"What an extravagant creature!" she gasped, breathless when after a wasted sixty seconds at most the taxi was en route.

"I had a present from a gentleman friend," said Lily in a self-satisfied voice, adding hastily, in deference to Miss Child's "stuck-up primness," "a filopena present, to choose myself anything I liked with. I thought us bein' in party dress, and you sort o' tired out, a taxi'd be just about the best thing goin'."

This reduced Win to the necessity for gratitude, and after months of the "L," the subway, and the crosstown car, the girl could not help revelling in a taxi. She refused to be depressed by the gloomy spectacle of lower-class New York in the throes of a heat wave—pallid people hanging out of windows or standing at corners to be eased of their torture by the merciful spray from fire hydrants; barefooted half-naked children staring thirstily at soda fountains in bright, hot drug stores they could never hope to enter—every one limp, lethargic, glistening unhealthily with horrid moisture, all loathing themselves and indifferent to each other. Sometimes Win felt that these were her true brothers and sisters, the only ones who could understand, because they were the only ones who really suffered; but to-night she dared not think of them. If she did, because of what they endured she could not enjoy the ice-cream and strawberries in the snow coolness of the artist's borrowed house.

New York not being her own city, its different divisions lacked for her the meaning and importance they had for those at home; therefore she was disappointingly calm when Lily made the taxi stop in front of a house only three or four doors off Fifth Avenue. Miss Leavitt had the fare ready, with a small tip for the driver, and the two were out of the cab, standing in the street, before Win noticed a thing that struck her sharply and quickly as being very strange.

"Why!" she exclaimed, "we must have come to the wrong place. All these houses are shut. Their doors and windows are boarded up!"



CHAPTER XX

THE CLOSED HOUSE

"It's all right," said Lily. "Don't you remember I told you the house was lent to my artist friend by the folks who own it and who've gone away for the summer to the seashore? The front door and windows were boarded up, I guess, like they always are, before the house was lent. My friend lives in the back part, and the caretaker looks after everything, but it's awful nice. You needn't be afraid you're goin' to waste your grand dress. Say, it's some swell street, ain't it?"

Lily talked fast and slid an arm through Win's in the thin silk kimono cloak, encouraging her to mount the steps. But Win objected to being hustled. She paused to look up at the house front which—like all its neighbours except a big, lighted building at the corner, that had the air of being a club—had apparently been put to sleep for the summer months.

The dark-brown facades were expressionless as the faces of mummies. Smooth boards had been neatly fitted into the window frames and made to cover front doors. There seemed at first glance to be no way in, but as Winifred slowly ascended the steps of the fourth house from the corner, she made out the lines of a little door cut in the boards which protected the big one. There was no handle to break the smooth, unpainted surface of wood—old, well-seasoned wood which had evidently served the same purpose year after year—but there was a small, inconspicuous keyhole, and into this Miss Leavitt deftly fixed a key which she took from her hand bag.

"My friend sent me this," she explained, "to save us waiting, 'cause there's only one servant, and he might be busy. Say, this is real fun, ain't it?"

"It's—it's quite like a sort of adventure," Win answered "I had no idea the house would be shut up, or—-"

"It'll make it all the cooler," said Lily. She had got the little door open, and the space between it and the house door it protected could be seen in the street lights, like a miniature vestibule. "Squeeze in and feel around till you find the electric bell," she went on. "Some one'll open the real door, and I can lock up behind us."

"Why lock up?" argued Win, hesitating. "Aren't there others coming?"

"My, yes, unless they're all here. But it wouldn't do to leave a cover-up door like this standing open. If the police happened along and saw, they'd think there was something wrong and make my friend a whole lot of bother."

Win saw the force of this explanation, and stooping to pass through the low aperture, found herself close to a pretentiously carved portal. The electric bell revealed itself to groping fingers, and to her surprise a few seconds after she had touched it, without hearing a sound, the door opened.

In the dimness of a hall or large vestibule the figure of a man loomed black against dark gray. Win could see of him only that he was tall and straight and prim, like a well-trained servant, and his voice was a servant's voice as he said: "Please be a little careful, miss, not to trip. We have to keep it rather dark here, but there's plenty of light inside Let me show you through the hall."

Win thanked him, but turned inside the door to ask: "Aren't you coming, Miss Leavitt?" (They had never been upon Christian name terms.)

"Yes, I'm just turning the key," replied Lily. "Go along. I'll follow."

Win went on through the dusk, dimly seeing panelled walls. She heard the door shut sharply behind her and supposed that Lily had come in, but at the same instant another door opened ahead and a soft wave of rosy light flowed out.

"Walk in, if you please, miss," requested the tall servant standing attentive, and mechanically Win obeyed.

Lily Leavitt had not exaggerated—this was a "swell house," and "cool as snow." The room into which she had been ushered was a dining-room, and at first glance was all one rosy glow—walls, drawn curtains, thick, mossy carpet, brocade-upholstered furniture, lamps and candle shades. The table was a shining bunch of lilies in a garden of deep-red roses seen at sunset, and the glitter of silver and gleam of glass was a bright sprinkle of dewdrops catching the red western light.

It was so long since Win had been in a pretty room or had seen a charmingly decorated table that for a few seconds she lost herself in the sheer joy of beauty. The sunset-garden simile flashed into her mind and pleased her. She was glad that she had come. The guests might be uninteresting, of the Lily Leavitt sort, and the artists might be so called only by themselves. The room might be over-gorgeous by daylight, but it was beautiful thus lighted, with a rosy radiance from above, bringing out the whiteness of damask, the snow purity of camellias crowding a crystal bowl, and the ruby splendour of strawberries piled on their own leaves.

What a wonderful sight after months of the Hands restaurant and free lunches with five-cent chocolate in busy drug stores! Oh, yes, she was glad she had come, and she must look, look, look at this beautiful picture, so that she might remember its details and hold it before her eyes, like a delicately painted transparency, in front of future realities.

But it was in carrying out this intention, in taking in the details, that Win's heart suddenly bounded and then missed a beat. The table had two chairs drawn up to it. It was small and round, and on it only two places were laid.

Win turned her head and looked for Lily Leavitt. Lily was not there, neither was the tall, respectable servant. But a smiling man in evening dress was just coming into the room with the ingratiating air of one who is a little late for an appointment.

"How do you do, Miss Child?" Jim Logan cordially inquired, holding out his hand. "This is mighty good of you!"

A thousand thoughts whirled after each other through the girl's head, like the mechanical horses on a circular toy race course, such as she had often sold at Peter Rolls's. Round and round they wildly turned for an instant, then began to slow down.

This house was closed for the summer. The front was boarded up, and perhaps the back windows also. No lights could be seen, and probably no sounds heard. Two places only were laid for supper. Lily, then, had gone—had always meant to go and leave her here, had been bribed to bring her and go. Oh, but it must have been a big bribe this time, for surely Lily Leavitt would never dare look her in the face again! One of them would have to disappear from the mantle department of the Hands. Was Logan giving Lily enough money to make up for a sacrifice of all those commissions, or did Lily think that after to-night she—Winifred Child—would never come back to Peter Rolls's?

As that question asked itself loud bells jangled in Win's head. She felt as if she were losing her senses. But no, she must not—must not do that. Never in her life had she so much need to keep them all as now, in this locked house, where she had no help to hope for save what her own wits might give, and no one could hear or see what happened to her except this smiling man and his well-trained servant. For all outside this was an empty house.

She steadied herself, the more readily because something in the narrow eyes twinkling into hers said that Jim Logan had expected her to scream and make a scene. Never until now had she imagined it possible to be afraid of him. In the park, when he had stopped his car to follow and speak to her, she had been a little startled, a good deal annoyed. Then, when Ursus had opportunely arrived to frighten him away as easily as the Spider frightened Miss Muffet, she had been impishly amused.

In Toys at Peter Rolls's she had been vexed, irritated, but never hotly angry. The young man's persistence had not seemed serious enough to call "persecution." She had rather enjoyed "shunting" him off upon Lily Leavitt, and thwarting him through Cupid and Earl Usher. It had never occurred to her that behind the unfailing smile and the twinkling gray eyes the brutal ferocity of the animal might lurk.

She had thought that he had forgotten her long ago and turned his attentions elsewhere. What girl, unless silly and Victorian, would be afraid of a dude who lived for the sleekness of his hair and the spick-and-spanness of his clothes? Yet now Win was afraid, and she did not think it was because she had suddenly become silly or Victorian. This aquiline-faced young man with the prominent jaw was looking at her as the primitive brute looks at the prey under his paws, and if he smiled and twinkled, it was but as the primitive brute might purr.

Winifred thought of this, and she thought, too, that when the prey had presence of mind to feign sleep or death the brute was said not to kill, after all.

She did not put her hand into the hand that Logan held out, but neither did she turn to run from him. "This is quite a surprise," she remarked quietly.

"A pleasant surprise, I hope," he suggested.

"A sort of practical joke, I suppose," the girl said.

"Well, yes, that's just what it is," Logan smiled, evidently wondering at her calmness and not sure whether to take it as a good or bad omen. "It seemed to be the only way I could get you to accept any invitation of mine."

"Rather a high-handed way!" said Win, shrugging her shoulders. "Still—here I am. This seems to be a nice house. Is it yours?"

"It's my father's. We're all supposed to be somewhere else for the summer. But I run in sometimes. My servant looks after me. He's as devoted as the servants in books. I pay him to be. There's nothing I want done that he wouldn't do."

"He appears to have made you a very nice supper." Win's eyes rested on the table.

"Nothing could be too good for you. If I've got you here—well, sort of under false pretences—there'll be no false pretences about anything else now I have got you. There's a little surprise in those flowers by your plate. I hope you'll like it."

"A peace offering?" suggested Win lightly.

