He knew that something called "sterilizing" was the beginning and end of life, and that things known as germs were the Great Peril. He had expended much thought on the subject of germs. Mamie, questioned, could give him no more definite information than that they were "things which got at you and hurt you," and his awe of Mrs. Porter had kept him from going to the fountainhead of knowledge for further data.

Building on the information to hand, he had formed in his mind an odd kind of anthropomorphic image of the germ. He pictured it as a squat, thick-set man of repellent aspect and stealthy movements, who sneaked up on you when you were not looking and did unpleasant things to you, selecting as the time for his attacks those nights when you had allowed your attention to wander while saying your prayers.

On such occasions it was Bill's practice to fool him by repeating his prayers to himself in bed after the official ceremony. Some times, to make certain, he would do this so often that he fell asleep in mid-prayer.

He was always glad of the night-light. A germ hates light, preferring to do his scoundrelly work when it is so black that you can't see your hand in front of your face and the darkness presses down on you like a blanket. Occasionally a fear would cross his mind that the night-light might go out; but it never did, being one of Mr. Edison's best electric efforts neatly draped with black veiling.

Apart from this he had few worries, certainly none serious enough to keep him awake.

He was sleeping now, his head on his right arm, a sterilized Teddy-bear clutched firmly in his other hand, with the concentration of one engaged upon a feat at which he is an expert.

* * * * *

The door opened slowly. A head insinuated itself into the room, furtively, as if uncertain of its welcome. The door continued to open and Steve slipped in.

He closed the door as gently as he had opened it, and stood there glancing about him. A slow grin appeared upon his face, to be succeeded by an expression of serious resolve. For Steve was anxious.

It was still Steve's intention to remove, steal, purloin, and kidnap William Bannister that night, but now that the moment had come for doing it he was nervous.

He was not used to this sort of thing. He was an honest ex-middleweight, not a burglar; and just now he felt particularly burglarious. The stillness of the house oppressed him. He had not relished the long wait between the moment of his apparent departure and that of his entry into the nursery.

He had acted with simple cunning. He had remained talking pugilism with Keggs in the pantry till a prodigious yawn from his host had told him that the time was come for the breaking up of the party. Then, begging Keggs not to move, as he could find his way out, he had hurried to the back door, opened and shut it, and darted into hiding. Presently Keggs, yawning loudly, had toddled along the passage, bolted the door, and made his way upstairs to bed, leaving Steve to his vigil.

Steve's reflections during this period had not been of the pleasantest. Exactly what his explanation was to be, if by any mischance he should make a noise and be detected, he had been unable to decide. Finally he had dismissed the problem as insoluble, and had concentrated his mind on taking precautions to omit any such noise.

So far he had succeeded. He had found his way to the nursery easily enough, having marked the location earnestly on his previous visits. During the whole of his conversation with Keggs in the pantry he had been repeating to himself the magic formula which began: "First staircase to the left—turn to the right——-" and here he was now at his goal and ready to begin.

But it was just this question of beginning which exercised him so grievously. How was he to begin? Should he go straight to the cot and wake the kid? Suppose the kid was scared and let out a howl?

A warm, prickly sensation about the forehead was Steve's silent comment on this reflection. He took a step forward and stopped again. He was conscious of tremors about the region of the spine. The thought crossed his mind at that moment that burglars earned their money.

As he stood, hesitating, his problem was solved for him. There came a heavy sigh from the direction of the cot which made him start as if a pistol had exploded in his ear; and then he was aware of two large eyes staring at him.

There was a tense pause. A drop of perspiration rolled down his cheek-bone and anchored itself stickily on the angle of his jaw. It tickled abominably, but he did not dare to move for fear of unleashing the scream which brooded over the situation like a cloud.

At any moment now a howl of terror might rip the silence and bring the household on the run. And then—the explanations! A second drop of perspiration started out in the wake of the first.

The large eyes continued to inspect him. They were clouded with sleep. Suddenly a frightened look came into them, and, as he saw it, Steve braced his muscles for the shock.

"Here it comes!" he said miserably to himself. "Oh, Lord! We're off!"

He searched in his brain for speech, desperately, as the best man at a wedding searches for that ring while the universe stands still, waiting expectantly.

He found no speech.

The child's mouth opened. Steve eyed him, fascinated. No bird, encountering a snake, was ever so incapable of movement as he.

"Are you a germ?" inquired William Bannister.

Steve tottered to the cot and sat down on it. The relief was too much for him.

"Gee, kid!" he said, "you had my goat then. I've got to hand it to you."

His sudden approach had confirmed William Bannister's worst suspicions. This was precisely how he had expected the germ to behave. He shrank back on the pillow, gulping.

"Why, for the love of Mike," said Steve, "don't you know me, kid? I'm not a porch-climber. Don't you remember Steve who used to raise Hades with you at the studio? Darn it, I'm your godfather! I'm Steve!"

William Bannister sat up, partially reassured.

"What's Steve?" he inquired.

"I'm Steve."

"Why?"

"How do you mean—why?"

The large eyes inspected him gravely.

"I remember," he said finally.

"Well, don't go forgetting, kid. I couldn't stand a second session like that. I got a weak heart."

"You're Steve."

"That's right. Stick to that and we'll get along fine."

"I thought you were a germ."

"A what?"

"They get at you and hurt you."

"Who said so?"

"Mamie."

"Are you scared of germs?"

The White Hope nodded gravely.

"I have to be sterilized because of them. Are you sterilized?"

"Nobody ever told me so. But, say, kid, you don't want to be frightened of germs or microbes or bacilli or any of the rest of the circus. You don't want to be frightened of nothing. You're the White Hope, the bear-cat that ain't scared of anything on earth. What's this germ thing like, anyway?"

"It's a——I've never seen one, but Mamie says they get at you and hurt you. I think it's a kind of big sort of ugly man that creeps in when you're asleep."

"So that's why you thought I was one?"

The White Hope nodded.

"Forget it!" said Steve. "Mamie is a queen, all right, believe me, but she's got the wrong dope on this microbe proposition. You don't need to be scared of them any more. Why, some of me best pals are germs."

"What's pals?"

"Why, friends. You and me are pals. Me and your pop are pals."

"Where's pop?"

"He's gone away."

"I remember."

"He thought he needed a change of air. Don't you ever need a change of air?"

"I don't know."

"Well, you do. Take it from me. This is about the punkest joint I ever was in. You don't want to stay in a dairy-kitchen like this."

"What's dairy-kitchen?"

"This is. All these white tiles and fixings. It makes me feel like a pint of milk to look at 'em."

"It's because of the germs."

"Ain't I telling you the germs don't want to hurt you?"

"Aunt Lora told Mamie they do."

"Say, cull, you tell your Aunt Lora to make a noise like an ice-cream in the sun and melt away. She's a prune, and what she says don't go. Do you want to know what a germ or a microbe—it's the same thing—really is? It's a fellow that has the best time you can think of. They've been fooling you, kid. They saw you were easy, so they handed it to you on a plate. I'm the guy that can put you wise about microbes."

"Tell me."

"Sure. Well, a microbe is a kid that just runs wild out in the country. He don't have to hang around in a white-tiled nursery and eat sterilized junk and go to bed when they tell him to. He has a swell time out in the woods, fishing and playing around in the dirt and going after birds' eggs and picking berries, and—oh, shucks, anything else you can think of. Wouldn't you like to do that?"

William Bannister nodded.

"Well, say, as it happens, there's a fine chance for you to be a germ right away. I know a little place down in the Connecticut woods which would just hit you right. You could put on overalls——"

"What's overalls?"

"Sort of clothes. Not like the fussed-up scenery you have to wear now, but the real sort of clothes which you can muss up and nobody cares a darn. You can put 'em on and go out and tear up Jack like a regular kid all you want. Say, don't you remember the fool stunts you and me used to pull off in the studio?"

"What studio?"

"Gee! you're a bit shy on your English, ain't you? It makes it sort of hard for a guy to keep up what you might call a flow of talk. Still, you should worry. Why, don't you remember where you used to live before you came to this joint? Big, dusty sort of place, where you and me used to play around on the floor?"

The White Hope nodded.

"Well, wouldn't you like to do that again?"

"Yes."

"And be a regular microbe?"

"Yes."

Steve looked at his watch.

"Well, that's lucky," he said. "It happens to be exactly the right time for starting out to be one. That's curious, ain't it?"

"Yes."

"I've got a pal—friend, you know——"

"Is he a germ?"

"Sure. He's waiting for me now in an automobile in the park——"

"Why?"

"Because I asked him to. He owns a garage. Place where automobiles live, you know. I asked him to bring out a car and wait around near by, because I might be taking a pal of mine—that's you—for a ride into the country to-night. Of course, you don't have to come if you don't want to. Only it's mighty nice out there. You can spend all to-morrow rolling about in the grass and listening to the birds. I shouldn't wonder if we couldn't borrow a farmer's kid for you to play with. There's lots of them around. He should show you the best time you've had in months."

William Bannister's eyes gleamed. The finer points of the scheme were beginning to stand out before him with a growing clarity.

"Would I have to take my bib?" he asked excitedly.

Steve uttered a scornful laugh.

"No, sir! We don't wear bibs out there."

As far as William Bannister was concerned, this appeared to settle it. Of all the trials of his young life he hated most his bib.

"Let's go!"

Steve breathed a sigh of relief.

"Right, squire; we will," he said. "But I guess we had best leave a letter for Mamie, so's she won't be wondering where you've got to."

"Will Mamie be cross?"

"Not on your life. She'll be tickled to death."

He scribbled a few lines on a piece of paper and left them on the cot, from which William Bannister had now scrambled.

"Can you dress yourself?" asked Steve.

"Oh, yes." It was an accomplishment of which the White Hope was extremely proud.

"Well, go to it, then."

"Steve."

"Hello?"

"Won't it be a surprise for Mamie?"

