ith her character that he looked at her in amazement, and it
took him several minutes to control his voice so as to make the proper
politely concerned query as to the demands of the city editor which had
proved too much for her well-known ability.

"It wasn't the city editor," she said, too unhappy to notice the icy
timbre of his voice. "It's a good thing to disappoint them once in a
while; keeps 'em from expecting you to outdo the labors of Hercules in
time to beat the morning papers. No, it was something I was to do for
Silvia, and I can't make good; at least I haven't, and I'm at the end of
my resources."

In spite of the fact that it was still broad daylight, and a crowded
thoroughfare, Frank Earl stopped and gave her hand a cordial grip that
made her wince. "You're all right," he said. "You're all right. Now
let's go and have dinner."

"Are you not going to the Ramseys'?" she asked, evidently taking it for
granted that the family would wish to be together at such a time.

"Oh, no," he answered. "Hilda will go straight to bed, poor girl; and
Ramsey will sit beside her and dab cologne on her forehead, and after a
while he'll coax her to eat a cracker and drink some tea, and he'll have
his dinner right there beside her. You don't know the turtle-doves. I
don't hanker for my own society to-night, but I shall have to put up
with it unless you take pity on me."

"I can't, Frank," she answered. "I simply can't eat when my mind is so
upset; I'm going straight home."

"And make _your_ supper on crackers and tea, I suppose," he said
disgustedly. "Well, in that case, I'll go for a tramp and try to get rid
of the cobwebs in my brain, and the stuffy air of that courtroom. I
always feel as if twenty centuries of alleged justice, injustice and
malpractice looked down upon me when I get into court; that's one reason
why I'm no good as a trial lawyer. Here, isn't this your street?"

"Yes, no--I don't live where I did any more just now," she answered
lucidly. He stopped and looked at her and smiled in spite of every
everything. "I've sent in my copy, and you can walk up with me, if you
want to."

They walked on in silence; Frank was evidently thinking deeply, and
Carroll was following some weary round of conjecture for the thousandth
time when she stopped at her number. Frank looked at it and then at her,
startled out of his usual debonair manner for once.

"Why--it is----"

"Yes," she answered. "I've been living here fo