"Yes. And a love token. You know I've been in love with you, you bewitching thing, just madly in love, since that night in the park. I never rested till I saw you again at Peter Rolls's. And then I knew I couldn't rest until—-"

"Wait!" exclaimed Win, putting out both hands to hold him off as he came close. "Wait—please!" She still spoke lightly. "I'm your guest. I quite understand that 'might makes right!' But there's another law—the law of hospitality, isn't there? This is—a great adventure. Let me get into the spirit of it before you say or do any more. Give me time—to breathe. Where may I put my cloak? Perhaps you've a long mirror somewhere? I want to see if I'm beautiful enough for my background."

Logan yielded to the hands which pushed him away. It charmed him that this tall, spirited creature was taking things in a debonair way. He thought it splendid that she should talk of an adventure and of entering into the spirit of it. If she had made a fuss and tried to escape and refused to eat supper with him, there would have been some pleasure in conquering, but not the same pleasure there would be in a jolly little supper with a pretty girl who gayly acknowledged that the "joke was on her," and then making love to her afterward.

Not that he quite trusted the strange creature yet. She might be like a kitten that submits to be petted while lying in wait for its chance to spring. But this kitten might lie in wait as long as it liked. The chance to spring wouldn't come. By and by the kitten would discover that fact if the hope were in its mind, for he meant business this time.

"There's a room next door my mother and sister use for their boudoir," he said graciously. "It's full of long mirrors, and you can have all the electric light you want, but the furniture's covered up. The dining-room and my den are the only places that are shipshape, I'm afraid."

Logan walked out into the hall and threw open one of the doors that opened into it. "Here you are!" he announced, switching on a blaze of electric light that showed a small room shrouded in white covers. "The first thing you see is a life-size picture of yourself. I guess that's what you want."

"You have guessed right. You deserve a prize," Win answered.

In the lighted boudoir a mirror faced the door.

"Will you give me a few minutes to myself?" she asked. "I may just as well confess that this surprise of yours has—gone to my head a little, as your champagne probably will—when I drink it. The hot weather has been taking it out of me horribly, and I'm not very strong. If I may sit still for five minutes and shut my eyes and think, why—I'm sure I shall be a more amusing guest at supper."

Logan, who had touched the electric-light switch inside the door, stood on the threshold, barring the way. Win did not try to push past him, nor did she show any impatience, nor even eagerness. He stared her in the eyes as if to ask: "What trick do you hope to play, I wonder? Do you think I'm such a blamed idiot as to leave a way out open after all the trouble and expense I've put myself to on your account?"

But being perfectly sure that there was no way out, no trick in her power seemed worth worrying about—unless she had some melodramatic little bottle of poison concealed about her which she would drain and die, like the heroine of an old-fashioned play. He was certain that the brave, vital young creature who had seized his fancy would do nothing of the kind, however, and he felt that it was safe to humour her.

"You can even go to sleep on the sofa, if you like, provided you'll promise to dream of me," he said, "and if you'll let me come and wake you up. Oh, I've caught you looking at the keyhole! There's no key in it, you see, for me to lock you in—or for you to lock me out."

"Neither of us would be so medieval, would we?" she laughed. "That would be a silly way to begin the evening. Now that I am here I am going to make the very, very best of it, I promise you!"

"That's right! You're the girl of my heart!" said Logan, and, stepping away from the door, let her walk into the lighted boudoir.

Gently and slowly, almost coquettishly, she shut him out, smiling into his face until the oak panels had closed between him and her.



CHAPTER XXI

THE TELEPHONE

The boudoir was stuffy and smelled of moth powder With its ivory-white walls and masses of sheeting it looked crudely bright in the glare of electricity switched on by Logan. A glance at the closed bay window showed that outside the glass was a screen of unpainted wood. There was no door save that through which Win had just entered.

All the furniture was pushed against the walls, except a writing-desk with gilded legs, which stood in the embrasure of the big window, and to this the girl ran softly, on tiptoe, across the bare parquet floor. It was covered with sheeting, which she turned carefully back that nothing might be disturbed and, in falling, make a noise. Almost she had reached the limit of her strength and had no breath even to whisper the "Thank heaven!" she felt, seeing what she had prayed to find—a telephone and directory.

It was the hope of this that had upheld her through the scene which already seemed dreamlike. But though telephone and book were here, she was far enough yet from being out of danger. She had not seen the house number, as the boards which covered the front door covered it also. Knowing the street and the name of the man who owned the house (if Logan had told the truth), she could find the telephone number in the book, but it meant a waste of time.

And then, Logan might have lied. This might not be his father's house. Or, if it were, the telephone might have been cut off for the summer in the family's absence. She could not be sure of that till the last moment, for the instant Logan heard her talk he would try to tear her away from the telephone. If only there were a key or a bolt—the frailest, slightest bolt, just strong enough to keep the man out for five minutes! But it was useless to wish for what could not be. She must do her best with the ammunition at hand, and be quick about it, for here was her fort of refuge, and she must hold it while she fired her one shot.

On the desk lay a large tortoise-shell paper knife. That, thrust under the door as a wedge, would be almost as good as a lock. At least she might count on it to protect her for those so necessary five minutes. But if she pushed it through to the other side Jim Logan would see the flat, brown blade stick out like a defiant tongue over the door sill, if he were in the hall keeping watch. Knowing that she could not escape, perhaps he had returned to the dining-room, perhaps he was giving instructions to his servant—perhaps any one of a dozen things, yet she could not count on any of them!

She took the paper knife, and holding it firmly by its carved handle, she put the blade under the sole of her foot and thus snapped it off short.

The thick end, still attached to the handle, was just not too thick to push part way under the door. Win could only hope that it might hold when need came.

Now for the book! As she began turning over the pages she found that her hands were trembling. She had to repeat the alphabet from the beginning before she could remember where the letter "L" came in.

Yes, there was the name—Logan. There were many Logans, but only one in this particular street. With a blunt pencil attached to a small writing-pad she scribbled down the telephone and house number to have them before her eyes, lest in her frantic excitement she might confuse the two in her mind.

These preparations made, the girl's heart quickened as the fateful moment came. The prompt response from Central was heavenly music. The Logan family had not studied economy and cut off their telephone. "Give me the nearest police station quick!" she added to the number, and at the sound of an hysterical note in her voice Logan's hand was on the door knob.

If the wedge failed she was lost. But bending over the desk, the receiver at her ear, she dared not turn to see what was happening.

"You young devil! Let me in, or you'll be sorry all your life!" Logan shouted through the door, giving the heavy oak panels a kick.

"Is that the police?" Win spoke loudly that Logan might hear. She gave the number of the house, then hurried on: "For God's sake send at once. The house is shut up, but by a trick a girl has been brought in by young Mr. Logan. She's in great danger. It's she who is calling—begging for help—quick—quick—he's here!"

Crash! The door flew wide and banged against the wall, Logan almost falling into the room as the wedge shook loose. Slipping on the smooth parquet, he lost his balance for an instant, and before he could reach the girl to snatch the receiver from her hand, she had dashed through the door and into the hall. There she would have been stopped by the servant if she had not dodged under his arm and darted into the dining-room. Once in, she slammed the door shut in the face of Logan's man, and fumbled wildly to turn the key her trembling fingers found.

Something was wrong—or else it was the fault of those shaking fingers. The key would not turn. Win set her shoulder to the door and pushed against the panels with the whole strength of her slim body. But it was not enough. The door gave and pushed her back. Then, realizing that she could not hold it against superior force, she suddenly let go and ran to stand at bay behind the table.

When Jim Logan, all the latent brutality in him wide awake, came bounding over the threshold she faced him across his silver and flowers and glittering glass.

"Come here!" he said in a voice curiously unlike the jovial tones she had known as his.

"No!" she panted. "I'll stay where I am till the police arrest you as a kidnapper."

"You'll not stay!" he flung at her. "If you won't come out of that, I'll fetch you."

The girl stood behind one of the two chairs drawn up to the table and both hands convulsively clutched the high, carved back. But seeing him spring toward her, she lost her nerve for the first time. Trying to make a screen of the chair, she felt the floating gauze of her dress catch on some unseen nail or splinter of broken woods struggled to tear it free, and found herself in Logan's arms. The shrill sound of ripping stitches and tearing gauze mingled with the sharp blow of the girl's palm on the man's ear, and his oath breathed hot on her cheek.

"You fool, do you think I wish to keep you after what you've done?" he blurted out. "All I ask is to be rid of you before those fellows get here. I thought I'd have one kiss—but I wouldn't take it now if you gave it to me. Sims, run down into the basement and let her out that way. Now, you young devil, after him, if you don't want to be choked and buried in the cellar."

Hardly knowing what she did, Win obeyed. Tripping in the rags of her torn gown, she followed the man, who opened a door that led to a narrow stairway. Next came a vague vision of a basement corridor and a disordered kitchen. A minute later she was pushed into a dark area, a door was shut behind her, she was stumbling up some stone steps; then, hurrying along the street as fast as she could go, conscious only that danger was behind her, that she must fly from it and put a long distance between her and that closed house.

If Win had known that the door had shut upon Jim Logan also, and that he had walked out of the house almost on her heels, she would have hurried even faster. But she did not know. And luckily he took the opposite direction, making straight for the New Cosmopolitan Club at the corner, which she had noticed when passing in the taxi.

Hardly five minutes after he had interrupted his guest in her call to the police, Jim Logan was inquiring of the hall porter whether Mr. Fred Fortescue had come in that evening.

"He came, sir, but has gone out again," replied the man, thinking that the immaculate Mr. Logan—one of the best-dressed, best-groomed members of the New Cosmopolitan—appeared to be feeling the heat severely.

"Jove, I'm sorry to hear that," and Logan's expression confirmed his words. "I wanted to see him badly. Let me think. Who else is here? What about Mr. Pindar?"

