In and Out

The Reluctant One

One knew Anthony Fry for two or three decades before quite understanding him. David's great disadvantage, of course, was that he had met Anthony only an hour or so before. To David, doubtless, the quiet, mysterious, speculative smile seemed sinister, for he repeated thickly:

"I want my—my cap and my coat and——"

"Well, what are you going to do if you don't get them?" Anthony laughed.

"What did you say?" David asked quickly.

"What if you don't get your coat?"

"Does that mean that you're going to keep me here, whether I want to stay or not?" the boy asked quickly.

"Not just that, perhaps, but it does mean that I'm going to keep you here for a little while, David, until you've come to your senses and——"

"I'll yell!" David stated.

"Eh?"

"If you try to keep me here I'll yell until everybody in the house comes in to see what's happening!"

Anthony laughed quietly.

"Don't be ridiculous, David," he said. "I've lived here for years, and they will know perfectly well that I'm not injuring you in any way."

"Oh!" gasped David.

"So just sit down again and consider what I have offered you. Sit still for just one minute and consider—and then give me your answer."

Finger-tips drumming, benevolent gaze beaming over his glasses, the unusual Anthony waited. David's scared eyes roved the room, wandered over Johnson Boller, reading his paper, and finally settled so steadily on that gentleman that he looked up and, looking, read David's mind and shrugged his shoulders.

"Your own fault, kid," said he. "I wanted to give you a free ride, but you had to come up and hear what he had to say."

"Johnson!" Anthony said sharply, "Just let the youngster's mental processes work the thing out in their own way."

Half a minute dragged along—yet before it was gone one saw clearly that the mental processes had taken their grip. An extremely visible change was coming over David Prentiss. He gulped down certain emotions of his own, and presently managed to smile, uneasily at first and then with a certain confidence. He cleared his throat and, with a slight huskiness, addressed Anthony:

"Er—do I understand that you want me to stay here until I fully appreciate all you've offered me, Mr. Fry?"

"Virtually that."

"Well, I appreciated that all along; but—but I was sort of worried about it getting so late, you know," David said brightly. "I certainly do appreciate it, and I thank you very much. Now can I have my coat?"

"Really decided to grip the opportunity, eh?" Anthony asked keenly.

"You bet!"

Johnson Boller laid aside his paper.

"Now chase him, Anthony!" he said. "He's standing up and holding the sugar on his nose. Slip the kid a five-dollar bill and let Wilkins——"

"Do you really imagine that I'd rouse all the boy's hopes and then play him a shabby trick like that?" Anthony asked sharply.

"Huh?"

"Most emphatically not!" Mr. Fry said. "I'll play no such shabby trick on the youngster. He shall have exactly the chance I promised, and I shall watch the working out of the idea with the most intense interest. David, I'm going to keep you here from this minute!"

"Keep me here?" David echoed blankly.

"Certainly."

David gazed fixedly at the electrolier.

"Well, I'll tell you, Mr. Fry," he said. "I'd like to stay to-night, but I can't—not to-night. You see, I have to go home to my father. He's an—an invalid."

"We'll telephone the good news to him," Anthony smiled.

"You can't," said David. "We're too poor to have a telephone."

"Very well. Then we'll wire him."

David shook his head energetically.

"That wouldn't do, either," said he. "Father's sick, you know. His heart's very weak. Just the sight of a telegram might kill him."

"Unfortunate!" Anthony sighed and shrugged his shoulders. "Very well, David. Then you shall write him a note, and I'll have Wilkins take it to him."

David swallowed audibly and smiled a wild little smile.

"Oh, no! Not that, sir!" said he. "That might be even worse than a telegram, I think."

"Why?"

"Well, father would be likely to think that I'd been—been injured and taken into some swell home, you know, and that I was writing like that just to reassure him. No," David said firmly, "that would be the worst possible thing. I'll have to go myself and talk it over with father and—now if I can have my cap and my coat?"

It came as a familiar refrain. It caused Anthony's eye to darken suddenly as he sat back and stared at the boy.

"Confound your hat and coat!" he rapped out. "See here, David. You write the note, and I myself will take it to your father and explain—and be sure that he will rejoice. There is the desk. Where do you live?"

His tone was not nearly so benevolent. Opposition, as always, was rousing Anthony's unfortunate stubbornness; with or without reason, had David but known it, every mention of that cap and coat was diminishing his chances of walking out of the Lasande—and it is possible that he sensed something of the kind, for his smile disappeared abruptly, and the assurance that had been with him was no more.

"I can't tell you where I live!" he said hoarsely.

"In the name of heaven, why not?" Anthony snapped.

"Because—because—well, you may not understand this, sir, but I promised father I wouldn't tell any one where we live."

"What?"

"I did, and I can't break a promise!" David insisted. "You see, father was rich once, and he's terribly proud. He doesn't want any one to know we live in such a poor place, because somebody he used to know might hear of it and try to help him, and that would break father's heart."

"His heart's in pretty bad shape, isn't it?" Johnson Boller muttered.

"Frightful!" said David. "And that's why I'll have to go now and explain to him and think it all over and——"

"Why think it over?" Anthony rasped. "Isn't your mind made up now?"

"Of course it is," the boy said hastily. "Only I'll have to tell father and then come back here in the morning, Mr. Fry; only—I have, to go home now!"

His voice broke strangely.

Anthony Fry looked him over with a quantity of sour curiosity.

If the golden opportunity before his very eyes was making even the trace of an impression on David Prentiss, the boy's faculty for masking his true emotions was downright amazing. That bright, rather attractive young countenance told of absolutely nothing but the heartfelt desire to escape from the gentleman who wished to improve his condition.

It was the same old story, world-old and world-wide. David, once he was out of this apartment, would never return; with opportunity fairly pushing against him, he turned from her in terror, refusing to know that she was there.

Well, then, he should see her!