"You bet it will. And she won't be the only one, at that."

"Will mother be surprised?"

"She sure will."

"And pop?"

"You bet!"

William Bannister chuckled delightedly.

"Ready?" said Steve.

"Yes."

"Now listen. We've got to get out of this joint as quiet as mice. It would spoil the surprise if they was to hear us and come out and ask what we were doing. Get that?"

"Yes."

"Well, see how quiet you can make it. You don't want even to breathe more than you can help."

* * * * *

They left the room and crept down the dark stairs. In the hall Steve lit a match and switched on the electric light. He unbolted the door and peered out into the avenue. Close by, under the trees, stood an automobile, its headlights staring into the night.

"Quick!" cried Steve.

He picked up the White Hope, closed the door, and ran.



Chapter X

Accepting the Gifts of the Gods

It was fortunate, considering the magnitude of the shock which she was to receive, that circumstances had given Steve's Mamie unusual powers of resistance in the matter of shocks. For years before her introduction into the home of the Winfield family her life had been one long series of crises. She had never known what the morrow might bring forth, though experience had convinced her that it was pretty certain to bring forth something agitating which would call for all her well-known ability to handle disaster.

The sole care of three small brothers and a weak-minded father gives a girl exceptional opportunities of cultivating poise under difficult conditions. It had become second nature with Mamie to keep her head though the heavens fell.

Consequently, when she entered the nursery next morning and found it empty, she did not go into hysterics. She did not even scream. She read Steve's note twice very carefully, then sat down to think what was her best plan of action.

Her ingrained habit of looking on the bright side of things, the result of a life which, had pessimism been allowed to rule it, might have ended prematurely with what the papers are fond of calling a "rash act," led her to consider first those points in the situation which she labelled in her meditations as "bits of luck."

It was a bit of luck that Mrs. Porter happened to be away for the moment. It gave her time for reflection. It was another bit of luck that, as she had learned from Keggs, whom she met on the stairs on her way to the nursery, a mysterious telephone-call had caused Ruth to rise from her bed some three hours before her usual time and depart hurriedly in a cab. This also helped.

Keggs had no information to give as to Ruth's destination or the probable hour of her return. She had vanished without a word, except a request to Keggs to tell the driver of her taxi to go to the Thirty-Third Street subway.

"Must 'a' 'ad bad noos," Keggs thought, "because she were look'n' white as a sheet."

Mamie was sorry that Ruth had had bad news, but her departure certainly helped to relieve the pressure of an appalling situation.

With the absence of Ruth and Mrs. Porter the bits of luck came to an end. Try as she would, Mamie could discover no other silver linings in the cloud-bank. And even these ameliorations of the disaster were only temporary.

Ruth would return. Worse, Mrs. Porter would return. Like two Mother Hubbards, they would go to the cupboard, and the cupboard would be bare. And to her, Mamie, would fall the task of explanation.

The only explanation that occurred to her was that Steve had gone suddenly mad. He had given no hint of his altruistic motives in the hurried scrawl which she had found on the empty cot. He had merely said that he had taken away William Bannister, but that "it was all right."

Why Steve should imagine that it was all right baffled Mamie. Anything less all right she had never come across in a lifetime of disconcerting experiences.

She was aware that things were not as they should be between Ruth and Kirk, and the spectacle of the broken home had troubled her gentle heart; but she failed to establish a connection between Kirk's departure and Steve's midnight raid.

After devoting some ten minutes to steady brainwork she permitted herself the indulgence of a few tears. She did not often behave in this shockingly weak way, her role in life hitherto having been that of the one calm person in a disrupted world. When her father had lost his job, and the rent was due, and Brother Jim had fallen in the mud to the detriment of his only suit of clothes, and Brothers Terence and Mike had developed respectively a sore throat and a funny feeling in the chest, she had remained dry-eyed and capable. Her father had cried, her brother Jim had cried, her brother Terence had cried, and her brother Mike had cried in a manner that made the weeping of the rest of the family seem like the uncanny stillness of a summer night; but she had not shed a tear.

Now, however, she gave way. She buried her little face on the pillow which so brief a while before had been pressed by the round head of William Bannister and mourned like a modern Niobe.

At the end of two minutes she rose, sniffing but courageous, herself again. In her misery an idea had come to her. It was quite a simple and obvious idea, but till now it had eluded her.

She would go round to the studio and see Kirk. After all, it was his affair as much as anybody else's, and she had a feeling that it would be easier to break the news to him than to Ruth and Mrs. Porter.

She washed her eyes, put on her hat, and set out.

Luck, however, was not running her way that morning. Arriving at the studio, she rang the bell, and rang and rang again without result except a marked increase in her already substantial depression. When it became plain to her that the studio was empty she desisted.

It is an illustration of her remarkable force of character that at this point, refusing to be crushed by the bludgeoning of fate, she walked to Broadway and went into a moving-picture palace. There was nothing to be effected by staying in the house and worrying, so she resolutely declined to worry.

From this point onward her day divided itself into a series of three movements repeated at regular intervals. From the moving pictures she went to the house on Fifth Avenue. Finding that neither Ruth nor Mrs. Porter had returned, she went to the studio. Ringing the bell there and getting no answer, she took in the movies once more.

Mamie was a philosopher.

The atmosphere of the great house was still untroubled on her second visit. The care of the White Hope had always been left exclusively in the hands of the women, and the rest of the household had not yet detected his absence. It was not their business to watch his comings in and his goings out. Besides, they had other things to occupy them.

The unique occasion of the double absence of Ruth and Mrs. Porter was being celebrated by a sort of Saturnalia or slaves' holiday. It was true that either or both might return at any moment, but there was a disposition on the part of the domestic staff to take a chance on it.

Keggs, that sinful butler, had strolled round to an apparently untenanted house on Forty-First Street, where those who knew their New York could, by giving the signal, obtain admittance and the privilege of losing their money at the pleasing game of roulette with a double zero.

George, the footman, in company with Henriette, the lady's-maid, and Rollins, the chauffeur, who had butted in absolutely uninvited to George's acute disgust, were taking the air in the park. The rest of the staff, with the exception of a house-maid, who had been bribed, with two dollars and an old dress which had once been Ruth's and was now the property of Henriette, to stand by the ship, were somewhere on the island, amusing themselves in the way that seemed best to them. For all practical purposes, it was a safe and sane Fourth provided out of a blue sky by the god of chance.

It was about five o'clock when Mamie, having, at a modest estimate, seen five hundred persecuted heroes, a thousand ill-used heroines, several regiments of cowboys, and perhaps two thousand comic men pursued by angry mobs, returned from her usual visit to the studio.

This time there were signs of hope in the shape of a large automobile opposite the door. She rang the bell, and there came from within the welcome sound of footsteps. An elderly man of a somewhat dissipated countenance opened the door.

"I want to see Mr. Winfield," said Mamie.

Mr. Penway, for it was he, gave her the approving glance which your man of taste and discrimination does not fail to bestow upon youth and beauty and bawled over his shoulder—

"Kirk!"

Kirk came down the passage. He was looking brown and healthy. He was in his shirt-sleeves.

"Oh, Mr. Winfield. I'm in such trouble."

"Why, Mamie! What's the matter? Come in."

Mamie followed him into the studio, eluding Mr. Penway, whose arm was hovering in the neighbourhood of her waist.

"Sit down," said Kirk. "What's the trouble? Have you been trying to get at me before? We've been down to Long Beach."

"A delightful spot," observed Mr. Penway, who had followed. "Sandy, but replete with squabs. Why didn't you come earlier? We could have taken you."

"May I talk privately with you, Mr. Winfield?"

"Sure."

Kirk looked at Mr. Penway, who nodded agreeably.

"Outside for Robert?" he inquired amiably. "Very well. There is no Buttinsky blood in the Penway family. Let me just fix myself a high-ball and borrow one of your cigars and I'll go and sit in the car and commune with nature. Take your time."

"Just a moment, Mamie," said Kirk, when he had gone. He picked up a telegram which lay on the table. "I'll read this and see if it's important, and then we'll get right down to business. We only got back a moment before you arrived, so I'm a bit behind with my correspondence."

As he read the telegram a look of astonishment came into his face. He sat down and read the message a second time. Mamie waited patiently.

"Good Lord!" he muttered.

A sudden thought struck Mamie.

"Mr. Winfield, is it from Steve?" she said.

Kirk started, and looked at her incredulously.

"How on earth did you know? Good Heavens! Are you in this, Mamie, too?"

Mamie handed him her note. He read it without a word. When he had finished he sat back in his chair, thinking.

"I thought Steve might have telegraphed to you," said Mamie.

Kirk roused himself from his thoughts.

"Was this what you came to see me about?"

"Yes."

"What does Ruth—what do they think of it—up there?"

"They don't know anything about it. Mrs. Winfield went away early this morning. Mr. Keggs said she had had a telephone call, Mrs. Porter is in Boston. She will be back to-day some time. What are we to do?"

"Do!" Kirk jumped up and began to pace the floor. "I'll tell you what I'm going to do. Steve has taken the boy up to my shack in Connecticut. I'm going there as fast as the auto can take me."

"Steve's mad!"

"Is he? Steve's the best pal I've got. For two years I've been aching to get at this boy, and Steve has had the sense to show me the way."

He went on as if talking to himself.

"Steve's a man. I'm just a fool who hangs round without the nerve to act. If I had had the pluck of a rabbit I'd have done this myself six months ago. But I've hung round doing nothing while that damned Porter woman played the fool with the boy. I'll be lucky now if he remembers who I am."

He turned abruptly to Mamie.

"Mamie, you can tell them whatever you please when you get home. They can't blame you. It's not your fault. Tell them that Steve was acting for me with my complete approval. Tell them that the kid's going to be brought up right from now on. I've got him, and I'm going to keep him."

