I
didn't have a chance.

Besides, I was some rushed myself. There was a lot of odds and ends to
be tied up after the meetin', and two or three of them resolutions that
was jammed through called for quick action early next day. That's what
kept me and Piddie and Mr. Robert doin' so much overtime. About six
o'clock we had coffee and sandwiches sent in, and it must have been
well after seven before we locked the big safes and called it a day.
Piddie had already beat it to catch a late train to Jersey, so there
was only the two of us that dodged the scrubwomen on our way down to
the street.

Mr. Robert had a taxi waitin' to take him to the club, and I was
debatin' whether I needed a reg'lar dinner or not, when I gets a
glimpse of someone leanin' patient against a pillar opposite the main
elevator exit.

"Sufferin' sisters!" says I. "Valentina!"

"I beg pardon?" says Mr. Robert.

"Say," says I, "help me put a smilin' party on the track of K. W.
Mason, will you? Here she is."

I expect Mr. Robert would have ducked if he could, after one view of
the polka-dot dress and the rusty straw lid; but there was Valentina
comin' straight at us.

"For the love of Mike!" says I. "You ain't been waitin' all this time,
have you?"

"Right hea-uh," says she. "Ah reckon Ah done missed him."

"Why," says I, "Mr. Mason left hours ago. Must be something important
you want to see him about, eh?"

"Ah don't know as it is," says she; "only Ah promised, ef ever Ah got
to Noo Yawk, Ah'd look him up. He made me. And Ah sure would like to
see Warrie mahself."

"Warrie!" says I. "Oh, gosh! Why, you mean young Mr. Mason--Warren,
don't you?"

She nods.

"Well, say, that's too bad," says I. "My fault, though. But I never
thought of Warrie as the one. Why, he hasn't been with the Corrugated
for over a year now."

I might have added that we'd had hard work missin' him at any time.
Not that he wasn't all right in his way, but--well, it was just a case
of bein' more ornamental than useful. A bit thick in the head, Warrie.
But it was a stunnin' head--reg'lar Apollonaris Belvidere. He had wavy
brown hair, and big, peaceful brown eyes. Stood a little over six feet
too, and they say that when it came to ridin' a spotted pony and
swingin' a polo mallet he was all there. But in the bond department he
was just under foot.

So, when he develops rheumatism in one shoulder and a specialist orders
him South, it wasn't any serious