ed into a
taxicab and hurried to the rendezvous. He spied her on a park bench,
watching with interest the maneuvers of the little Russian girls, as
they swarmed over the rocker swings. Even before he came within
speaking distance of her, he perceived that something must have
happened--read it in her attitude, her manner of one who lulls a
suppressed excitement. When she turned to answer his quick "Mme. Le
Grange!" her cheeks carried a faint color, and her gray eyes were
shining. But her face was serious, too; her dimples, barometer of her
gayer emotions, never once rippled. Before he was fairly seated, she
tumbled out the news in a rush:

"Well! I never was more fooled in my life!"

"She's a fraud!" He jumped joyously to conclusions. "You can prove it!"

Rosalie put a slender finger to her lips.

"Not so loud. Yids have ears. I ain't dead sure of anything now. I
ain't even sure she don't have me followed when I leave the house.
That's why I sent for you to change meeting places. There's nothing as
safe as outdoors, because you can watch the approaches."

"But is she a fake? Can you prove it?" persisted Dr. Blake.

"I'm a woman," responded Rosalie Le Grange, "not a newspaper reporter.
I can't tell my story in a headline before I git to it. I've got to go
my own gait or I can't go at all. Now you listen and don't interrupt,
or I'll explode. It goes back, anyhow, into our last talk.

"I was comin' downstairs in the afternoon a week ago Thursday, and I
saw Ellen let in a man. Good-looking man. Good dresser. Seemed about
thirty-five till you looked over his hands and the creases around his
eyes, when you saw he was risin' forty-five if a day. Stranger, I
guess, for Ellen kept him waiting in the hall. He read the papers while
he waited, and he didn't look at nothing but the financial columns. I
took it from that, he was in Wall Street, though you can't never tell
in New York, where they all play the market or the ponies. I didn't
wait to size him up real careful; that wouldn't do. I just passed on
down to the pantry and then passed back again. He was still there. This
time he had put up his newspapers, and he was looking over some pencil
notes on that yellow legal cap paper. He didn't hear me until I was
close on him, the rugs in the hall are that big and soft. But when I
did get close, he jumped like I had caught him in something crooked and
made like he was goin' to hide the sheets. Of course, I didn't look at
him,