"Hasn't been in, sir, for weeks," was the reply.

"Gee!" muttered Logan. He seemed worried, and in the brilliant light of the fine hall—white-panelled, and hung with clever caricatures of well-known men—his face was pale and even drawn. He looked, it occurred to the hall porter (a man of imagination), rather like a caricature of himself, not so well coloured as those on the walls. Evidently conning the names of friends who might be useful in an emergency, Logan's eyes were fixed on the stairway, as if thence inspiration or salvation might come. He had the air of having sent his astral body hastily upstairs to reconnoitre the reading and smoking room, but at that minute Peter Rolls, Jr., appeared on the landing, and Logan and his astral body joined forces again.

"Hello, Rolls!" he called out. "You're just the man I want. Will you do me a great favour in a big hurry?"

Petro, whose inmost self had also been absent on some errand, came to earth again with a slight start. "Hello!" he echoed, hastening his steps.

He did not care much for Logan, who had been a classmate of his at college, and whose acquaintance he had not cultivated since. Still he had nothing against the fellow except that he was a "dude" and something of an ass, whose outlook on life was so different from Petro's that friendship was impossible. They met occasionally at the New Cosmopolitan Club, of which they had both been members for some years, and at houses where their different "sets" touched distantly. If they talked at all, they talked of old times, but each bored the other. Petro, however, could never bear to refuse any one a favour, even if granting it were an uncongenial task. This peculiarity was constitutional and too well known for his comfort.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked in a tone polite, but void of personal interest.

"To come home with me quick and get me out of a horrid scrape. No trouble for you—but a lot for me without a pal to see me through. I won't keep you more than a few minutes, if you're engaged anywhere."

"I'm not engaged. But—" Petro began, only to be cut short.

"Come along, then, for the Lord's sake. Tell you everything when we're there." And taking Rolls affectionately by the arm, the other rushed him out of the club.

"House shut up, you know. But I stay there. My man'll let us in the basement way, if you don't mind," Logan explained disjointedly as they hurried along the street to the dwelling four doors away.

Sims, obedient to instructions flung at him over his master's shoulder when the girl had been let out, now awaited Logan's return at the tradesmen's entrance. The two young men were admitted and the door locked behind them. A minute more and they were in the rosily glowing dining-room, where the white table still offered attractive refreshment.

"Sit down," said Logan, and as he said it a great knocking began somewhere.

Listening in surprise, Petro forgot to accept the invitation—which might have been more tempting if he had not, about half an hour ago, finished dinner. Logan repeated the words, however, and even pulled out a chair for Petro, who took it. Logan seized the other, and Petro, following his host's example, drew up to the table. Still the pounding went on, more loudly than before, if possible. It began to seem rather like something in a play when you had missed the first scene and didn't quite understand what it was all about.

"I think, sir, it's some one at the door," calmly announced Sims, raising his voice decorously, to be heard over the noise. "Shall I see who it is, or shall I let them knock and go away?"

"See who it is, and if it's the police, make no objection to their coming in. Be surprised, but not frightened, and say Mr. Logan has a friend supping with him. Savvy?"

"Yes, sir," responded Sims, and vanished.

"No time to let you into this stunt on the ground floor," went on Logan. "But I will as soon as the turn's over. For all sakes, keep mum while I talk."

Before Petro could answer, if he had an answer ready, there were deep voices in the hall. Then the door was opened by Sims, and two plain-clothes policemen stepped briskly in.

"Hello! What's up? House on fire?" exclaimed Logan, pausing in the act of handing a dish of iced caviar to his guest.

"We're not from the fire department," said the elder and smarter looking of the pair, civilly, yet with a certain grimness. "I guess you know that well enough. We've been sent here on a hurry call on your 'phone to the police—a girl supposed to be detained in the house against her will." And keen eyes took in the details of the room.

Logan broke into a jovial guffaw. "Girl? Well, of all—the freak—stunts!" he chortled. "Say, Rolls, are you the great female impersonator? Ha, ha!"

"Sorry to interrupt you and your friend," remarked the detective, still grimly, though he had caught and been slightly impressed by the name of Rolls, as the speaker had, perhaps, intended. Logan as a name also carried some weight in New York. One was not rude to a Logan until sure how far and fast duty compelled one to proceed. "But I gotta ask you straight whether there's a girl in this house, and you'd better answer the same way."

Logan stopped laughing. "Really, I thought at first you were some of the fellows from the club got up in disguise for a joke," he said. "Of course I'll answer you straight. There's no girl in this house so far as I know, and hasn't been since my sister went away with the rest of the folks, 2d of June. I can't think how such a—but gee! yes, I can! The silly old sucker! I bet it's a put-up job."

"What d'ye mean?" the plain-clothes man wanted to know.

"Why, does the name of Frederick Doland Fortescue mean anything to you?"

"We know who he is."

"Well, then, I guess you know he's the champion practical joker of this burg. He was here a while ago—hasn't been gone a quarter of an hour. Went just before Mr. Rolls came in. Asked if he could use the telephone. I said yes, and my servant showed him into my mother's boudoir next to this room. I heard him ring up some one, but didn't get what he said. I noticed when he was through he came out chuckling, and then he was off like a shot—told me he had a date uptown somewhere. That's all I know, but it would be like him to play just such a fool trick on you and me."

"Seems 'twas a woman's voice at the 'phone."

"Gee! I did sort of get onto it, he was mimicking a girl! Sounded kind of shrill, but I didn't pay attention. He's always up to some lark. You're welcome to go over the house, though, if you don't believe me."

"It ain't a question of believing or not," said the detective. "But we'll have to look around."

"All right!" returned Logan, still with that perfect good nature which was having its effect on the two intruders. "Would you rather do the job by your lones, or shall my man show you the way? I suppose you don't mind us going on with our supper if I spare you Sims and we help ourselves to food?"

"You can stay where you are," was the answer.

"Thanks. But when you're satisfied that a mosquito or so's the only live stock on the premises, I should like you both to crack a bottle of champagne with us."

"It wouldn't be quite in order—-"

"Hang order! The police and I are pals. Now you'll do me proud if you'll look in on your way out. Bring the girl, if you find her!" And Logan laughed at his own joke.

"Don't think I've let you in for anything!" he turned to Rolls as the door shut. "They'll find no one, for the good reason that there's no one to find. All the same, I should have been in a mess if you hadn't come right along like a brick and helped me out."

"I don't quite see yet how I have helped you," rather dryly remarked Petro.

"But I guess you're guessing."

"If I've guessed right, I'm not enjoying the joke."

"Then maybe you haven't guessed right! Give me the benefit of the doubt till those good men and true are the other side of the front door, will you? I'm as rattled as they make 'em now! Say, this is a raid, ain't it? Wonder if they've got the Black Maria outside? Can't you eat any caviar? Wish you would. Well, shall we skip along to the consomme?"

"I've just got down my dinner," said Rolls, who was guessing too hard to taste anything with salt in it, in his old classmate's house.

"Well, a little of this champagne cup, anyhow? It's girls' drink, but not bad this weather, and old Sims is a nailer at mixing—-"

"No, thanks, nothing at all."

"You must let me half fill your glass, or those chaps will get onto it that you're playing dummy!" As he spoke Logan poured champagne cup into Peter's tall tumbler and his own. The latter he filled with the ice-cold, sparkling liquid which, as he said, was "girls' drink," and then, seizing the glass, emptied it in one long draft.

It was he who did most of the talking that whiled away time till the policemen returned from their tour of the house; and when they opened the door of the dining-room once more he was eating chicken salad while Peter crumbled toast.

"I don't see the lady!" Logan exclaimed facetiously, with his mouth full.

"Neither did we," said the man who had taken the lead.

"Hope you did the thing thoroughly while you were about it! Garret to cellar and all the rest?"

"You bet we did," returned the policeman, allowing himself the relief of a grin now. "I guess you was right about the practical joke. But you must excuse us if we look behind these curtains."

"Under the table, too!" laughed Logan, jumping to his feet. "Stand and deliver, Rolls!"

Petro obeyed rather reluctantly, feeling that he had been made a fool of, at best, in his stupid wish to be good-natured. It might be a joke, as Logan insisted, but something told him it was not. The look on the fellow's face as he gulped down the champagne cup had not been funny. It was in Petro's mind that he had been brought in to cover up with his presence an unpleasant incident and ignorantly to trick the police.

Of course, if there were a girl in the house, the police would have found her. But—there was something queer. He meant to have it all out with Logan when the police were gone. Meantime, however, he behaved loyally and stood up to leave the table clear while one of the detectives did actually bend down to peer under it. As the policeman stooped Peter mechanically pulled the chair back, and doing so he caught sight of a thin blue streak lying, like solidified cigarette smoke, across the red brocade cushion. In this smoke-blue streak there were little things that glistened—little silver things shaped like crescent moons set at regular intervals from each other. Peter had been unconsciously sitting on the smoke wreath, and as the policeman rose he deliberately sat down on it again. He felt suddenly sick, and his heart was large and cold in his breast, where it did not beat, but floundered like a caught fish.



CHAPTER XXII

THE FRAGRANCE OF FRESIAS

Winifred Child had been in this house, or else she had sold or given the Moon dress to another girl who had been here.

Thoughts were flashing through Peter's brain with the sharp quickness of motion pictures following one another to a far conclusion. Of the girl he could not be sure. The lost dryad, needing money more than she needed a smart evening gown, might well have disposed of Ena's gift. And yet Petro had—strangely enough it had seemed to him then—thought of Winifred and the mysterious "dryad door" on the Monarchic the moment he came into this place.

