Of course in the run-down state
he was in, it put him out of business, and by the time he got back to
Raffles', he didn't know who he was, nor where he was. I stayed with
him until the _Herald-Post_ sent for me to come home. Maybe you don't
think I hated to leave the old chap, in that God-forsaken country,
lying flat on his back, staring at the ceiling, with all his illusions
smashed."
"Did he want to come with you?" asked Gerald.
"He didn't want anything. He had wanted one thing so long there was no
more want left in him. I tried to get him to let me engage passage for
him on the next home-bound steamer. But he said he doubted if he'd
ever come back, that as soon as he was able to travel he would go on
around the world, and that it didn't make much difference where he
landed."
"Quite a tragic little romance," Gerald said. "What a lot of mischief
you women have to answer for, Mrs. Q.!"
But Miss Lady did not hear him, she was still leaning forward absorbed
in Decker's narrative.
"If he comes home, in answer to your cable, when can he get here?" she
asked.
"Not before Christmas I should say."
"If I were Lee Dillingham I should go South for the winter," Gerald
said, going to the piano and striking a few random chords.
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