Mamie had risen and was facing him, a very determined midget, pink and resolute.

"I'm not going home, Mr. Winfield."

"What?"

"If you are going to Bill, I am coming with you."

"Nonsense."

"That's my place—with him."

"But you can't. It's impossible."

"Not more impossible than what has happened already."

"I won't take you."

"Then I'll go by train. I know where your house is. Steve told me."

"It's out of the question."

Mamie's Irish temper got the better of her professional desire to maintain the discreetly respectful attitude of employee toward employer.

"Is it then? We'll see. Do you think I'm going to leave you and Steve to look after my Bill? What do men know about taking care of children? You would choke the poor mite or let him kill himself a hundred ways."

She glared at him defiantly. He glared back at her. Then his sense of humour came to his rescue. She looked so absurdly small standing there with her chin up and her fists clenched. He laughed delightedly. He went up to her and placed a hand on each of her shoulders, looking down at her. He felt that he loved her for her championship of Bill.

"You're a brick, Mamie. Of course you shall come. We'll call at the house and you can pack your grip. But, by George, if you put that infernal thermometer in I'll run the automobile up against a telegraph-pole, and then Bill will lose us both."

"Finished?" said a voice. "Oh, I beg your pardon. Sorry."

Mr. Penway was gazing at them with affectionate interest from the doorway. Kirk released Mamie and stepped back.

"I only looked in," explained Mr. Penway. "Didn't mean to intrude. Thought you might have finished your chat, and it was a trifle lonely communing with nature."

"Bob," said Kirk, "you'll have to get on without me for a day or two. Make yourself at home. You know where everything is."

"I can satisfy my simple needs. Thinking of going away?"

"I've got to go up to Connecticut. I don't know how long I shall be away."

"Take your time," said Mr. Penway affably. "Going in the auto?"

"Yes."

"The weather is very pleasant for automobiling just now," remarked Mr. Penway.

* * * * *

Ten minutes later, having thrown a few things together into a bag, Kirk took his place at the wheel. Mamie sat beside him. The bag had the rear seat to itself.

"There seems to be plenty of room still," said Mr. Penway. "I have half a mind to come with you."

He looked at Mamie.

"But on reflection I fancy you can get along without me."

He stood at the door, gazing after the motor as it moved down the street. When it had turned the corner he went back into the studio and mixed himself a high-ball.

"Kirk does manage to find them," he said enviously.



Chapter XI

Mr. Penway on the Grill

Fate moves in a mysterious way. Luck comes hand in hand with misfortune. What we lose on the swings we make up on the roundabouts. If Keggs had not seen twenty-five of his hard-earned dollars pass at one swoop into the clutches of the croupier at the apparently untenanted house on Forty-First Street, and become disgusted with the pleasing game of roulette, he might have delayed his return to the house on Fifth Avenue till a later hour; in which case he would have missed the remarkable and stimulating spectacle of Kirk driving to the door in an automobile with Mamie at his side; of Mamie, jumping out and entering the house; of Mamie leaving the house with a suit-case; of Kirk helping her into the automobile, and of the automobile disappearing with its interesting occupants up the avenue at a high rate of speed.

Having lost his money, as stated, and having returned home, he was enabled to be a witness, the only witness, of these notable events, and his breast was filled with a calm joy in consequence. This was something special. This was exclusive, a scoop. He looked forward to the return of Mrs. Porter with an eagerness which, earlier in the day, he would have considered impossible. Somehow Ruth did not figure in his picture of the delivery of the sensational news that Mr. Winfield had eloped with the young person engaged to look after her son. Mrs. Porter's was one of those characters which monopolize any stage on which they appear. Besides, Keggs disliked Mrs. Porter, and the pleasure of the prospect of giving her a shock left no room for other thoughts.

It was nearly seven o'clock when Mrs. Porter reached the house. She was a little tired from the journey, but in high good humour. She had had a thoroughly satisfactory interview with her publishers—satisfactory, that is to say, to herself; the publishers had other views.

"Is Mrs. Winfield in?" she asked Keggs as he admitted her.

Ruth was always sympathetic about her guerrilla warfare with the publishers. She looked forward to a cosy chat, in the course of which she would trace, step by step, the progress of the late campaign which had begun overnight and had culminated that morning in a sort of Gettysburg, from which she had emerged with her arms full of captured flags and all the other trophies of conquest.

"No, madam," said Keggs. "Mrs. Winfield has not yet returned."

Keggs was an artist in tragic narration. He did not give away his climax; he led up to it by degrees as slow as his audience would permit.

"Returned? I did not know she intended to go away. Her yacht party is next week, I understand."

"Yes, madam."

"Where has she gone?"

"To Tuxedo, madam."

"Tuxedo?"

"Mrs. Winfield has just rung us up from there upon the telephone to request that necessaries for an indefinite stay be despatched to her. She is visiting Mrs. Bailey Bannister."

If Mrs. Porter had been Steve, she would probably have said "For the love of Mike!" at this point. Being herself, she merely repeated the butler's last words.

"If I may be allowed to say so, madam, I think that there must have been trouble at Mrs. Bannister's. A telephone-call came from her very early this morning for Mrs. Winfield which caused Mrs. Winfield to rise and leave in a taximeter-cab in an extreme hurry. If I might be allowed to suggest it, it is probably a case of serious illness. Mrs. Winfield was looking very disturbed."

"H'm!" said Mrs. Porter. The exclamation was one of disappointment rather than of apprehension. Sudden illnesses at the Bailey home did not stir her, but she was annoyed that her recital of the squelching of the publishers would have to wait.

She went upstairs. Her intention was to look in at the nursery and satisfy herself that all was well with William Bannister. She had given Mamie specific instructions as to his care on her departure; but you never knew. Perhaps her keen eye might be able to detect some deviation from the rules she had laid down.

It detected one at once. The nursery was empty. According to schedule, the child should have been taking his bath.

She went downstairs again. Keggs was waiting in the hall. He had foreseen this return. He had allowed her to go upstairs with his story but half heard because that appealed to his artistic sense. This story, to his mind, was too good to be bolted at a sitting; it was the ideal serial.

"Keggs."

"Madam?"

"Where is Master William?"

"I fear I do not know, madam."

"When did he go out? It is seven o'clock; he should have been in an hour ago."

"I have been making inquiries, madam, and I regret to inform you that nobody appears to have seen Master William all day."

"What?"

"It not being my place to follow his movements, I was unaware of this until quite recently, but from conversation with the other domestics, I find that he seems to have disappeared!"

"Disappeared?"

A glow of enjoyment such as he had sometimes experienced when the ticker at the Cadillac Hotel informed him that the man he had backed in some San Francisco fight had upset his opponent for the count began to permeate Keggs.

"Disappeared, madam," he repeated.

"Perhaps Mrs. Winfield took him with her to Tuxedo."

"No, madam. Mrs. Winfield was alone. I was present when she drove away."

"Send Mamie to me at once," said Mrs. Porter.

Keggs could have whooped with delight had not such an action seemed to him likely to prejudice his chances of retaining a good situation. He contented himself with wriggling ecstatically. "The young person is not in the house, madam."

"Not in the house? What business has she to be out? Where is she?"

"I could not tell you, madam." Keggs paused, reluctant to deal the final blow, as a child lingers lovingly over the last lick of ice-cream in a cone. "I last saw her at about five o'clock, driving off with Mr. Winfield in an automobile."

"What!"

Keggs was content. His climax had not missed fire. Its staggering effect was plain on the face of his hearer. For once Mrs. Porter's poise had deserted her. Her one word had been a scream.

"She did not tell me her destination, madam," went on Keggs, making all that could be made of what was left of the situation after its artistic finish. "She came in and packed a suit-case and went out again and joined Mr. Winfield in the automobile, and they drove off together."

Mrs. Porter recovered herself. This was a matter which called for silent meditation, not for chit-chat with a garrulous butler.

"That will do, Keggs."

"Very good, madam."

Keggs withdrew to his pantry, well pleased. He considered that he had done himself justice as a raconteur. He had not spoiled a good story in the telling.

Mrs. Porter went to her room and sat down to think. She was a woman of action, and she soon reached a decision.

The errant pair must be followed, and at once. Her great mind, playing over the situation like a searchlight, detected a connection between this elopement and the disappearance of William Bannister. She had long since marked Kirk down as a malcontent, and she now labelled the absent Mamie as a snake in the grass who had feigned submission to her rule, while meditating all the time the theft of the child and the elopement with Kirk. She had placed the same construction on Mamie's departure with Kirk as had Mr. Penway, showing that it is not only great minds that think alike.

A latent conviction as to the immorality of all artists, which had been one of the maxims of her late mother, sprang into life. She blamed herself for having allowed a nurse of such undeniable physical attractions to become a member of the household. Mamie's very quietness and apparent absence of bad qualities became additional evidence against her now, Mrs. Porter arguing that these things indicated deep deceitfulness. She told herself, what was not the case, that she had never trusted that girl.

But Lora Delane Porter was not a woman to waste time in retrospection. She had not been in her room five minutes before her mind was made up. It was improbable that Kirk and his guilty accomplice had sought so near and obvious a haven as the studio, but it was undoubtedly there that pursuit must begin. She knew nothing of his way of living at that retreat, but she imagined that he must have appointed some successor to George Pennicut as general factotum, and it might be that this person would have information to impart.

The task of inducing him to impart it did not daunt Mrs. Porter. She had a just confidence in her powers of cross-examination.

She went to the telephone and called up the garage where Ruth's automobiles were housed. Her plan of action was now complete. If no information were forthcoming at the studio, she would endeavour to find out where Kirk had hired the car in which he had taken Mamie away. He would probably have secured it from some garage near by. But this detective work would be a last resource. Like a good general, she did not admit of the possibility of failing in her first attack.

