"It is all so terrible!" Her voice was tense; there was a note of agony in it that was real. She was balling her handkerchief, and I could see that her fingers were long and white and without jewels, though I caught the intermittent glimmer of a fine necklace circling an adorable throat. What a fine chance for a rascal! I wondered if she would have me arrested when she found out? Was I married, single, a brother, a near friend? What the deuce was her trouble? Ought I to kiss her? My double was a fortunate duffer. How I envied him! "Women are so silly sometimes. I do not know why I was dragged into this," she said. Dragged into what? Had a crime been committed, or had some one run away with another man's wife? Heavens! we might be eloping and I not know anything about it! I shivered, not with fear, but with a strange elation. "How could I have done it? How could I? Terrible!" "It must be," I admitted readily. No, a woman does not elope in her ball-gown. Perhaps we were going after the trunks. "To think that he would force me into a thing like this!"--vehemently. "I see that there is nothing left for me to do but to punch his head." I thought I was getting on famously. She gave me a swift, curious glance. "Oh, I am brave enough," said I. I wondered if she had noticed that I was a passably good-looking man, as men go. "What is done is done,"--wearily. "Retrospection will do us no good." "What do you wish me to do?" I asked presently. It was like writing a composite novel, no one knowing what the other chapters were about. I had already forgotten that I had written a play which was to be produced the following night; I forgot everything but the potent charm of the mystery which sat beside me and which I was determined to unravel, as they say in detective stories. "What do you wish me to do?" I repeated. "I will tell you when the time comes. For your own sake, be advised by me and do nothing rash. You are so impulsive." For my own sake do nothing rash: I was so impulsive! My hand wandered toward the door-latch, and fell. No! I would stick it out, whatever happened. "You are not afraid, are you?" she asked. "Afraid of what?"--adroitly. "I was right in waiting for you,"--simply. Maybe; that remained to be seen. We crossed under the Sixth Avenue "L," and the roar of a passing train silenced us for a time. Who was I, anyway? Where were we going? Why didn't she call me by some first name? So far she hadn't given me a clue to anything. An idea came to me. "Are you wise in taking me there to-night?" I asked. This was very cunning of me. She coughed slightly and peered from the window. "Ten blocks more! Oh, if only we dared go faster, faster, and have it all over with!" "A policeman would delay us no inconsiderable time," I cautioned. "And think of its being reported in the papers! That wouldn't help matters. They are bad enough as they are." Doubtless they were! She said nothing.