e big Morris chair of the little flat, a be-ribboned sack
loose about her comfortable little body, her head golden in the soft
cascade of light falling from the lamp, an open box of candy at her
elbow, Dolly was reading the evening paper. It was all about
Charles-Norton Sims, the paper, though it did not mention him by name,
but variously, according to the temperaments of its correspondents, as a
condor, an ichthyosaurus, the moon, an aeroplane, a Japanese fleet, a
myth, a cloud, a hallucination, a balloon, and a goose. As she read, she
alternately frowned and laughed. Her brows would draw together very
seriously, and then suddenly her red lips would part to let through a
sparkling rocket of laughter, and then her brows would again knit in
concern. The laughter was of triumph at seeing her prophecy come true,
for of course, all the time, she had known that Charles-Norton, left
alone, would make a fool of himself; the concern was at the thought that,
still alone, he would continue to make a fool of himself.

"Well," she said finally, as the paper slipped from her knees to the
floor; "well, it's about time I rescued the poor dear. I must go to him."

She sat gazing mentally back over the lonely two months, the period of
her existence now about to terminate, and was astonished to find that,
after all, it had not been so bad. Ever since the first crisis, ever
since she had made up her mind to hold on to Charles-Norton, the worst,
somehow, had been over. It had seemed as if, that determination once
made, there was little left to worry over, that things could not possibly
come out wrong, that the cosmos itself was with her. And so, she had not
worried. And she had had a pretty good time; a pretty good time. Better,
in fact, in some ways than----

"Sh-sh-sh," she hissed, stilling the thought.

But why was that?

Well, first of all, there had been the engrossing mystery of the spring
hat; this, followed by the still more exciting problem of the summer hat;
and now she was planning for the fall hat--she had seen the cutest
feathery toque, that came low down about her face, pushing to all sides
little wisps of golden curls and making her look--well, very nice indeed.
Then, of course, there had been less housework, and she had had much more
time to herself, more time and more freedom. The acquaintance with
Flossie, the young wife of the floor-walker in the flat across the
landing, had helped a lot. Together they had plunged de