the light in the lamp behind me, took a chair and drew it close to
me. Anxiety he made no effort to control was in his eyes.

"Well--have you anything to tell me?"

"Not as much as I hoped. Mrs. Mundy hasn't been able to find Etta
Blake yet. Until--"

"Etta Blake?" Selwyn's tone was groping. "Oh, the little
cashier-girl. I didn't expect you to tell anything of her. I wish
you'd put her out of your mind." His face darkened.

"I can't. She seems to be in no one else's. But we won't talk of
her to-night. I saw the Swinks this afternoon."

"I know you did. Mrs. Swink telephoned Harrie to-night. Did my
appraisement approach correctness?"

"Of Mrs. Swink, yes. She's impossible. Most fat fools are. They're
like feather beds. You could stamp on them, but you couldn't get rid
of the fool-ness. It would just be in another place. She told me
she was manicured on Mondays, massaged on Tuesdays, marcelled
Wednesdays, and chiropodized on Thursdays, and one couldn't expect
much of a daughter with that sort of a mother; still, the girl
interested me. I feel sorry for her. She mustn't marry Harrie."

"But who's going to tell her?" Selwyn's voice was querulously eager.
"I thought perhaps you might find--find--"

"I did." I nodded in his flushed face. "I don't think it will be
necessary to tell her anything. She's very much in love, but not
with Harrie."

Selwyn sat upright. A certain rigidity of which he is capable
stiffened him. He looked much, but said nothing.

"I've had an interesting time this afternoon. I never wanted to be a
detective person, but I can understand the fascination of the
profession. Luck was with me, and in less than thirty minutes after
meeting her I was pretty sure Madeleine Swink was not in love with
Harrie and was in love with some one else. A few minutes later I
found out who she was in love with, found he was equally in love with
her; that they were once engaged and still want to get married. Our
job's to help them do it."

Selwyn's seriousness is a heritage. Frowningly he looked at me.
"This is hardly a thing to jest about. I may be very dense, but I
fail to understand--"

For an hour we talked of Madeleine Swink and Mrs. Swink, of Harrie
and Tom Cressy, and in terms which even a man could understand I told
how my discoveries had been made, of how I had managed to see Tom and
Madeleine together, and of my frank questioning of the former. But
what I did not te