The perfume of the mirror room was here—the perfume which made all Nadine's model dresses delicately fragrant of spring flowers; fresias, the youngest dryad had said they were; and since then Peter had asked for fresias at the florist's, requested the Scottish head gardener to plant fresias in the garden, and had kept fresias in his room to call back old dreams. If the dryad had sold her dress, would the fresia fragrance haunt it still? Petro thought not. The other woman would have given it her own special perfume. Only in the possession of a dryad would it have retained this scent.

Winifred Child had been here, then—in Logan's dining-room, near Logan's table laid so alluringly for a supper en tete-a-tete!

This idea, passing through several phases, had shaped itself clearly in Peter Rolls's mind by the time the policeman's round black head had come up from under the table. And it was because of the idea that he sat down deliberately on the film of chiffon. He did not want questions to be asked, or Winifred Child's name to be mentioned in this business, at all events, until he had made up his mind what to do.

There was still time to make it up, and speak, if necessary while the detectives were on the spot, for Logan had offered them champagne and they had accepted now they were sure that all parties had been victimized by a practical joker. "Girls' drink" was not for the guardians of New York, and Sims was opening two frosty-looking bottles of the "real thing" just produced from some household iceberg The men would not go for several moments yet.

Winifred Child had listened to Ena Rolls's warnings and had taken them deeply to heart. It had seemed to her impossible that a sister could, for any motive whatever, calumniate a brother whom she loved. And then, Win had reminded herself that her own ignorance of men was profound They were said to be "all alike" in some dreadful ways, even those who seemed the noblest, the most chivalrous—or more especially those. So she had believed Ena's words, against her own instinct, and had not told herself that she lacked her favourite virtue—loyalty.

But with Peter it was exactly the opposite. He trusted his instinct before everything, and though he thought that his lost dryad had been in this shut-up house with Jim Logan, he knew that she had come innocently.

Somehow Logan had met her, admired her (that went without saying), and tricked her into the place. When she had understood the trick she had, of course, tried to get away. (Why, if proof were needed, was not the torn wisp of chiffon enough?) Her quick intelligence had suggested the telephone, and somehow she had contrived to call the police before she could be stopped by Logan.

Yes, that was like her! Then Logan had been scared and let her go, lest she should be found and he should get into disgrace. This was the natural thing for such a man to do in the circumstances, and equally natural that he should dash out to find a supper companion—some accommodating fellow whose presence would account for the table with its two places.

But that he—he, of all men in New York, should be the accommodating fellow found to screen the beast from punishment! This was the astounding thing—the terrible thing—and yet, the providential thing. Through Logan and the coincidence which had brought them together at a certain moment in the hall of the New Cosmopolitan Club, Petro told himself that he would by and by reach Winifred Child. It was a hateful combination of circumstances; but finding her thus would be no worse than discovering a rare jewel in a toad's head.

While the two detectives tossed off their champagne Peter Rolls sat still, his thoughts flashing on behind a face deprived of all expression, as a screen of motionless dark trees can hide the white rush and sparkle of a cataract. His vague contempt for Jim Logan had turned in the last few minutes to active loathing, even to hatred. He wanted the fellow punished, as he would have wanted a rattlesnake to have its poison fangs drawn. He wished to speak out and tell the now laughing policemen the brief story of Logan's hurried visit to the club.

Down would go the half-full champagne glasses on the table. The cheerful grins would be wiped from the two strong faces as by an artist who, with a stroke, changes the expression of a portrait. Peter Rolls's word was at least as good as Jim Logan's. Questions would be asked. Jottings would be made in notebooks. Perhaps they would both have to go to the police station. The girl's name would be demanded; Logan might be forced to tell it. That would be one way of finding Winifred—but it would be a way intolerable.

If only Peter were certain—as certain as he was of her innocence—that she wasn't hidden in the house, he would let the detectives go quietly and get the truth out of Logan himself afterward. But—could he be certain? Had he a right to take such chances when the girl's safety might depend on police knowledge of her whereabouts?

It was reasonable to suppose that Logan had put her into the street after the giving of the alarm and before he ran to the club. Yet he might not have done so. She might be fainting, or even dead. The most terrible, melodramatic things happened every day in New York. One saw them in the papers and felt they could never come into one's own life. Supposing there were some hiding-place?

The fishlike flopping of Peter's heart slowed down as if the fish were losing strength. The thought was too hideous to finish. Yet he would not dismiss it until he had played his hand in the game.

So far he had hardly spoken since the sight of the blue smoke wreath on the chair had set his brain whirling. But when Logan suddenly challenged him to drink a health to the New York police, he took the glass of champagne Sims offered.

"Here's to you!" he said. "I never had such a good chance to appreciate the thoroughness of your methods! By Jove! think of looking even under the table! Now that would never have occurred to me."

"I guess it would," one of the men encouraged him, "if you had our experience. It gets to be second nature to be thorough. We never, so to speak, leave a stone unturned"

"Well, it's mighty smart of you, that's all I can say!" young Mr. Rolls went on. "What do you call being thorough—not 'leaving a stone unturned?' Here, for instance how can you be sure you've looked in every hole and cranny where Mr. Logan might have stowed a young woman in a dead faint, if he wanted to fool you?"

Both men laughed. "You ought to bin with us when we went on our trip around the house!"

"I wish I had! It would have been a sort of experience," said Peter. "I sometimes read detective stories and wonder if they're like the real thing. When you were out of the room I was thinking if we'd had a girl hidden in here—behind the curtains, for instance—we might have sneaked her away when you were upstairs or down in the basement."

They laughed again, patronizing the amateur. "You must take us for Uncle Ezras from Wayback!" genially sneered he who claimed leadership. "We didn't 'both' go upstairs—or in the basement. While I waited in the hall my mate slipped down and locked the door that lets into the area and brought away the key on him. What's more, he did something to the keyhole—a little secret we know—that would have told us if any one had used another key while we were gone. But no one did. Good guard was kept, and if a mouse had tried to slip by we'd 'a' caught it."

"But what if a mouse had tried to hide?" suggested Peter Rolls.

"We'd 'a' found it. There ain't a closet or a pair o' curtains or a shower bath or bookcase or a screen or bureau or table or bed that's had a chance to keep a secret from us—-"

"Did you ever hear the song of 'The Mistletoe Bough?'" inquired the doubter.

"You bet we did. You don't have to show us! We snooped all around the trunk room and rummaged in every box big enough to hold a dwarf. None of 'em was locked, but if they had been—why, we go around prepared."

"You don't look as if you'd done much prowling in the coal cellar, anyhow!" laughed Peter.

"That's because there ain't enough coal in it to dirty a dove," explained the policeman. "Why, we even had a squint into the wine bins and the kitchen pantries and under the sink and into a laundry basket. There ain't a fly on the wall in this house but we wouldn't know its face if we met it again!"

They all laughed once more, and none more loudly than Logan, though he had given Peter Rolls a puzzled glance for each new and apparently aimless question.

"If I wrote those detective stories, I'd use this for a plot," Petro went on; "but it wouldn't be much good to the magazines the way it's turned out. I think I'd have a girl hidden behind a sliding panel, or a picture that came out of its frame, or something, and the hero find her."

"Then you mustn't lay your plot in this house," retorted the officer. "There ain't any pictures a full-sized cat could crawl through, and as for Mr. Logan's panels, they look real nice, but I guess they're the kind you buy by the yard. And there ain't a room with a wall that could open to hide anything thicker than a paper doll."

He earned a laugh again on that climax. Peter said that he would have to go to some old country on the other side to write the kind of story he meant. The men finished their champagne and had more. Then they finished that with a gay health (proposed by their host) to Freddy Fortescue. And at last there was no doubt that the time had come to go.

Logan shook hands with both and pressed gifts of cigars and cigarettes upon them. If Peter intended to give Logan away, now was the latest, the very latest moment. But he said not a word. Satisfied that the girl could not possibly be concealed in the house, her name must not be risked. While Logan accompanied the guardians of the law to the front door, opened by Sims for their benefit, Peter annexed the blue smoke wreath. A splinter of wood (the furniture was only imitation Jacobean) had impaled the rag of chiffon, and almost tenderly releasing it, Rolls folded the trophy away in a breast pocket.

His imagination had not tricked him. The stuff did smell of fresias—which he proved by holding it to his lips for an instant—the very scent that had come out to him whenever the dryad door opened, in reality and memory, the scent he had grown intimate with while the Moon dress hung in his wardrobe during those days when he had awaited a chance to present his offering to Ena!

When Logan came back he turned to tell Sims at the door that he would not be needed again, at any rate, for the present. Then he shut himself and Peter into the rosy glow of the dining-room.

"At last!" he exclaimed, sinking contentedly into the chair opposite Rolls. "I feel as if I'd earned a whole bottle of drink. But all's well that ends well."

"It hasn't quite ended yet, has it?" remarked Peter. "No, thank you, no champagne!"

"Not ended?" repeated Logan, bottle in hand. "Oh, I see what you're at!" and he began filling his own glass, already emptied half a dozen times during the visit of the detectives. "You mean you want an explanation of this hanky panky. Well, I promised it to you, didn't I? I said you must give me the benefit of the doubt till those chaps were out of the house. I hope you have. But I thought once or twice you looked a bit thick, as if you weren't sure what I'd let you in for. But I'm not the kind of chap to get a pal in a fix to save my own face. I'm going to explain, all right. Only first I want to thank you again for—-"

"You needn't," said Peter.

"Sure you won't change your mind and take a little fizz? We've been through some hot work for this weather."

"You have. No—not any!"

