ok his head, and she realized that he was already
engaged--there was a pile of luggage beside him with big labels, and
a familiar name struck her--"H.M.T. Nauru." A girl, leaning from the
window of the taxi, met her glance, and Cecilia took a sudden resolve.
She sprang forward, her hand on the door.

"I am a passenger by the Nauru. Could you take me in your car?" she
gasped.

"Why, of course," said the other girl. "Plenty of room, isn't there,
dad?"

"Yes, certainly," said the other occupant of the cab--a big, grizzled
man, who looked at the new-comer in blank amazement. He had half risen,
but there was no time for him to assist his self-invited guest; she had
opened the door and jumped in before his daughter had finished speaking.
Leaning forward, Cecilia saw her stepmother emerge from the traffic,
crimson-faced, casting wild and wrathful glances about her. Then her
wandering eye fell upon Cecilia, and she began to run forward. Even as
she did the chauffeur quickened his pace, and the taxi slid away, until
the running, shouting figure was lost to view.

Cecilia sat back with a gasp, and began to laugh helplessly. The others
watched her with faces that clearly showed that they began to suspect
having entertained a lunatic unawares.

"I do beg your pardon," said Cecilia, recovering. "It was inexcusable.
But I was running away."

"So it seemed," said the big man, in a slow, pleasant voice. "I hope it
wasn't from the police?"

"Oh no!" Cecilia flushed. "Only from my stepmother. My own taxi had just
broken down, and she found me, and she would have made a scene in the
street--and scenes are so vulgar, are they not? When I saw Nauru on your
luggage, you seemed to me to have dropped from heaven."

She looked at them, her pretty face pink, her eyes dancing with
excitement. There was something appealing about her, in the big childish
eyes, and in the well-bred voice with its faint hint of a French accent.
The girl she looked at could hardly have been called pretty--she was
slender and long-limbed, with honest grey eyes and a sensitive mouth
that seemed always ready to break into smiles. A little smile hovered at
its corners now, but her voice held a note of protection.

"I don't think we need bother you to tell us," she said. "In our country
it's a very ordinary thing to give anyone a lift, if you have a seat to
spare. Isn't it, daddy?"

"Of course," said her father. "And we are to be fellow-passengers, so it
was v