“That way inevitably suggests the combinations to you.” Mr. Robison nodded to himself. Richards, to be on the safe side, did likewise and muttered, absently, “That's so!” “Do you care to come with me?” asked Mr. Robison, with a politeness that betrayed effort. “Thank you, no. I am very busy, and--” “And you didn't cut me short!” said Robison, his voice ringing with remorse. “I'll come in tomorrow morning. Good afternoon--and please forgive my theft of your time, Mr. Richards.” “One moment. Do you wish this money--” “I'll get the receipt to-morrow. I am going to see Kidder now. I didn't mean to take up so much of your time.” And before the banker could stop him Mr. James B. Robison was out of the inner office and out of the outer office and out of the building and out of the financial district. Shortly afterward Amos F. Kidder, financial editor of the _Evening Planet_, west into Richards's office. He was thirty-five years old, a trifle under six feet, had light-brown hair and the eyes of a man who is a cynic by force of experience and an optimist by reason of a perfect liver--the kind of man who is fooled by strangers never and by intimate friends always. If what he had seen of Wall Street gave him a low opinion of men's motives he had the defect of steadfast loyalty. Having imagination and a profound respect for statistics, he wrote what might be called skilful articles on finance. “Your friend Robison was here to-day. What do you know about him?” asked Richards. He would not take a stranger's account, but he did not relish losing an account he already had. Kidder took a letter from his pocket, gave it to the stock-broker, and said: “Smiley gave him a letter to me and in addition sent me that one by mail.” Richards read: The New York Planet, 5 Rue de Provence. Paris, February 18, 1912. _Dear Kidder,--I've given a letter of introduction to a Mr. James B. Robison, who comes originally from some manufacturing town in Massachusetts, like Lynn or Lowell--I've forgotten which. He is well liked by the colony here and, I am told, has been kind to poor art students and other self-deluded compatriots. He is queer; is suspected of being rich--which he must be because he never borrows, lives well, and says moneymaking is too easy to merit discussion when men can discuss the eternal feminine or the revival of cosmetics. His trip to New York is prompted, he tells me, by the receipt of a letter from an old flame of his whom he warned against marrying her present husband. She would not listen to Robison, accused him in choice Bostonian of being a short sport, and now after long years she writes him, asking for forgiveness, being at last convinced that her husband is all that Robison said--and then some. He is off to try to find her; she is somewhere in New York. Put him in touch with some private detective who won't rob him too ruthlessly._