But like many another plan and resolve of this bedeviled night and morning, the latest had been blasted to flinders! Beatrice Boller, standing there with Mary's hat still clutched tight and partly broken, was not smiling the smile of a woman who fancied herself on the right track. She smiled the smile of one who knew exactly where she stood. Her lips curled now as she examined the worm that had been her husband, and she perched on the edge of the center-table. "Unfortunate, isn't it, that you didn't pick some poor drab from the streets?" she asked, significantly and triumphantly. "Unfortunate for you and unfortunate for her!" "Well, this--well, this----" Johnson Boller tried. "Don't talk to me, please. I want to talk to you--oh, not for my sake or for your sake, to be sure. I don't know how much real man may be left in either of you; not very much, I imagine. But if you do want to save two innocent women from a good deal of embarrassment, you shall have the chance." She laughed again as she watched the effect of the cryptic statement. She sat down, then, and having opened her hand-bag and drawn therefrom a little slip of paper, she resumed her inspection of the silent pair. "You don't understand at all, do you? Well, you shall! Your lady friend made one mistake, gentlemen. Any young woman off on that sort of adventure should be cautious enough to destroy marks of identification. This hat, as it happens, came from Mme. Altier, just uptown." "The little blonde?" escaped from Johnson Boller. "The little blonde," sneered his wife. "The little blonde is quite a friend of mine; I lent her the money that started her in business up this way, in fact, and I've been buying hats there for five years. Therefore, I went and interviewed the little blonde, and her memory and her methods of bookkeeping are alike commendable. She might not have told another woman, but she was very glad to tell me." Beatrice gazed at the slip briefly. "Mrs. Henry Wales!" she said very suddenly indeed, and sent her eyes straight through both of them at once. Innocent for once, Anthony and Johnson Boller merely frowned at Beatrice, and after a little she shrugged her shoulders. "Not Mrs. Henry Wales, evidently," she mused. "Very well; I was right about her. I've met her, I think, and she seemed a little bit too nice for that sort of thing. Er--Laura Cathcart!" Once more the word was hurled straight into them. Once more Anthony and his old friend stared innocently--but they did a little more this time. They turned and stared at one another, and all the air between them vibrated with a wordless message! Beatrice had made one grave tactical error in not reading the right name first; Anthony and his friend understood now and were quite prepared for anything--and it seemed almost as if Beatrice sensed the message, for she frowned a little as she said: "Mary Dalton!"