he detective was anxious that Senator Meiklejohn should
realize the folly of refusing all information to the authorities, and
this thinly-veiled threat of publicity was one way of bringing him to
his senses.

Winifred had never before come into touch, so to speak, with any deed of
criminal violence. She was so absorbed in the story of the junketing at
a fashionable club, with its astounding sequel in a locality familiar to
her eyes, that she hardly noticed a delay on the line.

She did not even know that she would be ten minutes late until she saw
a clock at Fourteenth Street. Then she raced to the door of a big,
many-storied building. A timekeeper shook his head at her, but, punctual
as a rule, on wet mornings she was invariably the first to arrive, so
the watch-dog compromised on the give-and-take principle. When she
emerged from the elevator at the ninth floor her cheeks were still
suffused with color, her eyes were alight, her lips parted under the
spell of excitement and haste. In a word, she looked positively
bewitching.

Two people evidently took this view of her as she advanced into the
workroom after hanging up her hat and coat.

"You're late again, Bartlett," snapped Miss Agatha Sugg, a forewoman,
whose initials suggested an obvious nickname among the set of flippant
girls she ruled with a severity that was also ungracious. "I'll not
speak to you any more on the matter. Next time you'll be fired. See?"

Winifred's high color fled before this dire threat. Even the few dollars
a week she earned by binding books was essential to the up-keep of her
home. At any rate this fact was dinned into her ears constantly, and
formed a ready argument against any change of employment.

"I'm sorry, Miss Sugg," she stammered. "I didn't think I had lost any
time. Indeed, I started out earlier than usual."

"Rubbish!" snorted Miss Sugg. "What're givin' me? It's a fine day."

"Yes," said Winifred timidly, "but unfortunately I stopped a while on
Riverside Drive to watch the police bringing in the boat from which Mr.
Tower was mur--pulled into the river last night."

"Riverside Drive!" snapped the forewoman. "Your address is East One
Hundred and Twelfth Street, ain't it? What were you doing on Riverside
Drive?"

"I walk that way every morning unless it is raining."

Miss Sugg looked incredulous, but felt that she was traveling outside
her own territory.

"Anyhow," she said, "that's your affair, not mine, an' it's no ex