Anthony's square chin set. He rose with a jerk and stood surveying the nervous David, a tall, commanding, rather fearsome figure. Some little time he transfixed the lad with his cold, hard eyes, while David grew paler and paler; then he walked down upon David, who cringed visibly, and seized his shoulders.

"David," he said sternly, "you have no conception at all of what I am trying to offer you. I'm going to keep you here until you have."

"Keep me—here?" David faltered.

"Just that."

It was in Johnson Boller's mind to rise and deliver a little speech of his own, pointing out the legal rights of David Prentiss and the chance that, at some later date, interested parties might hear of this evening and use it in moving Anthony toward an insane asylum. Yet he did not speak, for he grew interested in David himself.

That bewildered youngster was shrinking and shrinking away from Anthony. He was wilting before the stem eye, and he was smiling in the sickliest, most ghastly fashion. And now he was nodding submissively and speaking:

"Yes, I'll stay, Mr. Fry."

"Ah!" said Anthony.

"I—I'm glad to stay," David assured him.

Then, looking at Anthony, he contrived another smile and yawned; and having yawned once, he yawned again, vastly, and stretching the second time.

"The—the trouble with me is that I'm sleepy," David stated, in a strange, low voice. "I get that way because I'm not used to late hours, and when I do get sleepy I—I can't think or talk or do anything. I'll be myself in the morning, Mr. Fry; but if I'm going to stay here, I'd like to go to bed now."

He yawned again and still again, quite noisily and eying Anthony in an odd, expectant, pleading way. Anthony, after a puzzled moment, shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

"Go to bed if you like, David," he said. "There are one or two things I want to say to you first."

"Yes, sir," David said obediently.

"To-morrow, when you have slept on it, I'm confident that you will see the huge opportunity that I have offered you, and that you will stay with me as one of my little household. It is not an exacting position, but there are one or two laws you must remember. For the first—no dissipation. You don't drink, David?"

"Not a drop, sir."

"And for another," Anthony said gravely, "no women!"

"Eh?" said David.

"Absolutely no women in this Hotel Lasande!" Anthony repeated, with a fanatic force that caused Johnson Boller to snort disgustedly and throw up his hands. "This is, perhaps, more strictly than any other house in New York an all-man establishment. There are not even women servants here, David, and other sorts of women don't run in and out of here. In fact, the ladies who do come—relatives of the tenants, of course—are so very few that they're all known to the clerks. So, while you may have a sweetheart, David, and while she may be all very well in her place—keep her out of here!"

"But——"

"That's the unwritten law of the house, and it makes for profound peace," Anthony concluded. "You'll appreciate it more fully when you have lived here for a time."

David, facing Mr. Fry, gazed at the floor and yawned again.

"I guess I'll go to bed," he said weakly.

"And before that we'll start you on the right track," Anthony said with a gentle smile. "You'll take a good, hot bath."

He pressed the button and Wilkins appeared.

"The guest-chamber for young Mr. Prentiss, Wilkins," said Anthony. "You will outfit him with pajamas of my own and the gray bathrobe I used last year. To-morrow we'll get you something that fits, David."

David nodded numbly.

"And, Wilkins," said his master, "you will assist Mr. Prentiss with his bath."

David's nod broke in two.

"I don't want any help," he said.

"But Wilkins——"

"Wilkins or anybody else; I don't want any help with a bath. I know how to take a bath, at least. I don't know how you swells take yours, but I take mine alone; I don't want any one pottering around me, and I won't have it!"

His countenance flushed angrily, and Anthony favored him with an indulgent smile. After all, he was very young.

"As you please, David. Show him to the north bathroom, Wilkins. That is all."

But he tapped Wilkins's shoulder and held him back a moment to add:

"And get his wretched togs, Wilkins. I'll dress him properly to-morrow; but get those rags away from him."

"Very good, sir," said Wilkins, as he glided down the corridor after David.

The proprietor of Fry's Imperial Liniment watched him go and smiled softly, returning to his chair to grin at Johnson Boller in a perfectly human fashion. Johnson Boller, on the other hand, did not grin at all. He merely gazed at his old friend until, after a minute or two, Anthony asked:

"Well—what do you think?"

"I think you're a nut!" Johnson Boller said with sweet candor. "I think you're a plain da—well, I think you're unbalanced. You know what that young thug will do to you, don't you?"

"Eh?"

"If he's the crook he looks, he'll light out of here about three in the morning with everything but the piano and your encyclopædia. If he isn't a crook, just as soon as he gets loose and talks it over with his friends, he'll have you pinched for detaining him here against his will; and I'll give you ten to one that he collects not less than twenty-five hundred dollars before he's through. You scared him stiff with your eagle eye and your crazy notions, and he pleaded guilty so he could go to bed and get away from you. I'll have to testify to that if he calls on me."

"Fiddlesticks!" said Anthony Fry.

"Is it? Wait and see, Anthony," Johnson Boller said earnestly. "That kid spells trouble. I can feel it in the air."

"You can always feel it in the air," Anthony smiled.

"Maybe so; but this feeling amounts to a pain!" Boller said warmly. "This is a hunch—a premonition—one of those prophetic aches that can't be ignored. Why, he had a fight started before you had spoken ten words to him, and——"

"Oh, rot!" Anthony said.

Johnson Boller drew a deep, concerned breath.

"On the level," he said, "are you going to keep this kid imprisoned here?"

"By no means," Anthony laughed. "As a matter of fact, all I want to do is to talk to him in the morning. I want to know, Johnson, whether he will actually persist in fighting off the chance I'm offering him—because it's so confounded characteristic of the whole human race. If he's as obstinate in the morning as he is now—well, I suppose I'll turn him loose with a ten-dollar bill, and look around for another subject. I'd really like to approach a dozen men, picked haphazard, and write a little paper on the manner in which they greet opportunity."

"Yes, but not while I'm with you," Johnson Boller said. "Anthony, do this—get the kid aside in the morning and tell him you'd been drinking heavily all day and didn't know what you were doing to-night. See? Make a joke of it and slip him fifty to keep quiet, and then——"

"Ah, Wilkins," Anthony smiled. "Got his togs, did you?"

