is very human man
the ordeal he must face with Madame Forsyth when his reckoning came.

"My wife is prostrated with it all. She does not know the particulars
but she is deeply concerned. I do not like to add to your worry but do
you think there is any possibility that the child returned to the road,
and that Kraus, freed from Tom's rope, captured her and went off with
her?"

"Why, every possibility in the world!" shouted Robin's guardian. "Why
did you hug that idea to yourself? We'll telephone the New York police.
He's sure to make straight for the city."

Both men welcomed action. They rushed to the library and put in a long
distance call and then, while waiting, paced the room's length back and
forth. Harkness, shaking and white and miserable, glued his ear to the
crack in the door, hopeful for one crumb of comforting news.

Below stairs Mrs. Budge, flatly refusing to believe that "Miss Robin"
could be lost just when she had learned to love her, beat up a cake for
her homecoming, unmindful of the tears that splashed into the batter.

In the little sitting-room they had shared, Beryl, who did not even have
the heart to play with Susy, sat with her nose against the window
watching the ribbon of road over which anyone would come if they came.
That was why she was the first of the Manor household to spy the
dilapidated Ford approaching, snorting up the incline. Something about
it made her think of the general dilapidation of the Forgotten Village.
It might be some word! She rushed down the stairs, two steps at a time,
past the startled Harkness, through the big front door. The
strange-looking car had turned into the Manor gate. A man with long
white whiskers was driving it. And yes, a bareheaded girl, who looked
like Robin, sat on the back seat. It _was_ Robin. Beryl waved her hand
wildly and Robin answered. But who rode with her? Beryl's flying feet
came to a quick halt.

"As sure as I'm _alive_ it's the Queen of Altruria!"

Turning, Beryl rushed back to the Manor.

"Harkness! _Harkness!_" she cried, bursting in through the door.
"Robin's coming! She's _here!_ And she's brought the Queen of Altruria
with her! Oh, _what'll_ we do?" For surely some ceremony befitting
royalty should be prepared.

"The Queen of _what_--" cried Mr. Granger and Cornelius Allendyce
rushing from the library. "Oh, the girl's _crazy_--" asserted the
lawyer. Nevertheless he ran to the door, followed by Mr. Granger and
Harkness and Beryl