sing.

"Your little sibyl--she is not here? On a vacation, I suppose?"

This was futile and cheap and Raymond felt that he flushed.

Miss Gordon poised for action. Her face grew grave and hard--she
believed she was quite within her just rights when she sought to protect
this very handsome and worth-while young man. She really should have
done it before! She was convinced of that now.

"My assistant," she said, "has left without giving the usual notice. She
has left me in a most embarrassing position but I suppose she felt her
own personal affairs were paramount.

"I--I think she has made a hasty marriage." On the whole, this seemed
more kind than Joan deserved.

"A--what?" Raymond almost forgot himself. "A--what--did you say?"

"Well, I presume it was marriage. She simply stated that something had
occurred that was taking her to Chicago at once with a young man."

Elspeth Gordon watched the face of Mrs. Tweksbury's adopted son. She
felt she was serving a righteous cause. If any worthy young man came to
harm from the folly she had permitted she could never forgive herself!
Miss Gordon had an elastic conscience.

Raymond's countenance grew suddenly blank. He had recovered his
self-control. He laughed presently--it was a light, well-modulated
laugh, not the laugh of a shocked or very much interested man.

Miss Gordon was relieved--but disappointed.

And then Raymond went out to do his thinking alone. He walked the
streets as people often do who are lonely and can find relief in action.

He had never been so confused in his life, but then, he reflected, what
did he really know about the girl with whom he had spent so many happy,
sweet, unforgettable hours? The one black hour through which she had,
somehow, stood as the only tangible safe thing he could recall, had
shattered his faith in himself, in everything.

What was she? Who was she? And now she had gone--with some man! It
sounded cruel and harsh--but it could not, it never could, blot out
certain memories which lay deep in Raymond's mind. He was miserable
beyond words. He deplored his own part in the unhappy affair; he could
not adjust himself to the inevitable--the end of the amazing and
romantic episode.

Of course he had always known that it must end some time, but while he
drifted damnably he had not given much thought to that. But now he had
finished it by his own beastiality when, had he kept his head, it might
have passed as it came--a thing unde