oollen dressing gown thrown over a chair by the
bedside. This was no place for her. Beehive Valley was not far off,
and her forty-five cents would more than suffice to take her there.
She would see the casting director. She would get a job. With food to
eat and a place to sleep as a starting point she would find her own
way to wickedness, releasing the prince in spite of all the mishaps
which kept her as she was.

But she trembled so that having wrapped the dressing gown about her
she was obliged to sit down again. She would have to be crafty. She
must get this woman to help her with her dressing, without suspecting
what she meant to do. How could she manage that? She must try to
think.

She was trying to think when she heard the ring of the telephone. It
suggested an idea. Some time--not this time, of course--when the
telephone rang and the woman was answering it, she, Letty, would be
able to slip away. The important thing was to do her hair and get her
clothes on.

"Yes?... Yes?" There was a little catch to the breath, a smothered
laugh, a smothered sigh. "Oh, so this is you!... Yes, I got it....
Seeing it again gave me quite a turn.... I never expected that you'd
keep it all this time, but.... Yes, she's here.... No; she didn't come
exactly of her own accord, but I--I found her.... I could tell you
about it easier if you were--it's so hard on the telephone when
there's so much to say--but perhaps you don't care to.... Yes, she's
quite well--only a little tired--been worked up somehow--but a day or
so in bed.... Oh, very sensible ... and she wants me to teach her how
to be a lady's maid...."

So that was it! Steptoe had been treacherous. Letty would never
believe in anyone again. She could make these reflections hurriedly
because the voice at the telephone was silent.

"Oh!"

It was the same exclamation as that of Barbara Walbrook, but in
another tone--a tone of distress, sharp, sympathetic. Pulling the
dressing gown about her, frightened, tense, Letty knew that something
had gone wrong.

"Oh! Oh!... last night, did you say?... early this morning...."

Letty crept to where her hostess was seated at the telephone. "What is
it?"

But Miss Towell either didn't hear the question or was too absorbed to
answer it. "Oh, 'Enery, _try_ to remember that God is his life--that
there can be no death to be afraid of when----"

Letty snatched the receiver from the other woman's hands, and fell on
her knees beside the