e swung round with a frown
on his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor's
conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing to
lighten his gloom.

"Hullo!" he said.

"Hullo!" said Ginger.

Uncomfortable silence followed these civilities.

"Have you come to see Miss Nicholas?"

"Why, yes."

"She isn't here," said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had found
someone to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little.

"Not here?"

"No. Apparently..." Bruce Carmyle's scowl betrayed that resentment which
a well-balanced man cannot but feel at the unreasonableness of others.
"... Apparently, for some extraordinary reason, she has taken it into
her head to dash over to England."

Ginger tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He
followed his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce
Carmyle was addressing the driver of the expensive automobile.

"I find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage."

The chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat
cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when approaching
the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation.

"You'll have to pay just the same," he observed, opening his other eye
to lend emphasis to the words.

"Of course I shall pay," snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. "How much is
it?"

Money passed. The car rolled off.

"Gone to England?" said Ginger, dizzily.

"Yes, gone to England."

"But why?"

"How the devil do I know why?" Bruce Carmyle would have found his best
friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a physical
pain. "All I know is what the janitor told me, that she sailed on the
Mauretania this morning."

The tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on
the roof, calmly watching the boat down the river...

He nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further
remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all
interest had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a loose
end. Not even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with his money,
had had to pay a day's hire for a car which he could not use brought him
any balm. He loafed aimlessly about the streets. He wandered in the Park
and out again. The Park bored him. The streets bored him. The whole
city bored him. A city without Sally in it was a drab, futile city, and
nothing that the sun could do t