For she had needed
no long residence in San Juan to form her own estimate of the man's
ability . . . or lack of ability. But plainly this was Patten's case,
not hers; she got up from the table and went into her own room.
Elmer she found lying fully dressed upon a couch in her office,
sleeping heavily. She stood over him a moment, her eyes tender; he was
still, would always be, her baby brother. Then she went to her own
room and threw herself down upon her bed, worn out, anxious, vaguely
fearful for the future.
It was a long day for San Juan. Mrs. Engle came now and then to
Virginia's room to wipe her eyes and force a hopeful smile; Florrie ran
in like a young tempest to weep copiously and hyperbolically invest
poor dear Roddy with all imaginable heroic attributes; Engle and Struve
and Tom Cutter were grave-eyed and distressed. Every hour Ignacio came
to the hotel to ask quietly for news.
In his own way, it appeared that Elmer Page was as deeply concerned as
any one. It was long before he told Virginia that he had been in the
Casa Blanca when the shooting occurred; haltingly he gave her his
version of it.
"Don't you think, Elmer," suggested the girl somewhat wearily, "that
you have gotten hold of the wrong end of things here? I mean in
choosing your friends? Certainly after this you will have nothing to
do with men like Galloway and Rickard?"
Ten minutes' talk with Elmer gave her a deeper understanding of his
attitude than she had been able to guess until now.
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