nd were well acquainted with that awful purity. But eye the
Twist and Twinkler party as they might, they could see no trace of
marriage anywhere about it.

On the contrary, the man of the party looked so uneasy that it amounted
to conscious illegality.

"Sisters?" said the chief official, stepping forward abruptly.

"Eh?" said Mr. Twist, pausing in the wiping of his forehead.

"These here--" said the official, jerking his thumb at the twins. "They
your sisters?"

"No," said Mr. Twist stiffly.

"No," said the twins, with one voice. "Do you think we look like him?"

"Daughters?"

"No," said Mr. Twist stiffly.

"No," said the twins, with an ever greater vigour of repudiation. "You
_can't_ really think we look as much like him as all that?"

"Wife and sister-in-law?"

Then the Twinklers laughed. They laughed aloud, even Anna-Rose
forgetting her cares for a moment. But they were flattered, because it
was at least a proof that they looked thoroughly grown-up.

"Then if they ain't your sisters, and they ain't your daughters, and
they ain't your wife and sister-in-law, p'raps you'll tell me--"

"These young ladies are not anything at all of mine, sir," said Mr.
Twist vehemently.

"Don't you get sir-ing me, now," said the official sticking out his jaw.
"This is a free country, and I'll have no darned cheek."

"These young ladies in no way belong to me," said Mr. Twist more
patiently. "They're my friends."

"Oh. Friends, are they? Then p'raps you'll tell me what you're going to
do with them next."

"Do with them?" repeated Mr. Twist, as he stared with puckered brow at
the twins. "That's exactly what I wish I knew."

The official scanned him from head to foot with triumphant contempt. He
had got one of them, anyhow. He felt quite refreshed already. There had
been a slump in sinners the past week, and he was as full of suppressed
energy and as much tormented by it as an unexercised and overfed horse.
"Step this way," he ordered curtly, waving Mr. Twist towards a wooden
erection that was apparently an office. "Oh, don't you worry about the
girls," he added, as his prey seemed disinclined to leave them.

But Mr. Twist did worry. He saw Ellis Island looming up behind the two
figures that were looking on in an astonishment that had not yet had
time to turn into dismay as he was marched off out of sight. "I'll be
back in a minute," he called over his shoulder.

"That's as may be," remarked the official grimly.