was indisposed at the time it came, and
Mrs. Heron took it, but was unable to answer for her husband. He asks me
to say, in his name, that if Mr. Peterson has some particularly fine
pearls to dispose of, he'll be pleased to look at them, not to-night,
but to-morrow morning about ten o'clock, at his hotel, the Dietz."

"The Dietz!" cried Clo. "Now I know who's speaking to me. You're Justin
O'Reilly!"

Inadvertently she had kept her lips at the receiver. The cry had flown
to the man who held the line.

"And you're my girl burglar! By Jove, I thought I knew that voice! Are
you in the pearl business, too? Has Mrs. Sands commissioned you and some
fellow called Peterson to sell her pearls to Mrs. Heron? Now I begin to
see light! She tried to make a bargain with me over those pearls. I
refused in Heron's name and my own. What's her game now, when there's
nothing left to bargain for, and you've sent the papers back?"

"Sent the papers back!" Clo gasped into the telephone. This coming into
touch with O'Reilly over the wire had been a shock. But she forgot the
surprise of it in the new surprise of his last words.

"Wasn't it you who sent them?" he went on.

She stopped to think before daring a reply. O'Reilly had got the papers
back, or he wanted her to think so, for some reason of his own.

"Well, if you must know, perhaps I did send them," she prevaricated.

"I'm glad to have this chance to thank you for repenting. I felt at the
time you weren't the stuff trick-confidence-ladies and burglaresses are
made of."

"I didn't exactly repent," confessed Clo. "I had an object to gain. I'm
glad the papers weren't lost on the way. You're sure no one had tampered
with the envelope?"

"Apparently not. The messenger handed it to me sealed up and seemingly
intact, with the address of my bank on it in my own handwriting. The boy
wouldn't say how he knew I was staying at the Dietz. He is an ornament
to his profession! I want you to know that I don't bear malice."

As Clo listened she was surprised at the soothing effect of his voice
upon her nerves. It was like hearing the voice of a friend. After all,
why should they be enemies, since of the two O'Reilly was the injured
party, and had just assured her that he didn't "bear malice?" But he was
going on to ask what was the "object" she had wished to gain. "Do you
mean to tell me, or is it one of your many mysteries?"

"I realized I'd gone to work with you in the wrong way," she vent