ty of the thing,
I was almost hysterical. But Flannigan did not give me the bracelet;
instead, it struck me his tone was suddenly severe.

"Now look here, miss," he said; "you've played your trick, and you've
had your fun. The Lord knows it's only folks like you would play April
fool jokes with a fortune! If you're the sinsible little woman you look
to be, you'll put that pearl collar on the coal in the basement tonight,
and let me find it."

"I haven't got the pearl collar," I protested. "I think you are crazy.
Where did you get that bracelet?"

He edged away from me, as if he expected me to snatch it from him and
run, but he was still trying in an elephantine way to treat the matter
as a joke.

"I found it in a drawer in the pantry," he said, "among the dirty linen.
And if you're as smart as I think you are, I'll find the pearl collar
there in the morning--and nothing said, miss."

So there I was, suspected of being responsible for Anne's pearl collar,
as if I had not enough to worry me before. Of course I could have called
them all together and told them, and made them explain to Flannigan what
I had really meant by my delirious speech in the kitchen. But that
would have meant telling the whole ridiculous story to Mr. Harbison, and
having him think us all mad, and me a fool.

In all that overcrowded house there was only one place where I could be
miserable with comfort. So I stayed on the roof, and cried a little
and then became angry and walked up and down, and clenched my hands
and babbled helplessly. The boats on the river were yellow, horizontal
streaks through my tears, and an early searchlight sent its shaft like
a tangible thing in the darkness, just over my head. Then, finally,
I curled down in a corner with my arms on the parapet, and the lights
became more and more prismatic and finally formed themselves into a
circle that was Bella's bracelet, and that kept whirling around and
around on something flat and not over-clean, that was Flannigan's palm.

Chapter X. ON THE STAIRS

I was roused by someone walking across the roof, the cracking of tin
under feet, and a comfortable and companionable odor of tobacco. I
moved a very little, and then I saw that it was a man--the height and
erectness told me which man. And just at that instant he saw me.

"Good Lord!" he ejaculated, and throwing his cigar away he came across
quickly. "Why, Mrs. Wilson, what in the world are you doing here? I
thought--they