o the detriment of her soul
was interrupted by a ring at the bell. The steps of Mr. Pilkington's
Japanese servant crossing the hall came faintly to the sitting-room.

"Mr. Pilkington in?"

Otis Pilkington motioned pleadingly to Jill.

"Don't go!" he urged. "It's only a man I know. He has probably come
to remind me that I am dining with him to-night. He won't stay a
minute. Please don't go."

Jill sat down. She had no intention of going now. The cheery voice at
the front door had been the cheery voice of her long-lost uncle, Major
Christopher Selby.

CHAPTER XII

UNCLE CHRIS BORROWS A FLAT

I

Uncle Chris walked breezily into the room, flicking a jaunty glove. He
stopped short on seeing that Mr. Pilkington was not alone.

"Oh, I beg your pardon! I understood...." He peered at Jill
uncertainly. Mr. Pilkington affected a dim, artistic lighting-system
in his studio, and people who entered from the great outdoors
generally had to take time to accustom their eyes to it. "If you're
engaged...."

"Er--allow me.... Miss Mariner.... Major Selby."

"Hullo, Uncle Chris!" said Jill.

"God bless my soul!" ejaculated that startled gentleman adventurer,
and collapsed on to a settee as if his legs had been mown from under
him.

"I've been looking for you all over New York," said Jill.

Mr. Pilkington found himself unequal to the intellectual pressure of
the conversation.

"Uncle Chris?" he said with a note of feeble enquiry in his voice.

"Major Selby is my uncle."

"Are you sure?" said Mr. Pilkington. "I mean...."

Not being able to ascertain, after a moment's self-examination, what
he did mean, he relapsed into silence.

"Whatever are you doing here?" asked Uncle Chris.

"I've been having tea with Mr. Pilkington."

"But ... but why Mr. Pilkington?"

"Well, he invited me."

"But how do you know him?"

"We met at the theatre."

"Theatre?"

Otis Pilkington recovered his power of speech.

"Miss Mariner is rehearsing with a little play in which I am
interested," he explained.

Uncle Chris half rose from the settee. He blinked twice in rapid
succession. Jill had never seen him so shaken from his customary
poise.

"Don't tell me you have gone on the stage, Jill!"

"I have. I'm in the chorus...."

"Ensemble," corrected Mr. Pilkington softly.

"I'm in the ensemble of a piece called 'The Rose of America.' We've
been rehearsing for ever so long."

Uncle Chris digested this information in si