And, luck being with her, it happened that at the moment when she set out, Mr. Penway, feeling pretty comfortable where he was, abandoned his idea of going out for a stroll along Broadway and settled himself to pass the next few hours in Kirk's armchair.

Mr. Penway's first feeling when the bell rang, rousing him from his peaceful musings, was one of mild vexation. A few minutes later, when Mrs. Porter had really got to work upon him, he would not have recognized that tepid emotion as vexation at all.

Mrs. Porter wasted no time. She perforated Mr. Penway's spine with her eyes, reduced it to the consistency of summer squash, and drove him before her into the studio, where she took a seat and motioned him to do the same. For a moment she sat looking at him, by way of completing the work of subjection, while Mr. Penway writhed uneasily on his chair and thought of past sins.

"My name is Mrs. Porter," she began abruptly.

"Mine's Penway," said the miserable being before her. It struck him as the only thing to say.

"I have come to inquire about Mr. Winfield."

As she paused Mr. Penway felt it incumbent upon him to speak again.

"Dear old Kirk," he mumbled.

"Nothing of the kind," said Mrs. Porter sharply. "Mr. Winfield is a scoundrel of the worst type, and if you are as intimate a friend of his as your words imply, it does not argue well for your respectability."

Mr. Penway opened his mouth feebly and closed it again. Having closed it, he reopened it and allowed it to remain ajar, as it were. It was his idea of being conciliatory.

"Tell me." Mr. Penway started violently. "Tell me, when did you last see Mr. Winfield?"

"We went to Long Beach together this afternoon."

"In an automobile?"

"Yes."

"Ah! Were you here when Mr. Winfield left again?"

For the life of him Mr. Penway had not the courage to say no. There was something about this woman's stare which acted hypnotically upon his mind, never at its best as early in the evening.

He nodded.

"There was a young woman with him?" pursued Mrs. Porter.

At this moment Mr. Penway's eyes, roving desperately about the room, fell upon the bottle of Bourbon which Kirk's kindly hospitality had provided. His emotions at the sight of it were those of the shipwrecked mariner who see a sail. He sprang at it and poured himself out a stiff dose. Before Mrs. Porter's disgusted gaze he drained the glass and then turned to her, a new man.

The noble spirit restored his own. For the first time since the interview had begun he felt capable of sustaining his end of the conversation with ease and dignity.

"How's that?" he said.

"There was a young woman with him?" repeated Mrs. Porter.

Mr. Penway imagined that he had placed her by this time. Here, he told himself in his own crude language, was the squab's mother camping on Kirk's trail with an axe. Mr. Penway's moral code was of the easiest description. His sympathies were entirely with Kirk. Fortified by the Bourbon, he set himself resolutely to the task of lying whole-heartedly on behalf of his absent friend.

"No," he said firmly.

"No!" exclaimed Mrs. Porter.

"No," repeated Mr. Penway with iron resolution. "No young woman. No young woman whatsoever. I noticed it particularly, because I thought it strange, don't you know—what I mean is, don't you know, strange there shouldn't be!"

How tragic is a man's fruitless fight on behalf of a friend! For one short instant Mrs. Porter allowed Mr. Penway to imagine that the victory was his, then she administered the coup-de-grace.

"Don't lie, you worthless creature," she said. "They stopped at my house on their way while the girl packed a suitcase."

Mr. Penway threw up his brief. There are moments when the stoutest- hearted, even under the influence of old Bourbon, realize that to fight on is merely to fight in vain.

He condensed his emotions into four words.

"Of all the chumps!" he remarked, and, pouring himself out a further instalment of the raw spirit, he sat down, a beaten man.

Mrs. Porter continued to harry him.

"Exactly," she said. "So you see that there is no need for any more subterfuge and concealment. I do not intend to leave this room until you have told me all you have to tell, so you had better be quick about it. Kindly tell me the truth in as few words as possible—if you know what is meant by telling the truth."

A belated tenderness for his dignity came to Mr. Penway.

"You are insulting," he remarked. "You are—you are—most insulting."

"I meant to be," said Mrs. Porter crisply. "Now. Tell me. Where has Mr. Winfield gone?"

Mr. Penway preserved an offended silence. Mrs. Porter struck the table a blow with a book which caused him to leap in his seat.

"Where has Mr. Winfield gone?"

"How should I know?"

"How should you know? Because he told you, I should imagine. Where—has—Mr.—Winfield—gone?"

"C'nnecticut," said Mr. Penway, finally capitulating.

"What part of Connecticut?"

"I don't know."

"What part of Connecticut?"

"I tell you I don't know. He said: 'I'm off to Connecticut,' and left." It suddenly struck Mr. Penway that his defeat was not so overwhelming as he had imagined. "So you haven't got much out of me, you see, after all," he added.

Mrs. Porter rose.

"On the contrary," she said; "I have got out of you precisely the information which I required, and in considerably less time than I had supposed likely. If it interests you, I may tell you that Mr. Winfield has gone to a small house which he owns in the Connecticut woods."

"Then what," demanded Mr. Penway indignantly, "did you mean by keeping on saying 'What part of C'nnecticut? What part of C'nnecticut? What part——'"

"Because Mr. Winfield's destination has only just occurred to me." She looked at him closely. "You are a curious and not uninteresting object, Mr. Penway."

Mr. Penway started. "Eh?"

"Object lesson, I should have said. I should like to exhibit you as a warning to the youth of this country."

"What!"

"From the look of your frame I should imagine that you were once a man of some physique. Your shoulders are good. Even now a rigorous course of physical training might save you. I have known more helpless cases saved by firm treatment. You have allowed yourself to deteriorate much as did a man named Pennicut who used to be employed here by Mr. Winfield. I saved him. I dare say I could make something of you. I can see at a glance that you eat, drink, and smoke too much. You could not hold out your hand now, at this minute, without it trembling."

"I could," said Mr. Penway indignantly.

He held it out, and it quivered like a tuning-fork.

"There!" said Mrs. Porter calmly. "What do you expect? You know your own business best, I suppose, but I should like to tell you that if you do not become a teetotaller instantly, and begin taking exercise, you will probably die suddenly within a very few years. Personally I shall bear the calamity with fortitude. Good evening, Mr. Penway."

For some moments after she had gone Mr. Penway sat staring before him. His eyes wore a glassy look. His mouth was still ajar.

"Damn woman!" he said at length.

He turned to his meditations.

"Damn impertinent woman!"

Another interval for reflection, and he spoke again.

"Damn impertinent, interfering woman that!"

He reached out for the bottle of Bourbon and filled his glass. He put it to his lips, then slowly withdrew it.

"Damn impertinent, inter—I wonder!"

There was a small mirror on the opposite wall. He walked unsteadily toward it and put out his tongue. He continued in this attitude for a time, then, with increased dejection, turned away.

He placed a hand over his heart. This seemed to depress him still further. Finally he went to the table, took up the glass, poured its contents carefully back into the bottle, which he corked and replaced on the shelf.

On the floor against the wall was a pair of Indian clubs. He picked these up and examined them owlishly. He gave them little tentative jerks. Finally, with the air of a man carrying out a great resolution, he began to swing them. He swung them in slow, irregular sweeps, his eyes the while, still glassy, staring fixedly at the ceiling.



Chapter XII

Dolls with Souls

Ruth had not seen Bailey since the afternoon when he had called to warn her against Basil Milbank. Whether it was offended dignity that kept him away, or merely pressure of business, she did not know.

That pressure of business existed, she was aware. The papers were full, and had been full for several days, of wars and rumours of wars down in Wall Street; and, though she understood nothing of finance, she knew that Bailey was in the forefront of the battle. Her knowledge was based partly on occasional references in the papers to the firm of Bannister & Co. and partly on what she heard in society.

She did not hear all that was said in society about Bailey's financial operations—which, as Bailey had the control of her money, was unfortunate for her. The manipulation of money bored her, and she had left the investing of her legacy entirely to Bailey. Her father, she knew, had always had a high opinion of Bailey's business instincts, and that was good enough for her.

She could not know how completely revolutionized the latter's mind had become since the old man's death, and how freedom had turned him from a steady young man of business to a frenzied financier.

It was common report now that Bailey was taking big chances. Some went so far as to say that he was "asking for it," "it" in his case being presumably the Nemesis which waits on those who take big chances in an uncertain market. It was in the air that he was "going up against" the Pinkey-Dowd group and the Norman-Graham combination, and everybody knew that the cemeteries of Wall Street were full of the unhonoured graves of others who in years past had attempted to do the same.

Pinkey, that sinister buccaneer, could have eaten a dozen Baileys. Devouring aspiring young men of the Bailey type was Norman's chief diversion.

Ruth knew nothing of these things. She told herself that it was her abruptness that had driven Bailey away.

Weariness and depression had settled on Ruth since that afternoon of the storm. It was as if the storm had wrought an awakening in her. It had marked a definite point of change in her outlook. She felt as if she had been roused from a trance by a sharp blow.

If Steve had but known, she had had the "jolt" by which he set such store. She knew now that she had thrown away the substance for the shadow.

Kirk's anger, so unlike him, so foreign to the weak, easy-going person she had always thought him, had brought her to herself. But it was too late. There could be no going back and picking up the threads. She had lost him, and must bear the consequences.

The withdrawal of Bailey was a small thing by comparison, a submotive in the greater tragedy. But she had always been fond of Bailey, and it hurt her to think that she should have driven him out of her life.

It seemed to her that she was very much alone now. She was marooned on a desert island of froth and laughter. Everything that mattered she had lost.

Even Bill had gone from her. The bitter justice of Kirk's words came home to her now in her time of clear thinking. It was all true. In the first excitement of the new life he had bored her. She had looked upon Mrs. Porter as a saviour who brought her freedom together with an easy conscience. It had been so simple to deceive herself, to cheat herself into the comfortable belief that all that could be done for him was being done, when, as concerned the essential thing, as Kirk had said, there was no child of the streets who was not better off.

