"You'll be lost in the snow, sir," said Bellows, mildly. "It's worse than the Alps, sir." "Alps? Confound you, you've never seen the Alps!" "No, sir," said Bellows. "But Stokes, the butler, has, sir." "Send Stokes to me, Bellows," said Miss Downing, quietly. "I will give orders for to-night and to-morrow morning. I hope you will forgive me, Mr. Van Pycke, if I retire at once. I am very tired. It has been a busy day and--a rather wearing night." "Please don't go just yet," he begged. "You promised to tell me about the--" He was going to say wedding, but his father interrupted. "If you're not coming at once, Bosworth, I'll leave you here. I'll walk. I'll have pneumonia anyhow, so what's the sense of taking care of myself? I've been insulted, outraged, humiliated in this--But, I can't talk about it now, not in the presence of a lady--for I'm sure she is a lady. I can tell 'em by the sound of their voices. What, in God's name, are you doing here? That's the thing that puzzles me. 'Gad, if I did the proper thing, I'd take you away at once, storm or no storm." "Dad, you don't understand," began Bosworth. "Are you coming away with me?" roared his father, stamping the floor. "Do they still hurt you?" asked his son, with a solicitous glance at the old gentleman's feet. Mr. Van Pycke sputtered. "I have my own on, sir. But I'm crippled for life, just the same. Thank God, I got my trousers in the end." He passed his hand nervously over his brow. "In the end?" murmured Bosworth. Miss Downing turned to the fireplace. "I--I can't tell you about it now," said his father in a constrained manner. "'Gad, it was--it was awful! Bellows! Where the deuce is the man? Ah, here you are. Bellows, call me a cab or something at--" "Mr. Stokes will be here directly, Miss," said Bellows. "Very good, Mr. Van Pycke. A four-wheeler?" "Take the subway, dad," interposed Bosworth, glaring at Bellows. "Next corner below. But, think it over. You'd better wait for me." Stokes came in, and Miss Downing, with a significant glance at Bosworth, retired to the library with the butler. "Has everybody departed?" asked Bosworth of Bellows, who was turning off some of the lights in the lower end of the room. The young man dropped into a chair, opened his cigaret case, and then, first looking at the portières obscuring the library, yawned prodigiously. "Yes, sir," said Bellows, caught in the middle of an illy-suppressed yawn. "The detective, my mistress's maid, and Mr. De Foe's man, with the bags, sir, went away with the 'appy couple in your sleigh. It was a bit crowded, sir, for the driver." "Bellows," hissed Mr. Van Pycke, "who instructed you to take my trousers out to press 'em?" "They needed it, sir, badly," explained Bellows. "And my shoes, sir,--I did not ask to have them polished, did I?" "No, sir. As I remember it, you did not."