and sobbed so
violently. That it was a daughter whose acquaintance he was making for
the very first time, did not altogether deprive the situation of its
strangeness.

"Here," he said, when he began to recover somewhat, "here, buck up,
child! Buck up. This won't do at all, you know. Let's go home and
finish this!"

Arethusa "bucked up."

She drew away from him as suddenly as she had grabbed him and blushed
hotly all over with a most unusual accession of sudden shyness. And
Ross made straight for the waiting automobile without further parley.
She followed behind him in silence, but about halfway she stopped and
clapped her hand to her head.

"Oh, my hat!" she exclaimed. "And I've lost my purse and satchel!"

Ross turned around and went back to find them.

But the purse was gone beyond any power of their finding it, though hat
and satchel were safely retrieved and progress once more resumed.

CHAPTER XII

"This is Miss Arethusa, Clay," said Ross, when the chauffeur jumped
down to open the door of the machine and took charge of the ancient
handbag.

Clay touched his cap respectfully.

But to the surprise of both men Arethusa's acknowledgement of this
introduction was a shy and old-fashioned courtesy Miss Letitia had
taught her. She murmured politely, "I'm very glad to meet you," and
extended her hand.

Clay very nearly dropped the handbag.

But something in the friendly smiling of the grey eyes that regarded
him made Clay himself to smile warmly in return, and Arethusa had made
a friend. He grasped the out-stretched fingers lightly, in the spirit
in which they had been offered, and said with unmistakable cordiality,
"I'm awfully glad you've come, Miss Arethusa. Home, Mr. Worthington?"

"Home," replied Ross, smiling at him for his kind quickness.

And then Clay slammed the door upon Ross and Arethusa and climbed up in
front. Arethusa was just a bit puzzled at first, and then she decided
it was the City.

She had had no previous dealings of intimacy with automobiles, the
nearest she had ever been to one was to watch them fly past down the
Pike. The word "chauffeur" would have conveyed no meaning to her mind,
nor have given her any idea of his place in the general scheme of
things connected with machines. She had thought the good-looking,
well-dressed youth in his natty Norfolk suit and cap was some friend of
her father's out for a ride with him, and so it was quite in order that
he should be intr