He realized then that within forty-eight
hours what he had called borrowing would become theft.
There was no time to be lost: he must clear out and start life over again
somewhere else. The day that he reached this decision he was to have met
Miss Talcott at dinner. He went to the dinner, but she did not appear: she
had a headache, his hostess explained. Well, he was not to have a last
look at her, after all; better so, perhaps. He took leave early and on his
way home stopped at a florist's and sent her a bunch of violets. The next
morning he got a little note from her: the violets had done her head so
much good--she would tell him all about it that evening at the Gildermere
ball. Woburn laughed and tossed the note into the fire. That evening he
would be on board ship: the examination of the books was to take place the
following morning at ten.
Woburn went down to the bank as usual; he did not want to do anything that
might excite suspicion as to his plans, and from one or two questions
which one of the partners had lately put to him he divined that he was
being observed. At the bank the day passed uneventfully. He discharged his
business with his accustomed care and went uptown at the usual hour.
In the first flush of his successful speculations he had set up bachelor
lodgings, moved by the temptation to get away from the dismal atmosphere
of home, from his mother's struggles with the cook and his sister's
curiosity about his letters.
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