ible.

"Oh, a policeman--in the cellar," he repeated, staring at me, and he
moved toward the pantry door.

"You needn't go down," I said feverishly, with visions of Bella Knowles
sitting on the kitchen table, surrounded by soiled dishes and all the
cheerless aftermath of a dinner party. "Please don't go down. I--it's
one of my rules--never to let a stranger go down to the kitchen. I--I'm
peculiar--that way--and besides, it's--it's mussy."

Bang! Crash! through the register pipe, and some language quite
articulate. Then silence.

"Look here, Mrs. Wilson," he said resolutely. "What do I care about the
kitchen? I'm going down and arrest that policeman for disturbing the
peace. He will have the pipes down."

"You must not go," I said with desperate firmness. "He--he is probably
in a very dangerous state just now. We--I--locked him in."

The Harbison man grinned and then became serious.

"Why don't you tell me the whole thing?" he demanded. "You've been in
trouble all evening, and--you can trust me, you know, because I am a
stranger; because the minute this crazy quarantine is raised I am off
to the Argentine Republic," (perhaps he said Chili) "and because I don't
know anything at all about you. You see, I have to believe what you
tell me, having no personal knowledge of any of you to go on. Now tell
me--whom have you hidden in the cellar, besides the policeman?"

There was no use trying to deceive him; he was looking straight into my
eyes. So I decided to make the best of a bad thing. Anyhow, it was going
to require strength to get Bella through the coal hole with one arm and
restrain the policeman with the other.

"Come," I said, making a sudden resolution, and led the way down the
stairs.

He said nothing when he saw Bella, for which I was grateful. She was
sitting at the table, with her arms in front of her, and her head buried
in them. And then I saw she was asleep. Her hat and veil were laid
beside her, and she had taken off her coat and draped it around her. She
had rummaged out a cold pheasant and some salad, and had evidently had
a little supper. Supper and a nap, while I worried myself gray-headed
about her!

"She--she came in unexpectedly--something about the butler," I explained
under my breath. "And--she doesn't want to stay. She is on bad terms
with--with some of the people upstairs. You can see how impossible the
situation is."

"I doubt if we can get her out," he said, as if the situation were