"It's me, or
postponement," he said; "and I think it's me." The new opportunity--or bare
chance--loomed before him with immensity. Cope's affair might wait. He
would even risk Cope's running over to Randolph's place alone.
Cope seated himself at his desk with loyalty, or at least with docility;
and Lemoyne, putting on his hat and coat, started out for the fraternity
house where the president of the club was in residence.
Five minutes after Lemoyne's departure Cope heard the telephone ringing
downstairs, and presently a patient, middle-aged man knocked at the door
and told him the call was for him.
Cope sighed apprehensively and went down. Of course it was Amy. Would he
not come over for an hour? Everybody was away, and they could have a quiet
talk together.
Cope, conscious of others in the house, replied cautiously. Lemoyne, he
said, had gone out and left him with a deskful of themes: tiresome routine
work, but necessary, and immensely absorptive of time. He was afraid that
he could scarcely come this evening....
Amy's voice took on a new tone. Why, she seemed to be feeling, must Arthur
Lemoyne be mentioned, and mentioned so early? Yet Bertram had put him--
instinctively, unconsciously--at the head of the little verbal procession
just begun.
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