ilkins. "I deplore the necessity of sending
you out as you came, Miss Mary, but--er--Wilkins! Mr. Prentiss's
clothes, if you please."

"What of them, sir?" Wilkins asked blankly.

"Bring them here."

"But I can't do that, Mr. Fry."

"Why not?" Anthony asked crisply.

"You told me to dispose of them last night, sir. I've thrown them out!"

Anthony caught his breath.

"Where have you thrown them?"

"Out with the other refuse of the day, sir--on the dumbwaiter."

"Then--well, never mind. That is all, Wilkins," said Anthony Fry, his
voice thickening somewhat.

The invaluable one retired, with a last disapproving glance at the
frowsy David, and Anthony's forehead wrinkled. David, the while, sat
hunched on the bed and seemed altogether unaffected by the disaster.

"Well, you'll have to make the best of some of my wardrobe, I fear," the
master of the apartment smiled.

"_Yours?_" Mary cried.

"They will be a trifle large, but you'll have to hitch them up in spots
and in in other spots and make the best of it," Anthony pursued firmly.
"It's too bad, of course, but it is unavoidable. Those togs of yours
were decidedly shabby and I had meant, while supposing you to be a boy,
that to-day we'd have some shopping done for you. Just a moment,
please."

He left the room with a nervous stride altogether unlike his usual
dignified glide. He turned, wildly almost, into the nearest closet in
the corridor and switched on the light. There was the dark gray suit,
which was too loose even for Anthony, and the dark brown suit, which
happened to be too long for him; but the old blue suit--ah, that was the
one!

Very earnestly, Anthony tried to assure himself that it had been both
far too tight and far too short in every detail, at its last wearing;
almost pathetically he sought to tell himself that David in the old blue
suit would look quite like a young man wearing his own clothes--and with
the old blue suit over his arm and a pair of shoes in the other hand, he
tip-toed back to David.

"This is the next best thing to the clothes you wore, and I'm sure
you'll find them quite all right," said he.

"Me get into those?" Mary murmured with the same strange apathy.

"Most certainly, and I've thought out the rest of it--there while I was
locating this suit," Anthony pursued, with what was meant for a
reassuring smile and making his jerky way to the little desk in the
corner of the guest chamber. "I shall give you a note, Davi