The invaluable one bowed and held the shabby garments at a distance from his person.

"He passed them out to me through a crack in the door," he reported disgustedly. "What shall I do with them? They're hardly worth pressing, sir."

"Of course not. Don't bother with them," Anthony smiled, and waved his man away. "Johnson, turn intelligent for a moment, will you?"

"Why? Intelligence has no place in this evening."

"Oh, yes it has. Let's examine the case of this David youngster and try to reconstruct his emotions and his mental impressions when confronted with opportunity such as——"

"Damn opportunity!" said Johnson Boller, rising with a jerk. "I'm going to bed!"

Only once had Johnson Boller tarried in Montreal, and on that occasion the thermometer had ranged about ninety in the shade. Yet now, as he slumbered fitfully in Anthony's Circassian guest-chamber, childhood notions of Canada came to haunt his dreams.

He saw snow—long, glistening roads of snow over which Beatrice whizzed in a four-horse sleigh, with driver and footman on the box, and beside her a tall, foreign-looking creature with a big mustache and flashing eyes and teeth. He talked to Beatrice and leaned very close, devouring her beauty with his eyes; and Johnson Boller groaned, woke briefly, and drifted off again.

He saw ice; they were holding an ice carnival in Montreal, and everybody was on skates. Beatrice was on skates, ravishing in white fur, leading some sort of grand march with the Governor General of Canada, who skated very close to her and devoured her beauty with his bold, official eyes, causing Johnson Boller to groan again and thresh over on his other side.

He saw a glittering toboggan slide; laughing people in furs were there at the head of the slide, notably Beatrice, chatting shyly with a blond giant in a Mackinaw, who leaned very close to her as they prepared to coast and devoured her beauty with his large, blue eyes. Now they settled on the toboggan, just these two, although Johnson Boller's astral self seemed to be with them. The blond giant whispered something, and they slid down—down—down!

And they struck something, and Johnson Boller was on his feet in the middle of the Circassian chamber, demanding:

"What's that? What was that?"

Somewhere, Anthony was muttering and moving about. Somewhere else, Wilkins was chattering; but the main impression was that the roof had fallen in—and Johnson Boller, struggling into his bathrobe, stumbled to the door and burst into the brilliant living-room.

In the center of the room, flattened upon the floor, was Anthony's substantial little desk. Papers were around it and blotters and letters without number, and the old-fashioned inkwell had shot off its top and set a black streak across the beautiful Oriental carpet.

Two chairs were on their sides, also, but the striking detail of the picture was furnished by David Prentiss. That young man was sprawled crazily, just beyond the desk, and beside him, holding him down with both hands, was Wilkins, tastefully arrayed in the flowered silk pajamas Anthony had discarded last year as too vivid.

"I've got him, sir!" Wilkins' pale lips reported, as his master appeared. "I have him fast."

"What'd he do?" Johnson Boller asked quickly. "Pull a knife on you, Wilkins?"

"He'd not time for that, sir," Wilkins said grimly. "I think he stumbled over a chair and took the desk along with him, trying to get out. I always wake just as the clock strikes two, and stay awake ten minutes or more, and that's how I came to hear him and get him. He was just getting to his feet when I ran in and turned on the lights, and he——"

"Let him up!" Anthony said sharply.

"But don't let go of him!" Johnson Boller said harshly. "I missed the time by an hour, but I was right otherwise, Anthony. He's got the silver and your stick-pins and rings on him, and—what the dickens is he wearing?"

Silence fell upon them for a little, as David struggled to his feet and looked about with a strange, trancelike stare—for there was some reason for Mr. Boller's query.

David, apparently, had dressed for the street. He wore shoes not less than five sizes too long; he wore a bright brown sack coat which came almost to his knees, and blue trousers which were turned up until they all but met the coat. He had acquired a rakish felt hat, too, which rested mainly on the back of his neck.

"He got them clothes out of the junk-closet at the end of the corridor, sir," Wilkins said quite breathlessly. "He must have been roaming the place quite a bit, to have found them, and——"

"What were you trying to do, David?" Anthony snapped.

"I don't know, sir," David said vaguely, passing a hand over his eyes in a manner far too dramatic to be convincing.

"Where did you get those clothes?"

"I have no idea, sir," David murmured.

"Don't lie to me!" Anthony snapped. "What——"

"I'm not lying, sir," David said in the same vague, far-away tone. "I must have been asleep, Mr. Fry. I remember having a terrible dream—it was about father and it seemed to me that he was dying. There were doctors all about the bed and father was calling to me, and it seemed to me that I must get to him, no matter what stood in the way. I remember trying to go to him, and then—why, I must have fallen there, sir, and wakened."

For an instant the vagueness left his eyes and they looked straight at Anthony.

"May I go to father now?" he asked. "That—that dream upset me."

"Morning will do for father," Anthony said briefly.

"But I have a feeling that something terrible's going to happen if I don't go——"

Anthony Fry laid a kindly hand on his shoulder.

"Get back to bed, youngster," he smiled. "You're nervous, I suppose, being in a strange bed, and all that sort of thing. And incidentally, get off those clothes and give them to Wilkins."

David gulped audibly.

"I'll pass them out to Wilkins, if I must, sir," he said in the queerest, choking voice—and he turned from them and shuffled down the corridor to the north bedroom of Anthony Fry's apartment.

"Curious kid!" Anthony muttered.

"Not nearly as curious as you are," said Johnson Boller. "You didn't even go through his pockets and get out the stuff while he was here, and we could see just what he'd taken! You let him go in there and dump the pockets before he gives up the clothes and——"

Anthony permitted himself a grin and a yawn.

"My dear chap, go back to bed and forget it," he said impatiently. "The boy was stealing nothing. He may have been trying to escape; he may have been walking in his sleep. Consciously or subconsciously, he's certainly giving us a demonstration of humanity's tendency to dodge its opportunities."

