ell.

"It is through him I hoped to find the truth," she murmured.

"So you won't accept my help?" growled Mr. Grimes.

"Not--not the kind you offer. It--it wouldn't be right," Helen replied.

"Very well, then!" snapped the man, and opened the door into the outer
office. As he ushered her into the other room the outer door opened and a
shabby man poked his head and shoulders in at the door.

"I say!" he said, quaveringly. "Is Mr. Grimes----"

"Get out of here, you old ruffian!" cried Fenwick Grimes, flying into a
sudden passion. "Of course, you'd got to come around to-day!"

"I only wanted to say, Mr. Grimes----"

"Out of my sight!" roared Grimes. "Here, Leggett!" to his clerk; "give
Jones a dollar and let him go. I can't see him now."

"Jones, sir?" queried the clerk, seemingly somewhat staggered, and looking
from his employer to the old scarecrow in the doorway.

"Yes, sir!" snarled Mr. Grimes. "I said Jones, sir--Jones, Jones, Jones!
Do you understand plain English, Mr. Leggett? Take that dollar on the desk
and give it into the hands of _Jones_ there at the door. And then oblige
me by kicking him down the steps if he doesn't move fast enough."

Leggett moved rapidly himself after this. He seemed to catch his
employer's real meaning, and he grabbed the dollar and chased the beggar
out into the hall. Grimes, meanwhile, held Helen back a bit. But he had
nothing of any consequence to say.

Finally she bade him good-morning and went out of the office. She had not
given him Uncle Starkweather's letter. Somehow, she thought it best not to
do so. If she had been doubtful of the sincerity of her uncle when she
broached the subject nearest her heart, she had been much more suspicious
of Fenwick Grimes.

She walked composedly enough out of the building; but it was hard work to
keep back the tears. It _did_ seem such a great task for a mere girl to
attempt! And nobody would help her. She had nobody in whom to
confide--nobody with whom she might discuss the mystery.

And when she told herself this her mind naturally flashed to the only real
friend she had made in New York--Sadie Goronsky. Helen had looked up a map
of the city the evening before in her uncle's library, and she had marked
the streets intervening between this place where she had interviewed her
father's old partner, and Madison Street on the East Side.

She had ridden downtown to Washington Arch; so she felt equal to the walk
across town and down the