She tramped her round of social duties mechanically. Everything bored her now. The joy of life had gone out of her. She ate the bread of sorrow in captivity.

And then, this morning, had come a voice from the world she had lost—little Mrs. Bailey's voice, small and tearful.

Could she possibly come out by the next train? Bailey was very ill. Bailey was dying. Bailey had come home last night looking ghastly. He had not slept. In the early morning he had begun to babble—Mrs. Bailey's voice had risen and broken on the word, and Ruth at the other end of the wire had heard her frightened sobs. The doctor had come. The doctor had looked awfully grave. The doctor had telephoned to New York for another doctor. They were both upstairs now. It was awful, and Ruth must come at once.

This was the bad news which had brought about the pallor which had impressed Mr. Keggs as he helped Ruth into her cab.

Little Mrs. Bailey was waiting for her on the platform when she got out of the train. Her face was drawn and miserable. She looked like a beaten kitten. She hugged Ruth hysterically.

"Oh, my dear, I'm so glad you've come. He's better, but it has been awful. The doctors have had to fight him to keep him in bed. He was crazy to get to town. He kept saying over and over again that he must be at the office. They gave him something, and he was asleep when I left the house."

She began to cry helplessly. The fates had not bestowed upon Sybil Bannister the same care in the matter of education for times of crisis which they had accorded to Steve's Mamie. Her life till now had been sheltered and unruffled, and disaster, swooping upon her, had found her an easy victim.

She was trying to be brave, but her powers of resistance were small like her body. She clung to Ruth as a child clings to its mother. Ruth, as she tried to comfort her, felt curiously old. It occurred to her with a suggestion almost of grotesqueness that she and Sybil had been debutantes in the same season.

They walked up to the house. The summer cottage which Bailey had taken was not far from the station. On the way, in the intervals of her sobs, Sybil told Ruth the disjointed story of what had happened.

Bailey had not been looking well for some days. She had thought it must be the heat or business worries or something. He had not eaten very much, and he had seemed too tired to talk when he got home each evening. She had begged him to take a few days' rest. That had been the only occasion in the whole of the last week when she had heard him laugh; and it had been such a horrid, ugly sort of laugh that she wished she hadn't.

He had said that if he stayed away from the office for some time to come it would mean love in a cottage for them for the rest of their lives—and not a summer cottage at Tuxedo at that. "'My dear child,'" he had gone on, "and you know when Bailey calls me that," said Sybil, "it means that there is something the matter; for, as a rule, he never calls me anything but my name, or baby, or something like that."

Which gave Ruth a little shock of surprise. Somehow the idea of the dignified Bailey addressing his wife as baby startled her. She was certainly learning these days that she did not know people as completely as she had supposed. There seemed to be endless sides to people's characters which had never come under her notice. A sudden memory of Kirk on that fateful afternoon came to her and made her wince.

Mrs. Bailey continued: "'My dear child,' he went on, 'this week is about the most important week you and I are ever likely to live through. It's the show-down. We either come out on top or we blow up. It's one thing or the other. And if I take a few days' holiday just now you had better start looking about for the best place to sell your jewellery.'

"Those were his very words," she said tearfully. "I remember them all. It was so unlike his usual way of talking."

Ruth acknowledged that it was. More than ever she felt that she did not know the complete Bailey.

"He was probably exaggerating," she said for the sake of saying something.

Sybil was silent for a moment.

"It isn't that that's worrying me," she went on then. "Somehow I don't seem to care at all whether we come out right or not, so long as he gets well. Last night, when I thought he was going to die, I made up my mind that I couldn't go on living without him. I wouldn't have, either."

This time the shock of surprise which came to Ruth was greater by a hundred-fold than the first had been. She gave a quick glance at Sybil. Her small face was hard, and the little white teeth gleamed between her drawn lips. It was the face, for one brief instant, of a fanatic. The sight of it affected Ruth extraordinarily. It was as if she had seen a naked soul where she had never imagined a soul to be.

She had weighed Sybil in the same calm, complacent almost patronizing fashion in which she had weighed Bailey, Kirk, everybody. She had set her down as a delightful child, an undeveloped, feather-brained little thing, pleasant to spend an afternoon with, but not to be taken seriously by any one as magnificent and superior as Ruth Winfield. And what manner of a man must Bailey be, Bailey whom she had always looked on as a dear, but as quite a joke, something to be chaffed and made to look foolish, if he was capable of inspiring love like this?

A wave of humility swept over her. The pygmies of her world were springing up as giants, dwarfing her. The pinnacle of superiority on which she had stood so long was crumbling into dust.

She was finding herself. She winced again as the thought stabbed her that she was finding herself too late.

They reached the house in silence, each occupied with her own thoughts. The defiant look had died out of Sybil's face and she was once more a child, crying because unknown forces had hurt it. But Ruth was not looking at her now.

She was too busy examining this new world into which she had been abruptly cast, this world where dolls had souls and jokes lost their point.

At the cottage good news awaited them. The crisis was past. Bailey was definitely out of danger. He was still asleep, and sleeping easily. It had just been an ordinary breakdown, due to worrying and overwork, said the doctor, the bigger of the doctors, the one who had been summoned from New York.

"All your husband needs now, Mrs. Bannister, is rest. See that he is kept quiet. That's all there is to it."

As if by way of a commentary on his words, a small boy on a bicycle rode up with a telegram.

Sybil opened it. She read it, and looked at Ruth with large eyes.

"From the office," she said, handing it to her.

Ruth read it. It was a C. D. Q., an S.O.S. from the front; an appeal for help from the forefront of the battle. She did not understand the details of it, but the purport was clear. The battle had begun, and Bailey was needed. But Bailey lay sleeping in his tent.

She handed it back in silence. There was nothing to be done.

The second telegram arrived half an hour after the first. It differed from the first only in its greater emphasis. Panic seemed to be growing in the army of the lost leader.

The ringing of the telephone began almost simultaneously with the arrival of the second telegram. Ruth went to the receiver. A frantic voice was inquiring for Mr. Bannister even as she put it to her ear.

"This is Mrs. Winfield speaking," she said steadily, "Mr. Bannister's sister. Mr. Bannister is very ill and cannot possibly attend to any business."

There was a silence at the other end of the wire. Then a voice, with the calm of desperation, said: "Thank you." There was a pause. "Thank you," said the voice again in a crushed sort of way, and the receiver was hung up. Ruth went back to Sybil.

The hours passed. How she got through them Ruth hardly knew. Time seemed to have stopped. For the most part they sat in silence. In the afternoon Sybil was allowed to see Bailey for a few minutes. She returned thoughtful. She kissed Ruth before she sat down, and once or twice after that Ruth, looking up, found her eyes fixed upon her. It seemed to Ruth that there was something which she was trying to say, but she asked no questions.

After dinner they sat out on the porch. It was a perfect night. The cool dusk was soothing.

Ruth broke a long silence.

"Sybil!"

"Yes, dear?"

"May I tell you something?"

"Well?"

"I'm afraid it's bad news."

Sybil turned quickly.

"You called up the office while I was with Bailey?"

Ruth started.

"How did you know?"

"I guessed. I have been trying to do it all day, but I hadn't the pluck. Well?"

"I'm afraid things are about as bad as they can be. A Mr. Meadows spoke to me. He was very gloomy. He told me a lot of things which I couldn't follow, details of what had happened, but I understood all that was necessary, I'm afraid——"

"Bailey's ruined?" said Sybil quietly.

"Mr. Meadows seemed to think so. He may have exaggerated."

Sybil shook her head.

"No. Bailey was talking to me upstairs. I expected it."

There was a long silence.

"Ruth."

"Yes?"

"I'm afraid—"

Sybil stopped.

"Yes?"

A sudden light of understanding came to Ruth. She knew what it was that Sybil was trying to say, had been trying to say ever since she spoke with Bailey.

"My money has gone, too? Is that it?"

Sybil did not answer. Ruth went quickly to her and took her in her arms.

"You poor baby," she cried. "Was that what was on your mind, wondering how you should tell me? I knew there was something troubling you."

Sybil began to sob.

"I didn't know how to tell you," she whispered.

Ruth laughed excitedly. She felt as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders—a weight which had been crushing the life out of her. In the last few days the scales had fallen from her eyes and she had seen clearly.

She realized now what Kirk had realized from the first, that what had forced his life apart from hers had been the golden wedge of her father's money. It was the burden of wealth that had weighed her down without her knowing it. She felt as if she had been suddenly set free.

"I'm dreadfully sorry," said Sybil feebly.

Ruth laughed again.

"I'm not," she said. "If you knew how glad I was you would be congratulating me instead of looking as if you thought I was going to bite you."

"Glad!"

"Of course I'm glad. Everything's going to be all right again now. Sybil dear, Kirk and I had the most awful quarrel the other day. We—we actually decided it would be better for us to separate. It was all my fault. I had neglected Kirk, and I had neglected Bill, and Kirk couldn't stand it any longer. But now that this has happened, don't you see that it will be all right again? You can't stand on your dignity when you're up against real trouble. If this had not happened, neither of us would have had the pluck to make the first move; but now, you see, we shall just naturally fall into each other's arms and be happy again, he and I and Bill, just as we were before."

"It must be lovely for you having Bill," said little Mrs. Bailey wistfully. "I wish—"

She stopped. There was a corner of her mind into which she could not admit any one, even Ruth.

"Having him ought to have been enough for any woman." Ruth's voice was serious. "It was enough for me in the old days when we were at the studio. What fools women are sometimes! I suppose I lost my head, coming suddenly into all that money—I don't know why; for it was not as if I had not had plenty of time, when father was alive, to get used to the idea of being rich. I think it must have been the unexpectedness of it. I certainly did behave as if I had gone mad. Goodness! I'm glad it's over and that we can make a fresh start."

"What is it like being poor, Ruth? Of course, we were never very well off at home, but we weren't really poor."

