“It certainly must have looked bad,” he admitted to himself as the car stopped before the hotel. “I wouldn’t blame any girl for getting up on her ear.” In the lobby he was met by his three deserted companions, who instantly let fly a Gatling fire of comment. “Horning in with the management, are you?” grinned Nelson. “Just the same, I like your taste, kid. Some class there, all right!” “You bet!” chimed in Billy Orth. “What do you want to be such a hog for, though? Might have given somebody else a chance with one of ’em.” “Spilled the beans that time, old man,” Dalton added significantly. “Hard luck, boy. Who’d ever have thought the other one would turn up that way, and pinch you――” “Oh, go to blazes, the lot of you!” snapped Lefty, his face crimson. Without another word he strode toward the elevator, leaving Dalton――who had met Miss Harting in Boston, and shrewdly guessed that there was something more than passing friendship between the two――eying his companions with lifted brows. “Our genial southpaw seems somewhat peeved,” Larry murmured. “Have we touched upon a raw spot unawares?” Orth yawned. “Must be in a pretty bad way,” he commented. “I never knew him to give up like that without a word to say. Let’s hit the hay; I’m sleepy.” Rather silently the others followed him toward the elevator. Though there were no further remarks on the subject, they were all wondering what had happened to make the usually quick-witted, even-tempered Locke flare up the way he had at a little good-natured joshing, which ordinarily would have brought forth nothing more than a grin and a retort in kind. The object of their solicitude was thinking pretty much the same thing. He had scarcely set foot in the elevator before he regretted that silly burst of temper. “Looks as if I was bound to make a fool of myself to-night,” he thought. “I reckon I’m in bad all around.” He did not sleep well, and was up early. Having hurried through his breakfast, he dawdled around with a newspaper until eight o’clock, and then sought the telephone booth. A woman’s voice――Janet’s aunt, no doubt――answered his call. “Is Miss Harting in?” he asked quickly. “Who is this, please?” “Mr. Hazelton. I won’t keep her for more――” “I’m sorry,” interrupted the voice, with a curt, crisp intonation which belied the words, “but Miss Harting is too busy to come to the telephone.” “Will she be at home―― Hang it all! She’s cut off.” Lefty slammed up the receiver, and sat scowling for a moment at the instrument. “Might think I’d committed a crime,” he growled at last. “Won’t even give me a chance to say a word in my own defense.” His jaw squared stubbornly. “I’ll make her listen to me,” he went on. “I’ll go up there and see her, whether she’s at home or not. I’ll go now, too.”