Through the blinding storm he had reached the New York side before he thought of his own movements, of the morrow, of his coming friend, and of his wary enemies.
Then he resolutely made up his mind to fight the warring Fates to a finish.
He drove to the Astor House, dismissed his driver with a ransom fee, and there hid himself in an upper room.
When he presented himself at the half-deserted office of the Western Trading Company, upon the next morning, he was clad in unfamiliar garb.
His blood-shot eyes told of a vigil of mental suffering, and he dared say nothing as he gruffly bowed when Mr.Somers told him of Robert Wade's continued illness.
"I am going down to the election," said the old accountant.

"And so you will be in charge, as Mr.Ferris has not been heard from.
There is no one here but you to represent the management." "Trapped," muttered Clayton, who listened every moment for some tidings of the woman whose silken hair had wound its delicate meshes around him in the storm.

"Dying; dead, perhaps," he groaned, in an agony of excitement, and then and there he swore that, upon the arrival of Witherspoon he would leave the cave of his enemies, await his fate, and bear Irma Gluyas away to farther and fairer lands.
The long morning dragged on in a semi-stupor as he sat there listening to the hollow footfall of the casual passers-by.
And yet there was no word from Madame Raffoni, the only holder of the secret of Irma Gluyas' life.

His foot was on the threshhold to leave at last, when Arthur Ferris calmly entered.
Randall Clayton mastered himself with a mighty effort, as Ferris glibly murmured, "I am only here for a few moments! Come into the private office." The few minutes before they were at their ease in Robert Wade's impregnable sanctum enabled Clayton to steel himself against the secret bridegroom's duplicity.

Clayton's quick eye noted Ferris' satchel, his top-coat and umbrella carelessly thrown down on Wade's reading-table.
"Have you been at the rooms ?" carelessly remarked Clayton, tossing Ferris' private keys upon the table.