"Oh!" the coroner apologized, "I didn't get on to that! 'Course he's all right." Then Dr. Holt: "It appears the poor woman tried to get married, but she couldn't find a husband. So she killed herself." This time the two in the hall did not look at each other. Fred stared up at the stag's glistening eyes. Howard buckled and unbuckled his driving-gauntlets. For the rest of her life, Frederica never saw a mounted deer's head without a stab of remembrance. It was nearly four o'clock in the morning when everything was attended to and Howard turned his car homeward. "Do sit in front with me, Fred," he said; "you _can't_ sit back there in the tonneau." "All right," she said, absently, and, getting in, pulled Zippy on to her lap. As she sat down, she suddenly realized that Howard's request implied that he felt an embarrassment for her which she was not feeling for herself. She began to feel it soon enough! Embarrassment flowed in upon them both. Howard talked about Flora--then fell silent: ("She 'tried to get married'!") Then Fred talked about her--and fell silent. ("He needn't worry; _I_ won't drown myself!") The ride into town was forever! The bleary October dawn had whitened in the mist like a dead face, before they drew up at 15 Payton Street, and for the last ten miles they did not exchange a word. Fred was thinking, dazedly, of Flora; but every now and then would come the stab: "_He refused me._" Howard was thinking only of Fred. "Stunning!" he was saying to himself. "She's not a girl! She's a man--no, I don't know any man who would have done what she did. _I_ couldn't have, anyway. I take off my hat to courage like that!" Not a girl? Fred, not a girl?... When at last that dreadful night was over, and he had left the terrified Payton household, Frederica--the wonderful, the superwoman (superman, even, compared with Howard himself!), Frederica had, in a flash, been something less than superwoman; she had been pitifully, stupidly, incredibly feminine. It was six o'clock in the morning when he closed Mrs. Payton's front door behind him and went out to get in his car--giving a shuddering glance at that pool of water on the floor of the tonneau. Just as he was throwing in his clutch he heard the door open again, and Fred called to him. He went back, quickly; she was standing on the top step, haggard, ugly, dripping wet; a lock of hair had blown across her cheek, which was twitching painfully. She put out her hand to him, in a blind sort of gesture, but she did not look at him. "I just wanted--to say," she said, and paused, for the jangle of the mules' bells and the clatter of a passing car drowned her voice;--"I wanted to--to say," she began again, with a gasp, "don't--" she stopped, with a sobbing laugh; "don't--tell Laura." Don't tell!