rds from you can do your uncle no possible
harm, and they may save him a very bad relapse later on. I wouldn't
press this thing, my dear young lady, if I wasn't convinced of its
tremendous importance. You can trust me about that."

Virginia walked on for a few steps in silence. They were approaching her
uncle's house, and already a small crowd of people were collected,
reading the bulletin which was hung upon the railings. Mr. Weiss
stopped short.

"Isn't there any way of getting in without being seen by all this
crowd?" he asked. "They'll worry us to death with questions."

She nodded, and led him round the back way. Even here they were caught,
however, by a reporter, whom Mr. Weiss brushed unceremoniously away.
Virginia took her companion into a morning-room upon the ground floor,
and motioned him to a chair.

"If you will wait here," she said, "I'll go upstairs and see my uncle.
If I see that it is in any way possible, I will do as you ask."

"That's good," he declared. "If you don't mind, Miss Longworth, I'll
just step into the study, where we were last night. I dare say one of
your uncle's young men will be there, and there are a few minor details
I'd like to talk over with young Smedley, if he's about."

"I will find Mr. Smedley for you," Virginia said, "when I come down. I
am sure that he is not in the library, because my uncle uses that always
as his private room. Please wait here until I come down."

She left him and made her way upstairs. The door of her uncle's bedroom
was guarded by his man servant, who allowed her, however, to pass.
Inside the room Phineas Duge was sitting in an easy-chair, carefully
dressed, smoking a cigarette, and with a pile of newspapers by his side.
On the table a few feet away was a telephone, the receiver of which he
had just laid down.

"Well," he asked, looking up as she entered, "have they made a move
yet?"

"I met Mr. Weiss on Fifth Avenue," she said. "He explained that you were
all partners in some business undertaking of very great importance. Then
he went on to say that they could carry it on all right without you, but
that they must have one paper, which he said was the key to the
position. He remarked that he had telephoned to you last night about it,
and he is quite sure that you will give me orders to find it and give it
up to him. He persuaded me even, you see, to break the doctor's orders."

Phineas Duge smiled quietly.

"I am too ill to be disturbed about