It was nearly three months before the search began. Edith had gone home, Mrs. Newbolt was at the sea-shore, and Maurice was in and out--away for two or three days at a time on office business, and when at home absent almost every evening with some of those youthful acquaintances who seemed ignorant of Eleanor's existence. So there were long hours when, except for her little old dog, she was entirely alone--alone, to brood over Maurice's queer look when she had accused him of having an "acquaintance on Maple Street"; and by and by she said, "I'll find out who it is!" Yet she had moments of trying to tear from her mind the idea of any concealment, because the mere suspicion was an insult to Maurice! She had occasional high moments of saying, "I _won't_ think he has secrets from me; I'll trust him." But still, because suspicion is the diversion of an empty mind, she played with it, as one might play with a dagger, careful only not to let it touch the quick of belief. After a while she deluded herself into thinking that, to exonerate Maurice, she must prove the suspicion false! It was only fair to him to do that. So she must find the woman whom she had seen on the porch with him. If she wasn't Mrs. Dale, that would "prove" that everything was all right, and that Maurice's presence there only meant that he was attending to office business; nothing to be jealous about in _that_! And if the woman _was_ Mrs. Dale? Eleanor's throat contracted so sharply that she gasped. But again and again she put off the search for the exonerating proof--for she was ashamed of herself, "I'll do it to-morrow." ... "I'll do it next week."
It was a scorching, windy July day when she took her first defiling step and "did it." There had been a breakfast-table discussion of a vacation at Green Hill, the usual invitation having been received.
"Do go," Maurice had urged. "I'll do what I did last year--hang around here, and go to the ball games, and come up to Green Hill for Sundays." He was acutely anxious to have her go.
She was silent. "_Why_ does he want to be alone?" she thought; "why--unless he goes over to Medfield?" Then, in sudden decision, she said to herself, "I will find out why, to-day!" But she was afraid that Maurice would, somehow, guess what she was going to do; so, to throw him quite off the track, she told him that Donny O'Brien was sick again; "I must go and see him this morning," she said.