"One go at mine, then, and I'm yours. A-ah! that was pretty good. Well—there was a girl, of course. But she came because she wanted to come. Then the trouble began. There was a little misunderstanding about a pearl dog collar she admired in a jeweller's window. She seemed disappointed to find that this wasn't to be the occasion of a presentation. Said I'd promised. I hadn't! I never do promise beforehand to give girls things. Girls would love to have the same effect on your money the sun has on ice. Not that this one's like all the others. She's worth a little expenditure. A real stunner! Any fellow'd be wild over her. An English girl, tall and slim, but gorgeous figure: long legs and throat, and dark eyes as big as saucers. You'd turn and look after her anywhere! A lady, and thinks herself the queen, though she works in a New York department store. I've been running after her since one night we made acquaintance in the park—great chums—called each other Jim and Winnie and held hands from the first.

"But to-night, just because I said I'd never promised a dog collar or anything like one, she went mad as a tiger cat and took revenge by ringing up the police with a beast of a story that I'd kidnapped her. She got it out before I could make her stop, and for just a minute I was in a blue funk. New York's rampagin' so just now on the subject of kidnappers. But I had wit enough to chuck her into the street and run to the club for help. I thought of Freddy Fortescue (by the way, I must get him to stand by me with a story in case he's questioned. I can count on him every time!), but he wasn't in. I tried another man or two, same result, and just then I saw you coming downstairs—ram caught in the bushes."

"For the sacrifice," Peter finished.

"Well, not too much of a sacrifice, I hope," Logan temporized "You don't regret standing by?"

"No, I don't regret it."

"Yet your tone sounds sort of odd, as if you were keeping something back. I don't see why, either. I've kept my promise. I've explained—put the whole story in a nutshell, not to bore you too much with my love affairs gone bad. And what I've told you is the Gospel's own truth, old man, whether you believe it or not."

"I don't believe it," said Peter. "I know it to be the devil's own lie."

As he spoke he rose, and Logan jumped up, hot and red in the face.

"By Jove!" he sputtered. "I don't know what you mean."

"You know very well," Rolls insisted. "I mean—that you're a liar. A damn liar! The girl didn't come here because she wanted to come. And she wouldn't take a pearl collar or a paper collar from you if you went on your knees."

"You must be crazy!" Logan stared at him, paler now. "If you weren't my guest, in my house, I—I'd knock you down."

"Try it," Peter invited him. "This is your father's house, I believe, not yours. And I don't call myself your guest. Neither need you. I'm a sort of out-of-season April Fool. At least, I was. I'm not now."

"I tell you—you're bughouse!" stammered Logan.

"You stand up for a girl you don't know a damn thing about—-"

"I'd stand up for any girl against you," he was cut short again. "But I do know this girl. I won't say how. I know you're the dirt under her feet, and if I hadn't made sure every way that she was out of the house, I'd have set the police onto you as—as I wouldn't set terriers onto a rat."

"You—you can't tell me her name—or anything about her—I'll bet!"

"You won't bet with me. And neither of us is going to speak her name here. Shut your mouth on it if you don't want it stuffed down your throat and your teeth after it. You've been a villain. That's the one thing that stands out in this business. God! do you think you could make me believe anything wrong about that girl—you? Why, if an angel looped the loop down from heaven to do it I wouldn't. Tell me what store she's working in. That's what I want to hear about her from you, and nothing else."

Logan was not red in the face now. He had grown very pale. In truth, he was frightened. But he was angry enough to hide his fear for the present. He determined that Rolls should not get a word out of him.

"That's all you want to hear, is it?" he mimicked. "If you know so much about her, you can jolly well find out the rest for yourself or keep off the grass. I don't intend—-"

The sentence ended in an absurd gurgle, for the hand of Peter Rolls was twisting his high collar. It was horribly uncomfortable and made him feel ridiculous, because he was taller and bigger and older than Rolls. He tried to hit Peter in the face with his fist, but suddenly all strength went out of him. The hated face vanished behind a shower of sparks.

"You're murdering—me!" he gasped. "I've—got—a weak heart."

Peter let go and flung him across the room. He tottered toward the door. And his servant, who had been breathlessly listening outside, opened it opportunely on the instant. Logan saw his chance, as Sims meant him to do, half fell, half staggered out, and the door slammed in Peter's face.

It took the latter no more than thirty seconds to wrench it open again and drag Sims, who was holding desperately to the knob, into the dining-room. "Don't hurt me, sir!" the man pleaded. "I only did my duty."

"Hurt you!" repeated Rolls with a laugh. "Don't be afraid. Where's the other coward?"

"If you are referring to Mr. Logan, sir," Sims replied politely, "he is gone. If you look for him, I think you will find he has quite gone. I had the front door open, all ready, in case it should be needed."

Peter reflected for an instant, and then shrugged his shoulders.

"Let him go!" he said. "I'd as soon step twice on a toad that was hopping away as touch him again. Br-r! This place is sickening. I'll go, too—but not after him."

"Yes, sir, certainly," returned Sims with alacrity, slinking along the hall to the vestibule. "I'll open the front door for you. This," he added with a certain emphasis "will be the fourth time I've done so to-night. Once to let Mr. Logan in, once when the young ladies came, and—-"

"Ah, there were two of them!" Rolls caught him up.

"Yes, sir. And though I did my duty just now helping Mr. Logan—if I may say it, sir, without offence—helping him out of danger, I am ready to assist you, sir, by answering any questions you may wish to ask. I do not consider my doing so disloyal to my employer. My statements won't hurt him, I assure you. And if you would—er—-"

"Would 'make it worth your while,' I suppose you're trying to get out," Peter disgustedly prompted him.

"I have a wife to support, sir, and a child. I keep them in the country, and it comes expensive."

"Give me ten dollars' worth of talk," ordered Peter, "and I'll believe as much as I choose."

He was half ashamed of himself for stooping to bribe the fellow who perhaps, after all, was only trying to delay him. Yet he might have something worth hearing. He could not afford to lose a chance.

"Two young ladies came as far as the door, sir," said Sims, pocketing the greenback, "but only one came into the house—a tall, handsome young lady, different looking from most, with a thin yellowish silk cloak over a blue dress. She walked right in, but when she found her friend was gone she seemed surprised, and the next thing she was in the boudoir telephoning. Mr. Logan went in and she came out. They had a little dispute, I think, and though he'd been expecting her to supper, he told me to get her out of the house as quick as I could. I showed her through the basement, and she walked, rather briskly I should say, sir, down the street, while Mr. Logan went in the other direction—toward the corner, where the club is. As for the young ladies themselves, I can give you no information, except that the one who didn't come in to-night has been here before on several occasions. The one who came in and—er—used the telephone, I have never previously seen. That's all I know which you don't know yourself. But I hope I've been of some assistance to make up for doing my disagreeable duty, sir?"

"I've had ten dollars' worth, thank you," said Peter. "And now for the fourth time of opening that door."

He went out, satisfied that he was carrying with him the only trace of Winifred Child from the shut-up house. To-morrow he would begin with the opening of the shops and look through every department store until he found her.



CHAPTER XXIII

MOTHER

Peter Rolls, as it oddly happened, had run up to New York that hot night in order to see a girl do a "turn" at a vaudeville theatre—an English girl about whom he had read a newspaper paragraph, and who might, he thought, be Winifred Child. The girl's stage name was Winifred Cheylesmore. The newspaper described her as "tall, dark, and taking, with a voice like Devonshire cream."

She was a new girl, of whom nobody had heard, and Peter had been thrilled and impatient. Her "singing stunt" was to be heard at ten o'clock, and Peter had dined at his club, meaning to be early in his seat at the theatre. But a man he knew, sitting at a table near, was a budding journalist, an earnest amateur photographer. He began passing samples of his skill to Peter Rolls, calling out rather loudly the names of ladies snapshotted. Among them was Winifred Cheylesmore, whom he had interviewed. She was no more like Winifred Child than Marie Tempest is like Ethel Barrymore. Consequently Peter gave his ticket away and sat longer over his dinner than he had meant.

If he had started out even five minutes earlier he would have missed Jim Logan and the adventure in the shut-up house. He would not have known that there was hope—indeed, almost a certainty—of finding the lost dryad in one of New York's great department stores.

He was excited, and would have liked to spend half the night walking off his superfluous energy in the streets or the park where that lying beast said he had made Miss Child's acquaintance. Peter would have felt that he was marching to meet the dawn and that the day he longed for would come to him sooner if he walked toward the horizon. But father was in town that night—presumedly at his club, and Peter did not like to leave mother alone. She had exacted no promise—she never did exact promises, for that was not her way. Peter had said, however, that he would motor home after the theatre, and though mother mustn't sit up, she would know that he was in the house.

He determined to keep to this plan, which, of course, would not prevent his returning to New York early enough next day for the first opening of the first shop. He wished there were not so many shops. Unless luck were with him on his search, he might not reach the dryad for days.

In spite of all that had happened, midnight was not long past when Peter tiptoed softly through the quiet house at home and opened the door of his own den. He had expected to find the room in darkness, but to his surprise the green-shaded reading lamp on the book-scattered mahogany table was alight, and there in the horsehair-covered rocking-chair sat mother with her inevitable work. Close by the window was wide open, and the night breeze from over the Sound was rhythmically waving the white dimity curtains.

The sweetness of home-coming swept over Peter with the perfume of wallflowers which blew in on the wind—a sweetness almost as poignant as that of fresias. Half unconsciously he had been wishing to see his mother—perhaps not even to speak, but just to see her placid face in its kind womanliness. It was almost as if his wish had been whispered to her telepathically and she had answered it. She made a charming picture, too, he thought, in the shadowy room where the pale, moving curtains in the dimness were like spirits bringing peace, and all the light focussed upon the white-haired, white-gowned woman in the high, black chair seemed to radiate from her whiteness.

Mother looked up, pleased but not surprised, as the opening door framed her son.

"Howdy do, deary!" She smiled at him. "I thought you'd be coming along about this time."

