One of the visitors was a middle-aged woman of much elegance of figure, and with a face the outlines of which were beautiful, while its expression of discontent, accentuated by lines of worry, made its owner distinctly unattractive. She was clothed in all the glory of richly exaggerated plainness and in the latest fashion for morning walking dress. Her daughter, simply the beautiful mother over again without the disagreeable expression, though her young face was clouded by grief and concern, was the other caller. Joseph announced the names of the fair interlopers, and Oldfield groaned inwardly as he heard them.

"Mrs. and Miss Chester, Mr. Oldfield," said Joseph, with a low and sweeping Ethiopian bow, and after the ladies were seated he withdrew, not before casting upon Oldfield, however, a significant glance.

Oldfield was slow to seat himself again, after his greeting to his guests. Manifestly, he thought, his easy chair would not do for him during the coming interview. He selected a high-backed cane-seat chair from those around the writing table, and as he had already twice said, "Good morning, Mrs. Chester," and "I am very glad to meet you"--the last being a wicked perversion of his real emotions--he waited for the party of the second part to open the business of the meeting.

"We have come to you--and hope you will pardon us for troubling you, Mr.

Oldfield--"

The club man saw that Mrs. Chester was not going to cry, and took courage.

"We need your help," the lady continued, "and we are sure you will give it to us."

"I shall be very glad if I can in any way a.s.sist or oblige you, Mrs.

Chester," Oldfield a.s.sured the elder lady, while he looked determinedly away from the younger one, who, he was positive, was getting ready to cry. "What do you want me to do? Ned isn't in any trouble is he?" This was going straight to the point, as Mr. Oldfield knew full well.

Of course, Ned Chester was at the bottom of this spectacular disturbance of his morning. It might as well be out and over the sooner.

"Oh! Mr. Oldfield," cried the daughter, "have you seen papa?"

She was bound to cry, if she hadn't already begun. Oldfield was sure of it.

"Catherine!" expostulated the girl's mother, and Oldfield noticed the sharp acrimony of voice and gesture. "Mr. Oldfield," she softened as she addressed him, but there was a hardness about her every feature and expression, "my husband has not been seen nor heard from since last Sunday, when he left home, and I am almost distracted."

"And we have waited until we can bear it no longer. This is Friday--it is almost a week," broke in the girl, ignoring her mother's protesting wave of the hand and angry glance.

"Oh, he's all right," a.s.serted Oldfield. "Don't worry. We will find him at once; I'm sure some one in the club will know all about him. You have, of course, inquired at his office?"

"Yes, and no one there knows anything about him. His letters lie unopened on his desk; he has not been there since Sat.u.r.day."

There was no occasion for all this fencing. The heaven's truth, known to all three, was that Ned Chester was away on a symmetrical and gigantic spree, according to his custom once or twice a year.

Oldfield, looking straight at Mrs. Chester's slightly bent brow, said, quietly, "I have known Ned Chester for twenty years; it is no new thing for him to be away for a day or a night occasionally, is it?"

"No," replied the poor wife, "but he has never stayed so long before, and I know something has happened--he has been hurt, may be killed. We must find him!"

"You say he left home Sunday?"

"Yes, Sunday evening. He left in a fit of anger over some little thing, and now--"

She was dangerously near breaking down, and Oldfield could plainly hear smothered sobs beside him on the side of his chair toward which he chose not to look.

"I will inquire," he said, hopefully, "and I know I can find him almost immediately. Nothing has happened to hurt him. Sit here a moment and wait for me."

Just outside the door Oldfield met Joseph. "Well, where is he?" he asked.

"Mr. Oldfield, I tell you Mr. Chester has on a most awful jag, and he fell and almost split open his skull Tuesday morning, and I've had him over at the Barrett House ever since. The doctor has patched him up, but he ain't fit to be seen, not by ladies."

"Pretty nervous, is he?"

"Nervous! Why, he's just missed snakes this time, that's all!"

"Oh, nonsense! He's not so bad as that; but I must go and see him. When did you see him last?"

"Stayed all night with him, sir, and left him quite easy this morning.

Don't let the ladies see him, Mr. Oldfield; it would break him up."

