u down to the office,
Kitty."

"I don't fancy I ever will quite understand you," said Hawksley, leaning
back in his chair, listlessly. "Honestly, now, you'd be perfectly
justified in bundling me off to some hotel. I have funds. Why all this
pother about me?"

Cutty smiled. "When I tackle anything I like to carry it through. I want
to put you on your train."

"To be reasonably sure that I shan't come back?"

"Precisely"--but without smiling. With a vague yet inclusive nod Cutty
hurried off.

"It is because he is such a thorough sportsman. Mr. Hawksley," Kitty
explained. "Having accepted certain obligations he cannot abrogate them
off hand."

"Did I bother you last night? I mean, did my fiddling?"

"Mercy, no! From the hurdy-gurdy of my childhood, down to Kubelik
and his successors, I have been more or less music-mad. You
play--wonderfully!" Sudden, inexplicable shyness.

Hawksley smiled. An hour or two with that old Amati.

"I am only an unconventional amateur. You should hear Stefani Gregor
when the mood is on. He puts something into your soul that makes you
wish to go forth at once to do some fine, unselfish act."

Stefani Gregor! He thought of the clear white soul of the man who had
surrendered imperishable fame to stand between him and the curse of his
blood; who had for ten years stood between his mother and the dissolute
man whom irony had selected for the part of father. Ten years of
diplomacy, tact, patience. Stefani Gregor! There was the blood,
predatory and untamed; and there was the spirit which the old musician
had moulded. He could not harm this girl. Dead or alive, Stefani Gregor
would not permit it.

Hawksley rose slowly and without further speech walked to the corridor
door. He leaned against the jamb for a moment, then went on to his
bedroom.

"I'm afraid that breakfast was too much for him," the nurse ventured.
"An odd young man."

"Very," replied Kitty, rather absently. She was trying to analyze that
flash of shyness.

Meantime, Cutty sat down before the telephone. He wanted Kitty out of
town during his absence. In her present excitable mood he was afraid
to trust her. She might surrender to any mad impulse that stirred her
fancy. So he called up Burlingame. Kitty's chief, and together they
manufactured an assignment that was always a pleasant recollection to
Kitty.

Next, Cutty summoned Professor Billy Ryan to the wire, argued and
cajoled for ten minutes, and won his point. He wa