Peter threw his hat and coat at the whale, whose large, shining surface hospitably received them. Mrs. Rolls's small, plump feet in cheap Japanese slippers rested upon a "hassock" on whose covering reposed (in worsted) a black spaniel with blue high lights. This animal she had herself created before the birth of Peter or Ena, but it was as bright a beast as if it had been finished yesterday. No one at Sea Gull Manor except Peter would have given Fido house room. But he liked the dog, and now sat down on it, lifting his mother's little feet to place them on his knee.

"You oughtn't to have waited up," he remarked, having kissed her snow-white hair and both apple-pink cheeks and settled himself more or less comfortably on Fido.

"I thought I would," she returned placidly. "I like being here. And I had just this to finish." She held up a wide strip of crocheted lace. "It's 'most done now. It's go'n' to be a bedspread for Ena. But I don't know if she—-"

Mrs. Rolls did not finish the sentence, but it was a long, long ago established custom of hers not to finish sentences. Except when alone with Petro, she seldom made any attempt to bring one to an end. It was life at Peter senior's side which had got her out of the habit of trying to complete what she began to say. As he generally interrupted her when she spoke, even in their early years together, she had almost unconsciously taken it for granted that he would do so, and stopped like a rundown mechanical doll at about the place where her quick-minded husband was due to break in.

Peter junior, who never interrupted (though he, too, had a quick mind), knew as well as if she had gone on that his mother meant: "I don't know if Ena will think a homemade coverlet of crocheted lace smart enough for a real, live marchesa, but I feel I should like to make my daughter some bridal present with my own hands."

"Oh, yes, she's certain to. It'll be beautiful, if it's anything like the one you did for me," Petro assured her when the long pause had told him that mother had no more to add. "Just think of Ena getting married!"

"Yes, indeed," sighed Mrs. Rolls. "And it seems only a little while since you were both—-"

Peter knew that the missing word was "children." "Anyhow, she's happy, I think," he reflected aloud, a far-away look in his eyes.

"I guess so," mother agreed. "She'll like real well being a—- I wish—-"

"Marchesa" was easy for Peter to supply mentally, and would have been much easier for him to pronounce than it was for Mrs. Rolls, who had had small education in the management even of her native tongue.

She made dear little, cozy, common mistakes in grammar and other things. Peter adored her mistakes, and Ena was ashamed of them. But in those good manners which are taught by the heart and not by the head, no queen could have given Mrs. Rolls lessons.

As for the next sentence, beginning with "I wish—-" and ending in the air, that was more difficult. Even mother, so placid, seemingly so contented, must have many wishes. And so Petro ventured on a "What?"

"I wisht I could be just as sure you—-"

"As sure that I'm happy?"

"Yes, dear."

Peter had been looking at his mother's feet in those blue Japanese slippers, whose cheapness was rather pathetic. (With all their money, she never enjoyed wearing expensive things herself. It was as if she felt lost and un-at-home in them.) But suddenly he glanced up. The pink-and-white face was as calm as usual, yet her tone had meant something in particular. A chord seemed to vibrate in his soul, as if she had softly, yet purposely, touched it with her finger.

"Don't you believe I am happy?" he asked.

"Not—just like you used to be," she said. Their eyes met as she lifted hers from her work and began rolling it up, finished. She blushed beautifully, like a girl.

Peter pressed both the little feet between his hands, pressed them almost convulsively. He did not stop to think how strong his fingers were, though Logan had had cause to realize their strength two hours ago. The pressure hurt the small toes so lightly covered. And the mother of this strong, though slight, young man gloried in the hurt. She was proud of it, proud of Peter, the one thing in the world she felt was really hers.

"Mother!" he said in a low, tense voice. "What told you?"

"Why—just bein' your mother, I guess. I was wonderin'—-"

"Wondering what?"

"Whether some day you'd say something."

"I wanted to. I wanted to talk to you about—about it all. But I was afraid it might make you sad. I like to think of you always happy, dearest. And I couldn't bear to be the one to chase away your smile I love so much."

"It's thinking of you helps me to smile, Petie," said his mother, reverting to the pet name of his childhood as she stroked his smooth, black hair. "If 'twasn't for knowing I've got you—and your loving me—I do believe I could never smile."

"You're not unhappy?" Peter cried out, startled. It would be a dreadful pain to know that the placid reserve of this sweet, loved woman meant unhappiness.

"Not while I have you. But—-"

"You must go on, dear. Tell me what you feel. We're here together, all alone in the night, talking out our hearts. It seems as if it was meant to be—my finding you waiting here."

"I guess maybe it was, Petie. Something kind of said to me, 'You wait up for him. He wants you.' And I—why, I always want you, boy."

"Darling! We've got each other fast."

"Thanks be, dear! My! You don't know the times I've sneaked in and set in this room when you was away. And even now, if you're go'n' to be out pretty late, I bring in my work 'most always when your pa's out. I generally slip back to my room before you come in, because I know you think I oughtn't to be sittin' up. You mightn't just understand that 'twas because this is my only real home."

"Your only real home? Why, Mother!"

"The rest of the house is so big—and so awful new-fashioned and grand. Not like me a bit," she apologized meekly—but not with the flurried meekness of her apologies to Peter senior. "Here you've saved all my dear old things I had in the days before everything was big. I never can get used to it, and I never will now. It's the bigness, I guess, that's seemed—somehow—to take your pa and Ena away from me—long ago. But I've got you. And you let me come here. So I am happy. I'm a real happy woman, Petie. And I want you to be happy the way you used to be—or some better way, not all restless like you are now. I guess if there was some one you loved different from me you wouldn't make a new life for yourself without a little place in it for mother, would you—just a weenty little place I could come and live in sometimes for a while?"

"I'd want you in it always," said Peter. He leaned up and wound his arms around the plump, formless waist in the neat dressing-gown. "So would she—if there were a she. I hate the 'bigness,' too—the kind of false, smart bigness that you mean. We'll have a little house—she and you and I. For your room will be there, and you'll be in it whenever father'll spare you. But I'm running away in what I used to call my 'dreamobile!' I haven't found her yet. That is, I found her once and lost her again. I'm looking for her now. Mother, do you know what a 'leitmotif' is?"

"No, dear, indeed I don't. I'm afraid I don't know many of the things I—-"

"There's no reason why you should know this. In Wagner's operas, which I don't understand, perhaps, but which I love with thrills in my spine—and that's a kind of understanding—whenever a character comes on the stage he or she always is followed by a certain strain of music—music that expresses character, and seems even to describe a person. Well, wallflower perfume might be your leitmotif. Can't you hear perfume? I can. Just as you can seem to see music—wonderful, changing colours. The wallflower scent's all around us now. It's you. But through it I imagine another perfume. It's here, too. It's been with me for months. Because I've got to feel it's her spirit, her leitmotif. The perfume of fresias. Do you know it?"

"I thought maybe she liked it," mother said calmly.

"What put that idea in your darling head?"

"Why, because you've been havin' fresias planted in the garden—and in your room—as long as they lasted through the spring. You'd never thought of 'em before as I know of."

"You witch! You notice everything. Who'd believe it, you're so quiet?"

"Of course I notice things about you. I wouldn't be fit to be your mother if I didn't. Now, do you feel like tellin' me things about her?"

"I'm longing to," said Peter.

They forgot it was late at night. He told her everything, beginning at the moment when he had plunged through the dryad door and going on to the moment when he had lost, not only the girl, but her friendship, though he said nothing of the Moon dress or the shut-up house. Even then he did not stop.

"I must have done something inadvertently," he went on, "to make her stop liking me all of a sudden. For she did like me at first. There was no flirting or anything silly about it. I felt there was a reason for her changing, and ever since, every day and every night, I've been trying to make out what it could have been. I've thought the idea might come to me. But it never has. That's partly why I'm so anxious to find her—to make her explain. I was too taken aback, too—sort of stunned—to go about it the right way when she changed to me at the last minute there on the dock. Once I could understand, why, I might start with her again at the beginning and work up. It would give me a chance—the chance I once thought I had, you know—to try to make her care. Maybe it would be no use. Maybe I'm not the kind she could ever like that way, even if things hadn't gone wrong. But—but, Mother, it's been just agony to think that all this time she's hated me through some beastly misunderstanding which might easily have been cleared up."

"My poor boy!" the kind voice soothed him. "I guess that's the worst pain of all. I knew there was something hurting you, but I didn't know 'twas as hard a hurt as this. But 'twill come right. I feel it will—if she's really the right girl."

"She's the only girl!" exclaimed Peter. "You'd love her, and she'd adore you."

"Tell me just what she looks like," commanded mother, shutting her eyes to see the picture better.

Peter excelled himself in his description of Winifred Child. "Nobody ever even dreamed of another girl who looked or talked or acted a bit like her," he raved. "She's so original!"

"Why, but that's just what somebody did!" mother cried, throwing off the cloak of her placidity. "Lady Eileen."

"Lady Eileen did what?"

"Dreamed about such a girl. It must have been a real interesting dream, because she couldn't get it out of her head and told me all about it. She saw a tall, dark girl, with wonderful eyes and a fascinating mouth and graceful sort of ways like you've been telling me about. Hearing Lady Eileen talk was almost like seeing a photograph. In the dream you were in love with the girl—English she was, too, like the real one—and ransacking New York for her, while all the time she—-"

"Yes—yes, dear! All the time she—-"

"Lady Eileen said particularly I was to tell you about her dream and let you know she wanted you to hear it, because it seemed kind of dramatic and made her almost superstitious, it was so real every way. But she made me promise I wouldn't say a word unless you spoke first about such a girl as she dreamed of—and told me you loved her and wanted to find her again. If I began, it would spoil the romance, and there wouldn't be anything in it. That was how Lady Eileen felt."

