gown of silk and a pair of horn-rimmed
spectacles gave him a look of owlish wisdom, with a touch of the owl's
futility of expression, likewise. He rose, as usual, with all his
courtesy. She thought at first, as he showed her to a chair, that he was
going to take his usual damnable tack of pretended ignorance in order to
see how much she would confess. However, tonight this was not his plan
of battle.

The moment she was seated, he removed his spectacles, drew a chair close
to hers and sat down, leaning far forward. "Now, my dear, foolish girl,"
said the master thief, smiling benevolently upon her, "what have you
been doing tonight to make us all miserable?"

She knew at once that he was aware of every move she had made, from the
first to the last. It gave her firmness to tell the lie with suavity.
"It's a queer yarn, John," she said.

"I'm used to queer yarns," he answered. "But where have you been all
this time? It was only to take five minutes, I thought."

She made herself laugh. "That's because you don't know Ronicky Doone,
John."

"I'm getting to know him, however," said the master. "And, before I'm
done, I hope to know him very well indeed."

"Well, he has a persuasive tongue."

"I think I noticed that for myself."

"And, when he told me how poor Bill Gregg had come clear across the
continent--"

"No wonder you were touched, my dear. New Yorkers won't travel so far,
will they? Not for a girl, I mean."

"Hardly! But Ronicky Doone made it such a sad affair that I promised I'd
go across and see Bill Gregg."

"Not in his room?"

"I knew you wouldn't let him come to see me here."

"Never presuppose what I'll do. But go on--I'm interested--very. Just as
much as if Ronicky Doone himself were telling me."

She eyed him shrewdly, but, if there were any deception in him, he hid
it well. She could not find the double meaning that must have been
behind his words. "I went there, however," she said, "because I was
sorry for him, John. If you had seen you'd have been sorry, too, or else
you would have laughed; I could hardly keep from it at first."

"I suppose he took you in his arms at once?"

"I think he wanted to. Then, of course, I told him at once why I had
come."

"Which was?"

"Simply that it was absurd for him to stay about and persecute me; that
the letters I wrote him were simply written for fun, when I was doing
some of my cousin's work at the correspondence schools; that the best
thing he co