Gloria noticed that Robert Carroll was exceedingly grave as they talked it over just before leaving the house and took no part in the conversation. Later during the singing, it seemed to her that his voice bore a quality that had not been there before, an exceeding sweetness and delicacy like the white burning of a soul that has been and is going through the fire. She sensed that he felt it keenly that Vanna had not come back for her engagement, and then wondered if that was purely imagination. Oh, surely, surely Vanna would not do this to him willingly! She had seemed so friendly, so wholly interested in what they were all doing, so happy in the company of Carroll and the rest! She could not be going to turn from them to that viper Zane! Could it be that she did not see how much finer these men were than he? Could it be that she would really weight him against them even for a moment? Was it possible that Vanna was still considering marrying Zane?
Her mind in a tumult, hovering between indignation and fear, she went through her part or rather Vanna’s part, of the evening’s program, somehow got through the smiles and appreciation after the meeting, and went out under the quiet stars with the two young men.
She said very little on the way home, letting Murray do most of the talking, with a word now and then from Carroll, who was driving them in his own car this evening.
It was when they reached the house that Murray turned to her and said in a low tone, “You are worried, more worried than you are letting us know.”
“Oh, yes!” said Gloria with a deep, drawn breath that sounded almost like a sob. “I am terribly worried. If she isn’t home yet, I don’t know what I shall do! You see, I don’t trust the man she went with! I didn’t want her to go. I don’t think she quite trusts him either! But she thought she had to go for a little while because he had come so far! But—I seemed to know it was going to turn out this way! Only Vanna was so sure she could make him bring her back in time. She wanted to get back. I’m very sure she did!”
Her tone was excited, and her words reached the front seat where Carroll sat seeming not to listen.
“Well,” said Murray, “we’ll come in and see if there is any word or we can be of service. How about it, Bob?”
“Yes, you go in,” said Robert Carroll solemnly. “I’ll just sit here.”
Gloria hurried in, but there was no word from Vanna, though Emily Hastings said she had sat close to the telephone all the evening. There hadn’t been a call.
Murray suggested that they call up the chief operator and get the wire tested out to be sure it was working all right, and they did this, showing that it was in perfect order.
“All right, now,” said Murray, giving Gloria a compassionate look, “suppose Bob and I scout around and see if we can get any trace of them? Would you like to come along, or will you stay here? She might return at any minute now of course.”
“I’ll stay here, I think. If anything has happened, I may be needed,” said Gloria, shutting her white teeth sharply into her lower lip to keep it from trembling as she followed Murray to the front door.
Murray gave her a quick glance and laid his hand briefly on hers.
“Poor child!” he said softly, with an accent that almost sounded like “Dear” child! Then quickly added, “We have a great God! Remember He’s your Father, too, now. I’ll be praying.”
She looked at him through a glitter of tears.
Just then Emily swung open the sitting room door and came out to the hall, and there was no more opportunity to talk. He gave her hand another quick grasp and hurried away, calling back, “We’ll telephone if we find out anything. In any case, we’ll telephone occasionally to see if you have had word.” Then he was gone, and Gloria went up to her room to struggle with her wild fears and try to learn how to trust her heavenly Father, till at last she dropped on her knees beside her bed.
Chapter 12
Robert Carroll started the car into the darkness. “I wonder if this is the best direction to take,” said Murray, looking at his silent companion with a troubled frown. “Perhaps we should have gotten a better description of the car before we started.”
“We don’t need it,” said Carroll briefly. “I saw the car, and this is the way they went.”
“You saw the car!” exclaimed Murray. “Why didn’t you say something about it, old fellow?”
“Well, I didn’t see any point in doing so,” answered the tall fellow gravely. “I saw it. I’d know what to look for. It’s cream-colored, low, streamlined, and fairly screaming with chromium, the most expensive piece of machinery that could be bought, I imagine,” and he named its make.
Murray gave a low exclamation and sat thoughtful for a minute, and then he asked, “Where were you, Bob? How did you happen to see them?”
“I was just coming out of the meadow lot down at my place. Sam had left the bars down when he drove in, and I came over that way to put them up again. I was in overalls!”
Murray gave a whistle and grinned through the darkness. “Man! That was tough luck! But I don’t imagine that would make any difference with her. Perhaps she didn’t see you.”
“Yes, she saw me,” said Carroll grimly. “She waved her hand and called out something. The only word I thought I got was ‘back,’ but they were gone almost before they were there. Boy! I hope that man can drive! He was going at a cruel pace if anything got in the way!”
Murray was silent a long time, watching the outline of his friend’s face in the dim starlight. At last he spoke. “I had a wonderful talk with Gloria just before you came this afternoon, Bob. She said she knew she was a sinner and she wanted to be born again!”
“Praise the Lord!” cried Robert, although his heart winced even as he said it.
“I tried purposely to make it hard for her,” said Murray, “but I’m sure she understands and is saved.”
