"I think it is just as well. What you need most now is rest."

The girl looked at herself in a small mirror affixed to the side of the
car.

"Oh," she exclaimed. "I look terrible. These people are right, it seems.
Three more weeks of this persecution and my looks would be quite gone.
Mr. Edwards told me only this morning that he had never seen me look so
bad." There were tears in her eyes.

Duvall realized that she spoke the truth. The effect of the strain upon
her nervous system, the brutal shocks of the past two days, the horror
of the experience of the night before, had wrought havoc with the girl's
beauty. Her face, gray, lined, haggard, her eyes, heavy and drawn, made
her the very opposite of the radiant creature that had created such a
furore in motion picture circles. The methods of her persecutors, if
unchecked, would beyond doubt wreck her strength and health in a short
time, and in addition, there was the danger that at any moment a
physical attack, a swiftly thrown acid bomb, an explosive mixture
concealed in an innocent-looking package, might destroy both her beauty
and her reason in one blinding flash. With the fear in her great brown
eyes constantly before him, Duvall determined more than ever to free her
from this terrible persecution.

They separated in the neighborhood of 30th Street, Duvall and Miss
Morton taking a taxicab that stood before one of the smaller Fifth
Avenue hotels. He made a pretense of entering the hotel, and did not
summon the taxi until Mrs. Morton's car was well out of sight up the
Avenue. Then he instructed the driver to proceed first to his hotel.

Their stop here was but momentary. Duvall went to his room, threw a few
articles of clothing into his grip, left a note for Grace, telling her
that he would be absent for several days, then rejoined his companion
and drove uptown to the hotel opposite the park, the name of which he
had mentioned to Mrs. Morton. He felt perfectly certain that they had
not been followed.

Upon arriving at the hotel, he entered their names, including that of
Mrs. Morton, upon the register, using the pseudonym which that latter
had suggested. Then, sending Ruth to her room, he asked to see the
manager, and had a brief conference with him in private. Immediately
thereafter, he went up to his own apartment.

As he had arranged, it adjoined the suite selected for the Mortons. He
tapped lightly on the communicating door.

"Are you all right, Miss Mort