rice must needs appear and show that, tale or no tale,
Mary was to be accused.

And there wasn't a flaw in her program, by the way. She held the hat as
a man might cling to a straw in mid-ocean; and the lady who could show a
similar hat would clear herself and then start her male relatives after
Anthony; and the lady who could not show a similar hat--was Mary!

Obviously the fine resolve he had made was to avail little enough, but
Anthony could think of no way of staying the lady. Physical force leaped
up as a possibility in his tortured mind and leaped out again as
quickly.

One suggestion of that sort of thing and instinct told him that
Beatrice, in her present unlovely mood, would scream until the rafters
echoed, if they happened to have rafters in the Hotel Lasande. Moral
suasion, honeyed talk were still farther from the possibilities. No,
Beatrice would have to go!

She was ready now. Habit superseding circumstances, Beatrice had stepped
to the mirror and tucked up a few stray locks of hair. The little hat
was under her arm, and the arm had shut down tight on it.

"You two _curs_!" Beatrice said, by way of farewell, and turned away
from them with a sweep.

It was no apartment in which to do what one expected to do. Beatrice,
one step taken, stopped short. Out at the door some one was hammering in
a way oddly familiar. Anthony, rising again, hurried to answer the
summons--and the door was hardly open when young Robert Vining hurtled
in and gripped him by both arms.

"It's no use, Anthony!" he gasped. "There's not a trace of her yet!"

"No?"

"She's gone! She's _gone_!" cried Robert, breaking into his familiar
refrain. "I've just had the house on the wire, and there's no news of
her at all as yet. I've had police headquarters on the wire, and they
haven't heard or seen a thing. Miriam--that's one of her chums--has just
finished going over Bellevue, and there's no sign of Mary down there!"

By now they were in the living-room, and Beatrice, somewhat startled at
the sign of a being in agony equal to her own stood aside.

"She's gone!" said Robert Vining. "And I've been around to
Helene's--that's another of her chums, Anthony--and she's going to
telephone all the girls. That takes that off my hands and leaves me free
to go over all the hospitals that haven't been covered yet. That's what
brings me here, old man. You'll have to come with me."

"Very well!" Anthony said swiftly. "We'll start now."

"Becaus