Almost every other conceivable nook and cranny in the house which would have served for a hiding-place had been ransacked, and every desk and drawer opened and searched. It was a stupendous piece of luck.
A moment’s reflection decided me to leave them where they were. My first task must be to find Althea. Her safety was much more to me than my own, and she was not safe for a single second of the time she was with von Felsen.
It was an easy guess that his failure to find what he had sought so drastically would put him in a very ugly mood, and even his belief in my death would not suffice to ease his mind. So long as that evidence of his crimes remained in existence, it was liable to fall into the hands of some one who would be able to use it with disastrous results to him.
I would have given much to know the story he had told to Althea. He would not say a word about my supposed death, and the servants’ references to the warrants for my arrest suggested the line he had taken.
He would seek to prey upon her fears both for her father and myself, and pose as being still in a position to save us both. If he had done that I had no doubt that he would drive her to consent to marry him; and my fear was that, exasperated by not having found what he sought and needed so desperately, he would rush matters to a crisis at once.
I hurried at once to von Felsen’s house, but only to find it shut up. I knocked and rang several times without result, and in the end had to turn away baffled and a prey to fresh fears and apprehension.
Where to look for him I had no idea, nor where to look for Althea of course. I had felt so certain of finding them both at the house that the sting of the disappointment was all the more disconcerting.
It flashed across my thoughts that possibly Althea might have gone back to her own house, or might have communicated with Chalice in some way during my absence; and acting on the impulse, I jumped back into the cab and told the man to drive me there.
On the way another thought occurred to me: Hagar Ziegler. She might know where to tell me to look for von Felsen; and I was putting my head out of the window to give the driver the fresh direction, when we pulled up at Chalice’s house.