shleigh Allerton--in which he was not peculiar--but a client with so
much money was entitled to his way. At the same time he couldn't have
been human without urging a point of common sense.

"If you _don't_ want to--to continue your--your relation with
this--this lady, doesn't it strike you that now might be a happy
opportunity----?"

Allerton did what he did rarely; he struck the table with his fist. "I
want to find her."

The words were spoken with so much force that to Mr. Nailes they were
conclusive. It was far from his intention to compel anyone to common
sense, and least of all a man whose folly might bring increased fees
to the firm of Nailes, Nailes, and Nailes.

It was agreed that steps should be taken at once, and that Mr. Nailes
would report in the evening. Gravely was the name Allerton was sure
she would use, and the only one that needed to be mentioned. It needed
only to be mentioned too that Mr. Nailes was acting for a client who
preferred to remain anonymous.

It was further agreed that Mr. Nailes should report at Allerton's
office at ten that evening, in person if there was anything to
discuss, by telephone if there was nothing. This was convenient for
Mr. Nailes, who lived in the neighborhood of Washington Square, while
it protected Rash from household curiosity. At ten that night he was,
therefore, in the unusual position of pacing the rooms he had hardly
ever seen except by daylight.

Not Letty's disappearance was uppermost in his mind, for the moment,
but his own inhibitions.

"My God, what's the matter with me?" he was muttering to himself. "Am
I going insane? Have I been insane all along? Why _can't_ I say which
of these two women I want, when I can have either?"

He placed over against each other the special set of spells which each
threw upon his heart.

Barbara was of his own world; she knew the people he knew; she had the
same interests, and the same way of showing them. Moreover, she had in
a measure grown into his life. Their friendship was not only intimate
it was one of long standing. Though she worried, hectored, and
exasperated him, she had fits of generous repentance, in which she
mothered him adorably. This double-harness of comradeship had worked
for so many years that he couldn't imagine wearing it with another.

And yet Letty pulled so piteously at his heart that he fairly melted
in tenderness toward her. Everything he knew as appeal was summed up
in her soft voice, her