and office, he washed, gulped a hasty meal, and hurried away into the night with only the negro driver of a fortuitous hack for his guide.