ito. What
do you think of that for an idea?"

"Not much," Peter replied. "It isn't so easy to dodge the newspapers and
the Press in this country. Besides, although I could manage myself very
well, you would be an exceedingly awkward subject. Your tall and elegant
figure, your aquiline nose, the shapeliness of your hands and feet, give
you a distinction which I should find it hard to conceal."

Sogrange smiled.

"You are a remarkably observant fellow, Baron. I quite appreciate your
difficulty. Still, with a club foot, eh?--and spectacles instead of my
eyeglasses----"

"Oh, no doubt something could be managed," Peter interrupted. "You're
really in earnest about this, are you?"

"Absolutely," Sogrange declared. "Come here."

He drew Peter to the window. They were on the twelfth story, and to a
European there was something magnificent in that tangled mass of
buildings threaded by the elevated railway, with its screaming trains,
the clearness of the atmosphere, and in the white streets below, like
polished belts through which the swarms of people streamed like insects.

"Imagine it all lit up!" Sogrange exclaimed. "The sky-signs all ablaze,
the flashing of fire from those cable wires, the lights glittering from
those tall buildings! This is a wonderful place, Baron. We must see it.
Ring for the bill. Order one of those magnificent omnibuses. Press the
button, too, for the personage whom they call the valet. Perhaps, with a
little gentle persuasion, he could be induced to pack our clothes."

With his finger upon the bell, Peter hesitated. He, too, loved
adventures, but the gloom of a presentiment had momentarily depressed
him.

"We are marked men, remember, Sogrange," he said. "An escapade of this
sort means a certain amount of risk, even in New York."

Sogrange laughed.

"Bernadine caught the midday steamer. We have no enemies here that I
know of."

Peter pressed the button. An hour or so later the Marquis de Sogrange
and Peter, Baron de Grost, took their leave of New York.

They chose an hotel some distance down Broadway, within a stone's throw
of Rector's Restaurant. Peter, with whitened hair, gold-rimmed
spectacles, a slouch hat and a fur coat, passed easily enough for an
English maker of electrical instruments; while Sogrange, shabbier, and
in ready-made American clothes, was transformed into a Canadian having
some connection with theatrical business. They plunged into the heart of
New York life, and fou