wheeled.

"What!" he exclaimed, "is it you, my San Reve? And what fetched you out
so cold an evening?"

Storri attempted a manner of light and confident assurance. Somehow, he
did not altogether attain it; a sharp ear would have caught the false
note in his tones which told of an uneasiness he was trying to conceal.

That one whom Storri addressed as San Reve and who, following the touch
that startled Storri, had taken his arm, was a woman. In the dark of the
winter evening, nothing could be known of her save that she was above a
middle height.

"Yes; it is I, Sara," said the woman, in a pure contralto. "Come with me
to-night, Storri; I have not seen you for four days."

"We are pleasantly met!" cried Storri, still affecting an acquiescent
gayety. "And is it not strange? I was on my way to your fond, sweet
presence, my San Reve. Yes, your Storri was flying to you even now!"

All of which were lies, being leaf and stalk of that uneasiness which
rang so falsely in his voice and manner. Still, if Mademoiselle San Reve
took notice of his insincerity, she kept the fact to herself. Storri
drew her hand further within his arm, and the two walked slowly onward,
while the street lamps as they passed merged and separated and again
merged and separated their shadows as though the pair were agreeing and
disagreeing in endless alternation.

Richard, the next day, departed for New York as he had planned. Sending
Matzai and his luggage to the hotel, Richard on his arrival drove
straight from the station to Thirty, Broad. He glanced at a card as he
entered the elevator.

"Tenth floor!" was his word to the resplendent functionary in gold and
blue who presided in the elevator.

"Tenth floor!" cried the resplendent functionary in the sing-song of a
seaman taking soundings and calling the marks, and the elevator came to
a kind of bouncing stop.

"Mr. Bayard?" inquired Richard.

"Second floor to th' left," sang the blue and golden one; then the iron
door clashed and the cage flew on.

Richard entered a reception room, and from this outer harbor, like a
newly arrived ship sending up a signal, he dispatched his card to Mr.
Bayard. Under "Mr. Richard Storms" he wrote the words, "son of the late
Mr. Dudley Storms."

The stealthy, whispering individual, who spoke with a hiss and
scrutinized Richard as he took his card with a jealous intensity which
might have distinguished a hawk in a state of half alarm and whole
suspicion, pr