"A swindler!" exclaimed Mr. Pegg. "Oh, come now, Miss Free--smuggling in that picture wasn't Mark's fault. You can't say he did it--because you don't know it. Why, you and he have always been good friends; you're not going back on him now? Peaches is just a kid. By the end of the week she will have changed her mind again. Good heavens, look at the fix it would put us in if she insisted on breaking her engagement now! The invitations out, the presents coming in--trousseau bought! We'd be the laughingstock of the country. Not that I'd give a--cuss--if it wasn't that I know Alicia. She'd up and go back to him when it was all thoroughly broken off. You see that what she needs is the high hand. I've had to use it before." "Mr. Pegg," said I, "you are mistaken. What is worse, you are a cave man! I am convinced Peaches really is in love with Sandro di Monteventi and that you will break her heart if you persist in your heroic attitude. I beg you will desist." "Nothing doing!" said Mr. Pegg, rising and lighting the cigar--a sign that the interview was closed. "I'm not in a desisting mood. I may as well add that I am wise to the fact that she's been mooning round after that fellow ever since she came into this house. Kimball's Commercial Arithmetic, indeed!" "I don't know to what you refer, I assure you!" I said stiffly. "And I insist upon at least having a key to our rooms." "Will you give me your word of honor not to use that key to let her out with?" asked my employer doubtfully. "Certainly, if you wish," I replied promptly. "You may have my word for that!" "Well, here you are, then," he answered, taking a key from a great cluster on his ring. "You'll keep the letter of your word, I know, no matter how uneasy the spirit gets. And now I must mosey along. Mark and I have to run up to town on business, and he wants to see the family-doctor about his eye--he ran into his bedpost in the dark last night, and maybe it's just as well to keep Peaches from seeing him wearing that beauty spot." With which intelligent and discerning remark Mr. Pegg left me to my own devices, and of course I promptly returned to my apartment and the waiting Peaches, who greeted my entrance the more eagerly when she observed I let myself in with a key. "You wonder!" cried she, embracing me with a look of rapture. "So he gave in to you--you enchantress!" "He did not!" I said dryly. "He put me on my honor not to let you have this key, and my honor is sacred, and I'm going to keep it that way!" "Free--you beast!" cried Peaches. "Give it to me. Don't be absurd!" "Keeping one's freely given word is never absurd," I observed. "Besides, if I were to break it and let you walk out, do you think for one minute that the servants would let you get away without protest? Or without notifying your father by telephone? It is you who are absurd!" "That's so!" said Peaches, suddenly weary. "Oh, Free--you think it out! Help me, I am so tired."