Earlier, at the newspaper office that night, Jim went into the managing editor's office and laid a bulky manuscript on that gentleman's desk. "Is this it?" "It is," said Jim. "You have captured them?" "No; but there is a net about them from which not one shall escape. There's the story of my adventures, of the adventures of Miss Hargreave and the butler, Jones. You'll find it exciting enough. You might just as well send it up to the composing room. At midnight I'll telephone the introduction. It's a scoop. Don't worry about that." The editor riffled the pages. "A hundred and twelve pages, three hundred words to the page; man, it's a novel!" "It'll read like one." "Sit down for a moment and let me skim through the first story." At the end of ten minutes the editor laid down the copy. He opened a drawer and took out two envelopes. The blue one he tore up and dropped into the waste basket. Norton understood and smiled. They had meant to discharge him if he fell down. The other envelope was a fat one. "Open it," said the editor, smiling a little to himself. This envelope contained a check for two thousand five hundred dollars, two round-trip first-class tickets to Liverpool, together with innumerable continental tickets such as are issued to tourists. "Why two?" asked Jim innocently. "Forget it, my boy, forget it. You ought to know that in this office we don't employ blind men. The whole staff is on. There you are, a fat check and three months' vacation. Go and get married; and if you return before the three months are up I'll fire you myself on general principles." Jim laughed happily and the two men shook hands. Then Jim went forth to complete the big assignment. Five minutes later Florence called him up to learn that he had gone. What should she do? Jones had told her to stay in the house and not to leave it. But where was he? Why did he not come? What was the meaning of this desertion by the servants? She wandered about aimlessly, looking out of windows, imagining forms in the shadows. Her imagination had not deceived her; she had heard doors close softly. "Susan, Susan!" she murmured, but Susan was in the hospital. _Oliver Twist_! What had possessed her to start reading that old tale again? She should have read something of a light and joyous character. After half an hour's wandering about the lonely house she returned to the library, feeling that she would be safer where both telephone and revolver were. And while she sat waiting for she knew not what, her swiftly beating heart sending the blood into her throat so that it almost suffocated her, a man turned into the street and walked noiselessly toward the Hargreave place. He passed a man leaning against a lamp-post, but he never turned to look at him.