he key, forgets where she hid it, and--O
Tom! after searching for it for hours and making herself sick with
anxiety, she ties up her head in a wet handkerchief with vinegar on it
and--rings the bell for the bell-boy!

He comes.

As I said, he's a prompt, gentle little bell-boy, slight, looks rather
young for his job, but that very youth and innocence of his make him
such a fellow to trust!

"Nat," says Mrs. Kingdon, tearfully pressing half a dollar into the
nice lad's hand, "I--I've lost something and I want you to--to help me
find it."

"Yes'm," says Nat. He's the soul of politeness.

"It must be here--it must be in this room," says the lady, getting wild
with the terror of losing. "I'm sure--positive--that I went straight
to the shoe-bag and slipped it in there. And now I can't find it, and
I must have it before I go out this afternoon for--for a very special
reason. My daughter Evelyn will be home to-morrow and--why don't you
look for it?"

"What is it, ma'am?"

"I told you once. My key--a little flat key that locks--a box I've
got," she finishes distrustfully.

"Have you looked in the shoe-bag, ma'am?"

"Why, of course I have, you little stupid. I want you to hunt other
places where I can't easily get. There are other places I might have
put it, but I'm positive it was in the shoe-bag."

Well, I looked for that key. Where? Where not? I looked under the
rubbish in the waste-paper basket; Mrs. Kingdon often fooled thieves by
dropping it there. I pulled up the corner of the carpet and looked
there--it was loose; it had often been used for a hiding-place. I
looked in Miss Evelyn's boot and in her ribbon box. I emptied Mrs.
Kingdon's full powder box. I climbed ladders and felt along cornices.
I looked through the pockets of Mrs. Kingdon's gowns--a clever bell-boy
it takes to find a woman's pocket, but even the real masculine ones
among 'em are half feminine; they've had so much to do with women.

I rummaged through her writing-desk, and, in searching a gold-cornered
pad, found a note from Moriway hidden under the corner. I hid it again
carefully--in my coat pocket. A love-letter from Moriway, to a woman
twenty years older than himself--'tain't a bad lay, Tom Dorgan, but you
needn't try it.

At first she watched every move I made, but later, as her headache grew
worse, she got desperate. So then I put my hand down into the shoe-bag
and found the key, where it had slipped under a fold of c