"I don't want any money," sullenly.
"Fine. You'll probably have to go west somewhere, and you'll be set down
in the center of a hundred corn-fields and told to make them overnight
into a temporary town. I suppose you've thought of all that?"
"I'll go wherever I'm sent."
"Come along to the telephone, then."
Rodney hesitated. He felt cheap and despicable, and his anger was still
hot. They wanted to get him out of town. He saw that. They took little
enough trouble to hide it. Well, he would go. He wanted to go anyhow,
and he would show them something, too, if he got a chance. He would
show them that he was as much a man as Clayton Spencer. He eyed Nolan's
insolently slouching figure with furious eyes. But he followed him.
Had he secured an immediate appointment things might have been different
for him. Like Chris Valentine, he had had one decent impulse, and like
Chris too, there was a woman behind it. But Chris had been able to act
on his impulse at once, and Rodney was compelled to wait while the mills
of the government ground slowly.
Then, on the fourteenth of August, Natalie telegraphed him: "Have had bad news about Graham. Can you come?"
He thought of Graham ill, possibly dead, and he took the next train,
late in the evening. It was mid-week and Natalie was alone. He
had thought of that possibility in the train and he was miserably
uncomfortable, with all his joy at the prospect of seeing her again.
He felt that the emergency must be his justification. Clayton was still
abroad, and even his most captious critics would admit that Natalie
should have a friend by if she were in trouble. Visions of Graham
wounded filled his mind. He was anxious, restless and in a state of the
highest nervous tension.
And there was no real emergency.
He found Natalie in the drawing-room, pacing the floor. She was still in
her morning dress, and her eyes were red and swollen. She gave him both
her hands, and he was surprised to find them cold as ice.
"I knew you would come," she said. "I am so alone, so terrified."
He could hardly articulate.
"What is it?"
"Graham has been ordered abroad."
He stood still, staring at her, and then he dropped her hands.
"Is that all?" he asked, dully.
"No."
"Good heavens, Natalie! Tell me. I've been frantic with anxiety about
you."
"He was married to-night to Delight Haverford."