“Oh, I’m so glad!” said Robert. “Glad most of all for the joy that it brings to our Father and our Savior in the presence of the angels. But I’m glad for her sake, and for yours, too, old man!”
His voice was husky. “I guess it means happiness for you, and you know I rejoice in that! Even if—Vanna—!”
He broke off, not daring to put into words the possibility that came to him.
After a thoughtful silence, Murray spoke again. “You don’t know yet for sure that Vanna deliberately chose not to turn up tonight, Bob. At any rate, the path doesn’t seem to lead you away from her just yet. You certainly couldn’t drop her now when she’s lost! Has it struck you, Bob, that it is the Lord now who is throwing us back with the girls? This search tonight was not of our seeking nor planning.”
“I guess you’re right, Murray,” answered Robert slowly. “If my own cup is too bitter—and I guess it is—it’s no more than my Master had.” He spoke reverently, with deep feeling. “And, if that’s the case, let’s sing hallelujah! We oughtn’t to be downhearted if we are where the Lord wants us. Now, here’s the crossroads. Which way would you say a man like that would have taken?”
“Well, if he’s a stranger hereabouts and it was daylight, he would have chosen the way to the right because it is beautiful, but if he’s anxious to lure her back home, he would have gone to the left and civilization.”
“We’ll take a chance on the way to the left then. He didn’t look much to me like a man who was noticing the beauties of nature, if you ask me.”
So they turned to the left and drove swiftly through the night with a definite intention of finding out whether that cream-colored car had passed a certain point going south early that afternoon.
It was an hour later that they telephoned back to Gloria. They had heard of the car going north a little before noon, but it had not come back that way, and finding there had been no phone call at Gloria’s end of the wire, they turned away heavy burdened.
“We’d better go back the other way and take the right-hand turn,” said Robert Carroll, distress sounding in his voice. “I don’t know just how we are going to proceed with this search or what we can do when we find anybody
, but I feel we should go on.”
On they went into the night, penetrating roads that they knew well, even visiting several places tucked away in seclusion among the hills where a man would be likely to take a girl to dinner, questionable places from their own point of view, but they searched carefully for a cream-colored car and in several instances went inside and studied the patrons from a shadowed vantage point. If Matilda Coulter could only have got a spotlight on these two, she certainly would have made the countryside ring with tales of that night. But these two were wise and heavenled and kept well out of notice. And so went on their fruitless search. No cream-colored car could be found, and no trace of it.
“That car would have gone far in a short time!” mused Murray at last when they came away from the farthest outpost in the direction they had taken.
“Yes,” said Robert despondently. “There’s nothing in this direction now for more than fifty miles, I doubt whether it’s worth our while to go on this way. You know, they may have taken the round-about way home up over the mountain and so approached Afton from above. In that case, there would be good excuse for their being so late, for there are many turnings where a stranger might lose his way.”
“Well, shall we take the cut across near Shillingsworth? That would bring us around near the house, and there’s no public phone around here. She may be back by this time. It’s an hour and a half since we phoned.”
In silence the two took the long, lonely ride over high hills and across the top of a mountain, coming around at last through little sleeping Afton, to the one house in the town where lights burned steadily over the whole lower part of the house.
Gloria met them at the door. She had been watching at the window of her dark room, listening for a car, and was down before they reached the house. Her face was very white, and her eyes large and dark and frightened. They did not need to ask if the wanderer had returned yet. Her face told the story.
“You are to come in and have some coffee,” she said huskily, and they knew that there were tears in her voice.
“I have been thinking,” she said as she handed them the cups of fragrant coffee. “I suppose I am very foolish to worry so. At home we would think nothing of it if Vanna stayed out much later than this. In our set, a group will go from one nightclub to another, eating, drinking and dancing, and come home at dawn, perhaps, or even later.”
She studied the faces of the two young men before her. In her vigil, she had known she must tell them this. They had a right to know what she and Vanna had been accustomed to. She expected them to be shocked, to turn away as if they had had enough. Deep searching of her soul had told her what a difference lay between her life and the life these young men had led.
But surprisingly they looked as if they had understood this.
“Yes—of course,” said Murray, his eyes down on his cup.
“I had thought of that,” said Robert almost sorrowfully. “You should not be—unduly—frightened!”
He was trying to cheer her, and she saw he was deeply moved himself.
“I would not be worried,” she said, trying to brighten for their sakes, “only Vanna knows how such late hours would be regarded here, and I’m quite sure she would want to let me know if she had been unavoidably detained. That’s why I thought of an accident—with such a reckless driver!”
“There are no precipices or dangerous pieces of road hereabouts,” said Robert. “I am sure we would have heard if there had been a big wreck anywhere near us. I did quite a little telephoning and made inquiries at a place where such things are known. None has been reported in this locality.”
“I really feel that man is at the bottom of this,” said Gloria, letting the worry come into her voice again. “I know he is determined to have his way, and I know he is a heavy drinker at times.”
Robert Carroll’s face hardened, and his lips set in thin determined lines.
