and slim, but
gorgeous figure: long legs and throat, and dark eyes as big as
saucers. You'd turn and look after her anywhere! A lady, and thinks
herself the queen, though she works in a New York department store.
I've been running after her since one night we made acquaintance in
the park--great chums--called each other Jim and Winnie and held hands
from the first.

"But to-night, just because I said I'd never promised a dog collar or
anything like one, she went mad as a tiger cat and took revenge by
ringing up the police with a beast of a story that I'd kidnapped her.
She got it out before I could make her stop, and for just a minute I
was in a blue funk. New York's rampagin' so just now on the subject of
kidnappers. But I had wit enough to chuck her into the street and run
to the club for help. I thought of Freddy Fortescue (by the way, I
must get him to stand by me with a story in case he's questioned. I
can count on him every time!), but he wasn't in. I tried another man
or two, same result, and just then I saw you coming downstairs--ram
caught in the bushes."

"For the sacrifice," Peter finished.

"Well, not too much of a sacrifice, I hope," Logan temporized "You
don't regret standing by?"

"No, I don't regret it."

"Yet your tone sounds sort of odd, as if you were keeping something
back. I don't see why, either. I've kept my promise. I've
explained--put the whole story in a nutshell, not to bore you too much
with my love affairs gone bad. And what I've told you is the Gospel's
own truth, old man, whether you believe it or not."

"I don't believe it," said Peter. "I know it to be the devil's own
lie."

As he spoke he rose, and Logan jumped up, hot and red in the face.

"By Jove!" he sputtered. "I don't know what you mean."

"You know very well," Rolls insisted. "I mean--that you're a liar. A
damn liar! The girl didn't come here because she wanted to come. And
she wouldn't take a pearl collar or a _paper_ collar from you if you
went on your knees."

"You must be crazy!" Logan stared at him, paler now. "If you weren't
my guest, in my house, I--I'd knock you down."

"Try it," Peter invited him. "This is your father's house, I believe,
not yours. And I don't call myself your guest. Neither need you. I'm a
sort of out-of-season April Fool. At least, I was. I'm not now."

"I tell you--you're bughouse!" stammered Logan.

"You stand up for a girl you don't know a damn thing about---"

"I'd stand up for a