“I’m so disappointed in you,” she began in a low voice. He asked why, though not because he really cared to know. “After that hint of mine!” she explained reproachfully. “About Mrs. Vanderpool’s bronze diamond, I mean!” “I fear I do not understand you,” said Bob coldly. She bent nearer. “Of course I thought it would disappear,” she murmured. “I expected you to execute one of those clever coups, and so I went purposely to Mrs. Vanderpool’s room on some pretext this morning to learn if it was gone. But it wasn’t. I cleverly led the conversation up to it and she showed it to me.” “Great Scott!” he exclaimed. “Did you think she wouldn’t have it to show you? That it had found its way to my pockets?” “Of course,” she answered. “And you _are_ quite sure you haven’t it, after all?” she asked suspiciously. “How could I, when you saw—” “Oh, you might have substituted a counterfeit brooch just like it for—” Bob groaned. “You certainly have absorbed those plays,” he remarked. “I expected a whole lot of things would be gone,” she went on, “and, apparently,” with disappointment, “no one has missed anything. It’s quite tame. Did you get discouraged because you failed to land the ‘loot’—is that the word?—in my case? And did you then just go prosaically to bed?” “I certainly went to bed, though there was nothing prosaic about the procedure.” “And yet what a dull night it must have been for you!” “I shouldn’t call it that.” “No?” She shifted the conversation. “Who do you suppose has come? Dickie Donnelly. Said he had arrived in town on some business and took advantage of the opportunity to make a little call on me. Incidentally, he seems interested in you. Said he would make it a point to see you after you got down. He’s out on the veranda smoking now, I guess. He wanted to talk to me but I made an excuse to shoo him away. He isn’t half so exciting as you are, you know. I’m quite positive now I couldn’t marry him and annex his old chimneys to ours, for all the world. Chimneys are such commonplace means to a livelihood, Mr. Bennett, don’t you think? They are so ugly and dependable. Not at all romantic and precarious! They just smoke and you get richer. There isn’t a single thrill in a whole forest of chimneys. But I mustn’t really keep you from your breakfast any longer,” she added with sudden sedulousness. “I’ve quite planned what we’re going to do to-day.” “You have?” With a slight accent on the first word. “Yes,” she assured him quietly. “So run along now.” The slave, glad to get away, started to obey, when—“One moment!” said Miss Dolly as if seized with an afterthought. “Dickie asked about you so particularly that it occurred to me that— Well, do you think he harbors any suspicions?” “Suspicions?” “Yes; do you imagine he, too, by any chance, may have guessed—you know?” And Dolly again drew closer, her eyes beaming with new excitement.