son, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.[1] You are through with the office for to-day,—inform Swacker of the fact, will you?—there's a dear! We attend upon a lady—Miss St. Clair, no less."
Markham realized that Vance's jesting manner was only the masquerade of a very serious purpose. Also, he knew that Vance would tell him what he knew or suspected only in his own way, and that, no matter how circuitous and unreasonable that way might appear, Vance had excellent reasons for following it. Furthermore, since the unmasking of Captain Leacock's purely fictitious confession, he was in a state of mind to follow any suggestion that held the faintest hope of getting at the truth. He therefore rang at once for Swacker, and informed him he was quitting the office for the day.
In ten minutes we were in the subway on our way to 94 Riverside Drive.
- ↑ This quotation from Ecclesiastes reminds me that Vance regularly read the Old Testament. "When I weary of the professional liter'ry man," he once said, "I find stimulation in the majestic prose of the Bible. If the moderns feel that they simply must write, they should be made to spend at least two hours a day with the Biblical historians."
