ouse?"

"I mean she hasn't come yet."

As she spoke Ralph felt a sudden strength and hardness in his brain and
body. Everything in him became as clear as noon.

"But it was before Miss Hicks left that you told me you'd sent for her,
and that she'd be here the following week. And you say Miss Hicks has
been gone three weeks."

This was what he had worked out in his head, and what he meant to say
to his sister; but something seemed to snap shut in his throat, and he
closed his eyes without speaking.

Even when Mr. Spragg came to see him he said nothing. They talked about
his illness, about the hot weather, about the rumours that Harmon B.
Driscoll was again threatened with indictment; and then Mr. Spragg
pulled himself out of his chair and said: "I presume you'll call round
at the office before you leave the city."

"Oh, yes: as soon as I'm up," Ralph answered. They understood each
other.

Clare had urged him to come down to Long Island and complete his
convalescence there, but he preferred to stay in Washington Square till
he should be strong enough for the journey to the Adirondacks, whither
Laura had already preceded him with Paul. He did not want to see any
one but his mother and grandfather till his legs could carry him to Mr.
Spragg's office. It was an oppressive day in mid-August, with a
yellow mist of heat in the sky, when at last he entered the big
office-building. Swirls of dust lay on the mosaic floor, and a stale
smell of decayed fruit and salt air and steaming asphalt filled the
place like a fog. As he shot up in the elevator some one slapped him
on the back, and turning he saw Elmer Moffatt at his side, smooth and
rubicund under a new straw hat.

Moffatt was loudly glad to see him. "I haven't laid eyes on you for
months. At the old stand still?"

"So am I," he added, as Ralph assented. "Hope to see you there again
some day. Don't forget it's MY turn this time: glad if I can be any use
to you. So long." Ralph's weak bones ached under his handshake.

"How's Mrs. Marvell?" he turned back from his landing to call out; and
Ralph answered: "Thanks; she's very well."

Mr. Spragg sat alone in his murky inner office, the fly-blown engraving
of Daniel Webster above his head and the congested scrap-basket beneath
his feet. He looked fagged and sallow, like the day.

Ralph sat down on the other side of the desk. For a moment his throat
contracted as it had when he had tried to question his sister; then he