Peter listened, but his spirit had rushed on past these explanations. Lady Eileen had chosen this method of leaving a message for him. It was a strange method, and he did not understand why she had not herself told him of the dream. But she was a kind and clever girl, a true friend. There must have been a good motive for the delay. Loyal himself, he believed in her loyalty and was grateful. But he could not stop to think of her now.

"Where did Lady Eileen see my dryad girl—in the dream?" he asked.

"At father's place," said mother simply. "At the Hands."



CHAPTER XXIV

THINGS EXPLODING

Lily Leavitt did not come back to Mantles next morning. She sent no word, asked no leave for illness—and the rule at the Hands was discharge for such an omission. If she appeared again her place would be filled—unless she had a strong enough "pull" to keep it open.

Win, who arrived promptly, as usual (just as if last night's adventure had been a black dream) heard the other girls talking about Lily. She listened and said nothing; had no opinion when asked what she thought. But not a soul pitied Miss Leavitt. The general idea seemed to be that she was one "who knew which side her bread was buttered." She would not be stopping away without notice unless she had done better for herself. Probably she had secretly married one of those swell beaus she was always boasting about!

Win, pale and absent-minded (but that might be the heat), was giving the finishing touches to a cloaked group of figurines when a letter was brought to her by a messenger boy. It was not yet time for Peter Rolls's doors to open to the world, but the girl had to finish her task before reading the note. A glance at the envelope showed Sadie's handwriting, and as Sadie ought at that moment to have been making the toilets of dolls upstairs, Win realized that something unexpected must have happened.

Perhaps Sadie was ill and wanted her to explain to the management. She must make short shrift with the figurines and be ready to help Sadie before strenuous life began.

Five minutes later five headless ladies in perfectly draped wraps were showing off their finery to the best advantage, and their tiring maid was standing as still as they, an open letter in her hand.

"What's the matter?" asked a pretty, snub-nosed girl who laughed oftener than Win in these days. "You look as if you'd lost your last friend."

"I'm afraid—I have," Winifred replied in a strange, withdrawn voice which made Daisy Thompson's eyes widen.

"Say! I'm real sorry! I hope it ain't your beau."

Win did not answer, because she did not hear. Sadie! Sadie! The dear little old sardine!

"Good-bye, deerie," she read again. "I coodn't of said this to yure fase. I only noo for shure yesterdy. Its cunsumsion and they won't have me back for fere of my giving it to others. I gess thats right tho its hard luck on me. It aint that I care much about living. I dont, becawse theres sum one I love who loves another girl. Shes a lot better than me and werthy of him so thats all right too but it herts and Id be kind of glad to go out. Dont you be afrade of me doing anything silly in the tabloyde line tho. I wont. Im no coward. But I got to leeve this house for the same reeson as the Hands. I mite give my truble to sum one else. Its a good thing we found out in time. Ive hurd of a noo plase where they take consumps for nuthing, and Ive got to steer for it. Its in the country but I wont tell you where deerie or you mite try to see me and I dont think I cood stand it the way I feel now. But I love you just as much. Good-by. Yure affecshunate Sadie."

Win was overwhelmed. Lately she had seen little of her friend. Neither girl had much time, and the weather had drunk all their energy. She ought to have guessed from Sadie's thinness that she was ill. She ought—oh, she ought to have done a dozen things that she had not done! Now it was too late.

But no, it mustn't be too late! She would find out where Sadie was. It ought to be easy, for the verdict which had sent the girl away from the Hands must have been that of a young doctor who attended the employees. There were certain hours when he came to the hospital room which Win had seen on her first day at Peter Rolls's. One of these hours was just before the opening of the shop. Perhaps he hadn't yet got away.

The floorwalker who controlled Mantles was one of the smartest men in any department, somewhat of a martinet, but inclined to be reasonable with those who had any "gumption." Miss Child had gumption, and though it was nearly time for the public to rush in (there was a bargain sale that day) he gave her a permit of absence.

"Nothing worse than a headache, I hope, takes you to the H.R.?" he questioned, scrawling his powerful name. "We need everybody to get busy to-day."

"I'm going to beg for some sal volatile," answered Win, and determined to do so, as even white fibs were horrid little things, almost as horrid as cowardly, scuttling black beetles.

Poor Sadie had giggled the other night: "You stick even to the truth this hot weather!"

The doctor had not gone, but he did not know of the new place Sadie referred to, and, not knowing, didn't believe in its existence. He had told Sadie Kirk yesterday that her lungs were infected and that she had become "contagious." Of course she had had to be discharged. These things were sad, but they were a part of the day's work. It was a pity that Miss Kirk hadn't been longer with the Hands. Her insurance money wouldn't amount to much.

"Do you mean to say that they've sent her away to die and haven't given her anything?" Win gasped.

"Not to die, I hope," said young Dr. Marlow. "She's curable. But she wouldn't get more than a week's salary with her discharge, I'm afraid. Old Saint Peter isn't in this business for his health."

"Or for any one else's," the girl retorted.

Marlow shrugged his shoulders, bowed slightly to the pretty but unreasonable young woman, and went away.

Winifred also should have gone. She had got her sal volatile and her information. But life was lying in ruins around her—Sadie's life, if not her own—and she did not know how to set about reconstructing it.

"What man does she love who loves another girl?" she asked herself.

Then, suddenly, she knew. It was Earl Usher, and he loved her, Winifred, who could never be more to him than a friend.

Win had heard of a "vicious circle." It seemed that she and Sadie and Ursus were travelling in one, going round and round, and could never get out.

"But I must go down," the mechanical part of herself kept repeating.

She had involuntarily paused near the door to think things out in peace. There were no patients for the two narrow white beds, and the nurse—a small, nervous woman with sentimental eyes—was heating water over a spirit lamp. She suffered from headache and had prescribed herself some tea. The water had begun to boil, and despite the throbbing in her temples she hummed monotonously: "You Made Me Love You."

Winifred heard the tune through her thoughts of Sadie and Earl Usher, and it seemed to make everything sadder and more hopeless. But suddenly the singing broke off—the thin voice rose to a shriek, and was lost in a loud explosion.

In the act of going out Win turned, bewildered and expecting horror. Head down, her hands covering her burned face, the nurse came staggering toward the door. Hair and cap were on fire. All over the white dress and apron were dotted little blue tongues of flame that had spouted out from the bursting lamp.

Often such an accident had been lightly prophesied by this very woman. The spirit sent up for the hospital was of the cheapest. Peter Rolls was "not in business for his health!"

Dazed by the deafening noise, and shocked to the very heart by the woman's shriek of pain, Win was not conscious of thought. She did not tell herself to spring to the nearest bed, tear off the covering, stop the nurse before she could rush wildly into the corridor, and wrap her in the blanket. All she knew for a moment was that she had done and was doing these things, that she was using her strength to hold the maddened creature, and all the while calling out for help.

The doctor had not yet reached the end of the long corridor, and the explosion and cries brought him and others running. Vaguely Win was conscious that there were women there, maids who cleaned floors and windows, and that there were two or three men besides Dr. Marlow. She thought that he ordered some of them out and gave directions to others, but the scene sharpened into detail only when she heard herself told to stay and give assistance.

She aiding the doctor, the nurse's burns were dressed. The little quivering creature, hastily undressed, was put to bed, face, head, arms, and hands covered with oil and bandaged. It was not until another nurse—telephoned for from somewhere to somewhere—had arrived, and the invalid had been given an opiate, that Win realized the tingling pain in her own fingers.

"Why, yes, so I am burned a little!" she exclaimed when the doctor asked to see her hands. "But it's nothing to matter. I can go back to work now. Nurse is all right."

"No, it's nothing to matter, and you can go back to work, all right," briskly echoed Marlow, who was no coddler of any hands at Peter Rolls's; "that is, you can when I've patched you up a bit. And nurse isn't going to be bad, either. She won't be disfigured, I can guarantee that—thanks to you."

"Thanks to me?" Win echoed.

"Yes, just that. Perhaps you don't realize that you probably saved her life."

"No. I—I don't think I've realized anything yet." She found herself suddenly wanting to cry, but remembered a day on the Monarchic (as she always did remember if tears felt near) and swallowed the rising lump in her throat.

"Well, don't bother about it. You can get conceited later. Here, drink this to quiet your nerves in case you feel jumpy, and now run along. It'll be all right for you downstairs. The news will have got to your dep by this time and they'll know why you're late."

Win "ran along" and found the doctor's prophecy correct The news had bounded ahead of her.

"I hear you've been distinguishing yourself," said Mr. Wellby, the floorwalker. "Let's see your hands. Oh, I guess they won't put you out of business, a brave girl like you."

"I'm as well as ever, thank you," said Win.

Stupid of her, wanting to cry again just because people were paying her compliments! But perhaps she hadn't quite got over last night and not sleeping at all. And then Sadie's letter. Things had piled on top of each other, but she mustn't let herself go to pieces. She must keep her wits and think—think—think how to get at Sadie and what to do for her.

Dr. Marlow had covered Win's fingers with something he called "newskin," since it would not do for a "saleslady" to disgust customers by serving them with bandaged hands. It was like a transparent varnish and made her nails shine as brightly as those of the vainest girls who spent all their spare time in polishing. But the redness showed through, as if her hands were horribly chapped. She saw a lady who had asked her to try on a white lace evening coat staring at them.

"What's the matter with your hands?" The question came sharply.

"I scalded them a little this morning," Win explained.

"Oh! I'm glad it isn't a disease."

The girl blushed faintly, ashamed, glanced down at the offending pink fingers, and turning slowly round to display the cloak, suddenly looked up into the eyes of Peter Rolls.

She could not help starting and drawing in her breath. For half a second her brain whirled and she thought that she imagined him, that it was just such another vision as those of last night when she had put on the Moon dress.