"It's heaven if you're with the right man."

Mrs. Bailey sighed.

"Bailey's the right man, as far as I'm concerned. But I'm wondering how he will bear it, poor dear."

Ruth was feeling too happy herself to allow any one else to be unhappy if she could help it.

"Why, of course he will be splendid about it," she said. "You're letting your imagination run away with you. You have got the idea of Bailey and yourself as two broken creatures begging in the streets. I don't know how badly Bailey will be off after this smash, but I do know that he will have all his brains and his energy left."

Ruth was conscious of a momentary feeling of surprise that she should be eulogizing Bailey in this fashion, and—stranger still—that she should be really sincere in what she said. But to-day seemed to have changed everything, and she was regarding her brother with a new-born respect. She could still see Sybil's face as it had appeared in that memorable moment of self-revelation. It had made a deep impression upon her.

"A man like Bailey is worth a large salary to any one, even if he may not be able to start out for himself again immediately. I'm not worrying about you and Bailey. You will have forgotten all about this crash this time next year." Sybil brightened up. She was by nature easily moved, and Ruth's words had stimulated her imagination.

"He is awfully clever," she said, her eyes shining.

"Why, this sort of thing happens every six months to anybody who has anything to do with Wall Street," proceeded Ruth, fired by her own optimism. "You read about it in the papers every day. Nobody thinks anything of it."

Sybil, though anxious to look on the bright side, could not quite rise to these heights of scorn for the earthquake which had shaken her world.

"I hope not. It would be awful to go through a time like this again."

Ruth reassured her, though it entailed a certain inconsistency on her part. She had a true woman's contempt for consistency.

"Of course you won't have to go through it again. Bailey will be careful in future not to—not to do whatever it is that he has done."

She felt that the end of her inspiring speech was a little weak, but she did not see how she could mend it. Her talk with Mr. Meadows on the telephone had left her as vague as before as to the actual details of what had been happening that day in Wall Street. She remembered stray remarks of his about bulls, and she had gathered that something had happened to something which Mr. Meadows called G.R.D.'s, which had evidently been at the root of the trouble; but there her grasp of high finance ended.

Sybil, however, was not exigent. She brightened at Ruth's words as if they had been an authoritative pronouncement from an expert.

"Bailey is sure to do right," she said. "I think I'll creep in and see if he's still asleep."

Ruth, left alone on the porch, fell into a pleasant train of thought. There was something in her mental attitude which amused her. She wondered if anybody had ever received the announcement of financial ruin in quite the same way before. Yet to her this attitude seemed the only one possible.

How simple everything was now! She could go to Kirk and, as she had said to Sybil, start again. The golden barrier between them had vanished. One day had wiped out all the wretchedness of the last year. They were back where they had started, with all the accumulated experience of those twelve months to help them steer their little ship clear of the rocks on its new voyage.

* * * * *

She was roused from her dream by the sound of an automobile drawing up at the door. A voice that she recognised called her name. She went quickly down the steps.

"Is that you, Aunt Lora?"

Mrs. Porter, masterly woman, never wasted time in useless chatter.

"Jump in, my dear," she said crisply. "Your husband has stolen William and eloped with that girl Mamie (whom I never trusted) to Connecticut."



Chapter XIII

Pastures New

Steve had arrived at the Connecticut shack in the early dawn of the day which had been so eventful to most of his friends and acquaintances. William Bannister's interest in the drive, at first acute, had ceased after the first five miles, and he had passed the remainder of the journey in a sound sleep from which the stopping of the car did not awaken him.

Steve jumped down and stretched himself. There was a wonderful freshness in the air which made him forget for a moment his desire for repose. He looked about him, breathing deep draughts of its coolness. The robins which, though not so well advertised, rise just as punctually as the lark, were beginning to sing as they made their simple toilets before setting out to attend to the early worm. The sky to the east was a delicate blend of pinks and greens and yellows, with a hint of blue behind the grey which was still the prevailing note.

A vaguely sentimental mood came upon Steve. In his heart he knew perfectly well that he could never be happy for any length of time out of sight and hearing of Broadway cars; but at that moment, such was the magic of the dawn, he felt a longing to settle down in the country and pass the rest of his days a simple farmer with beard unchecked by razor. He saw himself feeding the chickens and addressing the pigs by their pet names, while Mamie, in a cotton frock, called cheerfully to him to come in because breakfast was ready and getting cold.

Mamie! Ah!

His sigh turned into a yawn. He realized with the abruptness which comes to a man who stands alone with nature in the small hours that he was very sleepy. The excitement which had sustained him till now had begun to ebb. The free life of the bearded farmer seemed suddenly less attractive. Bed was what he wanted now, not nature.

He opened the door of the car and lifted William Bannister out, swathed in rugs. The White Hope gurgled drowsily, but did not wake. Steve carried him on to the porch and laid him down. Then he turned his attention to the problem of effecting an entry.

Once an honest man has taken to amateur burgling he soon picks up the tricks of it. To open his knife and shoot back the catch of the nearest window was with Steve the work, if not of a moment, of a very few minutes. He climbed in and unlocked the front door. Then he carried his young charge into the sitting-room and laid him down on a chair, a step nearer his ultimate destination—bed.

Steve's faculties were rapidly becoming numb with approaching sleep, but he roused himself to face certain details of the country life which till now had escaped him. His earnest concentration on the main plank of his platform, the spiriting away of William Bannister, had caused him to overlook the fact that no preparations had been made to welcome him on his arrival at his destination. He had treated the shack as if it had been a summer hotel, where he could walk in and engage a room. It now struck him that there was much to be attended to before he could, as he put it to himself, hit the hay. There was the White Hope's bed to be made, and, by the way of a preliminary to that, sheets must be found and blankets, not to mention pillows.

Yawning wearily he set out on his search.

He found sheets, but mistrusted them. They might or might not be perfectly dry. He did not care to risk his godson's valuable health in the experiment. A hazy notion that blankets were always safe restored his spirits, and he became cheerful on reflecting that a child with William Bannister's gift for sleep would not be likely to notice the absence of linen in his bed.

The couch which he finally passed adequate would have caused Lora Delane Porter's hair to stand erect, but it satisfied Steve. He went downstairs, and, returning with William Bannister, placed him carefully on it and tucked him in. The White Hope slept on.

Having assured himself that all was well, Steve made up a similar nest for himself, and, removing his coat and shoes, crawled under the blankets. Five minutes later rhythmical snores proclaimed the fact that nature had triumphed over all the discomforts of one of the worst-made beds in Connecticut.

* * * * *

The sun was high when Steve woke. He rose stiffly and went into the other room. William Bannister still slept.

Steve regarded him admiringly.

"For the dormouse act," he mused, "that kid certainly stands alone. You got to hand it to him."

An aching void within him called his mind to the question of breakfast. It began to come home to him that he had not planned out this expedition with that thoroughness which marks the great general.

"I guess I'll have to get out to the nearest village in the bubble," he said. "And while I'm there maybe I'd better send Kirk a wire. And I reckon I'll have to take the kid. If he wakes up and finds me gone he'll throw fits. Up you get, squire."

He kneaded the recumbent form of his godson with a large hand until he had massaged out of him the last remains of his great sleep. It took some time, but it was effective. The White Hope sat up, full of life and energy. He inspected Steve gravely for a moment, endeavouring to place him.

"Hello, Steve," he said at length.

"Hello, kid."

"Where am I?"

"In the country. In Connecticut."

"What's 'Necticut?"

"This is. Where we are."

"Where are we?"

"Here. In Connecticut."

"Why?"

Steve raised a protesting hand.

"Not so early in the day, kid; not before breakfast," he pleaded. "Honest, I'm not strong enough. It ain't as if we was a vaudeville team that had got to rehearse."

"What's rehearse?"

Steve changed the subject.

"Say, kid, ain't you feeling like you could bite into something? I got an emptiness inside me as big as all outdoors. How about a mouthful of cereal and a shirred egg? Now, for the love of Mike," he went on quickly, as his godson opened his mouth to speak, "don't say 'What's shirred?' It's something you do to eggs. It's one way of fixing 'em."

"What's fixing?" inquired William Bannister brightly.

Steve sighed. When he spoke he was calm, but determined.

"That'll be all the dialogue for the present," he said. "We'll play the rest of our act in dumb show. Get a move on you, and I'll take you out in the bubble—the automobile, the car, the chug-chug wagon, the thing we came here in, if you want to know what bubble is—and we'll scare up some breakfast."

Steve's ignorance of the locality in which he found himself was complete; but he had a general impression that farmers as a class were people who delighted in providing breakfasts for the needy, if the needy possessed the necessary price. Acting on this assumption, he postponed his trip to the nearest town and drove slowly along the roads with his eyes open for signs of life.

He found a suitable farm and, applying the brakes, gathered up William Bannister and knocked at the door.

His surmise as to the hospitality of farmers proved correct, and presently they were sitting down to a breakfast which it did his famished soul good to contemplate.

William Bannister seemed less enthusiastic. Steve, having disposed of two eggs in quick succession, turned to see how his young charge was progressing with his repast, and found him eyeing a bowl of bread-and-milk in a sort of frozen horror.

"What's the matter, kid?" he asked. "Get busy."

"No paper," said William Bannister.

"For the love of Pete! Do you expect your morning paper out in the woods?"

"No paper," repeated the White Hope firmly.

Steve regarded him thoughtfully.

"I didn't have this trip planned out right," he said regretfully. "I ought to have got Mamie to come along. I bet a hundred dollars she would have got next to your meanings in a second. I pass. What's your kick, anyway? What's all this about paper?"

"Aunty Lora says not to eat bread that doesn't come wrapped up in paper," said the White Hope, becoming surprisingly lucid. "Mamie undoes it out of crinkly paper."

"I get you. They feed you rolls at home wrapped up in tissue-paper, is that it?"

