ber for inspection.

"Too bad," mourned Hippy, applying the familiar remedy of the devoted.
"Did you really lacerate your itty bitty finger? I don't see any signs
of it."

"Only the blind can't see," flung back Nora. "All joking aside, what
brought you here so early?"

Hippy cast an uneasy glance toward the doorway through which Grace had
just vanished. "This," he returned soberly. Unfolding a New York City
newspaper, he pointed to a black headline which read, "Young Man
Mysteriously Disappears."

Nora drew a sharp breath of dismay as her startled glance traveled down
the column. "Where--how--" she stammered.

"I don't know." Hippy glared savagely at the offending newspaper. "I've
got to show it to Grace," he deplored. "I'd rather be shot. Some one
broke a confidence. It's outrageous in who ever broke it."

"I should say so," agreed Nora. "You'd better--Here she comes now."

Grace stepped into view, carrying a quaint Japanese tray laden with
delectable cheer. In her crisp dotted swiss gown of white, her sensitive
face a trifle thinner than of yore, she looked hardly older than in her
freshman days at high school. "Here you are, weary wanderer," she said
gayly. "Eat, drink and be merry."

[Illustration: "Here You Are, Weary Wanderer," She Said Gayly.]

Hippy groaned inwardly as he sprang from the swing to relieve her of the
tray. "Grace," he began with grave affection, "I have something not in
the least pleasant to tell you. I don't----"

"About Tom?" Grace's question rang out sharply on the drowsy air.

"It's not bad news of him," Hippy hastily assured, "but it's about him."

"Then tell me quickly." Grace braced herself for the shock, her gray
eyes riveted on Hippy.

"Here it is." Hippy handed her the fateful newspaper. "I wanted to be
the first to let you know it," he added in sympathetic apology. "I am
afraid some one has played you false."

Grace focused her gaze on the flaring headline. Sinking into the nearest
porch chair she read on, apparently lost to her surroundings. Raising
her eyes at last from the printed sheet she astonished both Hippy and
Nora with a quiet, "I am glad of this."

"Glad?" rose the inquiring chorus.

"Yes; glad. During the last two weeks I've felt very queer about keeping
Tom's disappearance a secret. At first I dreaded to have any one know,
on account of Fairy Godmother's horror of gossip and on my own account,
too. She was afraid that some malicious person might start the