Mr. Pindar laid his finger on his lips, and rolled his eyes on his visitors with a warning glance. Then rising, he stole with measured and elaborately noiseless steps to the door, and listened at the keyhole, then to the window, and peered out with dramatic caution; then, still with his finger on his lips, he turned to his companions. "All is well!" he said; he waved the little bat-cloak, and then drew it round him with a flap of mystery. "Approach!" he whispered, beckoning the two friends toward him, "Conspiracy is the soul of Drama: approach, friends, and give--or rather receive--the counter-sign!" It was a pleasant sight to see Mr. Pindar Hollopeter, his eyes gleaming with dramatic fire, yet with a twinkle in the black depths of them, waving his arms abroad (the gesture so like his brother's, yet so unlike), expounding, suggesting, illustrating. It was pleasant, too, to see the responsive twinkle that danced and deepened in the blue and gray eyes as they met his. "I said you would fix it, sir!" cried Tommy Candy, smiting his thigh. "That will be capital, sir!" said Will. "Your coming seems really providential just at this time. Of course we could not have shown any incivility to a member of your family; but if you can arrange this--" "Sir," said Mr. Pindar, dropping his head forward, and gazing up through his eyebrows. "I know not 'if.' Regard the thing as done!" Punctually at eleven o'clock, Mrs. Pryor bustled and crackled up the garden path, and rang a defiant peal at the bell. She had brought no luggage with her; this was a preliminary skirmish, so to speak, merely to try her ground and assert her rights; but she was prepared to do fierce battle with Direxia Hawkes or any one else who might attempt to impede her progress in the Path of Duty. Accordingly, when she heard footsteps approaching along the hall, she stood with heaving breast and glittering eye, ready and determined to effect an entrance the instant a crack of the door should be opened. But there was no question of a crack this time. The door swung open to its fullest extent, and, instead of the small and warlike figure of Direxia Hawkes, it was Tommy Candy who stood on the threshold, with subdued and sorrowful looks. "How do you do, Mis' Pryor?" he said. "I'm rejoiced you have come. I took the liberty of reading your postal, and it seemed as though I couldn't hardly wait till eleven o'clock came. We need you here, the wust way, Mis' Pryor." Mrs. Pryor's bristling panoply smoothed itself, and she even gave an approving look at the youth, who certainly was a good-looking youth, and had probably been subjected to evil influences in his childhood.