and sent back by the pilot that she had received a telegram from Marjorie at sailing. And he ascertained also that Marjorie had withdrawn from the savings bank the money of her own which had formed her legacy from grandmother Winfield. He knew, therefore, that she had with her, or more likely had on deposit in some other bank under another name, at least five hundred dollars.
When it became necessary for him to explain her absence to the family friends, who knew she had not accompanied Mrs. Hale, he said that Marjorie had preferred an adventure of her own to again traveling in a routine way with her mother. He gave the impression that he had known of Marjorie's plan and approved of it, but that his wife, being more formal minded, would not approve. He repeated, what he found to be the fact, that Marjorie was writing her mother as though she were at home; and he suggested that his wife's friends refrain from disturbing Mrs. Hale by mentioning in letters that Marjorie actually was not at home.
As a matter of fact, Corinna Hale had few friends with whom she kept up any sort of correspondence; and none of these cared to intrude openly upon her personal affairs. Something was wrong in the Hale family, people began to realize; it might blow over, or it might not; Mrs. Hale's absence in England might have more significance than her previous sojourns abroad; or she might return, serene and calm, to resume her place in the big, white home. Neighbors gossiped, of course; but Charles Hale was president of Tri-Lake Products and Materials Corporation; conspicuously he abode in his own home, as he had upon previous occasions when his wife and daughter were away; and men
