"No, oh, no,--not that. But if--well, supposing she should declare positively that it was Natalie or Joyce,--either of them, don't you see it couldn't help influencing the police? I want the whole thing hushed up. Father is gone, it can't do him any good to find out who killed him, and it may make trouble for an innocent person." "I'll talk to Joyce again, but I doubt if I can change her determination to ask this Orienta here. Absurd name!" "Yes, and an absurd performance all round." "I'll do my best. And, Barry, I'm thinking of leaving here to-morrow; I've staid longer than I intended, now." "Oh, don't go away. Why, you're a kind of a--how shall I express it?" "A go-between?" "Well, not in the usually accepted sense of that term, but you are that, in a nice way. You can tell Joyce what I can't tell her--at least, what I say to her has no effect. By the way, Joyce wants to go away, too." "Will they let her?" "I don't know. But since she is thinking about this Orienta, she's planning to stay here longer. I don't know what she will do, but don't you see, Beatrice, if she goes away, even for a short time, Natalie couldn't stay here without a chaperon? So won't you stay a while longer, until we see how things are going? You've been such a trump all through these troubled days,--why, everybody depends on you to--to look after things, don't you know." Beatrice smiled at the boy,--for when bothered, Barry looked very boyish,--and said, kindly, "I will stay another week, then. You see, at first, Joyce was so nervous and upset, she asked me to look after the housekeeping a bit, but now her nerves are better, and I think the routine duties of the house help fill up her time, and are really good for her." "Well, you women settle those matters between yourselves. But you stay on a while, and help me and Natalie through. The girl threatens to go away, too; in fact, everybody wants to get out of this house, and I don't blame them." They were in the studio and Barry looked with a shudder toward the chair where his father had met his death. "No, I can't blame them either,--and yet, it is a wonderful house. Must it go to strangers?" "I suppose so. It's Joyce's, of course, but she doesn't want to live here. I don't want to take it off your hands, for Natalie won't live here either. You don't want it, do you?" "I? Oh, no. My own life here was a happy one, but the memories of those old days and the thoughts of this recent tragedy make the place intolerable to me as a home. But strangers could come in, and start a new life for the old place."