When it stopped the girl said: "You will give me a few moments in my library with you, won't you?"
The visage he turned to her was one of physical anguish. They sat confronting each other in silence for an instant; then he rose with a visible effort and descended, and she followed.
"Be at the garage at two, Wayland," she said, and ascended the snowy stoop beside McKay.
The butler admitted them. "Luncheon for two," she said, and mounted the stairs without pausing.
McKay remained in the hall until he had been separated from hat and coat; then he slowly ascended the stairway. She was waiting on the landing and she took him directly into the library where a wood fire was burning.
"Just a moment," she said, "to make myself as--as persuasive as I can."
"You are perfectly equipped, Miss Erith--"
"Oh, no, I must do better than I have done. This is the great moment of our careers, Mr. McKay." Her smile, brightly forced, left his grim features unresponsive. The undertone in her voice warned him of her determination to have her way.
He took an involuntary step toward the door like a caged thing that sees a loophole, halted as she barred his way, turned his marred young visage and glared at her. There was something terrible in his intent gaze--a pale flare flickering in his eyes like the uncanny light in the orbs of a cornered beast.
"You'll wait, won't you?" she asked, secretly frightened now.
After a long interval, "Yes," his lips motioned.
"Thank you. Because it is the supreme moment of our lives. It involves life or death.... Be patient with me. Will you?"
"But you must be brief," he muttered restlessly. "You know what I need. I am sick, I tell you!"
So she went away--not to arrange her beauty more convincingly, but to fling coat and hat to her maid and drop down on the chair by her desk and take up the telephone: "Dr. Langford's Hospital?"
"Yes."
"Miss Erith wishes to speak to Dr. Langford. ... Is that you, Doctor?... Oh, yes, I'm perfectly well.... Tell me, how soon can you cure a man of--of dipsomania?... Of course.... It was a stupid question. But I'm so worried and unhappy... Yes.... Yes, it's a man I know.... It wasn't his fault, poor fellow. If I can only get him to you and persuade him to tell you the history of his case... I don't know whether he'll go. I'm doing my best. He's here in my library.... Oh, no, he isn't intoxicated now, but he was yesterday. And oh, Doctor! He is so shaky and he seems so ill--I mean in mind and spirit more than in body.... Yes, he says he needs something.... What?... Give him some whisky if he wants it?... Do you mean a highball?... How many?... Oh... Yes... Yes, I understand ... I'll do my very best.... Thank you. ... At three o'clock?... Thank you so much, Doctor Langford. Good-bye!"