Johnson Boller gave it up and returned, soured, to his Circassian walnut bedstead—soured because, if there was one thing above all others that he abominated, it was being routed out in the middle of the night.

Five minutes or more he spent in muttering before he drifted away again, this time to arrive at somebody's grand ball in Montreal. It was a tremendous function, plainly given in honor of Beatrice's arrival in town, yet she was not immediately visible. Johnson Boller's dream personality hunted around for some time before it found her in the conservatory.

Behind thick palms, Beatrice sat with a broad-shouldered person in the uniform of a field-marshal; he had a string of medals on his chest, and he was devouring her beauty with his hungry eyes. Nay, more, he leaned close to Beatrice and sought to take her hand, and although she shrank from him in terror, there was a certain fascinated light in her own lovely black eyes; she clutched her bosom and sought to escape, but——

"Oh, my Lord!" said Johnson Boller, awakening to stare at the dark ceiling.

Somewhere a window slammed.

He listened for a little and heard nothing more; then, having the room nearest the elevators, he heard one of them hum up swiftly and heard the gate clatter open. And then there were voices and some one knocked on the door of the apartment with a club, as it seemed. Somebody else protested and pressed the buzzer—and by that time Wilkins had padded down the hall and was opening the door.

Johnson Boller caught:

"Police officer! Lemme in quick! You've got a burglar in there!"

The Wee Sma' Hours

Wilkins, in his official black, was a wonderfully self-contained person; roused from slumber in pink-rosed silk, his self-control was not so perfect, for as he struggled out of bed again Johnson Boller caught:

"God bless my soul, officer! What——"

"Hush!" interrupted an unfamiliar, horrified voice. "Come inside quickly and close that door."

Anthony was in motion, too. Johnson Boller, stumbling out of his Circassian apartment, met him just entering the living-room from his own chamber, and for an instant they stared at one another as they knotted bathrobe cords about them.

"You see?" Johnson Boller said, with acid triumph. "I was right, eh?"

"What?"

"The cops have tracked the little devil down for his last job, whatever that may have been, and they've found him here! Now you've got a nice scandal on your hands, haven't you? A tenth-rate kid crook found hiding in the flat of Mr. Anthony Fry, with the full knowledge and consent of——"

"Upon my word, Johnson, I think you've lost your senses to-night!" Anthony snapped. "Whatever is wrong, Wilkins?"

The silk-pajamaed one indicated their visitors with a hand that was none too steady.

"It's Mr. Dodbury, the night manager, sir, and this policeman that says——"

"I'm afraid you have a burglar in here, Mr. Fry," the manager put in agitatedly. "I can't understand how it occurred; nothing of the kind has ever happened to us before, and the mouth of that alley is constantly under the eye of the firemen on that side of the boiler-room. Moreover, there is a high gate from the street and I cannot believe that any one——"

The burly officer halted him.

"Well, however he got there, he was on the fire-escape and coming down when I see him from the street," he said energetically. "When he seen me he turned into this north window and closed it after him, and my partner'd have given me the whistle if he'd come out again. Which room will it be, now?"

Wilkins glanced significantly at his master.

"If it's the north room on the fire-escape, sir, it must be the room young Mr. Prentiss has to-night."

"And the burglar is supposed to have gone in there?" Anthony said calmly.

"He ain't supposed—he went. I seen him!" stated the law. "And the longer we stand here and talk about it, the more chance he has to kill whoever's in there!"

"Well, as it happens, he isn't killing any one, because he isn't there," Mr. Fry said patiently and with just a touch of contempt. "Any one entering that room must have wakened Mr. Prentiss, and he certainly hasn't called for help. For that matter, I should have heard the window myself, because I sleep very lightly. Nevertheless, if you wish, we will go in there."

Impressively dignified even in his bathrobe, Anthony led the way down the side corridor, with the four trailing after him. They came to the door, and the officer pushed forward, club raised grimly over his right shoulder as he laid his left hand on the knob.

"Where's the light-switch in there?" he whispered.

"Right by the door," Wilkins supplied.

"Duck in the second I turn the knob, throw on the light, and then dodge along the wall," the law commanded briefly. "Are you ready?"

The invaluable one muttered his assent. The knob turned soundlessly and the door flew open. Wilkins, with a distinctly terrified little wheeze, pushed in, jabbed at the button, and scurried down the room on his hands and knees, eyes shut to shield his brain from the horrible impression.

Yet there was no hint of anything horrible. With all four corners of the room in plain sight, with the empty closet partly open and its interior fully visible, no burglar crouched, pistol in hand—no masked malefactor leaped forward to stun the officer with his padded lead-pipe. Only David Prentiss was in the room, and David slumbered sweetly in the bed, the covers pulled tight up around his young chin, a gentle dream-smile upon his regular features.

"Well, wotter yuh know about——" the officer began.

"Hush!" Anthony said gently.

"What?"

"Don't wake the youngster!" Anthony whispered sharply. "There's no need for that, officer. Look around if you like and then let us get out of here."

He folded his arms and waited, while the officer, visibly puzzled, poked about the room, and Wilkins, on his feet and smiling sheepishly, tip-toed to the door—while the night manager of the Lasande stepped in and looked about with a mixture of perplexity and relief, and Johnson Boller stood and stared at the sleeping David.

"Are you quite sure it was this window, officer?" the manager asked.

"I am that, if this is the one next to the corner of the house."

"But are you quite sure that you didn't imagine it?" Anthony asked tartly.

The policeman looked him over gravely.

"Boss, when I can see a man in black clothes staring down at me, letting off a little howl of fright, and then turning around and going into a window—when I can see that and it ain't there, I'll turn in my tin and go back to the docks. The guy came in this window and——"

"Well, since it is quite evident that he didn't, he couldn't have come in," the manager of the faultless hotel said hastily, as he caught Anthony's expression. "You've made a mistake in the window, officer. We'll go down and look up from the street again and see just what window you do mean."

