gulped
and I said terribly hard to myself, 'You want this thing and you can't
get it if you're all soft inside and a coward', and, Robin, in a
twinkling, something began to grow inside of me and get big and big
until I had courage to do anything! Of course it was different with me
but you'll probably feel just the way I did, all strong inside, when you
face him and get stirred up. Only--I hate to tell you, but I saw you put
your stocking on wrong side out and then change it and _that's_ bad
luck!"

Robin looked down at the luckless stocking. It looked too absurdly a
trifle to have weight with anything as important as righting the wrongs
of the Rileys.

Afterward, however, Robin vowed she'd always take great care in her
dressing!

Frank Norris had been superintendent of the Forsyth Mills for
twenty-five years. Since the death of old Christopher Forsyth he had run
them pretty much as he pleased, for, inasmuch as his accounting was
accurate to the smallest fraction and his profits unfailingly
forthcoming, neither Madame Forsyth nor her financial or legal advisers,
saw fit to interfere with him. For that reason the old man felt
annoyance as well as surprise when Robin broke into the usual routine of
his Monday morning, already disturbed by the mystery of Saturday night's
fire.

He had duly paid his respects to the little Forsyth heir with a Sunday
afternoon call and had afterward reported to Mrs. Norris that she "was a
little thing, all red hair and eyes." But now, as she stood at one end
of his desk, something in the resolute set of her chin arrested and held
his attention; there _was_ something more--he could not at the moment
say what--to the "little thing" than eyes and red hair.

Robin swallowed (as Beryl had instructed) and plunged straight into her
errand. Wouldn't he please let the Rileys stay in their cottage for a
little while--until something could be done?

At the mention of the Rileys the smile he had mustered vanished, and his
bushy eyebrows drew sharply down over his narrow eyes from which angry
little gleams flashed.

"Who asked you to come to me, Miss Forsyth?"

Robin's heart went down into her boots. "No one," she answered in a
faint voice. Then, quite suddenly, something in the hard, angry face
opposite her fired that spark within her that Beryl had assured her she
would feel. She felt the "big thing" grow and grow until she stood
straight, quite unafraid, and could go on calmly. "Only I don't