an. Don't you understand?"

"Yes, I think so," she muttered. "It is not a new situation. But I--no
friend, man or girl, could avail in a case like that." She paused a
moment clasping and unclasping her hands. I waited.

"Who is this--this woman?" she blurted out at last.

I hesitated.

"A lady. You--you put me at a disadvantage."

"What is her name?" she insisted.

"Marcia Van Wyck," I muttered.

"Marcia! Surely--" She stopped. A look of bewilderment came over her
face, ending with a frown of perplexity.

"No," she murmured. "He wouldn't understand Marcia. I--" And then with
a gasp, "And you want _me_ to interfere? Mr. Canby, I--"

"Just a moment, please. I ask nothing that you cannot do. I have
thought of a plan. We are alone at the Manor. I ask you to meet Jerry
as you met him there last summer along by the Sweetwater. I am going
to arrange to have him fish up the stream on Saturday afternoon. Will
you come, Miss Habberton, come to the wall and meet him there inside
the broken grille? I know his mind. It is curiously affected by facts
of association. It is the only thing. I have--"

The words died on my lips as she rose, her slim figure straight in its
sudden dignity, and I knew that I had failed.

"Your proposal is preposterous, Mr. Canby," she said coolly, moving
toward the door.

"You refuse?"

"Of course. I am sorry if Mr. Benham has failed, is failing his
friends, but the thing that you suggest is impossible." She put out
her hand in token of dismissal.

"And you won't reconsider? Let me come to see you tomorrow, the next
day. Is it so much that I ask?"

"Good night, Mr. Canby."

"You do not care enough?"

"Good night."

I bowed over her fingers silently.

Then I took up my hat. There was nothing left to do.

CHAPTER XIX

THE PATH IN THE WOOD

Had I not been obsessed with the desire at all costs to divert the
unhappy tide of Jerry's infatuation, I must have known that no girl
such as Una Habberton could lend herself as accessory to a plan like
mine. I had had evidence enough that she cared for Jerry in a tender,
almost a motherly way, and while I had been unsuccessful in my
mission, I now saw no reason to change my opinion. Indeed, in my hotel
room that night, the more I thought of the interview the more
convinced I was that whatever modesty deterred her, it was the very
fact of her caring so much that made the thing impossible to her. Her
air of indifference, carefully assu