," the secret of which she had
mastered only that morning.

"I was up almost at dawn to make it, so that it would 'set' in time,"
she told him, and by the quiver of her lip Dundee knew that it was not
Spanish cream which had got her up....

"I'm going to help wash dishes," he announced firmly, and Penny, with a
quick intake of breath, agreed.

"Hadn't you better take a nap, Mother?" she added a minute later, as
Mrs. Crain, with a slight flush on her faded cheeks, began to stack the
dessert dishes. "You mustn't lay a hand on these dishes, or Bonnie and I
will have our dishwashing picnic spoiled.... Run along now. You need
sleep, dear."

"Not any more than you do, poor baby!" Mrs. Crain quavered, and then
hurried out of the room, since gentlewomen do not weep before strangers.

"I called you 'Bonnie' so Mother would know we are really friends,"
Penny explained, her cheeks red, as she preceded him through the
swinging door into the miniature kitchen.

"You'll stick to that--being friends, I mean, no matter what happens,
won't you, Penny?" Dundee said in a low voice, setting the fragile
crystal dishes he carried upon the porcelain drainboard of the sink.

"I knew you had something bad to tell me.... It's about--Ralph, I
suppose?" Her husky voice was scarcely audible above the rush of hot
water into the dishpan. "You'd better tell me straight off, Bonnie. I'm
not a very patient person.... Are they going to arrest Ralph when they
find him? There wasn't a word in the paper about him this morning--"

"I'm afraid they are, Penny," Dundee told her miserably. "Captain Strawn
has a warrant ready, but of course--"

"Oh, you don't have to tell me you hope Ralph isn't guilty!" she cut in
with sudden passionate vehemence. "Don't _I_ know he couldn't have done
it? They always arrest the wrong person first, the blundering idiots--"

It was the thorny Penny again, the Penny with glittering eyes which
matched her nickname. But Dundee felt better able to cope with this
Penny....

"I'm afraid I'm the chief idiot, but you must believe that I'm sorry it
should be a friend of yours," he told her, and reached for the plate she
had rinsed of its suds under the hot water tap.

"Shoot the works!" she commanded, with hard flippancy. "Of course I
might have known that Captain Strawn's theory about a gunman was just
dust in our eyes, and that only a miracle could keep you from fastening
on poor Ralph, since he and the gun are both missin