He had just realized that he was flat-strapped for cash. He had given his last quarter to the cabby, hours back. He was registered at a strange hotel, under an assumed name, unable to beg credit even for his breakfast without declaring his identity and thereby laying himself open to suspicion, discourtesy, insult.... Of course there were ways out. He could telephone Bannerman, or any other of half a dozen acquaintances, in the morning; but that involved explanations, and explanations involved making himself the butt of his circle for many a weary day. There was money in his lodgings, in the Chippendale escritoire; but to get it he would have to run the gauntlet of reporters and detectives which had already dismayed him in prospect. O'Hagan--ah! At the head of his bed was a telephone. Impulsively, inconsiderate of the hour, he turned to it. "Give me Nine-o-eight-nine Madison, please," he said; and waited, receiver to ear. There was a slight pause; a buzz; the voice of the switchboard operator below stairs repeating the number to Central; Central's appropriately mechanical reiteration; another buzz; a silence; a prolonged buzz; and again the sounding silence.... "Hello!" he said softly into the transmitter, at a venture. No answer. "Hello!" Then Central, irritably: "Go ahead. You've got your party." "Hello, hello!" A faint hum of voices, rising and falling, beat against the walls of his understanding. Were the wires crossed? He lifted an impatient finger to jiggle the hook and call Central to order, when--something crashed heavily. He could have likened the sound, without a strain of imagination, to a chair being violently overturned. And then a woman's voice, clear, accents informed with anger and pain: "_No!_" and then.... "Say, that's my mistake. That line you had's out of order. I had a call for them a while ago, and they didn't answer. Guess you'll have to wait." "Central! Central!" he pleaded desperately. "I say, Central, give me that connection again, please." "Ah, say! what's the matter with you, anyway? Didn't I tell you that line was out of order? Ring off!" Automatically Maitland returned the receiver to its rest; and rose, white-lipped and trembling. That woman's voice.... X CONSEQUENCES Breathing convulsively, wide eyes a little wildly fixed upon his face in the lamplight, the girl stumbled to her feet, and for a moment remained cowering against the wall, terribly shaken, a hand gripping a corner of the packing-box for support, the other pressed against the bosom of her dress as if in attempt forcibly to quell the mad hammering of her heart.