"But——"

"We will not bother the gentlemen further," Mr. Dodbury said firmly.

Anthony nodded.

"Show them out, Wilkins. Come, Johnson."

"Wait a second," Johnson Boller said softly, as the others filed out of sight.

"Wait for what?"

"I want to admire this little cherub, sleeping here so soundly," Mr. Boller muttered.

"Don't be absurd! Come and——"

This thing of losing sleep rendered Johnson Boller uglier than could anything else in the world.

"Are they out of hearing?" he said. "All right. Somebody did close a window in here. I heard it close!"

"When?"

"Five minutes before the last excitement," said Mr. Boller. "How many pair of pajamas did Wilkins give this kid?"

"What? One pair, I suppose. Why?"

Johnson Boller grinned almost wickedly.

"Because there's a pajama suit under that chair and it's been worn!" said he. "What's the kid wearing in bed there?"

He stepped forward suddenly and jerked back the covers, and Anthony stepped forward with a sharp little exclamation, for David Prentiss, although he seemed to slumber between the sheets, wore a suit of black clothes and a pair of black shoes, and beside him a black felt hat was crumpled!

"Maybe that cop wasn't the idiot he seemed, eh?" Johnson Boller asked.

"I don't understand it," Anthony said angrily. "I—David!"

The boy merely sighed in his sleep and turned on his back.

"David!" Johnson Boller snapped, thrusting a hard forefinger directly into the pit of David's stomach.

"Good gracious!" gasped David Prentiss, sitting up and staring about with eyes wide open. "What—I must have been asleep and——"

Anthony's gaze was growing keener and angrier by the second.

"Never mind that artistic amazement, David," he said sourly. "What were you trying to do?"

"Trying?" echoed David. "To do?"

"Those are Wilkins's clothes. Where did you get them?"

"I don't know."

"Yes, you do!" Anthony snapped. "You must have found them in his room. Well?"

David gazed up at him with the same unfathomable look that had so disturbed Johnson Boller in the taxicab.

"Very well—I did find them in his room," he said. "I put them on because I couldn't find my own clothes, and I—I wanted to get to father."

"Yes, and now you're going to father!" Johnson Boller said decisively. "Better let him go, Anthony."

David was on his feet with one swing.

"That's the only thing to do with me," he said heartily. "I'm too much of a nuisance to keep around, Mr. Fry; I'm so worried about father that I can't think of anything else. So now I'll go and——"

"So now you'll stay right here!" Anthony said fiercely.

"Why?" Boller asked.

"Because I've undertaken to show this kid the opportunity of his lifetime, and I'll drive it into his infernal little skull if I have to chloroform him and have a surgeon drill a hole to let it through!" Mr. Fry said quite irresponsibly.

David collapsed hopelessly on the edge of the bed.

"I—I should think you'd be so out of patience with me——" he began mournfully.

"I am, but I'm not going to drop the job on that account," Anthony said grimly. "Shed those clothes, David."

"I'll shed 'em when you go out," David said monotonously. "I—I'd rather undress alone."

Johnson Boller's plump hands were on his plump hips and he surveyed his old friend darkly.

"Are you actually going to keep the youngster here against his will?" he demanded.

"I am!" snapped Anthony Fry.

Johnson Boller swallowed his wondering rage.

"I hope you get all that's coming to you!" he said. "I hope he sues you for a million dollars and collects every penny of it!"

And he turned and thumped out of David's chamber, down the corridor, and into the living-room, across the living-room, and into his own bedchamber—and there for a little he sat on the edge of the bed and swore aloud.

Presently he heard Anthony come through from David's room, muttering to himself; he heard the switch snap, and the streak of light under his door vanished.

With a long, weary groan, Johnson Boller slipped back to slumberland, and presently he was again in Montreal. It was still winter, and they were holding a skiing contest. Beatrice was there at the top of the slide, and beside her stood a tall, foppish youth with a little blond mustache. He leaned very close to Beatrice as he spoke, and devoured her beauty with his hungry eyes.

In the east the first gray light of dawn was streaking the skies.

In Anthony Fry's living-room, ever so faintly, objects just took shape in the gloom, coming foggily out of the inky blackness that had been, even ten minutes ago. Down the corridor a door creaked, and for a minute or more after the creak the stillness was even more pronounced.

Then, had one been awake and listening, the softest, lightest shuffle came from the corridor—paused—moved on again. There was a sharp intake of breath and the almost inaudible sound of a hand feeling along the corridor wall, feeling along and feeling along, until it touched the curtains of the living-room.

In the wide doorway of the dusky place an indefinite, strange figure appeared and stopped. It wore slippers, several sizes too large. It wore a bathrobe of gray, so long that its owner held it up from the floor to avoid tripping. It wore pajamas, too, and of these the legs were upturned almost one foot—for they were Anthony's pajamas.

Warily the figure gazed about, squinting through the gloom for half a minute, listening intently. Its frowzy brown head nodded then and the bathrobed one tip-toed on, now with a definite idea of direction. Past Anthony's door it went and past Johnson Boller's without a sound, without a slip—stopped to listen again, and then scuffed on toward the far corner, where stood the little telephone table.

And now, trembling, the figure settled on the stool, and shaky hands gripped the instrument itself. The receiver went to its ear and the figure whispered into the transmitter—trembled the harder and waited through minutes that were hours, while from behind Johnson Boller's door came an irregular snore and an occasional groan, as some new fiend sought to capture Beatrice's slender hand.

Suddenly a visible shock ran through the stealthy figure at the telephone. The trembling ceased abruptly and the figure stiffened, leaning forward eagerly and cupping a hand about the transmitter. Thrice it whispered shrilly, nodding desperately at the uncomprehending instrument; and at last the listener at the other end seemed to understand, for the figure pressed lips even closer and spoke swiftly.

