finding them there it occurred to him that he ought to restore them at once. Circling the park he entered Irving Place and rang at Sylvia’s door.
There, instead of the usual if brief delay, the door opened at once. Orr was coming out. Beyond in the hall Sylvia stood. Orr looked at Annandale, wondering what the dickens he was after. But Annandale brushed by. Orr passed on. Annandale entered the hall.
As the door closed the light revealed to Sylvia what Orr in the semi-obscurity of the stoop had not observed and which, had he observed, would, in view of an anterior episode, have induced his return.
But Sylvia saw. In face and manner his excitement was obvious. Mindful of that episode she feared that he was again in his cups. Yet immediately, though for a moment, a question which he asked reassured her. She understood, or thought she did, why he had come.
“Did you know that you had lost your pearls?”
Instinctively the girl’s hand went to her throat.
“Here they are. They were found somewhere. In the hall, I think.”
“Thank you, Arthur. This is very good of you. But tomorrow would have done.”
She did not ask him in and this omission he did not appear to notice. He looked about the hall and then at the girl. At the look her fear returned.
“Did you know about Fanny and Loftus?” he suddenly asked. “They’re going to elope.” As he spoke he leaned back heavily against the door. “I shall kill him,” he added thickly.
Sylvia wrung her hands. “Oh, Arthur, you have been drinking again. You promised that you never would.”