d headlong into her request.

"Really, Miss Thurston, don't you think you are rather impertinent?"
drawled her hostess, when Bab finished. "I don't see what business it is
of yours whether or not I wish to play a joke on my friend, Mr. Hamlin.
Don't try to get out of mischief by reporting to Mr. Hamlin the story of
my poor little joke. You can hardly save yourself by any such method. No
one will believe you. And I have an idea that you came to my house
to-day for a very different purpose than to persuade me to give up my
joke. What was it?"

Bab was mystified. She had no idea how Mrs. Wilson and Peter Dillon had
planned to use her visit as evidence against her, so it was impossible
for her to understand Mrs. Wilson's insinuation.

Barbara did not stay long. She saw Mrs. Wilson had no intention of being
persuaded from her design. Even though the woman was beginning to see
that Bab and Ruth were a little suspicious of her, she had no idea of
being frightened from her deep-laid scheme by two insignificant
schoolgirls.

Barbara hurried to her car as fast as she could, anxious to get back to
Ruth and to devise some other move to checkmate the traitors. She even
hoped, against hope, that Harriet had been induced to change her mind and
that all would yet be well. But as Bab jumped aboard her car she saw
another girl, running down the street, waving something in the air and
evidently trying to induce Bab's street car to wait for her. Barbara
begged the conductor to hold the car for a moment, before she recognized
the figure, running toward them. But the next second she beheld the
ever-present newspaper girl, Marjorie Moore, tablet and pencil in hand,
completely out of breath and exhausted. Marjorie Moore could not speak
for some time after she had secured a seat next Bab in the car.

"I have been watching Mrs. Wilson's house since eight o'clock this
morning," she finally gasped. "What on earth made you go in there?"

"I can't tell you," Bab returned coldly. Not for anything in the world
would she have Marjorie Moore suspect what she and Ruth feared.

Miss Moore gave a little, half amused, half sarcastic laugh. "You can't
tell? Oh, never mind, my dear. I know you are all right. You weren't
doing anything wrong. I expect you were trying to help set matters
straight. You don't need to tell me anything. I think I know all that is
necessary. Good-bye now. I must get off this car at the corner. Let me
tell you, however, not to