“But it is of no use for you two to stay out any longer now,” went on Gloria. “I’m quite sure of that. You can’t do anything till morning, and by that time we surely will get some word. You’d better get some rest. Besides, you’ve made a thorough search of all the roads near here. What more could you do till daylight and people were up to be questioned?”
“We couldn’t,” said Murray, “except hang around and go out to meet them, and I imagine if they are coming home and have just lost their way or had a blowout, they wouldn’t really welcome us.”
“No,” said Gloria, “I don’t suppose Mr. Zane would, and that wouldn’t make it any easier for Vanna. So now won’t you both go home and go to bed? I can’t tell you how grateful I am for what you have done, and I’m just going to trust that everything will be all right and they’ll come back before long now. I’m sure Vanna will insist—unless of course there has been an accident!”
“Wait, Bob, I’ve had a thought,” said Murray. “Isn’t there a train from anywhere coming through Ripley after midnight?”
Robert shook his head.
“Only a way train, a freight. It comes from up the state. They would hardly have connected with that, I think. But we’ll start out again as soon as dawn comes.”
“Then why not stay here with me?” said Murray. Robert considered a moment then shook his head.
“No,” he said, “there’s another phone call I’d like to make before I start out, and I’d better use my own wire. It’s a private one, and these up here are all party lines. We don’t want to broadcast this thing, I take it.”
“Oh, no!” said Gloria sharply and thought of her cousin Joan and her aunt Miranda.
“All right, let’s go! We ought to get two hours of sleep before dawn.” He looked at his watch.
“Well, then you can take our car of course,” said Gloria, “and save his coming back.”
So it was arranged. The young men departed again, and Gloria was left to her terrible vigil at her dark window.
Chapter 13
When Vanna got into the luxurious car and was sped away into the glorious sunshiny day, her heart sank. She distinctly did not want to go. She felt that she might be losing something interesting by being away even for an hour, and the company of this man who was so insistent upon taking her away to visit with himself had ceased to be interesting to her. The question of a possible closer relationship between herself and him, which she had been considering when she came up, had drifted completely out of her mind, and now that it was brought to view again, she wondered why she had ever been uncertain about it.
Moreover, a vague premonition hovered over her and would not let her forget her sister’s warning. Well, of course, that was silly, but what if something should happen, some accident, and she would be late for the meeting after all their preparation? How disappointed they would all be! How disappointed she would be herself!
She knew that tonight the meeting was of special importance to Robert Carroll. He had planned it long for this special region, he had worked and prayed for it, he had made several trips to removed districts to get some prodigal sons who never heard a message to promise to come, and he had told her about some of them. She would feel personally disloyal to him and his plans if she failed him tonight, especially in that solo that he sang with so much feeling that was intended to come at the close of Murray MacRae’s address. She loved to play that accompaniment for him because, while she was doing it, she had a strange ecstatic feeling that she was working with him, helping him to do a great thing that in some mysterious way affected destinies.
“You’re not listening!” said Emory Zane looking down at her with a haughty frown. “You act to me as if you had left your real self behind.”
She came back to the present with a start. Of course, it was foolish to think of not getting back in time. She would insist on that, and of course now that she had come, she must be polite and talk, so she roused herself and threw him a careless little smile.
“Oh, yes, I’m listening,” she said, “I was just thinking about some of the things I have left
undone in running away like this right in the middle of the day.”
“What on earth could you possibly have to do up here that would matter in the least?” He sneered amusedly. “I should think you would be entirely fed up with this place. That’s why I came up here—to set you free—but I don’t seem to get much thanks for it.”
“Oh,” laughed Vanna decorously, “that was very kind of you of course, but I’m really having a lovely time up here and don’t in the least need to be pitied. I’m quite in love with this part of the world.”
Suddenly as they swept along, she saw the cornfield in the distance where she had planted a whole row of corn, and her heart gave an unexpected little leap as if she had spotted something precious. And was that one of the men walking toward the fence? The color flew into her cheeks. Why, that was Robert Carroll! And he would see her go by! He would wonder! This noisy car! This world-weary face beside her. She would have to explain them when she got back. She had a desperate longing to stop a minute, to have just a word with Robert Carroll, to look into his eyes and let him read in hers that this trip was not her wish, to get an assurance from his eyes that he would understand. But the worst about that costly car in which she was traveling was that it was seen at a distance and it shot by before one could draw breath. Before the thought had really formed in her mind of asking Zane to stop, before even she was quite sure that it was really Robert standing there by the bars, she was upon him.
She gave a little gasp and waved her hand with a bit of a frantic motion, calling as loudly as she could, “I’ll be back in time!” and then saw him far in the distance behind her.
When the ghastly feeling that settled down upon her somewhat subsided, she found Zane looking at her in curious amusement.
“What possible interest could you have in a common laborer that you should make a demonstration like that?” he asked, sneering. “Is he one of the farmhands on your father’s place? I should say you were being rather condescending to him!”