left of me, after missing the luxe and travelling for
about seventeen years in any sort of old train I could get," she replied
with elaborate nonchalance. "Kindly don't stare as if I were Banquo's
ghost or something. I'm so tired and dusty and desperately hungry that
if you don't grin at once I shall dissolve in tears."

She held out both hands, and Jim, aching to seize her in his arms and
kiss her breath away, took the extended hands as if they had been marked
"dangerous."

"Where's your father?" was his first question.

"In New York, as far as I know."

"Great Scott! you haven't come here from Scotland alone?"

"I thought I had, but if you say I haven't, perhaps I've been attended
by spirit chaperons."

"My--dear girl, what has possessed you? You are looking impish. What
have you come for?"

"Partly to see my darling, precious Mary Grant and criticise her Prince.
Partly----"

"Well?"

"Why does your face suddenly look as if you suspected me of criminal
intentions?"

"Don't keep me in suspense, my dear goose!"

"Why not 'duck?' It's a day for ducks. Only you're so afraid of paying
me compliments. I see you think you know why I've come. Tell me at once,
or I won't play. Be frank."

"You really want frankness?"

"Of course. I'm afraid of nothing."

"Well, then--er--I couldn't help seeing in New York that you and Dick
Carleton----"

"Good gracious! if I'm a goose, what _are_ you? There's no word for it.
Dick and I flirted--naturally. What are girls and men for?"

"I supposed this was more serious."

"Then you supposed wrong, as you generally have about me. I can't even
_think_ seriously of youths. Let Dick--fly."

Jim laughed out almost boyishly. "That's what I have let him do. Of
course you know he's been visiting me--but he's gone with his _Flying
Fish_."

"So Mary Grant wrote in the one letter I've had from her. That's partly
why I came straight to you. I thought you could tell me whether she was
still in the bosom of her Princess Della Robbia, where she said she was
going to visit for a few days."

"I believe she's still there. But you haven't told me yet the second
part of your reason for coming out here--alone."

"It's not quite as simple to explain as the first part. But it is just
as important. My most intimate Me forced me to start, the minute I got a
letter from Dad saying he couldn't get away from New York till the end
of May, and I must wait for him quietly at the convent. I haven