He felt that the past safe connection with Hathorn and Potter was broken for all time. He saw that the secret chief of the vast Syndicate blindly trusted the Queen of the Street, and, moreover, he was a man who was unable to resist the warm, womanly nature which drew him as the moon draws the seas. “If you will personally watch over your young neophyte, Lady Mine,” he said, at last, “I will side with you. Your interests are mine. I hope that you do not forget what we both have to lose.” The Senator was mindful of the sanctity of his “toga,” now. With softly shining eyes, she thanked him. “After all,” she laughed, her bosom heaving with the pride of victory, “you and I are the only real parties in interest here. We will let Endicott receive all the answers, and dear old Hugh Conyers can closely examine the whole record of the man whom we select as working partner. “Between Vreeland and myself, the line of communication to you shall be guarded. As of old, Judge Endicott shall act for me—and I will alone handle all that concerns you. Even Vreeland shall never know—there’s my hand on it. You know that Hathorn has always been secretly kept ‘in the dark’—against the day of his turning—like the fabled worm. You are safe as regards him—while I—” She sighed, and left the man who was the “missing link” in the great scheme of active operations, wondering if she had ever really loved Hathorn. The young Senator was unconsciously grimly jealous. “Damned little snob!” wrathfully cried the Senator. “I hope that purse-proud young minx of a wife will make his life a hell. I fancy that she can be trusted to do that.” It was Alynton’s just idea of Nemesis. The Senator had gone back to the Capital next morning with a parting pledge to make a flying visit to the “Circassia” in two weeks to settle the vital matter on Mrs. Willoughby’s winter hegira to New York, and the active lawyer and the busy journalist had also fled back to Gotham before Elaine Willoughby in the summer home had listened to all of Harold Vreeland’s accurate relation. “I can not afford to tell her the whole truth—as yet!” he had rightly decided, and he wisely abstained from adding a shade of color. For she was watching him keenly. It was the turning tide of his life. “You are my own true knight,” she gaily said, with an assumed lightness. “I wish you to ignore this coming social battle entirely. You are to be strictly non-committal. I will deal with both the Hathorns. Read that.” She handed him a paper. “In this way we will receive tenders from perhaps fifty individuals, and even from some good firms already established. “I will myself, handle the secret side of the operations, and Judge Endicott will guide you in my general business. When we have found the right man as a partner, our whole party will examine his past through the various mercantile agencies, surety companies, business detectives, and then, Endicott and Conyers, too, can throw on the searchlight.