A full two minutes of sharp whispering and it waited—listened and nodded animatedly—spoke again, enunciating each word clearly and still so softly that one across the living-room could not have heard.

Without the suggestion of a click, the receiver was returned to its hook. The figure rose cautiously and peered all about, through the shadows, getting its bearings once more. Again the bathrobe was gathered high above the grotesquely slippered feet; again the figure shuffled along, moving toward the doorway.

Without a stumble it threaded its mysterious way between chairs and little tables, divans and cases and pedestals, until it came safely to the corridor. There it paused for an instant, and in the gloom the faintest, excited giggle issued from beside the curtains. Then the corridor doorway was empty, and Johnson Boller snored on and groaned.

At the end of the corridor David Prentiss's door closed and utter stillness rested upon the apartment again.

After the skiing contest, although Johnson Boller did not seem to be present at the end, all hands trooped off to a clubhouse of some kind and there was a general jollification. Lovely women, handsome men grouped about a long table, and waiters rushed hither and thither, bearing viands and wine—although mostly wine.

He of the little blond mustache sat beside Beatrice, and as the champagne came around for the second or third time he leaped from his chair. Glass high held, he pointed to Johnson Boller's lovely wife with the other hand; he was beginning a toast, the temperature and intimacy of which caused Johnson Boller's fists to clench, and—he woke with a violent jerk and stared at the ceiling.

It was daylight—had been daylight for some time, apparently, because an early sun was reflected from the high building on the other side of the street. Wilkins seemed to be moving around, too, which indicated that it was at least six o'clock.

Johnson Boller stretched and snarled; he had had a wretched night of it! He was tired all through, as he was always tired when his rest had been broken. He was ugly as sin, too, and almost at once he found his ugliness focusing on young David Prentiss.

If Anthony Fry had carried his obsession over into the daylight, if he still persisted in poking his idiotic opportunity at David and the end of it did not seem to be in sight, Johnson Boller decided that the empty flat on Riverside should know its master's presence hereafter and—Boller sat up in bed, listening.

That was certainly Wilkins's voice, raised in horror—ah, and Wilkins was hurrying, too. Or no, it couldn't be Wilkins; that was somebody a good deal lighter, rushing along the corridor. And now the oddest babel of voices had risen, with Wilkins thrusting in an incoherent word here and there—and now the voices were growing fainter, all of a sudden, and he could hear Anthony Fry stirring in the next room.

Something new had happened! Johnson Boller, swinging out of bed, jammed his feet into his slippers and snatched up his bathrobe. Another night like this, and he'd be ready for emergency drill with a fire company.

Not that there was any need for haste, though. By the time he had opened the door and stepped into the living-room the little excitement seemed to have quieted down again. Anthony, bathrobed also, was just issuing from his bedroom, and again, for a moment, they gazed at one another.

"What was it that time?" Johnson Boller asked.

"I've no idea. Did you hear it, too?"

"Naturally. I——"

"Why, Wilkins!" Anthony Fry all but gasped, as his servitor appeared in the doorway. "What under the sun's the matter with you?"

"My—my eye, sir!" choked the faithful one. "It's downright scandalous, Mr. Fry!"

"What is?"

"The—the woman, sir! The woman that's come to see him!"

His jaw sagged senselessly and his blank eyes regarded his master quite fishily; and Anthony, after a wondering second or so, scuffed over to him and snapped:

"What's wrong with you, Wilkins? What woman came?"

"A—a young Frenchwoman, I should judge, sir," Wilkins stammered. "She came to the door here, getting past the office I don't know how. At any rate, she came, sir, and said some gibberish about Mr. David Prentiss, and with that she was past me and inside, Mr. Fry."

"Where is she now?"

"Well, she—she's in his bedroom, sir!" Wilkins stated. "The young chap came flying out like a madman, Mr. Fry, and threw his arms around her, speaking French as I suppose. And she—she threw her arms around Mr. Prentiss, sir, and with that they—well, they're in there now, sir."

Johnson Boller laughed unpleasantly.

"Picked off a live one, didn't you, Anthony?" said he. "There's nothing slow about David. He comes here and settles down at midnight, and his lady friends are calling by six the next morning. When you——"

Anthony had passed him, chin set and lips rather white.

There are some places where the questionable may be passed over quite lightly. The Hotel Lasande is not one of these places. There are thousands upon thousands of bachelors who would merely have grinned interestedly at the news; Anthony, being impeccable and a genuine woman-hater at heart, was not of these thousands. Hence, even his lean and aristocratic cheeks were white as he rattled at the knob of David's door.

He had expected to find it locked, and in that he was disappointed. The door gave quite readily, admitting Anthony and Johnson Boller as well—and for a matter of seconds they stood transfixed before the picture.

Beyond question, the woman was there!

She was little and very dark, decidedly pretty, for that matter, and obviously fond of David Prentiss; she sat at David's side on the edge of the bed and her arms were about David—while young Mr. Prentiss himself held her fast and seemed in a high state of excitement.

Even as the door opened, they had been speaking, both at the same time and both in French, in itself rather an astonishing phenomenon; but as the bathrobed gentlemen stopped beside them they ceased speaking. They merely clutched each other the tighter and looked at Anthony.

"Well?" Anthony Fry said slowly, and his voice was a terrible thing to hear.

"Well?" David said faintly.

His pretty little friend broke into a torrent of French, of which, unfortunately, neither Anthony nor Johnson Boller could make anything at all. David, with a long, gasping intake of his breath, muttered something to her, and that proving futile, put a gentle hand over her mouth. The girl, looking at Anthony, burst suddenly into loud and hysterical weeping!

"For Heaven's sake, shut her up!" gasped the master of the apartment.

"You started her—it was the way you looked at her!" David said thickly.

"Well, you stop her or I'll wring your neck!" Anthony panted. "You can hear that over half the house."

He turned his eye back to the unfortunate and froze her into sudden silence. Shaking, the girl crouched closer to David Prentiss, and Anthony drew breath once more.