His eyes were looking at her as they had looked then, and they were the good blue eyes of Mr. Balm of Gilead. It could not be that he was really here gazing at her. It must be some other man like him. But no! He had taken off his hat. He was saying something in the well remembered—too well remembered!—voice.

"How do you do, Miss Child? When you've finished with this lady, I shall be so much obliged if you can speak to me for a minute."

She bowed her head—quite a polite, ordinary sort of bow, just like that of any well-trained saleslady to a prospective customer intending to wait till she was free. But really it did not mean politeness at all. It meant that she had to hide her face, and that it was taking every square inch of nerve force she had to behave in the least like a saleslady.

It was seeing Peter Rolls suddenly—Peter Rolls in flesh and bone and muscle and magnetism of eyes, which told her in a devastating flash a thing about herself she had feared for months—ever since the day she turned her back upon Mr. Balm of Gilead and the Monarchic.

She was in love with him. Hideously, desperately, overwhelmingly in love with him, just as ridiculous girls always were with men they oughtn't to think of. Probably he had tried to make her so at first with his friendly, chivalrous ways that hid blacknesses underneath.

She had escaped, thanks to his sister. And it looked as if those horrid hints had indeed been true, otherwise he would not have troubled to persist after his snubbing. For he had persisted. Some glint of blue light in the steady eyes told her that. This was not a coincidence. Mr. Rolls had the air of having found her at last. She must make him sorry for it. Because, after her experience of the other man who had persisted—though she thought herself forgotten—why should she hope against hope that this man was different?

At last the customer, who did not hurry in the least—rather the contrary—wore all excuses for lingering to shreds, she waddled fatly away, carrying the lace cloak with her; and Win, not shirking the ordeal as she had done when Jim Logan haunted Toyland, turned to Peter Rolls.



CHAPTER XXV

A PIECE OF HER MIND

"Miss Child, I've been looking for you for months!" were Peter's first words when he had her to himself.

Instantly she knew what her pose ought to be. Not prim stiffness, not suspicious maidenly dignity, but just smiling civility, a recognition of past slight acquaintance. This would do for the beginning. This must surely show him that the tactics Ena credited him with were useless here.

"Have you? How nice of you to say so," she braced herself to reply with gayest indifference. "Well, I've been in this store for—a long time, migrating from one department to another and learning the business. I'm quite a fair saleswoman now, I assure you. Are you going to buy a cloak? Because, if not—this is a busy morning."

"Yes, I'll buy one as a present for my mother," said Peter. "I should like you to choose her something. I described her to you once, but I suppose you've forgotten. She's little, and rather plump, and has beautiful white hair and a rosy complexion. But, Miss Child, I want to talk to you, not about cloaks, about yourself. I've asked permission, and they know who I am, and it's all right. I said you and my sister were friends. That's true, isn't it?"

"Oh, yes!"

"I believed we were friends once. And we were, too. The more I've thought of it, the surer I've been. Something happened to make you change your mind about me. I was struck all of a heap at first. I didn't have the sense to know what to say or do, to try and put myself back where I had been. I let you go. And I lost you. But I'm not going to lose you again. You can see how much in earnest I am when I tell you that I haven't stopped looking for you for one single day after I realized you wouldn't keep your promise about writing my sister."

"It wasn't a promise," breathed Win. "I—never meant to write to her."

"I thought so!"

"Why should I? It was very kind of Miss Rolls to suggest it, if I should ever want help. But I didn't want help. All I wanted was to get on by myself."

"I know you mean me to understand from that, Miss Child, that you don't think I've any right to force myself on you after you showed me so plainly you thought me a bounder," said Peter, not mincing his words or stumbling over them. "But I'm not a bounder. There must be some way of proving to you that I'm not. That's why I'm here for one thing, though there's another—-"

"What?" Winifred threw in, frightened, and thinking it better to cut him short in time.

"I want you to meet my mother and let her help you to get some kind of a position more—more worthy of your talents than this."

Win laughed aloud. "You run down your father's shop?"

"It's not good enough for you."

She flushed, and all her pent-up anger against the House of the Hands tingled in that flush.

"You say so because I once had the great honour of being an acquaintance of yours—and your sister's," she hurried breathlessly on. "For all the rest of the people here, the people you don't know and don't want to know, you think it good enough—too good, perhaps—even splendid! It does look so, doesn't it? Magnificent! And every one of your father's employees so happy—so fortunate to be earning his wages. They're worms—that doesn't matter to rich men like you, Mr. Rolls. Unless, perhaps, a girl happens to be pretty—or you knew her once and remember that she was an individual. Oh, you must feel I'm very ungrateful for your interest. Maybe you mean to be kind—about your mother. But give your interest to those who need it. I don't. I've seen your name in the papers—interviews—things you try to do for the 'poor.' It's a sort of fad, isn't it—in your set? But charity begins at home. You could do more by looking into things and righting wrongs in your father's own shop than anywhere else in the world."

She stopped, panting a little, her colour coming and going She had not meant this at first. It was far removed from smiling civility, this—tirade! But, as Sadie Kirk would say, "He had asked for it."

He was looking at her with his straight, level gaze. He was astonished, maybe, but not angry. And she did not know whether to be glad or sorry that she had not been able to rouse him to rage. His look into her eyes was no longer that of a young man for a young woman who means much to him. That light had died while the stream of her words poured out.

For a moment, when she had ceased, they stared at each other in silence, his face very grave, hers flushed and suggesting a superficial repentance.

"Forgive me," she plumped two words into the pause, as if pumping air into a vacuum. "I oughtn't to have said all that. It was rude."

"But true? You think it's true?"

"Yes."

"You have been working here in my father's store for months, and you say I could do more good by righting the wrongs here than anywhere else in the world. That sounds pretty serious."

"It is serious. Whether I ought to have spoken or not."

"I tell you, you ought to have spoken. It was—brave of you. That's the way I always think of you, Miss Child, being brave—whatever happens. And laughing."

"I don't laugh now."

"Not at other people's troubles—I know. But you would at your own."

"I'm not thinking of my own. To-day of all days!"

He wondered what she meant. His mind flashed swiftly back to last night and all that had happened. He could have kissed the hem of her black dress to see her here, safe and vital enough to fling reproaches at him for his sins—of omission. Yet he must stand coldly discussing grievances. No, "coldly" was not the word. No word could have been less appropriate to the boiling emotions under Peter Rolls's grave, composed manner.

He let the baffling sentence go—a sentence which framed thoughts of Sadie Kirk.

"I should like to hear from you the specific wrongs you want righted," he said. "I know a girl of your sort wouldn't speak vaguely. You do mean something specific."

"Yes—I do."

"Then tell me—now."

"You came to buy a cloak for your mother."

"I didn't come for that, and you know it. I came for you. But you put a shield between us to keep me off. When you have emptied your heart of some of these grievances that are making it hot—against me, maybe you won't have to put me at the same distance. Maybe you'll let me be your friend again, if I can deserve it."

"I don't want to talk or think of ourselves at all!" she broke out.

"I don't ask you to. All that—and my mother's cloak, too—you needn't be getting down that box!—can wait. If you won't be my friend, anyhow show me how to help your friends."

"Oh, if you would do that!" Win cried.

"I will. Give me the chance."

Despite his injunction, she had taken from its neat oak shelf a box of summer wraps and placed it on the counter behind which she stood. Now, not knowing what she did, she lifted the cardboard cover and seemed to peep in at the folds of chiffon and silk.

Peter looked not at the box, but at her pitiful, reddened hands on the lid. The blood mounted slowly to his temples and he bit his lip. He, too, was standing, though any one of several green velvet-covered stools was at his service. He turned away, leaning so much weight on the bamboo stick he held that it bent and rather surprised him.

Suddenly the scene struck him as very strange, almost unreal—Winifred Child, his lost dryad, found in his father's store, separated from him by a dignified barrier of oak and many other things invisible! This talk going on between them—after last night! The hum of women's voices in the distance (they kept their distance in this vast department because he was Peter Rolls, Jr., as all the employees by this time knew) and the heavy heat and the smell of oak seemed to add to the unreality of what was going on. Fresias would have helped. But there was nothing here that suggested help—unless you wanted advice about a cloak.

Win had been marshalling her ideas like an army hastily assembled to fight in the dark.

"That is a favour I couldn't refuse to take from you, even if I would," she said in a low voice, "to help my friends."

"It is no favour. You'll be doing me that."

She went on as if he had not spoken.

"I don't know about any shops in New York except this one—only things I've heard. Some of the girls I've met here have worked in other department stores. They say—this is one of the worst. I have to tell you that—now I've begun. There's no use keeping it back—or you won't understand how I feel. There are real abuses. The Hands don't break the laws—that's all. About hours—we close at the right time, but the salespeople are kept late, often very late, looking over stock. Not every night for the same people, but several times a week. We have seats, but we mustn't use them. It would look as if we were lazy—or business were bad. We 'lend' the management half the time we're allowed for meals on busy days—and never have it given back. The meals themselves served in the restaurant—the dreadful restaurant—seem cheap, but they ought to be cheaper, for they're almost uneatable. Those of us who can't go out get ptomain poisoning and appendicitis. I know of cases. Hardly any of us can afford enough to eat on our salaries. I should think our blood must be almost white!

"But nobody here cares how we live out of business hours, so long as we're 'smart' and look nice. When we aren't smart—because we're ill, perhaps—and can't any longer look nice—because we're getting older or are too tired to care—why, then we have to go; poor, worn-out machines—fit for the junk shop, not for a department store! Even here, in Mantles, where we get a commission, the weak ones go to the wall. We must be like wolves to make anything we can save for a rainy day. But any girl or man who'll consent to act the spy on others—there's a way to earn money, lots of it. A few are tempted. They must degenerate more and more, I think! And there are other things that drive some of us—the women, I mean—to desperation. But I can't tell you about them. You must find out for yourself—if you care."