ssible, though usually he left his door
locked. He decided to accept the explanation. Later he had occasion to
revise it.

"Much obliged. By the way, on whose authority did you put a shadow on
Judge Enderby?"

"On mine," interposed Marrineal. "Mr. Ives has full discretion in these
matters."

"But what is the idea?"

Ives delivered himself of his pet theory. "They'll all bear watching. It
may come in handy some day."

"What may?"

"Anything we can get."

"What on earth could any but an insane man expect to get on Enderby?"
contemptuously asked Banneker.

Shooting a covert look at his principal, Ives either received or assumed
a permission. "Well, there was some kind of an old scandal, you know."

"Was there?" Banneker's voice was negligent. "That would be hard to
believe."

"Hard to get hold of in any detail. I've dug some of it out through my
Searchlight connection. Very useful line, that."

Ives ventured a direct look at Banneker, but diverted it from the cold
stare it encountered.

"Some woman scrape," he explicated with an effort at airiness.

Banneker turned a humiliating back on him. "The Patriot is beginning to
get a bad name on Park Row for this sort of thing," he informed
Marrineal.

"This isn't a Patriot matter. It is private."

"Pshaw!" exclaimed Banneker in disgust. "After all, it doesn't matter.
You'll have your trouble for your pains," he prophesied, and returned to
'phone Betty Raleigh.

What had become of Banneker, Betty's gay and pure-toned voice demanded
over the wire. Had he eschewed the theater and all its works for good?
Too busy? Was that a reason also for eschewing his friends? He'd never
meant to do that? Let him prove it then by coming up to see her.... Yes;
at once. Something special to be talked over.

It was a genuine surprise to Banneker to find that he had not seen the
actress for nearly two months. Certainly he had not specially missed
her, yet it was keenly pleasurable to be brought into contact again with
that restless, vital, outgiving personality. She looked tired and a
little dispirited and--for she was of that rare type in which weariness
does not dim, but rather qualifies and differentiates its beauty--quite
as lovely as he had ever seen her. The query which gave him his clue to
her special and immediate interest was:

"Why is Haslett leaving The Patriot?" Haslett was the Chicago critic
transplanted to take Gurney's place.

"Is he? I didn't know. You ought