"Oh no, you are making too much allowance for the country piano. I'm afraid the small career I've had already will have to last me the rest of my life!" Anne sighed. "And you want me to believe that you've forgotten how to play the violin after this exhibition?" she asked crossly. He gave her a startled look. "You think I've been trying to deceive you? You believe that of me? Oh Anne!" he cried in anguished tones. She leaned over him remorsefully and patted the weary-looking shoulder. "Poor Alexis," she murmured. "I didn't mean to hurt you! Of course I know you wouldn't deceive me intentionally." He glanced up at her through grateful tears. "Poor useless Alexis," he replied under his breath, "who cumbers the earth with his wasteful presence. What are you going to do with him?" His eyes held the plaintive appeal of a lost child. Anne moved away hastily. "Spank him and send him to bed," she laughed, uneasy at his tone. A sudden and more angry blast shook the house. Anne went to the window and drew up the shade. She looked out into the uproarious night. The rain beat against the panes like waves washing over a porthole. Anne shivered. "I had almost forgotten the storm while you were playing, hadn't you? Come, see how weirdly the trees are behaving!" He strolled up behind her and they stood, looking out into the blackness. Beaten beneath leaden shafts of rain, torn by a diabolic wind, the placid forest had become an inferno of twisting branches. Tossing limbs writhed in seeming agony under each shrieking gust. "They look like a company of maddened demons," Anne shuddered and pulled down the shade. "I could almost believe it is they and not the wind, which whistle and scream. It reminds one of a witch's Sabbath!" She went to the table, gathered up a book or two, and prepared to go upstairs, when the brusque whirr of the telephone stopped her. "What can that be?" she cried completely startled. She ran across the room and took down the receiver. "Yes, this is Mrs. Schuyler. Who is this? Oh--a telegram?" As she waited for the message, she encountered Alexis' eyes with a startled inquiry in her own. "It is for you, Alexis," she whispered. She held out the receiver and moved aside. He backed away with nervous horror. "Please take the message for me, Anne!" She nodded curtly and resumed her listening. A moment passed before she spoke. "Oh, yes, I'm responsible," she said shortly, evidently in answer to some remonstrance from the other end. "You may give me the message quite safely. I'll write it down word for word." She held out an imperious hand. Alexis rushed across the room to the desk, secured pencil and paper and prepared to write at her dictation. When she spoke her voice seemed strangely flat and monotonous. "Claire missing since yesterday morning. Traced to St. Patrick's by Ito. Then clue lost. Fear worst. Return immediately. Your Mother"