the very chic, blue-silk suit. "That is, I did have some--"

"Have they been destroyed?" questioned Mr. Vandeford, with the greatest
anxiety.

"No, not exactly," answered Miss Adair, with a distressed tremor at the
corner of her curved mouth that rivaled a rose of a deeper hue in the
southwest corner of the bouquet.

"I see," answered Mr. Vandeford, with great relief. "You are not just
sure where they are. That's great! You can have a talk with Mr. Corbett,
who is to design the costumes, and then hop right back home in a day or
two, as soon as you are rested and we've had a little bat on Broadway,
and find them for him to use in his designs. The management will pay all
the expenses and you can--can--"

Mr. Vandeford cast around in his mind for some other business in
connection with "The Purple Slipper" that would keep the author thereof
busy and contented in Adairville, Kentucky, out of the clutches of
Violet and out of the way of his stage director until it all was running
smoothly.

"How about your getting a lot of photographs of the house in which it
all happened?" he went on. Vaguely he felt photography must be a slow
process in Adairville, Kentucky.

Also, in his heart he was forced to acknowledge that his inspiration for
getting the author out of the way of her own play while it was being
murdered was not entirely original. Tradition had told him, whether
truly or not, that at a certain crucial moment in the butchering and
rehearsal of "The Great Divide" the poet-author, Moody, had been sent
West to hunt a genuine war costume for a great Indian war-chief, his
favorite written character, and on his return with the trophy had found
the Indian cut entirely and forever from the play.

"Those dresses would be the greatest help you could give us now," he
urged with an inward chuckle at the thought of the trick on the great
poet, which froze in his heart as he observed two tears balanced on the
black lashes of the lovely sea-gray eyes lowered away from his.

"What's the matter?" he gasped, in desperate fear that the Moody Indian
story had penetrated to the wilds of Adairville, Kentucky. "You'd only
be gone a few days, and everything could wait until you came back. I
wouldn't turn a wheel without you, and--" he committed himself deeper
and deeper at every step.

"I've had the dresses all made over, and this is one. I've hurt my play
just because I wanted to look pretty in New York! I'm humiliated with
myself. A