on. It's always a
woman's strongest weapon. And it wins in the end."

"I shall try, K.," she answered obediently.

But he turned away from the look in her eyes.

Harriet was abroad. She had sent cards from Paris to her "trade." It was
an innovation. The two or three people on the Street who received her
engraved announcement that she was there, "buying new chic models
for the autumn and winter--afternoon frocks, evening gowns, reception
dresses, and wraps, from Poiret, Martial et Armand, and others," left
the envelopes casually on the parlor table, as if communications from
Paris were quite to be expected.

So K. lunched alone, and ate little. After luncheon he fixed a broken
ironing-stand for Katie, and in return she pressed a pair of trousers
for him. He had it in mind to ask Sidney to go out with him in Max's
car, and his most presentable suit was very shabby.

"I'm thinking," said Katie, when she brought the pressed garments up
over her arm and passed them in through a discreet crack in the door,
"that these pants will stand more walking than sitting, Mr. K. They're
getting mighty thin."

"I'll take a duster along in case of accident," he promised her; "and
to-morrow I'll order a suit, Katie."

"I'll believe it when I see it," said Katie from the stairs. "Some fool
of a woman from the alley will come in to-night and tell you she can't
pay her rent, and she'll take your suit away in her pocket-book--as like
as not to pay an installment on a piano. There's two new pianos in the
alley since you came here."

"I promise it, Katie."

"Show it to me," said Katie laconically. "And don't go to picking up
anything you drop!"

Sidney came home at half-past two--came delicately flushed, as if she
had hurried, and with a tremulous smile that caught Katie's eye at once.

"Bless the child!" she said. "There's no need to ask how he is to-day.
You're all one smile."

The smile set just a trifle.

"Katie, some one has written my name out on the street, in chalk. It's
with Dr. Wilson's, and it looks so silly. Please go out and sweep it
off."

"I'm about crazy with their old chalk. I'll do it after a while."

"Please do it now. I don't want anyone to see it. Is--is Mr. K.
upstairs?"

But when she learned that K. was upstairs, oddly enough, she did not go
up at once. She stood in the lower hall and listened. Yes, he was
there. She could hear him moving about. Her lips parted slightly as she
listened.

Christine,