"All right," he said. He buttoned his gray vest securely over Maria's pretty little red purse. Then he leaned over the seat, and began to speak, but he absolutely did not know what to say. He made an idiotic remark about the darkness. "Queer how quick it grows dark, when it begins," said he. Maria ignored it, but Gladys said: "Yes, it is awful queer." Gladys's eyes looked wild. The pupils were dilated. She had been to New York but once before in her life, and now to be going in the evening to find Maria's little sister was almost too much for her intelligence, which had its limitations. However, after a while, Wollaston Lee spoke again. He was in reality a keen-witted boy, only this was an emergency into which he had been surprised, and which he had not foreseen, and Maria's own abnormal mood had in a measure infected him. Presently he spoke to the point. "What on earth are you going to do when you get to New York, anyhow?" said he to Maria. "Find her," replied Maria, laconically. "But New York is a mighty big city. How do you mean to go to work? Now I--" Maria cut him short. "I am going right up to Her cousin's, on West Forty-ninth Street, and find out if Evelyn is there," said she. "But what would make the child want to go there, anyhow?" "It was the only place she had ever been in New York," said Maria. "But I don't see what particular reason she would have for going there, though," said Wollaston. "How would she remember the street and number?" "She was an awful bright kid," said Gladys, with a momentary lapse of reason, "and kids is queer. I know, 'cause we've got so many of 'em to our house. Sometimes they'll remember things you don't ever think they would. My little sister Maud remembers how my mother drowned five kittens oncet, when she was in long clothes. We knowed she did, 'cause when the cat had kittens next time we caught her trying to drown 'em herself. Kids is awful queer. Maud can't remember how to spell her own name, either, and she's most six now. She spells it M-a-u-d, when it had ought to be M-a-u-g-h-d. I shouldn't be one mite surprised if M'ria's little sister remembered the street and number." "Anyway, she knew her whole name, because I've heard her say it," said Maria. "Her cousin's name is Mrs. George B. Edison. Evelyn used to say it, and we used to laugh." "Oh, well, if she knew the name like that she might have found the place all right," said Wollaston. "But what puzzles me is why she wanted to go there, anyway?" "I don't know," said Maria. "I don't know," said Wollaston, "but it seems to me the best thing to do would be to go directly to a police-office and have the chief of police notified, and set them at work; but then I suppose your father has done that already." Maria turned upon him with indignation. "Go to a police-station to find my little sister!" said she. "What would I go there for?" "Yes, what do you suppose that kid has did?" asked Gladys.