or interrupted roughly. "What
difference, I should like to know?"

She shrugged her shoulders lightly.

"He is stolid without being stupid," she explained. "He is entirely
self-centered. I smile at him, and he waits patiently until I have
finished to get on with our business. I have said quite nice things to
him and he has stared at me without change of expression, absolutely
without pleasure or emotion of any sort."

"You are too vain, Elizabeth," her father declared. "You have been
spoilt. There are a few people in the world whom even you might fail to
charm. No doubt this young man is one of them."

She sighed gently.

"It really does seem," she admitted, "as though you were right, but we
shall see. By-the-bye, hadn't you better go? The five minutes are nearly
up."

He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand, prepared for
departure.

"Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth," he begged, "that there
is no other reason for your interest? That you are not engaged in any
fresh schemes of which I know nothing? Things are bad enough as they
are. I cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for thinking of our position. If I
thought that you had any fresh plans on hand--"

She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a little
gesture.

"He knows where Beatrice is," she remarked thoughtfully, "and I can't
get him to tell me. There is nothing beyond--absolutely nothing."...

When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking, sitting in
an easy-chair and looking into the fire. Something in her attitude, the
droop of her head as it rested upon her fingers, reminded him suddenly
of Beatrice. He showed no other emotion than a sudden pause in his
walk across the room. Even that, however, in a person whose machinelike
attitude towards her provoked her resentment, was noticeable.

"Good morning, my friend!" she said pleasantly. "You have brought me the
fresh list?"

"Unfortunately, no, madam," Tavernake answered. "I have called simply
to announce that I am not able to be of any further assistance to you in
the matter."

She looked at him for a moment without remark.

"Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied. "The fact is I am not in a position to help you. I
have left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company."

"Of your own accord?" she inquired quietly.

"No, I was dismissed," he confessed. "I should have been compelled to
leave in a very short time, b