"What's tissue?"

"Same as crinkly. Well, see here. You remember what we was talking about last night about germs?"

"Yes."

"Well, that's one thing germs never do, eat bread out of crinkly paper. You want to forget all the dope they shot into you back in New York and start fresh. You do what I tell you and you can't go wrong. If you're going to be a regular germ, what you've got to do is to wrap yourself round that bread-and-milk the quickest you can. Get me? Till you do that we can't begin to start out to have a good time."

William Bannister made no more objections. He attacked his meal with an easy conscience, and about a quarter of an hour later leaned back with a deep sigh of repletion.

Steve, meanwhile had entered into conversation with the lady of the house.

"Say, I guess you ain't got a kid of your own anywheres, have you?"

"Sure I have," said the hostess proudly. "He's out in the field with his pop this minute. His name's Jim."

"Fine. I want to get hold of a kid to play with this kid here. Jim sounds pretty good to me. About the same age as this one?"

"For the Lord's sake! Jim's eighteen and weighs two hundred pounds."

"Cut out Jim. I thought from the way you spoke he was a regular kid. Know any one in these parts who's got something about the same weight as this one?"

The farmer's wife reflected.

"Kids is pretty scarce round here," she said. "I reckon you won't get one that I knows of. There's that Tom Whiting, but he's a bad boy. He ain't been raised right."

"What's the matter with him?"

"I don't want to speak harm of no one, but his father used to be a low prize-fighter, and you know what they are."

Steve nodded sympathetically.

"Regular plug-uglies," he said. "A friend of mine used to have to mix with them quite a lot, poor fellah! He used to say they was none of them truly refined. And this kid takes after his pop, eh? Kind of scrappy kid, is that it?"

"He's a bad boy."

"Well, maybe I'd better look him over, just in case. Where's he to be found?"

"They live in the cottage by the big house you can see through them trees. His pop looks after Mr. Wilson's prize dawgs. That's his job."

"What's Wilson?" asked the White Hope, coming out of his stupor.

"You beat me to it by a second, kid. I was just going to ask it myself."

"He's one of them rich New Yawkers. He has his summer place here, and this Whiting looks after his prize dawgs."

"Well, I guess I'll give him a call. It's going to be lonesome for my kid if he ain't got some one to show him how to hit it up. He's not used to country life. Come along. We'll get into the bubble and go and send your pop a telegram."

"What's telegram?" asked William Bannister.

"I got you placed now," said Steve, regarding him with interest. "You're not going to turn into an ambassador or an artist or any of them things. You're going to be the greatest district attorney that ever came down the pike."



Chapter XIV

The Sixty-First Street Cyclone

It was past seven o'clock when Kirk, bending over the wheel, with Mamie at his side came in sight of the shack. The journey had been checked just outside the city by a blow-out in one of the back tyres. Kirk had spent the time, while the shirt-sleeved rescuer from the garage toiled over the injured wheel, walking up and down with a cigar. Neither he nor Mamie had shown much tendency towards conversation. Mamie was habitually of a silent disposition, and Kirk's mind was too full of his thoughts to admit of speech.

Ever since he had read Steve's telegram he had been in the grip of a wild exhilaration. He had not stopped to ask himself what this mad freak of Steve's could possibly lead to in the end—he was satisfied to feel that its immediate result would be that for a brief while, at any rate, he would have his son to himself, away from all the chilling surroundings which had curbed him and frozen his natural feelings in the past.

He tried to keep his mind from dwelling upon Ruth. He had thought too much of her of late for his comfort. Since they had parted that day of the thunder-storm the thought that he had lost her had stabbed him incessantly. He had tried to tell himself that it was the best thing they could do, to separate, since it was so plain that their love had died; but he could not cheat himself into believing it.

It might be true in her case—it must be, or why had she let him go that afternoon?—but, for himself, the separation had taught him that he loved her as much as ever, more than ever. Absence had purified him of that dull anger which had been his so short a while before. He looked back and marvelled that he could ever have imagined for a moment that he had ceased to love her.

Now, as he drove along the empty country roads, he forced his mind to dwell, as far as he could, only upon his son. There was a mist before his eyes as he thought of him. What a bully lad he had been! What fun they had had in the old days! But that brought his mind back to Ruth, and he turned his mind resolutely to the future again.

He chuckled silently as he thought of Steve. Of all the mad things to do! What had made him think of it? How had such a wild scheme ever entered his head? This, he supposed, was what Steve called punching instead of sparring. But he had never given him credit for the imagination that could conceive a punch of this magnitude.

And how had he carried it out? He could hardly have broken into the house. Yet that seemed the only way in which it could have been done.

From Steve his thoughts returned to William Bannister. He smiled again. What a time they would have—while it lasted! The worst of it was, it could not last long. To-morrow, he supposed, he would have to take the child back to his home. He could not be a party to this kidnapping raid for any length of time. This must be looked on as a brief holiday, not as a permanent relief.

That was the only flaw in his happiness as he stopped the car at the door of the shack, for by now he had succeeded at last in thrusting the image of Ruth from his mind.

There was a light in the ground-floor window. He raised his head and shouted:

"Steve!"

The door opened.

"Hello, Kirk. That you? Come along in. You're just in time for the main performance."

He caught sight of Mamie standing beside Kirk.

"Who's that?" he cried. For a moment he thought it was Ruth, and his honest heart leaped at the thought that his scheme had worked already and brought Kirk and her together again.

"It's me, Steve," said Mamie in her small voice. And Steve, as he heard it, was seized with the first real qualm he had had since he had embarked upon his great adventure.

As Kirk had endeavoured temporarily to forget Ruth, so had he tried not to think of Mamie. It was the only thing he was ashamed of in the whole affair, the shock he must have given her.

"Hello, Mamie," he said sheepishly, and paused. Words did not come readily to him.

Mamie entered the house without speaking. It seemed to Steve that invective would have been better than this ominous silence. He looked ruefully at her retreating back and turned to greet Kirk.

"You're mighty late," he said.

"I only got your telegram toward the end of the afternoon. I had been away all day. I came here as fast as I could hit it up directly I read it. We had a blow-out, and that delayed us."

Steve ventured a question.

"Say, Kirk, why 'us,' while we're talking of it? How does Mamie come to be here?"

"She insisted on coming. It seems that everybody in the house was away to-day, so she tells me, so she came round to me with your note."

"I guess this has put me in pretty bad with Mamie," observed Steve regretfully. "Has she been knocking me on the trip?"

"Not a word."

Steve brightened, but became subdued again next moment.

"I guess she's just saving it," he said resignedly.

"Steve, what made you do it?"

"Oh, I reckoned you could do with having the kid to yourself for a spell," said Steve awkwardly.

"You're all right, Steve. But how did you manage it? I shouldn't have thought it possible."

"Oh, it wasn't so hard, that part. I just hid in the house, and—but say, let's forget it; it makes me feel kind of mean, somehow. It seems to me I may have lost Mamie her job. It's mighty hard to do the right thing by every one in this world, ain't it? Come along in and see the kid. He's great. Are you feeling ready for supper? Him and me was just going to start."

It occurred to Kirk for the first time that he was hungry.

"Have you got anything to eat, Steve?"

Steve brightened again.

"Have we?" he said. "We've got everything there is in Connecticut! Why, say, we're celebrating. This is our big day. Know what's happened? Why—"

He stopped short, as if somebody had choked him. They had gone into the sitting-room while he was speaking. The table was laid for supper. A chafing-dish stood at one end, and the remainder of the available space was filled with a collection of foods, from cold chicken to candy, which did credit to Steve's imagination.

But it was not the sight of these that checked his flow of speech. It was the look on Mamie's face as he caught sight of it in the lamplight. The White Hope was sitting at the table in the attitude of one who has heard the gong and is anxious to begin; while Mamie, bending over him, raised her head as the two men entered and fixed Steve with a baleful stare.

"What have you been doing to the poor mite?" she demanded fiercely, "to get his face scratched this way?"

There was no doubt about the scratch. It was a long, angry red line running from temple to chin. The White Hope, becoming conscious of the fact that the attention of the public was upon him, and diagnosing the cause, volunteered an explanation.

"Bad boy," he said, and looked meaningly again at the candy.

"What does he mean by 'bad boy'?"

"Just what he says, Mamie, honest. Gee! you don't think I done it, do you?"

"Have you been letting the precious lamb fight?" cried Mamie, her eyes two circles of blue indignation.

Steve's enthusiasm overcame his sense of guilt. He uttered a whoop.

"Letting him! Gee! Listen to her! Why, say, that kid don't have to be let! He's a scrapper from Swatville-on-the-Bingle. Honest! That's what all this food is about. We're celebrating. This is a little supper given in his honour by a few of his admirers and backers, meaning me. Why, say, Kirk, that kid of yours is just the greatest thing that ever happened. Get that chafing-dish going and I'll tell you all about it."

"How did he come by that scratch?" said Mamie, coldly sticking to her point.

"I'll tell you quick enough. But let's start in on the eats first. You wouldn't keep a coming champ waiting for his grub, would you? Look how he's lamping that candy."

"Were you going to let the poor mite stuff himself with candy, Steve Dingle?"

"Sure. Whatever he says goes. He owns the joint after this afternoon."

Mamie swiftly removed the unwholesome delicacy.

"The idea!"

Kirk was busying himself with the chafing-dish.

"What have you got in here, Steve?"

"Lobster, colonel. I had to do thirty miles to get it, too."

Mamie looked at him fixedly.

"Were you going to feed lobster to this child?" she asked with ominous calm. "Were you intending to put him to bed full of broiled lobster and marshmallows?"

"Nix on the rough stuff, Mamie," pleaded the embarrassed pugilist. "How was I to know what kids feed on? And maybe he would have passed up the lobster at that and stuck to the sardines."

"Sardines!"

