way from the other woman
down at the opera house, who had used her hardly.

He took a step toward her. "I can't tell a thing in the world about you,
Thea--if I may still call you that."

She took hold of the collar of his overcoat. "Yes, call me that. Do: I
like to hear it. You frighten me a little, but I expect I frighten you
more. I'm always a scarecrow after I sing a long part like that--so
high, too." She absently pulled out the handkerchief that protruded from
his breast pocket and began to wipe the black paint off her eyebrows and
lashes. "I can't take you in much to-night, but I must see you for a
little while." She pushed him to a chair. "I shall be more recognizable
to-morrow. You mustn't think of me as you see me to-night. Come at four
to-morrow afternoon and have tea with me. Can you? That's good."

She sat down in a low chair beside him and leaned forward, drawing her
shoulders together. She seemed to him inappropriately young and
inappropriately old, shorn of her long tresses at one end and of her
long robes at the other.

"How do you happen to be here?" she asked abruptly. "How can you leave a
silver mine? I couldn't! Sure nobody'll cheat you? But you can explain
everything tomorrow." She paused. "You remember how you sewed me up in a
poultice, once? I wish you could to-night. I need a poultice, from top
to toe. Something very disagreeable happened down there. You said you
were out front? Oh, don't say anything about it. I always know exactly
how it goes, unfortunately. I was rotten in the balcony. I never get
that. You didn't notice it? Probably not, but I did."

Here the maid appeared at the door and her mistress rose. "My supper?
Very well, I'll come. I'd ask you to stay, doctor, but there wouldn't be
enough for two. They seldom send up enough for one,"--she spoke
bitterly. "I haven't got a sense of you yet,"--turning directly to
Archie again. "You haven't been here. You've only announced yourself,
and told me you are coming to-morrow. You haven't seen me, either. This
is not I. But I'll be here waiting for you to-morrow, my whole works!
Goodnight, till then." She patted him absently on the sleeve and gave
him a little shove toward the door.

V

WHEN Archie got back to his hotel at two o'clock in the morning, he
found Fred Ottenburg's card under his door, with a message scribbled
across the top: "When you come in, please call up room 811, this hotel."
A moment later Fred's voice reached hi