It was fully a minute before the door was opened again, and Addis descended the steps alone. Mrs. Harrod and the McKelvey girls forgot the new machine immediately. They were all looking at Peter Addis. And they were all thinking precisely the same thing, namely, that they had never in all their lives seen a man who looked more extraordinarily handsome and happy. CHAPTER XXIX THE MANSION IN SHADOW When Bonnie May did not return to the mansion that night the fact was not commented upon by any member of the family. It was not quite remarkable that she should spend the night with the Thornburgs. That was where she had gone, of course. It is true that Mrs. Baron was decidedly uncomfortable. The rupture that had occurred was more serious than any that had preceded it. Possibly she had gone too far. There was the possibility that Bonnie May might nurse a very proper grievance and decide that it was pleasanter to live with the Thornburgs than to continue her residence at the mansion. In brief, she might refuse to come back. That was Mrs. Baron’s fear. It was a fear which hurt the more because she was unwilling to speak of it. However, when the next day passed and night came, Baron took no trouble to conceal his anxiety--for still Bonnie May had not returned. He called up the Thornburgs by telephone. Was Bonnie May there? He asked the question very affably. Yes, came back the reply--in an equally affable tone--she was there. Would he like to speak to her? No, she need not be troubled; he merely wished to be sure she was there. Baron believed, without expressing his belief to any one, that it would be a mistake to manifest anxiety about the late guest--or probably the temporarily absent guest. So it came about that one day followed another, and Bonnie May did not come back, and the several members of the family pretended that nothing was specially wrong. It was Mrs. Baron who first thrust aside a wholly transparent pretense. “That’s the trouble with that Thornburg arrangement,” she said at dinner one day, apropos of nothing that had been said, but rather of what everybody was thinking. “I don’t blame her for being offended; but if the Thornburgs were not making efforts to keep her she’d have been back before now. On the whole, we were really very good to her.” “Oh, I shouldn’t worry,” declared Baron briskly. “She’ll be back. If she doesn’t come before long I’ll go over there and--and tole her back.” A second week passed--and she had not returned. And now her absence was making a distinct difference in the mansion. The dinner and sitting-room conversations became listless; or during the course of them a tendency toward irritability was developed. One day Mrs. Baron sought her son alone in his attic. Said she: “Do you suppose she’s not coming back at _all_?” She looked quite wan and bereft as she asked the question.