"Break him up! What do you think about their own feelings!"

"Well, you see, he is dreading to go home, and to see her walk right in on him would break him all up. It would so! He would have 'em sure then."

"Joseph, you've got sense. Take this for any little thing you may need,"

said Oldfield, as he put a green colored piece of paper in Joseph's hand, and turned back into the library where the waiting women sat.

"Your father is safe, Miss Chester," he said, softly to the pale, anxious daughter, who ran to meet him; "you shall see him soon. I will tell your mother all about it."

Miss Chester, expressing great relief, and, giving Oldfield her hand, sat obediently down to the ill.u.s.trated books and magazines he handed her. She was quite out of earshot of the place where her mother sat impatiently waiting for news.

"Your husband is all right, Mrs. Chester. He has met with a slight accident, but is under a doctor's care at the Barrett House. I will go to see him. Without doubt he will be able to go home in a day or two."

The wife nearly lost self-control, but as Oldfield talked on, rea.s.suring her of her husband's safety, she gradually became calm, and then the look of settled hardness came back into her face.

"What shall I do?" she burst out. "How can I go on in such shame and agony year after year? You're an old friend of Ned's, Mr.

Oldfield--excuse me--perhaps you can advise me."

"I want to," answered Oldfield, promptly. "But will you hear me without becoming angry?"

"Certainly! I will be thankful for your advice, Mr. Oldfield."

The man had a certain hardness in his own look now.

"Let us sit down by this window. There, you look comfortable. Now, let's see--oh, yes, I remember where I wanted to begin. Ned is one of those fellows who find Sunday a bad day--and holidays. I've heard him say often how he hated holidays; and it's then, or on a Sunday, that he goes off on these drinking bouts, isn't it?"

"Yes," gasped the astonished woman. This cool, practical way of looking at the trial of her life was strange to her; she found it hard to adjust herself to the situation.

"He's a hard-working man, is Ned, a regular toiler and moiler. When he is at work he is all right, or when he is at play, so far as that goes.

He is never so happy and so entirely himself as when he is among congenial friends, unless it is when over a good book, or off hunting or fishing. These crazy drinking spells come on at Christmas or Thanksgiving time, or on some Sunday, when he is at home with his family."

Mrs. Chester's face had flushed painfully. Not seeming to notice her agitation, Oldfield continued: "You remarked, did you not, that Ned left home in anger Sunday evening. Pardon me, since I have said so much already, was there some argument or contention in the house--between you and Ned, for instance?"

"It was a little quarrel, nothing serious," faltered Mrs. Chester.

"I don't want to hear about it," said Oldfield, hurriedly, himself much embarra.s.sed, and inwardly fuming over himself as a colossal idiot for entering upon such a conversation. "I only want you to think for a minute about the last hour or two Sunday evening before Ned left home.

No doubt he was to blame for whatever that was unpleasant, not a doubt; but since you ask me for advice, can't you think of some way to make Sundays and holidays endurable to Ned, bless his big heart! Be a little easy on him, a little careless about his ways. Ned is such a simple fellow! Hard words, irony and sarcasm, complainings and scoldings cut him very deeply! Don't be offended, but don't you think that perhaps you could manage it to somehow keep Ned from flinging out of the house desperate and foolish every once in a while, on some Sunday or holiday?

I'll tell you! Begin early--begin sometimes before he is awake--to get things ready, and keep them going so that Ned won't start out, a reckless, emotional maniac before nightfall!"

Oldfield paused, struck by his own earnestness and plain speaking, and somewhat scared.

Mrs. Chester arose, and Oldfield's heart ached for her. "Madame," he said, "any man who leaves wife and child to worry over him for days while he carouses is to an extent a brute. There is no comprehensive excuse for him. But when one is living with, and intends to go on living with a man who at times becomes such a brute, it is as well to know and acknowledge his weak points, and forbear to press him too far, even in the best cause, even when you are perfectly right, as I am sure you always are, for example. But let us come back to our original topic of conversation. I am afraid you cannot see Ned to-day. I will call upon him, and then telephone you his exact condition, telling you if he needs anything. And to-morrow, after the doctor has made his morning visit, I will send you another message. Ned will be all right and at home in a day or two.