For the first time, Wilkins looked at Mr. Bates and thought swiftly. Having thought for half a minute, he had accomplished a complete circle and was exactly where he had started. It was plain that the maid Felice was somewhere else; equally plain was it that, for the purpose of the moment, the maid Felice could satisfactorily be in but one place--and that right here! Had she merely been out for a little time he could have taken the trunk to her room and, opening the lid a bit, could have fled with his task accomplished; she was, however, out permanently--so that the very best Wilkins had accomplished at the end of a full minute was: "Out? Quite so. But where has the young person gone, if you please?" Mr. Bates scowled angrily. "We don't know, I've told you!" he said sharply. "When one of the help's dismissed under circumstances like that, we don't trouble to ask where she's going and we don't keep her address." "But she might be having mail to forward----" Wilkins essayed hopefully. "Any mail that comes for her'll be handed to the carrier again," Bates snapped. "And now will you get her box out of here, you? I can't have it about, and I've no time this morning to argue with you. The master's daughter's disappeared and we're all on edge." "And not a soul in the world knowing where she's gone, poor lamb!" sniveled the under-laundress, laying a hand on the trunk that held Mary. "And her that home-loving she never----" "Hush!" said Mr. Bates. The woman subsided into her apron. "Whatever's taken her, she's trying to get home! She's trying----" she sobbed. "Well, whatever's taken her, get that trunk out of here!" the Dalton butler snapped. Was there anything else to do? Wilkins, having thought until his head ached, could not see it. If the girl had a friend among the help, it might be left with the friend; but the only woman of the household present had taken pains to look properly scandalized at each mention of Felice. Or if Mary hadn't cautioned him particularly against this Bates, he would have risked taking Bates aside and communicating the astounding truth. But since things were as they were, and not as they might have been; since Bates was actually glaring at him now, and would, in another minute, be banging the trunk back to the street himself, there was really nothing left for Wilkins but to grip the wide handle and start slowly for the door again. It was bad! Oh, it was very bad, with Mary in there and very likely stifling to death, but Wilkins shuffled slowly back to the taxicab with his burden, slowly and carefully put it aboard once more. "What's wrong?" asked the driver. "The party it was for had left!" said Wilkins. "Where to?" Wilkins pondered heavily. "Back again where we came from," he sighed. "But you might go rather slow, I think. Like enough I'll change my mind and decide to take it somewhere else. I can't say at the moment."