sense to you, of course, but it was the only way I could think of to
get him out of the place. He left convinced that you were not coming
here to-night."

"Do you know who he was, this man?" Vine asked.

"I do not," she answered, "but I can guess who his employers are."

"And so can I," Vine said grimly. "It seems to me that you are a very
plucky young lady, Miss Longworth."

"Not at all," she answered. "What I have done, I have done for the sake
of reward."

"Will you name it?" he asked.

"I want that paper to take back to my uncle," she said. "Stella stole it
from me brutally, and unless I can get it back again, my uncle is going
to send me back to the little farmhouse where I came from, and is going
to leave off helping my people. I want that paper back, Mr. Vine, and
you must give it to me."

He looked at her with utterly impassive face.

"I am afraid, Miss Longworth," he said, "that I must disappoint you. If
I gave you back that paper, it would go into the hands of one of the
most unprincipled men in America. It is not only your uncle whom I
dislike, but his methods, his craft, his infernal, incarnate
selfishness. He wants this paper as a whip to hold over other people. He
obtained it by subtlety. The means by which it was taken from him,
although I had nothing to do with them, were on the whole justified. I
cannot give it back to you, Miss Longworth. I have not made up my mind
yet what to do with it, and I certainly have no friendship for the men
whom it implicates; but all the same, for the present it must remain in
my possession."

"Do you know," she reminded him, "that I have saved your life
to-night?"

He laughed softly.

"My dear child," he said, "my life is not so easily disposed of. I
believe that you have tried to do me a kindness, but you ask too great a
return. Even if the paper you speak of was stolen, it is better in my
keeping than in your uncle's."

"You will not give it to me, then?" she asked.

"I will not," he answered.

She rose from her place.

"Very well," she said; "I am going now, but I think that we shall meet
again before very long."

He opened the door for her and walked out toward the lift.

"My dear young lady," he said, "I hope you will forgive my saying so,
but this is certainly a wild-goose chase of yours. If you will take my
advice, and I know something about life, you will go back to your
farmhouse in the Connecticut valley. These larger places in the world
m