And then Larry had what seemed to him an inspiration:  his inspiration being only a sane thought, and what the Duchess, though she had not pointed the way to him, had thought he would do.  Maggie was the important person in this situation!—­Maggie whose life was just beginning, and whose nature he still believed to be plastic!  Not Joe Ellison or Old Jimmie Carlisle, who had almost lived out their lives and whose natures were now settled into what they would be until the end.  By playing upon the finer elements in Maggie’s character he had all but succeeded in rousing to dominance that best nature which existed within her.  He would privately tell Maggie the truth, and tell only her and leave the using of that knowledge to her alone.  The shock of that knowledge, the effect of its revelations upon her, together with the responsibility of what she should do with this information, might be just the final forces necessary to make Maggie break away from all that she had been and swing over to all that he believed she might be.

Yes, that was the thing to do!  And he would do it within the next twelve hours; for Dick had told him that Maggie was coming out again to Cedar Crest on the afternoon of the day which was now rousing from its sleep.  That is, he would do it if the police or the allies of his one-time friends did not locate him before Maggie came.  But of that he had no serious fear; he knew he had made a clean get-away from the Grantham, and that the shrewd Duchess had left no scent by which those bloodhounds of the Police Department could trail her.

Larry did not even try to sleep; he knew it would be of no avail.  Back in his own room he sat going over the situation, and his decision.  He tingled with the sense of the tremendous power which had been delivered into his hands.  Yes, tremendous!  But what were going to be Maggie’s reactions the moment he told her?—­just what would be her course after she knew the truth?

CHAPTER XXX

Larry undressed, had a bath, shaved, dressed again, and started to work.  But that day the most Larry did was abstractedly going through the motions of work.  He was completely filled with the situation and its many questions, and with the suspense of waiting for Maggie to come and of how he was going to manage to see her privately.

The meeting, however, proved no difficulty; for Maggie, who arrived at four, had come primarily on Larry’s account and she herself maneuvered the encounter.  While they were on the piazza, Dick having gone into the house for a fresh supply of cigarettes, and Miss Sherwood being in an animated discussion with Hunt, Maggie said: 

“Miss Sherwood, I’ve never had a real look down at the Sound from the edge of your bluff.  Do you mind if Mr. Brandon shows me?”

“Not at all.  Tea won’t be served for half an hour, so take your time.  Have Mr. Brandon show you the view from just the other side of that old rose-bench; that’s the best view.”