ng decent and law-abiding and all like that, what with the
police keeping tabs and the neighbourhood not being Fifth Avenoo
either!--and this jinx wished on me--"

"Please--"

"Oh, I suppose you ain't a-goin' to stay here now that you've learned
all about these goin's on and all like that--"

"_Please_ wait!"--for the voluble landlady was already beginning to
sniffle;--"I am perfectly willing to stay, Mrs. Meehan,--if you will
promise to be a little patient about my rent until I secure a
position--"

"Oh, I will, Miss Greensleeve! I ain't plannin' to press you none! I
know how it is with money and with young ladies. Easy come, easy go!
Just give me what you can. I ain't fixed any too good myself, what
with butchers and bakers and rent owed me and all like that. I guess I
can trust you to act fair and square--"

"Yes; I am square--so far."

Mrs. Meehan began to sob, partly with relief, partly with a general
tendency to sentimental hysteria: "I can see that, dearie. And say--if
you're quiet, I ain't peekin' around corners and through key-holes.
No, Miss Greensleeve; that ain't my style! Quiet behaved young ladies
can have their company without me saying nothing to nobody. All I ask
is that no lady will cut up flossy in any shape, form, or manner, but
behave genteel and refined to one and all. I don't want no policeman
in the area. That ain't much to ask, is it?" she gasped, fairly out of
breath between eloquence and tears.

"No," said Athalie with a faint smile, "it isn't much to ask."

And so the agreement was concluded; Mrs. Meehan brought in fresh linen
for bed and bathroom, pulled out the new bureau drawers and dusted
them, carried away a few anaemic geraniums in pots, and swept the new
hardwood floor with a dry mop, explaining that the entire apartment
had been renovated and redecorated since the tragic episode of last
August, and that all the furniture was brand new.

"Her trunks and clothes and all like that was took by the police,"
explained Mrs. Meehan, "but she left some rubbish behind a sliding
panel which they didn't find. I found it and I put it on the top shelf
in the closet--"

She dragged a chair thither, mounted it, and presently came trotting
back to the front room, carrying in both arms a bulky box of green
morocco and a large paper parcel bursting with odds and ends of tinsel
and silk. These she dumped on the centre table, saying: "She had a
cabinet-maker fix up a cupboard in the baseboard