he brief fainting spell when he had made his
ill-advised proposal. It had been as elixir to her. He recalled how she
had met him every day. Had it been mere chance? Or--disconcerting
suspicion!--had she deliberately planned--

For Mr. Heatherbloom there was no sleep that night. At the first signs
of dawn he was up and out, directing his steps toward the park, as a
criminal returns to the haunts of his crime. No faces of any kind now
greeted him there; only trees confronted him, gaunt, ghostlike in the
early morning mists. Even the squirrels were yet abed in their miniature
Swiss chalets in the air. The sun rose at last, red and threatening. He
now met a policeman who looked at him questioningly. Mr. Heatherbloom
greeted him with a blitheness at variance with his mood. Officialdom
only growled and gazed after the young man as if to say: "We'll gather
you in, yet."

It was past nine o'clock before Mr. Heatherbloom ventured to approach
the house; as he did so, the front door closed; some one had been
admitted. He himself went in through the area way; from above came
joyous barks, a woman's voice; pandemonium. Mr. Heatherbloom listened.
Later he learned what had happened; a young woman had brought back
Naughty; a very honest young woman who refused all reward.

"Sure," said the cook, who had the story from the butler, "and she spoke
loike a quane. 'I can take nothing for returning what doesn't belong to
me, ma'am. I am but doing my jooty. But if ye plaze, would ye be lookin'
over these recommends av mine--they're from furriners--and if yez be
havin' ony friends who be wanting a maid and yez might be so good as to
recommind me, I'd be thankin' of yez, for it's wurrk I wants.' Think av
that now. Only wurrk! Who says there arn't honest servin' gurrls,
nowadays? The mistress was that pleased with her morals an' her
manners--so loidy-loike!--she gave her the job that shlip av a Jane had;
wid an advance av salary on the sphot."

"You mean Miss Van Rolsen has actually engaged her?" Mr. Heatherbloom,
face abeam, repeated.

"Phawt have I been saying just now?" Scornfully. "Sure, an' is it ears
you have on your head?"

Mr. Heatherbloom, a weight lifted from his shoulders, departed from the
kitchen. He had wronged her--this poor girl, or young woman, who, in her
dire distress, had appealed to him. How he despised now the uncharitable
dark thoughts of the night! How he could congratulate himself he had
obeyed impulse, and not st