"Ain't kids allowed sardines?" said Steve anxiously. "The guy at the store told me they were wholesome and nourishing. It looked to me as if that ought to hit young Fitzsimmons about right. What's the matter with them?"

"A little bread-and-milk is all that he ever has before he goes to bed."

Steve detected a flaw in this and hastened to make his point.

"Sure," he said, "but he don't win the bantam-weight champeenship of Connecticut every night."

"Is that what he's done to-day, Steve?" asked Kirk.

"It certainly is. Ain't I telling you?"

"That's the trouble. You're not. You and Mamie seem to be having a discussion about the nourishing properties of sardines and lobster. What has been happening this afternoon?"

"Bad boy," remarked William Bannister with his mouth full.

"That's right," said Steve. "That's it in a nutshell. Say, it was this way. It seemed to me that, having no kid of his own age to play around with, his nibs was apt to get lonesome, so I asked about and found that there was a guy of the name of Whiting living near here who had a kid of the same age or thereabouts. Maybe you remember him? He used to fight at the feather-weight limit some time back. Called himself Young O'Brien. He was a pretty good scrapper in his time, and now he's up here looking after some gent's prize dogs.

"Well, I goes to him and borrows his kid. He's a scrappy sort of kid at that and weighs ten pounds more than his nibs; but I reckoned he'd have to do, and I thought I could stay around and part 'em if they got to mixing it."

Mamie uttered an indignant exclamation, but Kirk's eyes were gleaming proudly.

"Well?" he said.

Steve swallowed lobster and resumed.

"Well, you know how it is. You meet a guy who's been in the same line of business as yourself and you find you've got a heap to talk about. I'd never happened across the gink Whiting, but I knew of him, and, of course, he'd heard of me, and we got to discussing things. I seen him lose on a foul to Tommy King in the eighteenth round out in Los Angeles, and that kept us busy talking, him having it that he hadn't gone within a mile of fouling Tommy and me saying I'd been in a ring-seat and had the goods on him same as if I'd taken a snap-shot. Well, we was both getting pretty hot under the collar about it when suddenly there's the blazes of a noise behind us, and there's the two kids scrapping all over the lot. The Whiting kid had started it, mind you, and him ten pounds heavier than Bill, and tough, too."

The White Hope confirmed this.

"Bad boy," he remarked, and with a deep breath resumed excavating work on a grapefruit.

"Well, I was just making a jump to separate them when this Whiting gook says, 'Betcha a dollar my kid wins!' and before I knew what I was doing I'd taken him. It wasn't that that stopped me, though. It was his saying that his kid took after his dad and could eat up anything of his own age in America. Well, darn it, could I take that from a slob of a mixed-ale scrapper when it was handed out at the finest kid that ever came from New York?"

"Of course not," said Kirk indignantly, and even Mamie forbore to criticize. She bent over the White Hope and gave his grapefruit-stained cheek a kiss.

"Well, I should say not!" cried Steve. "I just hollered to his nibs, 'Soak it to him, kid! for the honour of No. 99'; and, believe me, the young bear-cat sort of gathered himself together, winked at me, and began to hammer the stuffing out of the scrappy kid. Say, there wasn't no sterilized stuff about his work. You were a regular germ, all right, weren't you squire?"

"Germ," agreed the White Hope. He spoke drowsily.

"Gee!" Steve resumed his saga in a whirl of enthusiasm. "Gee! if they're right to start with, if they're born right, if they've got the grit in them, you can't sterilize it out of 'em if you use up half the germ-killer in the country. From the way that kid acted you'd have thought he'd been spending the last year in a training-camp. The other kid rolled him over, but he come up again as if that was just the sort of stuff he liked, and pretty soon I see that he's uncovered a yellow streak in the Whiting kid as big as a barn door. You were on it, weren't you, colonel?"

But the White Hope had no remarks to offer this time. His head had fallen forward and was resting peacefully in his grapefruit.

"He's asleep," said Mamie.

She picked him up gently and carried him out.

"He's a champeen at that too," said Steve. "I had to pull him out of the hay this morning. Well, I guess he's earned it. He's had a busy day."

"What happened then, Steve?"

"Why, after that there wasn't a thing to it. Whiting, poor simp, couldn't see it. 'Betcha ten dollars my kid wins,' he hollers. 'He's got him going.' 'Take you,' I shouts; and at that moment the scrappy kid sees it's all over, so he does the old business of fouling, same as his pop done when he fought Tommy King. It's in the blood, I guess. He takes and scratches poor Bill on the cheek."

"That was enough for me. I jumps in. 'All over,' I says. 'My kid wins on a foul.' 'Foul nothing,' says Whiting. 'It was an accident, and you lose because you jumped into the fight, same as Connie McVey did when Corbett fought Sharkey. Think you can get away with it, pulling that old-time stuff?' I didn't trouble to argue with him. 'Oh,' I says, 'is that it? Say, just take a slant at your man. If you don't stop him quick he'll be in Texas.'

"For the scrappy kid was beating it while the going was good and was half a mile away, running hard. Well, that was enough even for the Whiting guy. 'I guess we'll call it a draw,' he says, 'and all bets off.' I just looks at him and says, quite civil and polite: 'You darned half-baked slob of a rough-house scrapper,' I says, 'it ain't a draw or anything like it. My kid wins, and I'll trouble you now to proceed to cash in with the dough, or else I'm liable to start something.' So he paid up, and I took the White Hope indoors and give him a wash and brush-up, and we cranks up the bubble and hikes off to the town and spends the money on getting food for the celebration supper. And what's over I slips into the kid's pocket and says: 'That's your first winner's end, kid, and you've earned it.'"

Steve paused and filled his glass.

"I'm on the waggon as a general thing nowadays," he said; "but I reckon this an occasion. Right here is where we drink his health."

And, overcome by his emotion, he burst into discordant song.

"Fo-or he's a jolly good fellow," bellowed Steve. "For he's a jolly good fellow. For he's—"

There was a sound of quick footsteps outside, and Mamie entered the room like a small whirlwind.

"Be quiet!" she cried. "Do you want to wake him?"

"Wake him?" said Steve. "You can't wake that kid with dynamite."

He raised his glass.

"Ladeez'n gentlemen, the boy wonder! Here's to him! The bantam-weight champeen of Connecticut. The Sixty-First Street Cyclone! The kid they couldn't sterilize! The White Hope!"

"The White Hope!" echoed Kirk.

"Fo-or he's a jolly good fellow—" sang Steve.

"Be quiet!" said Mrs. Porter from the doorway, and Steve, wheeling round, caught her eye and collapsed like a pricked balloon.



Chapter XV

Mrs. Porter's Waterloo

Of the little band of revellers it would be hard to say which was the most taken aback at this invasion. The excitement of the moment had kept them from hearing the sound of the automobile which Mrs. Porter, mistrusting the rough road that led to the shack, had stopped some distance away.

Perhaps, on the whole, Kirk was more surprised than either of his companions. Their guilty consciences had never been quite free from the idea of the possibility of pursuit; but Kirk, having gathered from Mamie that neither Ruth nor her aunt was aware of what had happened, had counted upon remaining undisturbed till the time for return came on the morrow.

He stood staring at Ruth, who had followed Mrs. Porter into the room.

Mrs. Porter took charge of the situation. She was in her element. She stood with one hand resting on the table as if she were about to make an after-dinner speech—as indeed she was.

Lora Delane Porter was not dissatisfied with the turn events had taken. On the whole, perhaps, it might be said that she was pleased. She intended, when she began to speak, to pulverize Kirk and the abandoned young woman whom he had selected as his partner in his shameful escapade, but in this she was swayed almost entirely by a regard for abstract morality.

As concerned Ruth, she felt that the situation was, on the whole, the best thing that could have happened. To her Napoleonic mind, which took little account of the softer emotions, concerning itself entirely with the future of the race, Kirk had played his part and was now lagging superfluous on the stage. His tendency, she felt, was to retard rather than to assist William Bannister's development. His influence, such as it was, clashed with hers. She did not forget that there had been a time when Ruth, having practically to choose between them, had chosen to go Kirk's way and had abandoned herself to a life which could only be considered unhygienic and retrograde. Her defeat in the matter of Whiskers, the microbe-harbouring dog from Ireland, still rankled.

It was true that in what might be called the return match she had utterly routed Kirk; but until this moment she had always been aware of him as an opponent who might have to be reckoned with. She was quite convinced that it would be in the best interests of everybody, especially of William Bannister, if he could be eliminated. There were signs of human weakness in Ruth which sometimes made her uneasy. Ruth, she told herself, might "bear the torch," but when it came to "not faltering" she was less certain of her.

Ruth, it was true, had behaved admirably in the matter of the upbringing of William from the moment of her conversion till now, but might she not at any moment become a backslider and fill the white-tiled nursery with abominable long-haired dogs? Most certainly she might. In a woman who had once been a long-haired dogist there are always possibilities of a relapse into long-haired dogism, just as in a converted cannibal there are always possibilities of a return to the gods of wood and stone and the disposition to look on his fellow-man purely in the light of breakfast-food.

For these reasons Mrs. Porter was determined to push home her present advantage, to wipe Kirk off the map as an influence in Ruth's life. It was her intention, having recovered William Bannister and bathed him from head to foot in a weak solution of boric acid, to stand over Ruth while she obtained a divorce. That done, she would be in a position to defy Kirk and all his antagonistic views on the subject of the hygienic upbringing of children.

She rapped the table and prepared to speak.

Even a Napoleon, however, may err from lack of sufficient information; and there was a flaw in her position of which she was unaware. From the beginning of the drive to the end of it Ruth had hardly spoken a word, and Mrs. Porter, in consequence, was still in ignorance of what had been happening that day in Wall Street and the effect of these happenings on her niece's outlook on life. Could she have known it, the silent girl beside her had already suffered the relapse which she had feared as a remote possibility.