It was a horrible thing that had happened, of course—this coming of a strange woman into his apartment. It was likely to take a good deal of explaining to the management of the Lasande, too, later on. But he had brought it upon himself, and the realization caused Anthony's white fury to glow.

"This—this woman is a friend of yours?" he choked.

"One of the—best friends I have!" David faltered.

"How does she come to be here?"

"I—I sent for her," David confessed. "I telephoned and——"

"All right. That's enough," Anthony Fry said, composure returning in some degree. "Can she speak English?"

"Not one word."

"Positively," the master of the apartment said slowly, "the thing to do is to have you both arrested, David. Don't start like that and don't speak! There is a certain presumption that this woman is some sort of accomplice, David—not much, perhaps, but one strong enough to hold you until both of you had learned a lesson!"

David, himself, white to the lips, was beyond words.

"Nevertheless," Anthony pursued, only a trifle more gently, "I shall go to no such length, because of the character of the house and the personal reflection such a mess would cast upon myself. Tell the woman to go, David, and then you and I will have a little chat."

"But——" David whispered.

"Tell her to go this instant!" Anthony thundered.

The boy in the oversize bathrobe looked at his girl friend with stricken eyes—looked at Anthony for an instant, and turned away as swiftly. He swallowed, and, lips trembling, addressed the little French girl; and she started from him and threw out her hands in horror, pouring out a torrent of words. David spoke again, however, and she rose, swaying.

"Show the woman to the door, Wilkins, and to the back stairs," Anthony ordered, restraining himself with a considerable effort. "Be sure she doesn't go near the elevators. Quick!"

David spoke again, in French and in a strange, low, forlorn wail. The girl, as if at an eternal parting, thrust out the expressive hands once more and gurgled hysterical Gallic snatches; and then Wilkins had laid a hand on her shoulder, turned her about, and she was gone.

Johnson Boller looked after them and at his old friend.

"Aren't you going to send the youngster after her?" he asked with the superior air of a man who has proved his case beyond a doubt.

"Quite possibly," Anthony said, smiling a dangerous little smile. "But I mean to have a chat with David first."

Johnson Boller gazed at David for a moment and smiled himself, almost happily. Unless indications were highly deceptive, Anthony, with his precious reputation all mussed up by the pretty little French girl, was mad enough to beat up David.

But Johnson Boller had no idea of sitting around and watching it, later to waste days in a police court for David's wretched sake. Hence he thumped out of David's room and back to his own.

Alone with his find, Anthony said not a word for a full minute, nor did David. The boy, hunched on the edge of his bed, had passed the capability of motion and even of thought; he merely stared at Anthony with dazed, thunder-struck eyes that were very far from being intelligent.

"David," Anthony said savagely, "however slightly unusual the circumstances may have been, I brought you to this apartment for your own good."

"Um," David said numbly.

"And last night I laid down for you the rule that you were to have no women here."

David said nothing at all.

"Yet even before we've dressed this morning, you manage to worm an infernal woman in here and—what the devil do you mean by it, anyway, you infernal little whelp?" Anthony cried, as his temper snapped. "Don't sit there and shiver! Answer me!"

Still David said nothing.

"Answer or I'll shake some wits into you!" Anthony cried.

And by way of doing this he seized David's thick brown hair and gave a first, threatening shake.

And having shaken—Anthony Fry, the chilly and self-contained, emitted one rattling, half-shrieking gasp and reeled backward!

Johnson Boller Proposes

The whole head of brown hair had come free in his hand, and from David's cranium, billow upon billow of red-gold glory floated down about the bathrobed shoulders.

David, in fine, with no warning at all, had turned into a decidedly pretty young woman!

Through Anthony's astounded brain, impressions pursued one another so rapidly, those first few seconds, that the room danced crazily. There were two or three Davids and oceans of reddish-gold hair; there were several pairs of somber, deep-blue eyes as well, whirling around and mocking him, regarding his quite steadily and all packed with new significance.

Yet in the tumult several details, which had rather puzzled Anthony Fry, grew painfully clear. Very fully now did he understand that delicacy of feature—the small, beardless chin and the fine, regular little nose, which he had ascribed to good blood somewhere in David's family. He understood also the slenderness of David's hands and the curious, high-pitched shrillness that had come into the voice once or twice in moments of excitement.

But these were minor, insignificant realizations; he understood them and passed them, forcing his brain to some sort of calm; and now, with only one David in the room and the furniture quite steady again, he stood face to face with what was really one of the most horrible facts of his whole life; a pretty young woman, of whose identity he was utterly ignorant, was in his guest chamber now, in pajamas and bathrobe—and she had been there all night!

Out of Anthony's limp fingers the wig dropped, landing on the floor with a soft thump. He sought to speak and found that words would not come as yet; he gripped at one of the little chairs and presently discovered that his weak knees had lowered him into it, so that he sat and still stared at David and——

"I wish you wouldn't kick that wig around," said his guest. "I only hired it for the night, you know."

The owner of Fry's Imperial Liniment pulled at the loose collar of his pajamas.

"You—er—you——" he said intelligently.

"I wouldn't faint," the girl said coolly. "I'm not going to bite you, you know. And please don't make those silly faces, either, Mr. Fry. You've brought it on yourself. I'm not here by my own choosing. I've done my level best to get out and——"

Anthony's voice returned explosively.

"Why," he cried thickly, "why didn't you tell me?"

"That I was a girl?"

"Yes!"

The lovely little mystery had kicked off her slippers and was looking pensively at her bare feet. They were pink and tiny; as feet, however, they belonged anywhere in the world but in Anthony Fry's bachelor home, and he turned suddenly from them and looked at their owner, who smiled faintly.

"You look a lot saner when you're scared," she mused.

"Why didn't——"

"I'm coming to that, just because you do look saner," the girl explained. "I didn't tell you because I didn't dare. I thought you were crazy."

