find in the garret,"
he murmured. "But how about the little black men in the chimney, and the
ghosts who live in the wall? This is the strangest house, Crane, the
very strangest house I ever knew." But he took the note and wandered
slowly upstairs with it, shaking his head.

On the landing of the second story, his eye caught the whisk of a skirt,
and pursuing it instantly, he came upon Lily. He cornered her in the
angle of the stairs.

"Hold on," he said, "I have a note for you, at least I have if you are
one of the people who live in the garret."

Lily, knowing nothing of the explanation that had taken place between
Reed and Crane, was not a little alarmed at being thus caught in a house
from which she had been so recently dismissed. She did not think quickly
in a crisis, and now she could find nothing to say but "I don't exactly
live in the garret."

"How interesting it would be," observed Lefferts, "if you would sit down
here on the stairs and tell me who you are."

"There's nothing to tell," said Lily, wondering what she had better
admit. "I'm just the housemaid."

"Oh," cried Lefferts, "then there are lots of things to tell. I have
always wanted to ask housemaids a number of questions. For instance,
why is it that you always drop the broom with which you sweep the stairs
at six in the morning? Why do you fancy it will conduce to any one's
comfort to shut the blinds and turn on all the lights in a bedroom on a
hot summer evening? Why do you hide the pillows and extra covering so
that one never finds them until one is packing to go away the next
morning? If you are a housemaid, you do these things; and if you do
these things, you must know why you do them."

Lily smiled. "I'm afraid I was a very poor housemaid," she answered.
"Anyhow, I'm not even that any more. I was dismissed."

"Indeed," said Lefferts. "Now that must be an interesting experience. I
have had several perfectly good businesses drop from under me, but I
have never been dismissed. Might I ask what led to it in your case?"

A reminiscent smile stole over Lily's face. "Mr. Crane dismissed me,"
she said, "for saying something which I believe he thought himself. I
called Mrs. Falkener an old harridan."

Lefferts shouted with pleasure.

"If Crane had had a spark of intellectual honesty, he'd have raised your
wages," he said. "It's just what he wanted to say himself."

"Oh! I was glad to be dismissed," returned she. "I never approved of the
w