It was striking nine as I gathered up my bundle of papers and thrust them into a bag. I was rid of them for three days at least. "Bill, you may lock up now," I said, tapping the sleepy porter on the shoulder. "Oh, Mr. Munro, shure here's a card for yees," handing me a lady's card. "Who left it, Bill?" I hurriedly asked, taking it to the flaring gaslight on the stairway. "Two ladies in a carriage--an old 'un and a pretty young lady, shure. They charged me giv' it yees, and druv' off." "And why didn't you bring it in, you blockhead?" I shouted, for it was Bessie Stewart's card. On it was written in pencil: "Westminster Hotel. On our way through New York. Leave on the 8 train for the South to-night. Come up to dinner." The eight-o'clock train, and it was now striking nine! "Shure, Mr. Charles, you had said you was not to be disturbed on no account, and that I was to bring in no messages." "Did you tell those ladies that? What time were they here?" "About five o'clock--just after you had shut the dure, and the clerks was gone. Indeed, and they didn't wait for no reply, but hearin' you were in there, they druv' off the minute they give me the card. The pretty young lady didn't like the looks of our office, I reckon." It was of no use to storm at Bill. He had simply obeyed orders like a faithful machine. So, after a hot five minutes, I rushed up to the Westminster. Perhaps they had not gone. Bessie would know there was a mistake, and would wait for me. But they were gone. On the books of the hotel were registered in a clear hand, Bessie's hand, "Mrs. M. Antoinette Sloman and maid; Miss Bessie Stewart." They had arrived that afternoon, must have driven directly from the train to the office, and had dined, after waiting a little time for some one who did not come. "And where were they going?" I asked of the sympathetic clerk, who seemed interested. "Going South--I don't know where. The elder lady seemed delicate, and the young lady quite anxious that she should stay here to-night and go on in the morning. But no, she would go on to-night." I took the midnight train for Philadelphia. They would surely not go farther to-night if Mrs. Sloman seemed such an invalid. I scanned every hotel-book in vain. I walked the streets of the city, and all the long Sunday I haunted one or two churches that my memory suggested to me were among the probabilities for that day. They were either not in the city or most securely hid. And all this time there was a letter in the New York post-office waiting for me. I found it at my room when I went back to it on Monday noon. It ran as follows: "WESTMINSTER HOTEL.