"What?"

"Who wouldn't, when you were talking that way about opportunity and insisting that I stay here and all that sort of thing?" the young woman inquired tartly. "It was plain enough that you were a crank, at the best of it, and I didn't know—well, it seemed better to take a chance of getting out during the night."

Second by second, normal cerebration was returning to Anthony, and although it caused him to grow colder and colder with plain apprehension it also rendered his perspective more true, for he burst out with——

"Why in Heaven's name did you, a girl, ever come here in the first place?"

"What?" The girl smiled flittingly and ruefully. "Oh, there was a reason for that, too."

"What was it?"

She of the Titian hair eyed him thoughtfully and shook her head.

"Perhaps I'll tell you some other time," she said.

"Why not now?" Anthony snapped.

"You wouldn't be any happier for knowing, just now," the girl said mysteriously.

Her pajamaed legs, swathed in the mighty bathrobe, crossed comfortably Turkish fashion, and she considered Anthony with her calm, quizzical eyes—and of a sudden an overwhelming helplessness surged through Anthony Fry and he had more than a little difficulty in concealing the slight tremble of his limbs.

For if the boy David had been a nervous, frightened creature, the lady who had succeeded him was almost anything else! David had been timorous and given to shrinking; the girl was all quiet assurance. David's eyes had been frightened and round; these eyes were just as round, but, as much as anything else, they seemed to express mild amusement at Anthony's discomfiture.

And that was the way of the whole sex, Anthony reflected bitterly. Having enmeshed mere man and entangled him, hands, feet, and everything else, it was woman's habit to sit and stare calmly, just as this one was sitting and staring, wordlessly inquiring just what he meant to do about it.

"Who are you?" he asked dizzily.

"Um," said the girl meditatively. "Well, if you find it necessary to call me anything, call me—er—Mary."

"Mary what?"

"Just Mary."

"But your other name——"

"You wouldn't be any happier for knowing that either," the girl assured him serenely.

"What on earth does that mean?" Anthony demanded, with almost a return of his old imperious manner.

Mary gazed fixedly at him for a moment, deeply and inscrutably and with that in her eyes which, although he could not name it, caused Anthony's chilly blood to drop several more degrees.

"Don't ask me what it means, because I might tell you, and you wouldn't be any happier for knowing that!" the girl said quietly.

"But the Frenchwoman?" Anthony essayed, lunging off in another direction. "Who was she?"

"Well, she was my personal maid—at least it won't hurt you to know that much," Mary dimpled. "I sent for her and asked her to bring my bag and—there's the bag."

One pink foot indicated it, and for many seconds Anthony's dumfounded eyes stared at the thing. There was an intricate monogram on one end, which he could not decipher; otherwise, it impressed him. The bag was a very, very expensive bit of luggage and his failing heart thumped a trifle harder.

No stray young woman owns a bag like that and a French maid to carry it around; no adventurous female waif of the type one might expect to find wandering about in masculine raiment speaks in the unquestionably cultivated tone that Mary was using now. And no clear-eyed, clear-skinned young female friend of Mary's type ever belonged to the demi-monde!

Mary was a person of parts and position. How she had appeared at the fight, Anthony, if he had wonderful luck, might never learn; but the fact remained that he had detained her against her will in his apartment, and possibilities loomed so swiftly and numerous before his mental vision that his throat tightened.

"You—you're a respectable young woman!" he said hoarsely.

"Thank you, unquestionably," Mary smiled dryly.

"And—er—as such, the thing to do is to get you out of here as quickly and as inconspicuously as possible."

"I've been trying to get out inconspicuously myself," Mary suggested.

Anthony rose and his sickly smile appeared again.

"I can—can only apologize and assume all the blame," he said unsteadily. "I will have Wilkins bring you your clothes, and as soon as you are dressed we will——"

"You mean those men's clothes?" Mary asked sharply.

"Of course."

"And go out in them in daylight?"

"Certainly."

"I wouldn't do that for an even million dollars!" Mary informed him.

"But you'll have to do that!" said Anthony.

"But I will not have to do it, because I won't do it!" the girl said flatly and with considerable warmth. "Why, every man, woman, and child in the street would know, the very second they looked at me, and I—oh, no! I won't do that!"

"There's nothing else to do!" Anthony cried desperately. "You—er—you don't understand this hotel, young woman. A woman seen leaving one of these apartments and going out of the house, more especially at this time of the day—er——"

He flushed angrily.

"Yes, I know," Mary said helpfully. "But I'm not going out in those clothes if I stay here and die of old age."

And here, from the end of the corridor, Johnson Boller's deep, carrying voice came:

"Has he kicked the kid out yet, Wilkins?"

"Not yet, sir," said Wilkins's grave tone.

"What? Is he going to keep him here after all?"

"I should judge so, sir. There's been no disturbance down that way."

"Well, what," Johnson Boller muttered audibly, "do you know about that?"

"It's most distressing, sir!" Wilkins replied.

Anthony Fry's pupils dilated.

"He's coming down here, I think!" he said. "Get on that wig again!"

"Why?" Mary inquired, pausing in the process of knotting up her wonderful hair.

"Because Boller—Boller——" Anthony stammered wildly. "There is no need of his knowing that you're a—a young woman, now or in future. I am speaking for your own sake, you know. You may meet him a thousand times elsewhere in years to come, and there's a mean streak in Boller which——"

"Is there?" Mary asked, with what was really her very first touch of concern since resuming her proper sex. "Give me the wig, then."

Fortunately, at the living-room end of the corridor, Johnson Boller devoted a good five minutes to meditation. He had finished his usual lightning morning tub and resumed his bathrobe in a more cheerful frame of mind, quite confident that David Prentiss was no longer in their midst. He had even prepared a peppery line of chaffing for the breakfast table, the same dealing with the visit of a pretty little French girl to the irreproachable apartment and the various methods by which Anthony Fry could explain the matter to the management, should he be requested to explain.