interruption, "but you
did not tell me what time Mr. Avery is likely to want me to be ready to
go to the country club."

"About half-past twelve, I think."

"And what time shall we be coming back?"

"Probably about five."

He thanked her and withdrew. As Miss Davis stood holding open the
door, he had not looked to her, and he did not look back now as she
closed the door behind him; their eyes had not met; but he understood
that she had comprehended him fully. To-day he would be away from the
Santoine house, and away from the guards who watched him, for at least
four hours, under no closer espionage than that of Avery; this offered
opportunity--the first opportunity he had had--for communication
between him and his friends outside the house.

He went to his room and made some slight changes in his dress; he came
down then to the library, found a book and settled himself to read.
Toward noon Avery looked in on him there and rather constrainedly
proffered his invitation; Eaton accepted, and after Avery had gone to
get ready, Eaton put away his book. Fifteen minutes later, hearing
Avery's motor purring outside, Eaton went into the hall; a servant
brought his coat and hat, and taking them, he went out to the motor.
Avery appeared a moment later, with Harriet Santoine.

She stood looking after them as they spun down the curving drive and
onto the pike outside the grounds; then she went back to the study.
The digest Harriet had been working on that morning and the afternoon
before was finished; Miss Davis, she found, was typewriting its last
page. She dismissed Miss Davis for the day, and taking the typewritten
sheets and some other papers her father had asked to have read to him,
she went up to her father.

Basil Santoine was alone and awake; he was lying motionless, with the
cord and electric button in his hand which served to start and stop the
phonograph, with its recording cylinder, beside his bed. His mind,
even in his present physical weakness, was always working, and he kept
this apparatus beside him to record his directions as they occurred to
him. As she entered the room, he pressed the button and started the
phonograph, speaking into it; then, as he recognized his daughter's
presence, the cylinder halted; he put down the cord and motioned her to
seat herself beside the bed.

"What have you, Harriet?" he asked.

She sat down and glancing through the papers in her hand, gave him the
subject of each;