XV
ON the following morning Gregory, who had spent the night in the mine and had just come up to the cabin, heard his telephone ring as he was about to take his bath and go to bed. His first impulse was to ignore the summons, but, his business instinct prevailing, he went into the office and unhooked the receiver.
“Well?” he asked, in a voice both flat and uninviting.
“It is Ida. How tired your voice sounds. I won’t keep you a minute. I have a plan to suggest. Why not let me put up those geologists? Mrs. Cameron has asked me to stay with her and will come over and help me entertain them at meals. It will not only save you a fearful hotel bill but keep them from wandering into the wrong fold.”
“Good idea!” Gregory’s voice was more animated.
“I’ll get Professor Becke to take them down into one of the big mines here, take them out myself to yours, amuse them between times with the prettiest women in town—in short stick to them closer than a brother.”
“Good! You are the right sort. I’ll meet them at the train—on the night of the second, it is—and take them right up to your house. It’s putting you to a lot——”
“Not a bit. It will be immense fun. Good-bye.”
On that same morning Ora went to Butte. She had telephoned to Ida, and Mowbray met her at the train with the limousine.
“Mrs. Compton had to go to some charity meeting or other,” he said, as they shook hands warmly. “I am to drive you about for an hour.”
This was better fortune than Ora, who possessed little of Ida’s patience and talent for the waiting game, had dared to anticipate.
“How jolly!” Her face lost its traces of a sleepless night as it flashed with hope and enthusiasm. “And after that dreadful train! Drive to the Gardens,” she said to the chauffeur.
She pointed out Anaconda Hill as they passed under that famous portal, and the shaft houses of other mines,suggesting that he go down with the geologists when they made the inevitable descent. “But you will find your visit to Mr. Compton’s mine more satisfactory,” she added lightly. “You will see more ore in the vein. How do you like him?”
Mowbray growled something in his thick inarticulate English voice, and Ora grasped her opportunity. She turned to him with the uncompromising directness her sinuous mind knew so well how to assume.
“Take me into your confidence,” she said peremptorily. “I can help you. At all events keep you from making any mistakes with Ida. She is what is called a difficult proposition. Are you in love with her?”
Mowbray turned a deep brick-red and frowned, but he answered intelligibly: “You know jolly well I am.”
“Then let me tell you that there is only one way you can get her. Ida is moral to the marrow of her bones. You might make her love you, for she and her husband are practically separated, but you can get her only by persuading her to divorce Mr. Compton.”
“I’ve thought of that. Of course I’d rather marry her. I’m a decent sort myself—hate skulking—and lying—she’s the last woman I’d want to compromise. But I’m so beastly poor. I’ve only twelve hundred pounds a year.”
“And she has forty thousand pounds now of her own. You need not hesitate to spend the capital, for Mr. Compton is most generous, and is sure to give her much more. He is bound to be a multimillionaire—it is only a question of a few years.”
“Does he want his own freedom?”
“I am not in his confidence. But as they no longer care for each other and have agreed to live apart—merely showing themselves together in public occasionally to avoid gossip—it is natural to suppose that he would be indifferent, at least. He cannot be more than thirty, and will be sure to want his freedom sooner or later.”
“This is splendid of you!” cried the Englishman gratefully. “She’s not happy. I know that, and now I shall know just what to do.”
“Sympathise with her. Make yourself necessary—make her feel the neglected wife, and what a devoted husband would mean. You have the game in your own hands, and I will help you.”