and then I'll be right back."

Five minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing
to Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the
opening.

CHAPTER VI. FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE

1

It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for
Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel
Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel and
having 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into the
dining-room and ordered breakfast.

She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing
of Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the
train. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there had
been a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone just
now. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returning
after all these weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt and
perplexed.

A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always
like this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very different
Gerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened and
restored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and she
needed it.

She was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man,
of whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the
hotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room,
came in and stood peering about as though in search of someone. The
momentary sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. She
had thought how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Now
she perceived that it was Fillmore himself.

Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had
supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course,
your man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the place.
At any rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he had stood in
the doorway looking in every direction except the right one for another
minute, he saw her and came over to her table.

"Why, Sally?" His manner, she thought, was nervous--one might almost
have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience.
Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had become
engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he was
wondering how to begin.